Diocese of Helsinki

Diocese of Helsinki Helsingin hiippakunta
Location
Country	Finland
Ecclesiastical province	Turku & Finland
Metropolitan	Archbishop of Turku & Finland
Information
Denomination	Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland
Established	1959
Cathedral	Helsinki Cathedral
Current leadership
Bishop	Irja Askola
Metropolitan Archbishop	Kari Mäkinen

The Diocese of Helsinki (Finnish: Helsingin hiippakunta; Swedish: Helsingfors stift) is a diocese of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland, and the seat of the Bishop of Helsinki. Its cathedral is Helsinki Cathedral.

The Diocese was established in 1959 by dividing the Diocese of Tampere. It covers only 1% of the country's territory, but contains 10% of its population. The diocese comprises 39 parishes. It was partitioned again in 2002, when the western part became the Diocese of Espoo. The current Bishop of Helsinki, Irja Askola, was ordained on 12 September 2010, and thus become the first woman to become a bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland.

The diocese is unique among the Finnish dioceses in the sense that in some parish areas, the church members are in a minority. In the Kallio and Vallila districts, church membership among the residents is circa 49 per cent. Only in six of the 18 parishes of the diocese the membership share reaches over 60 per cent of the population.

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Wikipedia