The Diocese of Syracuse is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory or diocese of the Catholic Church in New York, United States. The of Syracuse includes the territory of seven counties of Central and South Central New York State: Broome, Chenango, Cortland, Madison, Oneida, Onondaga and Oswego. Its episcopal see is located in Syracuse. On June 4, 2019, Pope Francis appointed Douglas Lucia to be the next Bishop of Syracuse. Lucia was consecrated to the episcopacy and installed as bishop on August 8, 2019. The Diocese of Syracuse is a suffragan diocese in the ecclesiastical province of the metropolitan Archdiocese of New York. History Within the area that now makes up the Diocese of Syracuse, missionary activity was first recorded in 1654. During a brief truce between the French and the Iroquois, French Jesuit Simon Le Moyne, eloquent in Huron and Iroquois languages, departed from Quebec City to the upper Mohawk valley. On August 16 of that year, the Onondagas showed him a spring that they believed to be cursed, but which he immediately recognized as a salt spring. Upon his return, Pierre-Joseph-Marie Chaumonot and Claude Dablon laid the groundwork to build Sainte Marie among the Iroquois in 1656, a sizable mission which housed about 7 Jesuits and 50 French workmen. This group had to abandon the mission 2 years later to avoid a threatened massacre by Mohawks. Additional missions were undertaken by Jesuits and Sulpicians. Meanwhile, the nearby Dutch proprietary colony of New Netherlands fell to the English in 1664, and again in 1667. Almost immediately, the English and French began to dispute the territory that was inhabited by the Iroquois. Both sides incited their Indigenous allies to raid the allies of the other, leading to rivalries, atrocities, and reprisals, making it difficult to maintain and continue missions. Several decades later, the colonial legislature under Governor Bellomont ushered in harsh penal laws that threatened to fine, imprison, and even execute Catholic priests found not only in parts of New York controlled by the British, but the disputed areas as well. The last Jesuit missionary to the Iroquois surrendered at Albany in 1709. Great Britain gained full legal control over this territory with the signing of the Treaty of Paris (1763) at the conclusion of the Seven Years' War. 19th century The American Revolution and the ratification of the First Amendment finally removed the legal impediments to practice the Catholic faith.