scholarly journals Ritual Void or Ritual Muddle? Deconsecration Rites of Roman Catholic Church Buildings

Religions ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (10) ◽  
pp. 517
Author(s):  
Kim de Wildt
Keyword(s):  
Pastoral Care ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Sacred Space ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Church Building ◽  
Subject Orientation ◽  
Church Buildings

The decrease in people who regularly celebrate liturgy in western Europe has led to the question of what to do with so-called obsolete church buildings. This question not only refers to whether or not a church building will be converted, reused or demolished, but also to the question of whether or not such a building needs to be deconsecrated, and if so, what does deconsecration of a church building actually entail? In this contribution, I will consider the role deconsecration rites play in the Roman Catholic church when a church building is taken out of liturgical use. In Roman Catholic liturgy, there are no prescribed, official deconsecration rites that are mandatory for a church building that is to be taken out of liturgical use. The actual deconsecration of a church building is, according to canon law, established by a decree that is issued by the responsible diocesan bishop. In the case of a church being taken out of liturgical use, however, there seems to be a shift from having a ritual void with regard to deconsecration rites, and also a focus on the “legitimate” way (in the sense of canon law) to deconsecrate a church building (object orientation), towards, in recent decades, paying more attention to a growing pastoral need (subject orientation) for deconsecration rites. These new ritual initiatives can be regarded as forms of pastoral care intended to help parishioners cope with the loss of their church building. I will show that different interpretations of canon law articles complicate straightforward answers to the question of which arguments are legitimate to deconsecrate a church. Furthermore, I will address the “ritual muddle”, the mixture of the actual deconsecration act in the sense of canon law and deconsecration rites that, from the perspective of canon law, do not effect church deconsecration. I will also address the differentiation between desecration and deconsecration, address historical forms of deconsecration rites and pay attention to the making and unmaking of sacred space. Finally, I will focus on contemporary deconsecration rites against the background of the complex reality in which such rites are situated.

Sermons and the Performance of Historiographical Authority in the Construction of the Roman Catholic Built Landscape, 1880–1890

2020 ◽  
pp. 118-136
Author(s):  
Niamh NicGhabhann
Keyword(s):  
Sense Of Community ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Building Projects ◽  
Church Building ◽  
The Many ◽  
New Buildings ◽  
The Church ◽  
Church Buildings

During the nineteenth century, infrastructures of devotion and religious worship in Ireland changed dramatically. By 1900, the landscape was transformed by the presence of highly decorated, prominent church buildings. The many building projects of the Roman Catholic church were highly dependent on donations and fundraising. This essay explores the extent to which historical narratives, images, and ideas were used in order to motivate donations, and to develop a sense of community engagement with these new buildings as both symbols of past persecution overcome, and future spiritual glory. It explores sermons and speeches associated with new church building projects as sites for the performance of historiographical authority, and traces the emergence of key narratives of identity and memory, which were powerfully expressed through the spaces and architectural forms of the church buildings.

‘Anglicanism’ and the Origins of the Church of England

2014 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 319-334
Author(s):  
Peter McCullough
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
The Church ◽  
Historical Sketch ◽  
Formative Years

This article aims to provide an introductory historical sketch of the origins of the Church of England as a background for canon law in the present-day Anglican Communion and the Roman Catholic Church. Written by a specialist for non-specialists, it summarises the widely held view among ecclesiastical historians that if the Church of England could ever be said to have had a ‘normative’ period, it is not to be found in its formative years in the middle decades of the sixteenth century, and that, in particular, the origins of the Church of England and of what we now call ‘Anglicanism’ are not the same thing.

The Never-Ending Story? Or, Does the Roman Catholic Church Remain Vulnerable to Charges of Improper Handling of Clergy Child Sex Abuse?

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 270-299 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick S Nash
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Change ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Religious Institutions ◽  
Sex Abuse ◽  
Organizational Settings ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Child Sex Abuse

Abstract This article explores whether the Roman Catholic Church’s response to the clergy child sex abuse scandal shields it from further charges of improper handling of cases. It begins by noting the current topicality of institutionalized abuse and how several high-profile public inquiries have recently been established to investigate child sex abuse across a range of secular and religious organizational settings. Although numerous religious institutions have become embroiled in clergy child abuse crises, the Catholic Church has come in for particular scrutiny and condemnation on account of its distinctive institutional characteristics which have exacerbated its own abuse scandal in a uniquely severe way. The Church’s own understanding of this issue is that a culture of antinomianism has taken root within the clerical hierarchy and that, were canon law to be applied properly, the crisis would be resolved. This contrasts quite dramatically with the typical external understanding of the crisis which sees the canonical legal system as part of the problem, namely the Church’s refusal to cooperate fully with the secular criminal justice system and effective assumption of a criminal jurisdiction of its own. The article concludes with a final prognosis of the prospects of fundamental legal and cultural change.

