The Collaborative International Dictionary
Latin \Lat"in\, a. [F., fr. L. Latinus belonging to Latium, Latin, fr. Latium a country of Italy, in which Rome was situated. Cf. Ladin, Lateen sail, under Lateen.]
Of or pertaining to Latium, or to the Latins, a people of Latium; Roman; as, the Latin language.
-
Of, pertaining to, or composed in, the language used by the Romans or Latins; as, a Latin grammar; a Latin composition or idiom.
Latin Church (Eccl. Hist.), the Western or Roman Catholic Church, as distinct from the Greek or Eastern Church.
Latin cross. See Illust. 1 of Cross.
Latin races, a designation sometimes loosely given to certain nations, esp. the French, Spanish, and Italians, who speak languages principally derived from Latin.
Latin Union, an association of states, originally comprising France, Belgium, Switzerland, and Italy, which, in 1865, entered into a monetary agreement, providing for an identity in the weight and fineness of the gold and silver coins of those countries, and for the amounts of each kind of coinage by each. Greece, Servia, Roumania, and Spain subsequently joined the Union.
Wikipedia
The Latin Church is an autonomous or sui iuris particular church within the Catholic Church. There are 24 such sui iuris particular churches within the Catholic Church, the others being Eastern Catholic Churches. They differ from each other in liturgical rite (ceremonies, vestments, chants, language), devotional traditions, theology, canon law, and pastors (even if in the same territory as another), but they all hold the same faith, and all see union with the bishop of Rome (the pope), as essential to being a Catholic.
The Latin Church is the largest of these, with a membership far greater than all the others combined. It arose in Western Europe and North Africa, an area once encompassed by the Roman Empire, throughout which Latin was widely understood and spoken. It is sometimes called the Western Church. All the other sui iuris particular churches, of which there are 23, originated farther east and are, therefore, collectively known as the Eastern Catholic Churches. Because of the population migrations, members of all of these sui iuris particular churches are no longer confined to their areas of origin and can be found all over the world.
Usage examples of "latin church".
It is doubtful whether the idea of becoming Caesar in succession to Romulus Augustulus occurred to him before his acquisition of North Italy, or whether it was suggested to him by Pope Leo III, who was anxious to make the Latin Church independent of Constantinople.
Neither the fear of exile, nor the desertion of his brethren, nor the authority of the Latin church, nor the danger of failure or doubt in the succession to the empire, could bend the spirit of the inflexible monk.
But when the primate of Egypt, deserted and proscribed by the Latin church, was left destitute of any foreign support, Constantius despatched two of his secretaries with a verbal commission to announce and execute the order of his banishment.
Ambrose, a father of the Latin Church, 340-397, and the fourth is not by Comrade Debs, but by St.
By a decree of 28 February, 1476, this Pontiff adopted the Feast of Our Lady's Conception for the entire Latin Church and granted an indulgence to all who should assist at the Divine Office of this Solemnity.