KONTUM, APOSTOLIC VICARIATE OF. - In Indochina, erected on 18 January 1932 by division of the Vicariate of Quinhon.
It comprises the provinces of Attopeu, Bannethuôt, Kontum and the mountainous and barbarous part of Quangnam. It has an area of about 70,000 sq. km. with a total population of 725,000 barbarians, Annamites and Laotians, of whom 24,916 are Catholics, thus divided: 20,348 uncivilized, 4,330 Annamites and 238 Europeans. Protestants have about 300 adherents in the province of Bannethuôt. Pagan Annamites practice ancestor worship or observe Buddhism, but they are few. The uncivilized pagans venerate their spirits. There are many tribes, once constantly at war with one another, who now live in peace. Each tribe has its own language. The uncivilized have no temples or dogmas: they worship the goddess of rice (the Sori). In every village there are ten sorcerers called "bojan" who act as doctors and intervene in judgments. The "bojan" is considered by the priests to be the number one enemy of religion, because he deceives the people.
Regarding the origin of the mission of Kontum, in 1830 the Vicar Apostolic of Eastern Cochin China, Domenico Stefano Cuenot, later declared Blessed by the Church (1909), sent the Annamite deacon Do to explore the region of the barbarians, in order to find a suitable place to establish the seminary of the mission, on account of the religious persecution in the Annamite kingdom. Given the happy outcome of that exploration, Fathers Combes and Desgouts and others were sent to the region.
In 1890 the new mission of Kontum had 1,880 catechumens; in 1900, 10,120; and in 1933, 21,780. It is entrusted to the Paris Foreign Missions Society. There are 24 districts and 188 Christian communities. Priests: 36, of whom 19 French, 15 Annamites and 2 Bahnars; 166 catechists; 21 religious sisters; 13 primary schools; 23 orphanages; a printing press; a leper hospital; a printing house from which two newspapers are published: *Echos de la mission* and *Hlabar tobang*.
Major seminarians: 13; minor seminarians: 14. The Gospel is preached freely and the pagans are well disposed toward the Catholic religion.