Papal supremacy

Not to be confused with Papal primacy, Papal temporal power, or Papal infallibility.
This article is about the Catholic spiritual doctrine. For the doctrine of temporal authority in the Holy Roman Empire, see Universal power.

Papal supremacy is the doctrine of the Catholic Church that the pope, by reason of his office as vicar of Christ, the visible source and foundation of the unity both of the bishops and of the whole company of the faithful, and as priest of the entire Catholic Church, has full, supreme, immediate and universal power and authority over the whole church, a power which he can always exercise unhindered.

The doctrine had the most significance in the relationship between the church and the temporal state, in matters such as ecclesiastic privileges, the actions of monarchs and even successions.

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