The Legal Foundations Required at the Organisation and Introduction of the Institutions of Religious Fraternities

Abstract

The author seeks to show the legal foundations which were in power when the institution of religious fraternities were being established. He focuses, apart from literature, on papal documents and church visitation reports as one of the basic sources to study the problem of fraternities. He also takes advantage of some entries concerning archifraternities and fraternities from the Catholic Encyclopedia. He shows general legal rules binding in all fraternities and traces the genesis of some of them. At the same time, he refers to legal norms which were applied in their establishment and in the course of their work. Among the selected fraternities one finds e.g. the commonly known fraternities of mercy, of Christian teaching, and of good death. In order for a fraternity to become a church institution with full jurisdiction, it should have had an act of erection, foundation record, and an approval from the appropriate ordinary bishop (in the case of religious fraternities it was the superior of the order). If the two acts were lacking, then it was necessary to have the erection document. Once fraternities were approved by church authorities, bishops had full right to visitate them, the evidence of which are appropriate records in visitation acts.