Catholicism
(kəˈθɒlɪsɪz(ə)m, ˈkæθəlɪsɪz(ə)m)
[f. catholic + -ism. Cf. F. catholicisme.]
1. The system, faith, and practice of the Catholic Church; adherence to the Catholic Church.
| 1656 Blount Glossogr., Catholicisme..the orthodox Faith of the Catholick Church. 1685 Baxter Paraphr. Rom. xi. Annot., Much less will God ever confine the Church and Covenant of peculiarity to the Jewish Nation, and take it from the Gentiles, and cease Catholicism. |
b. usually of the Roman Catholic Church.
| 1613–7 Purchas Pilgr., Descr. India (1864) 131 Thomæan Christians. These Thomæans are now, as the Iesuites report, reduced to their Catholicisme. 1779 Swinburne Trav. Spain xxix. (T.) All the gipsies that I have conversed with assured me of their sound catholicism. 1871 Morley Voltaire (1886) 1 We may think of Voltairism..as we think of Catholicism or the Renaissance or Calvinism. |
c. so Roman Catholicism.
| 1870 Daily News 5 Dec., Mrs. Craik can do justice to the earnest and beautiful side of Roman Catholicism. 1876 Grant Burgh Sch. Scot. ii. xiii. 412 The object..being no doubt to ridicule Roman Catholicism. |
d. A trait, note, or act of a good Catholic.
| 1609 T. Morton Answ. Higgons 2 Who hold it a Catholicisme to brand me with only an imaginarie imputation. 1842 G. S. Faber Provinc. Lett. (1844) II. 286 Censure of what..we have been led to deem genuine Catholicisms. |
† 2. = catholicity 4. Obs.
| 1647 Jer. Taylor Dissuas. Popery ii. ii. Introd. (R.) This broken consent is not an infallible testimony of the catholicism of the Doctrine. |
3. = catholicity 1. rare.
| 1796 Morse Amer. Geog. I. 454 All religions..are tolerated and a spirit of liberality and catholicism is increasing. |