What makes a church a cathedral or just a church?

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CalifMomma

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Why are some Catholic Churches designated as Cathedrals and others are simply called a church? What is the difference?
 
A Cathedral holds a cathedra -

The cathedra is the Chair of the Bishop. The Cathedral is the Church of the Bishop. Every Bishop has one.

Can you tell, I listen to The Catholic Guy
😃
 
CalifMomma said:
Why are some Catholic Churches designated as Cathedrals and others are simply called a church? What is the difference?
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A Cathedral is the “home” church of the local ordinary (bishop.) It is the place of his cathedra (bishop’s chair.) There are also pro-cathedrals – not the main cathedral for the diocese, but a focus point for a section of a diocese.
 
Thanks! I figured it was related to the bishop in some way, just wasn’t 100% sure.
I listen to the Catholic Guy too. Great show.
 
Heckesh said:
A Cathedral is the “home” church of the local ordinary (bishop.) It is the place of his cathedra (bishop’s chair.) There are also pro-cathedrals – not the main cathedral for the diocese, but a focus point for a section of a diocese.
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Then there are co-cathedrals - where there are two or more cathedrals within the same diocese. Usually this occurs where population of the diocese has shifted greatly to a second city, or where two older dioceses have been merged.

A trickier question is what makes a church a basilica.
 
Digitonomy said:
A trickier question is what makes a church a basilica.
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I was curious so I did an internet search on basilica
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilica

I admit I assumed it was a special Italian catholic church. I’ve even been to a few…but interestingly enough the history of a basilica is rather interesting. Dating back to Roman times. Thanks for bringing that up, I learned something new again today.🙂
 
Digitonomy said:
Then there are co-cathedrals - where there are two or more cathedrals within the same diocese. Usually this occurs where population of the diocese has shifted greatly to a second city, or where two older dioceses have been merged.

A trickier question is what makes a church a basilica.
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A basilica relates to the style of the construction of a church.or sometimes a church is called a basilica because of its importance or primacy.
 
Heckesh said:
A Cathedral is the “home” church of the local ordinary (bishop.) It is the place of his cathedra (bishop’s chair.) There are also pro-cathedrals – not the main cathedral for the diocese, but a focus point for a section of a diocese.
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You’re incorrect on this*. Pro-*cathedrals are churches serving as a temporary cathedral. Epiphany Church in Pittsburgh was the *pro-cathedral *here after St. Paul’s Cathedral downtown was razed and the new cathedral was built in Oakland.

*Proto-cathedrals *are churches which used to be cathedrals. Old St. Patrick’s in Manhatten’s Lower East Side is an example.
 
Kielbasi said:
*Proto-cathedrals *are churches which used to be cathedrals. Old St. Patrick’s in Manhatten’s Lower East Side is an example.
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If more than one church in a diocese used to be a cathedral, would they be co-proto-cathedrals?
 
Kielbasi said:
You’re incorrect on this*. Pro-*cathedrals are churches serving as a temporary cathedral. Epiphany Church in Pittsburgh was the *pro-cathedral *here after St. Paul’s Cathedral downtown was razed and the new cathedral was built in Oakland.

*Proto-cathedrals *are churches which used to be cathedrals. Old St. Patrick’s in Manhatten’s Lower East Side is an example.
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I am sorry but you are mistaken.

Parish churches can serve as pro-cathedrals while there is also a cathedral. In my diocese it’s due to largely geographic distance and the small size of our actual cathedral:

dioceseofmonterey.org/observer/2007/sep/mission.htm
 
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