Roman Catholic Diocese of Jaca

Ecclesiastically, Jaca originally belonged to the Diocese of Huesca. When in 713 the town of Huesca was seized by the Moors, the bishop fled and the diocese was directed from Aragon by itinerant bishops, sometimes called bishops of Aragon, sometimes bishops of Huesca or Jaca, who lived either at Jaca or in the neighbouring monasteries of San Juan de la Peña, San Pedro de Siresa and San Adrián de Sasabe.

Among the itinerant bishops of Aragon were:

• c. 920: Iñigo
• c. 922: Ferriolus
• 933–947: Fortuño
• 971–978: Aureolus
• c. 981: Atón
• 1011–1036: Mancius
• 1036–1057: García
• 1058–1075: Sancho

• 1058–1075: Sancho
• 1076–1086: García Ramírez
• 1087–1097: Peter

A council held at Jaca in 1063 determined anew the boundaries of the Diocese of Huesca, which thereafter included the present dioceses of Huesca, Jaca and Barbastro, as well as a part of the Diocese of Lérida. Jaca was then made the permanent seat of the diocese.

At the same time Sancho was appointed Bishop of Huesca (1058–1075) and hastened to request the Pope Alexander II to confirm the decisions of the council. In the same year of 1063, however, King Sancho Ramirez of Aragon (1063–1094) had won back from the Moors the city of Barbastro, and had granted it to the Bishop of Roda. García Ramírez, the new Bishop of Huesca (1076–1086) and brother of the king, regarded this as an infringement of the rights of jurisdiction granted the Bishop of Jaca by the Council of Jaca. He therefore renewed his petition to the new pope (Gregory VII) to have the decisions of the council confirmed, which request the pope granted (cf. Jaffé, "Reg. Pont. Roman", I, 2nd ed., Berlin, 1885, n. 5098). As, however, Bishop Raimundo of Roda also obtained the confirmation of all his privileges from Gregory, a violent dispute arose between the Bishops of Huesca and Roda as to jurisdiction over the churches of Barbastro, Bielsa, Gistao and Alquezar, which in 1080 was decided by the king in favour of the Bishop of Roda.

In November 1096, King Pedro I of Aragon conquered Huesca from the taifa of Zaragoza and restored the original see. Pope Urban II decreed (May 11, 1098) that, instead of Jaca, Huesca should again be the seat of the bishop, as it had been until the year 713 (cf. Jaffé, "Reg. Pont. Roman", I, 2nd ed., Berlin, 1885, n. 5703). But Jaca itself had a separate existence under a vicar-general, independent of the Bishop of Huesca. It also retained its own cathedral chapter, which originally followed the Rule of St. Augustine, but in 1270 both this chapter and that of Huesca were secularized.

Jaca was again erected into a separate diocese and was made suffragan to the Metropolitan See of Zaragoza by a Bull of Pope Pius V (July 18, 1571), which decision was carried into effect on February 26, 1572. The first bishop was Pedro del Frago.

According to the diocesan statistics of 1907 Jaca possessed 73,659 inhabitants, 151 parishes, 151 parish churches, 239 public and 10 private oratories, 236 secular priests, 30 regulars and 54 sisters. The religious institutes in the diocese are:

• Augustinian Hermits, one monastery and novitiate;
• Piarists, 2 houses for the training of boys;
• Benedictine nuns, 1 convent and 18 professed sisters in the city of Jaca;
• Sisters of Mercy of St. Anna, who have charge of the hospital at Jaca;
• Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Mary, 1 house at Jaca; sisters of Mercy of St. Vincent de Paul, with a school at Jaca;
• Little Sisters of the Aged Poor, with a home for the aged in a suburb of Jaca.