Find the word definition

Crossword clues for priesthood

Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
priesthood
noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ VERB
ordain
▪ I believe women ought to be ordained to the priesthood.
▪ Biscop Baducing was born into a noble family, then was ordained into the priesthood at the age of twenty-five.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ the Babylonian priesthood
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Also during the summer months, one of the Diocesan students for the priesthood came to Lartington on placement.
▪ As a young man, with the priesthood still a distant dream, Hughes had gone ahead of his people.
▪ Biscop Baducing was born into a noble family, then was ordained into the priesthood at the age of twenty-five.
▪ He would know that smell anywhere, having lived off that particular soup during his early years in the priesthood.
▪ His illegitimate son Cesare had difficulty in being accepted for the priesthood until granted dispensation.
▪ I believe women ought to be ordained to the priesthood.
▪ I decided that my mission was to convince Dennis to leave the priesthood.
▪ While Bourdieu's self-deprecatory claims to priesthood and orthodoxy turn out to be a cover for a very avant-garde sociology of culture.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Priesthood

Priesthood \Priest"hood\, n.

  1. The office or character of a priest; the priestly function.
    --Bk. of Com. Prayer.

  2. Priests, taken collectively; the order of men set apart for sacred offices; the order of priests.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
priesthood

Old English preosthad; see priest + -hood.

Wiktionary
priesthood

n. 1 The role or office of a priest 2 Priests as a group; the clergy 3 Authority to act in the name of God.

WordNet
priesthood

n. the body of ordained religious practitioners

Wikipedia
Priesthood (Latter Day Saints)

In the Latter Day Saint movement, priesthood is the power and authority of God given to man, including the authority to perform ordinances and to act as a leader in the church. A body of priesthood holders is referred to as a quorum.

Priesthood denotes elements of both power and authority. The priesthood includes the power Jesus gave his apostles to perform miracles such as the casting out of devils and the healing of sick ( Luke 9:1). Latter Day Saints believe that the Biblical miracles performed by prophets and apostles were performed by the power of priesthood, including the miracles of Jesus, who holds all of the keys of the priesthood. The priesthood is formally known as the "Priesthood after the Order of the Son of God", but to avoid the too frequent use of the name of deity, the priesthood is referred to as the Melchizedek priesthood ( Melchizedek being the high priest to whom Abraham paid tithes).

As an authority, priesthood is the authority by which a bearer may perform ecclesiastical acts of service in the name of God. Latter Day Saints believe that acts (and in particular, ordinances) performed by one with priesthood authority are recognized by God and are binding in heaven, on earth, and in the afterlife. In addition, Latter Day Saints believe that leadership positions within the church are legitimized by the priesthood authority.

For most of the history of the Latter Day Saint movement, only men have been ordained to specific offices in the priesthood. The first exception to this policy was within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Strangite), a faction founded by James J. Strang that flourished between 1844 and 1856 (though a diminutive remnant still exists today). In Strang's church, women were—and still are—permitted to hold the offices of priest and teacher (but not any other offices) from as early as 1856. In 1984, the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (now the Community of Christ), the second largest denomination of the movement, began ordaining women to all of its priesthood offices. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), the largest church in the movement, still restricts its priesthood to men, as do most of the other Latter Day Saint denominations. Mormon feminist Kate Kelly was excommunicated for campaigning to allow women's ordination in the LDS Church. An apostle of the LDS Church has taught that "[m]en have no greater claim than women upon the blessings that issue from the Priesthood and accompany its possession."

Priesthood (album)

Priesthood is the third studio album by Wu-Tang Clan affiliate and Sunz of Man rapper Killah Priest. He had previously cut ties with the Wu-Tang Clan after problems with its leader RZA, and this album receives no input from them. Priesthood is also Killah Priest's first independent release as his last album, View from Masada sold poorly and he was dropped from his label. As a result, the album received very limited distribution and low sales, though it was well received by critics.

Priesthood (LDS Church)

In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), the priesthood is the power and authority to act in the name of God for the salvation of humankind. Male members of the church who meet standards of worthy behavior and church participation are generally ordained to specific offices within the priesthood.

Priesthood (Orthodox Church)

Presbyter is, in the Bible, a synonym for bishop (episkopos), referring to a leader in local Church congregations. In modern usage, it is distinct from bishop and synonymous with priest. Its literal meaning in Greek (presbyteros) is "elder."

Priesthood (Ancient Israel)

The priesthood of Ancient Israel was the class of male individuals, who, according to the Hebrew Bible, were patrilineal descendants from Aaron (the elder brother of Moses), who served in the Tabernacle, Solomon's Temple and Second Temple until the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE. Their temple role included animal sacrifice. The priests (Hebrew kohanim) are viewed as continuing in the Kohen families of rabbinical Judaism.

