Our History

Chapter 2
Beginnings of the Old Catholic Movement

In the seventh century A.D., St. Willibrord evangelized the area of Europe now known as the Netherlands. In time the city of Utrecht became the archiepiscopal See.

Geopolitics and the See of Utrecht

As was common prior to the Reformation, the See of Utrecht became a temporal as well as religious authority, controlling a large amount of territory.  For much of its history the See was filled by the sons of various noble families.  

In the geopolitics of Europe prior to the Reformation, both the Holy See in Rome and the See of Utrecht were active participants.  To help forge political and military alliances, the popes would sometimes grant special perpetual rights to the See of Utrecht. These rights were to be instrumental in the history of Old Catholicism.

St. Willibrord
(658 AD - 739 AD)

See

"See" (a noun) means both a bishop's jurisdiction and location (the cathedral town).  The phrase "Holy See" is the title given to the See of the Bishop of Rome, who is the Roman Catholic pope.

Province & City of Utrecht (Netherlands)

The coat of arms of the
 Province of Utrecht

The See of Utrecht granted special rights

The first of these special perpetual rights granted the See of Utrecht was in 1145.  At the request of the Holy Roman Emperor Conrad III and Bishop Heribert of Utrecht, Blessed Pope Eugene III granted the Cathedral Chapter of Utrecht the right to elect successors to the See in times of vacancy. A cathedral chapter is what we today refer to as the Chancery Office. 

This meant that, unlike most other Sees in the Roman Catholic Church, the Cathedral Chapter of Utrecht could elect bishops without permission or approval from the Pope.  This had always been the practice in the early Church.  In 1215, the Fourth Lateran Council (Canons 23 and 24) confirmed this privilege. 

Another significant right granted the Church of the Netherlands was its immunity from prosecution by Roman Catholic courts of canon law constituted outside the See of Utrecht. In 1520, Pope Leo X decreed in his papal bull Debitum Pastoralis that the Bishop of Utrecht, his successors, his clergy, and his laity should never be tried by an external tribunal of canon law. If any such proceedings did take place they were null and void. This extraordinary right had been granted by Pope Leo X at the request of Philip of Burgundy, who was the reigning prince-bishop of Utrecht at the time.  Such rights were regularly granted by Pope Leo X, whose papacy was marked by political intrigue and the selling of ecclesiastical offices, rights, and indulgences. 

Conflict between the Sees of Rome and Utrecht

By 1701 the See of Utrecht had ceased to be a temporal power and player in geopolitics. It had also been elevated to an archbishopry, responsible for bishops in neighboring territories. In that year Pope Clement XI disregarded the ancient rights of the See of Utrecht when he attempted to dismiss the Archbishop, Pieter Codde. The Jesuits had urged the Pope to do this on the charge that Codde was a heretic (specifically, a Jansenist).

It is clear from even these few examples that the black mark of "Jansenism" was applied to opinions unrelated to predestination and often supported by Scripture.  Some were even adopted by the Roman Catholic Church eventually.  The 1910 edition of the [Roman] Catholic Encyclopedia therefore concedes that at the beginning of the 18th century "'Jansenism' was beginning to serve as a label for rather divergent tendencies, not all of which deserved equal reprobation."  

Non-Jansenists who held any of these condemned beliefs could be labeled as "Jansenist" and persecuted as heretics.  Many religious were punished for simply refusing to sign an oath assenting to all 101 condemnations in Unigenitus (including the three cited in the table, above).  The most famous person punished for refusing to sign this oath was the archbishop of Paris, Cardinal Louis Antoine de Noailles.

One could also be labeled a Jansenist for questioning or challenging the Pope on any matter, as the Old Catholic Church was. In France, clergy were branded as "Jansenists" if they expressed the opinion that the Pope was infallible when defining dogma, but not when he stated facts separate from divine revelation.

In France and elsewhere, those accused of Jansenism could be imprisoned for years.  Isaac- Louis Le Maistre de Sacy, translator of the New Testament into French, was imprisoned for three years in the notorious Bastille prison in Paris.  He was released only when his accuser, Cardinal Richelieu, died.  Pasquier Quesnel (the subject of the papal bull Unigenitus) was imprisoned by a Belgian archbishop until Quesnel escaped.  Because of this persecution, many French religious fled to the Netherlands where religious tolerance was national policy.

The explanation for this extreme reaction by the popes is that the papacy was seriously threatened at this time.  The Moslem Ottoman Empire was on the march in Eastern Europe and gaining control in the Mediterranean.  Anglican Britain was a world power and had recently conquered Roman Catholic French Canada.  Protestants and humanists competed for the hearts and minds of Europeans.  In France, the Catholic monarchy competed with the pope for control of the French Church.  The popes therefore saw the Jansenists and would-be reformers only as new threats to the papacy and not as misguided faithful needing correction.

