Indictment: Invalidity of the 2013 Conclave
ABSTRACT
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This monograph examines the juridical validity of the 2013 papal conclave exclusively under Canon Law as promulgated. It argues that, while a papal resignation under canon 332 §2 validly terminates the office (munus) of the Roman See, the special law governing papal elections, Universi Dominici Gregis, does not positively identify resignation as the juridical trigger that activates conclave competence. Because invalidating law (lex irritans) governs papal elections, electoral competence must be expressly conferred and cannot arise from presupposition, intent, necessity, or acceptance. The conclave of 2013, convened while the predecessor Pope was still alive and without a promulgated resignation-trigger in the special law, therefore lacked constitutive authority and was null ipso iure under Universi Dominici Gregis 76. The argument is juridical rather than doctrinal and does not depend on questions of intention, legitimacy-by-acceptance, or ecclesial functionality.
PART I​: CANON LAW AS A JURIDICAL ORDER
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Canon Law binds as law by virtue of promulgation and competence, not by outcome or necessity. Canon 7 establishes promulgation as the condition of juridical force: “Lex instituitur cum promulgatur.” Canon 10 governs invalidating law, specifying that when a law declares an act null for failure to observe prescribed conditions, that nullity operates objectively and without regard to intent, equity, or consequence.
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Papal election law belongs to the category of constitutive authority, as confirmed by UDG 76, which declares elections conducted outside the prescribed conditions null ipso iure. It does not regulate the exercise of an already-existing power; it brings an officeholder into juridical existence. Such authority must be positively conferred by law and cannot be supplied by interpretation or acceptance.
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Clarification on Interpretation and Constitutive Competence
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Nothing in this analysis relies upon lacuna-filling under canon 19 of the Code of Canon Law. The interpretive resources identified in that canon--analogy, general principles, jurisprudence, praxis, or doctrinal opinion--pertain solely to the interpretation or application of existing law. They cannot supply constitutive competence, activate a juridical regime governed by invalidating norms, or cure the absence of authority where the law has not positively conferred it. Accordingly, in matters of papal election governed by lex irritans, silence does not signify discretion or implied authorization; it signifies exclusion in a field governed by invalidating law (c. 10; UDG 76). The argument that follows rests entirely on promulgated positive law and the strict conditions of juridical validity it establishes.
CORE JURIDICAL KERNEL
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Validity of the 2013 Conclave Under Canon Law
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This Core Juridical Kernel constitutes the controlling juridical argument of this monograph. All subsequent sections elaborate, defend, or apply the propositions stated here and do not introduce independent grounds of validity.
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Definitions
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D1. Canon Law as Law
Canon Law is a system of binding juridical norms constituted by promulgated text, binding according to their terms, and governed by strict rules of competence and validity (cc. 1-10, 1983 CIC).
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D2. Constitutive Competence
Constitutive competence is the juridical authority to bring an office or legal reality into existence. It must be positively conferred by law and cannot be supplied by necessity, intent, presupposition, or acceptance.
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D3. Invalidating Law (Lex Irritans)
An invalidating law is a norm that renders an act null ipso iure when its conditions are not fulfilled (c. 10). A null act is non-being in law and cannot be healed by subsequent acceptance.
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Positive-Law Premises
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P1. Promulgation Requirement
A juridical norm binds as law only when promulgated in text (c. 7).
P2. Strict Operation of Invalidating Law
Where the law declares an act null for failure to observe prescribed conditions, that nullity operates objectively and without regard to intent or outcome (c. 10; UDG 76).
P3. Resignation Under Canon 332 §2
A valid papal resignation terminates the office (munus) of the Roman Pontiff (the office attached to the Roman See), but does not itself legislate or activate the juridical regime governing papal elections (c. 332 §2).
P4. Canon 359 Is Referential, Not Constitutive
Canon 359 identifies the College of Cardinals as the subject competent to elect according to special law (ad normam legis peculiaris). It does not independently confer or generate electoral competence apart from the operative conditions established in that special law.
P5. Universi Dominici Gregis as Special Law
The sole law governing the constitution and validity of a papal election is the Apostolic Constitution Universi Dominici Gregis (UDG), which derogates from general law in matters of election.
