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Canonical territory


A canonical territory is a geographical area seen as belonging to a particular patriarchate or autocephalous Church as its own. The concept is found both in the Eastern Orthodox Church and in the Roman Catholic Church, and is mentioned extensively in the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches.

Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev, of the Russian Orthodox Church, asserts that

[t]he model of church organization that was formed during the first three centuries of Christianity was based on the principle of "one city-one bishop-one Church", which foresaw the assignment of a certain ecclesiastical territory to one concrete bishop." In accordance with this principle, the "Canons of the Apostles" and other canonical decrees of the ancient Church point to the inadmissibility of violating the boundaries of ecclesiastical territories by bishops or clergy.

The Canons prescribe that:

"In defining the boundaries of ecclesiastical territories, the Fathers of the ancient undivided Church took into account civil territorial divisions established by secular authorities," according to Alfeyev, "[a]lthough the principle of having ecclesiastical territories correspond to civil ones was accepted as a guiding principle in the ancient Church, it was never absolutized or viewed as having no alternatives." Alfeyev cites the conflict between two bishops, Basil of Caesarea and Anthimus of Tyana, as an example.

The Churches that accepted the teaching of the 431 Council of Ephesus (which condemned the views of Nestorius) classified as heretics those who rejected the Council's teaching. Those who accepted it lived mostly in the Roman Empire and classified themselves as orthodox; they considered the others, who lived mainly under Persian rule, as Nestorian heretics. These had a period of great expansion in Asia. Monuments of their presence still exist in China. Now they are relatively few in numbers and are divided into three Churches, of which the Chaldaean Church, which is in communion with Rome, is the most numerous, while the others have recently split between the Assyrian Church of the East and the Ancient Church of the East.


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