In historical Catholic theology, to engage in usury was a mortal sin. Consider the following from Pope Clement V (1305-1314):
Usury
[From the edict “Ex gravi ad nos”]
479 [DS 906] If
anyone shall fall into that error, so that he obstinately presumes to declare
that it is not a sin to exercise usury, we decree that he must be punished as a
heretic.
Consider also the following from the Third
Lateran Council, considered by Roman Catholics as the Eleventh Ecumenical
Council:
The dogmatic Third Lateran Council
(1179)
Canon 25:
“We therefore declare
that notorious usurers should not be admitted to communion of the altar or
receive Christian burial if they die in this sin.”
This decree of the
Third Lateran Council was not a man-made disciplinary law such as the Church
prohibition against consuming meat on Friday. The Roman Catholic Church’s law
concerning charging interest on loands of money was based on the immemorial
practice of the Church from its inception, rooted in the Word of God and
confirmed by the unanimous teaching of the Magisterium. Any sin sufficient to
prevent a Catholic from receiving Holy Communion (the Eucharist), constitutes a
transgression so grave it was judged to be “mortal”—subject to eternal
punishment after death if not confessed and forgiven before death . . . (Michael
Hoffman, Usury in Christendom: The Mortal Sin that Was and Now is Not [Independent
History and Research, 2013], 78-79)
That charging usury was a mortal sin can
also be seen in manuals confessors used:
Manuals for Confessors Classified Usury as Mortal Sin
That usury was a
moral sin was the unanimous doctrine imparted to all confessors in the dozens
of manuals compiled for their guidance and instruction by the Church up until
the early modern age. We can cite example after example: the Summa casuum of
Burchard of Strasbourg; the Summa confessorum of John of Freiburg; the Summa
de casibus conscientie of Bartolomeo of San Corcordio, the Summa
Confessorum of John of Saxony, the Formula confessionis of John
Rigaud (confessor to Pope Clement V), the Summa Astasana of Astesanus.
The theologian Peter
Lombard in his famous Sentences, in connection with the “fourth
commandment of the second table” which forbids theft, states: “. . . here usury
is prohibited as well, which is included under robbery” (hic etiam usura
prohibetur, quae sub rapina continetur). The German Dominican Conrad of Höxter
was professor of Canon Law at Bologna. He received the religious habit in 1220 “at
the very hands of St. Dominic.” His three volume manual for confessors, Summa
fratris Conradi, condemns usury as moral sin. “Usury is by its nature dishonest
and cannot be exercised without sin . . . all fruits of usury are to be
restored, including profit in legitimate business financed by usurious gains.
If the foundation is faulty all that is bult on it is faulty.” Concerning the
money-lending Lombards, Conrad of Höxter condemns their practice of charging
usury in the guise of late fees on loan payments.
“Raymond of Penafort
is remembered in the literary history of the Middle Ages for two major
achievements. Besides being the author of the most influential book on penance
ever written (Summa Raymundi), he compiled the definitive collection of decretals
promulgated by Gregory IX in 1234. Born near Barcelona, Raymond was nearing
middle age and already a doctor of law when he entered the Dominican order in
1222. Raymond’s handbook for confessors was originally composed in the 1220s . .
. The work was printed a number of times . . . Usury is discussed by Raymond of
Penafort in prolongation of theft, ‘since usury differs little or nothing from
robbery” (Decretales Gregor IX., p. 112).
Four points are cited
in the Summa Raymundi as proof of the mortal sin of usury: “the passage
of ownership in a mutuum, the passage of risk, the non-deterioration of
money and the sterility of money.” These in turn are based in the decretal Naviganti,
which was included in the final compilation by Pope Gregory IX and which originated
in a latter written by the pope to Raymond of Penafort. “Hardly any work . . .
was no frequently copied, glossed, abbreviated, adapted and imitated as the Summa
Raymundi; European manuscript libraries abound in penitential texts
deriving, in one way or another, from the source . . . When Vincent of
Beauvais, the Dominican compiler of the largest encyclopedia of the Middle Ages
(Speculum doctrinale, [Douay, 1624], Book 10, Chapters 102-33, cols.
