Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Honiara The American development of Honiara as an army base and war depot turned Honiara into the new capital for the British Solomon Islands. The Catholic population tripled between 1947 and 1957, from 1000 to 3000. The first Holy Cross Church, built in 1947, was replaced by a much larger structure in 1957. The statues of the Blessed Virgin and St Joseph, which had somehow survived the Japanese air raids of the Battle of Guadalcanal, were positioned outside the 1957 church. These statues were re-positioned once again outside the 1978 cathedral; damage caused by bullets can be easily seen on both.
Honiara Christian and is served by the headquarters of the Church of the Province of Melanesia (Anglican), the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Honiara, the South Seas Evangelical Church, the United Church, the Seventh-day Adventist Church and other Christian churches. There are many congregations of American and Australian style charismatic and evangelical movements. There are also members of the Bahá'í Faith, Buddhists, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, and Muslims such as the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community. The Anglican Church of Melanesia, a province of the Anglican Communion, was established in 1849 by George Augustus Selwyn of New Zealand. Initially, it was the Church of the