In Christianity (specifically the Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, Anglican and Methodist traditions), an oblate is a person associated with a Benedictine monastery or convent who is specifically dedicated to God and service.

Oblates are individuals, either laity or clergy, normally living in general society, who, while not professed monks or nuns, have individually joined themselves to a Benedictine monastic community associated with a certain Christian denomination, such as the Catholic Church or Lutheran Church. Individuals become oblates by undergoing an investiture in which they resolve to follow the Rule of Saint Benedict in their private lives. The Divine Office (canonical hours) is a focus of Benedictines and oblates strive to pray these individually or with others, including with monastics throughout the day in person, or live-streamed; this is normatively prayed seven times a day (cf. Psalm 119:164). They additionally seek to daily read the Bible through the monastic method of Lectio Divina. Benedictine oblates have used the postnominals Obl. O.S.B. or Obl. SB. after their names, usually in private correspondence.

Oblates are comparable to the tertiaries associated with the various mendicant orders. The term "oblate" is also used in the official title of some religious institutes as an indication of their sense of dedication, but are not Benedictine Oblates. (cf. oblation). Oblation may lead to monastic life for some, such as Br. Sixtus Roslevich O.S.B.

The word oblate (from the Latin oblatus – someone who has been offered) has had various particular uses at different periods in the history of the Christian church.

The children vowed and given by their parents to the monastic life, in houses under the Rule of St. Benedict, were commonly known by this term during the century and a half after its writing, when the custom was in vogue, and the councils of the church treated them as monks. This practice continued until the Tenth Council of Toledo in 656 forbade their acceptance before the age of ten and granted them free permission to leave the monastery, if they wished, when they reached the age of puberty. The term puer oblatus (used after that council) labels an oblate who had not yet reached puberty and thus had a future opportunity to leave the monastery, though puer oblatus can also refer to someone entering an abbey. At a later date the term "oblate" designated such lay men or women as were pensioned off by royal and other patrons upon monasteries or benefices, where they lived as in an almshouse or homes.

In the 11th century, Abbot William of Hirschau or Hirsau (died 1091), in the old diocese of Spires, introduced two kinds of lay brethren into the monastery:

Afterwards, the different status of the lay brother in the several orders of monks, and the ever-varying regulations concerning him introduced by the many reforms, destroyed the distinction between the conversus and the oblatus.

The Cassinese Benedictines, for instance, at first carefully differentiated between conversi, commissi and oblati; the nature of the vows and the forms of the habits were in each case specifically distinct. The conversus, the lay brother properly so called, made solemn vows like the choir monks, and wore the scapular; the commissus made simple vows, and was dressed like a monk, but without the scapular; the oblatus made a vow of obedience to the abbot, gave himself and his goods to the monastery, and wore a sober secular dress.