Historically a canon is a priest who lived under the laws of the Church. In the first millenium of Christianity, in the 600's, 700's, 800's, and 900's, there were movements to reform the clergy, and in that time, the name "canon" came to refer to those clergy who were living according to the laws or "canons" as prescribed for clergy by the Church.

There is a mystagogical meaning to the term "New Jerusalem", which refers to Heaven. By nature, canons are attached to a specific place of church, and are referred to as the Canons of "the name of that church". The Canons of the New Jerusalem were founded without a specific church building, and in order to instead highlight the supernatural end of Christianity for today's world and to focus on having our lives supernaturally oriented; and to signify that we are members of the Catholic Church, which is itself the New Jerusalem, as well as showing that we are canons of the "Church to come" in eternity, the Canons have taken this name of "New Jerusalem".

Since the 12th century, all canons who are "observant", that is, "canons regular, meaning those who live under vows and the canons of the Church, also live under the rule of St. Augustine, and we follow this way of life.

Our religious habit is characteristic of those habits that are worn by Augustinian regular canons. The white robe comes from habits of those orders and reform movements of the era of the great, Gregorian reforms in the Church, where the Cistercians, Carthusians, Norbertines, Dominicans, et. al. all had and have white habits, which is indicative of the angelic life. Canons also wear a "camail" (pronounced "kam-eye"), which is the shoulder cap with a hood. The black camail worn by the Canons Regular of the New Jerusalem signifies the mortality of this life, and which, after death, will be replaced by a new, white camail in eternal life. For Liturgical services, when not celebrating Mass as priests, we also wear a special white garment over the regular white robe called a "rochet" (pronounces as though rhymes with "rocket").