Jus novum (c. 1140-1563) Jus novissimum (c. 1563-1918) Jus codicis (1918-present) Other Sacraments Sacramentals Sacred places Sacred times Supra-diocesan/eparchal structures Particular churches Juridic persons Philosophy, theology, and fundamental theory of Catholic canon law Clerics Office Juridic and physical persons Associations of the faithful Pars dynamica (trial procedure) Canonization Election of the Roman Pontiff Academic degrees Journals and Professional Societies Faculties of canon law Canonists Institute of consecrated life Society of apostolic life In the canon law of the Catholic Church, a distinction is made between the internal forum, where an act of governance is made without publicity, and the external forum, where the act is public and verifiable.
It is this jurisdiction which is the foundation of ecclesiastical law, both externally and internally binding, and from Apostolic times it has been put into practice by the Church's rulers.
[2] As the power of the Church extends not only to its individual members but also to the whole corporate body, not only to questions concerning the conscience but also to the public actions of its subjects, ecclesiastical jurisdiction is distinguished into that of the internal and external forum.
In general, the acts of jurisdiction of the external forum are the decision of disputes concerning faith, morals or discipline, the making and enforcing of laws, the punishment of transgressors of ecclesiastical statutes, and the like.
Ecclesiastical causes themselves are called civil when they concern either spiritual things, as the sacraments, or matters connected with them, as church property, the right of patronage, etc.
They are called mixed causes when they are subjects proper for decision by either the ecclesiastical or civil forum, as usurious contracts, concubinage, violations of the Church's peace, etc.
Thus matrimony, in its sacramental nature as to validity or nullity, belongs to the Church; in its temporal aspect, as to the property of married persons and similar things, it may be dealt with by the civil tribunals.
To this class of mixed causes can also be reduced the suppression of heresy, where Church and State cooperate with each other for the maintenance of the integrity or the faith and the preservation of the civil peace.
Finally, they held that there is no valid argument to prove that the direct exercise of this power does not fall within the competence of the ecclesiastical forum, although it was the custom of the latter to hand over the criminal to the secular arm for the infliction of the death penalty.
The encroachments of the civil power on the Church's jurisdiction have in our days, practically though unwarrantly, restricted the ecclesiastical forum to spiritual causes only.