In the canon law of the Catholic Church, the loss of clerical state is the removal of a bishop, priest, or deacon from the status of being a member of the clergy.
In law, motu proprio describes an official act taken without a formal request from another party. Some jurisdictions use the term sua sponte for the same concept.
A papal renunciation also called a papal abdication, occurs when the current pope of the Catholic Church voluntarily resigns his position. As a pope's time in office has conventionally lasted from his election until his death, a papal renunciation is an uncommon event. Before the 21st century, only five popes unambiguously resigned with historical certainty, all between the 10th and 15th centuries. Additionally, there are disputed claims of four popes having resigned, dating from the 3rd to the 11th centuries; a fifth disputed case may have involved an antipope.
The process of beatification and canonization has undergone various reforms in the history of the Roman Catholic Church. For current practice, as well as a discussion of similar processes in other churches, see the article on canonization. This article describes the process as it was before the promulgation of the Codex Iuris Canonici of 1983.
A benefice or living is a reward received in exchange for services rendered and as a retainer for future services. The Roman Empire used the Latin term beneficium as a benefit to an individual from the Empire for services rendered. Its use was adopted by the Western Church in the Carolingian era as a benefit bestowed by the crown or church officials. A benefice specifically from a church is called a precaria, such as a stipend, and one from a monarch or nobleman is usually called a fief. A benefice is distinct from an allod, in that an allod is property owned outright, not bestowed by a higher authority.
The infallibility of the Church is the belief that the Holy Spirit preserves the Christian Church from errors that would contradict its essential doctrines. It is related to, but not the same as, indefectibility, that is, "she remains and will remain the Institution of Salvation, founded by Christ, until the end of the world." The doctrine of infallibility is premised on the authority Jesus granted to the apostles to "bind and loose" and in particular the promises to Peter in regard to papal infallibility.
Pedro Martínez de Luna y Pérez de Gotor, known as el Papa Luna(lit. 'the Moon Pope') or Pope Luna, was an Aragonese nobleman who was christened antipope Benedict XIII during the Western Schism.
In the jurisprudence of the canon law of the Catholic Church, a dispensation is the exemption from the immediate obligation of law in certain cases. Its object is to modify the hardship often arising from the rigorous application of general laws to particular cases, and its essence is to preserve the law by suspending its operation in such cases.
A Commissary Apostolic is Commissary who has been appointed by the pope, hence commissary Apostolic.
Confirmation in the Catholic Church is one of the seven sacraments. It is also one of the three sacraments of initiation into the Catholic Church, the other two being Baptism and Holy Communion.
A rescript is a public government document. More formally, it refers to such a document issued not on the initiative of the author, but in response to a question posed to the author. The word originates from replies issued by Roman emperors to such questions and is also used in modern legal terminology and the Papal curia.
Obreption and subreption are terms used in the canon law of the Catholic church for species of fraud by which an ecclesiastical rescript is obtained.
The Apostolic Datary was one of the five Ufficii di Curia in the Roman Curia of the Roman Catholic Church. It was instituted no later than the 14th AD. Pope Paul VI abolished it in 1967.
Ecclesiastical letters are publications or announcements of the organs of Roman Catholic ecclesiastical authority, e.g. the synods, but more particularly of pope and bishops, addressed to the faithful in the form of letters.
A faculty, in the canon law of the Roman Catholic Church, is an ecclesiastical right conferred on a subordinate, by a superior who enjoys jurisdiction in the external forum. These rights then allow the subordinate to act, in the external or internal forum, validly or lawfully, or at least safely.
The Acts of Roman Congregations is a term of the canon law of the Catholic Church, used to designate the documents issued by the Roman Congregations, in virtue of powers conferred on them by the Roman Pontiff.
Regarding the canon law of the Catholic Church, canonists provide and obey rules for the interpretation and acceptation of words, in order that legislation is correctly understood and the extent of its obligation is determined.
In the canon law of the Catholic Church, custom is the repeated and constant performance of certain acts for a defined period of time, which, with the approval of the competent legislator, thereby acquire the force of law. A custom is an unwritten law introduced by the continuous acts of the faithful with the consent of the legitimate legislator. Historically, some ritual and regulatory customs would be recorded in texts known as customaries for use both within particular cathedrals and religious orders or for dissemination among associated ecclesial communities.
The jurisprudence of Catholic canon law is the complex of legal theory, traditions, and interpretative principles of Catholic canon law. In the Latin Church, the jurisprudence of canon law was founded by Gratian in the 1140s with his Decretum. In the Eastern Catholic canon law of the Eastern Catholic Churches, Photios holds a place similar to that of Gratian for the West.
In Catholic canon law, the canon law of contract follows that of the civil jurisdiction in which Catholic canon law operates.
