Catholic Church in Fiji

The Catholic Church in Fiji is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the canonical authority and spiritual leadership of the Pope of Rome.

Latin hierarchy

The whole of the country forms a single archdiocese, the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Suva, which has two (foreign) suffragan sees :

• Diocese of Rarotonga, on the Cook Islands, for those and Niue (both New Zealand-associated countries)
• Diocese of Tarawa and Nauru, with see at Tarawa on Kiribati (formerly Gilbert Islands), also for Nauru (republic).

They all partake in the Episcopal Conference of the Pacific (C.E. PAC.; which is part of the broader Federation of Catholic Bishops’ Conferences of Oceania, F.C.B.C.O.) ), as neither of these countries' tiny episcopates warrants a national Episcopal Conference.

There are not titular, pre-diocesan or other exempt sees. The only defunct jurisdictions are the direct precursors of the Archdiocese of Suva.

There is formally an Apostolic Nunciature (papal diplomatic representation, embassy)level) to the Fiji Islands but it is vested (as with many South Sea states) in the Apostolic Nunciature in the New Zealand capital, Wellington.

Demographics

There are approximately 80,000 Catholics in Fiji, just under 10% of the total population. The 1996 census revealed just over 75 percent of Catholics to be indigenous Fijians and 5 percent Indo-Fijians, with minority communities making up the balance. The present leader of the Catholic Church in Fiji is Archbishop Peter Loy Chong.

See also

• List of Catholic dioceses in South Pacific Conference states

Sources and external links

• GCatholic - Fiji - data for all sections
• Catholic Hierarchy - Archdiocese of Suva