SHERBROOKE, ARCIDIOCESI di. – Archdiocese and city in the province of Québec (Canada).
The diocese has a Catholic population of 214,823 inhabitants (184,613 French and 2,820 English) and a non-Catholic population of 26,992 inhabitants. It has 403 diocesan priests (94 religious priests from 11 different congregations), 69 seminarians, 6 congregations of men religious, 18 women’s congregations, 121 parishes, 135 churches and chapels, 1 theological seminary, 2 minor seminaries, 7 hospitals, 3 orphanages, and 4 novitiates.
The diocese was erected by Pius IX on 28 August 1874, through the dismemberment of Trois-Rivières, St-Hyacinthe, and Québec, for the part of the province of Québec known as the Cantons de l’Est. The first missionary was Rev. Giovanni Raymbault (1816–23). In 1855, Bishop J. C. Prince, bishop of St-Hyacinthe, wished to build a college there and for this purpose provided the necessary land. The College officially took the name of Collège de S. on 25 May 1857; it was canonically erected as a diocesan seminary by Bishop Antonio Racine (1875–78) on 30 August 1875.
At the time of its foundation, the diocese had 29,000 Catholics, 28 diocesan priests, and 20 parishes in a center important for its industry, commerce, and the fertility of its soil. At present (1952), the city of S. has a total population of 47,000 souls (42,000 French and 4,000 English). On 2 March 1951, Pius XII dismembered the dioceses of St-Hyacinthe (province of Montréal) and Nicolet (province of Québec) and elevated S. to an archdiocese, assigning to it the two newly created dioceses as suffragans.