The Diocese of Calcutta,
Church of North India
The Church of North India (CNI) is the dominant united and uniting churches, united Protestant church in northern India. It was established on 29 November 1970 by bringing together the Protestant churches working in northern India. It is a prov ...
was established in 1813 as part of the
Church of England. It is led by the
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 ca ...
of
Calcutta
Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, commerc ...
and the first bishop was
Thomas Middleton (1814–1822) and the second
Reginald Heber
Reginald Heber (21 April 1783 – 3 April 1826) was an English Anglican bishop, man of letters and hymn-writer. After 16 years as a country parson, he served as Bishop of Calcutta until his death at the age of 42. The son of a rich lando ...
(1823–1826). Under the sixth bishop
Daniel Wilson (1832–1858), the see was made Metropolitan (though not made an Archbishopric) when two more dioceses in India came into being (Madras, 1835, and Bombay, 1837).
Calcutta was made a
metropolitan see by
letters patent on 10 October 1835 and in 1930 was included in the
Church of India, Burma and Ceylon
The Church of India, Burma and Ceylon (CIBC) was the autonomous ecclesiastical province of the Anglican Communion in British India.
The first Anglican diocese in India was established in 1813, the Diocese of Calcutta, which became the metropo ...
(from 1948 the
Church of India, Pakistan, Burma, and Ceylon) until 1970. In 1970, the
Church of the Province of Myanmar
The Church of the Province of Myanmar in Asia is a member church of the Anglican Communion. The province comprises the entire country of Myanmar. The current archbishop of Myanmar and bishop of Yangon is Stephen Than Myint Oo.
Official name
The ...
,
Church of Ceylon and the
Church of Pakistan
The Church of Pakistan is a united Protestant Church in Pakistan, which is part of the Anglican Communion and a member of the World Communion of Reformed ChurchesDatabase (9 February 2006)"Sialkot Diocese of the Church of Pakistan" Reformed On ...
were separated from the province.
The Anglican dioceses in Northern India merged with the
United Church of Northern India (Congregationalist and Presbyterian), the
Methodist Church (British and Australian Conferences), the
, the
Church of the Brethren in India
The Church of North India (CNI) is the dominant united Protestant church in northern India. It was established on 29 November 1970 by bringing together the Protestant churches working in northern India. It is a province of the worldwide Anglic ...
, and the
Disciples of Christ to form the Church of North India in the same year.
In 1842 (after Madras and Bombay dioceses had been erected), her jurisdiction was described as "
Presidency of Bengal
The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William and later Bengal Province, was a subdivision of the British Empire in India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and ...
". The diocese currently has jurisdiction over the corporation limits of
Kolkata and the Districts of
Hooghly &
Howrah
Howrah (, , alternatively spelled as Haora) is a city in the Indian state of West Bengal. Howrah is located on the western bank of the Hooghly River opposite its twin city of Kolkata. Administratively it lies within Howrah district, and is the ...
in the state of
West Bengal. The bishop's seat (
cathedra
A ''cathedra'' is the raised throne of a bishop in the early Christian basilica. When used with this meaning, it may also be called the bishop's throne. With time, the related term ''cathedral'' became synonymous with the "seat", or principal ...
) is located in the city of
Kolkata at
St. Paul's Cathedral. The current bishop is
Paritosh Canning Paritosh is an Indian first name
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper ...
.
List of Bishops of Calcutta
Assistant bishops
John Richardson was appointed assistant bishop for, and Commissary for the Metropolitan, in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in 1950, and remained an assistant bishop of Calcutta until the
Diocese of Andaman and Nicobar was erected from Calcutta diocese in 1966. At that point, he became an assistant bishop of the new diocese, where he served until 1977.
William Arthur Partridge (12 February 191218 December 1992; called Arthur) was assistant Bishop in Nandyal from 1953 until the erection of the
Diocese of Nandyal in 1963. He returned to the
United Kingdom and served as an
Assistant Bishop of Hereford
The Bishop of Hereford is the Ordinary (officer), ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Hereford in the Province of Canterbury.
The episcopal see is centred in the Hereford, City of Hereford where the bishop's seat (''cathedra'') is in t ...
.
M. D. (Manonmani David) Srinivasan was appointed an assistant bishop of the Anglican diocese in 1964 and consecrated a bishop in January 1985.
John Banerjee was appointed assistant bishop of Lahore in 1931. He travelled to Australia in 1936 and was presented as Metropolitan of India.
See also
*
Christianity in West Bengal
Christianity in West Bengal, India, is a minority religion. According to the 2011 census of India, there were 658,618 Christians in West Bengal, or 0.72% of the population. Although Mother Teresa worked in Kolkata (Calcutta), Christianity is ...
*
Christianity in India
Christianity is India's third-largest religion with about 27.8 million adherents, making up 2.3 percent of the population as of the 2011 census. The written records of the Saint Thomas Christians state that Christianity was introduced to t ...
*
Church of North India
The Church of North India (CNI) is the dominant united and uniting churches, united Protestant church in northern India. It was established on 29 November 1970 by bringing together the Protestant churches working in northern India. It is a prov ...
*
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Calcutta
References
CNI Diocese of Calcutta – Bishops
*Cross, F. L. (ed.; 1957) ''The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church''. Oxford U. P.; pp. 686–88: "India, Christianity in"
External links
– A History of the Church of England in India, SPCK, 1924
Diocese of Kolkata, CNI – Official WebsiteArchived
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bishop of Calcutta
*
Calcutta
Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, commerc ...
1813 establishments in British India
Church of North India
Anglican dioceses in Asia
Christianity in Kolkata
Church of India, Burma and Ceylon