From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishordainor‧dain /ɔːˈdeɪn $ ɔːr-/ verb [transitive] 1 RRto officially make someone a priest or religious leader → ordination Desmond Tutu was ordained in 1960.ordain somebody (as) something The church voted to allow women to be ordained as priests.2 formalTELL/ORDER somebody TO DO something to order that something should happenordain that The King ordained that deer should not be hunted without a royal licence.→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
ordain• He says that women are being conned into believing they will someday be ordained.• King Henry VIII believed his role as ruler was ordained by God.• Originally from Magheralin near Lurgan, he was ordained in 1947 and later ministered in Newry for 26 years.• He was ordained in 1950 for Magheralin Parish, Co Down.• Kahan was ordained in Brooklyn in 1938.• Biscop Baducing was born into a noble family, then was ordained into the priesthood at the age of twenty-five.• Their first choice was John Danforth of Missouri, an ordained Protestant minister.• The last ordained rabbi who worked here left several years ago and has not been replaced.ordain that• An Act of Parliament abolished the very surname and ordained that the property outside Perth should henceforth be called Huntingtower.• It was as if fate had ordained that they would marry.Origin ordain (1200-1300) Old French ordener, from Latin ordinare “to put in order”, from ordo; → ORDER1 