Trigger Premises (Election Law)
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P6. Death-Conditioned Structure of UDG
Universi Dominici Gregis explicitly and repeatedly attaches the activation of the conclave regime and electoral competence to the death of the Roman Pontiff (ob mortem, defuncto Romano Pontifice), including the cessation of governance, interregnum norms, and conclave procedures.
P7. UDG 77 Is Not a Constitutive Trigger
UDG 77 acknowledges the possibility of resignation (etiam si…contingat per renuntiationem), but does not positively identify resignation as a juridical trigger that instantiates the vacancy-state required to activate conclave competence. The clause is conditional and regulatory, not constitutive. Because constitutive competence cannot be supplied by presupposition (D2), the mere acknowledgment of a contingency cannot substitute for the positive conferral of electoral authority.​
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P8. Closed Field of Constitutive Competence
In matters governed by invalidating law, the juridical field is closed: what the law does not expressly authorize is withheld. Silence cannot be treated as discretion or implied conferral of authority.
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Factual Premise
P9. 2013 Circumstance
The 2013 conclave was convened while the predecessor Pope was still alive, following a resignation under c. 332 §2, without any promulgated norm identifying resignation as a conclave-trigger equivalent to death.
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Conclusions
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C1. Absence of Electoral Competence
Because the special law (Universi Dominici Gregis) did not positively attach electoral competence to resignation, and because Canon 359 does not independently confer such competence, the College of Cardinals lacked constitutive authority to elect in 2013.
C2. Nullity of the Election
Under UDG 76, an election conducted without the conditions laid down by the law is eo ipso null and void and confers no right on the person elected.
C3. Incurability by Acceptance
Because the act was null for lack of competence under an invalidating law, Universal Peaceful Acceptance cannot heal the defect. Acceptance presupposes a valid act; it cannot create one.
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Meta-Juridical Corollary
C4. The Cost of Rejection
To reject Conclusions C1-C3 while maintaining that Canon Law binds as law requires abandoning at least one foundational principle of the canonical system: promulgation (c. 7), strict invalidity (c. 10), closed constitutive competence, or the distinction between law and functional necessity. Such rejection therefore exits Canon Law as defined by the 1983 Code.
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PART II: THE TWO SEES AND THE TWO VACANCIES
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Canon Law distinguishes between the Roman See and the Apostolic See. The Roman See refers to the episcopal office of the Bishop of Rome (c. 331); the Apostolic See denotes the juridical complex through which supreme authority is exercised (c. 361). Readers who find the distinctions employed here unfamiliar may consult Appendix C, which sets out the operative juridical categories presupposed by this analysis as evidenced in the Church’s official legal texts.
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A resignation under canon 332 §2 vacates the Roman See by terminating the Pontiff’s holding of the office. The canon states that the Roman Pontiff may renounce his munus; once that renunciation takes effect, the Roman See is vacant. It does not legislate the juridical consequences of that vacancy for purposes of papal election. Those consequences are governed exclusively by special law.
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Universi Dominici Gregis presupposes a vacancy of the Apostolic See instantiated through the death of the last lawfully reigning Roman Pontiff. This is not a biological premise but a juridical one. The law repeatedly uses death-conditioned terms (mors /obitus /defunctus; see, inter alia, UDG 3, 11, 13, 14, 15, 17, 19, 25, 27, 30, 32, 33, 49, 84) to designate the datum presupposed by the conclave regime (namely, the death of the Roman Pontiff as the legally recognized terminus that activates the interregnum-and-election machinery), distinct from resignation under canon 332 §2, which vacates the Roman See but is not identified by the special law as an activating trigger for election.
The distinction is therefore not between “vacancy” and “non-vacancy,” but between two juridically distinct vacancy states:
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Death-Vacancy: the state presupposed by the special law, in which the predecessor Pope is deceased and the conclave regime is activated.
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Resignation-Vacancy: the state produced by c. 332 §2, in which the Roman See is vacated but the special law does not identify the juridical effects for election.
Because Universi Dominici Gregis attaches electoral competence to the former and remains silent with respect to the latter, the two states are not juridically interchangeable.
