CONVENT. — A designation often used, in the vulgar and improper sense, to mean a religious house in general (v. CASA RELIGIOSA). In the strict and specific sense, it indicates the religious house or community of a regular Order, that is, of a religious institute with solemn vows, but not monastic. It refers especially to the religious houses or communities of the mendicant Orders.
Originally, the term was used in the sense of an assembly (conventus) of monks. It then came to indicate, in canonical sources, both the college of religious constituted as a moral body (c. 2, X, 3, 10; c. 6, X, 3, 35; c. 6, III, 14, in VI; c. 1, III, 10, in Clem., etc.), and, later, the place or building (Conventualis locus) intended as their dwelling (c. 2, X, 3, 35; c. unic., V, 6, in VI; c. 3, V, 8, in Clem., etc.).
It is sometimes used as a synonym for monastery and cenobium, from which, however, it differs in that these terms more properly correspond to houses or communities of monks and nuns.
The c., thus conceived, is always a domus formata, but not vice versa. In addition to the concept of domus formata, the c., in order to be strictly such, requires the specific canonical erection thereof and the full, effective observance of the rule, especially the choral office, and of common life: requirements that may also be absent in a community even though, on the other hand, it may qualify as a domus formata by virtue of the number of its members. Such is the concept that, from the ancient monastic statutes (e.g., those of the Cluniacs), and especially through the legislation of the mendicant Orders, has characterized the term conventus or conventualis locus.
As regards the juridical personality enjoyed by every canonically erected c. (can. 556 § 1), it is disputed whether this is a collegial moral personality (corporation) or a non-collegial one (foundation): perhaps in this case a mixed or complex personality should be recognized, given that the community of religious constitutes a collegial moral person in its own right, capable of existing outside and independently of the summa bonorum.