Puerto Rico! What about the Catholic Church Records?!

For Puerto Rico and many of our Latin/Hispanic countries the Catholic Church records are treasure trove of information, but are they even available?? Short answer, yes....but before you jump and start to find them. I would advise that you keep reading.

The Catholic churches of Puerto Rico are divided with the following Dioceses and each of them cover Catholic Churches from different towns of Puerto Rico:

• Diocese of San Juan: Bayamón, Carolina, Cataño, Dorado, Gurabo, San Juan, Toa Alta & Trujillo Alto.

• Diocese of Fajardo: Canovanas, Ceiba, Culebra, Fajardo, Humacao, Loiza, Luquillo, Naguabo, Rio Grande & Vieques.

• Diocese of Caguas: Aguas Buenas, Aibonito, Barranquitas, Caguas, Cayey, Cidra, Comerio, Gurabo, Juncos, Las Piedras, Maunabo, Naranjito, San Lorenzo, Yabucoa.

• Diocese of Mayaguez: Aguada, Aguadilla, Añasco, Cabo Rojo, Hormigueros, Lajas, Las Marias, Maricao, Mayaguez, Moca, Rincon, Sabana Grande, San German, San Sebastian.

• Diocese of Arecibo: Arecibo, Barceloneta, Camuy, Ciales, Corozal, Florida, Hatillo, Isabela, Manati, Morovis, Orocovis, Quebradillas, Utuado, Vega Alta, Vega Baja.

• Diocese of Ponce: Adjuntas, Arroyo, Coamo, Guanica, Guayama, Guayanilla, Jayuya, Juana Diaz, Lares, Patillas, Penuelas, Ponce, Salinas, Santa Isabel, Yauco, Villaba.

Are all these records digitized and available online?

Not all, but you would be surprised how many are available. Please note that the Dioceses of Arecibo and Mayaguez did not have their records digitized by FamilySearch.

Some of Arecibo's records were digitized by the Sociedad Puertorriqueña de Genealogia and can be viewed at their headquarters in Puerto Rico. For more information on the hours go here :https://genealogiapr.com/biblioteca-central-de-investigacion-genealogica/, but please note that they are still currently closed for visitors due to COVID-19. You can also follow them on Facebook if you want to keep up with information: https://www.facebook.com/sociedad.degenealogia

A website I highly recommend and if I would advice to start with is: https://hijosdecoamopr.com/ and you can also follow on Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/HIJOSDECOAMO. This hard working fellow Genealogist has been making indexes for the towns whose Church Records are available online through FamilySearch. But not only do you find out what is available listed in a very simplified, comprehensive way, you get historical information which is essential to Genealogy research. Look at the Barranquitas page for example: https://hijosdecoamopr.com/san-antonio-de-padua-barranquitas-puerto-rico/. Please note that the author is still building and currently working hard on completing indexing, so some of the links for the towns are not functioning yet, but everyday more and more becomes available. The church records do link back to FamilySearch, but the experience through this site will make it a lot less overwhelming for you and I will say it again, start here.

If you do decide to go directly into Familysearch, you can go to this link: https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1807092

Also there are some records that are not searchable which means you have to look by image, to find those you want to go to FamilySearch Wiki Page and put in the town you are looking for and see if the Church Records are available: https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Main_Page