NUOVA ORLEANS, ARCIDIOCESI. — City and archdiocese in the United States of America.
It has an area of 13,090 square miles, with 1,247,894 inhabitants (1951), of whom 483,028 are Catholics (1951), entrusted to the care of 513 priests, including 303 religious belonging to 15 different congregations. It has 159 parishes, 98 missions, 16 stations, 1 diocesan seminary, 2 religious seminaries, 4 colleges and universities (Loyola University in N. O. and Xavier University for the colored population), 4 general hospitals, and 2 specialized hospitals and sanatoriums.
The diocese of N. O. was erected on 25 April 1793 and elevated to an archdiocese on 19 July 1850. Its history is very ancient. The first explorers—de Soto, d'Iberville, La Salle, and Bienville—were accompanied by missionaries; the territory was initially under the jurisdiction of the bishop of Québec (Canada), and in 1696 the superior of the missions sent by the Seminary of Québec was appointed vicar general there. Because of the distance of that territory from Québec, Mgr. de Saint-Vallier obtained from the Holy See the Capuchin L. Fr. Duplessy de Mornay as coadjutor in 1714 and appointed him vicar general for Luisiana. Mgr. de Mornay
however, never went to the United States, but in 1722 entrusted the spiritual care of the indigenous peoples to the Jesuits, who worked there successfully until 1763, when they were suppressed in Luisiana. In that same year Luisiana was transferred to Spain, and the province came under the authority of the bishop of Santiago di Cuba; he requested an auxiliary, who was consecrated in 1781 and given jurisdiction over Luisiana and Florida. Another change took place in 1787: the see of Santiago di Cuba was divided, and the diocese of S. Cristoforo di Avana, Luisiana, and the Floridas was created. Mgr. Cirillo di Barcellona, auxiliary, was charged by the Holy See with erecting Luisiana and the two Floridas into a diocese, and a decree to this effect was issued on 8 April 1793. A new diocese was founded at N. O., with Mgr. Luis Penalver y Cardenas as its first bishop.
The territory was ceded to France in 1800 and then sold to the United States of America in 1803 by Napoleone Bonaparte. In 1806 the Congregation of Propaganda entrusted Luisiana to the diocese of Baltimora, whose bishop was appointed apostolic administrator. Mgr. L. Dubourg, appointed administrator on 18 September 1818, was subsequently able to exercise his jurisdiction over the entire territory following the cession of Florida to the United States by Spain.
The diocese was then subdivided several times: on 29 May 1825 the apostolic vicariate of Alabama and Florida was established; 18 July 1826 marked the foundation of S. Luigi; and on 18 July 1850 Pio X elevated N. O. to an archdiocese, with the suffragan dioceses of Mobile, Natchez, Little Rock, and Galveston. The present ecclesiastical province comprises the dioceses of Alessandria and Lafayette in Luisiana, Little Rock in Arkansas, Mobile in Alabama, and Natchez in Mississippi.