Burma, Apostolic Vicariate of Southern

BURMA, Apostolic Vicariate of Southern. - A mission created in 1866 (under the name of South-Western B.) and definitively in 1870 (v. BIRMANIA), and which has since undergone various changes. It has been directed, from its origin, by the Fathers of the Foreign Missions of Paris. The central residence is Rangoon, the political capital of B. and seat of the government of the recent Burmese Republic. It is the only vicariate that does not take its name from the city, but retains the ancient one from the region. It has a population of 7,000,000 inhabitants, and missionary activity is divided between the capital and the rural districts of the mountains or of the immense Irrawaddy delta. In the urban centers the greater missionary activity is carried out on behalf of the Eurasian Catholics, the Indian immigrants (almost all Tamils) who form parishes of their own, and the Chinese immigrants: Indians and Chinese, however, are also found scattered outside the city. In the districts the principal care is devoted to the Karen tribes, which are becoming increasingly isolated from the Burmese rulers. To the north of the vicariate the Chin tribe has formed a Christianity of its own. The French missionaries (1948) number 25, assisted by 43 native priests and 43 catechists: the nuns number 238, from several Congregations (of the Apparition of Marseilles, Franciscan Missionaries of Mary, Little Sisters of the Poor, of the Good Shepherd and of three native Congregations) and 25 brothers of the Christian Schools. The schools and charitable works (leprosariums, shelters, etc.) are well developed. The Catholic community numbers 69,872 individuals and has a magnificent Gothic cathedral.

Giovanni B. Tragella