The Diocese of

Linköping Linköping () is a city in southern Sweden, with around 105,000 inhabitants as of 2021. It is the seat of Linköping Municipality and the capital of Östergötland County. Linköping is also the episcopal see of the Diocese of Linköping (Church ...

( sv, Linköpings stift) is a

diocese In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associa ...

within the

Church of Sweden The Church of Sweden ( sv, Svenska kyrkan) is an Evangelical Lutheran national church in Sweden. A former state church, headquartered in Uppsala, with around 5.6 million members at year end 2021, it is the largest Christian denomination in Sw ...

administering the

Östergötland County Östergötland County ( sv, Östergötlands län) is a county or '' län'' in southeastern Sweden. It has land borders with the counties of Kalmar to the southeast, Jönköping to the southwest, Örebro to the northwest, and Södermanland to the ...

, the north eastern part of

Jönköping County Jönköping County ( sv, Jönköpings län) is a county or '' län'' in southern Sweden. It borders the counties of Halland, Västra Götaland, Östergötland, Kalmar and Kronoberg. The total county population was 356,291 inhabitants in Sept ...

and the northern part of

Kalmar County Kalmar County () is a county or '' län'' in southern Sweden. It borders the counties of Kronoberg, Jönköping, Blekinge and Östergötland. To the east in the Baltic Sea is the island Gotland. The counties are mainly administrative units. G ...

. It comprises nine

deaneries A deanery (or decanate) is an ecclesiastical entity in the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Anglican Communion, the Evangelical Church in Germany, and the Church of Norway. A deanery is either the jurisdiction or residenc ...

subdivided into 176

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest, often termed a parish priest, who might be assisted by one o ...

es with a total of 443,000 members. The dioecese's largest parish is

Motala Motala () is a locality and the seat of Motala Municipality, Östergötland County, Sweden with 29,823 inhabitants (41,956 in the entire municipality) in 2010. It is the third largest city of Östergötland, following Linköping and Norrköping. ...

. The Diocese of Linköping has a rank directly below the

Archdiocese of Uppsala The Archdiocese of Uppsala ( sv, Uppsala ärkestift) is one of the thirteen dioceses of the Church of Sweden and the only one having the status of an archdiocese. Lutheran archdiocese Uppsala is the seat of the Lutheran Archbishop of Uppsala. Th ...

of the Church of Sweden. The current bishop is Martin Modéus. The diocesan territory comprises

and parts of

Jönköping Jönköping (, ) is a city in southern Sweden with 112,766 inhabitants (2022). Jönköping is situated on the southern shore of Sweden's second largest lake, Vättern, in the province of Småland. The city is the seat of Jönköping Municipa ...

and

. It has 212 parishes with a total of 443 000 members. As of 2006

Martin Modéus Nils Martin Modéus (born 1 March 1962 in Jönköping) is a Swedish theologian and bishop of the Diocese of Linköping. Modéus was ordained as a bishop on 6 March 2011 in Uppsala Cathedral. On 8 June 2022 he was elected Archbishop of Uppsala and ...

bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is c ...

History before the Reformation

The diocese originally included Småland, Östergötland, the Islands of Gotland and

Öland Öland (, ; ; sometimes written ''Øland'' in other Scandinavian languages, and often ''Oland'' internationally; la, Oelandia) is the second-largest Swedish island and the smallest of the traditional provinces of Sweden. Öland has an area ...

. The district of

Värend Värend was in the Middle Ages the most populous of the constituent "small lands" of the province Småland, in Sweden. Early on, Växjö became its center. Around 1170, Värend broke out of the diocese of Linköping, and formed its own diocese of ...

in Småland was taken from Linköping and formed into the

Diocese of Växjö The Diocese of Växjö ( sv, Växjö stift) is one of the 13 dioceses or regional units of the Lutheran Church of Sweden. It was also a former Roman Catholic bishopric. Lutheran diocese Diocese of Växjö is situated in southern Sweden and incl ...

about 1160. From 990 to 1100 the

Diocese of Skara The Diocese of Skara ( sv, Skara stift) is the oldest existing diocese in Sweden, originally a Latin bishopric of the Roman Catholic church, and since Protestant reformation a Lutheran diocese of the Church of Sweden (the former state church of S ...

embraced the whole country of the Goths ( Gauthiod); it was then divided between those of Skara and Linköping. The diocese was a suffragan of the

Archdiocese of Bremen The Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen (german: Fürsterzbistum Bremen) — not to be confused with the modern Archdiocese of Hamburg, founded in 1994 — was an ecclesiastical principality (787–1566/1648) of the Holy Roman Empire and the Catholic ...