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Clarification on the Nature of Vacancy and Succession
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Canon law distinguishes between a custodial vacancy and a death-conditioned vacancy of the Apostolic See. A papal resignation under canon 332 §2 validly vacates the Roman See and places the Apostolic See into a restrained, caretaking state governed by conservation norms (nihil innovetur, c. 335), in which governance is limited but not extinguished and succession is not yet necessitated. By contrast, the death of the Pope empties all of the offices that make up the Apostolic See, ceasing vicarious authority by nature and creating a complete vacancy that necessitates succession. Universi Dominici Gregis is structured around this latter state. UDG 77 regulates conduct during a resignation-induced custodial vacancy by requiring observance of the death-conditioned dispositions, but it does not transform resignation into the death-trigger required to activate conclave competence. Succession law presupposes death-conditioned vacancy, not mere vacancy.
FIGURE 1. Juridical Structure of Papal Vacancy and Electoral Competence
Path A: Death (Contemplated by the Special Law)
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The Roman Pontiff dies. ->
The Roman See is vacated. ->
The Apostolic See is vacated in the death-conditioned juridical sense required by law. ->
The conclave regime of Universi Dominici Gregis activates. ->
The College of Cardinals receives electoral competence. ->
A valid papal election is possible.
Path B: Resignation (2013 Fact Pattern)
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The Roman Pontiff resigns under canon 332 §2. ->
The Roman See is vacated. ->
The predecessor Pontiff remains alive. ->
No death-conditioned vacancy of the Apostolic See exists. ->
The conclave regime of Universi Dominici Gregis does not activate. ->
No electoral competence is conferred on the College of Cardinals. ->
Any attempted election is null under Universi Dominici Gregis 76.
Controlling Juridical Constraint (Applies to Both Paths)
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Canon 359 identifies the College of Cardinals as the electoral subject only according to the norm of the special law (ad normam legis peculiaris). Canon 359 does not independently confer electoral competence. It cannot activate an electoral regime that the special law itself does not activate.
PART III: WHY UDG 77 DOES NOT ACTIVATE CONCLAVE COMPETENCE
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UDG 77 states that the norms governing the vacancy and election are to be observed “etiam si contingat” that the vacancy occurs through resignation. The clause is concessive and conditional. It acknowledges the possibility of resignation without legislating its juridical effects. Because constitutive competence cannot be supplied by presupposition (D2), the mere acknowledgment of a contingency cannot substitute for the positive conferral of electoral authority required by the closed field of constitutive law (P8).
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Moreover, UDG 77's placement is significant. It appears at the end of a document whose preceding seventy-six sections have already established all constitutive elements—the cessation of governance, the interregnum norms, the convening of Cardinals, and the conditions of valid election. If John Paul II had intended resignation to function as a co-equal trigger alongside death, the natural drafting approach would be to define both triggers where the activating conditions first appear, not to address resignation-only in a final provision commanding observance of norms established elsewhere. The structure of the document confirms that UDG 77 is conservative, not constitutive: it ensures that resignation does not exempt the Church from the established requirements; it does not provide that resignation satisfies them.
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The operative verb of the sentence, serventur, imposes a regulatory command regarding observance. It does not instantiate competence, define a vacancy state, or activate jurisdiction.
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Canon 359 confirms this structure. The College of Cardinals possesses electoral authority only “ad normam legis peculiaris.” The canon identifies the subject of election but defers entirely to special law for the conditions under which competence arises. It does not generate competence independently of those conditions.
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Because papal resignation under canon 332 §2 does not per se necessitate succession, a conclave convened prior to the death of the Roman Pontiff would require a positive constitutive grant of electoral competence. No such grant exists in Universi Dominici Gregis.
Accordingly, neither UDG 77 nor Canon 359 supplies a juridical trigger for conclave competence in the case of resignation.
PART IV: NULLITY AND THE LIMITS OF ACCEPTANCE
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Because electoral competence is a condition of validity under the special law, its absence renders any attempted election non-existent in law. This consequence is stated explicitly in Universi Dominici Gregis 76.
UDG 76 declares that elections conducted contrary to the conditions laid down are null ipso iure and confer no right. Because competence is a condition of validity, an election conducted without competence is non-being in law.
