A particular church () is an ecclesiastical community of followers headed by a bishop (or equivalent), as defined by Catholic canon law and ecclesiology. A liturgical rite, a collection of liturgies descending from shared historic or regional context, depends on the particular church the bishop (or equivalent) belongs to. Thus the term "particular church" refers to an institution, and "liturgical rite" to its ritual practices, although the Second Vatican Council (1963–1965) also referred to "rite" as a term then in current use embracing "liturgy, ecclesiastical discipline, and spiritual heritage".
Particular churches exist in two kinds: An autonomous particular church sui iuris: an aggregation of particular churches with distinct liturgical, spiritual, theological and canonical traditions. The largest such autonomous particular church is the Latin Church. The other 23 Eastern Catholic Churches are headed by bishops, some of which are titled Patriarch or Major Archbishop. In this context the descriptors autonomous () and sui iuris (Latin) are synonymous, meaning "of its own law". While these particular churches have their own laws and practices, the Holy See acts as the arbiter of relations between them.Second Vatican Council, Decree on the Catholic Churches of the Eastern Rite, section 4, published on 21 November 1964, accessed on 17 June 2026 A local particular church: a diocese (or eparchy) headed by a bishop (or equivalent), typically collected in a national polity under an episcopal conference. However, there are also other forms, including apostolic vicariates, apostolic prefectures, military ordinariates, personal ordinariates, and territorial abbacies.
Liturgical rites also exist in two kinds: Liturgical rite: a liturgical rite depending on the tradition of an autonomous particular church sui iuris. Catholic liturgies are broadly divided into the Latin liturgical rites of the Latin Church and the various Eastern Catholic liturgies of the other 23 sui iuris churches Catholic order liturgical rite: a variant of a liturgical rite exceptionally depending on a specific religious order.
Churches List of churches sui iuris Name Est. Rite Seat Members Polity Jurisdictions BishopsCoptic Catholic Church1741 AlexandrianCathedral of Our Lady, Cairo, EgyptPatriarchate Eritrean Catholic Church2015Kidane Mehret Cathedral, Asmara, EritreaMetropolitanate Ethiopian Catholic Church1846Cathedral of the Holy Saviour, Addis Ababa, EthiopiaMetropolitanate Armenian Catholic Church1742ArmenianCathedral of Saint Elias and Saint Gregory, Beirut, LebanonPatriarchate Albanian Greek Catholic Church1628 ByzantinePro-Cathedral of Saint Mary and Saint Louis, Vlorë, AlbaniaApostolic administration Belarusian Greek Catholic Church1596NoneApostolic administration Bulgarian Greek Catholic Church1861Cathedral of the Dormition, Sofia, BulgariaEparchy Greek Catholic Church in Croatia and Serbia1611SeveralNo unified structureThe Byzantine Catholic Church of Croatia and Serbia comprises two jurisdictions: Greek Catholic Eparchy of Križevci covering Croatia, Slovenia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Ruski Krstur covering Serbia. The Eparchy of Križevci is in foreign province, and the Eparchy of Ruski Krstur is immediately subject to the Holy See. Greek Byzantine Catholic Church1911SeveralNo unified structureThe Greek Byzantine Catholic Church comprises two independent apostolic exarchates covering Greece and Turkey respectively, each immediately subject to the Holy See. Hungarian Greek Catholic Church1912Cathedral of Hajdúdorog, Debrecen, HungaryMetropolitanate Italo-Albanian Catholic Church1784SeveralNo unified structureThe Italo-Albanian Greek Catholic Church comprises two independent eparchies (based in Lungro and Piana degli Albanesi) and one territorial abbacy (based in Grottaferrata), each immediately subject to the Holy See. Macedonian Greek Catholic Church2001Cathedral of the Assumption, Strumica, North MacedoniaEparchy Melkite Greek Catholic Church1726Cathedral of the Dormition, Damascus, SyriaPatriarchate Romanian Greek Catholic Church1697Cathedral of the Holy Trinity, Blaj, RomaniaMajor archiepiscopate Russian Greek Catholic Church1905NoneNoneThe Russian Greek Catholic Church comprises two apostolic exarchates (one for Russia and one for China), each immediately subject to the Holy See and each vacant for decades. Bishop Joseph Werth of Novosibirsk has been appointed by the Holy See as ordinary to the Eastern Catholic faithful in Russia, although not as exarch of the dormant apostolic exarchate and without the creation of a formal ordinariate. Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church1646Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist, Pittsburgh, United StatesMetropolitanateThe Ruthenian Catholic Church does not have a unified structure. It includes a Metropolia based in Pittsburgh, which covers the entire United States, but also an eparchy in Ukraine and an apostolic exarchate in the Czech Republic, both of which are directly subject to the Holy See. Slovak Greek Catholic Church1646Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist, Prešov, SlovakiaMetropolitanate Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church1595Cathedral of the Resurrection, Kyiv, UkraineMajor archiepiscopate Chaldean Catholic Church1552 East SyriacCathedral of Our Lady of Sorrows, Baghdad, IraqPatriarchate Syro-Malabar Catholic Church 1552Cathedral of Our Lady, Ernakulam, Kerala, IndiaMajor archiepiscopate Maronite Church 4th c. West SyriacChurch of Bkerke, Bkerke, LebanonPatriarchate Syriac Catholic Church1781Syriac Catholic Cathedral of Saint Paul, Damascus, SyriaPatriarchate Syro-Malankara Catholic Church1930Cathedral of Saint Mary, Pattom, Kerala, IndiaMajor archiepiscopate Latin Church 1st c. LatinArchbasilica of Saint John Lateran, Rome, ItalyPatriarchate Other VariousFive of the ordinariates for Eastern Catholic faithful are multi-ritual, encompassing the faithful of all Eastern Catholic rites within their territory not otherwise subject to a local ordinary of their own rite. The sixth is exclusively Byzantine, but covers all Byzantine Catholics in Austria, no matter which particular Byzantine Church they belong to.SeveralThe six ordinariates are based in Buenos Aires (Argentina), Vienna (Austria), Belo Horizonte (Brazil), Paris (France), Warsaw (Poland), and Madrid (Spain).Ordinariates Technically, each of these ordinariates has an ordinary who is a bishop, but all of the bishops are Latin bishops whose primary assignment is to a Latin see. Totalmore 640 Archdioceses
Ecclesiology
In Catholic ecclesiology, a church is an assembly of the faithful, hierarchically ordered, both in the entire world (the Catholic Church), or in a certain territory (a particular church). To be a sacrament (a sign) of the Mystical Body of Christ in the world, a church must have both a head and members (Col. 1:18). The sacramental sign of Christ the head is the sacred hierarchy – the bishops, priests and deacons.
