LETICIA, APOSTOLIC PREFECTURE OF. — In Colombia, it is one of the three autonomous missions erected on 7 Feb. 1951 by the dismemberment Caquetá (v.). The vast extent of the said vicariate—253,511 sq. km.—and the limited means of communication prompted its division into the two Apostolic Vicariates of Sibundoy and Florencia, and the Apostolic Prefecture of L.
The Apostolic Vicariate of Florencia embraces the entire intendancy of Caquetá, covering 190,360 sq. km. and containing about 70,000 inhabitants. Eight Missionaries of the Consolata work there. The region is divided into four municipalities: Florencia, San Vicente del Caguán, Belén, and Leguízamo. Florencia, the capital of the intendancy and seat of the Ordinary, has a population of about 30,000, a large church, and two hospitals—one run by sisters and the other military. The entire school system is entrusted to the mission.
The Apostolic Prefecture of L., comprising the entire commissary of Amazonas, covers 121,900 sq. km. and has about 500 inhabitants, a number expected to increase soon through colonization from other parts of Colombia. The ten Capuchins of the Catalan Province who are responsible for its evangelization find their work hindered by the unhealthy climate. Schools are little developed; the principal towns, apart from L., the capital of the commissary and seat of the Apostolic Prefect, include La Chorrera.
LETICIA — LUNAR LETTER
Letoria V. Zabulghin, G. P. L., I, Rome 1900; II, Grottaferrata 1910; notes, 1912; id., L'autografo delle chiose vergini di P. L., in Arcadia, 1 (1918), pp. 135-136; for its philology V. what R. Sabbadini says in Giorn. storico, 60 (1912), pp. 184-186; Pastor, II, pp. 318-319; V. Rossi, Il Quattrocento, Milan 1938, pp. 313-316. Giuseppe Tofanin