The Catholic Church in Kazakhstan is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the pope in Rome.
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The Catholic Church in Kazakhstan is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the pope in Rome.
The 2021 census noted that Kazakhstan is 17.19% Christian. [1] Other figures suggest that less than 1% of the population is Catholic. [2] This is approximately 125,000 people, or half of the membership that the church had in 2007. [3]
In 2020, there were 104 priests and 133 nuns serving 81 parishes in the country. [4]
In 2007, most Catholics in the country were ethnic Poles, Germans and Lithuanians; the population of Catholics had decreased after the fall of communism as many German Catholics emigrated to Germany. [5] There were also 3,000 Greek Catholics, also referred to as Eastern Rite Catholics, in the country. [5]
In the second century AD, Christian Roman prisoners of war were taken to what is now Kazakhstan after their defeat by the Sassanid Persians. [3] A bishop's see existed in the fourth century, and there was also a Melkite monastery in the late fourth and early fifth centuries. [3]
A Franciscan monk, William of Rubruck travelled around Kazakhstan in 1254 and met Möngke Khan and Sartaq Khan (great-grandson of Genghis Khan). A few years later Pope Nicholas III established the Diocese of Kipciak. [6]
The head of the Soviet Union Joseph Stalin caused a great increase in the Catholic population of Kazakhstan by the deportation of Catholics and their clergy to concentration camps in the country. Some of the priests later decided to help build the church in that country. [3] In the late 1960s, two Catholic churches were registered, one in Alma-Ata and one in Kustanai, and later disbanded and were re-registered. [7]
With the fall of communism in 1991, the Catholic community fully came back out into the open. [8] In 1991, Pope John Paul II established an Apostolic Administration that covered all of Central Asia. [9] Diplomatic relations between the Holy See and Kazakhstan were established in 1994. [3] In 1997, the other four countries of the region, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan all became independent missions, so the Apostolic Administration became for only Kazakhstan and was based in Karaganda. [9] In 1999, the apostolic administration was split in four; three new apostolic administrations were created, based in Almaty, Astana, and Atyrau, and a diocese was created in Karaganda. [9] Pope John Paul II became the first Pope to visit Kazakhstan in the country's history in 2001. [10] In 2003, John Paul II elevated Astana to an archdiocese and Almaty to a diocese. [11] In 2006, Catholic priests were ordained for the first time ever in the country. [12]
Bishop José Luis Mumbiela Sierra, of Almaty Diocese, described the variety of the Catholic population in Kazakhstan during a conference with Aid to the Church in Need: "A large proportion of the Catholics live in the north of the country, where there is a Polish majority. In the larger cities there is a bigger mix of people. For example, there are many Koreans, from past deportations, who are Catholic. There are also people from non-Christian populations who converted to Catholicism. It is like a river that keeps flowing, because people are attracted by the Church’s message." [13]
In 2008, the Church in Kazakhstan affirmed its Asiatic identity when its episcopal conference was formally accepted into the Federation of Asian Bishops' Conferences. [3]
In 2022 three of the Catholic Church's bishops issued calls for peace, following the episodes of civil unrest that led to hundreds of deaths in the country. [14]
In 1996 here was appointed by the Holy See an Apostolic Visitor, who was replaced in 2002 by Apostolic Delegate, who depended from the Congregation for the Oriental Churches. But on 1 June 2019 by Pope Francis was established the Apostolic Administration of Kazakhstan and Central Asia for the all Byzantine Rite (mainly Ukrainian Greek Catholic) parishes. The circumscription encompasses Kazakhstan and others four Central Asia states. [15]
An apostolic administration in the Catholic Church is administrated by a prelate appointed by the pope to serve as the ordinary for a specific area. Either the area is not yet a diocese, or is a diocese, archdiocese, eparchy or similar permanent ordinariate that either has no bishop or archbishop or, in very rare cases, has an incapacitated (arch)bishop. The title also applies to an outgoing (arch)bishop while awaiting for the date of assuming his new position.
The Personal Apostolic Administration of Saint John Mary Vianney was established on 18 January 2002 by Pope John Paul II for traditionalist Catholic clergy and laity within the Diocese of Campos in Brazil. It is the only personal apostolic administration in existence, and the only canonically regular Catholic Church jurisdiction devoted exclusively to celebrating the Tridentine Mass in the area. Its current Apostolic Administrator is Bishop Fernando Arêas Rifan.
The Catholic Church in Kuwait is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the Pope in Rome.
The Catholic Church in Tajikistan is part of the worldwide Catholic Church in Tajikistan, under the spiritual leadership of the Pope in Rome.
The Catholic Church in Kyrgyzstan is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the Pope in Rome.
The Catholic Church in Nepal is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the pope in Rome. As of 2011 there are over 10,000 Catholics in Nepal, organized into one Catholic jurisdiction known as an apostolic vicariate.
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Mary Most Holy in Astana is a Latin Church archdiocese of the Catholic Church in Kazakhstan.
Joseph Werth SJ is Bishop of Transfiguration in Novosibirsk (Russia).
The Catholic Diocese of Most Holy Trinity in Almaty is a diocese located within the city of Almaty in the ecclesiastical province of Mary Most Holy in Astana in Kazakhstan.
Athanasius Schneider, O.R.C. is a Catholic prelate, serving as the Auxiliary Bishop of Astana in Kazakhstan. He is a member of the Canons Regular of the Holy Cross of Coimbra. He is known for championing the pre-Vatican II liturgical traditions and practices of the Church and for protesting certain current policies, including some associated with Pope Francis.
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Karaganda is a Latin diocese of the Catholic Church, suffragan in the ecclesiastical province of the Metropolitan of Mary Most Holy in Astana, yet remains subject to the missionary Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples.
Tomasz Bernard Peta is the current Catholic Archbishop of the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Saint Mary in the city of Astana, and the President of the Bishops' Conference of Kazakhstan from May 19, 2003. He speaks the Polish, Russian and Kazakh languages and is citizen of Kazakhstan.
José Luis Mumbiela Sierra is a Spanish-born Roman Catholic prelate and Bishop of the Holy Trinity Diocese in Almaty.
The Apostolic Administration of Atyrau is a pastoral area sui iuris, not yet fully a diocese, in western Kazakhstan which forms part of the Roman Catholic Church in this country, namely of the metropolitan Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Mary Most Holy in Nur-Sultan.
The Apostolic Administration of Kyrgyzstan is a Roman Catholic Apostolic Administration for the Catholics of Kyrgyzstan.
The Eastern Orthodox Church in Kazakhstan is a metropolitan district or metropolia of the Russian Orthodox Church. Although not autonomous or fully self-governing like the Ukrainian Orthodox Church under the Moscow Patriarchate, the Church in Kazakhstan has been given some self-government, with jurisdiction over all Orthodox Christians in Kazakhstan. Most of its members are ethnic Russians, Ukrainians, Koreans, and Belarusians resident in Kazakhstan.
The Apostolic Administration of Kazakhstan and Central Asia is an Apostolic Administration and is exempt, i.e. directly subject to the Holy See, that extends its jurisdiction over all the Eastern Catholic faithful of the Byzantine Rite who live in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
Vasyl Hovera is a Ukrainian-born hierarch for Eastern Catholic Churches of the Byzantine Rite, who serves as an Apostolic Administrator of the Apostolic Administration of Kazakhstan and Central Asia for Faithful of Byzantine Rite, with a see in Karaganda, for Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan since 1 June 2019.
The Catholic Bishops' Conference of Kazakhstan was the episcopal conference of Kazakhstan, that operated from 2003 until 2022. It consisted of Archdiocese, two dioceses, and apostolic administration.
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