Roman Catholic Diocese of Portsmouth - History

History

By a Papal Brief dated 19 May 1882, Pope Leo XIII created the Diocese of Portsmouth. It was formed out of the western portion of the Diocese of Southwark, as constituted at the re-establishment of the hierarchy in 1850. The Southwark diocese had become too large for one Bishop, extending as it did from London to Bournemouth and from the outskirts of Oxford to Dover and including the Channel Islands.

The new diocese comprised the counties of Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, Berkshire, and the Channel Islands. It was thus almost co-terminus with the limits of the Diocese of Winchester. The obvious place for the cathedral and curia of the new diocese was Winchester. The Ecclesiastical Titles Act forbade a Catholic diocese to have the same name as an Anglican see. It would appear that the original intention was to fix the see at Southampton, with St. Joseph's Church in Bugle Street as the pro-cathedral. The construction of a large parish church in the centre of Portsmouth had begun, and it was decided to make it the future cathedral of the diocese.

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