A cathedral (Lat. cathedra, "seat") is a Christian church that contains the seat of a bishop. It is a religious building for worship, specifically of a denomination with an episcopal hierarchy, such as the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Orthodox and some Lutheran churches, which serves as a bishop's seat, and thus as the central church of a diocese.

In the Greek Orthodox Church, the terms "kathedrikos naos" (literally: "cathedral shrine") is sometimes used for the church at which an archbishop or "metropolitan" presides. The term "metropolis" (literally "mother city") is used more commonly than "diocese" to signify an area of governance within the church.

There are certain variations on the use of the term "cathedral"; for example, some pre-Reformation cathedrals in Scotland now within the Church of Scotland still retain the term cathedral, despite the Church's Presbyterian polity which does not have bishops. The same occurs in Germany, where Protestant churches (mostly non-episocopal) co-operate under an umbrella organisation, the Evangelical Church in Germany, with some retaining cathedrals or using the term as a merely honorary title and function, void of any hierarchical supremacy. As cathedrals are often particularly impressive edifices, the term is often used incorrectly as a designation for any large, important church. This is especially true in Berlin, where three Protestant church buildings, which never functioned as cathedrals, are colloquially called cathedral (German: Dom; cf. Berliner Dom, Deutscher Dom and Französischer Dom).

Several cathedrals in Europe, such as that of Strasbourg, Essen, Freiburg i.B., and in England at York, Lincoln and Southwell, are referred to as Minster (German: Münster) churches, from Latin monasterium, because the establishments were served by canons living in community or may have been an abbey, prior to the Reformation. The other kind of great church in Western Europe is the abbey.

Definition

Though now grammatically used as a noun, the term cathedral was originally the adjective in the phrase "cathedral church", from the Latin ecclesia cathedralis. The seat marks the place set aside in the prominent church of the diocese for the head of that diocese and is therefore a major symbol of authority.

Designation