SANT'ANTONIO, ARCHDIOCESE OF. - City and archdiocese of the State of Texas, U.S.A. The archdiocese of S. A. comprises the whole State of Texas, except the diocese of El Paso and the State of Oklahoma.
It has an area of 33,025 sq. miles and a total population of 899,702 inhabitants, of whom 281,185 are Catholics, served by 312 priests of whom 176 are religious of 13 different congregations; it has 106 parishes, 61 chapels, 101 missions, 1282 sisters of 36 congregations, 1 seminary with 87 diocesan seminarians and 95 others, 3 scholasticates, 3 colleges and universities with 3273 students, 1 orphanage and 5 hospitals.
The first priests were French, who came with the expedition of La Salle. They settled in Matagorda Bay in 1585. They were followed by Franciscans and Sulpicians. The former then opened the missions of the Rio Grande. The first religious was Fr. Damiano Mazaret, who accompanied the expedition of Alonzo de León in 1685.
The territory of Texas was under the jurisdiction of Guadalupe until Dec. 1777, when it became part of the new diocese of Nuevo León or Linares. In 1813 all the Franciscan missions were suppressed by the Spanish government. Gregory XVI created an apostolic prefecture for Texas in 1839, and the Rev. J. Timon was appointed apostolic prefect. The prefecture was elevated to an apostolic vicariate on 10 July 1841, and Msgr. John M. Odin, bishop of Claudiopolis, was appointed apostolic vicar. In 1847 the diocese of Galveston was created for the whole State of Texas, and on 3 Sept. 1874 that of S. A. was established, with Msgr. Antoine Dominique Pellicier as its first bishop. The diocese was elevated to an archdiocese by Pius XI with the apostolic constitution Pastoris aeterni of 3 Aug. 1926 (AAS, 19 [1927], pp. 169-76).
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