CURACAO. — It is the largest (447 sq. km.) and most populous (80,000 inhabitants) of the six islands that make up the Dutch Antilles (Nederlandsche Antillen-C.).
Like Aruba and Bonaire, it lies off the northern coast of Venezuela (all three together measure 918 sq. km. with 120,000 inhabitants). The Dutch Antilles also include St. Martin (the southern half; the northern half is French), St. Eustatius and Saba in the Leeward Islands, east of Puerto Rico (76 sq. km. with 432 inhabitants). Altogether, the Dutch Antilles cover 994 sq. km. and have 140,000 inhabitants, all of them Black except for 6,000 foreigners (1,600 Dutch), and the vast majority Catholic.
More than tropical products (cotton, coconuts, sugarcane, cocoa, etc.), which are more or less common to all the islands, the refining of Venezuelan petroleum is important in Curaçao and Aruba, carried out in three large refineries. It is this recent activity that has brought economic prosperity to the two islands.
The capital of the Dutch Antilles is Willemstad (40,000 inhabitants), in Curaçao, which serves as an outpost to Venezuelan Maracaibo.
Giuseppe Caraci
THE APOSTOLIC VICARIATE OF CURACAO. — It comprises the islands of Curaçao, Aruba and Bonaire, commonly known as the Dutch Antilles: they were discovered by Alonzo de Ojeda in 1499 and remained under Spanish rule until 1643, when they were conquered by the Dutch.
The first missionaries were the Hieronymites, who came from Santo Domingo shortly after the Spanish conquest and remained until the arrival of the Dutch, who expelled them and forbade the practice of the Catholic religion. During the 18th century, various religious institutes and even secular clergy, who had settled on the island as colonists, attended to the spiritual needs of the faithful. In 1773 the Apostolic Prefecture was established, elevated to a Vicariate in 1842 and entrusted to the regular Dutch province of the Dominicans. The area of the mission is 1,529.75 sq. km. The spiritual state, according to 1948 statistics, is as follows: inhabitants 147,694, of whom 107,694 are Catholic, 37,100 Protestant, 1,700 Jewish, and the rest pagans. Priests: 57, of whom 3 are indigenous clergy; coadjutor brothers: 130; sisters: 319; seminarians: 2; teachers: 372. There are 24 parishes, 7 mission stations, 34 churches and chapels, 4 hospitals, 5 pharmacies, and one school each for elementary, secondary, higher and professional education.