Agra Archdiocese consists of the following districts in Uttar Pradesh:
Agra, Aligarh, Auraiya, Budaun, Bulandshahr, Etah, Etawah, Farrukabad,
Firozabad, Gautambudha Nagar, Hathras, Kannauj, Mainpuri, Mathura and in
Rajasthan, Bharatpur and Dholpur.

The Emperor Akbar, wishing to have some learned Christian priests at his Court, invited the Jesuits from their College at Goa. The first Church work with the Moghul was thus formed by Blessed Rudolf Aquaviva (later a martyr at Goa), Anthony Monserrate and Francis Henriquez, who arrived at the Moghul Court, then at Fatehpur Sikri in 1580. A second and a third Church work followed. The Jesuits enjoyed the patronage of Akbar and his son Jahangir; but under Shah Jehan and Aurangzeb this disappeared. Though there were no Christian congregations of importance in Moghul India, there were a number of individuals who wielded considerable influences in Court and elsewhere.

When in 1773 the Jesuits were suppressed, two Carmelite Fathers from Bombay succeeded them in Agra, who in turn, were replaced by the Capuchins after a very short while. By a decree of the Sacred Congregation, dated May 17, 1784, the Vicariate - Apostolic of the Great Moghul was constituted.

The history of the Agra Archdiocese under the Capuchins was closely linked with their work in Tibet. Early in 1708, four Capuchins, starting from Kathmandu, reached Lhasa after two months. More Capuchins followed them and took up their residence at Lhasa until April 20, 1745, when, owing to relentless persecution by the Tibetan Priesthood, they had to leave Tibet, and return to Nepal. Thus the capuchin Church work in Lhasa came to an end. But the Church work continued its existence in Nepal until 1768.

The whole chain of Capuchin stations, embracing the greater part of North India from Chandernagore to Lhasa, from Sind to Bengal, from the Himalayas to Narbada river, now the Diocese of Ajmer - Jaipur, Allahabad, Indore, Jhansi, Lahore, Lucknow, Meerut, Patna, Varanasi, Delhi, Jalandar, Simla - Chandigarh, Bijnor and Jammu & Kashmir, (formerly Rawalpindi) all came to be known as the Tibet Hindustan Church work. The Cathedrals of Agra, Ajmer, Allahabad, Delhi, Lahore (before the new one), Madras, Patna and Simla, are symbols and monuments of the untiring zeal of the Capuchins for the extension of the faith and the progress of the Catholic Church in India.

The prefecture Apostolic of Tibet-Hindustan was in 1820, constituted into the Vicaritae Apostolic of Agra, with Msgr. Maria Zenobio Benucci, ofm cap. as its first Vicar Apostolic, who was succeeded by Msgrs. Anthony Pezzoni and Anthony Borghi.

In 1845, the Agra Mission was divided into two separate vicariates: Agra and Patna.In 1846 the Kingdom of Tibet was entrusted to the Society of the Foreign Missions. In 1861 the districts of Allahabad, Oudh, Kanpur, Bundlekhand, Sagar and Bhopal were added to the Patna Vicariate, and in 1880 the districts of Kumaon and Almorah. In the same year, the Vicariate Apostolic of the Punjab was erected and separated from Agra. Finally in 1886 when the Catholic Hierarchy of India was established, the Vicariate Apostolic of Agra became a Metropolitan See from which the Prefecture Apostolic of Rajputana sprung in 1913, and in 1956, the nine northern districts were formed into the Diocese of Meerut.

Thus the Archdiocese of Agra is rightly called the Mother Diocese of all the Dioceses of North India.

Akbar's Church built in 1598 was the first Catholic Church of Agra and it was the Cathedral of Agra till 1848. The Church was built by the Jesuit Fathers under Akbar's order. It was a gift from the Mughal Emperor Akbar. In this Church the Mughal Emperors came to pray, especially Jahangir. Emperor Jahangir finding the Church built by his father, Akbar too small, donated a large sum of money for a larger and more beautiful Church to be built.

