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Catholic Church in Croatia
Croatian: Katolička crkva u Hrvatskoj
Đakovo Cathedral
TypeNational polity
OrientationLatin and Greek Catholic
GovernanceEpiscopal
PopePope Francis
Apostolic NuncioGiorgio Lingua
PresidentDražen Kutleša
RegionCroatia
LanguageCroatian, Latin
HeadquartersZagreb
FounderPope John IV and Abbot Martin, according to tradition
Originc. 65: in Roman Illyricum
c. 640: Croatian Christianity
Members3,057,586 (2021)
Ministersc. 3800
Official websiteCroatian Bishops' Conference
Part of a series on the
Catholic Church
in Croatia
Baptistry of Višeslav
HistoryHistory of the Catholic Church in Croatia
History of Croatia–Holy See relations
Historical dioceses
Diocese of Dubrovnik
Diocese of Ston
Archdiocese of Zadar
Archdiocese of Split
Diocese of Šibenik
Diocese of Nin
Historical people
Gregory of Nin
Markantun de Dominis
Ruđer Josip Bošković
Josip Juraj Strossmayer
Anton Mahnič
Franjo Šeper
Franjo Kuharić
Historical sacral architecture
Church in Nin
Church in Cetina
Church of St Donatus
OrganisationEpiscopal Conference of Croatia
Dioceses (list)
Archdioceses
Zagreb, Split-Makarska, Rijeka,
Đakovo-Osijek, Zadar
Other
Military Ordinariate of Croatia
Apostolic Nunciature
Schools
Archdiocesan Gymnasium Zagreb
Pontifical Croatian College
Catholic University of Croatia
Theology in Zagreb
Political
Croatian Catholic movement
Media
Croatian Catholic Radio
IKA
Laudato
OrdinariesPope
Francis
Archbishops

Bishops
Canonized peopleSaints
St. Leopold Mandić
St. Nicholas Tavelic
St. Marko Krizin
Beatified
bl. Aloysius Stepinac
bl. Marija Petković
bl. Ivan Merz
bl. Augustin Kažotić
bl. Miroslav Bulešić
CathedralsZagreb
Đakovo
Split
Šibenik
Zadar
Trogir
Churches & shrinesSt. Michael's Church
Euphrasian Basilica
Church of Saint Chrysogonus
Shrines
Marija Bistrica
Our Lady of Sinj
St. Joseph, Karlovac
OrdersFranciscans
Province of the Most Holy Redeemer
Province of St. Jerome
Province of Saints Cyril and Methodius
Dominicans
Croatian Dominican Province
Carmelites
Province of Saint Joseph the Father
Jesuits
Province of the Society of Jesus
Salesians
Province of Saint Don Bosco
Marian apparitionIlača apparitions
ControversiesClergy in NDH
Krunoslav Draganović
Aloysius Stepinac
Ivo Protulipac

The Catholic Church in Croatia (Croatian: Katolička crkva u Hrvatskoj) is part of the worldwide Catholic Church that is under the spiritual leadership of the Pope. The Latin Church in Croatia is administered by the Croatian Bishops' Conference centered in Zagreb, and it comprises five archdioceses, 13 dioceses and one military ordinariate. Dražen Kutleša is the Archbishop of Zagreb.

A 2011 census estimated that there were 3.7 million baptized Latin Catholics and about 20,000 baptized Eastern Catholics of the Greek Catholic Church of Croatia and Serbia in Croatia, comprising 86.3% of the population. As of 2017, weekly church attendance was relatively high compared to other Catholic nations in Europe, at around 27%. A 2021 Croatian census showed that 79% of the population is Catholic and 3.3% is Serbian Orthodox.

The national sanctuary of Croatia is in Marija Bistrica, while the country's patron is Saint Joseph: the Croatian Parliament unanimously declared him to be the national patron in 1687.

History

Roman Illyrians and early Christianity

The western part of the Balkan Peninsula was conquered by the Roman Empire by 168 BC after a long drawn out process known as the Illyrian Wars.

Following their conquests, the Romans organised the area into the province of Illyricum, which was eventually split up into Dalmatia and Pannonia. Through being part of the Roman Empire, various religious cults were brought into the region. This included the Levantine-originated religion of Christianity. Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire in 391. In 395, the Roman Empire was divided into two parts, and the dividing line went through the Balkans. Illyricum fell under the rule of Rome and the rest fell under the rule of Byzantium.

