ARMS, PROHIBITION of. - The CIC (can. 138), reproducing a rule that, with few substantial variations, has been in force in the Church since the earliest centuries, forbids clerics to bear arms, unless this is required by the necessity of protecting themselves against possible dangers.
Italian legislation, chiefly for the purpose of preventing crimes against the life and bodily safety of persons, against the State, and against public order, likewise establishes various limitations on the free use, as well as on the manufacture, sale, possession, and collection of arms, imposing, according to circumstances, the penalty of arrest or a fine upon offenders (arts. 695-704 of the Cod. pen.; arts. 28-57 of the consolidated text of the public security laws, 18 June 1931, no. 713). For the purposes of these provisions, arms are understood to mean: 1) firearms and all others whose natural purpose is assault upon the person (arms proper); 2) bombs, any device or container holding explosive substances, and asphyxiating or blinding gases.