sodality

Noun

sodality (plural sodalities)

1. A fraternity, a society or association.
   • There’d even evolved somehow a kind of sodality or fan club that sat around, read from her books and discussed her Theory.1963, Thomas Pynchon, V.
   • The story is a myth of origins, in this case the story of the origins of a sacred sodality of men in the city of Erech.1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 183
2. Companionship.
   • Those would, he thought, be expatriate writers. He was, of course, one of those himself now, but he was indifferent to the duties and pleasures of sodality.1968, Anthony Burgess, Enderby Outside
3. Spiritual communion with a divine being; a fellowship.
   • On the wall of his bedroom hung an illuminated scroll, the certificate of his prefecture in the college of the sodality of the Blessed Virgin Mary.1916, James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, New York, N.Y.: B[enjamin] W. Huebsch, →OCLC