Principi di ius pontificium

The title of Lorenzo Franchini’s contribution is “Principii di ius pontificium” and it consists in the attempt, which hasn’t any previous effort, to pinpoint and list the general principles which seem to have always inspired the interpretative activity either of the College of Pontiffs or of its single members in the resolution of cases or anyway in the proceeding of its own different functions, all of them referring more or less to the religious sphere. The original purpose of the work we are intended to develop, carrying on a dialogue with the other participants in the seminars, is not so much in the effort to put in order such principles according to logic hierarchies or thematic areas (this will never be possible in a precise way just because of the total lack of systematicness in the arcaic jurisprudential production), as to the fact instead that the object will be achieved abstracting nearly totally from doctrine and directly drawing from the sources. We are intended to apply such methodologic option with a special strictness, even if it will achieve extreme consequences: suffice it to say we will have a special regard for the priestly formularies and we will give a name to a principle only using words literally drawn from the original sources.