The Roman Catholic Diocese of Imola (Latin: Diocesis Imolensis) is a territory in Romagna, northern Italy. It is a suffragan of the Archdiocese of Bologna.[1][2] The diocese had originally been a suffragan of the metropolitan of Milan, and was then subject to the Archbishop of Ravenna until 1582, when Pope Gregory XIII made Bologna an archbishopric and assigned it two suffragans, Imola and Cervia. In 1604, however, Pope Clement VIII returned them to the metropolitanate of Ravenna.[3] Pope Pius VII transferred Imola back to the metropolitanate of Bologna.
The diocese of Imola is noted for having had a number of its bishops elected to the Papacy, including Cardinal Fabio Chigi (1652), afterwards Pope Alexander VII; Cardinal Barnaba Chiaramonti (1785), afterwards Pope Pius VII; and Cardinal Giovanni Maria Mastai Ferretti (1832), afterwards Pope Pius IX.
The Christian origins of Imola are obscure. The episcopal see certainly antedates St. Ambrose,[4] who, during a vacancy in the diocese of Imola, asked the bishop of Voghenza (the ancient Vicus Haventia), to visit the church of Imola since Ambrose himself was occupied and unable to do so, until a bishop was consecrated.[5] Ambrose was concerned about the Gothic Arians and the inroads that their heresies were making on the orthodox Christians.[6]
In 435 Emperor Valentinian III built the church of S. Maria in Arenula. The bishop then was Cornelius, whose archdeacon Peter was appointed Bishop of Ravenna by Pope Sixtus III. Bishop Peter, known as Chrysologus, gave a magnificent eulogy of Bishop Cornelius at the consecration of his successor, Projectus.[7]
In 888, Pope Stephen V ordered the Archbishop of Ravenna to see to it that a bishop was canonically elected for Imola. There was to be no election while the incumbent was still alive, even though he might be ill. When there was a legitimate vacancy, the Clergy was to carry out the election, and the People were to approve it. There had earlier been strife in the city when the People attempted to elect a bishop without reference to the Clergy. It was only later that the Cathedral Chapter began to exercise the rights which had once belonged to the entire Clergy.[8] By the year 1217, the right to elect the bishop belonged to the Canons of the Cathedral of S. Cassiano and the Canons of San Lorenzo, acting as a single electoral college.[9]
On 7 August 1118, Pope Gelasius II restored to the Archbishop of Ravenna all of the dioceses which had been removed from his metropolitanate by Pope Paschal II, due to the participation of the archbishops in the schism that supported the Emperor Henry IV. One of the dioceses that was restored to Ravenna was the diocese of Imola.[10]