Indeed, Salona, the capital city of the province of Dalmatia, was one of the earliest places in the region connected with Christianity. It was able to gain influence first among some of the Dalmatian Jews living in the city. St. Titus, a disciple of St. Paul the Apostle and the subject of the Epistle to Titus in the New Testament, was active in Dalmatia. Indeed, in the Epistle to the Romans, Paul himself speaks of visiting "Illyricum", but he may have meant Illyria Graeca.

Conversion of the Croats

Somewhere in the early 7th century the Archdiocese of Salona vanished with the plundering raids of Sclaveni and Pannonian Avars. Pope Gregory I (590–604) in his letters wrote about the arrival of Slavs in Dalmatia and Istria. Soon the Holy See, which had jurisdiction and ecclesiastical order in the territory of former Diocese of Illyricum (and parts of the Praetorian prefecture of Illyricum), began the process of Christianization.

The Croats settled in the area of present-day Croatia after successful war against the Avars, liberating province of Dalmatia. Francis Dvornik considered that to the Croatian victorius advance is related account from Miracles of Saint Demetrius (7-8th century) about the revolt and liberation of Christian hostages of the Avars between rivers Sava, Drava and Danube. The Croats had their first official contact with the Holy See in year 641 when the Pope John IV papal envoy led by Abbot Martin came to them in order to redeem Christian captives and the bones of the martyrs Anastasius, Maurus and Venancio. Such event "is witness to the civilised and peaceful co-existence established between the indigenous Christian population and the new rulers of what had once been Roman Dalmatia and Illyria".

There is little information about the "Baptism of the Croats", but it is known that it was peacefully and freely accepted, and that it started since the 7th century. Byzantine emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus in his De Administrando Imperio (10th century) wrote that the Heraclius (610–641), "obtained and brought priests from Rome and made of them an archbishop, bishop, presbyters and deacons, which then baptised the Croats". After the baptism, the Croats "made a convent, confirmed with their own signature, and by oaths sure and binding in the name of St. Peter the apostle, that never would they go upon a foreign country and make war upon it, but would rather live at peace with all who were willing to do so. They received from the same Pope of Rome this benediction: If some other foreigners should come against the country of these same Croats and bring war upon it, then might God fight for the Croats and protect them, and Peter the disciple of Christ give unto them victories". Neverthless the exact dating of the convect agreement (early 7th or late 9th century), it is again alluded in Pope John VIII's letters (879, 881).

New population certainly did not completely convert at the time as initially probably encompassed only the Croatian elite members (pagan burial customs ceased in the mid-9th century), neither such conversions are instantaneous events because missionary work seeks building a Christian mentality. The additional conversion stages were in the late 8th and early 9th century by Patriarchate of Aquileia and Prince-Archbishopric of Salzburg under Frankish supervision, and of pagan Narentines during the reign of Basil I (867–886).

Middle Ages

First certain signs of Church organization revival and active papal policy can be dated to the mid-or-late-8th century (in relation to the Carolingian political influence), with the Salonitan Archdiocese replaced as ecclesial centre by Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Zadar, and then by the Archbishopric of Spalathon by the late-8th century. The latter initially probably acted independently, without metropolitan bishop. Croatia after the Charlemagne's division of areas of Aquileia and Salzburg became under jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Aquileia, and some Frankish priests are mentioned in historical sources (Teudebert and Aldefred in Nin, Gumpert in Bijaći). The activity of Lombard missionaires from Principality of Benevento could be argued on the appearance of St. Bartholomew the Apostle, while of Northern Italian missionaries the appearance of St. Ambrose, St. Martha and possibly St. Martin titulary.

