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Ownership rights
Question from Curious on 9/24/2009:

If an individual parish has been incorporated by its bishop as a "member nonprofit religious corporation" and given its deed, under canon law, does it have the usual rights of ownership?

Answer by Rev. Mark J. Gantley, JCL on 9/27/2009:

The questions of ownership is two-fold: civil ownership, and canonical ownership.

Civil ownership is defined differently depending on the country or state.

Canonical ownership is defined by canon law. According to canon law, the parish as a "juridic person" (the canon law equivalent of a civil corporation) owns its own property and money.

The Vatican prefers that civil incorporation correspond with canonical juridic personality. This seems to have happened in the circumstances that you have described. This is good.

However, with the civil corporation, usually the civil articles of incorporation and the civil bylaws define the governing authority of the corporation. This would define whatever "rights of ownership" you are wondering about. I am sure that they are written in a manner that defines clearly the authority of the bishop and the pastor respectively.

COPYRIGHT 2009

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