Synonyms of clerics

clerics

noun

plural of cleric

as in priests

a person specially trained and authorized to conduct religious services in a Christian church

clerics were sharply divided on the issue of whether the war was morally justified

Synonyms & Similar Words

• priests
• preachers
• clergymen
• bishops
• clericals
• ministers
• pastors
• deacons
• ecclesiastics
• reverends
• prelates
• divines
• chaplains
• fathers
• clerks
• priestesses
• monks
• popes
• clergypersons
• churchmen
• archbishops
• missionaries
• abbots
• dominies
• vicars
• rectors
• padres
• deans
• presbyters
• friars
• deaconesses
• clergywomen
• confessors
• religious
• evangelists
• diocesans
• shepherds
• parsons
• curés
• mendicants
• archpriests
• missioners
• curates
• monastics
• revivalists
• monsignors
• abbés
• Holy Joes
• oblates
• sky pilots
• high priests
• missionizers
• high priestesses

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

• laymen
• laypeople
• seculars
• lay readers
• lectors

Example Sentences

Recent Examples of clerics

In Iraq, the faction earned rebukes from clerics who had previously supported global jihad as well as from more mainstream religious leaders. — Daniel Byman, Foreign Affairs, 8 Sep. 2026

After six months of war, Iran’s leadership has coalesced around a hard core of military generals and clerics long entrenched in the ruling theocracy. — Lee Keath, Fortune, 29 Aug. 2026

Iran's Assembly of Experts, a group of 88 clerics, picked the mid-ranking cleric with influence in the country's security forces and business networks to succeed his father, announcing the decision March 8. — Zac Anderson, USA Today, 26 Aug. 2026

But both Australian clerics successfully appealed their convictions. — ABC News, 13 Aug. 2026

The church refused, and Armenia's Prosecutor General's office launched the case against Karekin and the other clerics in February, accusing them of defying a court order and barring them from leaving the country. — Arkansas Online, 9 Aug. 2026

Voice of America’s Persian Service began airing in its current form in 1979, shortly after the Iranian Revolution toppled the Shah and installed the Islamist clerics who rule the country to this day. — Marc Fisher, New Yorker, 30 July 2026

Yet the mental horizons of Maucci and his associates were wider and more mobile than those of the big shots, small-time lawyers, and clerics who’d remained to vegetate in their old Lunigiana. — Literary Hub, 22 July 2026

Revolutionary Guard members and clerics mourn on the esplanade of the Imam Khomeini Grand Mosalla mosque. — Chantal Da Silva, NBC news, 3 July 2026