Boundaries of Faith: Catholics and Protestants in the Diocese of Geneva 9780271090696

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Boundaries of Faith

Habent sua fata libelli Early Modern Studies Series General Editor Michael Wolfe St. John’s University Editorial Board of Early Modern Studies Elaine Beilin Framingham State College Christopher Celenza

Raymond A. Mentzer University of Iowa Helen Nader

Johns Hopkins University

University of Arizona

Miriam U. Chrisman

Charles G. Nauert

University of Massachusetts, Emerita Barbara B. Diefendorf Boston University Paula Findlen

University of Missouri, Emeritus Max Reinhart University of Georgia Sheryl E. Reiss

Stanford University

Cornell University

Scott H. Hendrix

Robert V. Schnucker

Princeton Theological Seminary

Truman State University, Emeritus

Jane Campbell Hutchison

Nicholas Terpstra

University of Wisconsin–Madison

University of Toronto

Robert M. Kingdon University of Wisconsin, Emeritus Ronald Love University of West Georgia Mary B. McKinley University of Virginia

Margo Todd University of Pennsylvania James Tracy University of Minnesota Merry Wiesner-Hanks University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee

Boundaries of Faith

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Catholics and Protestants in the Diocese of Geneva

Jill Fehleison

Early Modern Studies 5 Truman State University Press

Copyright © 2010 Truman State University Press, Kirksville, Missouri USA All rights reserved tsup.truman.edu Cover: Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Solicitudo Rustica (Country Concerns), 1552–54. Pen and brown ink over black chalk, 244 x 352 mm. © The Trustees of the British Museum, London. Cover design: Teresa Wheeler Type: Minion Pro © Adobe Systems Inc.; Duc De Berry © Adobe Systems Inc. and Linotype AG Printed by: Thomson-Shore, Dexter, Michigan USA Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Fehleison, Jill, 1965– Boundaries of faith / Jill Fehleison. p. cm. — (Early modern studies ; 5) Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index. ISBN 978-1-935503-11-8 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Catholic Church. Diocese of Geneva (Switzerland)—History. 2. CounterReformation—Switzerland—Geneva Region. 3. Geneva Region (Switzerland)— Church history. 4. Francis, de Sales, Saint, 1567–1622. 5. Granier, Claude de, d. 1602. 6. Sales, Jean-Francois de, d. 1635. I. Title. BX1593.G4F4 2010 282'.4945109031—dc22 2010030709

No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any format by any means without written permission from the publisher. The paper in this publication meets or exceeds the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1992.

Contents Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii 1 The Reformation and the Diocese of Geneva. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 2 Understanding Boundaries Landscape of Catholic Reform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 3 Winning Converts The Mission in the Duchy of Chablais. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53 4 Shifting Borders Savoyards Become French. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100 5 Cleaning Houses Reform of the Clergy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 6 Defining Spaces Reform of the Laity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181 7 Reform Ideals and Reality. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239 About the Author. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255

Acknowledgments There are so many people who offered advice, support, and encouragement through the process of transforming my dissertation into a book. At Texas Tech University, David Troyansky and James Brink offered me my first exposure to early modern Europe when I returned to graduate school. At Ohio State University, John C. Rule, Dale K. Van Kley, Kenneth Andrien, and the late Joseph Lynch and Nicholas Howe all encouraged me to continue with the project and offered valuable guidance on how to proceed. While in graduate school, the department of history, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, and P.E.O. International provided much-needed funds to support my research trips to France. During my three-year postdoctoral fellowship at George Mason University, Jack Censer, Mack Holt, and T. Mills Kelly provided invaluable feedback on my scholarship as well as advice on how to navigate the world of academia. My colleagues and friends at Quinnipiac University, continually supported me and urged me to continue whenever I faced hurdles in the writing process. The University and the College of Arts and Sciences provided much-needed research funds to allow me to travel to Geneva and to write during the summers. I appreciate all the staff members at the French departmental archives of the Haute-Savoie in Annecy, of the Savoie in Chambéry, and the Côte d’Or in Dijon who offered patient help to me as I navigated their collections. In Geneva, the staffs at both the University Library and the State Archives provided clear and professional directions as I used their archives. The Rare Book Room at the University of Maryland proved a fruitful place to work during a hot DC summer. My work has been helped so much by the many people who offered comments and feedback at conferences and seminars along the way. The Erasmus Institute Summer Dissertation Seminar in History at the University of Notre Dame directed by Patricia Herlihy was crucial to my finishing the dissertation. The NEH Summer Seminar at Calvin College m vii l

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directed by Karin Maag and Raymond Mentzer helped me expand my work beyond its original Catholic boundaries. I thank my entire family for all their moral and financial support through graduate school and beyond. My parents, Robert and Nancy Fehleison, always had a supportive word for me throughout the long trek of graduate school, the job search, and the tenure process. I know my father would be so happy that I finished the book, and I wish he were here to see it. I thank my daughter, Juliana, who arrived near the end of the project, for her good nature that allowed me to continue with my scholarship and not feel too guilty. My husband, Bernard Grindel, has seen me through the entire process from the first research trip to Annecy to the final draft. I thank him immensely for all his help, suggestions, and patience and for being my in-house editor and sounding board.

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ith the advent of the Reformation, Europe lost the religious homogeneity that many believed crucial to the stability and prosperity of western Christendom, and the sixteenth century saw religious and political strife explode as the continent grappled with competing views of the path to salvation. Rome was slow to respond with any focused program to address the fragmenting of beliefs, but leaders of Catholicism convened at the Council of Trent between the years 1545 and 1563 to develop a plan of action that responded both to the proliferation of Protestant groups and to problems within their own faith. Out of the reform movement emerged new religious orders, lay confraternities, missions, and seminaries, and stricter rules and regulations for both clergy and laity. The new measures and movements ordained and inspired by Trent cannot be examined in isolation from other realities of the day, and any investigation of reform must consider political, confessional, and social conditions unique to the locale under study. Reform must be placed in the context of multifaceted secular and religious powers to comprehend more fully the process and results of implementing Tridentine decrees at the local and regional levels. Catholic leaders, forced to abandon the city of Geneva in the years 1535 to 1536, sought the protection of the House of Savoy and found a home in exile in Annecy. The sixteenth century was not kind to either the bishops of Geneva or the dukes of Savoy; they lost towns, property, and influence to France and to the Protestant cities of Geneva and Berne. It was not until the 1580s that the political and religious climate of the region allowed the bishops to commence a program of reform, inspired by the Council of Trent and focused on winning back populations lost to 1

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the Reformed faith and reenergizing the Catholic clergy and laity within the parishes, with the ultimate goal—at least on paper—of recreating the pre-Reformation boundaries of the diocese and reclaiming sacred spaces. These lofty aspirations were surely tempered by the nearby reminder of what had been lost in the Reformation—the city of Geneva—and by the seventeenth century, few in Rome held a realistic hope of winning back all the Protestants into the Catholic fold.1 The more realistic aims were to revitalize the Roman faith and, wherever possible, to weaken its rivals both psychologically and numerically. Personnel inspired by a renewed vigor emanating from Rome assumed leadership of the diocese beginning in 1579 with the episcopate of Claude de Granier, part of a new generation of bishops who had received their education in Rome as the Council of Trent drew to a close in 1563. Succeeding Granier in 1602, François de Sales, one of the leading figures of early modern Catholicism, was bishop for twenty years after serving the diocese as provost of the cathedral canons and being appointed coadjutor in 1599, and was in turn succeeded by his less beloved and charismatic but certainly able and devout younger brother, Jean-François de Sales. The careers of these three offer an important window into the process of Catholic reform.

Catholic Reformation Historiography

A short review of the relevant historiography helps situate this study in the broader context of the Reformation. Scholars have given decidedly less attention to the consequences of the Reformation on Catholicism than to the numerous Protestant groups, and consequently, the historiography related to the Roman Catholic faith is much less comprehensive for the early modern period and the reasons why much of Europe stayed Catholic are still often neglected in the broader narrative of the Reformation era. Confessional and national divisions within Reformation studies have further contributed to the marginal nature of Catholicism in the historiography since it remained a multinational religion. Only after World War II was there much interest in what happened to Catholicism during the Reformation. One notable scholar who took up the task was German Catholic theologian Hubert Jedin, who almost single-handedly sparked a new interest in the study of Catholic reform movements. In a seminal article, Jedin laid out a new terminology for  Bouwsma, Venice and Defense of Republican Liberty, 294.

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scholars, calling for the use of “Counter-Reformation”—the general term in Reformation studies—only for the movement against Protestants and “Catholic Reform” for the revival and renewal within the Roman Catholic Church.2 Despite Jedin’s framework, a consensus about terminology has remained elusive with “Catholic Reformation” and “Counter-Reformation” continuing to be used interchangeably. More than a half century after Jedin’s article, John W. O’Malley called for the more inclusive term “early modern Catholicism” to be used in conjunction with the other terminology because “it has a scope and a flexibility the others lack.”3 O’Malley’s framework of using all three terms makes sense and goes toward clarifying the multiple components of Catholicism present in the early modern world. Hubert Jedin devoted his scholarly life to understanding the Catholic Church in the context of the Reformation. Despite the failure of the conciliar movement from its origins in the late fourteenth century, Jedin saw the Council of Trent as an heir to the ideas produced during the Great Schism (1378–1417) as reform-minded church leaders continued to press for a general council. Jedin reveals the complicated relationship between church officials and secular rulers as they vied for influence during the course of Trent with both seeing potential dangers in a council curtailing their power.4 These studies of the council provide an early example of how Catholicism of the early modern world needs scholarly attention independent of the Protestant Reformation and why it remains a crucial area of study. Jedin’s work reflects his religious affiliation, complimenting Rome’s efforts and accomplishments, but signaled a new scholarly interest in the study of Catholicism within the larger framework of Christian reform. Henry Outram Evennett further generated interest in a rigorous exploration of early modern Catholicism through a series of lectures at Trinity College, Cambridge University. Evennett offered an analytical outline for approaching the study of Catholic reform and attempted to offer an overall assessment of its influence and significance on the early modern world. His observations remain relevant for scholarship of the twenty-first century. Evennett asserts that the Counter-Reformation, as 2

 Jedin, “Catholic Reformation or Counter Reformation?” 21–45.  O’Malley, Trent and All That, 143. 4  Jedin, Struggle for the Council, 5, 14, 30, 32, 61, 62, 76. 3

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he calls the entire movement, must be seen as a deeply felt religious movement and not just as a resistance to “progressive” forces of the Renaissance and Reformation.5 According to Evennett, a new spirituality within religious reformers played a greater role in spreading the Counter-Reformation than did any innovations in institutions or ordinances. This observation is a useful reminder that people’s spiritual practices could diverge greatly from official dogma. As Evennett views it, this “reinvigoration of Catholic spiritual life” manifested itself in a new clergy educated in seminaries, and new pastoral duties that passed down the new religious vigor to the laity. An example of this new Catholic leader was Ignatius of Loyola, who Evennett claims was the embodiment of the new reforming spirit.6 Ultimately Evennett argues that this revitalization of Catholicism allowed the church of Rome to continue into the modern world.7 Evennett, like Jedin, displays his religious predilection and emerged as a champion of the Catholic faith, but both men moved scholarship away from defensive sectarianism and toward a more critical and interpretative direction. Scholarship of the 1960s and 1970s took a dramatic turn as historians embraced the approaches of social scientists to aid in the study of social and cultural history.8 One of the most influential scholars in religious history was Jean Delumeau, who explored what he viewed as a transformation of culture during the early modern period. He asserted that prior to the Protestant and Catholic reform movements of the sixteenth century, most of Europe was pagan, and it was only after the rural and superstitious religious practices were suppressed during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries that Europe became truly Christian.9 Delumeau offered a fresh perspective by looking at both confessions together, and sparked a new interest in the study of religious culture. While most historians who have come after Delumeau dispute this view of a pagan pre-Reformation Europe, his work helped launch a new  Evennett, Spirit of the Counter-Reformation, 2, 4, 24. First given in the 1950s, these lectures were published posthumously by one of Evennett’s students, John Bossy. 6  Ibid., 3, 43, 45. 7  Ibid., 21, 125. 8  For a clear and concise overview, see Holt, “Social History of the Reformation.” Two classic works used by historians are Geertz, Interpretation of Cultures; and Durkheim, Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. 9  Delumeau, Le Catholicisme Entre Luther et Voltaire, 241–42, 256–58. 5

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interest in the Catholic side of reform, especially in what has become known as “popular religion.” Taking up the call of his mentor H. O. Evennett, John Bossy also addressed the Reformation’s influence on European piety and culture. Like Delumeau, Bossy saw a more uniform Catholicism after the implementation of the reforms of Trent, but he does not view late medieval religious practices as pagan; instead he views pre-Reformation Christianity as more communally oriented and bound by kinship ties.10 In what has become a standard work for the exploration of early modern religion, Bossy examined how Protestants and Catholics responded to similar forces within society by trying to reform the late medieval church, and viewed the two camps as often more similar than different.11 Bossy argued that both confessions were trying to resolve the issues of penance and salvation, and both faiths used similar tools to reform their followers, most importantly the catechism. In addition, both groups faced similar resistance from their parishioners, especially when it came to reforming popular practices like devotion to saints.12 Protestants and Catholics relied on the written word to defend and clarify their theological positions, but Bossy argues that Catholics did not become successful at using print until the seventeenth century.13 Ultimately, Bossy sees an end of unified Christendom by 1700 because of the reforms by both Catholics and Protestants. Christianity went from meaning a “body of people” to a “body of beliefs.”14 With this type of scholarship, there is a danger of minimizing the differences in order to study the two faiths concurrently. Delumeau and Bossy embrace the concept of a shared culture among confessions as a cornerstone of their work. Examining how the two confessions evolved in and reacted to a similar religious climate remains a fruitful area of study in order to more fully realize the impact of the Reformation. The last twenty-five years have seen more regional studies of Catholic reform, in part because the diocesan structure lends itself to study, with many dioceses leaving behind extensive records in the wake of

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 Bossy, “Counter-Reformation and the People of Catholic Europe,” 59.  Bossy, Christianity in the West. 12  Ibid., 118–19. 13  Ibid., 100. Publications associated with the Diocese of Geneva support this timing. 14  Ibid., 171. 11

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Trent. A study of a single diocese allows for close exploration of regional variation and of change over time, revealing how local situations shaped and even transformed confessional identities.15 According to Philip Hoffman’s work on the Diocese of Lyons, the Counter-Reformation significantly altered the role of the priest, with Trent calling for a better-educated and disciplined priest who was willing to impose reforms upon his flock. Furthermore, Hoffman asserts that the reformers altered or suppressed religious practices that allowed parishioners to participate together in joyful celebrations, causing communal relations to lose the spontaneity and emotion that villagers valued.16 Keith Luria, in his study of the Diocese of Grenoble, sought to probe the “nature of cultural changes in early modern villages” through the visitation records of Bishop Etienne Le Camus. Luria asserts that the harsh directives imposed by the reform-minded Bishop Le Camus changed popular religious practices, but local parishioners modified the new requirements that were placed on their community after Trent to make them more palatable.17 Both Hoffman and Luria see reform coming from above, but Hoffman concludes that local elites were allied closely with church officials, whereas Luria finds the secular and religious elites to be much less monolithic. If it is true that religious practices became more closely monitored and less fulfilling, historians need to look further at why many people willingly remained Catholic or why some regions even returned to the faith, including Poland and parts of Savoy.18 Catholicism’s continued and renewed appeal among many segments of lay society remains a neglected area of Reformation studies. Efforts at a synthesis of the Catholic Reformation/CounterReformation tend to make generalizations for a wide geographic region or a long period of time.19 Yet the majority of Europe caught up in the consequences of the Reformation manifested significant regional variations and local focal points evident in all aspects of religiosity. Recent surveys have attempted to offer more nuanced  I am especially indebted to Hoffman, Church and Community; Luria, Territories of Grace; and Forster, Counter-Reformation in the Villages. 16  Hoffman, Church and Community, 48, 70, 72, 75, 82, 87, 96, 129. 17  Luria, Territories of Grace, 2, 75. 18  For examination of conversion efforts in Poland, see Kowalski, “From the ‘Land of Diverse Sects’ to National Religion,” 482–526. 19  Examples of standard surveys since World War II include Janelle, Catholic Reformation; Daniel-Rops, Catholic Reformation; Dickens, Counter Reformation; and Searle, Counter Reformation. 15

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views of Catholicism, addressing how the implementation of Trent was not uniform, yet they continue to rely heavily on the earlier general scholarship. Robert Bireley, drawing from the influential works of Delumeau, Evennett, and Bossy, sees early modern Catholicism as a response not only to religious trends but also to the changing world in general from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century.20 He concludes that the structure of the Catholic Church became more like the centralized states that emerged during the same period, but notes that despite the papacy’s increased resemblance to a secular state, “there were wide variations geographically and differences between cities and towns, and rural areas.”21 Michael Mullett sees many of the ideas of Catholic reform already present in late medieval Catholicism; Martin Luther’s actions gave “a sense of the urgency in Catholic minds of the need for reform.”22 Like Jedin, Mullett links the Council of Trent to the earlier unrealized conciliar movement, and much of what could be described as popular piety can also be traced to the Middle Ages.23 Both Bireley and Mullett acknowledge that Trent’s implementation varied widely over time and location, but both see important accomplishments by the Catholic Church. Bireley sees the development of a clear distinction between Catholicism and Protestantism by 1700 as “a great achievement of the Council of Trent which contributed to order and to a sense of Catholic identity.”24 But what constituted a Catholic or other religious identity continued to vary based on local situations. Despite these recent overviews and significant regional studies, there is more to learn about the variations of Catholic reform in different locales. Mullett observes that there was always tension between centralization and standardization of reform by Rome and the need to adapt to local realities.25 During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Alpine region around Geneva was a religious, political, and cultural crossroads, thus the Diocese of Geneva offers a worthy laboratory to explore the many consequences of the political and religious changes of  Bireley, Refashioning of Catholicism, 2.  Ibid., 203, 210. 22  Mullett, Catholic Reformation, ix. 23  Ibid., 1, 8, 25. Mullett draws from the works of Evennett and Jedin as well as the earlier surveys of Dickens and Daniel-Rops. 24  Bireley, Refashioning of Catholicism, 202. 25  Mullett, Catholic Reformation, 142. 20 21

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the period. The political borders fluctuated as France, Savoy, Spain, and the cities of Geneva and Berne all vied for territory and influence. The political state of flux, coupled with the consequences of competing confessional identities, imposed a patchwork of overlapping political, sacred, economic, and social loyalties. The post-Tridentine Diocese of Geneva, whose history has too long been overshadowed by John Calvin’s prominence in the region, was at the forefront of reform in a contested area. Despite the influx of ideas from Rome, religion remained local for most Catholics who lived in the Alps. Scholars need to explore alternative frameworks to the concept of separate “popular” and “elite” religious activities that dominates much of the relevant historiography. Peter Burke’s influential Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe explores village religious practices by viewing popular and orthodox religion as almost separate belief systems.26 For the small, primarily rural parishes of Geneva only sporadically in contact with well-educated clergy, the popular/elite dichotomy is not a very useful interpretation. Natalie Zemon Davis points out the danger of identifying a religious ideal and labeling anything different as an “aberration.” Historians still too often dismiss rural populations as passive recipients of doctrine from the clergy and lacking any individual agency. This view does not take into account the role of laypeople in the creation of new shrines, the performance of religious plays, the formation of heretical movements, or the development of practices of worship later accepted by the upper hierarchy. Instead, Davis argues that historians should examine “the range of people’s relation with the sacred and the supernatural.”27 One alternative to the popular/elite dichotomy is the exploration of “local religion” as employed by William Christian in his work on religion in early modern Spain. He claims that “each village had its own calendar of sacred times, marked on the village memory by plagues and divine signs, part of solemn contracts with advocates of heaven.” Christian concludes that the Catholic Reformation reinforced local religion and the clergy only tried to curb perceived excesses.28 Other scholars of Spanish Catholicism in the early modern period have adopted Christian’s approach, including Allyson Poska, who explores the impact of  Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe.  Davis, “Some Tasks and Themes in the Study of Popular Religion,” 308–9, 312. 28  Christian, Local Religion in Sixteenth-Century Spain, 174, 179. 26 27

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reform on the parishes in the Diocese of Ourense.29 Defining orthodoxy more broadly to include a wider range of beliefs or even multiple orthodoxies in a single belief system better suits the situation in the Alpine region around Geneva. Social psychologist Jean-Pierre Deconchy provides a definition of an orthodox system based on the expectation of individuals in the system. He calls a person “orthodox if he accepts or even requests, that his thoughts, his language and his behavior be regulated by the ideological group to which he belongs.”30 Such an expansion of the idea of orthodoxy does more to explain the success of Catholicism in a fractured place like the Diocese of Geneva than would a theory of separation between elite and popular religion.