The Pax Nicephori (812) between the Franks and Byzantium did not influence the ecclesial borders and jurisdiction of Croatia. By the mid-9th century, Croats have already been fully included in a large European (West) Christian community. Croatian rulers Mislav (835–845), Trpimir I (845–864) and many others were building churches and Benedictine monasteries. Pope Nicholas I warned the bishop and clergy of large Diocese of Nin that cannot establish new churches without papal approval, a reference to the foundation of the Diocese of Nin itself. Its formation was probably an act of Croatian dukes and local clergy to separate from Byzantine influence, because in the second half of the 9th century Byzantine emperor Basil I and Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople Photios I tried to expand on the already present Christian organization of the Roman Church in the region of former Praetorian prefecture of Illyricum, causing so-called Photian schism (867), managing to get control only of First Bulgarian Empire (871) and Principality of Serbia (873). Before that, Constantinople Patriarchate did not have any jurisdictional pretensions over Western Illyricum. The presumed political alliance of duke Zdeslav (878–879) with Byzantium some historians interpreted "as an ecclesiastical submission of Croatia to the Constantinople Patriarchate", but it is doubtful, as would certainly return under Roman Church jurisdiction during duke Branimir. However, the Holy See under Pope John VIII did not have complete power over the region of Croatia as would temporarily compete with Patriarch Valpert of the Patriarchate of Aquileia, but eventually in the 880s the bishop of Nin, Teodosius (episcopus Croatorum), got the papal pallium and temporarily until his death in 892 united the Diocese of Nin with Archdiocense of Split.

In 879, Croatian duke Branimir (879–892) wrote a letter to Pope John VIII in which he promised him loyalty and obedience. Pope John VIII replied with a letter on 7 June 879, in which he wrote that he celebrated a Mass at the tomb of St Peter on which he invoked God's blessing on Branimir and his people, recognizing Duchy of Croatia as an independent and sovereign state. Both duke Trpimir (accompanied by son Peter, wife Ventescela, nobles Bribina, Peter, Mary, Presila) and Branimir (accompanied by wife Maruša) underdertook pilgrimages recorded in the Evangelistary of Cividale. Pope Leo VI while confirming the 2nd Church Council of Split (928) mentioned that the Archbishop of Split was "in Croatorum terra". The church councils in 925 and 928 were held to discuss about the bishopric of Nin, which bishop Gregory of Nin called himself as "Episcopus Croatensis" (a title which reappeared in the mid-11th century with the formation of Diocese of Knin and disappeared after the establishment of Diocese of Zagreb in late 11th century), and the usage of non-Latin liturgy (forbidden in 925 and 1060/1061). Since the 9th century there is in Croatia a unique phenomenon in the entire world of Catholicism, liturgy that was held in Church Slavonic language with Glagolitic script by Cyril and Methodius. Pope Gregory VII sent legate Girard under whom the "national synod of Dalmatian and Croatian bishops (in 1074-1075) rehabilitated Glagolitism". Despite the various disputes, the 13th century Pope Innocent IV again officially approved use of Church Slavonic language and the Glagolitic script to Filip bishop of Senj, thus making Croats the only Latin Catholics in the world allowed to use a language other than Latin in their liturgy prior to the Second Vatican Council in 1962. George of Slavonia in c. 1390 recorded that the "Croatian bishop knew both languages, Latin and Croatian, and was the first to celebrate mass sometimes in one and sometimes in the other language", called the Glagolitic script as "alphabetum chrawaticum", being used by the clergy in Istria and other eleven Croatian (arch)bishoprics (Kerbavia, Knin, Krk, Split, Trogir, Šibenik, Zadar, Nin, Rab, Osor, Senj).

King Demetrius Zvonimir was crowned on 8 October 1075/76 at Salona in the Basilica of Saint Peter and Moses (known today as the Hollow Church) by Gebizon, a representative of Pope Gregory VII. He was granted the royal title by Gregory after pledging "Peter's Pence" to the Pope, and took an oath of allegiance to Pope, by which he promised his support in the implementations of the Church reforms in Croatia. After the Papal legate crowned him, Zvonimir gave the Benedictine monastery of Saint Gregory in Vrana to the Pope as a sign of loyalty and as an accommodation for papal legates coming to Croatia.

By the 11th and 12th century existed around 50 Benedictine monasteries, with most important being the Abbey of St. Chrysogonus in Zadar (918/986) favoured by the Trpimirović dynasty, followed by St. Andrew near Pula, St. Stephen and St. Mary in Solin (975), St. Maxim in Korčula (997-998), St. Michael in Limska Draga (before 1000), St. Benedict on island of Lokrum near Dubrovnik (1023), St. Cassian in Poreč (1030), St. Peter on Osor (1044), St. Peter in Supetarska Draga on island of Rab (1059), St. Peter in Selo near Split (1069), St. Mary in Zadar (1065), St. John in Trogir (1108), St. Mary on Mljet (1151), and St. Michael in Kotor (1166) among others. Among them St. Mary in Zadar (consecrated in 1091), during nuns Čika and Vekenega, was particularly influental for the implemention of the Gregorian reform, cultural-religious life, literary traditions and international relations.

