page_title: Iloilo City
section_title: Religion
hierarchical_section_title: Iloilo City / Demographics / Religion
caption_attribution_description: English: Jaro Cathedral (Official - Jaro Metropolitan Cathedral) (Spanish: Catedral de Jaro) - The National Shrine of Our Lady of Candles.
context_page_description: Iloilo City, officially the City of Iloilo, is a 1st class highly urbanized city on Panay Island in Western Visayas, Philippines. It is the capital city of the province of Iloilo where it is geographically situated but, in terms of government and administration, it is politically independent. In addition, it is the center of the Iloilo-Guimaras Metropolitan Area, as well as the regional center and primate city of the Western Visayas region. In the 2015 census, Iloilo City had a population of 447,992 inhabitants, with a 1.02% population annual growth rate. For the metropolitan area, the total population is 946,146 inhabitants.
  Iloilo City is a conglomeration of former towns, which are now the geo-political districts consisting of: Villa Arevalo, Iloilo City Proper, Jaro, La Paz, Mandurriao and Molo. The district of Lapuz, a former part of La Paz, was declared a separate district in 2008.
  It was founded in 1566 when the Spaniards established a settlement area between the towns of Oton and the city's present district of La Villa Rica de Arevalo as the second Spanish colonial center after Cebu in the Philippine islands.
context_section_description: Iloilo City is one of the notable centers of faith in the Philippines. Due to the heavy Spanish Missions, the city's population is predominant Catholic with over 95% belonging to the Roman Catholic Church. Other religious minorities such as Protestants (5%), Iglesia NI Cristo(2%) and Aglipayans (1%) (also a form of Episcopal Protestantism) have a significant presence at the city.
  The former city of Jaro (one of the present districts (boroughs) of Iloilo city) is the seat of bishopric and pioneer Christian institutions not only in Western Visayas but in the whole Philippines established through the Spanish colonization. The Spaniards which brought the Catholic faith established the Roman Catholic metropolitan see of the Archdiocese of Jaro with its diocesan cathedral while the Americans which brought the Protestantism established the Convention of Philippine Baptist Churches (the first and oldest Baptist churches organization in the Philippines), the Jaro Evangelical Church (the first Baptist church in the Philippine islands), and Jaro Adventist Center (first organized Adventist church in the Philippines).
  The Roman Catholic Archdiocese is one of the oldest and largest bishopric sees in the country. It was established as a parish in 1587 initially covering Catmon, Cabatuan and Maasin . It was created a diocese by virtue of a papal bull of Pope Pius IX on 27 May 1865 . It has jurisdiction over sufragan bishops of Mindoro, Palawan, Zamboanga, the provinces of Iloilo, Negros Oriental, Guimaras, San Jose de Buenavista, Capiz, Bacolod, San Carlos and Kabankalan in Negros Occidental.
  It lost some of its territory to establish the Diocese of Zamboanga and Apostolic Prefecture of Palawan. Much later, three other ecclesiastical jurisdictions were established from parts of its territory: Diocese of Bacolod (15 July 1932), Apostolic Prefecture of Mindoro (2 July 1936), and Diocese of Capiz (27 January 1951). The diocese was elevated into a Metropolitan Archdiocese by Pope Pius XII. Later, on 24 March 1962, it lost further some of its territory that resulted to the establishment the Territorial Prelature of San Jose de Antique (but still a part of it at present).
  The Jaro Cathedral (National Shrine of the Our Lady of Candles) is the seat of the Archdiocese of Jaro. Saint Elizabeth of Hungary and the Our Lady of Candles are the official Catholic patronesses of the Archdiocese. The Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria or Our Lady of the Candles is the official patron of the whole Western Visayas and Romblon. Its image or statue perched atop the facade of the cathedral is the first and only Marian image crowned by a Pope and saint (Pope John Paul II) in the Philippines and Asia.
  Being designated as a National Shrine, Jaro Cathedral is likewise widely known as the seat of Roman Catholicism in Western Visayas. The said designation (National Shrine) by the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines is the first of its kind in the region, the second in Western Visayas (after Cebu), and the first Marian dedicated church outside of Luzon.
  Protestantism forms as the second largest faith in the City of Iloilo. Protestant sects was brought by the Americans when the Philippines was ceded to the American rule by Spain through the 1898 Treaty of Paris.
  The said faith brought by the United States in the heavily Roman Catholic Iloilo has gained adherents and still continues to grow at present. Iloilo which is one of the pioneering places in the country that Protestants set foot is strongly contributed due to its economic importance in the international scene in the early 1900s. The American colonial government tolerated religious freedom that even to this day Iloilo is still a predominantly Catholic.
  Presbyterians and Baptists are among the first Protestant sects that arrived in Iloilo. The arrival of American brand of Protestant denominations resulted to the establishment of notable pioneering institutions in Iloilo. The Presbyterians established the Iloilo Mission Hospital in 1901 (the first American and Protestant hospital in the Philippines) while
caption: Jaro Cathedral (Catedral de Jaro/Catedral Metropolitana de Jaro) or National Shrine of Our Lady of Candles which is the seat of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Jaro is one of the largest Roman Catholic Archdioceses in the Philippines. The present Archdiocese of Capiz, the islands of Palawan and Mindoro and Zamboanga were former parts of its ecclesiastical jurisdiction before they became a separate bishopric.  As the second National Shrine in the Visayas (first in Western Visayas and first Marian dedicated church to do so outside Luzon), Jaro Cathedral is likewise widely known as the seat of Roman Catholicism in Western Visayas.
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