Space and Boundaries and the Diocese of Geneva

The fractured nature of the Diocese of Geneva demands, in addition to a theory of religious thought, a due appreciation of the influence of place on thinking and actions. By using the framework of space and boundaries, this study of the Diocese of Geneva sheds light on individual and communal reactions to the religious and political transformations that embroiled the area for much of the early modern period. Anthropologist Fredrik Barth asserts that boundaries between competing groups are not static, and that such groups go to great lengths to maintain cultural differences.31 Will Coster and Andrew Spicer claim “the ways in which space was created, and recreated, are obvious means of investigating how change was achieved, or, just as importantly how limited was its extent.”32 Three crucial areas that shaped local populations in the Diocese of Geneva and their religious identities were the negotiation of sacred space among diocesan leaders, clergy, and the laity; the shifting confessional boundaries between a resurgent Catholic faith and maturing Reformed faith; and the changing political borders between France and Savoy. As the parishes that made up the diocese were at the center of religious and political conflicts during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, villagers experienced the convergence of sacred and secular  See Kamen, The Phoenix and the Flame; and Poska, Regulating the People.  Deconchy, “Rationality and Social Control in Orthodox Systems,” 430. 31  Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries, 10–11. 32  Coster and Spicer, “Introduction: Dimensions of Sacred Space,” 3. 29 30

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agendas. Border inhabitants often maintained numerous ties that could be personal, cultural, economic, and sacred—ties that did not necessarily coincide with the official boundaries. Social boundaries do not need to have corresponding “territorial counterparts.”33 Even now, national boundaries are often drawn with little thought to the kinship or cultural bonds of the area’s inhabitants.34 Better understanding of how communities of the past coped with living in disputed border regions can provide a useful framework for other studies of space and boundaries and offers important insight into more contemporary cases around the globe. At its most basic level, the fundamental goal of most Tridentine reformers was to establish a community that revolved around a clearly delineated parish space populated by a laity that practiced Catholicism as defined by Rome; however, this goal often came into conflict with the laity’s own ideas about its religious life and space. Trying to create a separate time and place for sacred activities was often difficult since most of the villagers’ lives revolved around the agriculture cycle, focused on their small plots of grain-bearing land and paltry herds of dairy cattle. The introduction of new rules and practices such as additional days of devotion, catechism classes after Sunday mass, and participation in confraternal orders did not always fit into the bucolic lives of the parishioners and required negotiation between the clergy and the laity before the new activities could be incorporated into the community. Just as Peter Sahlins argues that “both state formation and nation building were two-way processes” between the center and periphery, it is crucial that we view the relationships between diocesan officials and villages as two-way streets where influence traveled up and down the hierarchy.35 The sources on which this current study relies reveal dialogues between all members of society as communities attempted to establish or maintain boundaries that were both physical and spiritual.36 Those who lived within the parishes of the diocese constantly redefined space and, in so

 Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries, 15.  Wilson and Donnan, Border Identities, 13. See pages 4–13 for an introduction to the anthropology of borders. 35  Sahlins, Boundaries, 8. 36  Classic theoretical texts on space/place including Bachelard, Poetics of Space; Lefebvre, Production of Space; and Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane are still the foundation for examining sacred and profane space. 33 34

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doing, contributed to marking out the geographical space in their own spiritual terms. One aspect of contestation over space was the conflict between religious exigencies and the prosaic demands of agriculture. Catholic leaders frequently possessed a different understanding of how sacred space should be treated than did the parish laity and had difficulty communicating to the faithful that church properties should be used only for sacred purposes. A consensus of sacred and profane space was not necessarily present among Catholics.37 The bishops tried to carve out space and time within a parish to be used exclusively for sacred purpose, but even they sent mixed signals. The bishop often gave local curés the authority to allow people to tend their crops on holy days during critical periods of the agriculture cycle. Bishops permitted individual villages to continue long-standing religious customs often at the expense of more Tridentine practices. The reformers hoped the laity’s ideas of sacred and profane would come to mirror their own, but parishioners had their own well-defined ideas about the role of the divine in their lives. They often found long-standing local devotions tied to their agrarian culture more fulfilling than many new practices encouraged by Rome. As geographer Yi-Fu Tuan observes, “place can acquire deep meaning for the adult through the steady accretion of sentiment over the years.”38 The study of people’s relationships with space can help us understand “how it reflected and reinforced their understanding of sanctity, divinity, and themselves.”39 Laypeople viewed the parish church as their own and wanted it to meet spiritual needs as they perceived them, not necessarily as pope, council, or bishop ordained. The bishops of Geneva were not shaping the Catholic faith in isolation; competing beliefs provided pervasive and enduring disruption to communities and their sacred spaces. The boundaries between the Reformed and Catholic communities in this Alpine region did not remain static after the entrance of the Protestant faith in the 1530s into villages around Geneva. As in so many turbulent places in the world today, both sides held long-standing suspicions of each other that could

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 Coster and Spicer raise the issue of differing views of the same sacred space among the Catholic minority in England; “Introduction: Dimensions of Sacred Space,” 7. 38  Tuan, Space and Place, 33. 39  Coster and Spicer, “Introduction: Dimensions of Sacred Space,” 3.

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flare up at any time, disturbing tentative coexistence. In the 1590s, Catholic missionaries, who were inspired by a renewed spirituality emanating from Italy, launched a program to win back villages lost to the faith of Geneva and Berne. The duchy of Chablais, the region south of Lake Geneva, became a spiritual battleground where a small band of Catholic missionaries led by François de Sales confronted villagers and the Reformed ministers dispatched from Geneva. The Catholics entered an often-hostile arena where they preached, counseled, staged devotions, and disputed publicly with Protestant theologians. These missionary priests challenged their Protestant counterparts for possession of the physical and spiritual spaces in these communities. Through their public displays of their faith, the Catholics staked out their territory and reclaimed the streets. Barth stresses that the maintenance of cultural boundaries is not achieved “only by a once-and-for-all recruitment but by continual expression and validation.”40 As Natalie Zemon Davis and Barbara Diefendorf demonstrate in their exploration of religious rituals and violence during the French Wars of Religion, the Catholics in the duchy of Chablais sought to resacralize the village space after it had been “polluted” by the Protestants.41 In numerous villages in the duchy of Chablais, the Catholic missionaries reasserted the key elements of their faith; yet in the Pays de Gex, the region just west of Geneva, Protestants maintained their identity despite the reintroduction of Catholicism there a few years later. Luria reminds us, “The boundary also remained open because Catholics and Protestants had to live together, govern their communities, carry on their business and professional affairs, marry each other, and bury their dead.”42 The Diocese of Geneva demonstrates that both religious identity and boundaries remained fluid several generations into the Reformation. For the Catholic missionaries, their spiritual rivals were not the only actors they had to consider in their reforming efforts since church and state remained interconnected on many levels. It was a complicated relationship that has continued to fascinate historians. Some historians have observed that upper levels of the hierarchy of both church

 Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries, 15.  Davis, “Rites of Violence” in Davis, Society and Culture in Early Modern France, 152–87; and Diefendorf, Beneath the Cross. 42  Luria, Sacred Boundaries, 308. 40 41

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and state saw mutual benefit to a strong confessional identity. Scholars, most notably Heinz Schilling and Wolfgang Reinhard, have furthered the study of the German Reformation through examination of the links of church and state with their confessionalization framework.43 Schilling and Reinhard’s confessionalization paradigm has proven useful in examining Protestantism—particularly Lutheranism and Calvinism— alongside Catholicism as parallel processes. Schilling asserts, “The differences of the three varieties of confessionalization in theology and spirituality as well as in their legal and institutional forms were less important than their functional and structural similarities when their impact upon state and society is considered.”44 Examining confessions in concert after the mid-sixteenth century as a trajectory towards modern institutions is useful, but the clear and consistent link between religion, state building, and social disciplining is less convincing, especially when applied to regions beyond capitals. Of social discipline, Reinhard argues that churches had to rely on the aid of secular authorities, which led to rulers of France, Spain, and the majority of the Italian princes and republics having control of their national churches.45 Gerald Strauss asserts that church and state found the visitation an ideal instrument for both institutions to assert greater control over the behavior of the populous.46 Ronnie Po-Chia Hsia summarizes this view for Catholic countries: “Counter-Reformation goals coincided with the interests of Catholic dynasties in centralizing the early modern state; the fervor of Catholic reform was sustained by a social/spiritual elite that staffed both the ranks of the new religious orders and the administration of the confessional state.”47 Yet regional variations are striking when examining these relationships at the local level. Even in German states, as Marc Forster has shown in his study of the bishopric of Speyer, local realities often dominated.48 There is also a danger of portraying established churches as more monolithic than they were. In the case of the Catholic

43

 For an overview of major trends in Reformation historiography, see Hillerbrand, “Was There a Reformation?” In particular, see his discussion of confessionalization; ibid., 537–40. 44  Schilling, Religion, Culture, and the Emergence of Early Modern Society, 232. 45  Reinhard, “Reformation, Counter-Reformation, and the Early Modern State,” 401. 46  Strauss, Luther’s House of Learning, 257–58. 47  Hsia, World of Catholic Renewal, 75. 48  Forster, Counter-Reformation in the Villages.

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Church there were numerous institutions that functioned, some quite independently, under the umbrella of a universal church. At first glance, the relationship between the Dukes of Savoy and the Diocese of Geneva could be seen as one of cooperation in matters of faith, but further exploration reveals this assumption to be an oversimplification of the often-complex relationship and of the goals of each. The common loyalty to Catholicism did not necessarily mean that they were united on matters of religious reform. In the Diocese of Geneva, secular authorities played a crucial role in the successes and failures of Catholic reform and renewal, influencing the process of religious change within their territories. The actions of the French monarchy, the House of Savoy, and nearby Protestant cities cannot be ignored in the study of the Diocese of Geneva, but historians should be cautious in seeing political motives in religious actions; nor should scholars overplay the portrait of lay and clerical elites as united forces against their common foes, which included opposing confessions, political rivals, and ignorance. Downplaying genuine religious motivation independent of larger institutions in a time period when belief was fundamental to identity shortchanges a crucial component of the early modern world. Yet confessionalization is an enduring concept and scholars continue efforts to utilize it for exploring the consequences of the Reformation beyond the German states. Reinhard asserts that the Swiss republics “had drawn their definite ‘confessional borderlines’ as early as 1531.”49 But Barth points out that interactions are often not stable “where two or more interspersed groups are in fact in at least partial competition within the same niche.”50 Shifts in religious and national boundaries along the Rhône River clearly demonstrate that lines between confessional communities were not definitively established at the end of the sixteenth century. Reinhard points to the establishment of doctrines like the Augsburg Confession and the Council of Trent as important steps in the process of confessionalization.51 Yet it is important to remember that many of the reforms from Trent were slow to spread throughout Catholic Christendom and did not necessarily receive the full support of princes. In France, proponents of Gallican liberties argued that 49

 Reinhard, “Reformation, Counter-Reformation, and the Early Modern State,” 399.  Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries, 20. 51  Reinhard, “Reformation, Counter-Reformation, and the Early Modern State,” 391. 50

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Tridentine reforms threatened “the traditional independence of the French crown and church” and were able to prevent the decrees’ formal introduction into France.52 Alain Tallon asserts that the debates within France were multifaceted and included where reform should originate, the nature of temporal and religious power, and how to deal with those deemed religious dissidents. He further emphasizes that regional studies have shown that reform prior to the Council of Trent flowed from all manner of individuals, both clerical and lay, and that many at Trent were inspired by these reform movements.53 Even when new measures were introduced, most dioceses lacked the personnel for parish visits by the bishop or his representative to approach the regularity envisioned by the authors of the Council of Trent, making it difficult to follow up on whether parishes had implemented reforms. The proclamation of doctrine by religious elites does not necessarily lead to material changes in practice at the local level. Strauss vividly describes the disappointment of visitors who found widespread resistance to and ignorance about Lutheran doctrines in Germany.54 Reform could be uneven and did not necessarily need official doctrine sanctioned by church and crown. In the case of France, historians have adapted the confessionalization thesis to the particularities of the country. Mack Holt and Philip Benedict see promise in what they refer to as a “weak theory of confessionalization,” going back to the earlier work of Ernst Walter Zeeden. Zeeden’s ideas from the 1960s focused more on “how different confessional groups defined their boundaries and identities” while the later models of Schilling and Reinhard focus on the joint processes of state building and social disciplining.55 Gregory Hanlon also utilizes Zeeden’s ideas of religious identities as a key framework for understanding biconfessional Aquitaine.56 Benedict demonstrates how marriage contracts for the biconfessional city of Montpellier reveal “increasingly self-enclosed communities as the seventeenth century advanced.”57 James R. Farr sees 52

 Crimando, “Two Views of the Council of Trent,” 170.  Tallon, La France et Le Concile de Trente, 4, 813–14. 54  Strauss, Luther’s House of Learning, 280, 282–83. 55   Holt, “Confessionalization beyond the Germanies,” 257; Benedict, “Confessionalization in France?”; Zeeden, Entstehung der Konfessionen; and Zeeden, “Grundlagen und Wegen der Konfessionsbildung.” 56  Benedict, “Confessionalization in France?” 48; and Hanlon, Confession and Community in Seventeenth-Century France. 57  Benedict, “Confessionalization in France?” 60. 53

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Map 1: Reformation-era Europe.

more potential for employing the theory for France if the chronology is broadened (1530–1685) from the dates offered by Schilling and Reinhard (1550–1650).58 While this weak theory of confessionalization proposed by Holt and Benedict may be more applicable to border regions like the one under study, still it must be employed with caution. 58

 Farr, “Confessionalization and Social Discipline in France,” 291.

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The House of Savoy was characterized by wide-ranging regional variations; while Duke Charles-Emmanuel I made efforts to regain lost patrimony and establish his capital in Turin, cultural and geographical diversity precluded much centralization during the second half of the sixteenth century. Savoy’s Italian-speaking portion did not experience the full force of the Reformation, while Savoy’s holdings north of the Alps witnessed the establishment of the independent city of the Republic of Geneva as a political foe of Savoy and a leader of the international Protestant movement. The Diocese of Geneva was on the fringes of two kingdoms, being mostly Savoyard with a bit of French thrown in at the beginning of the seventeenth century. Border regions on the edge of a realm remained geographically isolated from centers of power like Paris and Turin. One only has to revisit the memoirs of Emilie Carles from the first half of the twentieth century to see how difficult it was even then for the state’s influence to penetrate the rugged Alpine regions.59 It is important that historians continue to look at the periphery and borders of countries when searching for trends and similarities in religious movements as they often complicate the paradigms. Even at the end of the sixteenth century, religious identity remained fluid between, and even within, confessions. In the last decades of the sixteenth century, Savoy attempted to regain territory previously held and also to expand influence at the expense of its neighbors. Thus the influence of political events on confessional identity must also be considered. While the villages in Savoy do demonstrate “increasing confessional polarization” in the 1580s as Schilling sees in Germany, the biggest disruptions were from military aggression, not confessional conflict. The wars waged between Savoy and France throughout the region disrupted rather than enforced confessional boundaries and proved to be a hindrance to the goals of the Catholic diocese.60 There is a danger in linking the goals of church and state too closely, as the strong confessionalization thesis does. Joel F. Harrington and Helmut Walser Smith find that too many studies “have often overemphasized the coercive power of the state while underestimating the degree to which local traditions and popular cultures con Carles, A Life of Her Own.  In the war of 1589, the duke faced troops of France, Geneva, and Berne, and in December 1602 the duke attempted the unsuccessful Escalade against the city of Geneva. See chapter 2 for a full discussion of the secular landscape. 59 60

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tributed to the process of confessionalization.”61 Men like François de Sales wanted secular rulers to use economic or social pressure, but were less enthusiastic about military force. Coercion by states too often took the form of undisciplined troops wreaking havoc on the local populations with little attention paid to the confessional loyalty of the towns.62 There were moments when the alliance of church and state occurred, but for the Diocese of Geneva it was not a stable partnership. Sometimes the actions taken by the secular authorities in the name of religion were not in the best interest of either confession. Coercion and extensive social discipline proved to be difficult when the next village over could be of the opposing confession. It is important to keep in mind that the goals of social discipline, by both Catholic and Protestant elites of church and state, and actual outcomes, were quite separate. Even the city of Geneva, a hub of international Protestantism, was not particularly successful in creating a confessional identity among its neighbors. The Protestant villages of the duchy of Chablais had not been fully incorporated into the Reformed tradition before the entrance of Catholic missionaries in the 1590s. By 1600, due to the evangelical efforts of the Catholics, only a handful of towns remained Protestant, but local and regional realities continued to shape religious identities. In a study that serves as a valid reminder, William Monter contrasts the trajectories of French and English Protestant churches in the middle of the sixteenth century and found a strong confessional identity among the French Protestants that led them to be unwilling to compromise with their religious rivals. On the other hand, the English church never developed a strong identity, which allowed the English to reach a compromise on religious issues under Elizabeth I.63 Understanding variations in religious identities from the national to the local level is an important component to comprehending the full impact of the Reformation. The political boundary between Savoy and France fluctuated for much of the sixteenth century until the Treaty of Lyons between Duke Charles-Emmanuel I and King Henri IV recognized the Rhône River

61

 Harrington and Smith, “Confessionalization, Community, and State Building in Germany,” 99.  The reputation of Spanish troops made both Catholic and Protestant villages fear their entrée into the region. See chapters 3 and 4 for further discussion of this issue. 63  Monter, “Fate of the English and French Reformations,” 7–19. 62

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as the divide between the two countries, making the Protestant Pays de Gex and sixty-eight Catholic Savoyard parishes part of France. The establishment of this border, made with little thought of the inhabitants’ familial, commercial, and religious ties, disrupted confessional bonds of Catholics and Protestants and the economic ties of Genevans and Savoyards. As Tuan observes, royal courts wanted orderly and rational organization of their dominions, and were “intolerant of messy, multiple viewpoints.”64 In the case of the Treaty of Lyons, the two sovereigns virtually ignored local complications brought on by the agreement. As geographer Kenneth Olwig points out, “The apparent unity created by the identification of a political community with the physical bounds of a geographical body and its scenic surface can mask a contested terrain.”65 What resulted was an international dispute over the staffing and administration of both Catholic and Protestant churches that demonstrates clearly how local delineations of faith may continue to follow long-standing patterns even when the political boundaries permanently change. Both Catholics and Protestants faced challenges to their religious identities as villages were subsumed by France. Even if the Diocese of Geneva was under two Catholic sovereigns in Savoy and France, there was not often a “pragmatic alliance” between the church and the states as Schilling sees in the German states. This study of the Diocese of Geneva takes account of the various historiographical trends in its investigation between secular and religious institutions, and between central and local experience. This example of overlapping religious, secular, and cultural boundaries requires a methodological approach appropriate both to the unique nature of the Diocese of Geneva in the period and the demand of a cultural approach to the narrative.

Sources

The many variables that shaped the religiosity of those living in the mountains around Geneva are not easy to uncover because, as Tuan observes, there is “a range and complexity of experience.”66 One crucial window into the region is the surviving accounts of the pastoral visi Tuan, foreword in Olwig, Landscape, Nature, and the Body Politic, xviii.  Olwig, Landscape, Nature, and the Body Politic, xxiv. 66  Tuan, Space and Place, 202. 64 65

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tations. The ecclesiastical visitation record is one of the best historical documents for inquiring into local religion and how it changed over time. This kind of document reflects the singularity of its particular region, epoch, and initiator. André Latreille views the move toward interdisciplinary studies as central to the growing interest in visitations for the medieval and early modern periods. Visitations are quantifiable and can reveal changes in religious institutions and mentalities over time. In addition, they may provide insight into moral attitudes of a locality and public expressions of faith. Visitations have the potential to offer details of a community or region absent in other official documents.67 Strauss addresses the potential difficulties of using visitations as sources in his work on Reformation Germany, including their accuracy and proclivity to find fault. He concludes: “Visitation documents are so full and so rich in detail, they cover so much ground, they are so uniform over so long a stretch of time in describing religious and moral conditions among so large a segment of the populations, that we are left with no honest choice but to read them as a reliable statement of what people did and failed to do in performing their Christian duties.”68 The bishops’ visitation records from the Diocese of Geneva are exceptionally rich for the years 1580 to 1640. The records for François de Sales’s visits to the parishes are highly detailed and a comparison of de Sales’s supervision of the diocese with that of his predecessor, Claude de Granier, and his successor, Jean-François de Sales, offers unique insight into the region and its complicated political and religious landscape. The visitation accounts shed light on the particular complexities faced by the Diocese of Geneva as it straddled two countries and coped with confessional divisions. While visitations provide a detailed ground-level view of the landscape and serve as an excellent foundation for exploring religious identities of the region, other forms of primary sources reveal different aspects of the relevant historical record. Because of François de Sales’s status as saint and doctor of the Catholic Church, a large corpus of his letters, sermons, and reports concerning the state of the diocese survives. Other diocesan records such as charters, foundations, and synodal regulations, as well as supporting civil documents including legislative records aid in revealing the extent to which the region’s elite and  Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Répertoire des visites pastorales, 1:7.  Strauss, Luther’s House of Learning, 262–67.

67 68

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secular authority participated, encouraged, and hindered implementing and enforcing Tridentine ideas. But the picture is not complete without the opponent’s view. Nearby Protestant cities, particularly Geneva, were an ever-present factor in all spiritual matters of the area as the Reformed city remained the biggest obstacle to obtaining their confessional goals, at least in the eyes of the Catholic leaders. The registers of the Council of Geneva and those of the Company of Pastors reveal the Protestant perspective to the interaction between the officials of the Catholic diocese and the religious and secular leaders of the Calvinist city. While the two may have been religious rivals, Catholics and Protestants did interact with each other regularly and this contact is understood more fully when viewed from both sides.

lm This study begins by outlining the secular and religious terrain of the region and the tools and institutions employed by the Diocese of Geneva to shape the programs of reform, including an analysis of the pastoral visitation and biographical sketches of the three bishops who propelled Catholic reform and renewal in the diocese. An examination of François de Sales’s mission in the duchy of Chablais shows the various methods Catholic missionaries used to highlight their faith and offers a comprehensive look into how secular and regular clergy worked together to navigate various secular interests while proselytizing among confessional rivals. After the Treaty of Lyons in 1601 redrew the border between Savoy and France, both Catholics and Protestants faced new rules and regulations; the Protestants of the Pays de Gex were suddenly incorporated into the Reformed Church of France and Savoyard Catholic communities viewed French priests as foreign interlopers in their parishes. A close look at reform measures directed at both the secular and regular clergy in the Diocese of Geneva highlights the importance of having competent clergy at the local level. While the three bishops included in this study made important inroads into raising the standards of priests who would introduce and enforce the reforms of Trent at the parish level, the task proved more difficult with religious houses, which were resistant to diocesan interference and had a multitude of tools at their disposal to resist diocesan discipline and sanctions. While diocesan

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officials increased their scrutiny of lay devotional practices as they set out to introduce Tridentine reforms in the parishes, the laity had longstanding devotional practices that it would not easily abandon. Most successful reforms ended up being a negotiation between parishes and bishops rather than the imposing of an elite culture on a rural population. Conceptualizing the many boundaries, borders, and spaces found in the Diocese of Geneva can offer fresh insight into the complexities of early modern religious and political communities. Coster and Spicer remind us, “We cannot see sacred space as immutable and fixed, but as interacting with a complex range of factors.”69 This study goes toward a better understanding of the religious landscape of the early modern world and of the ways the people of the past maintained their communities by negotiating situations as they arose. It is crucial to take into account factors of cultural differences that were most meaningful to people in the community. The external threats and influences may have actually reinforced communal ties. Sahlins asserts, “the village communities tended with greater insistence to affirm their local boundaries and identities, despite the flow of personnel across social and territorial boundaries.”70 As this region possessed unstable borders, there existed a “cultural permeability” that cut across political boundaries, and the inhabitants adapted.71 Exploration of local debate of religious practices sheds light on how the multiconfessional nature of the region impacted and even modified the implementation of Tridentine Reform on the Catholic side of the religious divide. Was the Catholic message shaped differently for parishes known to have continuing Reformed leanings? More broadly, study of a region’s negotiation and contestation of space and boundaries can offer a fuller understanding of individual and group reactions to aspects of early modern life beyond religious and political discontinuities; military occupation and economic problems also brought significant challenges, and when combined with the existing religious and political issues, added complexity to the lives of the border inhabitants of this alpine region.

