The Diocese of Shreveport ( la, Dioecesis Sreveportuensis in Louisiana) is a

Latin Church , native_name_lang = la , image = San Giovanni in Laterano - Rome.jpg , imagewidth = 250px , alt = Façade of the Archbasilica of St. John in Lateran , caption = Archbasilica of Saint Joh ...

ecclesiastical territory or

diocese In Ecclesiastical polity, 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 Roman province, pro ...

of the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

covering the parishes of northern

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

. The largest cities in the diocese are

Shreveport Shreveport ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Louisiana. It is the third most populous city in Louisiana after New Orleans and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Baton Rouge, respectively. The Shreveport–Bossier City metropolitan area, with a population o ...

, Monroe,

Bossier City Bossier City ( ) is a city in Bossier Parish in the northwestern region of the U.S. state of Louisiana in the United States. It is the second most populous city in the Shreveport–Bossier City metropolitan statistical area. In 2020, it had a ...

and Ruston. It is a

suffragan diocese A suffragan diocese is one of the dioceses other than the metropolitan archdiocese that constitute an ecclesiastical province. It exists in some Christian denominations, in particular the Catholic Church, the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria ...

of the metropolitan

Archdiocese of New Orleans The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans ( la, Archidioecesis Novae Aureliae, french: Archidiocèse de la Nouvelle-Orléans, es, Arquidiócesis de Nueva Orleans) is an ecclesiastical division of the Roman Catholic Church spanning Jefferson ...

. Its bishop is part of the

United States Conference of Catholic Bishops The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) is the episcopal conference of the Catholic Church in the United States. Founded in 1966 as the joint National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB) and United States Catholic Conference (US ...

and belongs to Conference Region V (which includes the diocese of Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee). Its

mother church Mother church or matrice is a term depicting the Christian Church as a mother in her functions of nourishing and protecting the believer. It may also refer to the primary church of a Christian denomination or diocese, i.e. a cathedral or a metro ...

is the Cathedral of Saint John Berchmans, in

. The territory of the diocese covers an area of . The total population was 784,665, out of which 39,436 (5 percent of the total population) were Catholic, served by 42 diocesan priests in 32 parishes, in 2004. In 2010, the diocese had eight

seminarians A seminary, school of theology, theological seminary, or divinity school is an educational institution for educating students (sometimes called ''seminarians'') in scripture, theology, generally to prepare them for ordination to serve as clergy, ...

preparing for ordination to the priesthood.

History

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...

erected the Diocese of Shreveport on 16 June 1986, taking its present territory from the Diocese of Alexandria-Shreveport and simultaneously changing the title of the mother diocese back to Diocese of Alexandria, thus effectively splitting the mother diocese into two. The pope designated the Cathedral of St. John Berchmans in Shreveport, until then the co-cathedral of the Diocese of Alexandria-Shreveport, as the cathedral church of the new diocese.

Sexual abuse

On July 19, 2020, it became public that the Diocese of Shreveport is a respondent in a lawsuit in which a male plaintiff said that the diocese had shielded a priest who sexually abused him in the 1970s.

Bishops

The list of ordinaries of the diocese and their years of service: #

William Benedict Friend William Benedict Friend (October 22, 1931 – April 2, 2015) was an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as the first bishop of the new Diocese of Shreveport in Louisiana from 1986 to 2006. He previously served as auxiliar ...

(1986–2006) #

Michael Duca Michael Gerard Duca (born June 5, 1952) is an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church who has been serving as bishop of the Diocese of Baton Rouge in Louisiana since his installation on August 24, 2018. He previously served as the bisho ...

(2008–2018); appointed Bishop of Baton Rouge # Francis Ignatius Malone (2020–present)

Coat of arms

High schools

Loyola College Prep Loyola College Prep is a private Catholic coeducational high school in Shreveport, Louisiana, founded by the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), but now operated by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Shreveport. It is among the oldest functioning former Jesuit ...

, Shreveport * St. Frederick Catholic High School, Monroe

Media

The diocese publishes a monthly magazine, ''The Catholic Connection''.

References

External links

Roman Catholic Diocese of Shreveport Official Site
Roman Catholic Ecclesiastical Province of New Orleans Christian organizations established in 1986 Culture of Shreveport, Louisiana

1986 establishments in Louisiana {{US-RC-diocese-stub