The Roman Catholic Diocese of Oran (french: Diocèse d'Oran, la, Dioecesis Oranensis) is a

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...

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 ...

in the

Ecclesiastical province An ecclesiastical province is one of the basic forms of jurisdiction in Christian Churches with traditional hierarchical structure, including Western Christianity and Eastern Christianity. In general, an ecclesiastical province consists of seve ...

of Algiers in

Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , relig ...

History

The current diocese of Oran was created on 25 July 1866, with the diocese of Constantine, by dismemberment of the single diocese of Algiers (established in 1838). It is limited to the east by the Archdiocese of Algiers, to the south by the Sahara, to the west by the border of

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria t ...

; it covers nearly . It is believed that its current population is around 8 million inhabitants spread over 9 departments. At the time of

Saint Augustine Augustine of Hippo ( , ; la, Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430), also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Afr ...

, about thirty bishoprics existed on the current extent of the diocese; from the 16th to the 18th centuries. Oran, occupied by the Spaniards, depended on the

Archbishop of Toledo This is a list of Bishops and Archbishops of Toledo ( la, Archidioecesis Metropolitae Toletana).

. After the massive departure of the French at the independence of Algeria in 1962, then of foreign workers at the beginning of the Algerian civil war, the Catholic community only has a few hundred members nowadays.

Special churches

The seat of the bishop is Cathédrale Sainte-Marie in Oran.

Ordinaries

Bishops of Oran

# Jean-Baptiste-Irénée Callot ( – ) # ( – ), appointed Bishop of Digne, France # ( – ), appointed Bishop of La Rochelle (-Saintes), France # ( – ), appointed Bishop of Perpignan-Elne, France # ( – ) # ( – ) # ( – ) # ( – ), appointed Bishop of Périgueux (-Sarlat), France # ( – ) # Bertrand Lacaste ( – ) #

Henri Teissier Henri Antoine Marie Teissier (21 July 1929 – 1 December 2020)

( – ), appointed Coadjutor Archbishop of Alger # Pierre Lucien Claverie, OP ( – ) # Alphonse Georger (July 10, 1998 – December 1, 2012) # Jean-Paul Vesco, OP ( – )

References

Sources

*
GCatholic.org

External links

{{authority control Oran Oran Oran Oran, Roman Catholic Diocese of 1866 establishments in Algeria