69

 Coster and Spicer, “Introduction: Dimensions of Sacred Space,” 13.  Sahlins, Boundaries, 220. 71  Wilson and Donnan, Border Identities, 4. 70

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eligious reformation is never accomplished or squelched in isolation but is the result of numerous individuals, institutions, and processes acting in concert or conflict. In the case of the Diocese of Geneva, inhabitants of Savoy, France, Geneva, Berne, and Rome all shaped and influenced the process of reform within the Catholic faith. The sacred and the secular worlds from both sides of the confessional divide were so intertwined during the early modern period that looking at the diverse participants of Catholic reform, whether as proponents or opponents, is crucial to our understanding of the process. As Philip Benedict reminds us, “it is an open question whether the ongoing process of confessional rivalry raised ever-higher barriers between the two confessions, or whether the experience of stable convivencia bred closer interaction with those of the other religion.”1 Certainly the region around Geneva saw regular encounters of Catholic and Protestant populations. The bishops oversaw the programs of Catholic reform, but people from all levels of society participated in the process and influenced the ultimate success or failure of the efforts.

The Physical Landscape

The Diocese of Geneva consisted mostly of small towns and villages scattered throughout the valleys and mountainous regions of the Alps. The region was a mix of Swiss, Savoy, French, and Italian culture and 1

 Benedict, “Confessionalization in France?” 53.

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influence (see map 2). The parishes were typically poor and people survived through farming small fields of grain and raising small herds of sheep, goats, and dairy cattle. In the fifteenth century, the majority of the inhabitants grew various cereal crops, with wheat and rye being the most prevalent. The inhabitants also produced their own wine, cheese, and butter, and supplemented their diets with produce from gardens and fish from Lake Geneva and the Rhône River. The region consumed most of what it produced, but probably did export salted fish and certainly some of its cheeses; certain cheeses were highly prized and served at the tables of popes and princes.2 It was a rugged terrain, and villages could be isolated from one another. Weather could be extreme, making roads difficult to navigate and potentially dangerous in the winter due to snow and ice, and in the spring due to rain and melting snow. Prior to the Reformation, the northernmost parishes—the region known as the duchy of Chablais—bordered the southern bank of Lake Geneva and the Diocese of Lausanne; to the east the Dioceses of Sion and Aosta; to the south the Dioceses of Grenoble and Tarentaise; and to the west the Dioceses of Belley and Lyons (see map 2). Over the course of the sixteenth century, the bishops of Geneva saw the diocese fractured by the Reformation and warfare and by treaties among rulers; it became difficult to stay in regular contact with some of the parishes since travel through hostile territory to reach them became difficult or even impossible. The bishop also found himself cut off from the diocese’s income-producing property as a result of his exile from Geneva. Protestant ideas entered the region via ministers from Geneva and Berne who evangelized in the duchy of Chablais and the Pays de Gex; as a result, there were Catholic and Reformed villages in close proximity to each other especially along Lake Geneva and the Rhône River.3 It would have been easy to attend the other confession’s services, and members of both confessions continued to use the same roads and water routes. By the beginning of the seventeenth century, Geneva was only able to maintain a handful of parishes on the outskirts of the city: several along the Rhône River, a few on the banks of Lake Geneva, and a few southeast of the city. The largest concentration of Protestant towns was in the Pays de Gex and they became  Binz, Vie religieuse et Réforme Ecclésiastique, 27–31; and Bruchet, Le Château de Ripaille,156, cited in ibid., 35. 3  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 65. 2

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Map 2: The Diocese of Geneva with pre-Reformation Boundaries

French in 1601. In many ways, Geneva was a Protestant island, albeit an important one, surrounded by Catholic villages. These villages had been subject to regular destruction and disruption at the hands of numerous armies cutting through the region. The Spanish Road ran to the western portion of the diocese and Spanish and Italian troops frequently fought in the area on the side of the duke against French and Protestant armies. The frequent warfare made it hard to maintain and repair physical structures like fortresses and churches, and made it hard to plant and harvest crops. Poverty and uncertainty were constants for many of the inhabitants.

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The Secular Landscape

The Diocese of Geneva found itself at the center of both religious and secular turmoil in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, as it had the misfortune of being the playground for the imperial and religious aspirations of the kings of France, the Dukes of Savoy, and the Protestant cities of Geneva and Berne. The region was part of the ancient holdings of the House of Savoy but that claim was threatened in earnest by its neighbors beginning with the Burgundian Wars in the 1470s.4 During this conflict, Savoy allied itself with the Duke of Burgundy, Charles the Bold, against the Swiss and French.5 The reign of Duke Charles III (1504–1553) saw dramatic changes in Savoy’s religious and political makeup. The duchy of Chablais and the Pays de Gex, located on the outskirts of Geneva, were two primary targets for the dual purposes of proselytizing by the Reformed faith and acquiring territory from Savoy. Geneva had gradually gained more independence from both the bishops and the dukes over the course of several centuries, culminating with the revocation of the dukes’ right of criminal jurisdiction in 1528 and the replacement of the bishop’s tribunal with a new civil court in 1529.6 Geneva’s ban of Catholicism in 1535, driving out the religious and secular clergy of the town, led to the bishop of Geneva’s resettling across the mountains in Annecy. Yet Geneva was not the most important city to the introduction of the Reformation to the region. The Bernese decided to increase Berne’s influence in the region by invading and occupying the French-speaking Pays de Vaud and Pays de Gex. Berne’s relationship with other Protestant cities was always complicated since the city was never eager to go to war with Catholic members of the Swiss Confederation or to spread Swiss evangelical ideas into Germany. Berne’s primary concerns were to expand its territory toward Geneva and to halt Savoyard influence in its own direction.7 Despite Geneva’s not being officially Swiss until 1815, the city certainly had alliances with Swiss cities in the sixteenth century and made overtures midcentury for a more formal

4

 Ibid., 26–29.  Ibid., 27. 6  Ibid., 38. Historically the bishop of Geneva had been a prince-bishop, but in 1387, the bishop had granted town liberties to the city. Since 1265 the House of Savoy held the office of vidomne, which granted the dukes criminal jurisdiction. 7  Gordon, Swiss Reformation, 115, 128. 5

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connection with the confederation.8 As Geneva grew in stature and influence in the Reformed movement under the guidance of Guillaume Farel and John Calvin, the relationship between Geneva and Berne deteriorated, as both cities wanted to lead the reform of the same region.9 In the meantime, François I of France took the opportunity to occupy Savoy proper and Piedmont to ensure his access to Milan; the French occupation lasted twenty-three years (1536–1559) and introduced important innovations in the political process, including the establishment of a French parlement in Chambéry. Savoy historian Roger Devos views this occupation as crucial to the evolution of Savoy into a modern state, as the period sees the decline of feudal institutions and the growth of a legislative body.10 When in 1553 Emmanuel-Philibert succeeded his father, Charles III, he found many former possessions of Savoy in the hands of his enemies. France controlled Bresse and Bugey; the Bernese held the Pays de Gex, the Pays de Vaud, and much of the duchy of Chablais; the Holy Roman Emperor and France were fighting over Piedmont. Emmanuel-Philibert distinguished himself in the imperial army of the Habsburgs and was able to regain some territory through the combination of his marriage in 1559 to Marguerite de France, sister of King Henri II, his military exploits, and his willingness to negotiate and compromise.11 France returned the area it occupied in 1559, and the duke established the Senate of the Savoy in Chambéry, replacing the French-style parlement to appease the nobles who were unwilling to give up their legislative body and return to feudal relations.12 The Senate would find itself involved in the mission project in the duchy of Chablais and other reform measures concerning the diocese.13 While the nobles gained important legislative power with the Senate  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 36, 56, 58. Geneva wanted Berne to sponsor it as an independent canton in 1549, but the bid was unsuccessful due to opposition from the Catholic cantons. 9  See both Gordon, Swiss Reformation, esp. 159 and 180; and Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 165, 182. This conflict will be discussed further in chapter 5. 10  Devos, “Un Siècle en Mutation,” 232–33. 11  Ibid., 233. 12  Martin, Trois Cas de Pluralisme Confessionnel, 43. This return of land by France was part of the Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis, signed in April 1559 between France and Spain; Arminjon, De la Noblesse des Sénateurs, 7–9. 13  See chapter 3 for the role of the senate and individual senators in the mission of the duchy of Chablais, and see chapter 5 for the senate’s involvement in the numerous disputes over the reform of religious houses. 8

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in Chambéry, they lost political influence in the larger state of Savoy as Emmanuel-Philibert moved his capital to Turin in 1563 and increasingly turned his focus to his Italian interests. The duke regained control of Gex, Ternier, and Thonon from Berne in 1564, but the population of these holdings remained Protestant and thus stayed closely tied to the Protestant cities.14 The issue of confessional composition was left to his son and successor. Charles-Emmanuel I (r. 1580–1630) continued to involve the House of Savoy in intrigue with the powers of Europe during his fiftyyear reign. He envisioned returning Geneva to Savoyard control and entered into several wars with the Reformed city that failed to accomplish this goal. Warfare resumed in 1589 between the cities of Geneva and Berne on one side with the aid of Henri III of France, and Savoy on the other side with support from Spain and the French Catholic League. Charles-Emmanuel made a claim to the French crown with the support of Catholic Leaguers and set his sights on at least adding Provence and the Dauphiné to his territory.15 But Henri of Navarre aided his allies in Geneva, and Charles-Emmanuel, even with support from the Spanish, could not attain his goals. A key turning point for the confessional composition of the region came with the Treaty of Nyon of 1589 between Savoy and Berne. Charles-Emmanuel demanded that the treaty include a provision that allowed for the reestablishment of Catholicism in the disputed areas. Berne abandoned its alliance with its Protestant brethren of Geneva by acquiescing to the demands of the duke. This alliance left vulnerable the Protestants who found themselves under Savoy’s secular rule and opened the door for the return of Catholicism to the Chablais in the 1590s.16 Meanwhile France and Savoy continued fighting sporadically and King Henri IV of France occupied Savoy in 1600 due to a dispute over the Marquisat of Saluces (Saluzzo). The Treaty of Lyons, concluded between the two countries in 1601, redrew the boundary, making all the parishes west of the Rhône River permanently part of France. Charles-Emmanuel tried again to take back Geneva in the illadvised Escalade of 11–12 December 1602 but was forced to recognize 14  Brossard. Histoire Politique et Religieuse, 279–80, 285–86. The lands from Berne were regained with the completion of the Treaties of Lausanne (1564) and Nyon. 15  Martin, Trois Cas de Pluralisme Confessionnel, 61, 66. Henri III’s support was short-lived; he was assassinated in July 1589. 16  Martin, Trois Cas de Pluralisme Confessionnel, 65; and Dufour, La guerre de 1589–1593, 94–96.

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the city’s independence in 1603.17 The duke spent much of the first three decades of the seventeenth century focused on Italy, a move that led him into conflict with his former ally Spain and to closer ties with France. This alliance with France culminated in 1619 with a marriage between the duke’s son Victor-Amadeus and Christine of France, a sister of Louis XIII.18 Savoy’s relationship with his neighbor remained problematic and in 1630, the year of his death, Charles-Emmanuel found much of his domain again occupied by his old enemy France.19 The seven-year reign of Duke Victor-Amadeus I (r. 1630–1637) found Savoy again caught between imperial aspirations of Spain and France in Italy as the Thirty Years’ War widened. The new duke’s primary goals were to maintain an independent Savoy and retain close ties with France without angering the Spanish. He managed to keep Savoy out of much of the expanding conflict in Europe, but his sudden death in 1637 left a five-year-old heir with his wife as regent. The House of Savoy was plunged into civil war as Christine of France tried to hold onto the regency for her sons as her brothers-in-law Prince Thomas of Savoy and Cardinal Maurice of Savoy, who had defected to the Spanish camp, challenged her for control. Only the diplomatic and military intervention of Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu saved the regency of Duchess Christine.20 The Diocese of Geneva truly was an intersection for much of Europe, and maneuvers made by the many secular powers with interests in the region reverberated through the parishes and shaped the religious agenda of the bishops whether they wanted them to or not.

The Papacy

The period covered by this study coincides with a papacy trying to reassert itself as the spiritual leader of Christendom in the face of Protestantism and the growing centralization of secular states. The reform of the Curia included increasing the power of some administrative bodies and changing the focus of others without dramatically altering the 17

 Devos, “Un Siècle en Mutation,” 245–46, 263.  Devos and Grosperrin, La Savoie de la Réforme à la Révolution Française, 100. 19  Devos, “Un Siècle en Mutation,” 247; and Martin, Trois Cas de Pluralisme Confessionnel, 66–69. 20  Devos and Grosperrin, La Savoie de la Réforme à la Révolution Française, 107–17. VictorAmadeus’s heir, François-Hyacinthe, died in 1638, leaving his four-year-old brother, CharlesEmmanuel II, as duke. 18

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basic foundations of the Catholic Church. The Council of Trent wanted to reform, but not dramatically alter the existing church structure. The administration of the medieval church had resembled a secular state and this would change little as the Curia faced new challenges in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.21 The growing centralization within the Curia was similar to what was happening with the secular states at the same time, and the church also became more hierarchical.22 More central control of reform offered the papacy a better structure for directing and monitoring regional and local activities. Despite new challenges, the papacy did have some success at promoting reform through curial institutions and the crucial years were 1534 to 1588 for this internal revitalization. The use of strategically placed nuncios in royal courts encouraged local implementation of the Council of Trent, and over the course of the sixteenth century, nuncios became permanent diplomatic representatives in the royal courts of Europe.23 The nuncios placed in Turin played central roles in the reform and mission projects in the Diocese of Geneva, and the bishops corresponded regularly with these papal representatives. A. D. Wright sees “the promotion of reformed and observant branches of religious orders, at the expense of conventuals,” as a crucial part of postconciliar papal policy despite the papacy’s periodic conflicts with religious orders.24 The Diocese of Geneva certainly promoted such reform-minded orders within its boundaries and attempted to reform the lax houses.25 The application of these measures was inconsistent and produced uneven results, but for the most part, the post-Tridentine papacy tried to increase the power of the Roman Catholic Church through its secular and religious policies. Ugo Boncompagni, who became Pope Gregory XIII (1572–1585), attended the Council of Trent from 1561 to 1563 as an expert of canon law. He spent his tenure as pope promoting Tridentine decrees, and it was under Gregory XIII that nuncios emerged as important agents of church reform where previously they had served mostly as diplomats. He was zealous in his anti-Protestant sentiments, which led him

 Evennett, Spirit of the Counter-Reformation, 90, 96.  Bireley, Refashioning of Catholicism, esp. 1–24, 70–71, 202–4. 23  Evennett, Spirit of the Counter-Reformation, 119; and Wright, Early Modern Papacy, 278–79. 24  Wright, Early Modern Papacy, 30, 45, 274. 25  See chapter 5 for discussion of the diocese’s efforts to reform religious houses. 21 22

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to support the Jesuits, the French Catholic League, and political plots against England and the Protestant Netherlands. He celebrated the news of the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre with Te Deums and church services in Rome.26 It was during Gregory’s episcopate that Bishop Claude de Granier commenced parish visitations for the first time since the start of the Reformation and took the first steps to introduce Tridentine reform into the diocese. Pope Clement VIII (1592–1605) was born Ippolito Aldobrandini to a prominent barrister family of Florence who had fallen into disfavor with the Medici and fled. Through the support of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, Aldobrandini studied law at Padua, Perugia, and Bologna. He began his career as an administrator in the papacy of Pius V (1566–1572). Clement VIII was active in reform and personally lived a devout and austere life. Acting as bishop of Rome, Clement instituted visitations of parish churches and religious houses under his jurisdiction and even made some visits personally. He pursued the reformation of the religious houses and revised key liturgical books. Clement is given credit for recognizing the attributes of François de Sales, whom he appointed as coadjutor of Geneva in 1599. He also increased the number of books on the Index and used the Inquisition to condemn over thirty people to be burned at the stake, including Giordano Bruno. Yet Clement could be pragmatic in matters of state; he absolved Henri IV of France and recognized him as king, in part to reduce the power of Spain over the papacy.27 By acknowledging the French king, the pope also had to accept or at least not openly oppose the Edict of Nantes, a move that had major ramifications on the Diocese of Geneva.28 Clement corresponded extensively with Claude de Granier and François de Sales and provided crucial support for the mission in the duchy of Chablais. He also oversaw the reestablishment of the mass in the Pays de Gex, once the region became French and as a result was subject to the provisions of the Edict of Nantes. Pope Paul V (1605–1621), formerly Camillo Borghese of Siena, had a very contentious tenure as bishop of Rome. He strongly asserted papal supremacy, which led him to place Venice under interdict and to 26  Kelly, Oxford Dictionary of Popes, 269–72; and Evennett, Spirit of the Counter-Reformation, 114–15. 27  Wright, Early Modern Papacy, 45; Kelly, Oxford Dictionary of Popes, 275–76; and Duffy, Saints and Sinners, 226. 28  Haan, “Les réactions du Saint-Siège à l’édit de Nantes,” 364–65, 367.

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clash with the French crown. His condemnation of Gallicanism in 1613 was partially the cause for the calling of the Estates General in October 1614. The estates refused to promulgate the decrees of the Council of Trent and thus denied any nationwide program of Catholic reform. The clergy did allow for the publication of the Tridentine decrees in provincial councils, which led to pockets of reforming vigor throughout France.29 The Diocese of Geneva faced significant restrictions of its efforts to reform parishes placed under French secular authority with the Treaty of Lyons. The failure of Paul V’s political policies ensured that Tridentine reform would lose momentum over the course of the seventeenth century. After 1625, popes increasingly lacked the ability to enforce ecclesiastical privileges concerning fiscal and judicial exemptions if the secular authorities refused to acknowledge them. This impotence was painfully evident in the failure of both Clement VIII and Paul V to overcome France’s defense of Gallican liberties and its continued refusal to promulgate Tridentine decrees despite the favor both men extended to the nation.30 Without the ability to fully implement Trent in the French parishes of the diocese, François de Sales struggled to make the same changes in French parishes as he had in his Savoyard ones. Notwithstanding continued involvement in the Bourbon/Habsburg struggle in Europe, the papacy found its influence in secular affairs primarily confined to Italy. The papacy took steps to gain greater control over the rapidly expanding missions with the establishment of the Congregatio de Propaganda Fide in 1622 during the brief pontificate of Gregory XV (Alessandro Ludovisi). This new congregation was well funded and given oversight of the Catholic missions throughout the world. Its membership included cardinals and bishops, and the Propaganda Fide had the lofty goal of providing uniformity to the missions and placing them under the close supervision of Rome.31 After a long and controversial conclave, Maffeo Barberini became Pope Urban VIII (1623–1644). He was from a prominent Florentine commercial family and received his early education from the Jesuits. He served the papacy as a special envoy to Henri IV and later became the papal nuncio in France. His sympathies toward  Kelly, Oxford Dictionary of Popes, 277–78.  Wright, Early Modern Papacy, 287, 289. 31  Evennett, Spirit of the Counter-Reformation, 122–23. 29 30

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France influenced his policy throughout his long reign, and his desire to appear as the leader of all Christendom never overcame his fear of Habsburg dominance. Urban VIII’s tenure as pope coincided with the Thirty Years’ War, in which he typically sided with France; his actions in the political arena hastened the decline of the church reform movement. He encouraged the spread of new religious orders for women including the Visitation founded by François de Sales and those of Vincent de Paul; he also personally oversaw revisions of the breviary (1631), and supported the spread of missions. He reaffirmed the Tridentine decree that bishops, including cardinals, had to reside in their dioceses and, like Clement VIII, he oversaw pastoral visitations in Rome.32 Urban could be authoritarian, rarely consulting his cardinals, and he extended lofty positions to his relatives. He condemned Galileo Galilei and spent excessively on building projects to glorify Rome, including the new St. Peter’s. His later years were taken up with petty conflicts over the Italian peninsula, and at his death, the people of Rome celebrated.33 The reorganized administration of the Curia left its mark on the course of Catholic renewal and reform especially during the pontificates of Gregory XIII and Clement VIII, evident with the more activist roles of the College of Cardinals and the papal nuncios. Popes shaped reform in Rome proper through their presence, but the results of their policies and decrees on the broader institutions of the Catholic Church are harder to discern without exploring the actions of their agents throughout Catholic Christendom. The implementation of new practices fell to the Curia’s regional representatives who lived and worked in the diocese—the preaching orders and the bishops.

The Preaching Orders

No groups have been identified with post-Tridentine Catholicism more than the preaching orders. Even though the foundation of most of the orders associated with Catholic reform can be traced to the years before the Council of Trent, their spread north of the Alps and beyond came in the second half of the sixteenth century, often in conjunction with the spread of Tridentine ideas. While their memberships were relatively small, the preaching orders could be found in the large cities and rural  Wright, Early Modern Papacy, 45.  Kelly, Oxford Dictionary of Popes, 280–81.

