minister

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. One who is authorized to perform religious functions in a Christian church, especially a Protestant church.
2. n. Roman Catholic Church The superior in certain orders.
3. n. A high officer of state appointed to head an executive or administrative department of government.
4. n. An authorized diplomatic representative of a government, usually ranking next below an ambassador.
5. n. A person serving as an agent for another by carrying out specified orders or functions.
6. v. To attend to the wants and needs of others: Volunteers ministered to the homeless after the flood. See Synonyms at tend².
7. v. To perform the functions of a cleric.
8. v. To administer or dispense (a sacrament, for example).

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. One who performs service for another, or executes another's will; one who is subservient; an agent, servant, or attendant.
2. n. One who acts as a medium or dispenser; an administrator or promoter: as, a minister of God's will, of justice, etc.; a minister of peace or charity.
3. n. In politics: One of the persons appointed by the sovereign or chief magistrate of a country as the responsible heads of the different departments of the government; a minister of state: as, the minister of foreign affairs, of the interior, of finance, of war. of justice, etc. These officers constitute the ministry or executive department of the government; at their head is the prime (first) minister, or premier, the immediate deputy or representative of the sovereign or chief magistrate; he and other ministers, selected by him, are called collectively, as his coördinate advisers in matters of policy, the cabinet. Minister is used in most European countries as the official title of all heads of departments, but in Great Britain only in a generic sense (as, a minuter of the crown), the individual ministers being officially designated the secretary of state for foreign affairs, for war, for the colonies, etc., or by other titles,as chancellor of the exchequer (minister of finance). In the government of the United States the title minister is not used at all, and there is no ministry; the corresponding officers, differing from the preceding both in mode of appointment and degree of power and responsibility, are called secretaries (of state, of the interior, of the treasury, of war, of the navy, of agriculture), postmaster-general, and attorney-general, See cabinet, 4.
4. n. A diplomatic representative of a country abroad; a person accredited by the executive authority of one country to that of another as its agent for communication and the transaction of business between the two governments; specifically, the political representative of a state in another state, in contradistinction to an ambassador, who holds a nominally higher rank as in general the personal representative of the sovereign or chief of the state at the court of another sovereign. The United States heretofore have sent and received only ministers in this specific sense, called in full either envoys extraordinary and ministers plenipotentiary or ministers resident.
5. n. Eccles., in the New Testament, a servant of God, God's word, Christ, or the church; an officer of the church; an attendant or assistant (Acts xiii. 5): translating διάκονος (whence deacon), but sometimes λειτουργός (liturge) orὑπηρέτης (an assistant); hence, any member of the ministry. The word is used of civil authorities in Rom. xiii. 4-6. In the ancient church minister usually meant a deacon or one in minor orders, the Latin word minister being the equivalent of the Greek διἁκονος. See ministry.
6. n. An officer of justice.
7. n. The catfish, Amiurus nebulosus: apparently so called from the silvery white throat, contrasting with the dark back, and likened to a clergyman's white necktie.
8. To furnish, supply, or afford; give; serve: as, to minister consolation.
9. To perform; render.
10. Synonyms Administer, Minister. See administer.
11. To act as a minister or attendant; perform service of any kind.
12. To afford supplies; give things needful; furnish means of relief or remedy.
13. To contribute; be of service.
14. To serve.
15. Synonyms Administer to, Minister to (see administer), contribute to, serve, assist, help, succor, wait upon.

Wiktionary

1. n. A person who is trained to perform religious ceremonies at a Protestant church.
2. n. A politician who heads a ministry (national or regional government department for public service).
3. n. At a diplomacy, the rank of diplomat directly below ambassador
4. n. Someone who serves others.
5. v. transitive To attend to; to tend.
6. v. transitive (archaic) To afford, to give, to supply.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. A servant; a subordinate; an officer or assistant of inferior rank; hence, an agent, an instrument.
2. n. obsolete An officer of justice.
3. n. One to whom the sovereign or executive head of a government intrusts the management of affairs of state, or some department of such affairs.
4. n. A representative of a government, sent to the court, or seat of government, of a foreign nation to transact diplomatic business.
5. n. One who serves at the altar; one who performs sacerdotal duties; the pastor of a church duly authorized or licensed to preach the gospel and administer the sacraments.
6. v. To furnish or apply; to afford; to supply; to administer.
7. v. To act as a servant, attendant, or agent; to attend and serve; to perform service in any office, sacred or secular.
8. v. To supply or to things needful; esp., to supply consolation or remedies.

WordNet 3.0

1. v. attend to the wants and needs of others
2. n. the job of a head of a government department
3. v. work as a minister
4. n. a person authorized to conduct religious worship
5. n. a person appointed to a high office in the government
6. n. a diplomat representing one government to another; ranks below ambassador