Confirmation of bishops

In canon law the confirmation of a bishop is the act by which the election of a new bishop receives the assent of the proper ecclesiastical authority.

In the early centuries of the history of the Christian Church the election or appointment of a suffragan bishop was confirmed and approved by the metropolitan and his suifragans assembled in synod. By the 4th Canon of the First Council of Nicaea (325 AD), however, it was decreed that the right of confirmation should belong to the metropolitan bishop of each province, a rule confirmed by the 12th Canon of the Council of Laodicaea. For the appointment of a metropolitan no papal confirmation was required either in the West or East; but the practice which grew up, from the 6th century onwards, of the popes presenting the pallium, at first honoris causa, to newly appointed metropolitans gradually came to symbolize the licence to exercise metropolitan jurisdiction.

By the 8th and 9th centuries, the papal right of confirmation by this means was strenuously asserted; yet as late as the 13th century, there were instances of metropolitans exercising their functions without receiving the pallium, and it was not until after this date that the present rule and practice of the Roman Catholic Church was definitively established. The canonical right of the metropolitan to confirm the election of his suffragans was still affirmed by Gratian; but from the time of Pope Alexander III (1159–1181) the canon lawyers, under the influence of the False Decretals, began to claim this right for the pope.

From the 13th century onwards, it was effectively exercised, though the all but universal practice of the popes of reserving and providing to vacant bishoprics, initiated by Pope Clement V, obscured the issue, since in the case of papal nominations no confirmation was required. The question, however, was raised, in connection with that of the papal reservations and provisions, at the councils of Constance and Basel. The former shelved it in the interests of peace; but the latter once more formulated the principle that elections in the churches were to be free and their result confirmed according to the provisions of the common law (juxta juris communis dispositionem), i.e. by the immediate superior to whom the right of confirmation belonged.

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