Monsignor Ernest Çoba, archbishop of Shkodra, head of the Catholic Church of Albania, passed away. Ernest Çoba was born in 1913, in Laç (Vau i Dejës). In 1936, he was ordained a priest and, gradually, the Catholic Church entrusted him with several positions as a teacher of the faith in the Papal Seminary (Shkodra), until 1946. He served as a parish priest of Shkodra (1946-1952), general secretary of the leadership of the Albanian Catholic Church (1952–1956). From 1956, he was appointed head of the Catholic Church of Albania in the most difficult years that the Catholic Church was going through with the separation of its dependence from the Vatican and the departure of Bernardin Shllaku as its leader. (In the photo: Ernest Çoba)
Text: Central State Archives
Photo: © Xhoxhi L., personal archive
Graphic processing: AHCF
