SIEDELCE, DIocese of. – A city and diocese in Poland. It has an area of 14,300 sq. km. with a population of 784,300 inhabitants, of whom 740,188 are Catholics, distributed in 264 parishes, served by 331 diocesan priests and 26 regular clergy; it has two seminaries, 7 male religious communities and 44 female ones (Ann. Pont. 1952, p. 379).
Founded in 1818 by the bull Ex imposita nobis of Pius VII, it arose from the division of parts of the dioceses of Chełm, Kraków, Poznań, Płock and Łuck, which from 1805 to 1818 formed part of the diocese of Lublin (v.).
Episcopal see at Janów Podlaski and Biskupi. First bishop: Feliks Łukasz Lewiński (1750–1825). By a decree of the Russian government in 1867 the diocese of Podlasie was suppressed, remaining under the administration of the bishops of Lublin. It was re-established in 1925 with its episcopal see at Siedlce, as suffragan of Warsaw. First bishop: Henryk Przeździecki.
Podlasie and the Land of Chełm were the object, especially from 1865 to 1875, of cruel religious persecutions by Russia, which provoked a deep echo throughout the world (v. LUBLIN).
In Siedlce the church of St Stanislaus dates from 1740, the Town Hall from the 18th century, and the so-called “Aleksandria” Palace from the 18th century. At Janów Podlaski or Biskupi the collegiate church of the Most Holy Trinity dates from the 15th century. The Dominican church is from the 18th century, and the Seminary from 1685. At Kodeń the parish church is from the 15th century; here is venerated the miraculous image of the Madonna.