The Holy Father has erected the new diocese of Petare, Venezuela, with territory taken from the metropolitan archdiocese of Caracas, making it a suffragan of the same metropolitan see.
The Holy Father has appointed Bishop Juan Carlos Bravo Salazar as the first bishop of the diocese of Petare, Venezuela, transferring him from the diocese of Acarigua-Araure, Venezuela.
Bishop Juan Carlos Bravo Salazar was born on 3 January 1965 in Quebrada Seca of El Pilar, diocese of Carúpano. He carried out his studies in philosophy with the Diocesan Worker Priests at the Santa Rosa de Lima Major Seminary in Caracas and theology at Saint Thomas Seminary in the metropolitan archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, United States of America. He attended a postgraduate course at the Tantur Ecumenical Institute in Jerusalem.
He was ordained to the priesthood on 28 November 1992, incardinated in the diocese of Ciudad Guayana.
As a priest he held the following positions: parish priest of the Inmaculada Concepción in San Felix, parish priest of Nuestra Señora del Rosario in Guasipati, parish administrator of Santa Teresa de Jesús in Puerto Ordaz, parish administrator of San Miguel Arcángel in El Palmar, parish administrator of Nuestra Señora de Monserrat, diocesan vicar for pastoral care and apostolic administrator of the diocese of Ciudad Guayana.
On 10 August 2015, he was appointed bishop of Acarigua-Araure and received episcopal consecration the following 24 October.
Newly-Erected Diocese of Petare
The territory of the newly-erected diocese of Petare corresponds to the civil department of the municipality of Sucre, Miranda, and is made up of five civil parishes hitherto belonging to the metropolitan archdiocese of Caracas.
The statistical data are as follows:
| Archdiocese of Caracas
Before division |
Archdiocese of Caracas
After division |
New diocese of PETARE | |
| Area | 991 Km² | 814 Km² | 177 Km² |
| Population | 3,200,000 | 2,440,000 | 760,000 |
| Parishes | 120 | 97 | 23 |
| Diocesan priests | 125 | 113 | 12 |
| Religious priests | 680 | 635 | 45 |
| Seminarians | 18 | 13 | 5 |
| Religious | 902 | 773 | 129 |
