Lay brother is a largely extinct term referring to religious brothers, particularly in the Catholic Church, who focused upon manual service and secular matters, and were distinguished from choir monks or friars in that they did not pray in choir, and from clerics in that they were not in possession of (or preparing for) holy orders. In female religious institutes, the equivalent role is the lay sister. Lay brother and lay sisters roles were originally created to allow those who were skilled in particular crafts or did not have the required education to learn Latin and to study.