Catholic Church in Serbia
The Catholic Church in Serbia is part of the worldwide Catholic Church under the spiritual leadership of the pope in Rome. There are 356,957 Catholics in Serbia according to the 2011 census, which is roughly 5% of the population. Estimates in 2020 suggested that the figure had risen to 5.5-6%.
Catholics are mostly concentrated in several municipalities in northern Vojvodina and are mostly members are Hungarians, Croats, and a small minority of Serb Catholics
[Image:Catholic Church Serbia.PNG|250px|thumb|right|Map of Catholic Church organization in Serbia
]
History
By the end of the 12th century, regions of Syrmia and Mačva came under the direct rule of the Kingdom of Hungary, and during the first half of the 13th century, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Syrmia was established for Catholics in those regions. In the same time, jurisdiction over Catholic communities in medieval Serbia, was exercised by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Kotor and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Bar, whose prelates took the title: Primate of Serbia. By the 15th century, some attempts were made to establish a Roman Catholic diocese for the regions of Belgrade and Smederevo in the Serbian Despotate. Attempts of missionary John of Capistrano to convert Serbian ruler Đurađ Branković from Eastern Orthodoxy to Roman Catholicism failed. All of those territories gradually fell under Ottoman rule, and the care of local Catholics came under jurisdiction of the Franciscan Province of Bosnia.In 1717, the Habsburg Monarchy captured Belgrade from the Ottomans, and the Treaty of Passarowitz was concluded in 1718, officially assigning Belgrade with much of central Serbia to the Habsburgs. Since local Serbian population was Eastern Orthodox, Habsburg authorities pursued complex religious policies towards various Christian communities, by recognizing the Serbian Orthodox Metropolitanate of Belgrade, and also establishing the Roman Catholic Diocese of Belgrade. After the loss of Belgrade to the Ottomans in 1739, many of local Catholics left the region, and the Diocese was returned to the state of provisional administration, that would continue up to the beginning of the 20th century.
The first official Concordat between the former Kingdom of Serbia and the Holy See was concluded on 24 June 1914. Through the Second Article of Concordat, it was decided that the regular Archdiocese of Belgrade should be created. Because of the outbreak of the First World War, those provisions could not be implemented, and only after the war were new arrangements made.
In 1918, Serbia became part of the newly formed Kingdom of Yugoslavia. By 1924, the Archdiocese of Belgrade was officially created and the first Archbishop appointed. Negotiations on a new Concordat between the Kingdom and the Holy See were led by the Yugoslav Minister of Justice Ljudevit Auer and Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli. The Concordat was signed in 1935, but was never officially ratified because of a political crisis in Yugoslavia.