Roman Catholic Church
For more details on this topic, see Interpretation (canon law).Besides the Pope, who has plenary legislative power, there are several other legislative authorities in the Roman Catholic Church with varying degrees of authority. Primary examples are diocesan bishops and their equivalents, episcopal conferences, and particular councils. Any of these legislators can issue authentic interpretations of their laws and their predecessor's laws. These authentic interpretations trump even administrative decisions of ordinaries and judgments of ecclesiastical courts, for neither of those acts have the force of law like an authentic interpretation. The effect of an authentic interpretation depends on the extent of the interpretation:
An authentic interpretation which is presented by way of a law has the same force as the law itself, and must be promulgated. If it simply declares the words which are certain in themselves, it has retroactive force. If it restricts or extends a law or explains a doubtful one, it is not retroactive.
Legislators also can entrust the power to authentically interpret their laws to someone else. For the Code of Canon Law, the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches, and other Papal laws, the Pope has delegated the authority to issue authentic interpretations to the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts. The following table contains the authentic interpretations issued by that dicastery (with Pontifical approval).
Read more about this topic: Authentic Interpretation
Famous quotes containing the words catholic church, roman, catholic and/or church:
“In fact what America expects of its citizens and what the Catholic Church expects of the faithful are sometimes so different that they lead to an enormous ker-KLUNK between democracy and theology.”
—Anna Quindlen (b. 1952)
“The gale, it plies the saplings double,
It blows so hard, ‘twill soon be gone:
To-day the Roman and his trouble
Are ashes under Uricon.”
—A.E. (Alfred Edward)
“I maintain that I have been a Negro three times—a Negro baby, a Negro girl and a Negro woman. Still, if you have received no clear cut impression of what the Negro in America is like, then you are in the same place with me. There is no The Negro here. Our lives are so diversified, internal attitudes so varied, appearances and capabilities so different, that there is no possible classification so catholic that it will cover us all, except My people! My people!”
—Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)
“The Church disowned, the tower overthrown, the bells upturned, what have we to do
But stand with empty hands and palms turned upwards
In an age which advances progressively backwards?”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)