Definition of "pastorate" [pas•tor•ate]

• The office, rank, or jurisdiction of a pastor. (noun)
• A pastor's term of office with one congregation. (noun)
• A body of pastors. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Anyway, as I continue to think about what goes into a long-term pastorate, last night was a revelation."
• "The two churches will also become part of the same 'pastorate'."
• "In the discourse delivered to my flock on the twenty-fifth anniversary of my pastorate was the following passage, to whose truth the added years have only added confirmation, “There is still another sweet mercy which has been vouchsafed to me in the true heart that has never faltered and the gentle footstep that has never wearied in the pathway of life for two and thirty years."