Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

The topic of the relations between the pastoral function and power in the Church continues to put forward, after Vatican Council 11, a series of interesting problems. On the one hand, the identification by the preconciliar doctrine of clericate and hierarchy and its recognition of the exclusive capacity of clergymen to be the titularies of power in the Church, and , on the other hand, the famous bipartition or tripartition of the power of the Church, seem to have as background a personalistic vision of the ecclesiastical hierarchy. In the light of Vatican Council 11, it seems that the problems put fcrth by the relation between the pastoral function and power in the Church can be solved best when they are contemplated from the starting point of an institutionalistic vision of the Church. The sudy of the munus and the potestas in this context and the comparison between ecclesiastical ministry, pastoral function, governing function, and power seem to permit the conclusion that it must not be spoken of -in juridical terms- a power of arder and a power of magisterium independent of the power of jurisdiction, or in it included.