VICTORIA, DIOCESE OF: See SPIRITO SANTO, DIOCESE OF.
VICTORIA (PORT VICTORIA), DIOCESE OF: See DARWIN, DIOCESE OF.
It has an area of 14,000 sq. km. with a population of 200,000, of whom 16,000 are Catholics, distributed in 24 parishes, served by 25 diocesan priests and 20 regular clergy; it has a seminary, 5 male religious communities and 16 female ones (Ann. Pont. 1953, p. 447).
The diocese of Victoria comprises Vancouver Island and the adjacent islands of the Canadian province of British Columbia. The first priests to appear in the territory were the Jesuat Brothers, who settled at Nootka. In 1793 the Rev. Magin Catala was there; the Rev. Gomez who succeeded him remained until the English conquest on 25 March 1795. On 14 March 1843, the Canadian priest G. B. Bolduc discovered the remains of Franciscan apostolic work on Vancouver Island, which Pius IX raised to the status of a diocese on 14 July 1846; the first bishop was Mgr. M. Demers, who took possession of his see at Victoria on 5 September 1852, then without a church and with a clergy of three priests and one subdeacon. Pope Leo XIII elevated Victoria to the status of an archdiocese on 19 June 1903, but on 19 September 1908 the see lost its archiepiscopal dignity in favour of Vancouver.