Catholic Arrival
The Tampa Bay Area remained largely unpopulated until Florida became a territory of the United States in 1821. Shortly thereafter, the Ft. Brooke military garrison was established in what is today downtown Tampa. The founding of St. Louis Catholic Church in Tampa in 1860 provided a focal point for Catholics.
After a serious outbreak of yellow fever in Tampa in 1888 that killed three of the four priests there, Bishop Moore of the Diocese of St. Augustine turned to the Jesuits from New Orleans for help. Not only did the Jesuit Fathers take over St. Louis Church, but they were responsible for founding many of the early parishes and schools of the area. In 1905, a new Church was constructed in Romanesque style and the parish was renamed Sacred Heart. It is the oldest parish and church within the diocese.
After the establishment of the Catholic colony of San Antonio and the Parish of St. Anthony of Padua in the 1880s, the Benedictine monks and nuns who came to Pasco County later in the decade became another important religious community in the history of the diocese. Based at Saint Leo Abbey and Holy Name Priory respectively, they founded, and staffed for many years, most of the parishes of Pasco, Hernando and Citrus Counties. Other early pioneer Religious include the Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary, who founded the oldest Catholic school in 1881, The Sisters of St. Joseph, who came to educate Black children, and the Redemptorists and Salesians, both of whom worked in the immigrant Latin community.
The growing population and economic boom following World War II brought major changes to the area, much of it under the tutelage of the sixth bishop of St. Augustine, Joseph P. Hurley. Archbishop Hurley presided over the largest institutional build-up in the history of the Florida Church. Not only did the Archbishop purchase property for future investment or development, he also established many new parishes and schools and recruited many priests from Ireland and the north United States to staff them. More than 40% of the parishes within our diocese today were founded during the Hurley years.
Read more about this topic: Roman Catholic Diocese Of Saint Petersburg
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