The Diocese of Münster (Latin: Dioecesis Monasteriensis) is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory or diocese of the Catholic Church in Germany.^[1][2] It is a suffragan diocese of the Archdiocese of Cologne. Bishop Felix Genn is the current bishop of the Diocese of Münster. He was ordained to the priesthood on 11 July 1976 and was appointed to the See of Münster on 19 December 2008.

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Diocese of Münster Dioecesis Monasteriensis Bistum Münster (in German)
Cathedral of St. Paul, Münster
Coat of arms
Location
Country	Germany
Ecclesiastical province	Cologne
Metropolitan	Cologne
Statistics
Area	15,268 km2 (5,895 sq mi)
Population - Total - Catholics	(as of 2014) 4,333,919 1,953,081 (45.1%)
Parishes	304
Information
Established	800
Cathedral	Cathedral of St. Paul
Secular priests	1,129
Current leadership
Pope	Francis
Bishop	Felix Genn
Metropolitan Archbishop	Rainer Maria Woelki
Auxiliary Bishops	Rolf Lohmann Christoph Hegge Wilfried Theising Stefan Zekorn
Bishops emeritus	Heinrich Janssen Dieter Geerlings (emeritus auxiliary bishop)
Map
Website
bistum-muenster.de

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As of 31 December 2006, with 4.336 million adherents or 47.1% of local population, nearly half the inhabitants of the Münster diocese were Catholic; due to continuing secularisation, this a decreased percentage compared to earlier periods. Sunday Mass attendance reflects this decline over the course of three decades. Per the diocesan website: in 2005, 13.6% Catholics attended Sunday Mass; in 2004, this was 14.5%. A decade earlier, in 1995, Sunday Mass attendance was about 20% (416,406 churchgoers); in 1985, Sunday Mass attendance was 29.3% (614,839 Catholics); and, in 1975, Sunday Mass attendance was 35.1% or 787,582 persons. Over a 30-year period, Sunday Mass attendance declined over 50%.

As of 18 July 2013, there were 1,129 priests, 296 permanent deacons, and 2,540 religious in the diocese.^[3]

The diocese was canonically erected in 800 by Pope Leo III. In 1803 the diocese was secularized by the Imperial Delegates Enactment and broken up into numerous parts. Freiherr von Fürstenberg administered as vicar-general the ecclesiastical affairs of the diocese even during the short supremacy of the French (1806-13). After his death, in 1810, the administrator was his former coadjutor, Clement Augustus von Droste-Vischering, later Archbishop of Cologne. In the years 1813-15 the diocese was administered, without the authorization of the pope, by Count Ferdinand Augustus von Spiegel, arbitrarily appointed by Napoleon, and to whom Droste-Vischering had given his faculties by subdelegation.^[4]

The see had been vacant for twenty years when Ferdinand von Lunninck (1821-25), formerly Prince-Bishop of Corvey, was appointed. On account of illness, he left the administration to Jodok Hermann von Zurmühlen, already an old man, whom he made pro-vicar. The succeeding bishop was Kaspar Max, Freiherr von Droste-Vischering (1824-46), who, having been auxiliary bishop of the diocese since 1795, had confirmed many hundreds of thousands and ordained over 2200 priests. His administration was greatly hampered by the petty and far-reaching supervision of the Government. In place of the university, suppressed in 1818, he was able to open, in 1832, an academy with philosophical and theological faculties.^[4]

During the episcopate of John Gregory Müller (1847-70), fruitful popular missions were held in many places, many churches were rebuilt, and a large number of religious houses and benevolent institutions were founded with the active assistance of the laity.^[4] During the Kulturkampf Bishop John Bernhard Brinkmann (1870-89) suffered fines, imprisonment, and from 1875 to 1884, banishment. He witnessed the destruction of much that had been established by his predecessors and by himself.

In 1886 the old west tower of St Lambert's Church, Münster was demolished and replaced.

It lost territory on 23 February 1957 to the newly established Diocese of Essen.

• Prince-Bishopric of Münster
• Roman Catholicism in Germany