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villages of Europe ministering to Catholics and Protestants, and in the New World among the indigenous populations. The three preaching orders that participated in the reform process in the Diocese of Geneva were the Jesuits, the Capuchins, and the Barnabites. The Society of Jesus is often synonymous with Tridentine reform even though they were recognized before the first session of the Council of Trent. These self-described “soldiers for Christ” were the largest of the preaching orders that emerged from the spiritual revival of the early sixteenth century. Unlike some of the other orders, the Jesuits had a clear founder in Ignatius Loyola, who, after the approval of his order by Pope Paul III in 1540, led the society until his death in 1556. Loyola was a Spanish soldier who experienced a spiritual conversion after being wounded in the 1520s. His travels took him on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and to the Universities of Alcalá and Paris for training. In Paris, Ignatius met his core group of initial followers, including Francis Xavier, and this group ended up in Rome seeking the papal bull establishing its order. Ignatius’s influence spread well beyond the Jesuits, largely because of his writing of the Spiritual Exercises, which provided a guide through the process of conversion and introduced the spiritual retreat.34 During his missionary work François de Sales sought counsel from leading Jesuits of the day, including Peter Canisius and Antonio Possevino. The Jesuits were unique in that they did not want to be compelled to keep liturgical hours because it would take them away from active ministry. The methods of the Jesuits were crucial in the evolution of education and preaching, including the incorporation of humanism into the methods of the mendicant orders from the Middle Ages. They taught scripture through formal sermons, lectures, and catechism; and focused on the sacraments of confession and the Eucharist. The Jesuits opened their first school in 1548 in Messina and began the spread of the order’s humanist approach to education. While the Jesuits supported the Council of Trent, they preferred to approach reform on their own terms.35 Probably because of this independence, the Jesuits were not universally supported by the papacy and both Clement VIII and

34

 O’Malley, “Society of Jesus,” 139–43.  Ibid., 148–54.

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Urban VIII approached the order with ambivalence at best.36 The Jesuits worked alongside François de Sales during the mission in the duchy of Chablais and were part of the Holy House of Thonon.37 They attracted members from throughout Europe; by 1615 the order had 13,000 members.38 They became the most international of the new preaching orders and played a key role in the spread of early modern Catholicism. The Capuchins emerged in central Italy in the 1520s and 1530s as a branch of the Franciscans. There was no distinct founder of the Capuchins; rather, a small group of Franciscans left their houses with a desire to observe the Rule of St. Francis as literally as possible. In 1528 the small band of religious persuaded Pope Clement VII (Giulio de’ Medici) to allow them to live as hermits and others soon followed. The Capuchins faced intense opposition from the Franciscan Observants who tried to stop the new group’s expansion, and their progress was dealt a great blow in 1542 when their vicar-general Bernardino Ochino, a popular preacher, fled to Switzerland and embraced Protestantism.39 As a result, the pope would not allow the Capuchins to preach for several years and prohibited them from accepting Observants into their communities and spreading north of the Alps. The wars of the later sixteenth century provided a chance for the Capuchins to extend their message when they began traveling with the armies as chaplains. Pope Gregory XIII lifted the ban on the Capuchins moving north in 1574, and they quickly seized the opportunity to establish missions first throughout the rest of Europe and then the rest of the world. They were given full independence as a third branch of the Franciscans in 1619.40 The Capuchins had two models for their conduct, Christ and St. Francis, who both placed great importance on preaching to large and

 Wright, Early Modern Papacy, 44.  See chapter 3 for a discussion of the Jesuits’ involvement in the Holy House of Thonon. 38  O’Malley, “Society of Jesus,” 157. 39  The Franciscans had a long history of internal conflict over the proper observance of the Rule left by their founder, Francis of Assisi. Members struggled with how to institutionalize the goals and practices of Francis, with the majority believing that modifications to the absolute vow of poverty allowed the order to better function within the Catholic Church. A papal bull in 1517 formally divided the Franciscans between Observants, who had commenced reform of the order in the fourteenth century because they desired a more secluded and meditative existence, and the Conventuals, who lived communally in more urban areas. The Capuchins faced intense opposition from the more moderate Franciscans. 40  Gleason, “Capuchin Order,” 31–40, 42–46. 36 37

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diverse audiences. Despite being a new order, the Capuchins did not introduce much innovation in their methods, which remained grounded in Franciscan practices of the late Middle Ages; their preaching was simple and direct, in a language and style the listeners could easily grasp. Yet the order did establish a program of studies in 1575 to ensure that those who preached were properly grounded in scripture. Through their missions, the Capuchins promoted lay confraternities, Marian devotion, and the Forty Hours celebrations of the Eucharist. The Capuchins were critical to the missionary projects in the Diocese of Geneva and were central to the staging of baroque celebrations along Lake Geneva. One Capuchin in particular, Chérubin de Maurienne, was probably the most important preacher to the mission after François de Sales. Like so much associated with the efforts to revive Catholicism in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Capuchins adapted and reinvigorated much from the medieval church rather than striking out in a new direction. The Clerics Regular of St. Paul, more commonly known as the Barnabites, never achieved the membership or fame of the Jesuits or the Capuchins, but they too were part of the movement of regular clergy into active service and left their own mark. Founder Antonio Maria Zaccaria was of a noble family from Cremona active in the woolen trade. He studied philosophy, medicine, and possibly law at the University of Padua, and he returned to Cremona where he seems to have worked among the poor and sick. Soon after Zaccaria’s ordination in 1528, the wealthy widow Countess Ludovica Torelli, who would become his lifelong benefactress, introduced him to Battista Carioni, an elderly Dominican friar who would serve as Zaccaria’s spiritual director. In the early 1530s Zaccaria joined the Oratory of Eternal Wisdom in Milan and met others of mostly aristocratic background who wanted to form a new religious community. Pope Paul III recognized the Clerics Regular of St. Paul in 1535, and they soon were referred to as the Barnabites because their motherhouse in Milan was the Church of St. Barnabas. In 1550 Pope Julius III (Giovanni Maria Ciocchi del Monte) confirmed them as a religious order.41 The Barnabites originally had two other congregations, the Angelic Sisters and the married couples of St. Paul, but they did not endure largely because of the church hierarchy’s dislike of

41

 DeMolen, “First Centenary of the Barnabites,” 59–70.

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uncloistered women and its suspicion of lay orders, the same obstacles de Sales faced when he helped launch the Order of the Visitation. Like the Capuchins and the Jesuits, the Barnabites faced hostility and accusations of heresy and public disorder in Rome in 1534 and in Venice in 1551. The Dominican Battista Carioni, at the request of Zaccaria, wrote the order’s first constitution based on the Rule of St. Augustine, but Carioni’s association brought suspicion on the fledgling order after he was accused of heresy. After Carioni’s death in 1534, several of his writings were placed on the Index of Prohibited Books.42 Only after the Barnabites received the personal protection of Carlo Borromeo, who supervised the drafting of a new constitution, did they free themselves from the scrutiny of the Inquisition. The Barnabites were always a small order, with only 322 members in 1608; however, their influence cannot be discounted. Zaccaria was instrumental in the spread of the Forty Hours Devotion, adopting and expanding the Forty Hours to include more sermons, processions of both the laity and clergy, and most importantly made the Eucharist visible to all throughout the celebration.43 While the Barnabites have been largely forgotten in the wider context of the Catholic revival, their impact on the Diocese of Geneva should be emphasized; they established several houses there and Juste Guérin, who served as bishop of Geneva from 1639 to 1645, was a member of the order. While there were never a substantial number of members from these preaching orders working in the diocese, individual members worked closely with the bishops and certainly left a significant mark.

The Bishops

The Introduction of Reform—Claude de Granier The Council of Trent bestowed more authority on the bishops, but with this power came greater responsibility in the diocese. Trent called for the bishop to oversee his clergy through annual synods, to visit the parishes

42  Grendler, “Man Is Almost a God,” 230–35. Carioni faced charges of heresy three times during his lifetime. In 1525, Pope Clement VII accused him of semi-Pelagianism for his treatise Aperta verità, but he was found innocent. In 1532, his position as live-in spiritual advisor to the young widow Countess Torelli prompted Cardinal Gian Pietro Carafa to charge him with abandoning the Dominican order, and shortly before Carioni’s death, Paul III charged him with heresy due to his support of conventicles of both men and women. Torelli used her influence to protect Carioni until his death. 43  DeMolen, “First Centenary of the Barnabites,” 70–83; and Grendler, “Man Is Almost a God,” 230–35.

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of his diocese, and to live frugally and morally as an example to others.44 The introduction of Tridentine reforms had to begin with the bishop; the three bishops included in this study were all active agents of reform despite coming to the diocese through different channels and from dissimilar educational backgrounds. An understanding of their history is crucial to interpreting how they interacted with the other protagonists and antagonists of reform, how they administered the diocese, and how they carried out their parish visits. Claude de Granier is not nearly as famous as his successor, François de Sales, yet many of the reform measures credited to de Sales actually began under Granier. Like his two successors, Claude de Granier was born in Savoy to a noble family. His father served the House of Savoy as a “master of the hotel.” Granier attended school in Annecy before he entered the Benedictine monastery at Talloires, where he spent several years as a novice. He was made prior in 1563 and soon after traveled to Rome to continue his studies. This would have placed Granier in Rome around the time that Pope Pius IV (Giovanni Angelo Medici) brought the Council of Trent to its conclusion. According to his biographer, Boniface Constantin, Granier studied philosophy under the Jesuit François Tolet as well as canon law while in Rome. During his studies he may have met Carlo Borromeo, archbishop of Milan.45 Whether he did or not, Borromeo’s reputation would have been known to the young Savoyard cleric. When Claude de Granier returned to the priory of Talloires in 1572, he was full of reforming vigor. He spent seven years trying to introduce reform into the monastery with little success. In the meantime the bishop of Geneva, Ange Justinian, had run afoul of local elites. In 1579 Pope Gregory XIII took the unusual step of naming Claude de Granier as bishop and Ange Justinian as prior of Talloires. Bishop Granier began trying immediately to implement the decrees from the Council of Trent. He held diocesan synods where he introduced the Tridentine breviary. Significantly, he placed great value on the visitation process as a way to

44  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 6th sess. chap. 1 (pp. 46–47;), 24th sess. chaps. 2–3 (192–94;), 25th sess. chap. 1 (232–33). 45  Constantin, La Vie du Reverendissime et Illustrissime Evesque Claude de Granier, 9, 12, 14, 24–26, 28–30.

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communicate doctrine and practice to the priests and laity as well as to correct errors.46 Granier faced opposition to his goals of reform from a variety of quarters throughout his twenty-three years as bishop. Constantin asserted that Granier’s biggest problem was the war between France and Savoy and the resulting destruction of property. The bishop also faced outbreaks of the plague. He met resistance from regional nobles when he tried to stop them from appointing curés in their territories, and parish priests opposed his observation of the Tridentine decree ordering their examination before ordination. Bishop Granier endured a chronic shortage of funds that kept him from establishing more schools and a seminary in the diocese.47 War, disease, poverty, and ignorance made the diocese difficult to govern. It was Claude de Granier who sent François de Sales to the fortress in Allinges to begin preaching to the Protestants of the duchy of Chablais. He also sought and received Duke Charles-Emmanuel I’s permission to bring Capuchins and Jesuits into the diocese to help with the mission. Bishop Granier expended a great deal of effort in an unsuccessful attempt to get back the benefices in the Chablais from the Chevaliers of SS. Maurice and Lazarus who had held them for “safekeeping” since the papacy of Gregory XIII. He participated in all three Forty Hours Devotions held in the Chablais. One of his last public actions was the celebration of a Jubilee in Thonon in August 1602; he fell ill while in Thonon and died while traveling back to Annecy.48 He literally devoted his entire life to reform and renewal of the diocese and planted seeds that his successors would continue to nurture in their efforts to revitalize the Catholicism of the region. The Embodiment of the Catholic Reformation—François de Sales If the participants of the Council of Trent had drawn a model for the bishop who would carry the Catholic Reformation to the French-speaking territories of Europe, François de Sales would have come close to the ideal. By all accounts, de Sales was an embodiment of the positive attributes of the Roman Church’s reform efforts. Born in 1567, the 46

 Ibid., 32, 88–89, 93, 112.  Ibid., 115, 118, 120, 123, 125. 48  Ibid., 162, 164, 168, 181, 228, 248, 251. 47

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eldest son of a noble family, de Sales was intended to practice law and inherit the family title and estate in Savoy. Instead, he became one of the most important agents of the new piety of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. His religious training was done under those leading the spiritual revival of the Catholic Church.49 François de Sales studied under the Jesuits at the College of Clermont in Paris from 1581 to 1588, and then studied law at the University of Padua where he placed himself under the spiritual direction of the renowned Jesuit Antonio Possevino, a reformer and missionary throughout Europe. Returning to his native region in 1592, de Sales received his ordination and became provost of the Geneva chapter of cathedral canons, which was in exile in Annecy along with the bishop.50 In 1594 he began active missionary work in the duchy of Chablais. According to legend, there were only one hundred Catholics in the Chablais when de Sales began his work, but by 1598 when the bishop came to inspect his assistant’s handiwork, almost all the region was again Catholic.51 This may be an exaggeration by de Sales’s hagiographers, but for his accomplishments he received an audience in Rome with Pope Clement VIII. The story goes that “in the presence of eight cardinals and twenty bishops, the Pope arose and embraced the young apostle.”52 François de Sales became coadjutor of the bishop of Geneva with the right of succession in 1599 to the aged and very ill bishop. He became bishop of the diocese in December 1602 at a ceremony in Thorens, his birthplace. For twenty years, de Sales shaped a diocese in a region wracked by political, religious, and economic turmoil. He dealt with the periodic fighting among the kings of France, the Duke of Savoy, and the Protestant cities of Geneva and Berne.53 The region suffered greatly from religious wars of the sixteenth century. The bishop spent his whole tenure in Annecy without adequate revenue since much of the property of his benefice had been lost when Geneva freed itself of the Duke of Savoy and Catholicism. He also felt the constant threat of Protestantism, but he never gave up the hope of returning people to the Catholic fold and restoring the boundaries of his  Ravier, Francis de Sales, 15; Janelle, Catholic Reformation, 240–46; and Dickens, Counter Reformation, 172–73. 50  Ravier, Francis de Sales, 64–65. 51  Ravier, Francis de Sales, 56–57, 62; and Daniel-Rops, Catholic Reformation, 380–81. 52  Daniel-Rops, Catholic Reformation, 381. 53  Janelle, Catholic Reformation, 241. 49

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diocese.54 He was tireless in his efforts to reform and guide those under his care in what he believed was the revival of Catholicism. François de Sales sought the reform of all those who were in his sphere of influence including clergy, laity, men, women, and Protestants. He administered rigorous examinations for those who wished to enter the priesthood, and during his tenure as bishop, he ordained almost nine hundred priests.55 He was one of the first to see the importance of a spiritual regimen for the laity. In his most famous writing, Introduction to the Devout Life, de Sales provided guidance for those who desired a closer and more spiritual relationship with God. His regimen was practical and showed laypeople how their daily lives offered chances for exercising virtue and communing with God. Both the humanism and mysticism of the age influenced the reforming methods of François de Sales.56 In addition to his duties overseeing his diocese, François de Sales also maintained a wide written correspondence. Religious individuals from throughout France sought the bishop’s advice. Always encouraging and positive, de Sales instructed bishops, priors, and abbesses in their religious lives and on reform. In a 1603 letter, de Sales responded to Antoine de Revol, the newly appointed bishop of the French Diocese of Dol, to discuss the characteristics necessary to hold episcopal office, and to suggest a reading list that Revol should undertake during his first year as bishop. Bishop de Sales suggested standards such as St. Gregory’s Morals and Pastoral Care and St. Bernard of Clairvaux’s On Consideration. He also recommended more recent authors like the Dominican theologian Luis de Granada and told Revol that “Cardinal Borromeo had no other theology to preach with, and yet he preached excellently.” Jesuits Franciscus Costerus and Francis Arias were also on the list, as well as the Life of Borromeo, whom de Sales called “the model of the true pastor.” According to de Sales, the most important works to study were the Council of Trent and the catechism, and the most important duty of a bishop was to preach.57 François de Sales continuously studied the literature that emerged during the period of Catholic reform, and he

 Ravier, Francis de Sales, 92, 123.  Ibid., 129–31, 239. 56  Janelle, Catholic Reformation, 244, 246; and Daniel-Rops, Catholic Reformation, 383. 57  Mackey, St. Francis de Sales, 29–31. 54 55

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encouraged those under his guidance to do the same in order to offer the best pastoral care. Women seemed especially attracted to de Sales’s guidance. He maintained an immense correspondence with women seeking spiritual advice, including Jeanne de Chantal who, with the bishop’s help, founded the Order of the Visitation.58 He corresponded extensively with abbesses who wanted to reform their houses. In a series of letters from 1604, Bishop de Sales instructed the abbess from a Benedictine abbey in Burgundy on how to introduce the breviary from Trent and reminded her of the council’s rules of confession for superioresses.59 His advice was very practical. For example, when telling the abbess how to introduce the breviary, he suggested that she gradually get each sister to say the grace from the end of the breviary at dinner. He informed her that he always observed the grace when he was home in Annecy.60 As with his visitations, Bishop de Sales realized that his example was the best encouragement for reform. François de Sales became one of the most popular figures of the post-Tridentine Catholicism and the Savoy region began to venerate him soon after his death while in Lyons. His cult was associated with miraculous cures for diseases common to his native region. At the papal hearing for his canonization, one deposition listed over a thousand miraculous episodes connected with his cult.61 The papacy encouraged his veneration, and he was canonized in 1665, fewer than fifty years after his death.62 In all his service to the Diocese of Geneva, François de Sales demonstrated perseverence and determination in his reform efforts, while still possessing a gentle compassion for the people of the Savoy. Continuing the Tradition—Jean-François de Sales Jean-François de Sales was born in the village of Thorens in 1578. Like his elder brother, he appears to have been drawn to the religious life. At the age of seventeen he entered the Capuchin order, but he left after only ten months because, by most accounts, his health was too poor for him to

 Rapley, The Dévotes, 35, 40. See chapter 5 for a fuller discussion of de Sales and religious women.  Mackey, St. Francis de Sales, 42, 80. 60  Ibid., 42. 61  Luria, Territories of Grace, 130–31. 62  Daniel-Rops, Catholic Reformation, 387. 58

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endure the austerity. Instead he was ordained as a secular priest in 1603 and promptly moved up the diocesan hierarchy.63 He was a canon of the cathedral and held the benefice of Petit-Bornand. François de Sales made his brother vicar-general, his second in command, in 1615, and JeanFrançois participated in the marriage negotiations between the Prince of Piedmont, Victor-Amadeus I, and Christine of France. He served as his brother’s coadjutor from 1621 to 1622 and handled much of the administration of the diocese during the last years of François de Sales’s life.64 Jean-François assumed the see of Geneva on December 28, 1622. As bishop, Jean-François de Sales continued the practices of annual synods and parish visits established by his predecessors. By most accounts he had a more severe personality than his brother and has been described as harsh, sour-tempered, and austere, but he was an able administrator. Even his brother François acknowledged this difference in temperament between the brothers when he described the three de Sales brothers as a salad with Jean-François as the vinegar for his strength, Louis as the salt for his wisdom, and François as the oil for his mildness. Jean-François’s meticulous nature is evident in the accounts of his visitations, which are much more detailed than his brother’s. He was rigorous in his efforts to continue the reform of the clergy, but his policies led to conflict with his cathedral chapter.65 While Jean-François de Sales may not have possessed the same gentle nature as his brother, he displayed great devotion to his family, to the Catholic Church, and to his diocese. He began the beatification process for François de Sales in 1627.66 He demonstrated great concern for the parishes of his diocese during an outbreak of the plague in 1629 to 1630; he stayed behind in Annecy with local syndics and a cathedral canon, his nephew Amédée de Sales, to minister to the ill while the rest of the local notables and the cathedral canons withdrew to Thorens. And apparently Jean-François sold his own household goods to buy food for the sick.67 Jeanne de Chantal wrote that his courage and 63  Ganter, L’Église Catholique de Genève, 299–300; and Plongeron and Vauchez, Histoires des Diocèses de France, 129–30. 64  Perron, “Les Evéques d’Annecy,” 61–63. 65  Ganter, L’Église Catholique de Genève, 300; and Plongeron and Vauchez, Histoires des Diocèses de France, 130. 66  Ganter, L’Église Catholique de Genève, 300. 67  Gonthier, “La Peste,” 126–29; and Plongeron and Vauchez, Histoires des Diocèses de France, 130.

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gentleness during the plague were without equal.68 In 1633, the Duke of Savoy named him chancellor of the Order of the Annunciation for his service to the state, but he was unable to thank the duke personally because his duties as bishop required him to lead the annual diocesan synod and conduct visitations.69 The tenure of Bishop Jean-François de Sales may have lacked the spectacular accomplishments of his canonized brother, but he was a competent administrator who was committed to continuing the reform and restoration of the Diocese of Geneva.

lm The Diocese of Geneva possessed three bishops who were committed to the tenets of Trent, and all had the blessing of relatively long tenures in office. The period from 1579 to 1635 saw continuity of programs and smooth transitions between the tenures of these three bishops. This period offers a crucial look at how and to what extent Catholic renewal envisioned at the Council of Trent could be accomplished by men with the commitment to pursue reform. All three men utilized one of the most powerful tools of reform that a bishop possessed, the episcopal visitation.