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Universal Peaceful Acceptance presupposes a man duly elected (rite electum). Classical authorities, including John of St. Thomas, restrict its healing effect to cases of doubtful but valid elections. It cannot confer existence on a juridically null act.
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Acceptance recognizes a reality; it does not create one.
PART V: THE COST OF REJECTION
To maintain the validity of the 2013 conclave while accepting the premises established above requires abandoning at least one foundational element of Canon Law: promulgation (c. 7), strict invalidity under lex irritans (c. 10), the closed field of constitutive competence (c. 359), or the distinction between law and functional necessity.
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The argument therefore presents not a disagreement within Canon Law, but a choice between Canon Law as a binding juridical system and an alternative normative framework governed by implication, necessity, or outcome.
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Accordingly, to deny the conclusion of this monograph while accepting the governing canons and constitutions is not to advance an alternative interpretation of Canon Law, but to deny its binding juridical force as law.
Conclusion and Implications for Subsequent Conclaves
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This analysis does not claim doctrinal error, moral culpability, or ecclesial collapse. It claims only that law binds according to its terms and that fidelity consists not in fabricating authority, but in recognizing its absence where the law has not conferred it.​
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The foregoing analysis does not terminate in the events of 2013. Its juridical consequences necessarily extend forward in time. If the election of March 2013 was null for lack of constitutive competence, then no papal authority was acquired by the person designated, and no acts requiring papal authority could validly proceed from that election.
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Among such acts is the creation of Cardinals, which canon law reserves exclusively to a true Roman Pontiff. Where an election is null, the purported creation of Cardinals is juridically non-existent and confers no ius eligendi.
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The College of Cardinals is not a numerical aggregate reducible to a valid remainder, but a juridical subject constituted by law. Where that subject lacks lawful constitution, it cannot exercise the power of electing the Roman Pontiff.
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Because the conclave held in May 2025 depended upon authority derived from the null election of 2013 and upon an electing body substantially composed of invalidly constituted members, it likewise lacked constitutive competence.​ Therefore, the conclave of May 2025 was also null and void.
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​This analysis establishes defect, not remedy. A detailed juridical account of how the College of Cardinals may lawfully act once competence exists is provided in a separate document, Conclave, to avoid conflation of constitutive and applicative reasoning.
APPENDIX C: OPERATIVE JURIDICAL CATEGORIES EVIDENCED IN OFFICIAL TEXTS
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This analysis presupposes several juridical distinctions that are not theoretical constructs but are evidenced directly in the Church’s official legal language. These distinctions are consistently employed in the Code of Canon Law and in papal constitutions, even where modern commentary tends to collapse them.
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Person / Office / Mode of Holding
Canon law distinguishes the person from the office (munus) and from the mode in which the office is held. Canon 332 §2 provides that the Roman Pontiff may renounce his munus, thereby terminating the office. The canon does not eliminate the person, nor does it treat resignation as death. This distinction is reflected linguistically in election law itself: the term pontificis designates the same man across different juridical states (active officeholder, resigned former officeholder, and deceased former officeholder), demonstrating that the term refers to a person rather than asserting current possession of the munus.
Roman See / Apostolic See
Canon 331 defines the Roman Pontiff as Bishop of Rome. Canon 361 separately defines the Apostolic See as the juridical complex through which supreme authority in the Church is exercised. Canon 335 distinguishes the vacant Roman See from other juridical states affecting governance. Canon 359 further presupposes the vacancy of the Apostolic See as the condition under which the College of Cardinals may act ad normam legis peculiaris, evidencing that the Roman See and the Apostolic See are treated as distinct juridical objects with distinct legal consequences.
Roman Pontiff / Supreme Pontiff
Official texts consistently designate the same man under different juridical relations. “Roman Pontiff” is used when anchoring facts to the person as Bishop of Rome (e.g., death, predecessor, succession), while “Supreme Pontiff” is used when referring to the active exercise of supreme, full, immediate, and universal authority (cf. c. 331; Universi Dominici Gregis). The titles are not interchangeable, but correspond to different juridical aspects of the same subject.
