abbot, secular
Cleric with the title and some of the honors of the office of abbot , who holds benefices which originally belonged to monastic houses, but which, since the suppression of the latter, are now secularized and transferred to other churches. There are three classes:
those who possess quasi-episcopal jurisdiction and the right to wear pontifical insignia;
those who have only the abbatial dignity;
those who hold the title of abbot and the privilege of precedence in choir and assemblies in a church to which a suppressed monastery ‘s benefice has been transferred.