956-980), cast about for suitable material on usury and commercial activity, he
chose Raymond of Penafort . . . copying (him) more or less verbatim . . . “ (O.I.
Langholm, Economics in the Medieval Schools, p. 115). (Ibid., 101-3)
Catholic theologians (many of them being
canonised saints and doctors of the Church) also echoed this belief about
the sinful, heinous nature of usury:
St. Anselm (1033-1109),
Archbishop of Canterbury, in his Homilia in Lucam forbad interest on
loans of money, declaring them tantamount to robbery.
St. Albert the Great (“Albert Magnus,” “Doctor
Universalis”; 1193-1280): Albert was the teacher of St. Thomas Aquinas; he
wrote, “Usury is and always has been, without any doubt a moral sin, according
to the natural law as well as the written law” (III Sent. dist. xxxvii, art.
13).
St. Bonaventure (1221-1274),
Professor of Theology at the University of Paris. Superior General of the
Franciscan Order; bishop and cardinal. He declared the breeding of sterile
money through the taking of interest, mortal sin and unnatural gain. “Pecunia
quantam est de se per seipsam non fructificat.”
Henry Goethals of Ghent (“Henricus
Gandavensis,” 1217-1293). Leading theologian and author of the treatises on
economics and commerce Mercimoniis et Negotiattionbus, and Quaestiones
Quodlibetales. In the latter he demonstrated from the Bible and the Fathers
that the Church forbids interest on money because it is evil per se, and
not due to any ecclesiastical declaration or canon law. The iniquity of usury
is made so by divine law and is not subject to alteration.
Alexander of
Alexandria (ca. 1268-1314). Superior-General of the Franciscan order and author of
Tractatus de Usuris. A native of Lombardy in northern Italy, he had his
work cut out for him since his homeland was replete with the usurious banking
operations of its Italian “Lombards.” (The heart of banking operations in
London, England were until very recently, headquartered for centuries on “Lombard
Street”). Alexander condemned interest on money from both the divine and the
natural law.
History of the Ecclesiastical
laws of England: “Usury in a strict sense seemeth to be a contract upon the loan of
money, to give the lender a certain profit for the use of it, upon all events
whether the borrower make any advantage of it, or the lender suffer any
prejudice for want of it, or whether it be repaid on the day appointed or not .
. . Manifest usurers are forbidden to make testaments themselves or to dispose
of their goods by their last wills . . . unless he satisfy for the usury; so
(too) they are forbidden to reap any benefit by the testament of others, or to
be capable of any legacy of goods . . . Canon 109: If any offend their brethren
by usury, the churchwardens . . . shall faithfully present every such offender,
to the interest that he may be punished by the severity of the laws, according
to his deserts and such notorious offenders shall not be admitted to holy communion,
until they be reformed. In general it is said by the ecclesiastical laws, if a
man be a manifest usurer, not only his treatment is void (as hath said), but
his body, after he is dead, is not to be buried amongst the bodies of other
Christian men, in any church or churchyard, until there be restitution, or
caution tendered, according to the value of such goods. By the laws of King
Alfred it was ordained that the chattels of usurers should be forfeited to the
king, their lands and inheritances should escheat to the lords the fee . . . “ Ecclesiastical
Law in Four Volumes, transl. Richard Burn, vol. 4, pp. 39-42) (Ibid.,
76-78)
According to these popes, theologians, saints, and an Ecumenical Council, charging any interest on loans of money, not just “exorbitant” rates, was defined de fide as a mortal sin. Today, however, charging (non-exorbitant) interest rates and/or receiving the benefits of interest rates is allowable by Roman Catholicism. For instance, consider the following from the 1917 Code of Canon Law which teaches that church monies can be used to accrue interest:
Canon 1543
If a fungible thing
is given to another so that it becomes his, and later it must be restored in
the same sort, no profit can be made by reason of the contract; but in the loan
of a fungible thing, it is not by itself illicit to reap a legal profit, unless
it can be shown to be immoderate of itself, and even greater profit [can be
made] if there is a just and proportionate title so supporting. (Edward N.
Peters, curator, The 1917 Pio-Benedictine Code of Canon Law: In English
Translation with Extensive Scholarly Apparatus [San Francisco: Ignatius Press,
2001], 516)
