Catholic church titles positions

European Union. Holy See. Isle of Man. New Zealand. South Africa. South Korea. Sri Lanka. United Kingdom.

Catholic church hierarchy monsignor

Precedence signifies the right to enjoy a prerogative of honor before other persons; for example, to have the most distinguished place in a procession, a ceremony, or an assembly, to have the right to express an opinion, cast a vote, or append a signature before others, to perform the most honorable offices. The order of precedence in the Catholic Church is organized by rank within the hierarchy according first to order , then jurisdiction , and finally to titular or ad personam honors granted to individuals despite a lack of jurisdiction.

Emeritus ecclesiastics are counted among the latter. At this time, a current table of precedence in its entirety is not published by the Holy See. However, the principles of precedence present in the Codes of Canon Law , and the customs of precedence longstanding, inform any formulation of an order of precedence. Some contemporary authors [ 2 ] have compiled helpful, though unofficial, reference texts with a table of precedence based on such principles.

Though the Catholic Encyclopedia [ 3 ] offered a brief order of precedence based on these principles, it was updated and replaced by the New Catholic Encyclopedia in , which was further updated with a Revised Edition in Since the publication of the first edition, in , several changes have rendered its order of precedence substantially out of date, including the publication of three codes of canon law , , , an ecumenical council —65 , and multiple apostolic constitutions that affect the topic.