Canons of the Council of Carthage (397)

Contents

1. 0Heading of the council of Carthage held on 28 August 397 by forty-seven bishops.
2. 1All African bishops are to take the date of Easter from the church of Carthage.
3. 2A general African council is to meet every year, attended by legates of each province.
4. 3Candidates for ordination are first to be taught the decrees of the councils.
5. 4Deacons and consecrated virgins must be at least twenty-five, and readers may not give the liturgical greeting.
6. 5Even at Easter catechumens receive only the customary blessed salt.
7. 6The eucharist is not to be given to corpses, since the dead cannot take and eat, and the practice might suggest that the dead can be baptized.
8. 7Procedure for accusations against a bishop: hearing before the primate within a month (two if excused), suspension of a defendant who fails to appear, and penalties for an accuser who withdraws.
9. 8Accused presbyters are judged by their bishop with five colleagues, deacons by their bishop with two; other clergy by their own bishop alone.
10. 9Clergy who take church cases to the civil courts lose their office or what they win, since Paul tells Christians to settle disputes in the church.
11. 10An appeal does not discredit the first judges unless they acted with malice or corruption, and judges chosen by both parties admit no appeal.
12. 11Sons of clergy may neither stage nor watch public shows.
13. 12Children of clergy may not marry pagans, heretics or schismatics.
14. 13Clergy may not give their property to non-catholics, even relatives.
15. 14Clergy are not to emancipate their sons until they are sure of their maturity and character.
16. 15Clergy may not be lessees or agents for others or earn a living by dishonorable business.
17. 16Clergy may not take interest on loans.
18. 17Clergy may live only with close female relatives and household women already there before their ordination.
19. 18No one may be ordained bishop, presbyter or deacon until his whole household is catholic.
20. 19Readers who reach puberty must either marry or profess continence.
21. 20No bishop may take over another bishop's people or territory.
22. 21No bishop may keep or promote another bishop's cleric without consent; readers, psalmists and door-keepers count as clergy.
23. 22Clergy are to be ordained only after examination by the bishops or testimony of the people.
24. 23Prayers at the altar are to be addressed to the Father, and prayers taken from elsewhere must first be checked by more learned brothers.
25. 24Only bread and wine mixed with water are to be offered in the eucharist.
26. 25Clergy and ascetics may visit widows and virgins only with permission and in company.
27. 26The primate is to be called only “bishop of the first see”, not “high priest” or the like.
28. 27Clergy may not eat or drink in taverns except when travelling.
29. 28Bishops may not travel overseas without consulting their primate and receiving his letter.
30. 29The eucharist is celebrated only fasting (except on Maundy Thursday); funeral commendations after a meal are made with prayers alone.
31. 30Clergy and people are not to hold banquets in church buildings.
32. 31The bishop sets the length of penance according to the sin.
33. 32Presbyters may reconcile penitents only with the bishop's consent, and notorious sinners are reconciled publicly before the apse.
34. 33Consecrated virgins who lose their parents are to be placed in a community of virgins or with older women.
35. 34Sick people unable to answer may be baptized on their family's testimony of their wish.
36. 35Actors, players and apostates who turn to God are not to be refused grace or reconciliation.
37. 36Presbyters may not consecrate virgins without the bishop, nor ever make the chrism.
38. 37Clergy may not stay in another city without just cause approved by the local clergy.
39. 38The synod repeats the rule of the synod of Capua against rebaptism, reordination and transfers of bishops.
40. 39Against a proposal to require twelve bishops for an episcopal ordination, Aurelius keeps the ancient rule of at least three.
41. 40If an objection is raised against a bishop-elect, more bishops are to be called and the charges examined publicly before he is ordained.
42. 41The date of Easter is to be announced each year by Carthage through the legates at the annual council, and Mauretania is to be told by letter.
43. 42A rural district that has never had its own bishop is not to receive one, lest ambitious presbyters set themselves up against their bishops.
44. 43Aurelius adds that bishops who separate themselves from the council and refuse its summons are to lose their dioceses and even their own churches, by public authority if need be.
45. 44No bishop may take another bishop's cleric without his consent.
46. 45The bishop of Carthage may take clergy requested by any church to be ordained as its leader, after first asking their own bishop; a bishop with only one presbyter may still have to give him up.
47. 46A bishop newly ordained for a rural district with its mother church's consent keeps only that district and may not claim others.
48. 47A list of the canonical Scriptures to be read in church, with a provision that the passions of martyrs may be read on their feast days.
49. 48The council will consult Siricius and Simplicianus on whether those baptized as infants among the Donatists may later be ordained; the Mauretanian legates then present their instructions.
50. 49Clergy who were poor at ordination and buy land in their own name during office must give it to the church; gifts and inheritances they may use as befits their calling.
51. 50The council closes with the bishops' assent and the subscriptions of Aurelius of Carthage, Epigonius of Bulla Regia and Augustine of Hippo.