Fiume [Rijeka], Diocese of

FIUME [RIJEKA], Diocese of. - City in Venezia Giulia immediately subject. It has united the abbatial title of S. Giacomo de Abbatia.

It has an area of 1,014.87 km² with a population of 110,000 inhabitants, of whom 108,000 are Catholics, distributed in 32 parishes served by 57 diocesan priests and 13 regulars; a seminary, 3 male religious communities and 10 female ones (1950).

F., which arose in the Middle Ages on the ruins of ancient Tarsatica, developed in the 13th century into a free commune, almost independent; it was at first under the authority of the bishop of Nola, who ceded it as a fief to the lords of Duino, who were succeeded by the Walsee. When the latter died out, F. passed under the dominion of the house of Austria. However, throughout this entire period, which extends almost to the end of the 18th century, F. always remained under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the bishop of Pola.

So it was that several attempts were made to remove F. from its dependence on the bishop of Pola; one of the most serious occurred in the time of Bishop Sozomeno, who, through his intervention with the Holy See, was then able to prevent the separation of F. from Pola.

In 1776 the city changed political allegiance, because by Maria Theresa it was separated from Austria in order to be annexed to Hungary, though mediately to Croatia. But the imperial diploma did not meet with the favor of the Fiumans, partly because the interference of Croatia weighed on them, and they did so much that the Empress Maria Theresa, by a new provision, in 1779 annexed F. immediately to the crown of St. Stephen as a «separatum Sacrae Regni Coronae adnexum corpus». In 1787 F. was detached from Pola and united to the diocese of Segna. This political position, although it underwent various vicissitudes in the 19th century, was the one that, in its broad outlines, prevailed at the time of the First World War of 1914-18.

From the point of view of spiritual care, the ecclesiastical dependence of F. on the diocese of Segna was not among the happiest, because the clergy, in their great majority Croatian - Fiuman vocations were very few - although good and conscious of their duties, had no influence whatsoever on the population of another language and another outlook.

The collapse of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy put an end to the painful ecclesiastical situation of the city. The Holy See, after the repeated requests of the National Council, which had established itself as the government of the city following the departure of the Hungarian authorities, first sent an apostolic visitor in the person of Msgr. Valentino Liva to examine the whole situation. Then, as the National Council renewed its requests, F. having been withdrawn from the diocesan jurisdiction of Segna, the Holy See appointed as apostolic administrator (23 Apr. 1920) Msgr. Celso Costantini, then director of the Archaeological Museum of Aquileia.

In 1920 there took place the occupation of the city by D'Annunzio, who established there the Italian Regency of Carnaro (Aug. 1920), but he had to withdraw by force of the Treaty of Rapallo (Nov. 1920), which established the independent State of F. This in 1924 was definitively annexed to Italy, and on 25 Apr. 1925 by pontifical bull the diocese of F. was established there. The Second World War saw the city evacuated, German reprisals, the occupation of Tito's troops (3 May 1945) and the consequent persecution, of a communist character, of the clergy and of Catholic Action.

The new diocese had the identical boundaries of the province of Carnaro and was divided first into four deaneries and forane vicariates: that of the city, that of Villa del Nevoso, detached from the diocese of Ljubljana, and those of Volosca and Elsane taken from the diocese of Trieste; and then, when the territory of the province was enlarged, the deanery of Crusizza (Castelnuovo d'Istria) was added to it, also taken from the diocese of Trieste.

Giovanni Regalati