More specifically, it is the local bishop, with his priests and deacons gathered around and assisting him in his office of teaching, sanctifying and governing (Mt. 28:19–20; Titus 1:4–9). Thus, the church is fully present sacramentally (by way of a sign) wherever there is a sign of Christ the head, a bishop and those who assist him, and a sign of Christ's body, Christian faithful. Each diocese is therefore considered a particular church.
On the worldwide level, the sign of Christ the head is the Pope, and, to be Catholic, particular churches, whether local churches or autonomous ritual churches, must be in communion with this sign of Christ the head. Through this full communion with Saint Peter and his successors the church becomes a universal sacrament of salvation to the end of the age (Mt. 28:20).
The word "church" is applied to the Catholic Church as a whole, which is seen as a single church: the multitude of peoples and cultures within the church, and the great diversity of gifts, offices, conditions and ways of life of its members, are not opposed to the church's unity. In this sense of "church", the list of churches in the Catholic Church has only one member, the Catholic Church itself (comprising Roman and Eastern Churches).
Within the Catholic Church there are local particular churches, of which dioceses are the most familiar form. Other forms include territorial abbacies, apostolic vicariates and apostolic prefectures. The 1983 Code of Canon Law states: "Particular Churches, in which and from which the one and only Catholic Church exists, are principally dioceses. Unless the contrary is clear, the following are equivalent to a diocese: a territorial prelature, a territorial abbacy, a vicariate apostolic, a prefecture apostolic and a permanently established apostolic administration." A list of Catholic dioceses, of which on 31 December 2011 there were 2,834,Vatican, Annuario Pontificio 2012, p. 1142. is given at List of Catholic dioceses (alphabetical).
Within the Catholic Church there are also aggregations of local particular churches that share a specific liturgical, theological, spiritual, and canonical heritage, distinguished from other heritages on the basis of cultural and historical circumstances. These are known as autonomous ("sui iuris") churches. The 1990 Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches defines such a church as follows: "A group of Christ's faithful hierarchically linked in accordance with law and given express or tacit recognition by the supreme authority of the Church is in this Code called an autonomous Church." There are 24 such autonomous Catholic churches: One Latin Church (i.e., Western) and 23 Eastern Catholic Churches", a distinction by now more historical than geographical. Although each of them has its own specific heritage, they are all in full communion with the Pope in Rome.
Unlike "families" or "federations" of churches formed through the grant of mutual recognition by distinct ecclesial bodies,Also unlike the situation of those countries within the Commonwealth that consider the British monarch to be their head of state, but are nonetheless fully independent and quite distinct states, not just one state. the Catholic Church considers itself a single church ("full communion, "one Body") composed of a multitude of particular churches, each of which, as stated, is an embodiment of the fullness of the one Catholic Church. For the particular churches within the Catholic Church, whether autonomous ritual churches (e.g., Coptic Catholic Church, Melkite Catholic Church, Armenian Catholic Church, etc.) or dioceses (e.g., Archdiocese of Birmingham, Archdiocese of Chicago, etc.), are seen as not simply branches, divisions or sections of a larger body. Theologically, each is considered to be the embodiment in a particular place or for a particular community of the one, whole Catholic Church. "It is in these and formed out of them that the one and unique Catholic Church exists."Second Vatican Council, Dogmatic Decree on the Church , 23"The particular Churches, insofar as they are 'part of the one Church of Christ' (Second Vatican Council: Decree Christus Dominus, 6/c), have a special relationship of mutual interiority with the whole, that is, with the universal Church, because in every particular Church 'the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church of Christ is truly present and active' (Second Vatican Council: Decree Christus Dominus, 11/a). For this reason, the universal Church cannot be conceived as the sum of the particular Churches, or as a federation of particular Churches. It is not the result of the communion of the Churches, but, in its essential mystery, it is a reality ontologically and temporally prior to every individual particular Church" (Communionis notio, 9).
Particular churches sui iuris