The Jansenists, through their scholarship, piety, and charity, attracted many educated followers and defenders.  These included royalty, clergy, and prominent laity.  This was particularly true at the self-professed Jansenist convent of Port-Royal in France.  At Port-Royal laypeople gathered to study the Bible and early Church theologians and to go on spiritual retreats.  Port-Royal was also the birthplace of revolutionary concepts in logic and reasoning. The famous French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal and the philosopher Antoine Arnauld were prominent Jansenists who taught and studied at Port-Royal.

Some of the reforms and innovations the Jansenists advocated were later adopted by the Roman Catholic Church, such as celebrating mass in the language of the people, scripture study, and spiritual retreats for laypeople.  However, the harm done by the Jansenists' grievous heresy of predestination far outweighed any good they brought to the Church.  The same can be said of the response to this heresy by Pope Clement XI and his successors. 

The See of Utrecht maintains its rights

Archbishop Codde denied the Jesuit's allegation that he was a Jansenist: he condemned the heresy of predestination. In truth the Jesuits wanted Codde removed from office because his Church had sheltered those fleeing arrest and imprisonment in France for being accused of Jansenism.  This confounded the Jesuits' "Counter-Reformation" efforts. 

Pope Clement XI formed a committee of cardinals to investigate the Jesuits' charge against Archbishop Codde.  It found Codde innocent.  However, the Committee still required the Archbishop to sign an oath.  The oath (the formulary of the late Pope Alexander VII) listed five ideas that it said were contained in the Jansenist book Augustinus and stated that these five ideas were heresies.  The oath was:

Codde said he agreed that the five ideas were heresies, but could not swear they were contained in the book since he had not read Augustinus (a book which had been declared heretical by Rome).  He therefore refused to sign this oath.

Having failed to convict Codde by the committee, the Jesuits now sought and obtained his dismissal by papal decree on the same false charge, this time based on Codde's refusal to sign the oath. To this day most religious histories erroneously refer to Archbishop Codde and the Old Catholic Church as "Jansenist".

For the Pope to act as his own tribunal of canon law and remove a bishop for heresy was a papal right since the Council of Trent in 1545.  However, the bishops of Utrecht were protected from such dismissal by that special perpetual right granted the See of Utrecht by Pope Leo X 25 years earlier in 1520. 

Furthermore, the Pope's own investigative committee had found Codde innocent of heresy. There were therefore no grounds for dismissal under canon law.

Archbishop Codde had the moral and canon law right to remain in office and he did, continuing to protest his innocence. The controversy between the Sees of Rome and Utrecht was therefore of canon law versus papal fiat, not the heresy of predestination.  

This controversy split Roman Catholics in the Netherlands. To end the conflict of conscience many Dutch Catholics faced, Archbishop Codde retired in 1704. However, the See of Utrecht continued to administer itself, as was its ancient right. Those that remained loyal to the See of Utrecht began calling themselves "Roman Catholics of the Old Episcopal Clergy." The name was later shortened to "Old Catholics."

The calumny of Jansenism against the Old Catholic Church

Because of Archbishop Codde's insistence on the ancient rights of the See of Utrecht and his providing refuge to those fleeing religious persecution in France, the Old Catholic Church suffered the calumny of "Jansenism".  This continues today. 

The 2003 edition of the [Roman] Catholic University of America's New Catholic Encyclopedia says without evidence or explanation that the Old Catholic Church was guilty of "Juridical Jansenism, as distinct from preexisting theological and moral Jansenism" [Vol 14, p.363].  It also mentions that a "commission of cardinals studied [Archbishop Codde's] case."  However, this New Catholic Encyclopedia article fails to mention the committee's verdict, which was that Codde was innocent of heresy.

Other histories of this subject, either written by or referencing Roman Catholic sources, repeat without evidence the Jansenist calumny against the Old Catholic Church. Most also describe Archbishop Codde's retirement in 1704 as his "dismissal" by the Pope.

The 2003 edition of the New Catholic Encyclopedia is more accurate than most histories, however.  It acknowledges that efforts by the See of Utrecht to reconcile with Rome throughout the 18th century "were frustrated chiefly by divergent views concerning ecclesiastical law."  This had always been the reason for the conflict, not the heresy of predestination.

The reader who decides to research the period of the Jansenist crisis in Church history should always look for what specifically earned someone or something condemnation as "Jansenist." Often it will not be the heresy of predestination, but rather an idea later adopted by Rome.

Because religious reformers and Jansenists fled to the Netherlands to escape persecution, the world's largest collection of documents on the era of the Jansenist crisis is to be found in Utrecht, Netherlands, preserved by the Old Catholic Church. Those documents are now available on microfiche.

 Next:  Chapter 3 "The Old Catholic Movement in Modern Times"