The Juridical Perspectives of the Relationship between the Church and Civil Society

Abstract

Church-State Relations is a subject that is part of the official curriculum of Canon Law Schools, where it has come to replace the Ius Publicum Externum, from which it in part has inherited its theoretical apologetic character of affirming and defending the freedom of the Church in the fulfillment of her mission. It is typically presented as a canonical subject, yet without specifying its sources, its content or its object
as a science, and thus it is worth asking whether it is indeed a legal matter and, if so, what kind of a right it is. This article addresses the question of the scientific and didactic status of the subject, in the context of the past and the present of Church-State relationships. Current positions on the matter turn to the magisterium of the Second Vatican Council, in particular Lumen gentium, Gaudium et spes and Dignitatis humanae. Some however take into account that the CIC has maintained a considerable number of the iura nativa that
in the Code of 1917 were attributed to the Church as a societas iuridice perfecta, a concept left behind by the conciliar ecclesiology Others, while affirming the juridical nature and scientific autonomy of the
subject