The chorepiscopi were at first confined to the Eastern Church. In the Western Church, and especially in France, they began to be known about the fifth century. They have never been numerous in Spain and Italy. In Germany they must have been frequent in the seventh and eighth centuries. In the East, the order was abolished by the Council of Laodicea, A. D. 361. But so little respect was entertained for this decree, that the order continued until the tenth century. They were first prohibited in the Western Church in the ninth century; but, according to some writers, they continued in France until the twelfth century, when the arrogance, insubordination, and injurious conduct of this class of ecclesiastics became a subject of general complaint in that country; and they are said to have existed in Ireland until the thirteenth century. The functions of the chorepiscopi are now in great part performed by archdeacons, rural deans, and vicars-general. (See Suffragans.)
CHOREUTÆ. A sect of heretics, who, among other errors, persisted in keeping the Sunday as a fast.
CHORISTER. A singer in a choir. It properly means a singing boy; and so it is used in all old documents and statistics.
CHRISM. (Χρίσμα, oil.) Oil consecrated in the Romish and Greek Churches by the bishop, and used in baptism, confirmation, orders, and extreme unction. This chrism is consecrated with great ceremony upon Holy Thursday. There are two sorts of it; the one is a composition of oil and balsam, made use of in baptism, confirmation, and orders; the other is only plain oil consecrated by the bishop, and used for catechumens and extreme unction. Chrism has been discontinued in the Church of England since the Reformation.
CHRISOME, in the office of baptism, was a white vesture, which in former times the priest used to put upon the child, saying, “Take this white vesture for a token of innocence.”
By a constitution of Edmund, archbishop of Canterbury, A. D. 736, the chrisomes, after having served the purposes of baptism, were to be made use of only for the making or mending of surplices, &c., or for the wrapping of chalices.
The first Common Prayer Book of King Edward orders that the woman shall offer the chrisome, when she comes to be churched; but, if the child happens to die before her churching, she was excused from offering it; and it was customary to use it as a shroud, and to wrap the child in it when it was buried. Hence, by an abuse of words, the term is now used not to denote children who die between the time of their baptism and the churching of the mother, but to denote children who die before they are baptized, and so are incapable of Christian burial.
CHRIST. From the Greek word (Χριστος) corresponding with the Hebrew word Messiah, and signifying the Anointed One. It is given pre-eminently to our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. As the holy unction was given to kings, priests, and prophets, by describing the promised Saviour of the world under the name of Christ, Anointed, or Messiah, it was sufficient evidence that the qualities of king, prophet, and high priest would eminently centre in him; and that he would exercise them not only over the Jews, but over all mankind, and particularly over those whom he should elect into his Church. Our blessed Saviour was not, indeed, anointed to these offices by oil; but he was anointed by the power and grace of the Holy Ghost, who visibly descended upon him at his baptism. Thus, (Acts x. 38,) “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power.”—See Matt. iii. 16, 17. John iii. 34. (See Jesus and Messiah.)
CHRISTEN, To. To baptize; because, at baptism, the person receiving that sacrament is made, as the catechism teaches, a member of Christ.
CHRISTENDOM. All those regions in which the kingdom or Church of Christ is planted.