Priesthood (Community of Christ)

In the Community of Christ, formerly the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, priesthood is God's power and authority to minister in the church and to conduct God's business on the earth. Although the church believes that all Christians are called by their gifts and talents to the ministry, priesthood is seen as a particular expression of universal ministry to which all are called. In the Community of Christ, both women and men can be ordained to the priesthood. All offices are deemed equal in importance, but the duties and responsibilities of each differ.

For a person to be called to the priesthood for the first time, his or her calling is typically discerned by the pastor of the local congregation. These priesthood calls are approved after review by a Mission Center President and vote of a congregational conference. For certain calls, the discernment will come through other church officials and approval will be voted upon at a Mission Center Conference or World Conference. Once the call has been administratively processed it is presented to the individual called. If that individual accepts the call and is sustained by a conference vote, he or she will be ordained to that office.

Priesthood (Catholic Church)

The ministerial orders of the the Roman Catholic Church are those of bishop, presbyter (more commonly called priest in English), and deacon. The ordained priesthood and the common priesthood (or priesthood of all the baptized faithful) are different in function and essence. The Catholic Church teaches that when a man participates in priesthood, he participates in the priesthood of Christ Himself. All men who, through the Sacrament of Holy Orders, have become priests participate in Christ's priesthood; they act in persona Christi Capitis, in the person of Christ, the Head of His Body, the Church.Unlike usage in English, "the Latin words sacerdos and sacerdotium are used to refer in general to the ministerial priesthood shared by bishops and presbyters. The words presbyter, presbyterium and presbyteratus refer to priests in the English use of the word or presbyters." In late 2008, there were 409,166 Catholic priests of the Latin Church and the Eastern Catholic Churches worldwide. A priest of the regular clergy is commonly addressed with the title "Father", abbreviated Fr., in the Roman Catholic and some other Christian churches.

The state of consecrated life or monasticism is a separate, third distinct vocational state from the clergy and the laity. As an overview, there are the members of the laity- who are married or unmarried, and the clergy- the bishops, priests, and deacons. Deacons are male and usually belong to the diocesan clergy, but, unlike almost all Latin-rite (Western Catholic) priests and all bishops from Eastern or Western Catholicism, they may marry as laymen before their ordination as clergy.

Members of institutes of consecrated life, or monks, can be either clergy or non-ordained members of the religious order (male or female non-ordained religious are not to be considered laypersons in the strict sense- they take certain vows and are not free to marry once they have made solemn profession of vows; all female religious are non-ordained, they may be sisters living to some degree of activity in a communal state, or nuns living in cloister or some other type of isolation). The male members of religious orders, whether living in monastic communities or cloistered in isolation, and who are ordained priests or deacons constitute what is called the religious or regular clergy, distinct from the diocesan or secular clergy. Those ordained priests or deacons who are not members of some sort of religious order ( secular priests) most often serve as clergy to a specific church or in an office of a specific diocese or in Rome.

Usage examples of "priesthood".

Then the high priest asserted his authority and expelled Argan from the priesthood.

It was also noted that Sulla had given himself a priesthood to complement the augurship he held already-and that he was the only man to hold both.

Rank dictated the positions of some, like those holding magistracies, priesthoods, augurships, but the bulk of the senators were at liberty to distribute themselves among cronies and settle to partake of viands the bottomless purse of Young Marius had provided.

According to tradition, the new priest would belong to the same family as the dead priest, thus enabling priesthoods and augurships to pass from father to son, or uncle to nephew, or cousin to cousin.

But Calphurnius-first served God a long time in the deaconship, and at length closed his days in the priesthood.

But Calphurnius first served God a long time in the deaconship, and at length closed his days in the priesthood.

He would not be consoled, even when the Senate decreed the baby instant deification, a temple, and a priesthood.

Nearly a hundred have been elevated to the diaconate and priesthood, meeting all requirements and thereby teaching the same level as other men.

In that moment he rises above his stupid gianthood, and earnestly warns the Son of Light that all his power and eminence of priesthood, godhood, and kingship must stand or fall with the unbearable cold greatness of the incorruptible law-giver.

Demand then that Jad-ben-Otho uphold his godship and the dignity of his priesthood by directing his consuming fires through my own bosom.

John was ordained to the priesthood, and when John de Gronde, the first Confessor of the Sisters at Deventer died, he ruled the said Sisterhood which Gerard had founded, being set up as the second Rector thereof, in which office he was a zealous minister, and he governed the Sisters in most excellent wise for many years, for God helped him.

I gave him, but with proper caution, some of the particulars of my life, for I wanted him to be satisfied that, if I had at first entered the career of the holy priesthood, it had not been through any vocation of mine.

I had at that time to attend to the affairs of my posthumous brother, who had, as he said, a call from Heaven to the priesthood, but he wanted a patrimony.

How can we, the priesthood, let the flame die when you who have lived through the sufferings of the Hogen and Heiji wars have not forgotten to love and comfort each other?

Connected with this opinion is the idea that the priesthood is the only mediatorial office between Christ and the congregation.