What is a diocese? What is an archdiocese?

The Origin of Dioceses

The bishops who lived in cities, were either by their own preaching, or by the preaching of others — presbyters, deacons, or people — the means of gathering new churches in the neighbouring towns and villages. These young assemblies, very naturally, continued under the care and protection of the city churches by whose means they had received the gospel, and were formed into churches. Ecclesiastical provinces were thus gradually formed, which the Greeks afterwards denominated dioceses. The city bishops claimed the privilege of appointing office-bearers to these rural churches; and the persons to whom they committed their instruction and care were called district bishops. These formed a new class, coming in between the bishops and the presbyters, being considered inferior to the former, and superior to the latter. Thus were distinctions and divisions created, and offices multiplied.

The Origin of the Metropolitan Bishop

Churches thus constituted and regulated rapidly increased throughout the empire. In the management of their internal affairs every church was essentially distinct from every other, though walking in spiritual fellowship with all others, and considered as part of the one church of God. But, as the number of believers increased, and churches were extended, diversities in doctrine and discipline sprang up, which could not always be settled in the individual assemblies. This gave rise to councils, or synods. These were composed chiefly of those who took part in the ministry. But when the deputies of the churches were thus assembled, it was soon discovered that the control of a president was required. Unless the sovereign action of the Holy Spirit in the church be owned and submitted to, there must be anarchy without a president. The bishop of the capital of the province was usually appointed to preside, under the lofty title of the Metropolitan. On his return home it was hard to lay aside these occasional honours, so he very soon claimed the personal and permanent dignity of the Metropolitan.

Bishops (overseers) are identical with elders (presbyters). For conclusive proof see Acts 20:17 and 28; Titus 1:5 and 7. In both passages the same persons are called both bishops and elders. It is nowhere taught in the Word of God that a bishop has a place of superior authority in the body of Christ, as head of a diocese, etc. These things as practised in the Romish, Episcopal and other ritualistic churches are according to human ordinances.

Nor was it only departure from scripture in worldliness; it is as plain ecclesiastically. For the accepted tradition among the ancient systems, Catholic and Protestant, is that to the bishop or overseer belongs the authority of ordination, consecration of persons and places, and excommunication. Now the written word is positive, that what is called ordination belonged solely to apostles, or an apostolic delegate, like Timothy or Titus, commissioned for definite action in a given time and place. Even when the church looked out God-fearing men for external or diaconal service, like the seven in Jerusalem, the apostles set them over this business (Acts 6:3). But the church in scripture never chose elders; nor did elders, but only an apostle or an envoy by his authority. Hence we read (in Acts 14:23) that the apostles Paul and Barnabas on their return to the gathered saints chose for them elders in every church. Is it needful to say that at a later day Timothy and Titus followed this model, when authorised to act similarly where Paul could not be? Their instructions are simple and clear, as we can see; and they were faithful. Even the competent advocates of Episcopacy acknowledged that in apostolic times there were elders in each local assembly, and that these elders were bishops, the distinction which is found in the second century being unknown in the first, not even a leader among equals. "The" bishop first appears in the letters of Ignatius, who (if not the inventor of that hitherto unknown official, nay in defiance of all scriptural facts and order) is the first to assume its existence and lofty position. His jurisdiction was limited to those in the city. The diocesan bishop later was another and considerable step away from scripture, as were other superior dignitaries, as the church lost its true character and sunk into, or rose in, the world, till the rivalry of the bishops of Rome and Constantinople became a struggle for primacy in honour of old or new Rome, as mistress of the earth, the office as set forth in God's word being long forgotten and despised.*

The next step would be that as Christianity extended to the districts around a city, if any dispute arose, appeal would be made to the presbytery of the city, when, if one of these had assumed a separate place of bishop, he would be brought into prominence, and by degrees would obtain influence over a district. Then later on there were several bishops in a province, and when any important matters arose a synod of the bishops would be called, and one would preside. The bishop of the chief city or district generally presided, and he was eventually called Metropolitan. This again was followed by the appointment of archbishops or patriarchs.

Gregory, on hearing of the great success of Augustine, sent him more missionaries, who carried with them a number of books, including the Gospels, with church plate, vestments, relics, and the pallium which was to invest Augustine as Archbishop of Canterbury. He also directed him to consecrate twelve bishops in his province; and, if he should see it advantageous to the propagation of the faith, to establish another metropolitan at York, who should then have authority to nominate twelve other bishops for the northern districts of the island. Such were the rudiments of the English church, and such the excessive eagerness of Gregory for ecclesiastical supremacy, that he settled a plan of government for places before they had been visited by the evangelist.

Pope Gregory was overjoyed at the success of the mission. He made Augustine an Archbishop, and wrote to him: "All the bishops of Britain we comit to your charge, that the unlearned may be instructed, the weak be strengthened, and the perverse be corrected by your authority."

In A.D. 397, the bishop of Constantinople, Nectarius, died, and many inquiries were made as to who should succeed him. It was a very honourable position at that time, the bishop being the Metropolitan of that district of the church, and sometimes called archbishop. Many were the aspiring candidates who in an unseemly manner pressed their claims.

The bishops (and not a bishop, for there were always several) were local charges; they only acted within the precincts of the particular church where they were found. The bishop was not a gift, nor a joint of supply in the body according to the measure of the gift of Christ, but a local charge, for which, among several other things, the capacity to feed was suitable.

The humblest peasant is familiar with the grandeur and worldly greatness of a bishop, but he may not know how a minister of Christ, and a successor of the humble fishermen of Galilee, came to such dignity. In the days of the apostles and for more than a hundred years after, the office of a bishop was a laborious but "good work." He had the charge of a single church, which might ordinarily be contained in a private house. He was not then as a "lord over God's heritage," but in reality its minister and servant, instructing the people, and attending on the sick and poor in person. The presbyters, no doubt, assisted in the management of the general affairs of the church, and also the deacons; but the bishop had the chief part of the service. He had no authority, however, to decree or sanction anything without the approval of the presbytery and people. There was no thought then of "inferior clergy" under him. And at that time the churches had no revenues, except the voluntary contributions of the people, which, moderate as they doubtless were, would leave a very small emolument for the bishop after the poor and needy were attended to.

8 "Bishops, and not a bishop, for there were always several, were local officers, who only acted in the midst of the particular church in which they were found. A bishop was not a gift, nor a joint in the body according to the measure of the gift of Christ; but a local office, for which the possession of pastoral capacity was suitable among many other things. Pastorship is never presented as an office established by men, although bishops, who were, according to God, established by men, with a special object of watching over souls locally, may have possessed this gift and used it in their locality. These things are linked on one side, as the authority conferred on the apostles by Christ was linked with what had been given to them. For apostleship, although directly from God, was also an office, and that, we may say, from Christ as man, acting with authority in the government of the Church; and authoritative charges flowed from thence.

"The bishop may be called to pastoral care and teaching also, as qualities of his office. I do not doubt, historically speaking, that as man has continually more and more eclipsed the action of the Spirit of God in the Church, the gift became gradually lost in the office; but that makes no change in the word, and we live in times in which we must come either to the word or to Popery," pp. 40, 41, 42.