TALI [DALI], Diocese of. - In the western part of the province of Yunnan, in southern China.
It was erected as a sui iuris mission, with 33 civil sub-prefectures of the apostolic vicariate of Yunnanfu (v. KUNMING) on 22 Nov. 1929 and was entrusted to the Priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus of Bétharram, who had been on the spot since 1922. On 10 Dec. 1934 it was elevated to an apostolic prefecture and on 9 Dec. 1948 to a diocese, suffragan of Kunming.
It has an area of about 160,000 sq. km. As of 30 June 1947, out of a total population of about 5,000,000 inhabitants, Catholics numbered 7,524 and catechumens 2,461; the priests 20, of whom 2 were of the Chinese secular clergy; the foreign lay brothers 2; the sisters 12, of whom 4 were native. Among the works were 4 orphanages, 6 medicine dispensaries, 12 schools.
The Priests of Bétharram who arrived in the territory of T. in 1922 found it almost virgin from the missionary point of view: difficulties of terrain, malignant fevers, brigandage, a population partly primitive and reduced to a state of almost complete materialism, partly Chinese given over to commerce and the exploitation of the primitives, constituted so many obstacles to the advance of the Gospel, whose preaching had its victims in 6 priests and 2 lay brothers. But the fruits were not lacking: already in 1929 the baptized numbered 1,428 with 472 catechumens and 2 seminarians.