www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West How many bishops?

How many bishops, world-wide, are there in communion with Rome?

How many bishops, world-wide, are there in communion with Constantinople?

Thanks,
Marshall

Dear Marshall:

For the Catholic Communion, the official Annuario Pontificio, 2002 (i.e., as of the end of Calendar Year 2001) published by the Vatican, counted 4,541 bishops worldwide. In capsule, the statistics can be found at:

http://www.ewtn.com/library/CHISTORY/ANNUPONT.HTM

For a glance at an on-going project related to this concern, check out this very informative website:

http://www.catholic-hierarchy.org

which is maintained by our own davidc of this Forum.

I think there is no centralized record-keeping by the Orthodox.

Amado

Dear Marshall,

As of this date, there are 4,713 bishops, give or take one or two, in communion with Rome. The statistics in the Annuario Pontificio are good, but not exact. For instance, in the 2003 edition, the figures as of 12-31-2002 are 171 cardinals and 4,524 bishops, for a total of 4,695. To get a true figure for bishops as of that date, one has to subtract the 3 non-bishop cardinals from the total as well as those cardinals who are diocesan bishops and who are therefore also included in the figure for bishops, which is broken down by diocesan, titular, and emeritus bishops. One would also have to know that there are a very few dioceses which share a bishop and therefore one has to reduce the total by the appropriate number.

My statistics are real-time statistics and are updated as bishops are named, elected, or die.

David Cheney`s website is an excellent resource for information and I recommend it highly. The difference in statistics which you will see between my figures and those on David`s website are due to David`s inclusion, completely appropriate, of those members of the hierarchy who are not in episcopal orders but who exercise or did exercise (emeriti) jurisdiction over a territorial entity, such as territorial abbots and apostolic prefects.

Peace,

Charles

Dear Charles:

Thanks for chiming in!

I was likewise thinking about your on-going, real-time project when I responded to Marshall but your handle just kept escaping me at that moment: your name remained stuck at the tip of my tongue. (Signs of old age, I guess.)

Tracing the "lineage" of every bishop (of the Catholic Church only?) IS enormous, to say the least.

Is there any website dedicated to this very beneficial endeavor?

Amado

Dear Amado,

I have my own website which is small and gives only general information:

http://home1.gte.net/cbransom/index.htm


I had thought about setting up a website tracing episcopal lineages, but - here`s the old age thing - I can`t do the data entry which such a site would require. I`m 56 but at times I feel like 96. My own research work over the past 40 years has taken its toll. I have typed chronological lists of episcopal ordinations going back to the year 1550 (in French), plus complete lists of episcopal ordinations for all countries of Africa, Asia, and Latin America, plus several European countries, in various languages. Added to that is the work involved in my own publications (1 book and several articles in journals), plus my yearly Revue des Ordinations Episcopales. I have another book in preparation on the U.S. hierarchy, but publication is a few years in the future.

I provide episcopal lineages, a/k/a episcopal genealogies, to bishops all over the world. I`ve done several hundred over the years.

I just published the 12th number of the Revue. Each issue contains abbreviated episcopal lineages in it. I am contemplating publishing future issues in PDF format and converting the issues published thus far into PDF so that they can be easily available to researchers.

Once I retire, I hopefully will have the time and good health to set up a lineage website.

Peace,

Charles