Roman Catholic Diocese of Aberdeen

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Aberdeen is a diocese of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic church in the Scotland.

Founding

The see was founded in 1063 at Mortlach by Blessed Beyn. The earliest mention of the old See of Aberdeen is in the charter of the foundation, by the Earl of Buchan, of the Church of Deer (c. 1152), which is witnessed by Nectan, Bishop of Aberdeen. The first ecclesiastical record of the see is in a Papal Bull of Pope Adrian IV (1157), confirming to Bishop Edward the churches of Aberdeen and Saint Machar, with the town of Old Aberdeen and other lands.

The granite cathedral was built between 1272 and 1277. Bishop Thomas Spence founded a Franciscan house in 1480, and King's College was founded at Old Aberdeen by Bishop Elphinstone, for eight prebendaries, chapter, sacristan, organist, and six choristers, in 1505. The see was transferred to Old Aberdeen about 1125, and continued there until 1577, having had in that time a list of twenty-nine bishops.

Restoration of the Diocese

The Scottish Church officially broke allegiance with the Roman church in 1560, but continued intermittently having bishops until 1689. In 4 March 1878 Pope Leo XIII restored the hierarchy of Scotland by the Bull "Ex supremo Apostolatus apice" and Vicar-Apostolic John MacDonald was translated to the restored See of Aberdeen as its first bishop.

The Bull made Aberdeen one of the four suffragan sees of the Archdiocese of St. Andrews and Edinburgh, and defined as its territory "the counties of Aberdeen, Kincardine, Banff, Elgin or Moray, Nairn, Ross (except Lewis in the Hebrides), Cromarty, Sutherland, Caithness, the Orkney and Shetland Islands, and that portion of Inverness which lies to the north of a straight line drawn from the most northerly point of Loch Luing to the eastern boundary of the said county of Inverness, where the counties of Aberdeen and Banff join."

Early Twentieth Century

In 1906 there were nearly 4,000 Catholics out of a population of 800,000. The clergy consisted of 48 secular priests, 24 regular priests, 57 churches, chapels, and stations; and various schools. There was a Benedictine Abbey at Fort Augustus which had been raised to the rank of an abbey, immediately subject to the Holy See, by a brief of Leo XIII in 12 December, 1882. Its building was made possible by the financial backing of Lord Lovat.

The current bishop of the diocese is the Right Reverend Peter Moran.

Ordinaries

*Alexander John Grant † (16 Sep 1727 Appointed - 19 Sep 1727 Died)
*Hugh MacDonald † (12 Feb 1731 Appointed - 12 Mar 1773 Died)
*John MacDonald † (12 Mar 1773 Succeeded - 9 May 1779 Died)
*Alexander MacDonald † (30 Sep 1779 Appointed - 9 Sep 1791 Died)
*John Chisholm † (8 Nov 1791 Appointed - 8 Jul 1814 Died)
*Aeneas Chisholm † (8 Jul 1814 Succeeded - 31 Jul 1818 Died)
*Ranald MacDonald † (27 Aug 1819 Appointed - 13 Feb 1827 Appointed, Vicar Apostolic of Western District)
*James Kyle † (13 Feb 1827 Appointed - 23 Feb 1869 Died)
*John MacDonald † (23 Feb 1869 Succeeded - 4 Feb 1889 Died)
*Colin Grant † (16 Jul 1889 Appointed - 26 Sep 1889 Died)
*Hugh MacDonald, C.SS.R. † (14 Aug 1890 Appointed - 29 May 1898 Died)
*Aeneas Chisholm † (7 Jan 1899 Appointed - 13 Jan 1918 Died)
*George Henry Bennett † (18 Jun 1918 Appointed - 25 Dec 1946 Died)
*John Alexander Matheson † (2 Aug 1947 Appointed - 5 Jul 1950 Died)
*Francis Raymond Walsh, M. Afr. † (20 Jun 1951 Appointed - 22 Jul 1963 Resigned)
*Michael Foylan † (8 Dec 1964 Appointed - 28 May 1976 Died)
*Mario Joseph Conti (28 Feb 1977 Appointed - 15 Jan 2002 Appointed, Archbishop of Glasgow)
*Peter Antony Moran (13 Oct 2003 Appointed - )

ee also

* List of Roman Catholic dioceses in Scotland
* Diocese of Aberdeen
* Bishop of Aberdeen

External links

* [http://www.dioceseofaberdeen.com/ Diocese of Aberdeen]
* [http://www.gcatholic.com/dioceses/diocese/aber0.htm Giga-Catholic Information]