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James J. CONN and Luigi SABBARESE (eds.), Iustitia in Caritate: Miscellanea di studi in onore di Velasio De Paolis, Rome, Urbaniana University Press, 2005, 548 p. - ISBN 88-401-4015-8 - 25 euros.
This is a Festschrift in honour of Velasio De Paolis, former professor of canon law at the Gregorianum and Urbanianum universities before his ordination as bishop and appointment as secretary of the Apostolic Signature. The twenty-nine contributions on wide-ranging subjects are divided thematically into six parts: questions of history and the philosophy and theology of law; general norms; the people of God; marriage; temporal goods; sanctions and procedures. Twenty-four are written in Italian, three in English, and one each in French and Spanish. All are authored by competent scholars and make for interesting and informative reading. With such a great variety of topics, readers will doubtless be attracted to certain tides of greater personal interest. Four caught the particular attention of this reviewer, the first three being in Part II on general norms and the fourth in Part VI on sanctions and procedures.
Eduardo BAURA examines the position of particular law in the canonical system today. He says that the subordination of particular law to universal law is a consequence of ecclesiastical communion and in a certain way guarantees the rationality of legislation at lower levels while protecting the rights of the faithful recognized in universal law. Today there is a greater sensitivity to the importance of particular law, rooted in the Church's own ecclesiological self-understanding. Consequently, the universal legislator should exercise great caution before using broadly worded formulas that revoke particular law or raise doubts about its revocation. The A. then points to the importance of canonical custom as tus particulare, maintaining that cc. 23-28 give wide berth to the development of local custom. He also has some remarks on the relationship to the universal law of conferences of bishops, dispensation, and diocesan tribunals.
Andrea D'AuRiA examines the notion of "disciplinary" law in the context of the dispensing power of the diocesan bishop (c. 87, § 1). He rightly rejects the simple equation, made by some authors, of disciplinary law with ecclesiastical law. Disciplinary law is but one kind of ecclesiastical law. While it is not defined, the A. sees a...