Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Owerri

The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Owerri (Latin: Archidioecesis Overriensis) is located in Owerri, Imo State, Nigeria. The Seat of Wisdom Seminary is in Owerri. The archdiocese covers an area of 2,996 km². 670,986 of the 1.7 million people in the area are member of the Catholic Church.

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Quick Facts Archdiocese of Owerri Archidioecesis Overriensis, Location ...

Archdiocese of Owerri Archidioecesis Overriensis

Assumpta Cathedral
Location
Country	Nigeria
Territory	Imo State
Ecclesiastical province	Owerri
Coordinates	5°29′06″N 7°02′06″E
Information
Denomination	Catholic
Sui iuris church	Latin Church
Rite	Roman Rite
Cathedral	Assumpta Cathedral, Owerri
Current leadership
Pope	Francis
Archbishop	Most Rev. Lucius Iwejuru Ugorji
Suffragans	Aba, Ahiara, Okigwe, Orlu, Umuahia
Auxiliary Bishops	Moses Chikwe
Bishops emeritus	Anthony J. V. Obinna
Map
Imo State shown in red
Website
owarch.org.ng

The diocese dates back to the Vicariate Apostolic of Owerri, which was created on February 12, 1948, when the Vicariate Apostolic of Onitsha-Owerri was split. On April 18, 1950, it was elevated to a diocese. On March 26, 1994, it became an Archdiocese.

On 27 December 2020, auxiliary bishop Moses Chikwe and his driver were kidnapped by gunmen in Owerri. They were both released unharmed and without ransom, on 1 January 2021.^[1]

Ordinaries

Vicar Apostolic of Owerri (Latin Church)
- Joseph Brendan Whelan, C.S.Sp. 12 Feb 1948 – 18 Apr 1950; see below
Bishops of Owerri (Roman rite)
- Joseph Brendan Whelan, C.S.Sp. 18 Apr 1950 – 25 Jun 1970; see above
- Mark Onwuha Unegbu 25 Jun 1970 – 1 Jul 1993
- Anthony J.V. Obinna 1 Jul 1993 – 1993; see below
Metropolitan Archbishops of Owerri (Roman rite)
- Anthony John Valentine Obinna 26 Mar 1994 – 6 Mar 2022; see above
- Lucius Iwejuru Ugorji since 6 Mar 2022; see above

Auxiliary bishop

Moses Chikwe (2019-)

Other priest of this diocese who became bishop

Augustine Ndubueze Echema, appointed Bishop of Aba in 2019

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Roman Catholicism in Nigeria

[1]
"Catholic bishop released five days after kidnapping in Nigeria". Catholic News Agency. Retrieved 2021-01-02.

Official website of the Archdiocese of Owerri, Nigeria
Catholic Hierarchy
Diocese information at the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria Archived 2016-12-19 at the Wayback Machine
GCatholic.org Information
Seat of Wisdom Seminary
Seat of Wisdom Seminary Archived 2013-06-14 at the Wayback Machine

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Italian. (February 2011) Click [show] for important translation instructions.

View a machine-translated version of the Italian article.
Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia.
Consider adding a topic to this template: there are already 731 articles in the main category, and specifying|topic= will aid in categorization.
Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article.
You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing Italian Wikipedia article at [[:it:Arcidiocesi di Owerri]]; see its history for attribution.
You may also add the template {{Translated|it|Arcidiocesi di Owerri}} to the talk page.
For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

Quick Facts Archdiocese of Owerri Archidioecesis Overriensis, Location ...

Archdiocese of Owerri Archidioecesis Overriensis

Assumpta Cathedral
Location
Country	Nigeria
Territory	Imo State
Ecclesiastical province	Owerri
Coordinates	5°29′06″N 7°02′06″E
Information
Denomination	Catholic
Sui iuris church	Latin Church
Rite	Roman Rite
Cathedral	Assumpta Cathedral, Owerri
Current leadership
Pope	Francis
Archbishop	Most Rev. Lucius Iwejuru Ugorji
Suffragans	Aba, Ahiara, Okigwe, Orlu, Umuahia
Auxiliary Bishops	Moses Chikwe
Bishops emeritus	Anthony J. V. Obinna
Map
Imo State shown in red
Website
owarch.org.ng

On 27 December 2020, auxiliary bishop Moses Chikwe and his driver were kidnapped by gunmen in Owerri. They were both released unharmed and without ransom, on 1 January 2021.^[1]

Ordinaries

Vicar Apostolic of Owerri (Latin Church)
- Joseph Brendan Whelan, C.S.Sp. 12 Feb 1948 – 18 Apr 1950; see below
Bishops of Owerri (Roman rite)
- Joseph Brendan Whelan, C.S.Sp. 18 Apr 1950 – 25 Jun 1970; see above
- Mark Onwuha Unegbu 25 Jun 1970 – 1 Jul 1993
- Anthony J.V. Obinna 1 Jul 1993 – 1993; see below
Metropolitan Archbishops of Owerri (Roman rite)
- Anthony John Valentine Obinna 26 Mar 1994 – 6 Mar 2022; see above
- Lucius Iwejuru Ugorji since 6 Mar 2022; see above