Diocesan Chancery - Administration

Administration

Diocesan chanceries may be universal, but there is nothing in the common ecclesiastical law concerning their creation and equipment. The explanation lies in the very nature of this law, which provides only for what is general and common, and takes no account of local means of administration, which it abandons to the proper authority in each diocese, the concrete circumstances offering always great variety and calling for all possible freedom of action.

Although, as above described, the methods of diocesan administration exhibit no little variety, there exists on the other hand a certain uniformity. Each diocese, after all, is bound to observe the common law, has an identical range of freedom, and identical limits to its authority. Each diocese, therefore, is likely, a priori, to develop its administration along similar lines, but does so regularly in harmony with others, particularly neighbouring dioceses. In this way the dioceses of a given country come to have similar official administration.