The Diocese of Amarillo consists of the following 26 counties: Armstrong, Briscoe, Carson, Castro, Childress, Collingsworth, Dallam, Deaf Smith, Donley, Gray, Hall, Hansford, Hartley, Hemphill, Hutchinson, Lipscomb, Moore, Ochiltree, Oldham, Parmer, Potter, Randall, Roberts, Sherman, Swisher, and Wheeler.

The first Catholic church in the Texas Panhandle was St. Mary's, dedicated in Clarendon in 1892, to serve Irish and German railroad workers.

[9] The second bishop of Amarillo was Reverend Robert Lucey of the Diocese of Los Angeles, named by Pius XI in 1934.

That same year, Pope Pius XII appointed Monsignor Laurence FitzSimon of San Antonio as the next bishop of Amarillo.

FitzSimon had visited the camp in July 1945 and saw that prisoners were receiving low rations of substandard quality.

[15] Pope John XXIII in 1963 named Monsignor Lawrence De Falco of the Diocese of Fort Worth as the fifth bishop of Amarillo.

In 1980, Pope John Paul II appointed Reverend Leroy Matthiesen of Amarillo as bishop of that diocese.

[25] In July 2002, Bishop Yanta and the diocese were named in a lawsuit for the rape of a teenage girl in 2000 by Reverend Rosendo Herrera.

The accuser said that the diocese was aware of previous offenses by Herrera, but had failed to notify authorities as required by Texas state law.

[30] In 2004, Matthiessen stirred controversy when he started a private fundraising effort for three priests whom he had removed from public ministry.