holy order

Noun
  1. (usually plural) the status or rank or office of a Christian clergyman in an ecclesiastical hierarchy (synset 113974030)
    "theologians still disagree over whether `bishop' should or should not be a separate Order"
    is a type of: position, status - the relative position or standing of things or especially persons in a society
    subtypes:
    • acolyte - someone who assists a priest or minister in a liturgical service; a cleric ordained in the highest of the minor orders in the Roman Catholic Church but not in the Anglican Church or the Eastern Orthodox Churches
    • anagnost - a cleric in the minor orders of the Eastern Orthodox Church who reads the lessons aloud in the liturgy (analogous to the lector in the Roman Catholic Church)
    • deacon - a cleric ranking just below a priest in Christian churches; one of the Holy Orders
    • doorkeeper, ostiarius, ostiary - the lowest of the minor Holy Orders in the unreformed Western Church but now suppressed by the Roman Catholic Church
    • exorcist - one of the minor orders in the unreformed Western Church but now suppressed in the Roman Catholic Church
    • lector, reader - someone who reads the lessons in a church service; someone ordained in a minor order of the Roman Catholic Church
    • priest - a clergyman in Christian churches who has the authority to perform or administer various religious rites; one of the Holy Orders
    • subdeacon - a clergyman an order below deacon; one of the Holy Orders in the unreformed western Christian church and the eastern Catholic Churches but now suppressed in the Roman Catholic Church
    same as: order
  2. The sacrament of ordination (synset 101041854)
    is a type of: sacrament - a formal religious ceremony conferring a specific grace on those who receive it; the two Protestant ceremonies are baptism and the Lord's Supper; in the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church there are seven traditional rites accepted as instituted by Jesus: baptism and confirmation and Holy Eucharist and penance and holy orders and matrimony and extreme unction
    has: ordinance, ordination - the act of ordaining; the act of conferring (or receiving) holy orders

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