When Croatia lost its own dynasty and entered into a personal union with Hungary in 1102, the Benedictines were slowly dying out, while the mendicant orders, especially Franciscans and Dominicans were becoming more important. By the end of the 12th century also arrived Cistercians, "important intermediaries in the inclusion of Croatia within the mainstream of Mediaeval Western Christian civilisation". Religious and cultural formation of Croats was also strongly influenced by Jesuits. Church writers from northern Croatia and Dubrovnik, which was a free center of the Croatian culture, have done a lot for standardization and expansion of the Croatian literary language.

Map of Catholic Dioceses in Eastern Adriatic in 15th Century (in Croatian).

During the Hundred Years' Croatian–Ottoman War that lasted from the late 15th to late 16th century Croats strongly fought against the Turks which resulted in the fact that the westernmost border of the Ottoman Empire and Europe became entrenched on the soil of the Croatian Kingdom. In 1519, Croatian Kingdom was called the Antemurale Christianitatis by Pope Leo X.

Austrian Empire/Austria-Hungary

The Austrian Empire signed a concordat with the Holy See in 1855 which regulated the Catholic Church within the empire.

Kingdom of Yugoslavia

See also: Holy See–Yugoslavia relations

In Yugoslavia, the Croatian bishops were part of the Bishops' Conference of Yugoslavia.

The situation of the Catholic Church in the new kingdom was affected by the pro-Orthodox policy of the Yugoslav government and the strong influence of the Serbian Orthodox Church in the country's politics. After the coup of 1929, several Catholic organizations and institutes were closed or dissolved, specially in Croatia, as the Club of Seniorates, the Eagle Movement (Orlovstvo) and the Catholic Action. Some members of Eastern Catholic churches, such as Croatian Greek Catholics, were persecuted and forced to convert to Orthodox Christianity.

The Church in the Independent State of Croatia

Main article: Catholic clergy involvement with the Ustaše
Archbishop Aloysius Stepinac "in 1941 had welcomed Croat independence (in form of NDH), subsequently condemned Croat atrocities against both Serbs and Jews"

In 1941, a Nazi puppet state, the Independent State of Croatia (NDH), was established by the fascist dictator Ante Pavelić and his Ustaše movement. The Ustaše regime pursued a genocidal policy against the Serbs (who were Eastern Orthodox Christians), Jews and Romani.

Historian Michael Phayer wrote that the creation of the NDH was initially welcomed by the hierarchy of the Catholic Church and by many Catholic priests. Ante Pavelić was anti-Serb and pro-Catholic, viewing Catholicism as an integral part of Croat culture. A large number of Catholic priests and intellectuals assumed important roles within the Ustaše.

British writer Peter Hebblethwaite wrote that Pavelić was anxious to get diplomatic relations and a Vatican blessing for the new 'Catholic state' but that "neither was forthcoming". The Archbishop of Zagreb, Aloysius Stepinac, wanted Croatia's independence from the Serb dominated Yugoslav state which he considered to be "the jail of the Croatian nation", so he arranged the audience with Pius XII for Pavelić.

Vatican under Secretary of State Giovanni Montini (later Pope Paul VI)'s minutes before the meeting noted that no recognition of the new state could come before a peace treaty and that "The Holy See must be impartial; it must think of all; there are Catholics on all sides to whom the must be respectful." The Vatican refused formal recognition of NDH but Pius XII sent a Benedictine abbot Giuseppe Ramiro Marcone as his apostolic visitor. Pius was criticized for his reception of Pavelić but he still hoped that Pavelić would defeat communist Partisans and reconvert many of the 200,000 who had left the Catholic Church for the Serbian Orthodox Church since World War I.

Many Croatian nationalist clergy supported the Pavelić's regime push to drive out Serbs, Gypsies and Jews, or force their conversion to Catholicism. Phayer wrote that it is well known that many Catholic clerics participated directly or indirectly in Ustaše campaigns of violence. Despite that, Pavelić told Nazi Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop that while the lower clergy supported the Ustaše, the bishops, and particularly Archbishop Stepinac, were opposed to the movement because of "Vatican international policy".

