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Ecumenical vs Ecclesiastical - What's the difference?

ecumenical | ecclesiastical |

As adjectives the difference between ecumenical and ecclesiastical

is that ecumenical is pertaining to the universal Church, representing the entire Christian world; interdenominational; sometimes by extension, interreligious while ecclesiastical is of or pertaining to the church.

ecumenical

English

Alternative forms

* * oecumenical

Adjective

(-)
  • (ecclesiastical) Pertaining to the universal Church, representing the entire Christian world; interdenominational; sometimes by extension, interreligious.
  • * 1999 , Dr Martyn Percy, The Guardian , 5 Jun 1999:
  • Within Europe, the church's ecumenical partnerships have demonstrated that ecclesial unity may have political resonances.
  • * 2009 , (Diarmaid MacCulloch), A History of Christianity , Penguin 2010, p. 215:
  • Nicaea has always been regarded as one of the milestones in the history of the Church, and reckoned as the first council to be styled ‘general’ or ‘oecumenical ’.
  • * 2010 , ‘Britain's ancient shame in Slovenia’, The Economist , 30 Oct 2010:
  • Rather touchingly, an ecumenical mass of reparation for the victims of the massacres was held on October 29, in the very English village of Great Missenden in Buckinghamshire. The service was led by the Catholic bishop of Northampton, with Archbishop Metropolitan Stres from Ljubljana and the Anglican bishop of Buckingham.
  • General, universal, worldwide.
  • Synonyms

    * universal, worldwide

    Derived terms

    * ecumenically * ecumenicism * ecumenicist * ecumenicity * ecumenism

    References

    ecclesiastical

    English

    Alternative forms

    * ecclesiasticall (obsolete)

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Of or pertaining to the church
  • ecclesiastical architecture

    Synonyms

    * (l) * ecclesiastic (less common)

    See also

    *