Encyclical

That which “circles around.” The term is applied especially to epistolary literature: Paul's letter to the Ephesians represents the earliest example within Christian documents: his statement in Colossians 4:16 provides explication of both intention and operational mode. In the subsequent generation several of the documents now grouped under [[Apostolic Fathers]] were similarly intended, and thereafter any of the letters of a bishop to his church. Modern terminological usage distinguishes churchwide teachings of the bishop of Rome.