Covenant ministries

The ministries were the Covenant's primary administrative departments. While the Hierarchs and the High Council wielded supreme executive and legislative power, it were the Ministries that managed most of the Covenant's day-to-day operations; the vast majority of matters never reached the High Council Chamber.

More often than not, the ministries acted as regulatory and supervisory bodies overseeing numerous sanctioned holy orders, guilds and other organizations that put their edicts into practice. These relationships were not always as straightforward as they may have seemed; there were several holy orders or guilds that wielded more de facto power than the ministries tasked with overseeing their operations, and even more cases where the two were on a mostly even ground. However, as ministries amassed more power, they would also be able to exert more draconian control over the organizations under their charge, or even absorb lesser organizations into themselves. Many of the more worldly Ministries' functions were also filled by the Covenant's feudal states' own governments, but the ministries remained the supreme authority, and also had representatives in the domains' synods.

The ministries were far from static throughout history, nor were their functions. In addition, few if any of the ministries that were there in the beginning survived up to the 9th Age of Reclamation, sooner or later falling victim to the attrition of relentless inter-ministerial politics. Ministries were in constant flux, merging, splitting or emerging over the ages. It was rare that an age passed without at least some change in one or more of the ministries. Many ministries had overlapping tasks also partly so they would police one another and keep their power in check. However, these overlaps were also partly borne out of ambitious ministries expanding their influence and power. As ministries amassed power, they also assumed new functions and duties so as to be more independent of the others.

List
The ministries are divided here roughly by areas of responsibility.

Religious theory
Studying and interpreting scripture and canon as well as accepting new revelation into canon. It was a core tenet of the Covenant faith that revelation was continuous and ever-evolving; while previous revelation could not be nullified, newer revelation (or the Covenant's incomplete interpretation thereof) could recontextualize it, providing a more complete reflection of the divine Truth. The Ministry of Revelation frequently worked with the Ministry of Abnegation to reconcile seeming conflicts between accounts in councils that took the form of endless debates on often minute details of esoteric scripture that most Covenant citizens weren't even aware of. The Ministry of Revelation also had the important responsibility of advising the Covenant's religious courts in enforcing orthodoxy across the Holy Ecumene and its numerous denominations.
 * Revelation

Conferring religious titles and naming saints, investigating and substantiating cases of new revelation or providence. The Ministry's duties overlapped with those of Revelation, though typically most new revelation passed through the filter of the Ministry of Ordination before more in-depth studies and canonization by the Ministry of Revelation; such a filter was useful as most new revelation was vague or not genuine. In general, the Ministry of Ordination dealt more in "immaterial" aspects of the religion, to the point of dabbling in heretical Solipsism at times.
 * Ordination

Studying scripture for contradictions and devising apologetics and exegetics; had a role as kind of a "devil's advocate" and a critical counterpart to the Ministry of Revelation, but also dabbled in esoteric and mystic scripture. These duties were largely relegated to the Ascetics and related monastic orders, which fulfilled many related functions in the Covenant's constituent governments, often acting as trusted advisors and experts.
 * Abnegation

Internal affairs
Culture, language, education, news, propaganda, information control; also maintained the ecumenical wavecaster network
 * Edification

Social affairs, health, public works, disaster relief
 * Contentment

The Ministry of the Common Weal runs social programs, hospitals and also a police force. It occupies a middle ground between the Ministry of Contentment and the Ministry of Concert, and it came into existence because those two Ministries kept undermining each other and competing against each other on High Charity. Its charter grants it power only over High Charity and its attendant fleets, but the real borders of its jurisdiction are murky. Both Contentment and Concert have concerns on High Charity, and the Ministry of the Common Weal's name makes no mention of High Charity, a subtle hint that the Ministry has always had ambitions to extending its power throughout the Covenant Empire.
 * Common Weal

Dealing with provincial authorities and the domain-level ecclesiarchy on routine administrative tasks, settling day-to-day disputes
 * Integrity

Dealing with the caste system, imposing labor policies and policing unions and guilds, settling disputes among member species, particularly the Unggoy and Kig-Yar
 * Concert

Finances, tax collection, regulation of trade and commerce on a macro level (partial overlap with Concert and Integrity)
 * Prosperity

Record-keeping and historical research; while countless Covenant organizations and families kept their own records and histories, the duty of the Ministry of Annals was to pull together these various sources as well as study their veracity; their archives in High Charity were without a doubt the most comprehensive library in all of the Covenant. The records kept by Sangheili houses were often comprehensive, but also highly embellished and biased; many familial epics began to resemble mythology more than history when it came to events beyond living memory. Family sagas were also usually highly exclusive to those families and their associates, and available even to High Charity bureaucrats only through negotiation. Even then, much familial oral tradition in particular went unrecorded by parties outside the families in question. Aside from periodic interest by some annalists, the traditions and histories of the lesser species such as Unggoy or Kig-Yar received much less attention than those of the Sangheili.
 * Annals

Judicial matters and the conviction of criminals
 * Penance

Ensuring orthodoxy in practice, investigating allegations of heresy and apostasy, oversight of religious courts, conviction of heretics
 * Inquisition

Technology and science
Acquisition and deciphering of Forerunner artifacts, relic-hunting fleets
 * Tranquility

Distributing artifacts and sanctioned technologies to member species
 * Fortitude

Ascertaining the purposes of relics
 * Etiology

Oversaw holy orders of discovery-priests reverse-engineering relics into useful and replicable design patterns, kept records of existing patterns, as well as the distribution of existing designs to manufacturers
 * Discovery

Overseeing industry, operating fabricaries and assembly forges, large-scale construction projects, controlling the distribution of industrial machinery to guilds
 * Fabrication

Mining, acquiring and refinement of raw materials and resources, controlling the mining rights of clans and guilds; maintained the most extensive excavator fleet in the Covenant
 * Providence

Colonization and conversion
Charting, exploration and colonization of new worlds, astrography and cosmology; also artifact discovery.
 * Exploration

Bringing new species into the fold; also scouting for new species and civilizations. While they maintained sizable fleets and had played a key role in prior species assimilation wars, they took the back seat during the human conflict, as the Covenant's goal was not to convert but destroy. This troubled many within the ministry as they watched the war from the sidelines; while conversion by the sword was a common and acceptable reality, a means to a noble end, utter xenocide was not.
 * Conversion

Security
Internal security, experimental projects
 * Preparation

Dealing with internal dissent, putting down rebellions and secession movements by client races and states. Established during the Second Illumination and had the majority of High Charity's armed forces consolidated under it by the end.
 * Preservation

Security, anti-piracy, warfare
 * Resolution

Secret police and espionage. Agents of the Ministry of Vigilance meddle with a myriad Covenant organizations, not in the least other Ministries, and in their own way maintain the status quo between those organizations.
 * Vigilance

Securing strategic relic sites during crises, oversight of the Chapters of the Zealotry
 * Fervent Intercession

Defunct ministries

 * Ministry of the Higher Pathways - Originally established to chart and maintain records of slipspace routes, it was eventually merged with the Ministry of Exploration.
 * Ministry of Nomenclature - Established at some point to standardize and control the naming of all things Covenant, from spacial locations to organizations. Was largely ineffectual at getting any real change done, and was eventually disbanded.
 * Ministry of the Uplifting Word - A ministry active at the time of the incorporation of the Kig-Yar, which its minister oversaw.
 * Ministry of Canon - an earlier predecessor to the ministries of Revelation and Annals.