Pastor is a religious title, and like the pope, the bishop, and similar religious titles, it has its very own rules. But the question still is worth asking, is pastor capitalized?
When Is the Word Pastor Capitalized?
As with any other word, if the word pastor is at the beginning of a sentence it has to be capitalized.
Likewise, if the word pastor is used as an honorific before the full name of the person, it should be capitalized. This is especially the case if this is the first mention of the person. Always put the word pastor before a person’s full name when you are mentioning him or her for the first time.
For example:
- “Paige went to see Pastor Tim.”
- “She has read what Pastor Tim wrote in his diary.”
- “Pastor Tim and his wife Debra are expecting twins, a boy, and a girl.”
- “The leader of our community, the much-beloved Pastor Eric Matthews, went missing in Africa earlier this week.”
- “Pastor is a calling in life, not a job.”
When is the Word Pastor Not Capitalized?
In every other instance, the word pastor should be written in lowercase. This means that the word pastor should be written in lowercase if it finds itself in every place of a grammatical structure that is not the beginning of a sentence or before the name of the person who carries the word pastor as an honorific or religious title.
For example:
- “Paige’s church is run by a very popular pastor named Tim.”
- “Her pastor likes to keep a diary”
- “I am so clumsy, I called our pastor bishop the other day.”
- “She told me that your pastor does a lot of charity work.”
- “The woman said that the FBI went and questioned our pastor for some reason.”
- “Stan Beeman thought about being a pastor, but the quit life never really suited him.”
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