Whats' the difference between a chapel and a church?

Question

Why are some called chapels..whilst others are called churches?

Laura C - I am a christian...and I attend a chapel!

Answer 1

The word 'church' relates to the 'people' who gather and meet to share the expression of god's love through denominational, independent, or new expressions meetings.You can meet in a field, a wine bar, in someones house..on top of mount Everest..and still be the 'church' The physical building is not the church..its just been given that name..because that's where the church meets. The chapel..for me has far more of a traditional connotation..and expresses a type of way of being church through denominations IE Catholicisms , Methodisms .... but these are just a few expression of 'church'.

Answer 2

A church (lower-case c) is a public building intended for worship. It is for the use of all those who wish to participate in the sacraments, especially the Mass. So, we say parish church.

Within churches, including parish churches, chapels may be found. At our cathedral church, for instance, there is a blessed sacrament chapel. So , a chapel can be part of the larger building called a church. It can also refer to a large building that is not for a parish, not owned by the Church at large, but built and for the use of a religious community (as was the Chapel of the Immaculate Conception) or a family or even a person. Sometimes that group may invite others or include others in its services, but its primary purpose is to serve those who built it and maintain it. Then it is not a parish church, but a chapel.

An oratory can be another word for chapel. It is more likely to be private. It is more likely to be small. Sometimes a mortuary will have an oratory connected to it, but people wouldn't typically go there to visit, unless their loved one was being laid out or buried from that place.

Answer 3

Depends on where you are....in the US, a chapel is just a very small church building, or a part of a larger building such as a hospital, school etc. set aside for prayer and worship. In Wales, "church" has come to mean the Anglican church (aka the Church in Wales) while "chapel" refers to smaller groups with nonconformist (independent) roots. In that sense, chapel services are less formalized and have no liturgy. It is said that "chapel" congregations in Wales are very strict or strait-laced if you will, in terms of doctrine and the behaviour expected of their membership.

Answer 4

Technically a chapel is a room inside a building where a church is an entire building. Another definition would place the church to be all of the people who attend and make up that church body.

Sometimes they are used interchangably.

Answer 5

The chapel is the room where actually worship takes place. It is within the church that usually has an office or two and classrooms for Sunday School.

Answer 6

A chapel is mostly a development wherein non secular persons meet. The be conscious 'church' is used colloquially to imply a development too, however the unique meaning of 'church' grow to be the folk (Greek 'ecclesia' - the 'referred to as out ones').

Answer 7

Chapel is a small chirch often attached to the another institution, like college, hospital, palaceor even bigger chirch.
Chapel can be also a part of the big chirch, dedicated to the certain saint or event, for example, "Lady Mary chapel", "Blessed Sacrament Chapel".
In Britain non-anglican protestants often call their chirches "chapels" and in Ireland and Scotland "chapels" are catholic chirches.

Answer 8

A chapel is a small Church.

Answer 9

I think that this has been summed up quite well in the answers given. Technically a chapel is a dedicated place of worship in a Cathedral, i.e. Lady Chapel, Chapel of Repose etc. In certain parts of the United Kindgom it has localised meanings, i.e. in Western Scotland it refers locally(if not accurately) to Roman Catholic Churches. In Wales, it is the opposite, it refers to strict non conformists sects. You say potato, I say potarto......

Answer 10

"Chapel" is a very broad term, and can apply to anything from a section of a much larger church or cathedral, to small buildings. The word itself is associated with the idea of relics, since it is drawn from the idea that St. Martin divided his cape (chapelle) in half and left half with a beggar.
"Church" is a word that covers pretty much everything given above... generally any building set aside "in perpetuity for the public exercise of Divine worship."

Answer 11

A chapel is always attached to some institution and it may not have regular members like a church.