Читать книгу Catholicism For Dummies - Rev. Kenneth Brighenti - Страница 121

Each individual bishop retains his own authority, which comes from episcopal ordination and consecration. Episcopal refers to anything that has to do with a bishop or bishops, and episcopal ordination and consecration is the sacrament by which a priest becomes a bishop. It’s the third and fullest level of the Sacrament of Holy Orders. (The first level is the ordination of a deacon, and the second is the ordination of a priest. Deacons, priests, and bishops are all considered clergy.)

The local bishop runs the diocese. He’s not an ambassador of the pope but governs the local diocese as an authentic successor of the apostles, just as the pope governs the universal Church as the successor of St. Peter.

The pope appoints the bishops, and they must make a visit to the Holy Father every five years and give a report on their particular diocese. The rest of the time, the bishop goes around the diocese confirming adults and teenagers, ordaining men to the diaconate (the office of deacon), and ordaining men to the priesthood once a year. Only bishops have the authority to administer the Sacrament of Holy Orders whereby men are ordained deacons, priests, or bishops. Bishops make pastoral visits to the parishes and chair numerous meetings with their staff. (See Chapter 8 for more on the Sacrament of Confirmation, and see Chapter 9 for more on the Sacrament of Holy Orders.) A bishop is like a pastor of an extra-large parish. (See the later section “The parish priest” for details about pastors.)

The local diocese is a collection of local parishes, just like a state is a collection of counties and cities. Many dioceses are comprised of several state counties, and in a few places, the entire state makes up one diocese.

In general, you can think of a local parish as being like a town or city, and the local pastor as being like the mayor. The diocese is like a state or province, and the bishop is like the governor. (The pope is like the prime minister, governing the entire nation, except that he governs the universal Church all over the world.)

An archbishop runs a really large diocese, known as an archdiocese. For example, an archbishop is given authority in each of the following archdioceses: Newark, San Francisco, Denver, Hartford, Miami, St. Louis, and Omaha. Sometimes, though, the archbishop is also a cardinal, which is often the case in Philadelphia, New York City, Boston, Chicago, Baltimore, Los Angeles, Detroit, and Washington, D.C.

The bishops within an entire country or nation get together at least once a year in a gathering known as an episcopal conference. The American bishops belong to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB); the Canadian Bishops belong to the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB); in Australia, it’s the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference (ACBC); and in Great Britain, it’s the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales (CBCEW).