Active Officeholder / Retired (Emeritus) Person
Canon law provides for the resignation of the papal munus (c. 332 §2) but does not recognize a partial retention of supreme authority. Official post-resignation usage preserves personal designation while withholding jurisdiction, evidencing a distinction between the active officeholder and the retired person.
Death-Vacancy / Resignation-Vacancy
Both death and resignation terminate the papal office, but Universi Dominici Gregis repeatedly predicates the activation of the interregnum and conclave regime upon the death of the Roman Pontiff (ob mortem Pontificis; defuncto Romano Pontifice). Resignation is acknowledged as a factual contingency (UDG 77) without being identified as juridically equivalent to death for purposes of electoral competence. The law thus evidences distinct vacancy states with distinct legal effects.
These distinctions are not introduced by this analysis; they are reflected in the Church’s own juridical texts and govern the legal consequences examined throughout the monograph.
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END OF APPENDIX C
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APPENDIX M: Methodological Clarification on Constitutive Nullity and Procedural Illegality
This work observes a strict methodological distinction between constitutive (ontological) nullity and procedural (regulatory) illegality, in accordance with classical Thomistic jurisprudence and the positive law of the Church.
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In canon law, not every violation of a binding norm results in the non-existence of the juridical act. As established by Canon 10, only those laws are invalidating (leges irritantes) which expressly determine that an act is null or that a person is rendered incapable. Accordingly, the presence of strong prohibitory or nullity language within a legislative text does not, of itself, authorize the conclusion that every procedural deviation annihilates the act in law. Juridical invalidity must be grounded in an explicitly promulgated invalidating norm, not inferred from philosophical necessity, functional reasoning, or the gravity of the violation.
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On this basis, the following distinction governs the analysis throughout this work:
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Constitutive Nullity (Demonstrative)​
Constitutive nullity arises where the law fails to instantiate the subject, competence, or juridical condition required for the act to exist at all. In such cases, the act is non-being ab initio, because the formal cause necessary for its juridical existence was never conferred. This category concerns matters of authority, competence, and legal triggers, and is logically and juridically prior to any inquiry into procedural execution. Where constitutive competence is absent, no subsequent observance or violation of procedure can supply what the law itself has withheld.
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Procedural Illegality (Diagnostic)
​Procedural violations concern the mode of acting by a subject whose competence is otherwise presumed. Such violations may be gravely illicit and may evidence serious juridical disorder; however, they do not constitute proof of nullity unless the law expressly attaches invalidating force to the specific norm violated. Absent such express attachment, procedural defects function diagnostically or illustratively, not demonstratively: they reveal disorder in execution but do not establish non-being in law.
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Accordingly, procedural irregularities--including deviations from numerical, temporal, or operational norms governing the execution of an act--are treated in this work as secondary indicators of juridical breakdown, not as independent grounds of nullity, unless and until the legislator has explicitly rendered such deviations invalidating.
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This methodological discipline preserves the integrity of canon law as a rational juridical system, prevents the collapse of illegality into invalidity, and ensures that conclusions of nullity rest solely on promulgated law and constitutive juridical effects, rather than on inferred necessity, retrospective rationalization, or post hoc validation.
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END OF APPENDIX M
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APPENDIX L: LATIN TEXTS OF CITED NORMS (CONTROL TEXTS)
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Norms are reproduced here in Latin as stable control texts for verification.
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CIC 1983
https://www.vatican.va/archive/aas/documents/AAS-75-1983-II-ocr.pdf
Canon 7
Lex instituitur cum promulgatur.
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Canon 10
Irritantes aut inhabilitantes eae tantum leges habendae sunt, quibus actum esse nullum aut inhabilem esse personam expresse statuitur.
Canon 18
Leges quae poenam statuunt aut liberum iurium exercitium coarctant aut exceptionem a lege continent, strictae subsunt interpretationi.
Canon 19
Si certa de re desit expressum legis sive universalis sive particularis praescriptum; aut consuetudo, causa, nisi sit poenalis, dirimenda est attentis legibus latis in similibus, generalibus iuris principiis cum aequitate canonica servatis, iurisprudentia et praxi Curiae Romanae, communi constantique doctorum sententia.
