Catholic religious order

1 Essential distinguishing mark

Solemn vows were originally considered indissoluble. As
noted below, dispensations began to be granted in later
times, but originally not even the Pope could dispense
from them.[2] If for a just cause a religious was expelled,
the vow of chastity remained unchanged and so rendered
invalid any attempt at marriage, the vow of obedience
obliged in relation, generally, to the bishop rather than to
the religious superior, and the vow of poverty was modied to meet the new situation but the expelled religious
could not, for example, will any goods to another; and
goods which came to him reverted at his death to his institute or to the Holy See.[3]

2 Weakening in 1917
The 1917 Code of Canon Law reserved the name religious order" for institutes in which the vows were solemn,
and used the term religious congregation" or simply
congregation for institutes with simple vows. The
Saint Francis of Assisi, founder of the mendicant Order of Friars
members of a religious order for men were called regMinor, as painted by El Greco.
ulars, those belonging to a religious congregation were
simply "religious", a term that applied also to regulars.
For women, those with simple vows were called sisters, with the term "nun" reserved in canon law for those
who belonged to an institute of solemn vows, even if in
they were allowed to take simple vows
Catholic religious orders are, historically, a category of some localities
[4]
instead.
Catholic religious institutes.
However, it abolished the distinction according to which
solemn vows, unlike simple vows, were indissoluble. It
recognized no totally indispensable religious vows and
thereby abrogated for the Latin Church the special consecration that distinguished orders from congregations,
while keeping some juridical distinctions.[3]

Subcategories are canons regular (canons and canonesses

regular who recite the divine oce and serve a church and
perhaps a parish); monastics (monks or nuns living and
working in a monastery and reciting the divine oce);
mendicants (friars or religious sisters who live from alms,
recite the divine oce, and, in the case of the men, participate in apostolic activities); and clerks regular (priests
who take religious vows and have a very active apostolic
life).

In practice, even before 1917 dispensations from solemn

religious vows were being obtained by grant of the Pope
himself, while departments of the Holy See and superiby it could dispense from simple
In the past, what distinguished religious orders from other ors specially delegated
[5]
religious
vows.
institutes was the classication of the vows that the members took in religious profession as solemn vows. Accord- The 1917 Code maintained a juridical distinction by
ing to this criterion, the last religious order founded was declaring invalid any marriage attempted by solemnly
that of the Bethlehem Brothers in 1673.[1] Nevertheless, professed religious or by those with simple vows to which
in the course of the 20th century some religious insti- the Holy See had attached the eect of invalidating
tutes outside the category of orders obtained permission marriage,[6] while stating that no simple vow rendered a
to make solemn vows, at least of poverty, thus blurring marriage invalid, except in the cases in which the Holy
See directed otherwise.[7] Thus members of orders
the distinction.
1

4 AUTHORITY STRUCTURE
gan to have some members who had all three solemn vows
or had members that took a solemn vow of poverty and
simple vows of chastity and obedience.

3 Further changes in 1983

The current Code of Canon Law, which came into force
in 1983, maintains the distinction between solemn and
simple vows,[10] but no longer makes any distinction between their juridical eects, including the distinction between orders and congregations. It has accordingly
dropped the language of the 1917 code and uses the single term religious institute (which appears nowhere in
the 1917 Code)[11] to designate all such institutes of consecrated life alike.[12]

The Hieronymite monks.

Thus the Church no longer draws the historical distinction between religious orders and congregations. It
applies to all such institutes the single name religious institute and the same rules of canon law.[13] While solemn
vows once meant those taken in what was called a religious order, today, in order to know when a vow is
solemn it will be necessary to refer to the proper law of
the institutes of consecrated life.[14]

