REGIONE CONCILIARE. - This is the name given to the districts into which Italy was divided by the decree of 15 February 1919 of the Sacred Congregation of the Consistory for the purposes of the periodic meetings of the various Ordinaries.
The aforementioned document established that in Italy, in place of the provincial council (v. CONFERENCES, II), a regional plenary council should be convened every twenty years; it was followed by the circular of 22 March 1919, which partly modified the regions: Emilia was distinguished from Romagna and Latium was divided into two regions, upper (Ciminian Region) and lower, while the diocese of Lipari was added to the Sicilian region. For Venetia, Lombardy and Liguria nothing was changed, because, since in them the ecclesiastical province coincided with the region, the provisions on the provincial council continued to be in force. For Piedmont, which is divided into two ecclesiastical provinces, it was left to the discretion of the bishops to hold, with apostolic assent, either the regional plenary council or the provincial council. The circular moreover expressly noted that for Italy the episcopal conferences were to continue to be annual and not quinquennial, as canon 291 § 1 of the CIC prescribes for the world.
A new and important centralization, with slight modifications to the region, was that carried out by Pius XI with the motu proprio Qua Cura of 8 December 1938 (AAS, 30 [1938], p. 410 ff.), by which eighteen regional ecclesiastical tribunals of first instance were created (Turin, Milan, Genoa, Modena, Venice, Bologna, Florence, Perugia, Fermo, Vicariate of Rome, Chieti, Benevento, Salerno, Naples, Bari, Reggio Calabria, Palermo, Cagliari) and ten regional tribunals of appeal (Milan, Genoa, Turin, Bologna, Venice, Florence, S. Romana Rota, Benevento, Naples, Vicariate of Rome) with exclusive competence over cases of matrimonial nullity. Further Normae, issued on 10 July 1940 by the Sacred Congregation of the Sacraments (AAS, 32 [1940], p. 304), regulate the functioning of the regional tribunals.
BIBL.: sources