In the recent past one of our communities had taken a loan from a particular bank to build a part of the school building with the permission of the then Major Superior. However due to the pandemic, they could not pay back the stipulated money. Now though they are able to pay back, the community is not ready to return the amount, rather they have just left the burden of payment on the Major Superior. We are aware of civil consequences; however we would like to know about the canonical admonitions in this regard.
The juridical system of the Church recognizes physical persons and juridical persons. “Juridical persons”, are similar to a civil “Society” or “Trust” or “Company”; and thus are aggregates of persons or things (can. 114 of CIC; can. 921 of CCEO). Juridical persons are perpetual by nature. There are a number of juridical persons in the Church with rights and obligations. They are represented by an administrator (head/president of such a person); for example a Bishop on behalf of a diocese, a parish priest on behalf of a parish or a Major religious superior on behalf of a religious institute. Certain juridical persons are “public”, in the sense that they operate in the name of the Church itself; others are private, resulting from private initiatives (can.116 of CIC). Among public juridical persons listed by virtue of the law itself, we could mention the following: the Conference of Bishops; the Diocese; the parish; a religious institute, a province of an institute, and a juridically established religious house (Canon 634, §1of CIC). Among the consequences of acquiring a juridical personality, the most important one is regarding the administration of temporal goods (can. 1256 of CIC; can. 1009 of CCEO).
Sr Navya Thattil OSF
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