Problem misjonarza migrantów w czasie soboru watykańskiego II i w prawodawstwie posoborowym

Abstract

The present paper shows the stages of evolution of a missionary's institution at the time of the Council and in the post-Concillar period, both in common and in special legislation. The principle direction of this evolution tended towards the following objectives: to adapt this institution to a new theological and legal thought and to the conditions of the contemporary phenomenon of migration; to integrate the office and ministrations of a missionary with the structure and life of the local Church; to make the personal status of a missionary equal with the status of the local clergy; to provide a missionary with indispensable pastoral authority towards migrants; to adjust the form of pastoral organisation to local conditions. The new Code of Canon Law, promulgated in 1983, initiated the subsequent and most recent period of the development of a missionary's institution, the missionary (chaplain) of migrants. It basically renewed the rules of common legislation which applied to the missionary.