Religious order and religious institute tend indeed to

be used now as synonyms, and canon lawyer Nicholas Cafardi, commenting on the fact that the canonical term is
were barred absolutely from marriage, and any marriage religious institute, can write that religious order is a
they attempted was invalid. Those who made simple vows colloquialism.[15]
were obliged not to marry, but if they did break their vow,
the marriage was considered valid.
Another dierence was that a professed religious of
solemn vows lost the right to own property and the capacity to acquire temporal goods for himself or herself, but
a professed religious of simple vows, while being prohibited by the vow of poverty from using and administering
property, kept ownership and the right to acquire more,
unless the constitutions of the religious institute explicitly
stated the contrary.[8]
After publication of the 1917 Code, many institutes with
simple vows appealed to the Holy See for permission to
make solemn vows. The Apostolic Constitution Sponsa
Christi of 21 November 1950 made access to that permission easier for nuns (in the strict sense), though not for
religious institutes dedicated to apostolic activity. Many
of these latter institutes of women then petitioned for
the solemn vow of poverty alone. Towards the end of
the Second Vatican Council, superiors general of clerical institutes and abbots president of monastic congregations were authorized to permit, for a just cause, their
subjects of simple vows who made a reasonable request
to renounce their property except for what would be required for their sustenance if they were to depart.[9] These
changes resulted in a further blurring of the previously
clear distinction between orders and congregations,
since institutes that were founded as congregations be-

4 Authority structure
A religious order is characterized by an authority structure where a superior general has jurisdiction over the
orders dependent communities. An exception is the
Order of St Benedict which is not a religious order in
this technical sense, because it has a system of independent houses, meaning that each abbey is autonomous.
However, the Constitutions governing the orders global
independent houses and its distinct congregations (of
which there are twenty) were approved by the pope. Likewise, according to rank and authority, the abbot primate's
position with regard to the other abbots [throughout the
world] is to be understood rather from the analogy of a
primate in a hierarchy than from that of the general of an
order like the Dominicans and Jesuits. [16]
The Canons Regular of Saint Augustine are in a situation similar to that of the Benedictines. They are organized in eight congregations, each headed by an abbot
general, but also have an Abbot Primate of the Confederated Canons Regular of Saint Augustine. And the
Cistercians are in thirteen congregations, each headed
by an abbot general or an abbot president, but do not
use the title of abbot primate.

6 See also
7 References
[1] lvarez Gmez, Jess, C.M.F., Historia de la vida religiosa, Volume III, Publicaciones Claretianas, Madrid,
1996.
[2] Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, II-II, q. 88, a.11
[3] Paul M. Quay, Renewal of Religious Orders, or Destruction?", in Commentarium pro Religiosis et Missionariis,
vol. 65 (1984), pp. 77-86
[4] 1917 Code of Canon Law, canon 488
[5] William Edward Addis, Thomas Arnold, A Catholic Dictionary Containing Some Account of the Doctrine, Discipline, Rites, Ceremonies, Councils and Religious Orders
of the Catholic Church, Part Two, p. 858 (reprinted by
Kessinger Publishing 2004)
[6] 1917 Code of Canon Law, canon 1073
[7] 1917 Code of Canon Law, canon 1058
[8] 1917 Code of Canon Law, canons 580-582
Thomas Schoen 1903, OCist.

List of institutes of consecrated

life in the Annuario Ponticio

The Annuario Ponticio lists for both men and women the
institutes of consecrated life and the like that are of pontical right (those that the Holy See has erected or approved by formal decree).[17] For the men, it gives what it
now calls the Historical-Juridical List of Precedence.[18]
The arrangement in this list dates back many decades.
It is found, for instance, in the 1964 edition of the Annuario Ponticio, pp. 807870, where the heading is
States of Perfection (of pontical right for men)". In
the 1969 edition the heading has become Religious and
Secular Institutes of Pontical Right for Men, a form it
kept until 1975 inclusive. Since 1976, when work was already advanced on revising the Code of Canon Law, the
list has been qualied as historical-juridical and still includes as orders the following institutes for men of the
Latin Church, while not distinguishing between orders
and congregations in the case of the Eastern Catholic
Churches and Latin Church women.
Within that long list, a relatively small section is devoted
to Latin-Rite orders for men:
The 2012 Annuario Ponticio, which devotes 19 pages to
this information on Latin-Rite orders for men, gives 35
pages to Latin-Rite "congregations" for men, 7 to Eastern
orders, religious congregations and societies of apostolic
life for men, and 198 pages to more concise information
on religious institutes for women.

