PEORIA, DIOCESE of. — Diocese and city in the state of Illinois, in the United States of America. This diocese was erected in 1875 by division from the archdiocese of Chicago and today (1951) covers a territory of 16,933 square miles with a total population of 1,108,951 inhabitants (1940 census), of whom 160,266 are Catholics.
The diocese of P., suffragan of Chicago, has 1 abbey (S. Beda, Peron), 344 priests, of whom 105 are religious belonging to 8 different congregations, 158 parishes, 34 chapels, 58 missions, 13 general hospitals, and 2 specialized hospitals or sanatoriums. There are also 30 women’s congregations and 1,270 religious women.
Catholicism in this part of the United States dates back to the time of the Jesuit Fr. Marquette, who stopped at the indigenous village of P. on 25 May 1673 during a journey on the Illinois River. Invited by the indigenous people, he promised to return there the following year. The Recollects celebrated Holy Mass and preached the Gospel at Fort Crevecoeur in 1680. The names of Frs. Gabriele Ribourdi, Zenobio Membre, and Luigi Hennepin are well known there. Among the first immigrants were many Irish who came to work on the Illinois-Michigan Canal and received land in exchange for their wages. They were followed by Poles, Slovenes, Slovaks, Croats, Lithuanians, and Italians, who came in large numbers to work in the mines. All were organized into parishes with priests of their own nationality. Mons. Giovanni Lancaster Spalding, a native of Kentucky, was consecrated the first bishop of P. on 1 May 1877; he played a decisive role in the founding of the Catholic University of Washington.