Ecclesiastical Province

An ecclesiastical province is a large jurisdiction of religious government, so named by analogy with the secular Roman province. In those hierarchical Christian churches that have dioceses, a province is a collection of those dioceses. The Roman Catholic Church (both Latin and Eastern Catholic), the Orthodox Churches and the Anglican Communion all have provinces. These provinces are led by an archbishop.

In the early church and in some modern churches, a province's cathedral (sometimes called a "seat") and the cathedral's city is called a metropolis and the province's bishop is called, in turn, a metropolitan bishop or a metropolitan.