Canons of the Council of Chalcedon

Contents

1. 1The canons of earlier synods are confirmed.
2. 2Bishops who ordain or appoint church officers for money, those so ordained, and their go-betweens are punished.
3. 3Clergy and monks are not to lease estates or manage secular business, except legal guardianships or charitable tasks given by the bishop.
4. 4Monks are subject to the bishop, may not found monasteries or leave them for outside affairs without his consent, and may not receive slaves without their masters' consent.
5. 5The earlier canons against bishops and clergy moving from city to city are confirmed.
6. 6No one is to be ordained without assignment to a particular church, shrine or monastery; such ordinations are void.
7. 7Clergy and monks who take up military service or secular office and do not return are anathematized.
8. 8Clergy of poorhouses, monasteries and shrines remain under the city bishop's authority.
9. 9Disputes among clergy go first to their bishop, those with a bishop to the provincial synod, and those with a metropolitan to the exarch of the diocese or the see of Constantinople.
10. 10A cleric may not belong to the churches of two cities at once, and one transferred has no further share in his former church.
11. 11The poor travel with letters of peace, while letters of commendation are reserved for persons of standing.
12. 12Bishops may not use imperial decrees to split a province and create a second metropolitan; cities already so honored keep only the title.
13. 13Unknown clergy from elsewhere may not minister without letters of commendation from their bishop.
14. 14Readers and singers who may marry are not to take wives of another faith, nor have their children baptized among heretics or married to non-orthodox persons.
15. 15Women deacons must be at least forty and carefully examined, and one who later marries is anathematized with her husband.
16. 16Dedicated virgins and monks may not marry; those who do are excommunicated, subject to the local bishop's clemency.
17. 17Rural parishes held for thirty years stay with their bishop; disputes go to the provincial synod and above, and church boundaries follow those of newly founded cities.
18. 18Clergy or monks who conspire against bishops or fellow clergy lose their rank.
19. 19Provincial synods are to meet twice a year as the canons require, and absent bishops without excuse are to be rebuked.
20. 20Clergy may not move to another city's church except as refugees; a bishop who receives another's cleric is excommunicated with him.
21. 21Accusers of bishops or clergy are heard only after their own reputation has been examined.
22. 22Clergy may not seize their bishop's property after his death.
23. 23Clergy and monks who linger in Constantinople without commission and cause trouble are to be expelled by the church's advocate.
24. 24Consecrated monasteries and their property may never revert to secular use.
25. 25Metropolitans must ordain bishops to vacant sees within three months, and the steward keeps the vacant church's revenue intact.
26. 26Every bishop is to have a steward from his clergy to manage church property under his direction.
27. 27Those who abduct women for marriage, or help to do so, are deposed or anathematized.
28. 28The council confirms Constantinople's privileges as New Rome, second after Rome, and gives its archbishop the ordination of the metropolitans of Pontus, Asia and Thrace.
29. 29A bishop may not be reduced to a presbyter: either he is removed altogether for just cause or, if blameless, restored as bishop.
30. 30The Egyptian bishops are allowed to delay signing Leo's letter until a new archbishop of Alexandria is ordained, on surety that they stay in Constantinople.