RELIGIOUS HOUSE. - The smallest part of an Order, Congregation, or religious society, which exists as a community, is commonly called in canon law a religious house (CIC, can. 488, n. 5). Other more common names for such a community are: monastery (generally a religious house of monks or nuns), convent (especially among the Mendicant Orders), cenobium, and other names proper to each Religious institute.
The constitutions proper to each Religious institute determine which organs of the internal government (Chapters, superiors) have the right to erect a new religious house; however, for such an erection these organs must always have the license of the local Ordinary, and in certain cases also the beneplacitum of the Holy See. Likewise, for the suppression of a religious house, the consent of the local Ordinary or of the Holy See, respectively, is required (cann. 495-98).
Juridically, religious houses are customarily distinguished into "formed" and "unformed." For a religious house to be "formed," it is necessary that it be composed stably of at least 6 religious, of whom at least 4 are priests if it is a matter of a clerical religion (can. 488, n. 5). Unformed houses too are true religious houses and true communities with their own superior, but in certain matters they do not have the same juridical position as formed houses.
Religious houses, under common canon law, are juridical persons (cf. can. 536 § 1), and more correctly they can be considered as associations, although by some they are considered as foundations. They also have the capacity to acquire and possess goods, except and to the extent that the rules or constitutions provide otherwise (can. 531).
The religious house is presided over by the local superior, called by different names according to the different Religious institutes: superior, prior, abbot, guardian, rector, etc. In the governance of the house he is assisted by his Council, whose consent, or at least opinion, he needs in matters of greater importance.
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