The Pastoral Visitation

Almost as soon as the diocesan structure emerged within western Christendom, ecclesiastical officials realized the need for a process to provide spiritual guidance and correction at the parish level. The pastoral visitation became the primary tool the church hierarchy used to monitor priests, parishes, monasteries, and any other individuals or institutions that came under its jurisdiction. Church officials soon realized that other administrative duties such as confirmation, dedication of altars, and ordination could also be accomplished during these visits.70 The practice of the visitation was not new; its origins can be traced back to the sixth and seventh centuries and specifically to a call for frequent visits at the Council of Tarragon in 516. Gratian affirmed visitations in the Decretum with a list of the basic duties, which included 68

 From Jeanne de Chantal’s letter of 11 August 1629, quoted in Gonthier, “La Peste,” 126–29.  Coutin, “Journal de Mgr. Jean-François de Sales,” 27. Originally a military order from the fourteenth century, the Order of the Annunciation was the House of Savoy’s honorary society for those who had given great service to the state and Catholic Church. 70  Binz, Vie Religieuse et Réforme Ecclésiastique, 178. 69

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examining the clergy, listening to them preach, and correcting errors of paganism and sin found among the parishioners.71 By the pontificate of Innocent III at the beginning of the thirteenth century, the visitation was a highly developed practice and evidence from Italy and England reveals visitors already following practices detailed in visitation manuals of two centuries later. Even though some standardization emerged within the visitation process, surviving records reveal that the visits never became strictly formulaic; written accounts of visitations contain specific instructions and admonitions that reveal the unique circumstances or problems present at each site visited.72 By the later Middle Ages, the visitation had become an established part of diocesan life. During the Avignon papacy of the fourteenth century, the specie-poor popes intervened in the visitation system by taking a portion of the procurement dues traditionally given to the bishopvisitor or his representative. This practice was very unpopular at the diocese and parish levels and was condemned by both the Council of Pisa (1409) and the Council of Constance (1414–18). As a result, the dues were returned to the bishop in the fifteenth century.73 After this time, Rome for the most part stayed out of the visitation process at the diocesan level, leaving the direct link in the church hierarchy between a bishop and his parish. The regularity and intensity of visitations ebbed and flowed with the level of reforming vigor within the Catholic Church. While annual parish visits were the ultimate goal of church officials, even the most frequently observed dioceses during the height of reform typically waited five to ten years between visitors.74 Visitations became even more important for both Catholics and Protestants during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as leaders of both confessions realized that the best way to ensure observance of the faith was through close supervision and inspection of parish practices. After the Council of Trent (1545–63), a Catholic bishop had exclusive authority to order a visitation of his diocese.75 He was expected to conduct or oversee regular visits of the

71

 Ibid., 179, 182.  Coulton, “Interpretation of Visitation Documents,” 17, 28, 35. 73  Binz, Vie Religieuse et Réforme Ecclésiastique, 184–85. 74  Ibid., 182. 75  Forster, Counter-Reformation in the Villages, 62. 72

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parishes under his control. Compliance to this decree from Trent varied greatly from one diocese to another, but some bishops took this requirement very seriously. Carlo Borromeo established the standard for systematic and thorough visitations for the post-Tridentine Catholic world during his tenure as archbishop of Milan (1564–84). Borromeo believed that the diocese was the foundation of the Catholic Church, and that the priests and parishioners were a single unit that shared a common bond of faith. Through pastoral visitations, diocesan synods, provincial councils, and the establishment of seminaries, Borromeo began a process of renewal and reform within his diocese.76 Borromeo wanted neither the papacy, nor secular rulers, nor civic officials to interfere with diocesan activities and administration,77 and he was willing to resist Rome itself to maintain this autonomy. The visitation was the most effective of all the instruments that a bishop had to convey Tridentine Catholicism to the parish level. How better for a bishop to inspire and instruct the priests and the faithful than with his example and his presence? Borromeo believed the framers of Trent wanted an active, austere, and resident bishop in every diocese, and he provided a model for other diocesan leaders to emulate and adapt for their corners of Catholic Christendom. Borromeo is almost always cited as the inspiration for other reform-minded bishops throughout the early modern period. But how widespread was the influence of Borromeo’s bishop-visitor outside of Italy? Was he the embodiment of Trent for reformers north of the Alps? It is impossible to know how many people made contact with Borromeo during his tenure as archbishop. Two men whom scholars know to have had direct contact with the reformer from Milan were Alexandre Canigiani, the archbishop of Aix-en-Provence, and Giovanni Battista Castelli, papal nuncio in France from 1581 to 1583. Both of these men spent time in Milan while Borromeo was in residence and transmitted his ideas of austerity, rigor, and reform to their posts in France.78 Borromeo’s writings and the accounts of his pious actions influenced other French Catholic reformers. Six thousand copies of the decrees from his first provincial council of 1564 were printed and distributed throughout 76

 Tomaro, “San Carlo Borromeo,” 67, 69.  Ibid., 73. 78  Venard, “Influence of Carlo Borromeo,” 208–9. 77

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the Catholic world.79 Borromeo’s Acta Ecclesiæ Mediolanensis set out a methodology for parish visits. Many dioceses had realized the value of frequent visitations before Borromeo, but his methods were helpful in providing structure for the actual visits and the written accounts of them.80 Word of his accomplishments in Milan spread rapidly during his lifetime, and he was canonized in 1610, only twenty-six years after his death. Borromeo was not the only inspiration for Tridentine reform, just the most famous. In some dioceses, reform attempts can be traced back to before the Council of Trent. How much of the diocesan reform beyond Italy was based on Borromeo’s model and how much was indigenous? According to Louis Binz, ideas of pastoral renewal were widespread in the fifteenth century and were evident in the Diocese of Geneva. The bishops of Geneva conducted regular visitations during the fifteenth century up to the start of the Reformation. Six visits were performed between 1411 and 1518. In addition, the surrounding Dioceses of Lyons, Lausanne, and Aix-en-Provence also had visitations at regular intervals during the same period.81 At least some of the reform-minded visitors of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries entered areas that had been touched by earlier spiritual revivals. If possible a bishop undertook the parish visitations personally, but if he was unable to go, he sent another clergyman in his place. Visiting each parish was a very time-consuming and arduous task. Many of the villages were difficult to reach, and roads became impassable during the winter months. All three men included in this study toured the diocese during their tenure as bishop, but other duties and failing health forced both Claude de Granier and François de Sales to appoint others to visit parishes in their later years. De Sales’s growing reputation as a spiritual guide and reformer placed great demands on his time, making it difficult for him to carry out all of his duties personally. Pastoral visitors have been portrayed as outsiders whose status allowed them objectivity and freedom to perform often-unpopular duties such as punishing errors and issuing fines. None of the surrogates appointed

79

 Tomaro, “San Carlo Borromeo,” 77.  Froeschlé-Chopard and Froeschlé-Chopard, Atlas de la Réforme Pastorale, 8; and Venard, “San Carlo Borromeo,” 216. 81  Binz, Vie Religieuse et Réforme Ecclésiastique, 185, 188–90. 80

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as visitors were strangers to the region and all entered a parish with the power of the bishop behind them; the visitors were local priests who had performed their duties well and had been rewarded by the bishop with his trust and with offices in the diocesan structure. It took Claude de Granier two years to visit the parishes of his diocese because he did the majority of his visiting in the summer months. He visited 360 parishes and forty-three annexes between 1580 and 1582.82 This was the first complete tour of the diocese since Pierre Farfein had surveyed 452 parishes in the name of Bishop Jean de Savoie from 1516 to 1518.83 Most of Granier’s visitation accounts are very short, and he often went to three or four parishes a day. Bishop Granier was primarily interested in the revenues of a parish, the services required of the priest, and the quantity and physical condition of the chapels. The majority of the injunctions he issued concerned the repair of parish properties including the church and the priest’s residence, the inventory of parish property, and the purchase of ceremonial linens. For the visits to the newly reestablished parishes in the duchy of Chablais conducted 21 October to 21 November 1598, Bishop Granier sent Claude d’Angeville and a carpenter to evaluate the physical state of parish property and the needed repairs.84 Granier established procedures and practices for his successors to follow and expand upon. When François de Sales became an active agent of Catholicism in the Alpine region of Savoy and France, he was both building on the past and striking out in his own direction. Bishop de Sales visited the French part of his diocese in October and November 1605 and the Savoyard portion in 1601 to 1610. The bishop evoked the name of the Council of Trent in the written records of his visits, but many of his actions centered on traditions that had been followed in the diocese before the Reformation. Based on the transcripts for the visitations in Avignon during the early seventeenth century, Marc Venard found the bishops’ visits to be thorough and not subject to a preexisting script. Bishops used the time in a parish to follow up on issues from previous visits and explore the current state of confraternities, alms distribution, and other parish duties and

 ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582.  Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Répertoire des visites pastorales, 2:324. 84  Gonthier, La Mission de Saint François, 238–41. 82 83

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activities.85 The written description of each parish toured by François de Sales began with a listing of who was present during the visit, and usually included local notables such as syndics, counselors, notaries, or châtelains. The document also mentioned the name of the parish priest and any curates, and whether they were present and in residence in the village. If the priest was absent, the reason was also recorded. For example, in the account of the visit to the Abbey of Notre Dame of Abondance, it is noted that a priest was absent because he was away studying in Chambéry.86 Clergy absenteeism had long been a concern for church officials; the visitors of the Genevan diocese during the fifteenth century were confronted with a large number of nonresident curés.87 In contrast, at the beginning of the seventeenth century, most of the priests appear to have been present during the bishop’s visits. Perhaps continued pressure by the bishops and a new mandate from Trent for residence had finally compelled the priests to stay in their parishes. The visitation records of Bishop François de Sales listed the services the priest was expected to conduct. This often included the number of weekly masses, feast days, and any other regularly performed ceremonies, followed by a listing of the properties and related revenues of the parish. Most of the parishes were relatively poor, so small parcels of land that grew wheat or vines were the major sources of income. The visitor then recorded the injunctions that he ordered the priest and parishioners to fulfill. These charges included a list of the materials the parish church needed to purchase such as books, linens, or altarpieces. It is here that de Sales ordered numerous churches, including the parishes of Alex, Balmont, and Hotonnes, to purchase a missal and “a manual in the usage of Trent.”88 Additionally, a parish was often ordered to make repairs to church buildings, including the priest’s house. The bishop issued a deadline for the completion of these purchases and repairs that normally ranged from one to six months. The visitor also noted under the injunction heading any requests and complaints made by the parishioners. These ranged from special ceremonies the parishioners wanted to have performed to complaints about the conduct or abilities of the curé. Finally, the visitation  Venard, Réforme protestante, 636–37.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:6. 87  Binz, Vie Religieuse et Réforme Ecclésiastique, 207. 88  “un manuel á lusage de Trente.” Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:24, 74, 341. The manual was most likely a diocesan guide created to help parish priests implement the council. 85 86

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account included a list of any individuals who received tonsure or orders during the visit. Parish visits were always a convenient time for a bishop to conduct administrative business like ordination.89 Under a separate heading in the visitation records the bishop listed each chapel located in the parish along with its patron saint, benefactors, revenue, physical condition, and the rector’s name. Injunctions pertaining to the repair and maintenance of the chapels were also in this section. Many of the chapels in the Diocese of Geneva were in poor condition and possessed little revenue. In 1607 at the parish of Alex, the rector of the Chapel of St. Magdalene was threatened with fines and excommunication if he did not improve conditions of the chapel and quality of the services in a month.90 Confraternities or individual sponsors, however, faithfully supported other chapels. Bishop de Sales followed this pattern for recording the accounts with only minor variation during the first decade of the seventeenth century when he visited over four hundred parishes and annexes. Evidence from the injunctions issued by the bishop reveal that his primary concern at this point was repairing the church property, obtaining the supplies for divine services including the missal of the Council of Trent, and ensuring that the priest was performing all of his assigned duties. The visitations of the sixty-six French parishes completed between 25 May and 25 June 1614 under the guidance of Bishop de Sales were performed by Jean Rosetain, curé of Chavornay and vicar-general for the French part of the diocese. These visits follow a similar format to those of François de Sales and note injunctions not fulfilled from de Sales’s previous visit in 1605. One noticeable difference is that the visitor gave a copy of the injunctions to the local official of the king. There is no specific reference to the Council of Trent, but the visitor did issue injunctions calling for missals, diocesan manuals, and rituals, and Rosetain ordered the priest from the parish of Echallon to teach the catechism.91 Because of France’s reluctance to promulgate the decrees of Trent, the visitors were circumspect in the introduction of reforms. As the works of Hoffman and Luria demonstrate, reform did enter France

 Binz, Vie Religieuse et Réforme Ecclésiastique, 178.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:25. 91  Ibid., 1:418. 89 90

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through individual dioceses headed by reforming bishops.92 Ultimately, as Venard concludes, “It is on the bishops that the new Catholicism essentially rests.”93 De Sales followed a similar path of introducing measures from Trent into the French parishes of the Diocese of Geneva despite France’s resistance to the Council’s proclamations. Diocesan officials completed an intensive survey of parishes in the duchy of Chablais where two decades previously missionaries had made a great effort to reestablish Catholic parishes and to convert or drive out the Protestant populations. Many of the villages were visited three times in a five-year period between 1617 and 1622. Jean-François de Blonay, prior of Saint-Paul, Jean Mocand, curé of Abondance, and Claude Cullaz, curé of Le Biot, surveyed parishes located in the duchy of Chablais in 1617, 1620, 1622, respectively. Even though de Sales delegated the actual visiting to others, he still took an active part in the process. The written reports for each parish have a statement signed by Bishop de Sales describing the injunctions issued. In addition, the visitor forwarded any unusual problems to the bishop for his attention. The accounts of the visitations to the duchy of Chablais reveal that the diocesan officials made an effort to introduce practices identified with post-Tridentine Catholicism. Confraternities dedicated to the Eucharist or rosary, many newly established, were mentioned often. In addition, injunctions appeared ordering the parishes to teach the catechism and to build confessionals. These efforts to introduce Tridentine reforms reveal that de Sales’s diocese was in the forefront of reform. According to Venard, Borromeo’s instructions for confessors, which included directions for constructing confessionals (Acta Ecclesiæ Mediolanensis), were not widely available throughout France until the middle of the seventeenth century.94 It appears that the parishes in the duchy of Chablais were a testing ground of the reform measures that would later be implemented throughout the Diocese of Geneva. Jean-François de Sales spent the summer and fall of almost every year during his tenure as bishop touring his diocese. By 1635 he had visited 272 parishes and forty-five annexes. It is evident from the written accounts that his thorough and precise nature left its mark on his  See Hoffman, Church and Community; and Luria, Territories of Grace.  Venard, Réforme protestante, 599. 94  Venard, “Influence of Carlo Borromeo,” 219. 92 93

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visits. While he followed the general format of his predecessors, he was meticulous in his descriptions of the duties of the priest, revenues of the parish, and descriptions of the chapels, and his accounts provide far more detail than his brother’s about the property holdings of the parish and the chapels. Headings to identify separate portions of the accounts such as revenue, chapels, responsibilities of the curé, and dividing the injunctions between priest and parishioners are two notable differences in the recordings of Jean-François de Sales. Regular parish visits did not seem to resolve the problems; on the contrary, the bishops found more to be concerned about. The visitations certainly reveal that the Catholic Reformation had entered parishes of the diocese in both Savoy and France by the beginning of the seventeenth century. The accounts of the parish visits provide a glimpse of the richness of village religious life and the vitality of the inhabitants’ spirituality during the early modern period. A comparison of the efforts of the three bishops better identifies what aspects of the visitation process were unique to an individual bishop and what were traditional to the diocese. The identification of subtle continuities and variations within the visitations will allow for a much more nuanced view of the Catholic faith as a result of the revival of the sixteenth century. It is impossible to know all who participated in the process of reform in the diocese or exactly how the protagonists interacted, but the situation around Geneva reveals that nothing was monolithic. Monarchs, popes, and bishops approached religious reform with varying goals and preconceived ideas and all wanted to play a leadership role. While the policies and actions of the rulers of church and state could make the implementation of practices easier or more difficult, the bishops, the regular clergy, and the secular clergy were the ones in the villages ministering to Catholic and Protestant populations. The methods employed by the reformers and their results will be explored in the following chapters.

3

Winning Converts The Mission in the Duchy of Chablais

T

he young provost of the cathedral, François de Sales, accompanied by his cousin and fellow priest, Louis de Sales, set out for the fortress at Allinges located in the duchy of Chablais in September 1594 (see map 3). François de Sales’s biographers, including his nephew, Charles-Auguste de Sales, recounted the mission efforts of Chablais in hagiographic terms, claiming de Sales almost single-handedly converted the Reformed populations back to Catholicism.1 While the success of the mission was an impressive feat, it was a complex and difficult enterprise for the future saint, and numerous individuals played a role. The inauspicious start did not foreshadow the mission’s ultimate success or the reputation de Sales would gain from the endeavor. The first months of the mission were not very promising and quickly discouraged the priests. In a letter to Antoine Favre, a close friend, confidant, and senator of Savoy, de Sales complained that the local populations did not come hear him preach and civic leaders interfered in his mission.2 He protested to the bishop of Geneva, Claude de Granier, that the people

 C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux. See Charles-Auguste de Sales’s description of his uncle’s exploits in volume 1 of his biography, especially books 1 through 4. Most scholars have dismissed his biography as hagiography, but it is an important early portrait of his uncle. CharlesAuguste was very involved in the canonization process of his uncle, and François de Sales’s success as a missionary was crucial to his becoming a saint. Charles-Auguste de Sales was bishop of the diocese (1645–60) and had access to family and diocesan records. 2  F. de Sales to Senator Antoine Favre, beginning of October 1594, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:91. Antoine Favre was one of de Sales’s greatest supporters in all his duties. 1

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Map 3: The Duchy of Chablais prior to the Catholic Mission of 1594

were very stubborn and had even reinstated a public ordinance that no one was required to attend Catholic services. De Sales voiced his disappointment to the bishop that some people wanted to hear him preach, but they feared being mistreated by the Bernese and the Genevans if they listened to him without shouting insults and holding rocks in their hands.3 The fear may not have been unfounded since troops regularly used the region as a battleground and the inhabitants had faced various occupations in the past.4 De Sales claimed he felt like St. Paul in the early  F. de Sales to Claude de Granier, end of October 1594, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:94–95.  Martin, Trois Cas de Pluralisme Confessionnel, 53–91.

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days of Christianity, describing the slow progress of his work: “We walk, but as the sick who, after leaving bed, find they have lost the use of their feet and, in poor health, do not know if they are more well than ill.”5 The words of François de Sales are not those of a man hopeful in his mission and reveal a very different figure from the one portrayed by many of his early biographers. By March 1595, François de Sales was spending more time preaching in the Protestant town of Thonon, but had failed to convert many people, leading him to feel isolated and at times doubtful about his mission. He confided to Antonio Possevino, the Jesuit missionary and diplomat who had been an early mentor to de Sales, that even though he preached often, only three or four Huguenots attended his sermons. It felt as if he was preaching to the walls and he wondered if someone else might be better for the job. One hopeful sign he revealed was that some people hid behind windows and doors to listen to him secretly.6 Throughout his stay in Chablais, friends and other religious sustained the missionary with their correspondence offering support and advice. He mentioned to Antoine Favre that Père Chérubin de Maurienne, a Capuchin missionary who would later join de Sales in Chablais, advised him to continue offering sermons to the people and bring in new preachers if necessary to repeat the message.7 François de Sales appeared overwhelmed in the early stages of the mission, but this feeling is understandable considering he was one of only a handful of preachers trying to convince thousands of Reformed followers to leave a faith they had known for nearly sixty years.

Converting Community Elites

What little success the de Sales found in these early days resulted from contact with local notables within the Reformed community, who, most likely, had expressed some curiosity of the Catholic faith. Like the evangelists of the early Middle Ages, Catholic officials first approached the 5  “Nous marchons, mais a la façon d’un malade qui, après avoir quitté le lict, se trouve avoir perdu l’usage de ses piedz et, dans son infirme santé, ne sçait s’il est plus sain que malade.” F. de Sales to Claude de Granier, from Thonon, April 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:118–19. 6  F. de Sales to Antonio Possevino, from Thonon, beginning of April 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:120–21. De Sales uses the word “Huguenot” in the letter. 7  F. de Sales to Senator Antoine Favre, 7 March 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:115. For a fuller discussion of Chérubin, see below.

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leaders of a community with the goal of achieving an influential convert who could serve as a public example before shifting their efforts to the general population. One potential covert convert was Pierre Poncet, a local notable who was considering conversion to Catholicism, but feared losing property and friends and worried about the duration of a truce. Political and economic issues appeared to be as much of a deterrent to Poncet as matters of faith; de Sales revealed that, despite various errors of belief, the man had believed in the Catholic doctrine of the real presence of the Eucharist for some time.8 This fact alone made de Sales optimistic that he could convince Poncet to leave the Reformed faith, but belief coupled with a more stable political situation would make the conversion more probable. De Sales continued to pursue Poncet and grew more hopeful of convincing him to embrace Catholicism, claiming that he “promised to make a public profession to the Catholic faith soon.” Poncet made good on this vow in late spring or early summer 1595.9 De Sales informed Peter Canisius, the Jesuit theologian, that he had converted eight people, including Poncet, after being in Chablais for nine months. To ensure that Poncet remained in the Catholic fold, Provost de Sales continued his meetings with the new convert, requesting Canisius’s aid for the benefit of Poncet in refuting Calvin’s translation from the Hebrew of Genesis 4:7 concerning God’s warning to Cain. The dispute was over whether God’s reproach of Cain refers to him mastering his sin (the Catholic view) or his brother Abel (Calvin’s view). De Sales had utilized Canisius’s catechism and examples from the church fathers to convince Poncet of his errors, but the only appropriate book he had with him was Robert Bellarmine’s Controversies, which was silent on the particular scripture.10 Different translations of one word could potentially spoil a fragile relationship between a new convert and his or her new faith. The missionary wrote that he did not want to fail in refuting Calvin’s interpretation. This task was not easy since de Sales claimed Poncet was more knowledgeable about Calvinism than a Protestant

 F. de Sales to Senator Antoine Favre, 11 April 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:124.  “promis de faire publiquement profession de la foi catholique d’ici à peu de temps.” F. de Sales to Senator Antoine Favre, 15 April 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:128–29. 10  On 21 July 1595, De Sales wrote to Peter Canisius from Thonon concerning the recent conversion of Poncet; de Sales, Œuvres, 11:140–44. 8 9

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minister and the authority of antiquity did not persuade him as to the infallibility of the Catholic Church; rather it deterred him.11 Rome’s continuity with the early church was often a useful tool in conversion. Susan Rosa explores the use of such polemics in her analysis of the return to Catholicism of Henri de la Tour d’Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne.12 Rosa argues that Reformed polemics were vulnerable to attacks by opponents when they accused the Roman Catholic Church of “innovation and error” concerning scripture and the ancient church because these charges implicitly linked Rome to the idea of one, true, apostolic church.13 De Sales went to great lengths to ensure that Poncet, a man well respected in the region, sincerely and permanently converted to Catholicism, but soon after his conversion, there were difficulties. Rumors spread that Poncet was tormented by demons and that de Sales had performed an exorcism to rid him of the affliction.14 Despite all of de Sales’s effort it appears that Poncet may not have remained Catholic. In April 1599, a Pierre Poncet went before the Council of Geneva and renounced the Roman faith.15 Prospects of individual conversions seemed to ebb and flow with the political negotiations of the region. The conflicts between France and Savoy and the involvement of the neighboring Protestants certainly impinged on the progress of de Sales’s mission, though his determined efforts ultimately did bear some fruit. He believed a peace agreement that was being negotiated between the states would give too much power to the Protestants, making his job even more difficult. De Sales informed Possevino that there were more inhabitants of the region whom he had convinced to abjure Protestantism, but just like Poncet, they claimed to be fearful of converting due to uncertainty about the truce.16 People did not want to embrace Catholicism if the faith was not going to be a permanent part of the community. The threat of military conflict, regardless of the armies’ confessional affiliation, could have a drastic impact on the missionaries’ ability to be in the villages among the people. At one point, de Sales notified the papal nuncio in Turin that further progress  F. de Sales to Peter Canisius, 21 July 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:140–44.  Rosa, “Il était possible aussi que cette conversion fût sincère,” 632–66. 13  Ibid., 638–41. 14  F. de Sales to Senator Antoine Favre, August 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:154–55. 15  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:182, n241. 16  F. de Sales to Antonio Possevino, beginning of April 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:120–21. 11 12

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of the mission was on hold until the completion of a truce.17 Political stability was crucial for the success of the mission. When de Sales had been preaching in Thonon for eight months, he informed Senator Favre that he would stay for four more months, but if after a year, people were not fulfilling their duty to the mission he would not continue there. The people de Sales referred to were the secular authorities of the region. He claimed that some inhabitants of the Chablais believed that he was proselytizing without the permission of Charles-Emmanuel I, complaining that the duke aided and abetted the accusation, writing “his silence is in effect a great argument.”18 François de Sales wanted the duke and members of the senate, as loyal Catholics, to become active participants in what he viewed as God’s work. He needed them to support his mission by publicly embracing the cause and supporting it financially. The duke, however, was trying to negotiate a peace settlement with France and he did not want to antagonize Geneva or the Swiss Protestant cities more than necessary at this juncture. At the beginning of 1596, with his threat of resignation seemingly forgotten, Provost de Sales became more assertive with his requests for increased support to both Archbishop Jules-César Riccardi of Bari, the newly appointed papal nuncio to Turin, and Duke Charles-Emmanuel I. He informed the papal nuncio of his immediate need for money to repair churches and to hire preachers to send out into the villages beyond Thonon. De Sales offered this suggestion to Riccardi: It would be a great help for us if his Highness [the duke] ordered the governor of the province to favor the converts, to call upon the obstinate, and to deprive them [in case they refuse] from all charge and from all public honor, and above all if he ordained one of the members of the sovereign senate of the Savoy to come here to Thonon to exhort the inhabitants.19 He wanted the Duke of Savoy to take a much more participatory role in the conversion of the Protestant populations, especially in the area of finances. He asked Riccardi to intervene with the duke about getting 17  F. de Sales to Archbishop Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 23 April 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:278. 18  F. de Sales to Senator Antonio Favre, end of May 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:139. 19  F. de Sales to Archbishop Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 19 February 1596, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:187–88.

