The Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem (in Latin, Ordo Equestris Sancti Sepulcri Hierosolymitani), is an order of knighthood and recognized order of chivalry under the direct protection of the Holy See. According to its constitutions, the popes are the sovereign of the order and members include knights, dames, and prelates of the order (clergy).
Clergy are knight members who are priests, bishops, or deacons. When they are invested, they are made full members of the Order, with the title "Very Reverend." As such they are entitled by long-standing custom to wear the rochet and white mozzetta - instead of the mantle worn by lay members - and a biretta according to their ordinary rank.
Around their neck they don the "jewel," the Jerusalem cross in scarlet enamel, surmounted with the golden military trophy of the Order, suspended by a black ribbon in watered silk.
Although historians are uncertain in regard to the precise year in which the Order was founded, it is believed to date back to the time of Sir Godfrey of Bouillon, who established the knights to guard the empty tomb of Christ after the conquest of Jerusalem in 1099. Pope Pascal II approved the Order in a papal bull of approbation in 1113.
Around that time, the Canons Regular of the Holy Sepulchre were founded, a religious order that followed the Rule of St. Augustine. With the fall of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem the knights and canons regular were driven out of Palestine. They therefore fled to nearby Cyprus where they established an Abbey.
From there they spread to Italy and lived the life of religious knights, maintaining a religious rule of life as canons regular with all its duties. Priories and monasteries of the Order were eventually established across Europe in France, Spain, Poland, Belgium. This included convents for female nuns in Belgium, England, the Netherlands, France, and Spain. In the Vatican, Pope Celestine II gave the Order the oratory of Sant'Egidio on Feb. 11, 1144.
Eventually the male branch of the religious order was suppressed in 1489 to be combined with the Order of Malta. Meanwhile, part of the male branch continued in other parts of Europe until the nineteenth century. In addition, there was a female branch founded in the fourteenth century, the Canonesses Regular of the Holy Sepulchre, still in existence today in various countries.
Below are various historical images of the canons, taken from circa 1790, with one of the canonesses.
The Equestrian Order's mission is to primarily support the Christian presence in the Holy Land (historically, pro sacris Palestinae locis). It exists to arouse both prayers and assistance for the land of Jesus. It sustains and assists the religious, spiritual, charitable, social works and rights of the local Christians. Worldwide Catholics pledge their support, praying always for the freedom and exultation of Holy Mother the Church. Members pray daily in a special way for the Church in the Holy Land.
The Order is admittedly exclusive and limits its membership to elect members - to those priests and laymen who have demonstrated they are in a special way friends and supporters of the missions of the Church in the Holy Land, patrons either by their labors or generosity. The obligation demands that members be of decorous and social class and that they live a life of noble virtue (nobilium).
Worldwide there are some 30,000 members of the Order and they help support the schools of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, educating over 20,000 students in Palestine, Israel, Jordan, and Cyprus. Each year the Order donates about $10 million to the Latin Patriarchate to sustain its operations.
While the Cardinal Grand Master resides in Rome, the order's ex officio Grand Prior is the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, who resides in Jerusalem. He is the Archbishop of the Latin Church for the Archdiocese of Jerusalem, with jurisdiction over all Latin Rite Catholics in the Holy Land. He has his own titular and honorary canons of the Holy Sepulchre, who are canons attached to the Basilica of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem (titular canons are those incardinated into the Latin Patriarchate, while honorary canons are all others worldwide).
His Eminence Nicholas Cardinal Canali, once the Grand Master of the Order, said to members (clergy and laymen alike) in the Holy Year 1950:
"No vain and empty pride of decorations and uniforms - however honorable and meritorious they may be - should flatter with its allure those whom the Supreme Pontiff Pius XII honors with the name of Crusaders. The only legitimate pride is that which the ardent Apostle of the Gentiles inculcated among the Galatians: 'God forbid I should glory save in the Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ.' The one boast we may make is that of being and of proving ourselves, in the sight of God and man, truly militant under the Standard of the Risen Christ, Who, upon the empty Sepulchre, vanquishes death, and raises aloft the crusading banner of salvation, of life and resurrection."
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