Phayer wrote that Stepinac came to be known as "judenfreundlich" ("Jew friendly") to the Nazi-linked Ustaše regime, and suspended a number of priest collaborators in his diocese.

Archbishop Stepinac made many public statements criticizing developments in the NDH. On Sunday, 24 May 1942, to the irritation of Ustaša officials, he used the pulpit and a diocesan letter to condemn genocide in specific terms, although not mentioning Serbs:

All men and all races are children of God; all without distinction. Those who are Gypsies, Black, European, or Aryan all have the same rights.... for this reason, the Catholic Church had always condemned, and continues to condemn, all injustice and all violence committed in the name of theories of class, race, or nationality. It is not permissible to persecute Gypsies or Jews because they are thought to be an inferior race.

He also wrote a letter directly to Pavelić on 24 February 1943, stating: "The very Jasenovac camp is a stain on the honor of the NDH. Poglavnik! To those who look at me as a priest and a bishop I say as Christ did on the cross: Father forgive them for they know not what they do."

Thirty-one priests were arrested following Stepinac's July and October 1943 explicit condemnations of race murders being read from pulpits across Croatia. Martin Gilbert wrote that Stepinac, "who in 1941 had welcomed Croat independence, subsequently condemned Croat atrocities against both Serbs and Jews, and himself saved a group of Jews".

According to historian Jozo Tomasevich however, neither Stepinac nor the Croatian Catholic hierarchy or the Vatican ever made a public protest regarding the persecution of Serbs and the Serbian Orthodox Church by the Ustaše and added that "it seems the Catholic Church fully supported the Ustasha regime and its policies". The Catholic Press also praised Pavelić and the Ustaše.

The Yugoslav Partisans executed two priests, Petar Perica and Marijan Blažić, as collaborationists on the island of Daksa on 25 October 1944. The Partisans killed Fra Maksimilijan Jurčić near Vrgorac in late January 1945.

The Church in communist Yugoslavia

The National Anti-Fascist Council of the People's Liberation of Croatia (ZAVNOH) originally foresaw a greater degree of religious freedom in the country. In 1944 ZAVNOH still left open the possibility of religious education in schools.

This idea was scuttled after Yugoslav leader Josip Broz removed secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Croatia Andrija Hebrang and replaced him with hardliner Vladimir Bakarić.

In 1945, the retired bishop of Dubrovnik, Josip Marija Carević, was murdered by Yugoslav authorities. Bishop Josip Srebrnić was sent to jail for two months. After the war, the number of Catholic publications in Yugoslavia decreased from one hundred to only three.

In 1946, the Communist regime introduced the Law on State Registry Books which allowed the confiscation of church registries and other documents. On 31 January 1952, the communist regime officially banned all religious education in public schools.

That year the regime also expelled the Catholic Faculty of Theology from the University of Zagreb, to which it was not restored until democratic changes in 1991.

In 1984, the Catholic Church held a National Eucharistic Congress in Marija Bistrica. The central Mass held on September 9 was attended by 400,000 people, including 1100 priests, 35 bishops and archbishops, as well as five cardinals. The Mass was led by Cardinal Franz König, a friend of Aloysius Stepinac from their early studies. In 1987 the Bishops' Conference of Yugoslavia issued a statement calling on the government to respect the right of parents to obtain a religious education for their children.

The Church in the Republic of Croatia

Popemobile in front of the Croatian National Theater during Pope Benedict XVI's official state visit in 2011
Holy Mass in the Zagreb Cathedral

After Croatia declared its independence from Yugoslavia, the Catholic Church regained its full freedom and influence. First nuncio in Croatia was mons. Giulio Einauldi, appointed on 13 January 1992. Croatian Bishops' Conference was founded on 15 May 1993, by exclusion from the Bishops' Conference of Yugoslavia.

During the Croatian War of Independence, Catholicism and Orthodoxy were often cited as a basic division between Croats and Serbs, which led to a massive destruction of churches (some 1,426 were destroyed or damaged).

The Croatian Bishops' Conference established Croatian Catholic Radio in 1997.

In the Republic of Croatia, the Catholic Church has defined its legal position as autonomous in some areas, thus making it able to provide religious education in state primary and secondary schools to those students who choose it, establish Catholic schools and conduct pastoral care among the Catholics in the armed forces and police.

