Diocese of Orléans
The Diocese of Orléans is a Latin Church diocese of the Catholic Church in France. The diocese currently corresponds to the Départment of Loiret. The city is 133 kilometers south-southwest of Paris.
The diocese has experienced a number of transfers among different metropolitans. In 1622, the diocese was suffragan of the Archdiocese of Paris; previously the diocese had been a suffragan of the Archdiocese of Sens. From 1966 until 2001 it was under the jurisdiction of the Archdiocese of Bourges, but since the provisional reorganisation of French ecclesiastical provinces, it is now subject to the Archdiocese of Tours.
After the Revolution it was re-established by the Concordat of 1802. It then included the Departments of Loiret and Loir et Cher, but in 1822 Loir et Cher was moved to the new Diocese of Blois.
The current bishop is Jacques André Blaquart, who was appointed in 2010. In 2021, in the Diocese of Orleans, there was one priest for every 4,306 Catholics.
Jurisdiction
The present Diocese of Orléans differs considerably from that of the old regime; it has lost the arrondissement of Romorantin which has passed to the Diocese of Blois and the canton of Janville, now in the Diocese of Chartres. It includes the arrondissement of Montargis, formerly subject to the Archdiocese of Sens, the arrondissement of Gien, once in the Burgundian Diocese of Auxerre, and the canton of Châtillon sur Loire, once belonging to the Archdiocese of Bourges.History
Foundation myth
To Gerbert, Abbot of St. Pierre le Vif at Sens, is due a detailed narrative according to which Saint Savinianus and Saint Potentianus were sent to Sens by St. Peter with St. Altinus; the latter, it was said, came to Orléans as its first bishop. Before the ninth century there is no historical trace in the Diocese of Sens of this Apostolic mission of St. Altinus, nor in the Diocese of Orléans before the end of the fifteenth. Christianity was an illegal cult in Roman law until the Edict of Milan.Diclopitus is the first authentic bishop; he figures among the bishops of Gaul who ratified the absolution of St. Athanasius. Other bishops of the early period are: St. Euvertius, about 355 to 385, according to M. Cuissard; Anianus, who invoked the aid of the "patrician" Ætius against the invasion of Attila, and forced the Huns to raise the siege of Orléans ; St. Prosper ; St. Monitor ; St. Flou, died in 490; St. Eucherius, native of Orléans and a monk of Jumièges, who protested against the depredations of Waifre, a companion of Charles Martel, and was first exiled by this prince to Cologne, then to Liège, and died at the monastery of St. Trond.
Cathedral
The cathedral of Sainte Croix, perhaps built and consecrated by Bishop Euvertius in the fourth century, was destroyed by fire in 999, and rebuilt between 1278 and 1329; the Protestants pillaged and destroyed it during the Wars of Religion, from 1562 to 1567; the Bourbon kings restored the cathedral in the 17th century.In 816, the Emperor Louis the Pious held a council at Aix, at which it was ordered that Canons and Canonesses live together according to a set of rules, expressed in great detail. In the Roman synod of Pope Eugene II of November 826, it was ordered that Canons live together in a cloister next to the church. In 876, the Council of Pavia decreed in Canon X that the bishops should enclose the Canons: uti episcopi in civitatibus suis proximum ecclesiae claustrum instituant, in quo ipsi cum clero secundum canonicam regulam Deo militent, et sacerdotes suos ad hoc constringant, ut ecclesiam non relinquant et alibi habitare praesumant. The term "canon" first appears at Orléans next to the signatures of eight persons in a charter of Bishop Isambard in 1038.
The cathedral of Sainte-Croix was served and administered by the Chapter, which was composed of twelve dignities and forty six-canons. The earliest known dean, Humbert, in 974, bears the old title "abbot", but in 1027, Erfred signs himself decanus, and the title abbot disappears.
Plagues in Orléans
It is recorded that in the early Middle Ages, there were plagues in 590. 874, and 906, and a plague of locusts in 1043. Leprosy was alreeady known in Orléans by 549, when the Fifth Council of Orléans ordered the bishops to take care of the sufferers. Nothing is known about the Black Death in Orléans in 1348–1349; the record of morbidity and mortality kept by the Hotel-Dieu is either missing or was never written. Records do survive testifying to its bloody reappearance in 1414, 1430, 1458 and 1482–1483. In 1430, the plague carried off the hospital's chaplain, and the survivors were not able to find a replacement. In the 16th century, there were twenty-two outbreaks of the plague; in 1529, 2383 burials were reported; in 1530, 2736; in 1531, 3080; in 1532, 2675; in 1533, 2752 burials. In 1562, from August to November, according to a report of Theodore de Béze, the Protestant leader, more than 10,000 persons died in Orléans.Abbey of Micy
After his victory over the Alamanni, the Frankish king Clovis was bent on the sack of Verdun, but the archpriest there obtained mercy for his fellow-citizens. To St. Euspicius and his nephew St. Mesmin, Clovis also gave the domain of Micy, near Orléans at the confluence of the Loire and the Loiret, for a monastery. When Euspicius died, the said St. Maximinus became abbot, and during his rule the religious life flourished there notably. The monks of Micy contributed much to the civilization of the Orléans region; they cleared and drained the lands and taught the semi-barbarous inhabitants the worth and dignity of agricultural work. Early in the eighth century, Theodulfus restored the Abbey of Micy and at his request St. Benedict of Aniane sent fourteen monks and visited the abbey himself.From Micy monastic life spread within and around the diocese. St. Liphardus and St. Urbicius founded the Abbey of Meung-sur-Loire; St. Lyé died a recluse in the forest of Orléans; Viator of Orleans in Sologne; St. Doulchard in the forest of Ambly near Bourges. Leonard of Noblac introduced the monastic life into the territory of Limoges; St. Almir, St. Ulphacius, and St. Bomer in the vicinity of Montmirail; St. Calais and St. Leonard of Vendœuvre in the valley of the Sarthe; St. Fraimbault, and the aforesaid St. Bomer in the Passais near Laval; St. Leonard of Dunois; St. Alva and St. Ernier in Perche; St. Laumer became Abbot of Corbion. St. Lubin, a monk of Micy, became Bishop of Chartres from 544 to 56. Finally Agilus, Viscount of Orléans, was also a protector of Micy.
