INJUNCTUM NOBIS
Pope Pius IV, 1564
Shortly after the final meeting of the Council of Treat, Pope Pius IV issued a
profession of faith to be recited publicly by bishops and other clergy. It began with
a statement of basic beliefs that all Christians accepted about such things as God’s
creation of the world and Jesus’s life and resurrection. The second part set out
specifically Catholic doctrines on every major point of controversy with Protestants,
which had recently been affirmed at Trent. This became the standard profession of
faith to be recited by converts to Catholicism for centuries…
I, [name], with steadfast faith believe and profess each and all the things
contained in the Symbol of faith which the holy Roman Church uses, namely…
I most firmly acknowledge and embrace Apostolic and ecclesiastical traditions
and other observances and constitutions of the same Church. I acknowledge the
sacred Scripture according to the sense which Holy Mother Church has held and
holds, to whom it belongs to decide upon the true sense and interpretation of
the holy Scriptures, nor will I ever receive and interpret the Scripture except
according to the unanimous consent of the Fathers.
I profess also that there are seven sacraments…I embrace and receive each and
all of the definitions and declarations of the sacred Council of Trent on Original
Sin and Justification.
I profess likewise that true God is offered in the Mass, a proper and propitiatory
sacrifice for the living and the dead, and that in the most Holy Eucharist there
are truly, really and substantially the body and blood, together with the soul
and the divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and that a conversion is made of the
whole substance of bread into his body and of the whole substance of wine into
his blood, which conversion the Catholic Church calls transubstantiation. I also
confess that the whole and entire Christ and the true sacrament is taken under
the one species alone.
I hold unswervingly that there is a purgatory and that the souls there detained
are helped by the intercessions of the faithful; likewise also that the Saints who
reign with Christ are to be venerated and invoked; that they offer prayers to
God for us and that their relics are to be venerated. I firmly assert that the
images of Christ and of the ever-Virgin Mother of God, as also those of other
Saints, are to be kept and retained, and that due honour and veneration is to be
accorded them; and I affirm that the power of indulgences has been left by
Christ in the Church, and that their use is very salutary for Christian people.
I recognize the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church as the mother and
mistress of all churches; and I vow and swear true obedience to the Roman
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Pontiff, the successor of blessed Peter, the chief of the Apostles and the
representative of Jesus Christ.
I accept and profess, without doubting, the traditions, definitions and
declarations of the sacred Cannons and Ecumenical Councils and especially
those of the holy Council of Trent; and at the same time I condemn, reject and
anathematize all things contrary thereto, and all heresies condemned, rejected
and anathematized by the Church. This true Catholic Faith (without which no
one can be in a state of salvation), which at this time I of my own will profess
and truly hold, I, [name], vow and swear, God helping me, most constantly to
keep and confess entire and undefiled to my life’s last breath, and that I will
endeavour, as far as in me shall lie, that it be held, taught and preached by my
subordinates or by those who shall be placed under my care: so help me God
and these Holy Gospels of God.
Source: Henry Bettenson, ed., Documents of the Christian Church, 2nd ed. (London: Oxford
University Press, 1963), 267-68 in Wiesner-Hanks, Merry, ed. Religious Transformations in
the Early Modern World: A Brief History with Documents (New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s,
2009), 73-5.
