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Diocese of Comayagua

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Diocese of Comayagua
Dioecesis Comayaguensis
Diócesis de Comayagua
Catedral de la Inmaculada Concepción
Catedral de la Inmaculada Concepción
Location
Country Honduras
Ecclesiastical province Province of Tegucigalpa
Metropolitan Oscar Andrés Rodríguez Maradiaga, S.D.B.
Statistics
Area 7,527 km2 (2,906 sq mi)
Population
Total
Catholics 		(as of 2006)
689,725
642,254 (93.1%)
Parishes 29
Information
Denomination Roman Catholic
Rite Roman Rite
Established 13 March 1963 (63 years ago)
Cathedral Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception
Current leadership
Pope Leo XIV
Bishop Ángel Falzóne
Metropolitan Archbishop José Vicente Nácher Tatay
Map

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Comayagua is a Latin suffragan bishopric in the ecclesiastical province of the Archdiocese of Tegucigalpa. The present diocese, erected 13 March 1963, revives a larger colonial bishopric.

Its present cathedral episcopal see is the Catedral de la Inmaculada Concepción, devoted to the Immaculate Concepcion, in Comayagua, which city also has the former cathedral: Iglesia de La Merced Iglesia de La Merced, devoted to Our Lady of Mercy.

History

In 1561, the first bishopric was established as Diocese of Comayagua, on territory split off from the then Roman Catholic Diocese of Trujillo (founded as diocese of Honduras), and in 1571 gained its mother bishopric's remaining territory at its suppression (Trujillo would however be restored in 1987).

Like many missionary dioceses, it had mainly regular priests as Ordinaries, who generally died in office or were transferred/promoted within the vast Spanish colonial empire.

On 1916.02.02 it was suppressed, its territory being divided to establish the Archdiocese of Tegucigalpa (its Metropolitan still, in the national capital), the then Apostolic Vicariate of San Pedro Sula and the Diocese of Santa Rosa de Copán.

It was restored on 1963.03.13, as Diocese of Comayagua, on much smaller territory (7,527 km2) split off from its Metropolitan, the Archdiocese of Tegucigalpa.

Statistics

As per 2014, it has a population of 635,586 Catholics (93.3% of 681,546 total), pastorally served in 32 parishes by 56 priests (46 diocesan, 10 religious), 102 lay religious (33 brothers, 69 sisters) and 30 seminarians.

Ordinaries

Bishops of Comayagua (1531–1916)

  1. Alfonso de Talavera, OSH (1531–1540)[1]
  2. Cristóbal de Pedraza (1539–1553)[1][2]
  3. Jerónimo de Corella, OSH (1556–1575)[1]
  4. Alfonso de la Cerda, OP (1578–1587),[1] appointed Bishop of La Plata o Charcas
  5. Gaspar de Andrada, OFM (1587–1612)[1]
  6. Alfonso del Galdo, OP (1612–1628)
  7. Luis de Cañizares, OFM (1628–1645)
  8. Juan Merlo de la Fuente (1650–1656)
  9. Martín de Espinosa y Monzón (1672–1676)
  10. Ildefonso Vargas y Abarca, OSA (1678–1699)
  11. Pedro Reyes de los Ríos de Lamadrid, OSB (1699–1700), appointed Bishop of Yucatán (Mérida)
  12. Juan Pérez Carpintero, OPraem (1701–1724)
  13. Antonio López Portillo de Guadalupe, OFM (1725–1742)
  14. Francisco de Molina, OSBas (1743–1749)
  15. Diego Rodríguez de Rivas y Velasco (1751–1762), appointed Bishop of Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico
  16. Isidro Rodríguez Lorenzo, OSBas (1764–1767), appointed Archbishop of Santo Domingo
  17. Antonio Macarulla Minguilla de Aguilain (1767–1772), appointed Bishop of Durango
  18. Francisco José de Palencia (1773–1775)
  19. Francisco Antonio Iglesia Cajiga, OSH (1777–1783), appointed Bishop of Michoacán
  20. José Antonio de Isabela (1785–1785)
  21. Fernando Cardiñanos, OFM (1788–1794)
  22. Vicente Navas, OP (1795–1809)
  23. Manuel Julián Rodríguez del Barranco (1817–1819)
  24. Francisco de Paula Campo y Pérez (1844–1853)
  25. Hipólito Casiano Flórez (1854–1857)
  26. Juan Félix de Jesús Zepeda (1861–1885)
  27. Manuel Francisco Vélez (1887–1901)
  28. José María Martínez y Cabañas (1902 – 2 February 1916), appointed Archbishop of Tegucigalpa

Bishops of Comayagua (1963–present)

  1. Bernardino N. Mazzarella, OFM (13 March 1963 – 30 May 1979)
  2. Geraldo Scarpone Caporale, OFM (30 May 1979 – 21 May 2004)
  3. Robert Camilleri Azzopardi, OFM (21 May 2004 – 17 October 2023)
  4. Angelo Falzon, OFM (14 May 2024 - present)

Coadjutor bishop

See also

https://ofm.org/en/br-angel-falzon-appointend-bishop.html#:~:text=Diocese%20of%20Comayagua%2C%20Honduras&text=From%20the%20bulletin%20of%20the, the%20diocese%20of%20Comayagua%2C%20Honduras.

