Feedback
Corrections? Updates? Omissions? Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login).
Thank you for your feedback

Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article.

Basilica, in the Roman Catholic churches, a canonical title of honor given to church buildings that are distinguished either by their antiquity or by their role as international centers of worship because of their association with a major saint or an important historical event. The title gives the church certain privileges, principally the right to reserve its high altar for the pope, a cardinal, or a patriarch, and special penitential privileges that remove the basilica...