Dice

Dice The playing at dice or other games of chance has always been discountenanced by the Church. The Paedagogue of Clement forbids it. Apollonius denounces the Montanists for it, asking whether prophets play at dice. The Apostolical Canons forbid the practice, under pain of degradation or excommunication. The Council of Eliberis (A.D. 305) and the Trullan Council (at the close of the 7th century) both forbade it. Justinian denounced games of chance, and even the being present at them, affixing a penalty to the act by the clergy, of suspension and seclusion in a monastery for three years. The account Jerome gives of Synesius alleging his own propensity to gambling as a reason for not being made bishop, and the account of the accusation by certain nuns of the convent of St. Radegund at Poictiers against their abbess, for dicing, and other references of like character, show that the habit was nevertheless all too frequent in the Church.