Fabrica ecclesiae

In this particular connexion, the expression is first met with in the letter of Pope Simplicius to Gaudentius, Bishop of Aufina (19 November 475); however, even then it was not new, being borrowed from secular usage.

Some writers maintain this division was owing to the establishment of ecclesiastical benefices; others claim that it followed the canonical recognition of the private ownership of churches.

Some hold that in consequence of the principles governing feudal society all medieval churches and their revenues became private property, and that the conflict of Pope Gregory VII and his successors against the Holy Roman Emperors concerning lay investitures was in reality an effort to restore its lost possessions to the ecclesiastical domain.

During the long Investitures conflict this right, it may be, was completely annihilated; when peace was restored the clergy were often obliged to appeal to the inhabitants of the parish to defray the expenses of religion.

They were called vestrymen, churchwardens, procurators (procuratores), mambours (mamburni), luminiers, gagers, provisores, vitrici, operarii, altirmanni etc.

A reaction is visible in the councils of the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth centuries which undertake to check the tendency towards an exclusively lay administration of the parochial property.

As no general law has determined either the competency or the composition of fabric committees (conseils de fabrique) there has been in this respect very great variations.

In modern times secular power has frequently interfered in the administration of ecclesiastical property set apart for purposes of worship, and in the organization of church fabrics.

Originally they were designated by bishops who wanted to separate their spiritual affairs from pecuniary ones but, in the centuries, people from the local administrations entered the deputations.

Nowadays fabricas are only intended to keep their buildings with restoration works, maintenance, surveillance and letting conduct daily religious services without interfering.