Episcopal Conference

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online.In the Roman Catholic Church, an Episcopal Conference, Conference of Bishops, or National Conference of Bishops is an official assembly of all the bishops of a given territory. Episcopal conferences have long existed as informal entities, but were first established as formal bodies by the Second Vatican Council and implemented by Pope Paul VI's 1966 motu proprio Ecclesiae sanctae. The operation, authority, and responsibilities of episcopal conferences are currently governed by the 1983 Code of Canon Law. The nature of episcopal conferences, and their magisterial authority in particular, was subsequently clarified by Pope John Paul II's 1998 motu proprio Apostolos suos which stated that conferences of bishops do not participate in the teaching authority of the college of bishops although individuals bishops do as they are members of the college of bishops which maintains unity with and under the Bishop of Rome, that is, the Pope. Consequently, a conference of bishops cannot make doctrinal declarations unless it receives two-thirds approval of the individual bishops of the conference and receives the subsequent recognitio, that is, recognition of approval, of the Holy See