Penance Quotes
Johnson was Vice President at the time. What he did not realize at the time was that one of the plotters was supposed to have killed him at the same time as the others, but the assassin got cold feet at the last minute and never entered Johnson’s house.
Note that the penalty for priests who married was not very great. By this Cannon, they would be forbidden to perform their priestly duties for a short while, and the marriage was dissolved, but they could maintain their rank, status and privileges although they could not advance further. This reflects the greater tolerance for marriage of the Eastern Church then the Westerners of Rome would allow. This grew to total acceptance of married priests in the Eastern Church but there were ideological differences when there was but one church.
Much of the Catholic Church was greatly influenced by Aquinas long past his death. This quotation laid the foundation for the view, that anything the Church does, even if seemingly wrong or absurd, has some positive value. Here, Aquinas refused to totally condemn the Church practice of giving indulgences (official absolution for serious sins) to the rich in exchange for money. His view assumes that there must be some good in all acts of the church, even if we can not now determine it. This view makes reform very difficult even after the evil is recognized. Some theologians argue that although this perpetuates some bad practices, it provides stability and prevents leaders of the church from constantly trying to adapt the church to meet current popular or civil criticism.
The major targets of this law were the Puritans who would not attend the normal Church of England services but had their own, usually in a private home.
