VANCOUVER, ARCHDIOCESE of. - City and archdiocese in the western part of continental Canadian Columbia (Canada).
It has an area of 119,439 sq. km., with a population of 650,000 inhabitants, of whom 82,847 are Catholics, distributed among 61 parishes with 60 diocesan and 70 regular clergy. It has a major and a minor seminary; 17 male and 39 female religious communities (Ann. Pont. 1953, p. 442).
In all likelihood, Christianity appeared there with the establishment of the Spanish Franciscans on the nearby island of V., toward the end of the 18th century, but nothing precise is known of their apostolate on the mainland. On 24 Nov. 1838, the priests of Québec, M.-Fr. Blanchet and M. Demers, arrived at Fort V., then an important centre of the fur trade. They remained there until Oct. 1839, when they went to Oregon. In the following years the region was intermittently evangelized by M. Demers, by Fr. De Smet, a Jesuit, in May 1842, and by Fr. Giovanni Nobili, also a Jesuit, for some time a missionary in the territory then called New Caledonia. On 13 Sept. 1860, the Oblates of Mary Immaculate established themselves in the new city of New-Westminster and became the sole missionaries throughout the entire present territory of the archdiocese. On 14 Dec. 1863, the apostolic vicariate of British (Canadian) Columbia was erected and entrusted to Msgr. L.-J. d'Herbomez. In the city of V. itself, the first church was opened in 1886 under the title of Notre-Dame du St-Rosaire. On 2 Sept. 1890 Leo XIII created the diocese of New Westminster, and blessed Pius X, on 19 Sept. 1908, raised V., which had become more important than Victoria, to an archdiocese. Its present suffragans are Victoria, Nelson, and Kamloops, and the apostolic vicariates of Prince Rupert and Whitehorse. The incumbents of the see of V., through its various changes, were Msgr. L.-J. d'Herbomez (1864–90); P. Durieu (1890–1899), Agostino Dontenwill (1899–1908), Neil McNeill (1910–12), Timoteo Casey (1912–31), and Guglielmo Mark Duke (1931), still in office (1953).