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Comment by amarant | Hacker News Reader

I'm curious what "minor" means exactly in this context?

I've seen the Sagrada familia, and it ain't small!

Organizational hierarchy of the Catholic Church: a building is a cathedral if and only if it is the seat of a bishop, no matter how grand or modest the building is. There can not be more than one cathedral in a diocese.

But colloquially, Sagrada Familia is what most people would consider a cathedral.

> There can not be more than one cathedral in a diocese.

There can be, though it's not common: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co-cathedral

Also a basilica can be a cathedral and vice versa. Saint-Denis in Paris is both a basilica and cathedral.

The page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilica_of_Saint-Denis states

> Although known as the "Basilica of St Denis", the cathedral has not been granted the title of Minor Basilica by the Vatican.

Does it matter when it has been called like that for more than 12 centuries?

Well there's a lot of people with the family name King, but you know, they still have to play (and win!) the fancy hat game to be actually granted royal rights.

In that case it is different because it is/was a building used by the french church. Not some random one named like this by someone with no relation to the church.

A cathedral is the official seat of the local the bishop and the Sagrada Familia isn't one.

A basilica on the other hand is an honorific title granted to some churches by the pope for historical/religious reasons.

An interesting note: Saint Peter in Rome, the most famous church in the christian world is not a cathedral itself as it is not where the pope has its seat, that's actually another basilica in Rome, Saint John Lateran, which makes it the most important church in the catholic hierarchy with the title of "Omnium Urbis et Orbis Ecclesiarum Mater et Caput", or "Mother and leader of all the churches in the world".

The other interesting thing about that is the cathedral seat of the Pope is outside the Vatican City - so it is in his religious territory as Bishop of Rome but not in his secular state.

It's also why St Peters is not the cathedral of Rome. It's not in Rome.

It's been not in Rome only since Vatican City came into existence in 1929. It's been in Rome every single year before then.

Saint John Lateran is also not in Italy [1] due to an extraterritoriality treaty in 1929, part of the same treaty that established Vatican City. By the way, that church is exactly 1700 years old this year.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archbasilica_of_Saint_John_Lat...

I should have said it's why it can't become the cathedral of rome.

I don't know whether this is correct, as the Vatican itself falls into the Rome diocese and has no separate one.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diocese_of_Rome

I don't think this is correct, the territory belongs to the vatican state as many other buildings around Rome they are not formally located in Italy.

It belongs to the Holy See, but it's outside of Vatican City. It's kind of like how Guernsey is owned by the British Crown, but it's not part of Britain.

I'm not 100% of all legalese technicalities but I know for a fact vatican law applies there and it's managed and guarded by vatican's gendarmerie (my ex went to the university behind the basilica which is also part of the Holy See).

They are like foreign embassies, part of Italy but under ownership of Holy See. The Holy See is different than Vatican City. The Vatican City is independent country governed by the Holy See, the head of the Catholic Church.

The Dedication of the Basilica of St John Lateran is one of the observances in the Catholic liturgical calendar with its own special mass readings that supplant the normally scheduled readings for the day (most of the liturgical calendar consists of dates relative to the start of Advent which happens on the fourth Sunday before Christmas). If I remember correctly, this is one of the feasts considered important enough to supplant the normal Sunday readings if it happens on a Sunday. (Also, worth noting that it’s one of the feasts celebrated in both the Latin and Eastern churches.)

Religions like to "rank" things so it's clear who's on top and who's on the bottom. In terms of churches, same thing applies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilicas_in_the_Catholic_Chur...

In short, the "major" is reserved for four top churches in Rome. "Minor" is used to signal that the church is of significant importance, but not as important as the major ones. It's not related to the size at all :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basilicas_in_the_Catholic_Chur... indicates that there are four major basilicas and almost 2,000 minor ones.

Seems like the four major basilicas have historical (maybe even pre-Schism?) associations, while the minor ones are designated by the pope.

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