PARACATÙ. – City and “nullius” prelature in the State of Minas Geraes, Brazil. It has an area of 70,000 sq. km and a population of approximately 80,000 inhabitants, all Catholics. It has 6 parishes served by the Carmelites of the Ancient Observance; there are also priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Capuchins, and a women’s religious community.
The prelature was created by Pope Pius XI by the apostolic constitution Pro munere sibi divinitus of 1 March 1929, through the partitioning of the dioceses of Montes Claros and Uberaba, and by elevating to the rank and dignity of a prelatic church the church of S. Antonio da Padova existing in the city of P. The prelature is suffragan to Diamantina.
BIBL.: AAS, 23 (1931), pp. 317–19; G. B. Lehmann, O Brasil Católico 1947, Juiz de Fora 1947, pp. 478–79. Virginio Battezzati