Roman Catholic Diocese of Saint-Flour


The Roman Catholic Diocese of Saint-Flour is a Diocese of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church in France. The diocese comprises the department of Cantal. Erected in 1317, the diocese was suffragan of the Archdiocese of Bourges until 2002. With the general reorganization of the structure of the French church by Pope John Paul II, Saint-Flour became the suffragan of the Archdiocese of Clermont. The seat of the bishop is located in Saint-Flour, Cantal.
The current bishop is Bruno Grua, who was appointed in March 2006 by Pope Benedict XVI. Like many French bishops, he was compelled to face the problem created by the dwindling number of priests in the Roman Catholic Church. In 1970 in Saint-Flour there were 264 priests; in 2010 there were 85. The number of parishes was 161 in 2010, and half did not have a full-time priest. Bishop Grua therefore reorganized the parish structure, reducing the number of parishes from 161 to 32 to ensure that every Catholic had a priest who was responsible for his/her spiritual needs. In 2014 there was one priest for every 1,914 Catholics. In 2017 there was one priest for every 2,553 Catholics.

History

The diocese is named after St. Florus, who is said to have been the first Bishop of Lodève and to have died at Indiciat while evangelizing Haute-Auvergne. These traditions have been the subject of numerous discussions. In two documents concerning the foundation of the second monastery of St-Flour, drawn up in 1013 and 1031, and in a letter written to Pope Urban IV in 1261 by Pierre de Saint-Haon, prior of Saint-Flour, St. Flour is already considered as belonging to the Apostolic times, and the Speculum sanctorale of Bernard Gui in 1329 relates at length the legend of this "disciple of Christ". Marcellin Boudet believes it more likely that St. Flour lived in the fifth century, and that it was he who attended the Council of Arles in 450 or 451.
At the close of the tenth century there was already a monastery at Indiciat. A local seigneur, Astorg de Brezons, surnamed "the Red Bull", gave this monastery to the abbey of Cluny, then under the direction of Odilo, Abbot of Cluny, and the donation was confirmed by Pope Gregory V. Amblard de Brezons, his nephew, surnamed "le Mal Hiverné", seized the monastery and destroyed all of it except the church. Amblard and Astorg, from 1010 to 1013, gave this church and its fief to St. Peter's at Rome, together with the monastery of Sauxillanges, governed by Odilo; but later Amblard considered this donation as void, and constructed a fortress, a remnant of which is now the sacristy of the cathedral, on the site of the old monastery; afterwards Amblard, seized with remorse at Rome, between 1025 and 1031 gave back to Odilo all he possessed, and a large monastery was again founded. Pope Urban II, after the Council of Clermont, consecrated the church of this new monastery. Pope Callistus II passed some time there, on 1 and 2 June 1119. The church collapsed in 1396, and no remains of it exist.

Creation of the diocese

In August, 1317, Pope John XXII detached Haute-Auvergne from the bishopric of Clermont and raised St-Flour to the rank of a bishopric, the first ordinary of which was his chaplain Raymond de Montuéjols. Among his successors were Pierre d'Estaing, afterwards Archbishop of Bourges and cardinal in 1370; and Louis-Siffrein-Joseph de Salamon, former counseiller-clerc to the Parliament of Paris, who during the French Revolution had secretly acted in France as the pope's agent, a rôle concerning which he has left very important memoirs.
The diocese of Saint-Flour was particularly hard hit by the Black Death of 1348–1353. The mortality rate was over 50%.

Revolution

During the French Revolution, the National Constituent Assembly reformed the Church in France, drawing up the Civil Constitution of the Clergy. All clergy were obliged to swear an oath of allegiance to the Constitution, thereby effectively entering into a schism with the Papacy and the Roman Catholic Church. The Assembly ordered that the number of dioceses in France be reduced from 135 to 83, and that these surviving dioceses should be coterminous with the new 'départements' which were being created for civil administration; the new dioceses were to be grouped into new Metropolitanates. Saint-Flour was one of the dioceses to be suppressed. These revisions were contrary to the procedures of the Canon Law of the Roman Catholic Church.
In the Haut-Auvergne, the new Constitutional diocese was to be called 'Cantal', and it was assigned to the 'Metropole du Sud-Est'. The legitimate bishop of Saint-Flour, Ruffo de Bonneval, refused to take the oath to the Constitution, and therefore his seat was declared vacant. The electors of 'Cantal' were convened at Aurillac in March 1791, and nearly every village had its candidate. Half of the eligible electors refused to participate, and the remaining voters took some time to sort out the candidates. On 15 March, they elected Anne-Alexandre-Marie Thibault, who had been a parish priest at Souppes in the diocese of Meaux. He was consecrated in Paris at Nôtre-Dame on 3 April 1791 by Constitutional Bishop Lamourette, his Metropolitan. Naturally he did not have his bulls of consecration from Rome, and therefore his consecration was valid, but illegitimate in Canon Law. He returned to his diocese in May to considerable hostility; he dismissed all the faculty of the seminary, since they had refused to take the oath to the Constitution, and then returned to Paris, where he was elected a member of the National Convention. He never returned, becoming a politician and successfully maneuvering the changes in government up to 1801 and the Concordat. He was forced to retire into private life, and died on 26 February 1813 without having been reconciled to the Church.

Restoration

The diocese was re-established by the Holy See in accordance with canon law and the Concordat of 1801, which had been agreed by First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte and Pope Pius VII. The boundaries of the canonically re-established diocese were aligned, however, to coincide with those of the civil département of Cantal, rather than the territory of the pre-revolutionary diocese.
The :fr:Abbaye Saint-Géraud d'Aurillac|Abbey of Aurillac is located in the diocesan territory.

Bishops of Saint-Flour

to 1800

Studies