Procurator

PROCURATOR: In general, one who acts as agent or factor for another in temporal interests. The term was anciently applied to lawyers in the civil courts and to proctors in ecclesiastical judicatories. As a secular calling it was forbidden to the clergy by a series of synods beginning with the First Synod of Carthage (348, chaps. viii.–ix.) and coming down to the Synod of Mainz (813, chap. xiv.). In case one who followed the profession desired to enter the clergy, he was required first to purge himself from participation in the duties which his profession involved. The clergy were repeatedly enjoined to abstain from labors of this sort, the only exception being service in behalf of widows or orphans, that intrusted to them by their bishop, or where the property of the church was concerned. In church life the term seems to have been applied to those who had charge of the temporalities. It was also applied to those who represented a person in absence during the ceremony of marriage or betrothal, as well as in some other ecclesiastical ceremonies.