IBAGUÉ, DIOCESI di. — Diocese and capital city of the department of Tolina, Colombia, South America.
It has an area of 30,000 sq. km. and a population of 500,000, of whom 499,500 are Catholics; it has 56 parishes, served by 86 diocesan priests and 13 religious priests, one seminary, 5 male and 22 female religious communities (1949).
The diocese was established by Pope Leo XIII on 20 June 1900. The first bishop was Mons. Ismael Perdomo. The Cathedral is dedicated to the Immaculate Conception. It is a suffragan diocese of Bogotá.
The city of I., founded in 1550, was, in 1854, the capital of the Republic of Colombia.
BIBL.: P. J. Mac Auley, s. V. in Cath. Enc., VII, p. 613; Enc. Eur. Am., XXVIII, pp. 799–800. Enrico Josi