Chronology of Catholic Dioceses:Notes on the New Metropolitan Province of Taunggyi, 1998

The Holy Father, Pope John Paul II has created (January 17^th 1998) the Ecclesiastical Province of Taunggyi (Myanmar) elevating to the rank of Metropolitan Church this Episcopal See, assigning to it as suffragans the dioceses of Kentung, Loikaw and Taungngu.

The newly created Ecclesiastical Province of Taunggyi, the third, with its Metropolitan See at Taunggyi has as suffragans the following dioceses:

• Kentung (detached from Mandalay Province)
• Loikaw (detahced from Yangon Province)
• Taungngu (detached from Yangon Province)

Here are the statistics of the three ecclesiastical provinces:

The new Archdiocese of Taunggyi has an area of 52,740 sq km and a population of some 1,709,956 people of whom 95% are Buddhist. 37,377 are Catholics and there are about 10,000 Baptists.

The Catholics, 85% of whom are members of the Kayan people, are gathered in 15 parishes. They are looked after by 28 diocesan priests, 4 Religious priests (all PIME Fathers), assisted by 98 women Religious, 2 Brothers and 148 Catechists. As well as the Catechists there are 155 "Little Evangelizers" also called Zetamanns belonging to a lay association founded in 1987 for the evangelization of non-Christians. They carry out their apostolate in the jungle among the Lahus, Akhas and Lisus tribals who are animists. There are 25 major seminarians preparing for the priesthood.

Source: Fides, March 20th, 1998

- CT