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revenues controlled by the Catholic Chevaliers of SS. Maurice and Lazarus for church repairs and curés’ salaries in the duchy of Chablais.20 Duke Emmanuel-Philibert had entrusted the Chevaliers in 1575 with Catholic benefices located in Chablais, since much of the population there was part of the Reformed flock and, not surprisingly, the order was less than eager to give them up. The papal nuncio told the missionary, “do not lose hope of the good intentions of the duke and the eagerness with which I solicit them” but reminded de Sales that the negotiations for the benefices were complex and exhausting and that the duke was very sincere in affairs of religion.21 This uncertainty over revenue and the duke’s support would continue to nag François de Sales in all his service to the diocese. The Protestants continued to challenge de Sales’s right to reside and preach in Chablais, forcing him to request letters from the nuncio in Turin that proved to the Protestant opposition that he possessed the duke’s permission to practice Catholicism openly.22 Even with the challenges to his authority, François de Sales continued to work towards the conversions of prominent Calvinists. One of his most important conquests was Antoine de Saint-Michel, Seigneur d’Avully, who would play a critical role in the mission. The case of Avully was a family affair as his daughter Madeleine, her maid, and his son Gabriel came into the Catholic fold the same year as their patriarch.23 De Sales again called on the historical foundations of the Roman Catholic Church as he forwarded the prospective convert Avully a commentary of St. Jerome that the missionary claimed was clear on key points of Catholic doctrine, including the issue of purgatory. The tone of the correspondence reveals that Avully was at least open to the idea of converting to Catholicism. Through doctrinal education and familial pressure, the missionary hoped for a successful conversion, and his prayers were answered when after almost nine months of meetings, Avully embraced Catholicism 20  F. de Sales to Archbishop Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 19 March 1596, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:190. A medieval military order that originated during the crusades, the Chevaliers were an honorific order for the House of Savoy by the sixteenth century. 21  Papal nuncio to François de Sales, 10 December 1596 and 4 January 1597, in de Sales, Nouvelles Lettres, 1:165, 178. 22  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 2 March 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:239–40. 23  F. de Sales to Antoine de Saint-Michel, seigneur d’Avully, 10 May 1596, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:198–99.

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in a public ceremony in Turin on 26 August 1596 in the presence of the papal nuncio and the inquisitor.24 His son Gabriel followed suit in Abondance in October of the same year.25 Similar to Pierre Poncet’s, Avully’s conversion raised questions about the sincerity of his new profession of faith, but Avully had the added burden of being questioned by both confessions. The chorus of naysayers became so troublesome that de Sales broached the subject with the papal nuncio in Turin, claiming that Avully was the object of so much slander and hatred that it was obscuring the fact of his conversion.26 Rather than giving into the rumors and innuendo, Avully remained firm in his faith, becoming an example to other new Catholics and provided de Sales “immense consolation” with his piety.27 Avully proved himself a devoted Catholic, becoming one of the more vocal opponents of the Reformed faith as the mission’s chief propagandist. Seigneur d’Avully employed his pen to write several pamphlets that recounted the successes and progress of the mission, even goading Theodore Beza into responding personally to the attacks on Geneva.28 A case like Avully’s demonstrates why the missionaries went to such lengths to convert community leaders despite previous failures. In the face of numerous attacks on his character, Avully never wavered publicly in his new faith. His privileged position in society allowed him to become a leader in the Catholic community immediately upon his abjuration of the Reformed faith, and his family’s joining him in his new confession gave him the strength and comfort to withstand the assault of his critics. Engaging in missionary activities at a crossroads of so many sacred and secular interests like Chablais meant that no move went unnoticed. Geneva and Berne would seek recourse first from the Duke of Savoy for their grievances against the missionaries, and if that channel failed to achieve results, they turned to King Henri IV of France, viewed as the protector of Protestants. De Sales complained to Pope Clement VIII  F. de Sales, Œuvres, 11:198–99n1.  Formule de L’Abjuration de Monsieur de Saint-Michel, in de Sales, Œuvres, 23:16–17. 26  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, September 1596 and 12 December 1596, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:202–5, 219–24. 27  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 23 April 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:275–78. 28  See most notably d’Avully, Copie de la lettre (Lyons, 1598). For a discussion of Beza’s response to Avully, see Manetsch, Theodore Beza and the Quest for Peace, 323–28. 24 25

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in April 1597 that he was tired of the Republic of Geneva’s use of the name of Henri to justify its opposition to reestablishing Catholicism in Chablais. He claimed that the king did not know of this evocation and that if he did, he would not allow the Protestant cities to claim him since he had returned to the Catholic Church. Furthermore, de Sales believed that if the king pressed Geneva, its leaders would give Catholics in Chablais what the Genevans themselves claimed—“liberty of conscience.”29 All of de Sales’s correspondence concerning the French king supported the validity of Henri’s renunciation of Protestantism, but there is no way to know if de Sales really believed in the sincerity of the king’s most recent conversion.30 De Sales, as bishop, would work with the French king for a decade to reestablish the mass in the Pays de Gex, but answering to more than one secular ruler was never easy. After he became bishop, de Sales expressed to Clement VIII that the greatest difficulty he faced was having “two different temporal jurisdictions” because he had to maintain good relationships with both rulers and their legislative bodies.31 In operating in disputed areas, de Sales was always juggling divergent interests. François and Louis de Sales received long-awaited help for the mission in Chablais with the arrival in 1597 of several reinforcements who went to work immediately on a strategy for the region. The small band included two Capuchins, Chérubin de Maurienne and Esprit de Beaume; a Jesuit, Jean Saunier; and the curé of Annemasse, Jean Maniglier. The newly constituted group met with both de Sales in the Catholic village of Annemasse to discuss their next course of action, addressing various concerns and strategies for the Catholic mission including the possibility of holding some sort of conference or debate with Protestant ministers.32 The three key measures the group agreed on were, first, that the Chevaliers of SS. Maurice and Lazarus and others must relinquish revenues from property they held in the region, making them available to support parish priests. Second, they should establish a College of Jesuits in Thonon using the revenue of a priory  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, 21 April 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:270–71.  Wolfe, Conversion of Henri IV, offers a full exploration of Henri’s conversion and its many ramifications. For a cogent discussion of Henri IV’s conversion and its broader implications on France, see Holt, French Wars of Religion, 151–57. 31  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, end of February 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:257. 32  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:187. 29 30

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that had been there previously. Finally, the taxes owed to the duke by the inhabitants should be suspended because relief from this financial burden would improve their standard of living and make them more willing to listen to the preachers.33 The diocese consistently sought a combination of spiritual and economic support for their reform and conversion efforts. All of these measures were reasonable steps for the mission project to take in order to reinstall Catholicism into the villages. François de Sales informed the papal nuncio for Savoy in September 1597 of the results of the meeting, setting in motion the chain of events that would culminate in dramatic changes to the region.34 Bringing prominent Protestant figures to the Catholic side remained a cornerstone of the project, and the most important person both in the political and religious realms whom de Sales tried to convert was Theodore Beza. At the beginning of 1597, de Sales and a fellow missionary, Capuchin Esprit de Beaume, hatched a plan to gain an audience with Beza with the expressed goal of counseling him to abjure the Reformed faith. De Sales was to try and obtain a meeting with Beza while Beaume, in Rome for a chapter meeting, was to obtain assurances from Pope Clement VIII that Beza would be welcomed into the Catholic fold were de Sales successful in his conversion. De Sales recounted to the pope that he visited Geneva often under various pretexts before he was able to meet with Beza “alone and in secret” on the third festival of Easter. After the initial encounter, the young missionary claimed that he had used all his means to influence the Reformed leader but came to the conclusion that he was a bitter old man with a “heart of stone.” This impression did not dissuade de Sales from hoping to meet with Beza again to persuade him to cross the confessional divide, noting that time was of the essence due to Beza’s advanced age.35 The Catholic missionary’s meeting with Beza did not go unnoticed, and rumors spread throughout Europe in the summer of 1597 that Beza had converted to Catholicism, forcing the

33

 F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 14 September 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:309. 34  Ibid. 35  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, 21 April 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:268–70. Ganter, L’Église Catholique de Genève, 274, claims that de Sales made two more trips to meet with Beza after this April meeting, but de Sales’s surviving correspondence is silent on these alleged later trips.

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spiritual leader of Geneva to publish a pamphlet addressing the gossip.36 De Sales’s visits were most likely the origin of these rumors. In the end de Sales was unable to convince Beza to convert, but his easy entrée to the city and access to Beza are striking, and one wonders why the Reformed pastor was willing to meet with de Sales. The long-standing boundaries between the two faiths could not sever all contact between the rival sides. De Sales had little to lose and much to gain from this encounter, and had he somehow been successful in his mission, it would have been a major coup of the Counter-Reformation. The rumors that forced Beza to defend himself may have been enough of a reward for de Sales’s efforts. The attempted conversion, even if it had been nothing more than a rumor, illustrates clearly the potentially confusing personal encounters that could occur between Catholics and Protestants. Furthermore, this episode demonstrates the importance of cooperation between secular and regular Catholic clergy and the continued importance of personal outreach across confession boundaries in the mission efforts. One of the recent arrivals in particular would play a critical role in the new direction of the mission. Père Chérubin de Maurienne was the most colorful and contentious Catholic missionary present in Chablais, and the controversy surrounding Chérubin long outlasted his stay in Savoy. Two of his later defenders wrote biographies of the mendicant in an attempt to justify some of his more theatrical actions during the mission. He took a hard-line approach to conversion, which included taking the rope from the church bell so the Protestants could not use it to call their faithful to services and accosting people on the street for spontaneous theological debates.37 Men like Chérubin were known as much for their ability as orators as for their biblical knowledge; he repeatedly used his flair for the dramatic to challenge Protestant influence in the region. He promoted an aggressive program that harnessed the emotional power of baroque Catholicism; he revitalized the mission by focusing on dramatically staged public and oral events held in communal spaces including Forty Hours Devotions, Jubilee celebrations, and

 Manetsch, Theodore Beza and the Quest for Peace, 318–20. Manetsch says the Jesuits were the source of these rumors. The timing of the reports makes a convincing argument that de Sales’s visit was the impetus for the ensuing gossip. 37  L’Abbé Truchet, Vie du Père Chérubin de Maurienne, 33–35; and de Cognin, Le Pere Chérubin de Maurienne, 30. 36

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public debates with Reformed theologians.38 Over the next several years, the expanded mission reestablished over two dozen parishes in a region that had been part of the Protestant fold for more than half a century.

The Forty Hours

Both the art and theater associated with Catholicism during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries took on new vibrancy and drama. Nothing is more reflective of the splendor of baroque Catholicism than the Forty Hours celebration. A reference to the time Christ was in his tomb before the resurrection, the Forty Hours included continual display of the Eucharist, preaching, confraternity processions, theater, and music. The devotion grew out of liturgical ceremonies from the Middle Ages that centered on the period between Good Friday and Easter morning.39 Capuchin Joseph of Ferno is credited as the founder of this devotion, and Milan saw the first of such ceremonies in the 1520s and 1530s.40 The eucharistic celebration gained popularity with the spread of Tridentine decrees; the Capuchins, followed by the Jesuits and the Barnabites, spread it from the mid-sixteenth century onwards.41 In 1577 the visiting Carlo Borromeo performed the first Forty Hours Devotions for Savoy in Turin.42 Pope Clement VIII played an important role in popularizing the Forty Hours when he ordained in 1592 that the celebration be conducted continuously through the churches in Rome.43 In other words, when one church of the city finished its devotion, another church began a new Forty Hours. The devotion would serve as the anchor for the missionary projects around Geneva and provide an emotional spark to help attract the inhabitants back to Catholicism. Between September 1597 and October 1598, the Catholic clergy and laity in the duchy of Chablais celebrated Forty Hours Devotions on three separate occasions, once in the village of Annemasse and twice in Thonon. The celebrations served as the culmination of three years of missionary work and produced impressive results in the region. 38

 F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 14 September 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:309. 39  Weil, “Devotion of the Forty Hours,” 220. 40  Dompnier, “Un aspect de la dévotion,” 6. 41  Châtellier, Religion of the Poor, 24; and Dompnier, “Un aspect de la dévotion,” 6–7. 42  La Volontaire conversion, 22. 43  Dompnier, “Un aspect de la dévotion,” 8.

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Chérubin pursued the planning and staging of these devotions with zeal, managing to convince both the bishop of Geneva, Claude de Granier, and the Duke of Savoy, Charles-Emmanuel I, of the usefulness of such a celebration. Charles-Auguste de Sales asserted that the Capuchin decided to hold an oration of the Forty Hours “in order to wake up the ministers of Geneva.”44 Annemasse’s close proximity to Geneva made it an ideal place to celebrate the more flamboyant and dramatic elements of Catholicism literally within earshot of the Reformed leaders. Charles of Geneva, a fellow Capuchin who recounted Chérubin’s exploits, wrote that the missionary made a resolution to undertake the Forty Hours in Annemasse “to nourish the new converts…and entice them in the preaching and the divine sweetness of the exercises of the Catholic religion.”45 The Forty Hours had the ability to attract the attention of the willing and unwilling alike. The missionaries had a great deal of preparation in front of them in order to stage a Forty Hours in Annemasse. Père Chérubin acted as the main organizer of the event and set about planning a celebration “such that the people had not seen for seventy years.”46 They erected tents and stages, in part because the parish church in Annemasse was in a state of disrepair, but also because outdoor celebrations could reach a wider audience. An open-air arena had the added bonus of making an entire village a stage as processions ran along lavishly adorned streets. The missionaries wanted the experience to be visually stunning, so they decorated the temporary structures and streets with tapestries, carpets, images, and greenery, many of which were on loan from the duke.47 Decorations for such elaborate celebrations often had to be borrowed from the wealthy; in Rome in 1608, prominent families, cardinals, and foreign  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:187; and Tisserand, Les Trophées Sacrés, 86. Tisserand’s introduction recounts how the Capuchins assigned one of their own, Charles of Geneva, to write about the mission in the Chablais to give proper credit to Chérubin. Charles of Geneva visited the convents of the province between 1644 and 1650 to collect evidence for his chronicle that he composed between 1651 and 1653. From the many depositions that Charles of Geneva collected, he composed an abridged Latin version in 1657, which another Capuchin translated into French in 1680. However, there is no evidence that either was published until the French version was in 1867. It was only in the 1930s that the Capuchins returned to the unabridged version left by Père Charles and took steps to publish it. 45  Charles of Genève, Les Trophées Sacrés, 84. 46  Ibid., 216–17. 47  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:188; Annemasse continued to be a Catholic parish even when other villages surrounding it became part of the Reformed fold. 44

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embassies loaned out tapestries and other wall hangings for a Forty Hours Devotion.48 In Chablais, the ornamentation became increasingly lavish over the course of the three devotions, coinciding with the increased status of the participants. Theater was an effective way to expose all within earshot to the broad messages of the missionaries. By centering the celebrations on public and oral events, the men recognized the greater efficacy of live voices over the written word in a region where literacy was not particularly prevalent. Charles Mazouer in his 1982 article in Revue Savoisienne deemed it “catechetical theater.”49 The missionaries returned to biblical stories that would have been familiar to Catholic and Protestant alike, hoping the stories would strike a chord in the audience. Charles of Geneva claimed that Chérubin planned the demonstration of mysteries, including the three kings in the stable of Bethlehem, while CharlesAuguste de Sales wrote that there was a performance of the sacrifice of Abraham with verses written by the two Louis de Sales, François de Sales’s cousin, a cathedral canon, and his brother.50 Perhaps CharlesAuguste wanted to highlight the role his family played in the devotions. Mazouer points out that both stories could be connected to Christ’s sacrifice and thus to the symbol of the Eucharist. The sacrifice of Abraham was a logical drama for the Forty Hours, but the fact that Theodore Beza had written a piece of theater on the same subject when he was a professor in Lausanne might have been an added incentive.51 By using wellknown biblical imagery, the missionaries hoped to call on common past bonds of the community. The missionaries held the Forty Hours in Annemasse from Sunday, 7 September, until Tuesday, 9 September 1597. It began with a mass by Bishop Claude de Granier and the presentation of the Eucharist. From the beginning of Christianity, the accounts of the suffering and sacrifice of Christ and the early martyrs had attracted people to the faith. The leaders of the Catholic Reformation recalled these emotional origins and placed them at the heart of baroque Catholicism. With the Eucharist as the primary focus of adoration, the Forty Hours Devotion was an 48

 Weil, “Devotion of the Forty Hours,” 225.  Mazouer, “Théâtre et mission,” 55. 50  Charles of Genève, Les Trophées Sacrés, 84; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:188. 51  Mazouer, “Théâtre et mission,” 58–59. 49

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ideal tool for the missionaries to highlight not only the physical suffering of Christ but also the conflict with the Protestants over the real presence of the sacrament. The missionaries used the physicality of the Host as a rallying point for those in attendance, recognizing that it is easier to comprehend the material object than the word for that object.52 Seeing the Host elevated and hearing the Latin rites were keys to eliciting reactions from the laity, and for many they were more important than partaking in the sacrament.53 The missionaries recognized the power of displaying the Host while they preached about it and wanted the Eucharist to evoke memories and stories from the past.54 Charles of Geneva wrote, “Man needs physical objects to excite the senses which are doors to understanding in the knowledge of the mysteries of the faith.”55 The missionaries wanted the ceremonies surrounding the Eucharist to lead its viewers to define the community as those who believed in the power of the Host. Furthermore the priests were attempting to implement a script of sorts by calling on issues of duty, loyalty, and historical ties to the imagery.56 The missionaries constantly reminded the villagers of Catholicism’s connection to the larger community and to the past. Processions of confreres from neighboring villages were central to the devotion; they served dual roles as both participants and audience, demonstrating the proper awe and reverence at the sight of the splendor while offering the appropriate verbal and physical responses to the proceedings. As Edward Muir has shown in his analysis of ritual and processions in early modern Venice, it is important to explore not only how a public ritual was conducted and presented, but also how those watching reacted to it.57 Charles-Auguste de Sales recounted how the Penitents of the Holy Cross, a confraternity established by François de Sales in Annecy, were led into the village to partake in the worship by their prior Louis de 52  Reddy, “Emotional Liberty,” 267. People respond differently to the printed word than to the physical object. 53  Muir, Ritual in Early Modern Europe, 162–63. 54  Bachelard, Poetics of Space, 33. 55  “l’homme eyant besoingt des objects corporels pour exciter les sens quy sont les portes de l’entendement en la connoissance des misters de nre foy.” Charles of Genève, Les Trophées Sacrés, 91. 56  Reddy, Navigation of Feeling, 114, 122. To accept emotional cues that Reddy calls “performatives,” people have to have something at stake and the outcome must coincide with their “normative goals.” 57  See Muir, Ritual in Early Modern Europe; and Muir, Civic Ritual in Renaissance Venice.