The Canon Law Society of Great Britain and Ireland and its Newsletter

1999 ◽  
Vol 5 (25) ◽  
pp. 284-285
Author(s):  
Robert Ombresop
Keyword(s):  
Great Britain ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Annual Conference ◽  
Pope John Paul Ii ◽  
Code Of Canon Law ◽  
John Paul Ii

The organisation now known as the Canon Law Society of Great Britain and Ireland was founded in 1957, and its Newsletter was first published in 1969. The activities, publications and achievements of the Society within the Roman Catholic Church are manifold, and were acknowledged by Pope John Paul II when he granted an audience to participants of the 1992 annual conference held in Rome. This papal address is printed at the beginning of The Canon Law: Letter & Spirit (London 1995), the full commentary on the 1983 Code of Canon Law prepared by the Society.

Library of Congress Religious Law Classification Schedules: Elegant, Flexible and User-Friendly

2001 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 488-496 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucia Diamond
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Development Process ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Library Of Congress ◽  
New Classification ◽  
Religious Law ◽  
History Of ◽  
User Friendly

The Library of Congress recently issued new classification schedules for the law of the Roman Catholic Church and for the History of Canon Law. The schedules were developed by Dr. Jolande E. Goldberg of the Library of Congress with input from librarians and scholars from many countries. During the final months of their development, we spoke, individually and together, to several groups of librarians to introduce them to the elegant structure of these forthcoming schedules and to get reaction from librarians who had, and had not been, involved earlier in the development process. My role was to provide some context to the content of the schedules. I discussed the concept of religious law for purposes of these schedules and introduced the historical development of religious law, particularly that of the Roman Catholic Church.

A Question of Interpretation: The Roman Rota and the Theology of Marriage

2006 ◽  
Vol 8 (39) ◽  
pp. 425-437
Author(s):  
Aidan McGrath Ofm
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Code Of Canon Law ◽  
Complete Reversal ◽  
The Law ◽  
Roman Catholics ◽  
The Way

Judges need guidance if they are to apply the law in particular circumstances with an even hand. For Roman Catholics, Canon 19 of the 1983 Code of Canon Law provides this guidance by reference to the practice of the Roman Curia and by the constant opinion of learned authors. Useful as these supplementary sources are, they mean that judges have to trust that those responsible for making decisions in the Roman Curia and the learned authors have drawn their conclusions on a sound basis. This study considers what happened when a specific document was misunderstood in the Roman Catholic Church for almost four hundred years. The document, a letter from Pope Sixtus V to his Nuncio in Spain in 1587, responded to a specific query concerning the capacity for marriage of men who had been castrated. The interpretation of the letter defined the Roman Catholic Church's concept of marriage in general and its understanding of the impediment of impotence for four centuries. In the twentieth century, several Roman Catholic judges and canonists refused to take at face value the conclusions offered by other judges and learned authors, and decided to carry out their own analysis of the document in question. This resulted in a complete reversal of the way in which marriage cases were considered by the Apostolic Tribunal of the Roman Rota, and contributed to the emergence of a much richer and more integrated theology of marriage.

Religious Legal Pluralism Revisited – The Status of the Roman Catholic Church and Her Canon Law in Singapore

2012 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 1-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary F. Bell
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Legal Pluralism ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Jewish Law ◽  
State Recognition ◽  
Legal Traditions ◽  
The Status ◽  
Recognition And Enforcement

AbstractBy religious legal pluralism we usually mean state-recognised legal pluralism, such as the kind of legal pluralism implemented in Singapore through the Administration of Muslim Law Act. But there is also religious legal pluralism outside State recognition and enforcement. Many religions have very long legal traditions which have survived, often without much support or official recognition by States (Jewish law, for example). In this paper we shall look at one such tradition, the canon law of the Latin Church of the Roman Catholic Church and its implementation by the Church in Singapore, including the establishment of very busy ecclesiastical tribunals in Singapore to administer disputes relating to the possible nullity of religious marriages, for example. The hope is that this example of Canon Law in Singapore will show that there can be very detailed and formal religious laws implemented by formal institutions such as tribunals outside the ambit of the State.

Papal Primacy: An Anglican Perspective

2003 ◽  
Vol 7 (33) ◽  
pp. 112-126
Author(s):  
John Hind
Keyword(s):  
Great Britain ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Code Of Canon Law ◽  
Ecclesiastical Law ◽  
The Church

I am grateful to the Ecclesiastical Law Society and the Canon Law Society of Great Britain and Ireland for their invitation to address this theme, although I have to confess, as a non-lawyer, I do feel rather a fraud standing here. I take comfort, however, first from the fact that, albeit welcome, your invitation was unsought, and second from my understanding that the purpose of canon law is to give legal expression to the theology of the church and that the purpose of the theology of the Church (in its positive and articulated aspects) is to explain the purposes and the work of God. In other words, the ultimate point of canon law is and must be pastoral, as is well expressed by the last canon, Canon 1752, of the 1983 Code of Canon Law for the Roman Catholic Church, with its reference to ‘the salvation of souls, which in the Church must always be the supreme law’.

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