VALENCIA IN VENEZUELA, DIOCESE of. — Capital city of the State of Carabobo and diocese in Venezuela (South America).
Over an area of 20,650 sq. km., it has 327,450 inhabitants, of whom 326,000 are Catholics; it has 40 parishes with 41 diocesan priests and 70 religious priests; it has 20 male and 13 female religious communities (Ann. Pont. 1953, p. 440). The diocese was created by Pope Pius XI by the apostolic constitution Ad munus of 12 October 1922, through dismemberment from the archdiocese of Caracas or Santiago de Venezuela, of which it is a suffragan, and by raising the church of the Blessed Virgin to the rank and dignity of a cathedral. The first bishop was Mgr. S. Montes de Oca (1927–34), succeeded from 1937 by Mgr. G. Adam.
BIBL.: AAS, 15 (1923), pp. 99–102; J. Cunillera, Anuario eclesiastico venezolano 1953, Caracas 1953, pp. 178–99.