Through the ratification of treaties between the Holy See and Croatia on 9 April 1997, treaties that regulate legal issues, cooperation in education and culture, conducting pastoral care among the Catholics in the armed forces and police and financing Church from the state budget came into force. As regards to financing, the Church has received the following amounts of money over the 2000s: 2001; 461.3 bln kunas, 2004–2007; 532 bln kunas, 2008–2011;475.5 bln kunas, 2012–2013; 523.5 bln kunas, plus around 200 million kunas per each year for teachers of religious studies in schools, around 60 million kunas for maintenance churches which are considered to be a cultural heritage etc.

The Catholic Church in Croatia in modern times is very active in social and political life. It has implemented a number of actions in conservative spirit in order to promote its values such as: non-working Sunday, punishment of the crimes of the communist era, introducing religious education in schools, protection of marriage as the union of a man and a woman (2013 referendum), opposition to abortion (campaigning for "protecting human life from conception to natural death"), opposition to euthanasia, opposition to natural methods of family planning and the treatment of infertility, and opposition to artificial birth control methods.

Demographics

Đakovo Cathedral
Zadar Cathedral

The published data from the 2011 Croatian census included a crosstab of ethnicity and religion which showed that a total of 3,697,143 Catholic believers (86.28% of the total population) was divided between the following ethnic groups:

  • 3,599,038 Catholic Croats
  • 22,331 Catholic believers of regional affiliation
  • 15,083 Catholic Italians
  • 9,396 Catholic Hungarians
  • 8,521 Catholic Czechs
  • 8,299 Catholic Roma
  • 8,081 Catholic Slovenes
  • 7,109 Catholic Albanians
  • 3,159 Catholic Slovaks
  • 2,776 Catholic believers of undeclared nationality
  • 2,391 Catholic Serbs
  • 1,913 Catholic believers of other nationalities
  • 1,847 Catholic Germans
  • 1,692 Catholic Ruthenians
  • 1,384 Catholic believers of unknown nationality
  • 1,339 Catholic Ukrainians
  • other individual ethnicities (under 1,000 people each)

Organisation

Hierarchy

Map of the Catholic dioceses in Croatia
  Archdiocese of Split-Makarska  Diocese of Dubrovnik  Diocese of Hvar-Brač-Vis  Diocese of Kotor (in Montenegro)  Diocese of Šibenik (partly in Bosnia-Herzegovina)
  Archdiocese of Zagreb  Diocese of Bjelovar-Križevci  Diocese of Sisak  Diocese of Varaždin
  Archdiocese of Rijeka  Diocese of Gospić-Senj (partly in Bosnia-Herzegovina)  Diocese of Krk  Diocese of Poreč-Pula
  Archdiocese of Đakovo-Osijek  Diocese of Požega  Diocese of Srijem (in Serbia)
  Archdiocese of Zadar

Within Croatia the hierarchy consists of:

Archdioceses and dioceses Croatian name (Arch-)Bishop Est. Cathedral Weblink
Archdiocese of Zagreb Zagrebačka nadbiskupija
Archidioecesis Zagrebiensis
Dražen Kutleša 1093 Zagreb Cathedral
Eparchy of Križevci (Greek-Catholic) Križevačka eparhija Milan Stipić 1777 Križevci Cathedral
Zagreb Co-cathedral
Diocese of Varaždin Varaždinska biskupija Bože Radoš 1997 Varaždin Cathedral
Diocese of Sisak Sisačka biskupija Vlado Košić 2009 Sisak Cathedral
Diocese of Bjelovar-Križevci Bjelovarsko-križevačka biskupija Vjekoslav Huzjak 2009 Bjelovar Cathedral
Križevci Co-cathedral
Archdiocese of Đakovo-Osijek Đakovačko-osiječka nadbiskupija Đuro Hranić 4th century Đakovo Cathedral
Diocese of Požega Požeška biskupija
Dioecesis Poseganus
Antun Škvorčević 1997 Požega Cathedral
Diocese of Srijem (in Serbia) Srijemska biskupija Đuro Gašparović 2008 Cathedral Basilica of St. Demetrius
Archdiocese of Rijeka Riječka nadbiskupija Mate Uzinić 1920 Rijeka Cathedral
Diocese of Gospić-Senj Gospićko-senjska biskupija Zdenko Križić 2000 Gospić Cathedral
Senj Co-cathedral
Diocese of Krk Krčka biskupija Ivica Petanjak 900 Krk Cathedral
Diocese of Poreč-Pula Porečko-pulska biskupija Ivan Štironja 3rd century Euphrasian Basilica
Pula Cathedral
Archdiocese of Split-Makarska Splitsko-makarska nadbiskupija Zdenko Križić 3rd century Split Cathedral
Makarska Co-cathedral
Diocese of Dubrovnik Dubrovačka biskupija Roko Glasnović 990 Dubrovnik Cathedral
Diocese of Hvar-Brač-Vis Hvarsko-bračko-viška biskupija Ranko Vidović 12th century Hvar Cathedral /
Diocese of Kotor (in Montenegro) Kotorska biskupija Rrok Gjonlleshaj (administrator) 10th century Kotor Cathedral
Diocese of Šibenik Šibenska biskupija Tomislav Rogić 1298 Šibenik Cathedral
Archdiocese of Zadar Zadarska nadbiskupija Milan Zgrablić 1054 Zadar Cathedral
Military Ordinariate Vojni ordinarijat Jure Bogdan 1997

