Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Vicar
1.
One deputed or authorized to perform the functions of another; a substitute in office; a deputy.
[R.]
2.
(Eng. Eccl. Law)
The incumbent of an appropriated benefice.
☞ The distinction between a parson [or rector] and vicar is this: The parson has, for the most part, the whole right to the ecclesiastical dues in his parish; but a vicar has generally an appropriator over him, entitled to the best part of the profits, to whom he is in fact perpetual curate with a standing salary.
Burrill.
Apostolic vicar
, or Vicar apostolic
(R. C. Ch.)
(a)
A bishop to whom the Roman pontiff delegates a portion of his jurisdiction.
(b)
Any ecclesiastic acting under a papal brief, commissioned to exercise episcopal authority.
(c)
A titular bishop in a country where there is no episcopal see, or where the succession has been interrupted.
– Vicar forane
.
(R. C. Ch.)
A dignitary or parish priest appointed by a bishop to exercise a limited jurisdiction in a particular town or district of a diocese.
Addis & Arnold.
– Vicar-general
. (a)
(Ch. of Eng.)
The deputy of the
Archbishop of Canterbury
or York, in whose court the bishops of the province are confirmed. Encyc. Brit.
(b)
(R. C. Ch.)
An assistant to a bishop in the discharge of his official functions.
– Vicar of Jesus Christ
(R. C. Ch.)
, the pope as representing Christ on earth.
Webster 1828 Edition
Vicar
VIC'AR
,Noun.
1.
In a general sense, a person deputed or authorized to perform the functions of another; a substitute in office. The pope pretends to be vicar of Jesus Christ on earth. He has under him a grand vicar, who is a cardinal, and whose jurisdiction extends over all priests, regular and secular.2.
In the canon law, the priest of a parish, the predial tithes of which are impropriated or appropriated, that is, belong to a chapter or religious house, or to a layman, who receives them, and only allows the vicar the smaller tithes or a salary.Apostolical vicars, are those who perform the functions of the pope in churches or provinces committed to their direction.
Definition 2024
vicar
vicar
English
Alternative forms
- vic. abbreviation
Noun
vicar (plural vicars)
- In the Church of England, the priest of a parish, receiving a salary or stipend but not tithes.
- 1907, Harold Bindloss, chapter 20, in The Dust of Conflict:
- Hester Earle and Violet Wayne were moving about the aisle with bundles of wheat-ears and streamers of ivy, for the harvest thanksgiving was shortly to be celebrated, while the vicar stood waiting for their directions on the chancel steps with a great handful of crimson gladioli.
- 1918, W. B. Maxwell, chapter 12, in The Mirror and the Lamp:
- All this was extraordinarily distasteful to Churchill. It was ugly, gross. Never before had he felt such repulsion when the vicar displayed his characteristic bluntness or coarseness of speech. In the present connexion […] such talk had been distressingly out of place.
- 1997, Frank Muir, chapter 1, in A Kentish Lad, ISBN 0552141372:
- For this [annual choir outing] the vicar traditionally hired a brake, an ancient, Edwardian, horse-drawn, bus-like vehicle which had plodded along for many years between Ramsgate and Pegwell Bay, carrying passengers who were in no hurry, until it became so unroadworthy that no horse could be persuaded to pull it on a regular basis.
-
- In the Roman Catholic and some other churches, a cleric acting as local representative of a higher ranking member of the clergy.
- A person acting on behalf of, or is representing another person.
Derived terms
Translations
lower-ranking priest
local representative of higher-ranking member of clergy