Diocese of Bridgeport Dioecesis Bridgeportensis | |
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Location | |
Country | United States |
Territory | Fairfield County, Connecticut |
Ecclesiastical province | Province of Hartford |
Metropolitan | Bridgeport, Connecticut |
Statistics | |
Area | 626 sq mi (1,620 km2) |
Population - Total - Catholics |
(as of 2015) 939,904 420,000 (44.7 %) |
Parishes | 82 |
Schools | 38 |
Information | |
Denomination | Roman Catholic |
Rite | Roman Rite |
Established | August 6, 1953 |
Cathedral | Cathedral of Saint Augustine |
Patron saint | St. Augustine |
Current leadership | |
Pope | Francis |
Bishop | Frank J. Caggiano |
Metropolitan Archbishop |
Leonard Paul Blair Archbishop of Hartford |
Vicar General | The Rev. Msgr. Thomas W. Powers |
Map | |
Website | |
bridgeportdiocese.com |
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport is located in the southwestern part of the state of Connecticut, and its boundaries are the same as that of Fairfield County, Connecticut. There are 82 parishes in the diocese. Its cathedral is St. Augustine in Bridgeport.
As of September 19, 2013[update], the diocese is led by Bishop Frank Joseph Caggiano. He succeeds William E. Lori, appointed March 19, 2001, who served until 2012, when he was installed as Archbishop of Baltimore. The diocese was led by Msgr. Jerald A. Doyle as Diocesan Administrator until Caggiano, named by Pope Francis on July 31, 2013, was installed as bishop on September 19, 2013.
The diocese is one of 195 Roman Catholic dioceses in the United States. It is one of four dioceses in the Ecclesiastical Province of Hartford—the others are the Archdiocese of Hartford, the Diocese of Norwich and the Diocese of Providence.
The church with the greatest capacity in the diocese is St. Mary's Church on Elm Street in Stamford, built in 1928.
Sacred Heart in Georgetown is where Catholic writers Flannery O'Connor and Robert Fitzgerald worshipped in 1949–1952 when O'Connor was living in Ridgefield as a boarder with the Fitzgeralds. ("The working day as we set it up that fall began with early Mass in Georgetown, four miles away," Fitzgerald wrote.)