The last abbot of Micy, Chapt de Rastignac, was one of the victims of the 1792 "September Massacres", at Paris, in the prison of L'Abbaye.
Theodulf
Charlemagne had the church of St. Aignan rebuilt, and reconstructed the monastery of St. Pierre le Puellier.It is not known when Bishop Theodulfus began to govern, but it is certain that he was already bishop in 798, when Charlemagne sent him into Narbonne and Provence as missus dominicus. Under king Louis le Débonnaire he was accused of aiding the rebellious King of Italy, was deposed and imprisoned four years in a monastery at Angers, but was released when Louis came to Angers in 821, reportedly after hearing Theodulfus sing "All Glory, Laud and Honour." The "Capitularies" which Theodulfus addressed to the clergy of Orléans are considered a most important monument of Catholic tradition on the duties of priests and the faithful. His Ritual, his Penitential, his treatise on baptism, confirmation and the Eucharist, his edition of the Bible, a work of fine penmanship preserved in the Puy cathedral, reveal him as one of the foremost men of his time. His fame rests chiefly on his devotion to the spread of learning. The Abbey of Ferrières was then becoming under Alcuin a centre of learning. Theodulfus opened the Abbey of Fleury to the young noblemen sent thither by Charlemagne, invited the clergy to establish free schools in the country districts, and quoted for them, "These that are learned shall shine as the brightness of the firmament: and they that instruct many to justice, as stars to all eternity". One monument of his time still survives in the diocese, the apse of the church of Germigny-des-Prés modelled after the imperial chapel, and yet retaining its unique mosaic decoration.
In October 856, the Northmen invaded and surrounded Orléans, which was able to avoid pillage and burning by the payment of a large sum of money. The Northmen turned their attention instead on the abbey of Saint-Micy, which was entirely destroyed. They burned Paris in 857, and returned to Orléans in 865, when they destroyed part of the fortifications, pillaged the city, and put it to the torch. The churches went up in flames, except for the cathedral. They then turned on the abbey of Saint-Benedict in Fleury, which they found entirely evacuated; nonetheless, they set fire to all the buildings.
In the cathedral of Orléans on 31 December 987, Hugh Capet had his son Robert crowned king.
Pope Innocent II and Bernard of Clairvaux visited Fleury and Orléans in 1130.
Education
Already by the 12th century, the School of Grammar and Rhetoric at Orléans was noted for its quality. In the medieval French poem, "The Battle of the Seven Arts," rhetoric is personified as the Lady of Orléans. There were also teachers of law in the city. Orleans became an unexpected beneficiary of a decree issued by Pope Honorius III on 16 November 1219, prohibiting the teaching and learning of civil law at the University of Paris, on pain of excommunication. Numbeers of students and professors migrated to Orleans. Scholarship in Orléans received another unintended benefit when the Masters of the University of Paris, in opposition to the royal court, the papal legate, and the bishop and clergy of Paris, suspended teaching and closed the university in 1229. Some teachers withdrew to England, to Oxford or Cambridge; others, particularly those in the legal facuolty, to French schools, particularly Orléans and Angers. On 17 January 1235, Pope Gregory IX, in response to an inquiry from the bishop of Orléans, ruled that Honorius III's prohibitions extended only to Paris, and that the bishop was free to exercise his powers and allow the law to be taught and studied in his jurisdiction.On 27 January 1306, in the bull "Dum Perspicaciter", Pope Clement V raised the studium of Orléans to the status of a university, with the same privileges as enjoyed by the University of Toulouse. The powers over the educational establishment which had once belonged to the Scholasticus of the cathedral Chapter were transferred to the bishop and the Masters. The usual disorders between town and gown reached such an extent that Philip IV of France intervened in 1312, in favor of the magistrates of the city, and suppressed both the university and the "nations" of the students. Abused by the domination of the magistrates, the university engaged in a secession of its own, and withdrew to Nevers in 1316. In 1320, after negotiations with both Pope John XXII and King Philip V of France, the masters and students, with most of their privilege restored, returned to Orléans. By 1337, the university had ten regent professors, presided over by a rector; the scholars were organized into ten "nations": France, Normandy, Champagne, Burgundy, Bourbon, Aquitaine, Picardy, Touraine, Scotland, and Germany.