mission

Learned borrowing from Latin missiō, missiōnem (“a sending, sending away, dispatching, discharging, release, remission, cessation”).

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈmɪʃ(ə)n/

  • Audio (General American):

    (file)

• (Indic) IPA^(key): /mɪʃᵻn/
  • Homophone: machine (dialectal, weak vowel merger)
• Rhymes: -ɪʃən
• Hyphenation: mis‧sion

mission (countable and uncountable, plural missions)

1. (countable) A set of tasks that fulfills a purpose or duty; an assignment set by an employer, or by oneself.
2. A important goal or purpose; an objective.
   • 2008 October 16, Martina Cole, The Business: A compelling suspense thriller of danger and destruction, Headline, →ISBN:

     [She] made it her mission in life to make sure that no one around them would ever know the real truth. But this daughter of hers, she was a loose cannon, she was not someone to be trusted. […]

   • 2013 September 30, Ratanjit, How Oneness Changes Everything: Empowering Business Through 9 Universal Laws, BalboaPress, →ISBN, page 213:

     The first page [of her CV] was a statement of her mission and role in life, which was to add the highest value in everything she undertook. On page two, we listed her primary governing values and operating principles. The third page listed her objectives […]

3. (countable) A missionary expedition.
4. (in the plural, "the missions") Third World charities, particularly those which preach as well as provide aid.
5. (countable, Catholicism) An infrequent gathering of religious believers in a parish, usually part of a larger regional event with a central theme.
6. A number of people appointed to perform any service; a delegation; an embassy.
   • 1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “New Atlantis. A Worke Vnfinished.”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC, pages 18–19:

     [I]n either of theſe Ships, there ſhould be a Miſsion of three of the Fellowes, or Brethren of Salomons Houſe; [...]

7. (obsolete) Dismissal; discharge from service
8. A settlement or building serving as a base for missionary work.

   Many cities across the Americas grew from Spanish missions.

9. (Australia, becoming obsolete) An settlement predominantly inhabited by Indigenous Australians living in housing commission.
10. (slang, drugs) A drug run.
11. (colloquial) An ordeal; an difficult, trying task.
    • 2025 July 30, Ben Ebbrell, Sorted Food, Can Antique Gadgets Handle Modern Cooking?‎^[1], 18:23:

      I was thinking like meat, [you could use this wooden device to] tenderize a steak ... but not into a wooden box, 'cause it's gonna be a mission to clean.

mission (third-person singular simple present missions, present participle missioning, simple past and past participle missioned)

1. (transitive) To send on a mission.
2. (intransitive) To do missionary work, proselytize.

• “mission”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “mission”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• Douglas Harper (2001–2026), “mission”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

• Ionisms

mission

1. genitive singular of missio

Inherited from Old French mission, borrowed from Latin missiōnem.

• IPA^(key): /mi.sjɔ̃/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Audio (France (Vosges)):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Vosges)):

  (file)

• Audio (France (Somain)):

  (file)

mission f (plural missions)

1. mission (duty that involves fulfilling a request)
2. mission (religious evangelism)

• mission spatiale
• missionnaire
• missionner

• admission
• démission
• permission
• rémission
• mettre

• → Romanian: misiune
• → Turkish: misyon

• “mission”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012

• misions

From Old French mission, borrowed from Latin missiō, missiōnem.

mission f (plural missions)

1. (Jersey) mission

• mession
• micion
• mision

Borrowed from Latin missiō, missiōnem.

mission oblique singular, f (oblique plural missions, nominative singular mission, nominative plural missions)

1. expense; cost; outlay

• French: mission
• Norman: mission

• IPA^(key): /mɪˈɧuːn/

• Audio:

  (file)

mission c

1. (countable) a mission; a purpose or duty, a task set by an employer
2. (uncountable) mission; religious evangelism

   inre mission ― domestic mission (evangelizing within the home country)

• missionär
• missionsfält
• missionsförbund