Apostolic Signatura

The Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura is the highest judicial authority in the Catholic Church (apart from the Pope himself, who is the supreme ecclesiastical judge).Code of Canon Law, canon 1442 In addition, it oversees the administration of justice in the Church.Apostolic constitution Pastor Bonus, 121-125 (translation revised by the . Its current Prefect is Raymond Leo Burke, Archbishop Emeritus of St. Louis, Missouri.
==Field of competence==
The Roman Rota is the ordinary appellate tribunal of the Apostolic See.Code of Canon Law, canon 1443Pastor Bonus, 128 The Signatura's competence covers instead:
# complaints of nullity and petitions for total reinstatement against sentences of the Roman Rota;
# recourses, in cases concerning the status of persons, when the Roman Rota has denied a new examination of the case;
# exceptions of suspicion and other proceedings against judges of the Roman Rota arising from the exercise of their functions;
# conflicts of competence between tribunals which are not subject to the same appellate tribunal.Code of Canon Law, canon 1445 §1
Apart from these judicial matters, the Signatura has competence as an administrative tribunal to deal with controversies over administrative decisions made by or approved by departments of the Roman Curia, if it is contended that the decision violated some law either in the decision-making process or in the procedure used; it can also deal with administrative controversies referred to it by the Pope or those departments, and with conflicts of competence between the departments.Code of Canon Law, canon 1445 §2
A third field of competence for the Signatura is that of overseeing over all the tribunals of the Catholic Church, with power to extend the jurisdiction of tribunals, to grant dispensations from procedural laws, to establish interdiocesan tribunals, and to discipline canonical advocates.Code of Canon Law, canon 1445 §3
==History==
In the thirteenth century the Popes made use of "referendarii" to investigate and prepare the signing - hence the name signatura - of petitions and other cases presented to the Holy See. Pope Eugene IV (1431-1447) entrusted these referendaries with authority to sign certain petitions and thereby established a permanent office for this purpose. Under Popes Alexander VI, Sixtus IV and Julius II this office was divided into two, the Signatura gratiae for examining petitions for favours, and the Signatura iustitiae for contentious cases. The honourable office of referendary came to be conferred frequently as a merely honorary title, but Pope Sixtus V put a limit on their number, and Pope Alexander VII combined the limited number of voting referendaries into a college, assisted by the simple referendaries, who had only a consultative position. The Signatura gratiae gradually lost its functions to other bodies, and the growth of the work of the Roman Rota, the foundation of the Congregations of Cardinals resulted in the Signatura iustitiae becoming mainly a Supreme Court of the Papal States.
On 29 June 1909, Pope Pius X reestablished a single Apostolic Signatura, consisting of six cardinals, one of whom acted as its prefect. On 28 June 1915, Pope Benedict XV reconstituted the college of the voting referendaries and simple referendaries with consultative functions and the 1917 Code of Canon Law removed the limitation of the number of cardinals members of this Supreme Tribunal.
The present competence of the Apostolic Signatura is that laid down in the apostolic constitution Pastor Bonus of 28 June 1988.Annuario Pontificio 2008, pp. 1896-1897Catholic Encyclopedia: Roman Curia
==Prefects of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura since 1908==
*Vincenzo Vannutelli (20 Oct 1908 - 9 Jul 1930)
*Michele Lega (15 Dec 1914 - 20 Mar 1920)
*Augusto Silj (20 Mar 1920 - 26 Feb 1926)
*Francesco Ragonesi (9 Mar 1926 - 14 Sep 1931)
*Bonaventura Cerretti (12 Oct 1931 - 8 May 1933)
*Enrico Gasparri (18 May 1933 - 20 May 1946)
*Massimo Massimi (29 May 1946 - 6 Mar 1954)
*Giuseppe Bruno (20 Mar 1954 - 10 Nov 1954)
*Gaetano Cicognani (18 Nov 1954 - 5 Feb 1962)
*Francesco Roberti (14 Nov 1959 - 24 Mar 1969)
*Dino Staffa (7 Apr 1967 - 7 Aug 1977)
*Pericle Felici (13 Sep 1977 - 22 Mar 1982 )
*Aurelio Sabattani (17 May 1982 - 1 Jul 1988)
*Achille Silvestrini (1 Jul 1988 - 24 May 1991)
*Gilberto Agustoni (2 Apr 1992 - 5 Oct 1998)
*Zenon Grocholewski (5 Oct 1998 - 15 Nov 1999)
*Mario Francesco Pompedda (15 Nov 1999 - 27 May 2004)
*Agostino Vallini (27 May 2004 - 27 June 2008)
*Raymond Leo Burke (27 June 2008 - )
== Current Membership ==
The following are the present members of the Apostolic Signatura:
* Raymond Leo Burke, Prefect.
* Agostino Vallini
* Józef Glemp
* Antonio Rouco Varela
* Edward Egan
* Péter Erdő
* Agostino Cacciavillan
* Sergio Sebastiani
* Walter Kasper
* Jean-Louis Tauran
* Julian Herranz
* Zenon Grocholewski
* Lluís Martínez Sistach
* Joseph Mercieca
* Emilio Eid
* Eduardo Davino
* Heinrich Mussinghoff
* Francesco Coccopalmerio
* Thomas Doran
* Javier Echevarria Rodriguez
==References==
==External links==
*Giga-Catholic Information
cs:Nejvyšší tribunál Apoštolské signatury
de:Apostolische Signatur
es:Tribunal Supremo de la Signatura Apostólica
fr:Tribunal suprême de la Signature apostolique
it:Supremo Tribunale della Segnatura Apostolica
la:Supremum Tribunal Signaturae Apostolicae
nl:Hoogste Rechtbank van de Apostolische Signatuur
no:Det høyeste tribunal for den apostoliske signatur
pl:Najwyższy Trybunał Sygnatury Apostolskiej
pt:Supremo Tribunal da Assinatura Apostólica
ru:Верховный трибунал апостольской сигнатуры
Category:Canon law (Catholic Church)
Category:Apostolic Signatura
Category:Ecclesiastical courts