CHAPLAIN. — In a general sense, the term is often used to indicate the priest to whom is entrusted the officiating in a chapel or oratory without cure of souls. In a strict sense, it denotes the office of a priest attached to the religious service of certain bodies (women’s religious communities, male lay orders, confraternities and pious associations, the army, the Papal household, courts, noble families, educational institutions, pious works, hospitals, prisons, etc.), or bound by special obligations of Masses and worship in the so‑called ecclesiastical or lay chaplaincies (cc. 451, §3; 479, §2; 529; 698; 1412, n. 2). This latter sense is particularly proper and prevalent in civil legislation on ecclesiastical matters.
In canon law, the chaplain occupies a juridical position of his own, which partly reproduces that of the parish priest and the rector of a church, while at the same time differing from both. The parish priest is the incumbent of parochial cure of souls in a territorial parish, whereas the chaplain either has no cure of souls or, if he does (military, palatine, noble‑family chaplains, etc.), he exercises it as a personal office for the benefit of socially defined groups rather than territorial ones. Likewise, whereas the office of rector is considered solely in relation to a church, the office of chaplain is viewed primarily in relation to the moral person for whose benefit it is established (can. 479).
In non‑exempt lay orders, whether masculine or feminine, the appointment and removal of the chaplain belongs to the local Ordinary; in exempt orders, he is designated by the regular superior, the bishop supplying the omission in case of negligence (can. 529). The appointment and removal of the chaplain in confraternities and other canonically erected and approved associations of the faithful likewise falls to the local Ordinary, except where an apostolic privilege provides otherwise; an exception is made for associations erected by religious in their own churches, for which the consent of the Ordinary is required only when the chaplain is chosen from among the secular clergy (cc. 698, §§1–3; 480, §2).
As regards rights and duties, the position of the chaplain must be inferred in each case from the statutes or foundation charters, from particular law where it exists, from the prescriptions of the Ordinary, and from legitimate local customs. The chaplain’s competence is generally commensurate with the degree of autonomy enjoyed by the moral person to which he is attached, in relation to the parish priest of the place. Thus, the total exemption of a moral person—for example, a religious community, a prison, a hospital, etc. (cc. 615; 464, §2)—ordinarily authorizes the chaplain to exercise, for its benefit, the same functions that would rightfully belong to the parish priest. Hence, if the institution is not subject to the jurisdiction of the parish priest, the right and duty to administer the last sacraments and to officiate at funerals belong to the chaplain (cc. 514, §3; 1230, §5).
If the institution is a confraternity, pious association, or other body possessing its own public church (not annexed to a religious house), the respective chaplain also assumes the role of rector of that church, with all the attendant rights and duties, and subject to the same limitations and safeguards imposed by law on rectors, so as not to disturb parochial functions or prejudice parochial ministry (cc. 481–83; 1345). The same rights and duties as those of church rectors also pertain to the chaplains of confraternities and pious associations in their oratories and chapels, even when these are not public churches, though in such cases they cannot strictly be termed true rectors (can. 479, §1). Moreover, all such chaplains have the faculty to bless and impose the habit or scapular of the association upon candidates; for preaching, however, they are bound by the common law (can. 698, §2).