Two eminent Catholics, Khwaja Martins and Mirza Sikandar Junior contributed generously towards the extension of this Church.

In 1632 Emperor Shah Jahan declared war on the Portuguese. He defeated them in 1634. He brought over 4000 prisoners to Agra, all Christians. They underwent persecution and so did the Jesuit Fathers. In 1635 Shah Jahan released the Jesuit Fathers on condition that they pulled down their Church. This was done. However in 1636 the Emperor allowed the Fathers to rebuild the Church with the material of the ruined Church. On September 8,1636 the first Holy Mass was celebrated in this reconstructed Church. It underwent great changes during the course of the next two centuries.

In 1758 the Persian Invasion under Ahmed Shah Abdali shattered the Mughal supremacy. During the siege of Agra, the Church was ransacked by the Persian soldiers.

In 1769 Walter Reinhardt then Commander of Agra Fort helped Father Wendel S.J. to rebuild the Church and make an extension. In 1835 Bishop Pezzoni with the generous aid from Sir John Baptist Filose extended the Church westward.

This Church has witnessed many a historical event In 1610 to this Church came the three Royal Princes, nephews of the Emperor Jahangir to be baptized by Rev. Fr. Corsi, S.J. and Fr. Xavier S.J. In this Cathedral was baptized the Begum Johana Sumroo, the Begum of Sardhana. It was in this Cathedral the Religious of Jesus and Mary from France were welcomed by Bishop Borghi in 1842. It was the proud privilege of Bishop Borghi to consecrate in this historic Church Msgr. Carli Bishop of Almira in 1843 and the Servant of God Bishop Anastasius Hartmann, Vicar Apostolic of Patna in 1846.
In 1604 Akbar gave a written order under his royal seal to build in Agra the Church known up to the present day as his, Akbar's Church. One of those Firmans states that in the fourth year of his reign Emperor Jahangir granted to the Agra Fathers 12 bighas of land (for the use of a cemetery) and a garden, free from all taxes. This cemetery is situated near the Civil Courts, on the road to Dayal Bagh. It is an enclosed garden with a big gate facing south. Its walls built of ancient small bricks are very high. It is still in use.

The history of this cemetery is of great value. It has therefore been declared a protected monument and placed under the care of Government. Many bodies were very often brought from long distances to this cemetery even when there was a Christian cemetery available locally. Thus men like the English Diplomat Mildenhall who died in Ajmer in 1614, the Italian Jerome Veroneo, the supposed architect of the Taj who died at Lahore in 1640 and many others were buried here.
Khojah Martyrose a very wealthy and charitable merchant is buried in the mortuary chapel he himself built in 1611. This chapel is also the tomb of Fr. Mark Anthony Santucci, a saintly Italian Priest from Lucca who cam to India in 1668 and died in 1686. He was and till after so many years so held in reverence, that the chapel where he is buried is also spoken of as the PADRE SANTO CHAPEL and vows are made of flowers, incense, candles etc offered at his grave by Christians and non-Christians alike, for favours received through his intercession.

The cemetery is also knows as the "Martyrs' cemetery" because Fr. Manuel Garcia and Fr. Manuel Danhaya buried there, died in prison for the faith, the former on March 23,1634 and the latter on August 2,1635. Also because in the persecution of 1632 to 1635 by Shah Jahan, hundreds of Portuguese and Indian men, women and children perished in Agra for the faith. Shah Jahan declared war against the Portuguese on June 11, 1632 for political causes. It involved him in the attack and capture of their settlement of Hooghly on the North-West mouth of the River Ganges. 4400 prisoners were taken and they were bodily marched in chains to Agra. The journey took nine months. They were accompanied by Fathers Antonio de Christo, Francisco of the Incarnation, Joas de Cruz, Manuel Garcia and Manuel Danhaya. A great number of them died in prison or through terrible hardships because they refused to become Muslims. Their bodies were carried in the silence of the night to this cemetery and confined to pits and unmarked graves.