What is a diocese? What is an archdiocese?

Response

A diocese is a jurisdiction overseen by a bishop or pastor. Individuals within a specific diocese are under the pastoral care of the bishop of that region.

Initially, the Roman Empire was segmented into dioceses, which were territorial divisions created for administrative purposes. With the official adoption of Christianity as the Roman religion, each diocese was assigned a bishop to supervise the ministry within that area. As the Roman ecclesiastical structure expanded to other territories, the practice of dividing cities into religious dioceses persisted.

A diocese is further subdivided into smaller parishes, each with a designated priest for ministry. All parish priests within a diocese are overseen by a bishop. Multiple dioceses are clustered to establish an archdiocese, which is supervised by an archbishop. In the Roman Catholic Church, the United States is divided into over 17,000 parishes, comprising 144 dioceses and 32 archdioceses, along with one archdiocese for the Military Services, USA. Additionally, there are 16 dioceses and 2 archdioceses in the Eastern Catholic Church (www.usccb.org/about/bishops-and-dioceses#tab–episcopal-regions-archdioceses-and-dioceses-in-the-us, accessed 2/8/22). Due to the significant number of congregants and churches, many major metropolitan areas have an archbishop, even if the city is not officially designated as an archdiocese. Cardinals rank above archbishops, and ultimately, the pope holds the highest position.

Presently, when people think of dioceses, they often associate them with the Catholic Church. However, several other denominations, such as the Episcopal Church (comprising 100 dioceses in the U.S. organized into 9 provinces), have a comparable hierarchical structure with dioceses and archdioceses. Similarly, other churches like the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America have bishops and archbishops in a hierarchical arrangement, although their roles may not align with the geographical boundaries of a diocese or archdiocese.