Pierre-Joseph de Castellane

Pierre-Joseph de Castellane (* 1661 in the diocese of Senez ; † March 21, 1739 in Fréjus ) was a French Roman Catholic clergyman , abbot and bishop .

life and career

Origin and priestly career

Pierre-Joseph (also: Joseph-Pierre ) de Castellane-Norante came from the Provencal noble family Castellane, which provided a total of 9 bishops in the 17th and 18th centuries. We know that he was born in 1661 in the diocese of Senez , to which the towns of Castellane and Norante belonged; Place and date of birth are not known. After studying theology in Paris, he was ordained a priest in 1698. As Vicar General of the Archdiocese of Aix , he was appointed Bishop of Fréjus in 1715 . At the same time he was appointed Commendatabab of the Benedictine Abbey of Saint-Basle in Verzy near Reims .

Bishop of Fréjus

Bishop Castellane experienced a plague epidemic in his diocese (but not in Fréjus itself) in 1720 . He devoted a considerable part of his energy to combating Jansenism , which in 1713 (at the insistence of Louis XIV. ) Pope Clement XI. in the bull unigenitus had been convicted. Ultimately, the question was whether the Christian God is more of a punishing (according to the Jansenists) or a loving (according to the Jesuits ) God. He forbade the Jansenist oratorians of Cotignac to hear confession. In 1724 he had to settle a dispute between the abbess and the nuns in the Cistercian convent of Saint-Bernard in Hyères . In 1727 he belonged to a college of bishops in Embrun , which deposed the Jansenist bishop Jean Soanen von Senez and banished him to a monastery. Castellane, who had earned the reputation of a humane shepherd in the diocese, died in 1739 at the age of 77 or 78 years.

Motto

Castellane's episcopal motto was that of his noble house: May d'hounour que d'hounours (Honor stands above the honors).

literature

• Louis Porte: Histoire du diocèse de Fréjus-Toulon . Editions du Lau 2017, pp. 84–86.

Web links

• Short biography , French
• Entry in catholic-hierarchy.org