Specific

14°27′37″N 87°38′28″W / 14.4602°N 87.6410°W

Canonical status and jurisdiction

Roman Catholic Diocese of Comayagua is a diocese of the catholic church of the Catholic Church.[3]

From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia

The Diocese of Comayagua, suffragan to Guatemala, includes the entire Republic of Honduras in Central America, a territory of about 46,250 square miles, and a population (1902), exclusive of uncivilized Indians, of 684,400, mostly baptized Catholics. It also includes a group of islets in the Bay of Honduras (Ruatan, Bonacca, Utila, Barbareta, and Moret). The surface is mountainous, with many fertile plains and plateaux. Communication is difficult, as there are few good roads, but a railroad from Puerto Cortez to La Pimienta (sixty miles) is destined to reach the Pacific. The mineral wealth is great, and the trade in bananas very lucrative. The climate in the interior is usually healthy, but fevers are frequent along the low coast. The capital of the State, Tegucigalpa, has 17,000 inhabitants. The first missionaries were Franciscans, though the records of their labours have disappeared in the disastrous conflagrations that the wars of the nineteenth century visited on Comayagua, and in which the archives of the cathedral perished. The diocese was established in 1527 by Clement VII, and confirmed in 1539 by Paul III. It is supposed that Bishop Pedrasa, who went in that year to Trujillo, was the first bishop. Under the fourth, Jeronimo de Corella, Pius IV transferred (1561) the see to Nueva Valladolid, now Comayagua. The prosperous missions among the savage Indians on the north coast were broken up in 1601 by English pirates; colonists and missionaries were scattered, and the Indians (now about 90,000) relapsed into their original savagery. The revolution of 1821 did great damage to the Church. Before that time there were more than 300 ecclesiastical foundations, and public worship was everywhere carried on with dignity. The revolutionary Government confiscated the ecclesiastical property to the value of more than a million pesos, according to a presidential message of 1842. Since then parishes depended for public worship on precarious alms, and the clergy diminished in number. Nevertheless, tithes were still paid to the Church, and from them the bishop, the cathedral services, and the seminary were supported. The latter was open only to externs and only the sciences were taught; ecclesiastics and young men destined for the law were educated there together.

Between 1878 and 1880 the new president of Honduras, imposed by Guatemala, confiscated anew the ecclesiastical resources put together by the faithful, the parochial properties, residences of clergy and churches, abolished the tithes, and, to complete the ruin of the ecclesiastical order, suppressed in the university the courses of canon law and moral theology, and in the colleges even the study of Latin. These oppressive acts hampered greatly the proper formation of the clergy, public worship, and the administration of the diocese. Lately the seminary has been reopened, but despite the separation of Church and State the former is subject to many restrictions. The civil government is no longer hostile, but in its name provincial and local authorities exhibit no little hostility to the parish priests. The episcopal city, which has 8000 inhabitants, suffered much from the civil wars of the period of federation (1823-39) and has never regained its former size or prosperity. Bishop Joseph Maria Martinez Cabanas (1908) is the twenty-eighth or twenty-ninth of the line. The five parish priests of the Department of Comayagua represent the former cathedral canons, and assist the bishop on occasions; at his death they elect the vicar capitular. There are seventy secular priests, and no regulars; the Government has never tolerated the return of the latter since their expulsion (1821). There is a missionary on the northern coast and at Comayagua a Salesian Father. The wealthier classes of the diocese, with very few exceptions, are indifferent to religion. There are no parochial schools, as the people of the pueblos are unable to support them, after paying taxes for the public schools; moreover the clergy are unable to conduct them, being obliged at all times to move about from one small town to another and among the widely scattered villages and the mountains. (See HONDURAS; GUATEMALA.)

References

  1. Back to citation occurrence 1.0 Back to citation occurrence 1.1 Back to citation occurrence 1.2 Back to citation occurrence 1.3 Back to citation occurrence 1.4 HIERARCHIA CATHOLICA MEDII ET RECENTIORIS AEVI Vol III. p. 173.
  2. Back to citation "Bishop Cristóbal de Pedraza" Catholic-Hierarchy.org. David M. Cheney. Retrieved March 25, 2016
  3. Back to citation Roman Catholic Diocese of Comayagua, official website
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