Ecclesiastical court

In organized Christianity, an ecclesiastical court, also called court Christian or court spiritual, is any of certain non-adversarial courts conducted by church-approved officials having jurisdiction mainly in spiritual or religious matters. Historically, they interpret or apply canon law. One of its primary bases was the Corpus Juris Civilis of Justinian, which is also considered the source of the civil law legal tradition.

In the United Kingdom, secular courts that took over the functions of the ecclesiastic courts, e.g. in family law, are still known as courts ecclesiastical as distinct from courts temporal.

In the Middle Ages, ecclesiastical courts had much wider powers in many areas of Europe than they did after the development of nation states. They held jurisdiction over not only religious matters, but also family law, equitable relief, probate, and cases involving priests, religious communities, or public heretics.^{[citation needed]}

Secular courts in medieval times were numerous and decentralized: each secular division (king, prince, duke, lord, abbot or bishop as landholder, manor, city, forest, market, etc.) could have their own courts, customary law, bailiffs and gaols with arbitrary and unrecorded procedures, including in Northern Europe trial by combat and trial by ordeal, and in England trial by jury.

Ecclesiastical courts generally followed the better regulated inquisition, accusation or denunciation judicial procedures. In medieval times, they had a very wide jurisdiction including family law and dowry disputes, probate, equity, defamation, failure to observe holy days, and cases involving priests and religious communities and individuals or public heretics.

In the Church of England, the ecclesiastical courts are a system of courts, held by authority of the Crown, who is ex officio the Supreme Governor of the Church of England. The courts have jurisdiction over matters dealing with the rights and obligations of church members, since the 19th century limited to controversies in areas of church property and ecclesiastical disciplinary proceedings. In England these courts, unlike common law courts, are based upon and operate along civil law procedures and Canon law-based jurisprudence.

The ecclesiastical courts formerly had jurisdiction over the personal estates of deceased persons to grant probate or administration. This jurisdiction of the Ecclesiastical Courts was transferred to the Court of Probate by the Court of Probate Act 1857.

Offences against ecclesiastical laws are dealt with differently based on whether the laws in question involve church doctrine. For non-doctrinal cases, the lowest level of the court is the Archdeaconry Court, which is presided over by the local archdeacon. The next court in the hierarchy is the bishop's court, which is in the Diocese of Canterbury called the Commissary Court and in other dioceses the consistory court. The Commissary Court is presided over by a commissary-general; a consistory Court is presided over by a chancellor. The chancellor or commissary-general must be thirty years old and either have a seven-year general qualification under the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990 section 71 or have held high judicial office.