SANTISSIMA CONCEZIONE (CONCEPTION), ARCHDIOCESE of. - City and archdiocese of Chile, in the province of Concepción, Arauco, and Bio-Bio, in South America.
It has an area of 26,000 sq. km., with a population of 535,000 inhabitants, of whom 530,000 are Catholics; it includes 42 parishes served by 63 diocesan and 62 regular priests; it has 1 seminary, 15 male and 30 female religious communities (Ann. Pont. 1952, p. 366). The diocese was created by a bull of Pius IV on 22 May 1563; from 1818 to 1832 the see of S. C. was vacant; on 20 May 1939 Pope Pius XII, by the apostolic constitution Quo provinciarum, raised it to metropolitan rank, assigning to it as suffragans the dioceses of Chillán, Puerto Montt, Punta Arenas, S. Carlo di Ancud, Temuco, and Valdivia. In the diocese there are many communities of Franciscans, Dominicans, Augustinians, Capuchins, Jesuits, Salesians, Redemptorists, and an equal number of female communities, which administer various colleges. There is also the Conciliar Seminary.