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Sales, dressed in their robes, holding rosaries, and chanting the litanies of the crucifix.58 The celebrations offered the lay participants an integral role in the rituals and thus a place in the church and society. Rotating preachers dealt with three subjects: the blood shed by Jesus Christ, the reality of the Eucharist, and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin.59 These topics were areas where Catholics and Protestants held divergent theological positions, but they were also some of the most tangible aspects of Christianity. Catholic preachers frequently focused on religious doctrines challenged by Protestants.60 The priests intentionally highlighted them in their sermons during the Forty Hours in an effort to attract people back to the ideas of Catholicism and away from the influence of Geneva. Girolamo Seripando, archbishop of Salerno in the second half of the sixteenth century, also used his sermons to teach basic Catholic doctrine that focused on the sacraments, the liturgy, and prayer.61 By combining the verbal with the visual imagery, the priests hoped their sermons would offer a powerful and persuasive message. During the 1530s, the parish churches in Chablais had been subject to acts of iconoclasm, and the 1598 visits conducted by diocesan representatives revealed that many of the structures and decorations remained damaged.62 The Catholic missionaries preached about and presented to their audience the same physical elements of their faith— the crucifixes, relics, and images—that had been defiled by the Protestants and used them as rallying points. A stone cross, called the Cross of Philiberte, that contained two statues, one of the Virgin and one of the crucifix, had been destroyed in the religious violence of the region.63 During the Forty Hours in Annemasse, the clergy replanted a wooden crucifix in place of the Cross of Philiberte because they could not afford another stone one; a robe-clad procession of the laity from Thonon, led by François de Sales, escorted the cross in the village.64 Charles of Geneva said that Chérubin placed the cross so it could be seen from the  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:189. This is Louis de Sales the cousin, not François’s brother also named Louis. 59  Charles of Geneva, Les Trophées Sacrés, 90. 60  Worcester, “Catholic Sermon,” 27–28. 61  Cesareo, “Penitential Sermons in Renaissance Italy,” 5. 62  Gonthier, Mission de Saint François de Sales en Chablais, app. E, 238–41. 63  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:190. 64  Ibid., 1:189–90. 58

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city of Geneva, fashioning both a symbol of triumph and a challenge.65 Chérubin proceeded to preach about the meaning of the cross, whose reverence was often labeled as idolatry by the Calvinists, highlighting that Catholics did not just adore the symbols with their senses, but also understood intellectually that it was not the tangible nature of the cross that mattered, but that Jesus Christ was crucified for the sins of humanity.66 Gaston Bachelard observes that while “a spectacle that is already in the past” can never be reproduced, reliving it creates “the possibility of a fresh impact.”67 In this case, the replanting of the cross allowed the audience to relive not only Christ’s crucifixion, but also the destruction of a cherished icon. Charles-Auguste de Sales asserted that the Catholics present at the devotion understood that they did not honor stone or wood, but rather honored God.68 The explanation for the veneration of the cross was meant as a clear refutation of the Protestant charges of idolatry. The missionaries wanted the Catholic faithful to understand the proper meaning of the images, but at the same time, the priests maintained the importance of physical symbols to Catholicism. The preparations and publicity for the festivities had not gone unnoticed by the ministers in Geneva, who were informed at the end of August 1597 that the Capuchins were planning several processions, including one in Annemasse that would include a “great assembly where they [would] also erect a cross.” The Company of Pastors feared that the people would be distracted by the processions.69 On 2 September, five days before the planned Forty Hours celebration, the company viewed two placards made by the Capuchins advertising the adoration of the cross and chose Minister Antoine de la Faye to counter with his own propaganda denouncing the forthcoming Catholic festivities.70 Both confessions’ leaders recognized that the simple act of placing a wooden cross at an intersection of two Alpine roads could arouse feelings in all involved because of the historical, cultural, and theological significance attached to the act and to the icon. The Catholic missionaries had taken

 Charles of Geneva, Trophées Sacrés, 87.  Volontaire conversion, 41. 67  Bachelard, Poetics of Space, xxxiii. 68  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:191. 69  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:72–73. 70  Ibid., 7:74. 65 66

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the offensive in their efforts to convert the populations of the region, and the pastors of Geneva were left to respond. The Catholics had no desire to lose momentum in a mission program that was bearing fruit; they quickly commenced planning a followup to the successful Forty Hours Devotion in Annemasse with a larger one in Thonon. François de Sales recounted to the papal nuncio in Turin the success of the devotion and began seeking permission for a similar festivity in Thonon, boasting that three thousand people came from Geneva to watch the festivities and there was no place to lodge them.71 The consistory of the Reformed church in Geneva punished several people for attending the festivities in Annemasse, including a Pierre Besson who was sentenced to prison on bread and water.72 As far as concrete results, de Sales was a little more vague on actual numbers, but claimed that “some” people converted, others had their conscience aroused, and that the Catholics were comforted.73 By August 1598, plans were taking shape in Thonon and de Sales attempted to settle financial responsibilities. Duke Charles-Emmanuel I supported the preparations and promised monetary aid, and he let it be known that he wanted the Forty Hours celebration to begin 15 August so he could attend.74 De Sales informed the fiscal procurator of the Chablais, Claude Marin, that he needed more money to hire musicians and other support personnel for the festival. He also was searching for appropriate lodging with “good Catholics” for the visiting bishops and clerics.75 To ensure that those traveling to attend the celebration would have an easy journey to Thonon, de Sales sent a letter to the commander of the Spanish troops asking him to avoid the region with his men during the celebration.76 The eucharistic celebration ultimately took place in Thonon 20 through

71

 F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 14 September 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:310–11. 72  RC 92 Mi B462 (1597), fols. 118v, 125; Council registers mentioned one man brought before the consistory on 2 September 1597 and three women on 4 October. L’Abbé Fleury, in St. François de Sales Le P. Chérubin et Les Ministres de Genève, 64, mentions these episodes. 73  F. de Sales Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 14 September 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:311. 74  Charles of Genève, Les Trophées Sacrés, 215. 75  F. de Sales to Claude Marin, 6 August 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:342–45. 76  F. de Sales to Don Juan de Mendoça, commander of the Spanish troops, 16 August 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:347–50.

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22 September 1598, and a second one 1 through 3 October because the duke was unable to attend the first one. As with the Forty Hours in Annemasse, Chérubin set up a public sanctuary in Thonon near the church of St. Augustine. Holding much of the celebration outdoors again offered a public stage that ensured even those unwilling to attend would experience the activities. It also provided plenty of space for the Catholics attending from neighboring villages who could furnish the proper responses throughout the celebration. The organizers constructed a large oratory, two altars, and a pulpit for preaching, and decorated the area with rich tapestries of gold brocade sent by the duke for the purpose. As in Annemasse, a theater was set up near the church where processions would end and for the performance of the “eucharistic mysteries.”77 Employing the streets for the processions was also a way for the missionaries to claim the public space for Catholicism. The pope issued a plenary indulgence for all those who participated in the Forty Hours, and it was published in neighboring dioceses, encouraging Catholics to fill the streets.78 Once the physical structures were ready, Bishop de Granier, along with several other clergy, blessed the ornaments and cross, reconciled the church of St. Augustine, and reconsecrated the altar, thereby reclaiming the sacred space.79 Unlike in Annemasse, the church in Thonon had become a Protestant house of worship. This consecration further signified that the church and the town belonged to Catholicism. On Sunday morning, 20 September 1598, the devotion began in Thonon with a mass, a general procession through all the main streets, and the public presentation of the Eucharist.80 As in Annemasse, the Host was the focal point as Bishop Granier carried the sacrament followed by a procession that included the clergy, the regional nobles such as Jérôme de Lambert, governor of the province for the duke, and the confreres of the Blessed Sacrament.81 The organizers hoped that the  Volontaire conversion, 17; and Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 216–17.  Volontaire conversion, 17–18; and Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 217–18. 79  Volontaire conversion, 19. 80  Volontaire conversion, 24; C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:203–4; and Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 221. Volontaire conversion says the mass took place in the church. Charles of Geneva concurs that the bishop celebrated mass in the church while Charles-Auguste de Sales claimed that the bishop was at an oratory behind the church of St. Augustine. 81  Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 221. 77 78

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simultaneous participation of clergy, elite, and laity would encourage Reformed members of the audience to become part of the Catholic community. After the public entrance of the region’s elites came the processions of people from all provinces of Savoy and beyond.82 The first to arrive were the penitent confreres from Taninges, who listened to the preaching of Chérubin as he discussed the Eucharist, the Passion, and vocation of the missionaries.83 They used penitential sermons, in conjunction with instruction in the catechism, regular devotional activities, and the example of the clergy to achieve their goal of converting Protestants to the Roman church.84 A group with white robes and bare feet arrived from Bellevaux, a nearby Protestant town; they requested and received “absolution from heresy” and were welcomed back into the Catholic Church.85 The public image the missionaries wanted to offer to the region was one of the sincere penitent Protestant who realized his/her error and returned willingly to the true church to be embraced warmly and offered a place of refuge. A voluntary conversion was preferable to a forced one and was more likely to convince others to follow suit. Processions continued each hour as did the preaching, and four preachers oversaw the groups as they waited for their assigned hour. François de Sales preached about the “reality and dignity of the holy Eucharist,” and players performed a short piece about manna from heaven.86 One of the processions was composed of laity from the parish of St. Cergue, who arrived bearing a cross someone had hidden during the iconoclastic violence of the past. This parish had supposedly been the last of the region to leave the Catholic faith for the Reformed one

82  Volontaire conversion, 24–25; and Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 222. Dignitaries reportedly attended from Burgundy, Switzerland, the Val d’Aoste, and Bresse. 83  Volontaire conversion, 24–25; and Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 222. The sources describe the penitents of Taninges arriving dressed in white and chanting prayers and motets. Taninges is approximately thirty miles south of Thonon. 84  Norman, “Social History of Preaching”; and Besnier, Literacy, Emotion, and Authority, 139. Norman finds similar methods used in Italian missions. 85  Volontaire conversion, 25; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 222–23; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:203. Charles of Geneva claimed there were five hundred people from Bellevaux while Charles-Auguste de Sales said three hundred. Norman finds similar methods used in Italian missions; “Social History of Preaching,” esp. 144. 86  Volontaire conversion, 25; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 223; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:204. The accounts are almost identical on these events.

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during the early days of the Reformation.87 Through their rhetoric, the missionaries always asserted that the people around Geneva had been forced rather than willing converts to Protestantism, and there is evidence to support this claim. Michael W. Bruening describes the problems faced by Protestant ministers during the 1530s in the nearby Pays de Vaud: “Those clergy first had to confront a populace that had never wanted to become Protestant in the first place.”88 The implication was that the inhabitants of St. Cergue had held onto their Catholic faith as long as they could and had held onto a tangible symbol of it even longer. Throughout the night, the processions and sermons continued to enter Thonon, and the next morning many notables arrived, including Thomas Pobel, bishop of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux, who said mass in the church of St. Augustine and led the processions from the towns of Cluses and Sallanches. Those who came from the mountains of Faucigny were dressed in white robes with bare feet, which provided a constant reminder of the penitential aspect of the celebration, and one confrere performed a discourse on the suffering of Christ.89 The participation of a layperson who understood the tenets of Catholicism was crucial to a display of a united church. Père Chérubin was so inspired by the “devout emotion of the people” that he preached for the hour on the same subject.90 The Passion of Christ had long evoked powerful emotions in laity and clergy alike. One only has to recall the tales of English woman Margery Kempe and her uncontrollable crying when she meditated on Christ’s suffering.91 Again the missionaries showcased an aspect of Christianity, in this case the crucifixion, which was more central and concrete to Catholics than to Calvinists and connected back to the ancient apostolic church. The nobles of Chablais arrived the second morning led by Jérôme de Lambert, who, as a secular leader in the region, played a prominent role in the progress of the celebration. The afternoon brought a group from the nearby Catholic parish of Evian who entered Thonon dressed up like angels and carrying the symbols of the Passion. They proceeded  Volontaire conversion, 26; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:203–4.  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 165. 89  Volontaire conversion, 27; C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:204; and Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 224. 90  Volontaire conversion, 27. 91  Book of Margery Kempe, trans. Windeatt. 87 88

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to perform a play about the prophet Elijah as he ate the bread from the angels under a juniper tree while hiding from Jezebel.92 In her study of sermons, Larissa Taylor found that while all social and economic classes attended sermons, the poor appear to have preferred mystery plays and performances.93 All of the theater pieces at this Forty Hours in Thonon featured the idea of nourishment from God, which could be concretely tied back to the Eucharist.94 The concept of the Catholic Church as the source of sustenance and comfort could be very inviting to people who had experienced material hardships as a result of the sustained religious and political turmoil of the sixteenth century. The accounts of the celebration in Thonon make mention of the risk and even danger some faced in coming to the festivities. Charles-Auguste de Sales wrote that while traveling to the celebration, some groups were accosted by the region’s Protestants; a group from Ternier arrived a day late because they were detained in Geneva. He also asserted that some of the attendees feared for their safety so they chose to come under the cover of night, compelling François de Sales and Père Chérubin to preach throughout the night to accommodate the late arrivals.95 Charles of Geneva wrote that the pilgrims endured the insults of the Protestants so bravely that it moved several Huguenots to convert.96 All three accounts of the Forty Hours in Thonon portray the people as religious pilgrims who risked their lives to be a part of this devotion. In other words, they were potential martyrs. The religious pilgrims believed they might encounter some great peril when venturing out onto the narrow and rugged mountain roads to travel to Thonon. There is no way of knowing what actual dangers the people faced, but considering the very real religious violence that had been so prevalent in the region for decades, their fears were surely genuine and heightened the intensity of the devotion until its conclusion at two in the morning on Tuesday, 22 September 1598. While all involved in the first Forty Hours of Thonon hailed it as a great success, it lacked a key element—the presence of the duke. The  Volontaire conversion, 27; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:204–5.  Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, 28–31. 94  Of the Forty Hours in Chablais, Mazouer (“Théâtre et mission,” 48) says, “Nothing was neglected in order to strike the senses and imagination of the faithful.” 95  Volontaire conversion, 28; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:205. 96  Volontaire conversion, 29; and Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 225. 92 93

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missionaries needed more from Charles-Emmanuel I than his money and decorations; they needed his public participation in the mission project. In addition, Cardinal Alexander de’ Medici was passing through the region on his way back from France, and the duke invited him to stop in Savoy. The cardinal was papal legate to France, a key figure in the absolution of Henri IV, and would later become Pope Leo XI.97 He had been in France to mediate between France and Spain.98 Plans rapidly took shape to hold yet another of the three-day celebrations. There were additional preparations necessary to properly entertain such high-ranking dignitaries, including appropriate adornment of the accommodations and the churches.99 The preparations and the arrivals of the guests became important public rituals to demonstrate the cooperation between secular and religious authority. Both men and their entourages arrived in Thonon at the end of September 1598 with the duke greeting Cardinal de’ Medici and ushering him first to the church of St. Hippolyte and then to lodgings that had been “sumptuously prepared and decorated in the town hall.” The church of St. Augustine was decorated with tapestries and drapes of gold, silver, and purple, while the pulpit was elevated on scaffolding and the base covered with a Turkish carpet and a gold drape. There were prominent places in the church for the cardinal and the duke. The heart of the church was turned into a small chapel with candles that gave the effect of stars in the sky, and the altar held a very ornate tabernacle to hold the sacrament.100 The descriptions of the decorations are quite similar to those Christopher Black found for the Forty Hours in Italy.101 The ornamentation was more lavish for this second celebration in Thonon to match the increased status of the participants. The interior of the church was used more extensively than at the previous celebration so that parts of the devotion became more exclusive for the visiting dignitaries. The stage was set for an even more powerful and moving performance with hope of more impressive results. On Thursday morning, the first day of October 1598, the duke escorted the cardinal from his lodgings to the church of St. Hippolyte.  Kelly, Oxford Dictionary of Popes, 276–77.  Haan, “Les réactions du Saint-Siège à l’édit de Nantes,” 357. 99  Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 227, 231–32; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:205. 100  Volontaire conversion, 32–33; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 235–36; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:207–8. 101  Black, Italian Confraternities in the Sixteenth Century, 99–100. 97 98

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Various dignitaries of both church and state were present; they were seated according to their rank and included the bishops from the surrounding dioceses.102 Cardinal de’ Medici, dressed in all his pontifical finery, was presented with people who wanted to receive absolution. The first person offered for absolution was the Protestant minister Pierre Petit, who after his public profession addressed the crowd about his journey that led him to return to the Catholic fold.103 Petit claimed that the Catholic Church’s historical foundations and far-reaching membership, coupled with the miracles revealed in the doctrine had swayed him to embrace the Roman faith. Again the Catholic Church’s continuity with early Christianity was offered as an incentive to potential converts.104 While the public abjuration of Pierre Petit was a staged performance, its impact cannot be discounted. The Protestant minister had agreed to participate in this public return to the Catholic Church, providing himself as an important symbol that showed Catholics that the mission was making progress and reminded Calvinists that even someone trained in their beliefs could see “the truth.” Finding a minister willing to convert was no easy task, but the missionaries were willing to take less than ideal candidates.105 Pierre Petit was a troubled Reformed minister whose drinking and marital problems had repeatedly come before the Council of Geneva and the Company of Pastors in the five years before his suspension in 1595.106 He had petitioned repeatedly for his reinstatement to the ministry but was denied each time.107 Consequently he publicly professed loyalty to Rome in the presence of the Duke of Savoy and other dignitaries at the Forty Hours Devotion. Even though Petit had been a failure as a Reformed minister, in the Catholics’ eyes he could be a successful convert. Keith Luria has shown that the conversion of clergy always occasioned attacks  Volontaire conversion, 34; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 236; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:208. The bishops from Mantua, Geneva, St. Paul, Torcelle, and Termoly attended, as did the general of the Observance. 103  Volontaire conversion, 34; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 236–37; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:208–9. He supposedly spoke for more than an hour. 104  Rosa, “Il était possible aussi que cette conversion fût sincere,” 662–65. 105  See the attempt to convert the Reformed minister from Gex, Arnoul Martin, in chapter 4. 106  RC 85 Mi B455, fols. 245, 246v (12 October 1590); RC 86 Mi B456, fol. 92 (14 May 1591), and fol. 145v (6 August 1591); RC 90 Mi B461, fol. 166 (9 September 1595); and Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 6:79–80, nn80–81. 107  RC 90 Mi B460, fol. 166 (9 September 1595); RC 91 Mi B461, fol. 13v (13 January 1596). 102

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and questions of sincerity from the opposing confession, and in the case of Petit, there was plenty of ammunition.108 The Catholics quickly published an account of Petit’s conversion to which, despite the disgraced Reformed minister’s low standing in Geneva, the Company of Pastors felt compelled to respond, attacking Petit’s character with its own propaganda. The pastors chose Antoine de la Faye to write a brief account of “that rascal Pierre Petit,” claiming the Catholics were treating him like a “grand homme.”109 Geneva’s propagandists detailed Petit’s character problems, and someone even composed a derogatory sonnet that plays on his name beginning with the lines “Petit de nom, petit en bien, / Grand en perfidie & malice, / Apposté pour estre complice / D’un traditeur Herodien.” (Small of name, small in good, / Great in perfidy and malice, / Apostate in order to be an accomplice to a / Herod-like renegade.)110 Petit remained in the Catholic fold, and the duke made him a châtelain of Thonon four years after his conversion. During subsequent fighting after the Escalade (on the night of 11 to 12 December 1602), Geneva’s troops captured Petit; the council ordered that he be ransomed back to Savoy, and Petit was freed in late March 1603 after the ransom was paid.111 According to the parish register of Thonon, Petit died in October 1621 after receiving the sacraments.112 He was a more successful public figure as a loyal Catholic and hated apostate than he had been as a suspended and troubled Reformed minister. After the public absolutions, there was music, a mass, and a general procession through the sumptuously decorated streets of Thonon. Bishop Granier led the procession and carried the Eucharist as the prominent 108

 Luria, “Politics of Protestant Conversion to Catholicism,” 26.  The account was La Volontaire conversion de Pierre Petit, cy devant ministre de Genève, à nostre saincte foy et religion catholique, apostolique et romaine (Paris, 1599). It was reproduced by Emile Vuarnet in “Découverte d’un livre de 1598 relatif à la Célébration des Quarante-Heures de Thonon.” Mémoires & Documents Publiés par L’Académie Chablaisienne 26 (1912–13): 1–62; and Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:191. 110  Attacks on Petit were published with UGL, Response de Hermann Lignaridus à certaine letter imprimé, en laquelle le sieur d’Avully s’est essayé de représenter la dispute entre iceluy Hermann et Cherubin (1598). 111  RC 98 Mi B468, fol. 123v (29 March 1603); Documents sur L’Escalade de Genève, 286–87. The papal nuncio in Turin, Paulo Tolosa, informed Cardinal Pietro Aldobrandini in May 1603 of Petit’s capture and his fear that the former Protestant minister would be executed; Colladon, Journal d’Esaie Colladon, 74, has an entry for 26 March 1603 that Pierre Petit was briefly captured but that someone paid “100 ducatons” for his release. It appears that in the confusion of war, the papal nuncio did not know that Petit had already been set free. 112  Cited in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:227n1. 109

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visitors, including the duke, walked to the church of St. Augustine in a procession with their heads bare and candles in their hands.113 One key goal of a preacher was to delineate sacred space through ritual actions.114 It is significant that the route of the procession was from the church of St. Hippolyte through the narrow streets of Thonon to the church of St. Augustine. The Catholics were staking out their territory and reclaiming the streets. They were re-sacralizing Thonon after it had been “polluted” by the Protestants.115 As Thonon is built up on the rise along the banks of Lake Geneva, all of this was done in full view of the Calvinists who lived in and around the village. No one would have been able to escape the sights and sounds of the Forty Hours. The organizers placed various images and props along the streets on the path between the two churches. Charles of Geneva described a large rock emitting flames placed before the door of the church of St. Augustine as a symbol of the invincible Catholic Church, a fountain to symbolize the “living, perpetual, and clear doctrine of the church,” and a triumphal arch decorated with artificial doves that held gilded scrolls in their feet. The verses sang the praises of the two men as preservers of Catholicism with a Latin verse proclaiming that Alexander de’ Medici was greater than Alexander of Macedonia, while a French verse said that the duke was a ruler with a great heart who gave more in peace than in war.116 In this scene, the missionaries united the political images with the sacred ones to signify the common goals of church and state of a unified Catholic population.117 The dignitaries entered the church of St. Augustine and were seated so they were visible to others present in the church. As in the first two Forty Hours Devotions, the rest of the first day and night was taken up with preaching and confraternity processions. Père Chérubin made the first sermon on the power of God; François de Sales followed with a homily on gospel passages interpreted differently by Catholics and  Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 238–40; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:209–10. 114  Norman, “Social History of Preaching,” 156–57. 115  Davis, “Rites of Violence,” in Davis, Society and Culture in Early Modern France, 152–87. 116  Volontaire conversion, 37–39; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 239–40; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:209–10. 117  At this time, the elites of clergy and state appear united in their aims, as scholars of confessionalization have argued, but this convergence could be fleeting. 113

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Protestants; and other preachers, including Louis de Sales, succeeded them. Processions arrived from neighboring villages and like the first general procession, followed the route between the two churches and paid their respects to the duke.118 On Friday morning, the duke became a more active participant in the ceremonies. All the accounts claimed that Duke Charles-Emmanuel I realized he had to be an example to his people, so he received the sacraments along with the other dignitaries.119 The endorsement of the proceedings by the secular ruler made a crucial public statement about the duke’s desire for a unified Catholic dominion, and he was both a humble penitent and a leader by example. The leaders offered at least an ephemeral statement of the link between church and state. It was the duke along with the bishops of Geneva and St. Paul who led a confraternity dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament in a procession to replant a crucifix. The procession of white-clad confreres began at the church of St. Hippolyte and carried a large wooden cross to the crossroads of Rue de la Croix where they installed it in the place a cross had stood before the Reformation. The duke, dressed as the other confreres, knelt before the cross in prayer, then kissed and embraced the sacred object with the other confreres following suit.120 For this moment, the duke was symbolically one of many anonymous confreres, but all who viewed the planting of the cross certainly knew who he was. The duke’s active participation as a penitent signaled to the crowd his loyalty to the church of Rome.121 Although the clergy and Charles-Emmanuel I sometimes clashed over administration of the mission, the Forty Hours provided the opportunity for secular and religious goals to dovetail, if only temporarily, and allowed the leaders to stand publicly together, united as Catholics. The missionaries claimed even greater success from the two Forty Hours Devotions in Thonon than they had from the one in Annemasse. François de Sales notified the papal nuncio that several thousand

118  Volontaire conversion, 40–41; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 241–44; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:211. The route went from St. Hippolyte to St. Augustine. 119  Volontaire conversion, 43; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 244; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:212. 120  Volontaire conversion, 44–45; Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 245; and C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:212. 121  In addition to more sermons and processions on the second day, as at the first devotion in Thonon, the pope offered a plenary indulgence for all who confessed and received communion.

