2086: vicar Aug 31, 2020

Now used exclusively by the Church, the terms 'vicar' and and 'diocese' come from Roman administrative terms, used in the government of that empire. 'Vicar' was used to mean 'second in command' in Rome but it came to mean 'deputy' (i.e. a divine proxy) ecclesiastically. It actually comes from the root 'vicārius' meaning 'change' refers more to the idea of 'interchange' like 'vicarious' means today. In the case of the Vicar of Bray (1540) though, he famously was a Catholic vicar twice, and also a Protestant vicar in the span of 48 years in the same place, making the meaning more literal.

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