A cathedral (Lat. cathedra, “seat”) is a Christian church that contains the seat of a bishop. It is a religious building for worship, specifically of a denomination with an episcopal hierarchy, such as the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Orthodox and some Lutheran churches, which serves as a bishop’s seat, and thus as the central church of a diocese.

Duomo is a generic Italian term for a cathedral church. The formal word for a church that is presently a cathedral is cattedrale; a Duomo may be either a present or a former cathedral (the latter always in a town that no longer has a bishop nor therefore a cathedral, as for example Trevi). Such churches are usually referred to simply as “Il Duomo” or “The Duomo”, without regard to the full proper name of the church. Similar words exist in other languages: Dom (German), Dóm (Slovakian), Domkirke (Danish), Dómkirkja (Icelandic), Domkyrka (Swedish), Domkyrkje (Norwegian), Toomkirik (Estonian), Tum (Polish), and Tuomiokirkko (Finnish). Also in these languages the respective terms do not necessarily refer to a church functioning as a cathedral, but also to former cathedrals or simply prominent church buildings, which have never been a cathedral in the exact sense of that word. Therefore the uniform translation of these terms into English as cathedrals may not always be appropriate.

In current English usage, Minster is an honorific title given to particular churches in Great Britain, most famously York Minster. Eventually a minster came to refer more generally to “any large or important church, especially a collegiate or cathedral church”.

As of 2008 the Roman Catholic Church had about 3,000 churches of cathedral and co-cathedral status around the world. List of worldwide cathedrals

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