INTERDICT, an ecclesiastical censure or penalty in the Roman Catholic church, consisting in the withdrawal of the administration of certain sacraments, of the celebration of public and of the solemn burial-service. Interdicts are of three which affect a particular place, and thus Comprehend all, without dis Unction, who reside_ herem; personal, which only affect a person or persons, and which reach this person or persons, and these alone, no matter where found; and mixed, which affect both a place and its inhabitants, so that the latter would be bound by the interdict even outside of its purely local limits. The principle on which this penalty is founded may be traced in the early discipline of public penance, by which: penitents were for a time debarred from the sacraments, and front the privilege of presence at the celebration of the eucharist; but it was only in the mediawal period that, owing to circumstances elsewhere explained (see EXCOMMUNICATION), it came into use as an ordinary church censure in the then frequent conflicts of the ecclesiastical and civil power. It was designed to awaken the national conscience to the nature of the crime, by including all alike in the penalty with which it was visited. The most remarkable iuterdicts are those laid upon Scotland in 1180 by Alexander III.; on Poland by Gregory VII., on occasion of the murder of Stanislaus at the altar; by Innocent III. en France, under Philippe Auguste, in 1200; and on England under John in 1209. The description of England under the last-named interdict, as detailed by some of the con temporary chromelers, presents a strangely picture of the condition of the public mind, which it is difficult with our modern ideas fully to realize or to under stand. It would be a great mistake, however, to suppose that during the continuance
of an interdict the people were entirely destitute of spiritual assistance. The interdict mainly regarded the solemnities of public worship; it was permitted to administer baptism, confirmation, and the eucharist in all cases of urgency; to confess and absolve all who were not personally the guilty participators in the crime which the interdict was meant to punish; to celebrate marriage, but without the solemnities; and to confer orders in cases of necessity. And under the popes, Gregory IX., Innocent III. and and Boniface III., still further mitigations of its rigor were introduced, one of which was the removal of the interdict and restoration of public worship on certain great festivals, especially Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, Assumption, and All Souls. The council of Easel enacted very stringent rules as to the use of this penalty, and in later times the general interdict has been entirely disused, although occasionally, in very special circumstances, and to mark the horror of the church for some enormous crime, instances are still recorded in which a particular place or church has been visited with the penalty of a local interdict.