The second element comes also from God, but indirectly, as it reaches the individual minister through the Church. It is the authority or commission of the Church to a priest or bishop to exercise the power of pardoning which he has received of God. This is called jurisdiction. It is included in the words said to Peter: "To thee will I give the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound also in heaven, and whatsoever then shalt loose on earth shall be loosed also in heaven."[56] Of the which, Tertullian, writing more than sixteen centuries ago, says: "For if then thinkest heaven is still closed, remember the Lord left here the keys thereof to Peter, and through him to the Church."[57] Many a man has all the innate and acquired talent to be an excellent judge, a proficient ambassador, an efficient naval or military officer; but over and above capability, there is needed commission or appointment by competent authority. So, in like manner, bishops and priests possess the power to pardon, but jurisdiction is needed to say on whom and where this power is to be exercised. Merely because a man is ordained validly, this does not give him the power to absolve; without jurisdiction, his absolution has no more value than would that of a layman. It will be evident that as jurisdiction comes from God but through the Church, she can control those who are to exercise the power of pardoning sin. Hence, she insists that her priests shall carefully study the moral law, just as a lawyer does civil law. She exacts that those who hear confessions shall, by examination, prove their competency in the way of knowledge. She trains from boyhood her Levites to the sacred work they have to do, and she permits only those to be admitted to the Ministry of Reconciliation whose piety, past conduct, and judgment commend them for confessions. To those so approved she gives jurisdiction--or, as it is technically called, "faculties"--specifying where and on whom such power may be exercised. This jurisdiction is always granted for a limited period of time, during which it may be withdrawn if deemed advisable by the grantor. Thus, then, is every care taken in the selection and in the preparation of priests for the work of hearing confessions and absolving from sin. Even after they are duly appointed, the restriction of the power to time, places, persons, and causes, together with the varied tests of competency afforded by the conferences on cases of conscience and other theological knowledge, held at frequent and regular intervals in each diocese, under the direction of the bishop, constitute a solid control over those exercising the Ministry of Reconciliation. Then the priest's own belief and conscience, as well as the obligation to confess his sins and seek absolution for them, add to the faithful exercise of his duties as confessor.