The Theology and Canon Law

Project (TCLP)

Pope Francis speaks in Evangelii Gaudium 16 “of the need to promote a sound ‘decentralization’” mirrored in the newly promulgated Constitution for the Roman Curia and the importance of the Dicastery for Evangelisation for the life of the Church (Praedicate Evangelium, Art. 53-58). At the same time, the church in our times is characterised by an abuse of power ultimately leading to a Synodal Pathway that will culminate in a Synod of Bishops on “Communion, Participation, and Mission” in autumn 2023. An important question surrounding these events that this symposium takes as a hypothesis lies in the right understanding of power as such in the Church. 

But how do we need to understand power in an ecclesiastical context? How is it reflected in various areas of both the Latin and Eastern Code of Canon Law? Which questions and challenges arise from a theological, historical, and ecumenical perspective?