, and became a suffragan of the

Diocese of Lund The Diocese of Lund ( sv, Lunds stift) is a diocese within the Church of Sweden which corresponds to the provinces of Blekinge and Skåne. There are 217 parishes within the diocese, the most significant number in any of the dioceses of the Chu ...

, when the latter was elevated to an archdiocese in 1104. The first three bishops of Linköping were Herbert, Richard and Gisle (c. 1138–48). Then came Stenar, who apparently resigned in 1160 and subsequently became Bishop of Vexiö. Notable bishops after him were Kol (c. 1160–96), who died on a pilgrimage in Jerusalem and Bengt Magnusson who was killed at the

Battle of Lihula The Battle of Lihula or Battle of Leal was fought between invading Swedes and Estonians for the control of a castle in Lihula, Estonia in 1220. The exact date remains uncertain, though some historians suggest that the battle took place on Augu ...

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

on 8 August 1220, and Benedict (1220–37). The last Catholic bishop of Linköping was Hans Brask (born 1464; bishop, 1513–27; died 30 July 1539). He was compelled to leave his diocese in 1527 owing to the adoption of

Lutheranism Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

in Sweden at the

Diet of Västerås Riksdag of the Estates ( sv, Riksens ständer; informally sv, Ståndsriksdagen) was the name used for the Estates of Sweden when they were assembled. Until its dissolution in 1866, the institution was the highest authority in Sweden next to th ...

Council of Skenninge

Of the numerous provincial and diocesan synods held in the Diocese of Linköping, the Council of Skenninge (1248) was the most important. The papal legate, Cardinal William of Sabina, presided and the celibacy of the clergy was strongly enforced. The following religious institutions were set up in the diocese between the twelfth and the sixteenth centuries: the cathedral chapter, which consisted at the time of the Reformation of a dean, an archdeacon, a subdean, nine canons and fifteen other prebendaries; the Cistercians had three houses for men, the abbeys of

Alvastra Alvastra () is a small village in Ödeshög Municipality in eastern Sweden. It is known for being the seat of the Cistercian Alvastra Abbey Alvastra Abbey (''Alvastra klosterruin'') was a Cistercian monastery located at Alvastra in Östergötla ...

, the mother-house of the Cistercian Order in Sweden, in Östergötland and Nydala in Småland, both founded in 1143, and Gutvalla ( Roma) in Gotland; also four nunneries,

Vreta Abbey Vreta Abbey ( sv, Vreta kloster), in operation from the beginning of the 12th century to 1582, was the first nunnery in Sweden, initially Benedictine and later Cistercian, and one of the oldest in Scandinavia. It was located in the present-day m ...

(1160), Askaby, Byarum, dissolved about 1250 and the nuns transferred to Sko (in Upland) and

Solberga Abbey Solberga Abbey (Swedish: Solberga kloster), was a Cistercian nunnery in Sweden, in operation from 1246 until at least 1469. It was located outside Visby on Gotland until 1404, and then in Visby. It was the only nunnery on the island of Gotland. ...

(Gotland); the Brigittines, who had the great Abbey of Vadstena; the Dominicans, who possessed priories at Skenninge (1220?), Visby (1240) and Kalmar, as well as nunneries at Skenninge (1260) and Kalmar (1286). There were hospitals at Linköping, Visby (2), Söderköping (2) Skenninge (2), Kalmar (2), Norrabygd (Uknabäck) and on the Island of

. Most of these institutions were suppressed at the

Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Diocese of Linkoping Östergötland County Linkoping Jönköping County Kalmar County Former Catholic dioceses in Sweden Dioceses established in the 12th century

History before the Reformation

Council of Skenninge

See also

References

External links