The bishops are organized into the Croatian Conference of Bishops, which is presided by the Archbishop of Zadar Mons. Želimir Puljić.

There are also historical bishoprics, including:

As of 2009, there were 1570 Catholic parishes in Croatia.

Franciscans

There are three Franciscan provinces in the country:

Other orders

Attitudes

Although the vast majority of Croatians declare themselves as Catholics, a certain share of them do not follow the Church's teaching on moral and social issues. According to a Pew Research poll from 2017, only 27% of respondents attended mass regularly, 25% supported the Church's stance on contraception, 43% supported the Church's stance on ordination of women and 38% thought abortion should be illegal in most cases. On the other hand, 66% supported the Church's stance on same-sex marriage.

Places of Pilgrimage of the Croats

Notable people

See also

References

  1. "Koliko ima pedofila u Crkvi?". 22 July 2014. Retrieved 18 April 2017.
  2. "Religious Belief and National Belonging in Central and Eastern Europe". Pew Research Center. 10 May 2017.
  3. US State Deptartment 2022 report
  4. "Sv. Josip - zaštitnik hrvatske domovine". Archived from the original on 2016-02-13. At its season on June 9th and 10th 1687 Croatian Parliament encouraged by the Bishop of Zagreb Martin Borković, unanimously declared St Joseph to be the patron of the Croatian Kingdom
  5. "Balkans | Definition, Map, Countries, & Facts | Britannica". www.britannica.com. 2023-06-26. Retrieved 2023-07-05.
  6. ^ "Balkans - Roman Empire, Slavs, Christianity, and Byzantine Empire | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 2023-07-05.
  7. Budak 2018, p. 76.
  8. ^ Šanjek 1999, p. 217.
  9. ^ Živković, Tibor (2013). "On the Baptism of the Serbs and Croats in the Time of Basil I (867–886)" (PDF). Studia Slavica et Balcanica Petropolitana (1): 33–53.
  10. ^ Komatina, Predrag (2015). "The Church in Serbia at the Time of Cyrilo-Methodian Mission in Moravia". Cyril and Methodius: Byzantium and the World of the Slavs. Thessaloniki: Dimos. pp. 711–718.
  11. ^ Dvornik 1956, p. 63.
  12. Šanjek 1999, p. 218.
  13. Šanjek 1999, p. 217, 219.
  14. ^ Šanjek 1999, p. 219.
  15. Živković 2012, p. 63–64.
  16. Živković 2012, p. 66–67.
  17. Šanjek 1999, p. 219, 228–229.
  18. Budak 2018, p. 145–146.
  19. Šanjek 1999, p. 219–220.
  20. Budak 2018, p. 146.
  21. Budak 2018, p. 76–80, 133–135, 151.
  22. Budak 2018, p. 150.
  23. Budak 2018, p. 146, 156, 158.
  24. Budak 2018, p. 147, 158–159.
  25. ^ Budak 2018, p. 152.
  26. Šanjek 1999, p. 225.
  27. Budak 2018, p. 135, 152–153.
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