Brno (Brünn), Diocese of

BRNO (Brünn), Diocese of. - Capital of Moravia (Czechoslovakia), area 10,370 sq. km., pop. 1,259,613, of whom 1,113,189 are Catholics; it comprises 449 parishes with 1044 churches, 786 diocesan priests and 160 regulars. The diocese extends over the south-western part of Moravia. Its principal cities are: B., the capital of Moravia, Jihlava, Trebic and Znojmo. In this territory the Catholic faith was spread in the 9th century by Sts. Cyril and Methodius (v.). During the Hussite tumults this part of Moravia remained Catholic; it passed however in large part to Lutheranism under the first Habsburgs; in the period of the Counter-Reformation it returned to the Catholic faith. B., already a provostship from 1296, was elevated to an episcopal see by Pius VI, at the request of the empress Maria Theresa, on 5 Dec. 1777, by division of the archbishopric of Olomouc.

Among its bishops the most eminent have been Matteo Fr. Count Chorinský (1777-86), card. Francesco Sal. Bauer (1882-1904) and Giuseppe Kupka (1926-41). Among the priests the canons Francesco Sušil, professor of Sacred Scripture, and Giuseppe Pospisil, professor of philosophy, distinguished themselves as scholars and patriots. Besides the cathedral Chapter of B. there exists the collegiate church of Mikulov, founded in 1625. B. has good traditions of study. Mention should be made of: the university library (about half a million volumes) and that of the theological Institute; there are moreover the civic library, the library of the Augustinian convent, the archive of the church of St. James, founded in the 14th century, with precious manuscripts and historical documents. Near B. is found the great and rich Benedictine library of Rajhrad (Raigern), the first monastery in Moravia, founded in 1048. Among the cultural institutes may be remembered the theological Institute; the Masaryk University; the polytechnic; the important cultural society Matice Moravska and the higher school of religious culture, a gymnasium and episcopal lyceum. Monasteries are found in B. and in other places of the diocese: Augustinian in B., Benedictine at Rajhrad, Premonstratensian at Nova Rise and others of various male religious orders.

The most remarkable monuments in the Romanesque style of the diocese are the church of St. Procopius at Trebic and the conventual church of the Cistercian nuns Porta coeli at Predklasteri. Of the churches of B. the most important are the cathedral of St. Peter and Paul, Gothic, destroyed in 1645, restored in 1748 and 1908; St. James, Gothic of the fourteenth century; St. Thomas, Gothic of the fourteenth century, rebuilt in Baroque style in the seventeenth century; the Augustinian conventual church, Gothic of the fourteenth century. The church of St. Mary at Krtiny near B., in Baroque style, has the largest and most monumental dome in central Europe.

Giuseppe Hebata