[9] Yji Sugawara, Religious Poverty: from Vatican Council

II to the 1994 Synod of Bishops (Loyola Press 1997 ISBN
978-88-7652-698-5), pp. 127-128
[10] Code of Canon Law, canon 1192 2
[11] IntraText concordance to the 1917 Code
[12] Robert T. Kennedy, Study related to a pre-1983 book by
John J. McGrath Jurist, 1990, pp. 351-401
[13] Code of Canon Law, canons 607-709
[14] E. Caparros, M. Thriault, J. Thorne (editors), Code of
Canon Law Annotated (Wilson & Laeur, Montral 1993
ISBN 2-89127-232-3), p. 745
[15] Article published in Theological Exploration, vol. 2. no. 1
of Duquesne University and in Law Review of University
of Toledo, vol 33
[16] See The Benedictine Order in New Advent, Catholic
Encyclopedia
[17] Code of Canon Law, canon 589
[18] Annuario Ponticio 2008 (Libreria Editrice Vaticana 2012
ISBN 978-88-209-8722-0), pp. 1411-1468

8 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

8.1

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Catholic religious order Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_religious_order?oldid=656758424 Contributors: GTBacchus,

Ahoerstemeier, JASpencer, Choster, Gentgeen, EdwinHJ, Roscoe x, Lysy, Dominick, Tom harrison, Samuel J. Howard, Karnan, Williamb,
Xandar, Icairns, Neutrality, D6, O'Dea, Pmadrid, Rich Farmbrough, MCBastos, Naive cynic, Cjrs 79, El C, Julius.kusuma, Jonathunder,
Patsw, Anthony Appleyard, Mark Dingemanse, Arthena, JohnAlbertRigali, Ynhockey, InShaneee, Malo, JerH, Blahedo, RJFJR, Lerdsuwa, Strongbow, Halcatalyst, BD2412, Kbdank71, Miq, Dpr, Eoghanacht, Dominicotoole, Olessi, SchuminWeb, Emmanuel83, Heycam,
Musical Linguist, Gurch, Windharp, Aloysius, Psantora, Portress, Borgx, NTBot~enwiki, Briaboru, DanMS, Scott5834, Gaius Cornelius,
Kimchi.sg, Searley, Royalbroil, Tony1, Kiddo54, Bruce Hall, Mamathomas, Arundhati bakshi, Fastifex, Ant ie, SmackBot, Marcusscotus1,
Mister X, Hmains, Chris the speller, Bistropha, Banderas, RFD, Kraftbj, Dkusic~enwiki, BrownHairedGirl, Mathiasrex, Thegreatbrandoni,
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Mbtz, Krushsister, JohnCD, Drinibot, Raz1el, ShelfSkewed, Ghfj007, Tmac4434, Manjaly, Vaquero100, Faylei, Marek69, SGGH, Susanrosecsjp, Freddiem, Amycsj, Smith2006, Edokter, Billertl, Vlnangel, Deep Submerge, SiobhanHansa, Alekjds, Martynas Patasius, Gun
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Buddhaamaatya, SpaceFlight89, Rumiawee, Willikers32, Rednevog, Coquidragon, Sweet kate, Lucobrat, Beyond My Ken, Caritas1, Esoglou, The Mysterious El Willstro, Lenyjanuar, Werieth, Midas02, Cobaltcigs, Josephtt1, Sistermaryhelen, ClueBot NG, Wallybigballs,
Helpful Pixie Bot, Handyhuy, MPSchneiderLC, Cdenic, J R Gainey, 8110charlie, CsDix, Anjo-sozinho, Johnmaroun, JoeHebda, Dai
Pritchard and Anonymous: 178

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