Acquisition and Loss of the Right of Patronage according to the 1917 Code of Canon Law

The present article is a brief analysis of the acquisition and loss of the right of patronage as described in the provisions of the 1917 Code of Canon Law. The author brings to the readers’ attention the specific nature of the institution of patronage, which was not only ecclesiastical, due to the fact that it was regulated by canon law, but also civil, since the right of patronage to a large extent concerned lay believers and was also regulated by secular law. As founders of churches and benefices, patrons, or church protectors, along with those who acquired the right of patronage later on, occupied an important position in the system of church financing in the period described, even though the ecclesiastical legislators had intended to remove this institution from the legal order altogether. For this reason, it is important to explain how the members of the Catholic Church could acquire this right or be deprived of it.