Santiago De Chile, Archdiocese Of (SANTIAGO DEL CHILE, ARCIDIOCESI DI)

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

SANTIAGO DEL CHILE, ARCHDIOCESE of. — Capital city and archdiocese of the Republic of Chile, in South America.

Over an area of 16,987 sq. km., it has 1,620,000 inhabitants, of whom 1,450,000 are Catholics; it has 116 parishes served by 235 diocesan priests and 295 religious priests; there are 3 seminaries and a Catholic University founded in 1888; 66 male and 140 female religious communities (Ann. Pont. 1952, pp. 364–65). The diocese was created by Pius IV on 27 June 1561 as a suffragan of the archdiocese of Lima; Pope Gregory XVI raised it to metropolitan dignity on 23 June 1840, assigning to it as suffragans the dioceses of Linares, Rancagua, S. Filippo, Talca, and Valparaiso. The Cathedral, in the Romanesque style, is dedicated to the Assumption.

BIBL.: Eubel, III, p. 321; IV, p. 206; V, p. 224; C. Silva Cotapos, s. V. in Cath. Enc., XIII, pp. 460–61; anon., s. V. in Enc. Eur. Am., LIV, pp. 289–99. Enrico Josi

THE CENTRE OF STUDIES. — 1. The Metropolitan Seminary of the Holy Guardian Angels, founded in 1587, declared interdiocesan for the dioceses established in 1925 through the division of S. (cf. AAS, 18 [1926], p. 203), and granted the title of “Pontifical” (decree of the S. Congreg. of Seminaries and Universities, 15 Aug. 1929), has enjoyed governmental legal recognition of its courses since 1879. Its new premises are currently being constructed. Its library is used by the Faculty of Theology of the Catholic University.

2. The Catholic University, founded on 21 June 1888 by decree of the archbishop M. Casanova and approved by Leo XIII on 28 July 1889, is one of the first Catholic universities in Latin America. In 1930 it received canonical erection from the Holy See (cf. AAS, 22 [1930], p. 362). It comprises the faculties of philosophy and letters, law and political and social sciences, physics and mathematics, architecture and fine arts, agriculture, commerce and economic sciences, medicine, and the Faculty of Theology, inaugurated on 1 April 1935 and canonically erected on 16 July 1938; on 8 September 1938 Pius XI approved its Statutes, together with the General Statutes (Reglamento General de la Universidad Cat. de Chile). The university enjoys civil juridical personality (university law of 4 Nov. 1929; DL 27 Nov. 1929). The cardinal archbishop of S. is its Grand Chancellor. The bishops of the Republic belong to it as “protectors.” Today approximately 600 professors teach several thousand students there.

BIBL.: 1) Seminary: El Seminario Conciliar de los Santos Angeles, Santiago d. C. 1910; 2) University: La Univers. Católica de Chile (collective pastoral letter of the Chilean episcopate), ibid. 1927; 3. Lira, in Annuaire général des Universités Catholiques by A. Gernelli and J. Schrijnen, Numega 1927, pp. 371–76; Memoria de la Univ. Cat. de Chile, Santiago 1932; Revista Universitaria (journal of the Catholic University), 20 (1935), pp. 1–44 and 121–63.

Igino Cecchetti