page_title: Catholic Church in Kazakhstan
section_title: 1991 to the present
hierarchical_section_title: Catholic Church in Kazakhstan / History / 1991 to the present
caption_attribution_description: Русский: Римско-католический кафедральный собор Пресвятой Троицы в Алматы
context_page_description: The Catholic Church in Kazakhstan is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the pope in Rome.
context_section_description: With the fall of communism in 1991, the Catholic community fully came back out into the open. In 1991, Pope John Paul II established an Apostolic Administration that covered all of Central Asia. Diplomatic relations between the Holy See and Kazakhstan were established in 1994. In 1997, the other four countries of the region, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan all became independent missions, so the Apostolic Administration became for only Kazakhstan and was based in Karaganda. In 1999, the apostolic administration was split in four; three new apostolic administrations were created, based in Almaty, Astana, and Atyrau, and a diocese was created in Karaganda. Pope John Paul II became the first Pope to visit Kazakhstan in the country's history in 2001. In 2003, John Paul II elevated Astana to an archdiocese and Almaty to a diocese. In 2006, Catholic priests were ordained for the first time ever in the country.
  In 2008, the Church in the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan affirmed its Asiatic identity when its episcopal conference was formally accepted into the Federation of Asian Bishops' Conferences.
caption: The Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in Almaty
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