continues, a good minister does not dispense better alms than a bad one. And, if the evil of a bad minister doesn’t diminish the effect of his baptism, therefore the goodness of a good one doesn’t augment the goodness of his. Peter’s utterly predictable answer is that in substantial matters the operation of a good minister isn’t of greater value than a good one, because God here operates as auctor, and the man as mere minister.
Peter then moves on to ask if baptism can be given by those who do not have holy orders, whether lay people or angels.104 His responsio brings out the fact that baptism is the sacrament of maximum necessity, because neither children nor adults may be saved without it. In extremis any kind of water suffices for baptism, and any man can give it. Indeed, Peter had said a little earlier that in the case of necessity even an old woman (vetula) can perform an efficacious baptism.105 That view was commonplace. Albert the Great, for instance, had affirmed that “When an old woman baptizes, the baptism actually does take place” (vetula baptizat, et baptizatum est), emphasizing that in casu necessitatis the person performing this rite does not have to be of the masculine sex, have holy orders or jurisdiction, or be living a good life.106 However, no-one actually recommended this course of action, or thought for a moment that it should be the norm. Ideally, an ordained minister should do the deed, just as proper holy water should be used, as Peter of Tarantasia (typically) emphasizes. He sums up by saying that the bestowal of baptism may be justified on two grounds: either with reference to authoritative office, which applies solely to a priest, or ex iuris permissione (i.e., in accordance with what is legally permitted), which applies to others, chiefly in case of necessity. But what about angels? They cannot baptize or consecrate ex officio, Peter explains, but only by special divine mandate. And, the angel in question must be a good one— in this very special case, it would seem, individual goodness does matter after all.
As far as lay people are concerned, however, personal virtue or vice is irrelevant in the emergency conferral of baptism. The schoolmen are utterly unanimous on that point, and there is little variation in how the issue is handled.107 However, Thomas Aquinas isolates and treats separately the specific question, can a woman baptize?108 He begins by quoting the Council of Carthage’s prohibition: “A woman, no matter how learned and holy, should not presume to teach men in public assembly or to baptize others.”109 Given that it is perfectly clear that women cannot teach publicly (it being “shameful for a woman to speak in church”; I Corinthians 14:35), it would seem that they cannot baptize either. Moreover, baptism belongs to the prelatical office (the officium praelationis), and thus should be dispensed by priests who have the cure of souls. Because women cannot hold this office (“I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over men”; I Timothy 2:12), they lack the authority to baptize. Aquinas then embarks on a somewhat bizarre excursus. In the spiritual rebirth of baptism “water seems to take the place of the maternal womb.” But the person who baptizes “seems rather to have the task of father (patris officium)”: this is not fitting for a woman, and therefore a woman cannot baptize. This assertion is set up only to be knocked down, of course, but its deficiency as an argument is particularly glaring: a woman’s material possession of a womb means that a body-metaphor relating to spiritual matters works against her, destroying her case to be allowed to baptize.
Not one of Aquinas’s better moments. Still, he does invoke the contrast between the material and the spiritual in his response. In human generation, male and female function in accordance with their different natures, the male being active and the female passive. “So a woman cannot be the active principle of generation but the passive only.” But in spiritual generation people work not by their own powers but as instruments of the power of Christ, and therefore both men and women can baptize in casu necessitatis. One might interrogate this position further, and ask, if in certain spiritual matters men and women operate not in accordance with their different and distinctive natures but as the equal instruments of a higher agency, is there not a basis here for treating male and female equally in respect of their right to preach and indeed to confect the Eucharist?
But of course Aquinas does not go down that route; for that sort of argument we will have to await the Lollard theology of Walter Brut and John Purvey (as discussed in Chapter 3 below). What Aquinas does say here is that a woman, although not permitted to teach publicly (publice docere), can nevertheless “instruct and admonish privately” (potest tamen privata doctrina vel monitione aliquem instruere): on the same argument, while she may not baptize publicly and solemnly she can baptize “in case of necessity.” For the purposes of this argument, then, baptism in necessitate is put on a par with private teaching. And the emphasis is very much on what is permissible in the most extreme of circumstances. If there is a capable layman present, then he should perform the baptism rather than a woman; if there is a cleric present the layman should defer to him; and of course if an ordained priest is available, he must do the job. Aquinas cites I Corinthians 11:3 in justification: “the head of a woman is man and the head of man is Christ.” So, if and only if there is no supposedly superior individual available, should a woman act. The rigidity of this hierarchical system somewhat undermines the apparent inclusiveness of the auctoritates with which Aquinas had started his responsio. There it had been affirmed that Christ principally baptizes, so the person of whatever sex “on whom you see the spirit descend and remain” (John 1:33) can perform the physical action, particularly in view of the fact that “in Christ there is neither male nor female” (Galatians 3:28). The force of that Galatians passage was further circumscribed and muted when orthodox theologians came to ponder the question of whether women can preach, as we shall see.
Indeed, many of the thirteenth-century quaestiones on the proper ministry of the sacraments have a curiously prophetic quality—they indicate the shape of things to come in late-medieval England. This need not surprise us, given that the Church had considerable experience of dealing with earlier versions of heresies espoused by Wyclif and his followers, within Catharism and Waldensianism.110 Certain “contrary opinions” which were canvassed in the course of the affirmation of orthodoxy, allowed a brief span of life within the firmly controlled thought structure of the quaestio, were to return to haunt the establishment. Excellent examples are afforded by discussions of the relationship between the sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist included in the Alexandri summa111 and Bonaventure’s Sentences commentary,112 particularly since both address the issue of the moral goodness of the person administering the sacraments, whether priest or layman. The Alexandri summa lists inter alia the following arguments against the proposition that priests alone can confect the Eucharist. The works of a man who is just and good are pleasing to God, so why can’t he consecrate? Also, the sinner loses all dignity, and if such dignity is necessary for consecration, then surely the just layman possesses the potestas consecrandi? If the unjust priest is said to have this power, does not the just layman have it to an even greater extent? Then there is the telling parallel with the sacrament of baptism. Priests are given this power ex officio, yet nevertheless if a lay person baptizes, the sacrament is efficacious. Although priests have the power of baptizing, laymen can do it also: so, the same argument would seem to apply to the consecration of the Eucharist. Since the power of baptizing is widely granted, so also should be the power of consecration. At I Peter 2:9 God says to all just men, “you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood”; it follows that priestly privilege belongs to all just men, and hence they can consecrate.113
Naturally, the Alexandri summa gives these arguments short shrift. Unjust priests do possess the potestas consecrandi: after all, the works of the unjust may actually may be pleasing to God, as when they afflict those who have turned away from Him. Then again, while it’s true that whatever the just man does is pleasing to God, his justice does not enable him to consecrate—holy orders are required. Concerning dignity, it may be said there are two kinds: dignity of merit and dignity of office or authority. If a priest lacks the dignity of personal merit he does nevertheless possess the dignity of office and authority; on the contrary, the just layman lacks the dignity of office and authority though he enjoys the dignity of merit. But the power of consecrating depends on the power
