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Summary
- A Catholic bishop is greeted as Your Excellency, then as Bishop with his surname; Fr. William Saunders advised against a bare “Bishop, how are you?”
- In the United States a letter to a bishop is addressed to The Most Reverend and his full name, with Bishop of and his diocese on the next line, and opens Your Excellency or Dear Bishop Smith.
- Adoremus gives Respectfully yours in Christ as the close for formal and less formal letters to a bishop.
- A cardinal is Your Eminence, the Pope is Your Holiness or Holy Father, a priest is Father, a deacon is Deacon and a religious sister is Sister.
- Kissing a bishop’s ring was customary before the Second Vatican Council but is no longer expected; Popes Benedict XVI and Francis discouraged people from kissing the pope’s ring.
- The Southern Cross says the older style of My Lord for a bishop is “rapidly falling out of fashion”; in that usage an archbishop is Your Grace, while the United States uses Your Excellency for both.
- Pope Pius XI extended the title Most Reverend Excellency to all archbishops and bishops in a decree dated 31 December 1930.
Bibliography (Click to show)
- Scripture: King James Version, 1 Timothy 3:1.
- Archdiocese of Baltimore, “Proper Forms of Address,” archbalt.org.
- Catholic Diocese of Erie, “Style Guide for the Preparation of Correspondence for Bishop Persico” (sample letter dated 30 May 2013), eriercd.org.
- Michael Andrews, “How to Address Church Officials, Bishops, Priests,” Adoremus Bulletin, 15 August 2009, adoremus.org.
- Fr. William Saunders, “Proper Etiquette” (“Straight Answers” column), Arlington Catholic Herald, 2003, reprinted by the Catholic Education Resource Center, catholiceducation.org.
- “How Should We Address a Bishop Properly?”, The Southern Cross, 14 December 2020, scross.co.za.
- Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, “Diocesan Bishops of England and Wales,” cbcew.org.uk.
- Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, “Retired Bishops of England and Wales,” cbcew.org.uk.
- Eric Sundrup, S.J., “Explainer: Why doesn’t Pope Francis want people to kiss his ring?”, America, 26 March 2019, americamagazine.org.
- Catholic Diocese of Gary, “Office of the Bishop,” dcgary.org.
- Sacra Congregatio Caeremonialis, decree “De titulo Excellentiae Reverendissimae,” 31 December 1930, Acta Apostolicae Sedis 23 (1931), vatican.va.
- Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraphs 861–862, vatican.va.
- Code of Canon Law, canon 1031, Holy See, vatican.va.
- The Holy See, home page (list of popes), vatican.va.
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