The Jordanian legal system is divided into religious, regular, and special courts (Article 99, 2011 Jordanian constitution). Regular courts have jurisdiction over all people in regular and criminal matters (Article 102) while family law is adjudicated by religious courts which are divided into sharia courts and courts of other religious communities (Article 104). Thus, Christian communities in Jordan are allowed to operate their own courts and to apply their own family laws. Whereas the Islamic family law has undergone reform in 2001 and in 2010, Christian family law has largely been exempted from this reform dynamic. This is despite the fact that legal practitioners have criticize the lack of accountability of the Christian courts, the missing legal training of Christian judges, outdated legislation, the lack of procedural law, and judicial corruption. The absence of reform of the Christian legal system is therefore not due to a lack of perceived need for reform. This paper investigates in what way the design of the legal system has shaped legal reform and advocacy with respect to Christian family law. It argues that reform of Christian family law as well as the Christian court system has been hampered by several factors. Legal reform tends to be associated with the state which is seen as in charge of reform. However, the design of the Jordanian legal system in Jordan means that the Christian courts enjoy relative autonomy. The family laws that are applied by the Christian courts are non-Jordanian laws that are in most cases applied on the regional level. The state thus has limited means to initiate reform. This has complicated questions of jurisdiction and legal advocacy. It is often unclear to judicial practitioners working in the field who has the authority to reform the Christian family laws which presents a challenge to legal mobilization and advocacy efforts. This paper focuses on the Roman Orthodox community and it’s court since it is the oldest and largest Christian community in Jordan and the court is the most frequented Christian court in the country. Triangulating written and interview sources, this article is based on 22 semi-structured interviews that were conducted in Jordan with judicial practitioners in September 2016 as well as various written sources including laws, draft laws, and rulings from the Orthodox court.