Canon 331
Ecclesiae Romanae Episcopus, in quo permanet munus a Domino singulariter Petro, primo Apostolorum, concessum et successoribus eius transmittendum, Collegii Episcoporum est caput, Vicarius Christi atque universae Ecclesiae his in terris Pastor; qui ideo vi muneris sui suprema, plena, immediata et universali in Ecclesia gaudet ordinaria potestate, quam semper libere exercere valet.
Canon 332 §2
Si contingat ut Romanus Pontifex muneri suo renuntiet, ad validitatem requiritur ut renuntiatio libere fiat et rite manifestetur, non vero ut a quopiam acceptetur.
Canon 335
Sede Romana vacante aut prorsus impedita, nihil innovetur in Ecclesiae universae regimine: serventur autem leges speciales pro iisdem adiunctis latae.
Canon 359
Sede Apostolica vacante, Cardinalium Collegium ea tantum in Ecclesia gaudet potestate, quae in peculiari lege eidem tribuitur.
Canon 361
Nomine Sedis Apostolicae vel Sanctae Sedis in hoc Codice veniunt non solum Romanus Pontifex, sed etiam, nisi ex rei natura vel sermonis contextu aliud appareat, Secretaria Status, Consilium pro publicis Ecclesiae negotiis, aliaque Romanae Curiae Instituta.
Universi Dominici Gregis (Ioannes Paulus II, 1996)
https://www.vatican.va/archive/aas/documents/AAS-88-1996-ocr.pdf
https://www.vatican.va/archive/aas/documents/2013/marzo2013.pdf
UDG 76
Quodsi electio aliter celebrata fuerit, quam haec Constitutio statuit, aut non servatis condicionibus pariter hic praescriptis, electio eo ipso est nulla et invalida absque ulla declaratione, ideoque electo nullum ius tribuit.
UDG 77
Quae de actis electionem praecedentibus et de ipsa Romani Pontificis electione hactenus dicta sunt, ea omnia servanda esse declaramus, etiam si contingat vacationem Sedis Apostolicae per renuntiationem Summi Pontificis occurrere, secundum can. 332, § 2 « Codicis Iuris Canonici » et can. 44, § 2 « Codicis Canonum Ecclesiarum Orientalium ».
John of St. Thomas (for UPA “rite electum”)
X. Sit conclusio: De fide divina est immediate hunc hominem in particulari rite electum et acceptatum ab Ecclesia esse summum pontificem, et successorem Petri, non solum quoad se, sed etiam quoad nos, licet multo magis quoad nos id manifestetur, quando de facto pontifex aliquid definit, nec in ipso exercitio, et quasi practice aliquis Catholicorum ab hac conclusione dissentit, licet in actu signato, et quasi speculative putent se id non credere fide divina. In hac conclusione duo facienda sunt. Primum, eam explicare; deinde, a fundamentis probare, et praesertim ex auctoritate, secundum quam credimus hunc hominem in particulari esse papam. Et quidem explicatio hujus conclusionis meo videri praesertim pendet ex tribus. Primum est, quod electus in papam eligitur in regulam fidei taliter quod sicut liber canonicus Scriptura, est quaedam fidei regula scripta, ita homo electus in papam est quaedam regula fidei animata: secundum est, quod Ecclesiae commissum est a Christo Domino eligere sibi hominem, qui pro tempore sit talis regula, ut supra ostendimus, et eidem Ecclesiae consequenter commissum est per suam acceptationem determinare quod sit canonice, et legitime electus; ita quod sicut ad pontificem, et Ecclesiam pertinet determinare, qui libri sint canonici, sic et ad ipsam pertinet determinare, qui homo sit electus in canonem, et regulam animatam fidei: tertium est, quod ista materia, scilicet hunc hominem esse rite electum, et canonice factum regulam fidei, est materia determinabilis de fide ab Ecclesia.
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[Tractatus de Auctoritate Sumi Pontificis, Disputatio II, Articulus II, pp 228-264. Cursus Theologicus – Tomus Septimus in Secundam Secundae Ludovicus Vives, Parisiis, 1886.]
END OF APPENDIX L
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