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| A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z |
(Latinin, not, andcastus, chaste).
Incest is sexual intercourse between those who arerelated by blood or marriage.
Its specific malice is contracted by such unlawful commerce between those related within the fourth degree ofconsanguinity oraffinity, as computed by canonists. The guilt is incurred not only by thosesinful acts which are, astheologians say, fully consummated, but also by incomplete acts.
The particular deformity of incest comes not merely from the violation of thevirtue ofchastity, but also from the offence against the mingled affection and reverence with whichparents and, proportionately, otherrelatives should be regarded.
It iscertain that this crime has its distinctive enormity from the prohibition of thenatural law, where there is question of the first degree in the direct line, for instance, betweenparents and children. For the other degrees it is probable that recourse must be had to the ecclesiastical law which invalidates marriage within those limits.
It is commonly held, with regard to those related byconsanguinity oraffinity, that with the exception of the first degree in the direct line all forms of incest are, morally speaking, of the samespecies, and therefore for the integrity ofconfession there is nonecessity to distinguish between them. It must be noted, however, that carnalsins between those who are spiritually or legallyrelated within the degrees that would render their marriage invalid, are separatespecies of incest.
Adecree of the Holy Office, 25 June, 1885, declares that in applications for matrimonialdispensations it is no longernecessary to make mention of the circumstance of incest relations between the petitioners.
APA citation.Delany, J.(1910).Incest. InThe Catholic Encyclopedia.New York: Robert Appleton Company.http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07717a.htm
MLA citation.Delany, Joseph."Incest."The Catholic Encyclopedia.Vol. 7.New York: Robert Appleton Company,1910.<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07717a.htm>.
Transcription.This article was transcribed for New Advent by Christine J. Murray.
Ecclesiastical approbation.Nihil Obstat. June 1, 1910. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor.Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.
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