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inhabitants had returned to Catholicism in Thonon and he believed that Calvinism was finally being turned back in the region: “The interests of Jesus Christ are now in such a state in these provinces that if we are able to give to the cult proper splendor, the head of the serpent will be broken.”122 De Sales reported to Pope Clement VIII that Cardinal de’ Medici attended with the duke and viewed an “innumerable multitude of men” abjure Protestantism.123 All the accounts claimed that the Forty Hours Devotions brought huge numbers of converts, and the events were successful enough for Duke Charles-Emmanuel I to renounce publicly the liberty of conscience for the Protestants guaranteed by the Treaty of Lausanne of 1564.124 Because the duke was now in a better political position, he was able to assert his goal of a Catholic realm. Representatives arrived from Berne, Geneva, and Fribourg to plead the case of the Protestants of the region, but Charles-Emmanuel claimed that he was the legitimate ruler of the region who had reconquered the area and had the right to reestablish Catholicism. The duke reportedly gathered people together in a “public assembly” to exhort them to return to his faith.125 At this moment the duke’s policies complemented those of the mission, but their common goal could diverge if the situation changed.

The Disputation

The missionaries’ goals went beyond their desire to return the Protestants of Chablais to the Catholic fold. In order to conquer the region completely, they wanted to engage directly the Reformed leadership of Geneva, viewing the city as “mother and source of the Calvinist heresy.”126 Discrediting the pastors of Geneva in public was a crucial step towards continuing the reversal of Reformed influence in the Chablais and perhaps beyond. Between 1597 and 1601, as the Catholics planned and executed the Forty Hours Devotions, the missionaries also participated in lengthy negotiations with citizens of Geneva in efforts to stage 122  “Sonno le cose di Christo a tal segno in queste provintie adesso, che se habbiam modo di farle splendidamente, il capo del serpente se ne va spezzato.” F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 13 October 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:356, 358–59. 123  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, around 20 October 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:364. 124  Brossard, Histoire Politique et Religieuse, 280. The Treaty of Lausanne was signed in 1564 by Duke Emmanuel-Philibert. 125  Volontaire conversion, 47–48; and Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 249–50, 259. 126  “Genève, mère et source de l’hérésie calviniste”; F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, ca. 20 October 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:363–66.

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formal debates. Though only one brief disputation ever took place, it is apparent from these discussions that the two confessions had very divergent goals. The Catholic missionaries wanted to have their message heard in as many public forums as possible, so it is not surprising that the Catholics appeared much more eager than the Calvinists to engage in an oral debate of confessional issues. The followers of the Reformed faith viewed flamboyant displays as excessive and unnecessary. Secondly, Geneva continued to fear the Duke of Savoy and did not want to antagonize him with a public confrontation with Catholic clergy. Since his arrival in the region, François de Sales had believed in the potential benefit of a dialogue with the Calvinists, whether in one-on-one meetings or formal disputations; however, in the early months of the mission, he could not organize a debate because he lacked manpower, financial resources, and secular support.127 During the early stages of the Reformation and prior to the abolition of the mass, the region had witnessed debates in Geneva (1535) and Lausanne (1536). The Reformed position had been effectively championed by Guillaume Farel and Pierre Viret, men who would work closely with John Calvin in Geneva.128 While these early debates served as important public milestones in the expansion of the Reformation, six decades later, a public disputation would serve a very different purpose for both the Reformed and Catholic populations. Emboldened by reinforcements in 1597, Provost de Sales mentioned to the papal nuncio in Turin that Père Chérubin was in contact with someone from Geneva, and de Sales hoped a dispute with the Protestants would transpire. In an effort to justify such an event, de Sales cited the success of similar debates between the Jesuits of Tournon and the Protestants of Vivarais and Languedoc.129 De Sales seemed to be acting on this evidence that public exchanges between the confessions could be efficacious for the diocesan goals in the region. In March, the exchanges came to the attention of the Company of Pastors in Geneva who mistakenly thought a Jesuit was pursuing the disputation. A citizen of Geneva had communicated with the Capuchin without the company’s consent, which it viewed as a “dangerous thing,” warning against putting anything

 F. de Sales to Senator Antoine Favre, 18 September 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:158–60.  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 137–41. 129  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 21 February 1597 and 17 March 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:235–39, 323–26. 127 128

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in writing and ordering a halt to further discussion with the presumed Jesuit.130 These negotiations continued and the issue reached the full bodies of both the Council of Ten and the Company of Pastors by early summer. Jean Corajod, Geneva lapidary and member of the Council of 200, had issued some sort of invitation to Chérubin.131 Theodore Beza convened a special meeting at his home to address the Capuchin’s letters to Corajod and to uncover why Chérubin assumed the lapidary possessed authority to negotiate a conference between the two confessions. Corajod and his accomplice Jacob Gradelle defended their actions, claiming that several pastors, including Charles Perrot, were well aware of their activities, but Beza acted as if he was not.132 It is difficult to believe that the two men would have corresponded with Chérubin without at least tacit approval from a religious authority, which points to disagreement among members of the Company of Pastors on how best to respond to Chérubin’s overtures. The leaders of Geneva continued to finger-point over who had responded to the missionary in the first place.133 Leonard Chester Jones, in his biography of Simon Goulart, identifies Goulart, Perrot, and perhaps even Beza, all from the Company of Pastors, as being involved in the initial negotiations with the Capuchin and says Antoine de la Faye was the biggest opponent. Jones is critical of la Faye, asserting that if the pastor could not lead the negotiations in his “mediocrity,” then he did not want to proceed.134 For many in the Company of Pastors, there was little to gain from an oral debate of their faith with their rivals; yet someone from Geneva succumbed to the Catholics’ persistence. On 14 March 1598, the Protestant professor of theology Herman Lignaridus, who had assumed his position in Geneva the previous July, arrived in Thonon and over the course of two days engaged in a disputation with Chérubin.135 Lignaridus halted the proceedings and left for  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:63, 19 March 1597.  F. de Sales, Œuvres, 11:236n1. 132  RC 92 Mi B462: fols. 87, 89v, 90 (1597); and Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:67–68: 12 & 17 June 1597. 133  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:67–69. 134  Jones, Simon Goulart, 113, 123, 125. 135  RC 92 Mi B462, fol. 22 (4 February 1597), Council addresses the hiring of Lignaridus; and fol. 105vº (4 August 1597) mentions making payments to the elector palatine as a gesture of goodwill for Lignaridus. See also Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 186; F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 17 March 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:324–26; and Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:95–96. 130 131

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Geneva but, according to the Catholics, signed a notarized statement promising to return.136 The two sides offered very different accounts of how the debate actually transpired. François de Sales reported to the papal nuncio in Turin that four people, including Lignaridus, came to Thonon from Geneva and engaged in a disputation that was recorded by witnesses. Not surprisingly, de Sales recounted that Chérubin performed with “great dexterity” and “embarrassed” the Protestant professor.137 On the other hand, Beza denied that any formal debate was ever planned and claimed in a letter to his brethren in Lausanne that Lignaridus was simply in Thonon to refresh himself in the waters and had been accosted in the street by Chérubin. To maintain his honor in the face of the Capuchin’s affront and at the urging of the people in the town, with Calvinists wanting their faith affirmed in public and Catholics hoping to see Chérubin best the Reformed theologian, Lignaridus in his “impudence” accepted the Capuchin’s challenge.138 The debate covered rather standard points of contention between the two confessions including the interpretation of scripture; the existence of purgatory; the authority of councils, tradition, and scripture versus the authority of scripture alone; and the role of various church fathers.139 Much of the debate centered on whether the Book of Maccabees was canonical, as the Catholics claimed, or apocryphal, as argued by the Reformed tradition.140 In the end, neither side probably accomplished much or changed many minds during the debate itself, but how each side handled the aftermath offers intriguing insight into the clash and coexistence of a biconfessional community. Chérubin insisted that the two sides must finish the debate as it was started, with live voices, and he continued to press Geneva to send either Lignaridus or someone else to complete the task. Geneva appeared unhappy with the outcome of the public dispute and seemingly tried to ignore the Capuchin’s continued overtures.141 By all accounts Chérubin

 Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 186.  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 17 March 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:325–26. 138  Theodore Beza to church of Lausanne, 5 August 1598, in Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:317. 139  Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 132–61. 140  Avully, Copie de la lettre du seigneur d’Avully, 14–15. The majority of the published letter was included in Charles of Genève, Les Trophées Sacrés, 129–32, 158–60. 141  The company registers are silent on the matter until late summer 1598. 136 137

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was a powerful preacher and may have been better able to express himself than theology professor Lignaridus. The company maintained that the “dispute that he [Chérubin] requests before the people is only a vain thing and of no use unless our good conditions are met.”142 The purpose of debating was very different for each side; the Reformed leadership viewed it as a way to offer instruction in its doctrine, which could be done more effectively in writing, while the Catholic mission preferred public displays that highlighted a few key emotion-evoking elements of its faith like the Eucharist, the crucifix, and purgatory. In the aftermath of the dispute, the Catholics put a much more successful public spin upon the proceedings and pursued its continuation with much more enthusiasm than their Protestant rivals. As the Catholic camp asserted that it was Geneva who chose not to continue the debate, it proclaimed victory from the pulpit, in published pamphlets, and on posted placards. Keith Luria found that debates of this later period favored the Catholics because they had better access to printing presses, were better funded, and received less interference from royal censors.143 One such publication after the Thonon debate was an open letter about the encounter written by Antoine de Saint-Michel, seigneur d’Avully, detailing how Chérubin vanquished his opponent.144 In the letter, Avully portrayed Lignaridus as a lofty theologian who arrived in Thonon with his degree and books in hand to face Chérubin who was armed with only his faith and passion.145 Avully claimed that Lignaridus always interrupted Chérubin when he was making a significant point and halted the proceedings, pleading the lateness of the hour, rather than letting the Capuchin have his full say.146 In all of their propaganda, the Catholics portrayed the Calvinists as hostile and desperate.147 François de Sales asserted that the pastors of Geneva continued to fight not from courage or ardor but out of rage and despair, writing of the Prot-

142

 “dispute qu’il demande devant le peuple ce n’est que chose vaines et de nul usage, sinon qu’il y eust de bonnes conditions commes la Seigneurie l’avoit demandé.” Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:99 (18 August 1598). 143  Luria, Sacred Boundaries, 83. 144  Avully, Copie de la lettre du Seigneur d’Avully; and Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:98; note 70 mentions the letter. 145  Charles of Genève, Trophées Sacrés, 131–32. 146  Ibid., 158–59. 147  Ibid., 115, 133.

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estant ministers he hoped would convert that they, “already fatigued from the idle talk that they produce, will easily open up their ears to the truth.”148 Regardless of the veracity of these portrayals, the message was effective and often drowned out the message of the Protestants. When the company did react, it was always in writing in an effort to counter some action or publication on the part of the Catholics. Herman Lignaridus attempted to free himself of any further involvement in the situation by secretly negotiating a teaching position in Berne, and the only subsequent service he grudgingly completed for Geneva was providing a written account of the dispute as a rebuttal to Avully’s letter, which Geneva published at the end of 1598. While Beza instructed Lignaridus to address the points of controversy, the theologian’s account responded directly to Avully’s characterization of the encounter and attacked Chérubin.149 Lignaridus in his response claimed that Chérubin was easily confused, could not speak correctly, and generally was ignorant, knowing very little Latin and no Greek or Hebrew.150 Leveling charges traditionally made against pre-Reformation priests, the professor wrote that the Capuchin could only recite Latin and that Lignaridus’s students understood theology better than the friar did. In his litany of attacks on Chérubin’s ability to instruct Christians, Lignaridus deemed the Capuchin the most ignorant monk ever, claiming that he saw more value in the knowledge of a pig herder.151 The theologian’s response does little to counter the Catholic’s portrait of him as angry and haughty. Catholic preachers during the early days of the Reformation frequently accused Protestants of being “cruel and arrogant,” charges that persisted in the late sixteenth century.152 The pastors of Geneva continued to let the Catholics take the offensive in the matter and refused to allow themselves to be engaged in what the missionaries desired, a public and oral confrontation. The Catholic missionaries did not need their Calvinist foe to be able to continue with public proclamations and celebrations of their faith, so 148  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 24 August 1599, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:20. 149  Lignaridus, Response de Herman Lignaridus; and Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:98–100; note 78 mentions the publication of the pamphlet. 150  Lignaridus, Response de Herman Lignaridus, 7.12, 31–32, 37. 151  Ibid., 37. 152  Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, 214.

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they continued these activities even as they pursued another disputation. Meanwhile the Protestants appeared extremely divided over the entire affair as the pastors of Geneva turned to the churches in Berne and Lausanne for advice and support.153 Correspondence between the two camps escalated later in the summer of 1598 as the plans for the Forty Hours in Thonon were taking shape, and reveals a very tentative leadership in Geneva.154 Meanwhile Chérubin tried to widen the challenge by calling on both Geneva and Berne to send someone to dispute.155 The more senior members of the company in particular voiced frustration at the continued challenges from Père Chérubin, with Beza even proclaiming that the friar was more of a beast than a man.156 Perhaps the advanced age of some in the Protestant leadership lessened their enthusiasm for a confrontation with the robust Capuchin; after all, Beza was almost eighty and Antoine de la Faye, who would lead the faith after Beza’s death, was nearly sixty, as was Charles Perrot. These men had seen their confession face many assaults including the most devastating in the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, and the memories of that violent confrontation surely remained with them.157 In addition, the greatest protector of the Calvinists, Henri IV of France, was now Catholic. The Berne clergy, who continued to put Swiss interests first, wanted no part of the affair, even asking the pastors in Geneva to not use their names in connection with the “dangerous quarrel.”158 In September 1598, the Company of Pastors proclaimed public prayers for their “brothers of Thonon,” and the city council sent Jean Sarrazin on three missions to negotiate with the Catholics about the disputation as Chérubin continued to insist that the debate needed to be completed as it was begun: orally.159 The back and forth throughout the fall had both sides continuing to propose laundry lists of condi153

 Geneva waited for affirmation from Lausanne and especially Berne before they responded to the Catholics; UGL, Ms Fr 8: Pièces relatives à la Dispute entre le Counseil de Genève et le père Chérubin de Maurienne, capucin. 154  UGL, Ms Fr 8: Pièces relatives à la Dispute. 155  UGL, Ms Fr 8, Pièces relatives à la Dispute, fols. 1–2 are a summary of the previous communications up to 8 October 1598, mentioning that Chérubin is calling on both Geneva and Berne. 156  Theodore de Bèze to the Church of Lausanne, 5 August 1598, in Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:316. 157  See, for example, Kingdon, Myths about the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, 214–20. 158  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:96–97, 110. 159  UGL, Ms Fr 8: Pièces relatives à la Dispute, fol. 19, Declaration de J. Sarrazin 18 September 1598; and Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs 7:113 (29 September 1598) and 7:114–15, 120–23.

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tions, with Geneva still consulting Berne at every turn and little progress being made. The Company of Pastors was well aware that it was rapidly losing ground in and around Thonon, acknowledging, “They [the Catholics] by their artifice and constraint have made the majority of the village into papists.”160 In October, Claude Deprez, syndic of Thonon, dispatched urgent pleas to Geneva to continue the debate with Chérubin. Deprez reiterated the importance of a “dispute by live voice” and reminded the company that a written contest would only benefit those who could read and understand it. He implored, “If you do not show more zeal in the defense of your cause, you will lose it completely.” In an even more ominous prediction, Deprez referred to “a time of desolation” and warned the company that if they did not aid Thonon they could not blame the people if they turned to Catholicism.161 Syndic Deprez appeared isolated by the actions of the missionaries led by Chérubin and by the perceived inaction of his Protestant neighbors. The pressure Deprez must have felt from the constant exposure to the message of the missionaries led him to join with the Catholic community. Political, economic, and religious factors all contributed to Deprez’s decision to convert, but in the end, submitting to Catholicism was more in line with his goals than remaining with Geneva.162 Claude Deprez, along with his son, left Thonon in exile after the Forty Hours, but returned in 1599 and accepted Catholicism.163 In the end, since none of Geneva’s allies were willing to offer much support, Beza and the rest of the company concurred with their brethren and did not succumb to the pressures of either the Catholic missionaries or the Protestants of Thonon to continue any sort of debate. Throughout the negotiations and aftermath of the dispute, the Calvinists often seemed at cross-purposes about the efficacy of an oral debate. Why were they so resistant to a public defense of their faith? After all, religious leaders of both Berne and Geneva had supported and participated in public disputations during the 1530s. There are several contributing factors. First of all, the Catholics and Calvinists had fundamentally 160  “ilz ont par leurs artifius et contraintes fait descendre la pluspart du bailliage au papisme.” Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:110 (27 September 1598). 161  Letter from Claude Deprez to the company, 5 October 1598, in Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:328. 162  Reddy, Navigation of Feeling, 114, 122. 163  F. de Sales, Œuvres, 12:17–18n1, 11:162–63n1.

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divergent approaches to proselytism. The Company of Pastors in Geneva subscribed to an internal and contemplative faith that came from listening to sermons and studying the Bible and not from overt emotional displays. As William M. Reddy states, “communities systematically seek to train emotions, to idealize them, to condemn others.”164 The Calvinist leaders were disdainful of the theatrical Catholic approach and viewed public disputes as more about “ardor” than “truth.”165 Debates were not preaching and relied on different preparations.166 Secondly, the Calvinists feared being officially suppressed by the secular ruler in the region, the Catholic Duke of Savoy, therefore they did not want to antagonize him with any confrontational actions. Yet Catholics and even some Calvinists interpreted Geneva’s refusal to defend the Reformed faith more publicly and vigorously as a lack of commitment to its followers. Chérubin’s methods were a special source of concern for the Reformed populations. Beza described the Capuchin’s preaching as “impudent,” claiming that he “tried to win the people in the neighboring villages with his babble” and even accused him of trying to bewitch his listeners.167 Surely Chérubin’s proficiency as an orator added credence to his proclamations, and the Protestants feared the lengths to which Chérubin would go to achieve his ends. Citizens of Geneva were traveling to the countryside to listen to the Capuchin.168 Berne corresponded with the Duke of Savoy and his lieutenants concerning the behavior of Chérubin, asking that the Capuchin stop harassing people who had been promised by the duke “to be left to their religion.”169 The duke wrote Governor Jérôme de Lambert that he too desired to return Chablais to the “true religion” and viewed the Calvinists as “usurpers of the country.” While the duke claimed that he appreciated the “zeal” of Chérubin and President Favre, he wanted Lambert to remind them that violent threats were

 Reddy, Navigation of Feeling, 323.  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:114. See note 132 concerning the writing of company member Jean Pinault. 166  Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, 83. 167  Theodore Beza, in the name of the company, to Guillaume du Bac, the Church of Lausanne, 5 August 1598, in Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:316. 168  RC 93 Mi B463 (1598), fol. 183v, 12 December 1598. The council registers mention that the consistory did not want people going to hear Chérubin in Thonon. 169  Government of Berne to Governor Lambert, 23 December 1597, reprinted in Vuy, “A Propos de Saint François de Sales,” 13. 164 165

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not the best way to convert the population.170 Despite warnings from the duke’s officials in the region to curb his behavior, the Capuchin continued with his controversial and very public approach to proselytizing, raising alarm even among fellow Catholics about his health.171 Just several months before, the duke had participated alongside Chérubin at the final Forty Hours Devotion in Thonon, but now the duke was ordering a halt to the friar’s activities. De Sales informed Bishop Granier that Chérubin had “fallen into a lamentable illness” and was unable to work. He wrote that the pope and the Holy Office regretted “this accident of such a valued person being rendered useless” and claimed that Chérubin’s “adversaries” were spreading rumors about his illness.172 Charles-Emmanuel informed the governor that he was sending someone to persuade Chérubin to leave the area immediately, and if the friar refused, the duke wanted the governor, the bishop, and Gaspard de Genève, Marquis de Lullin and an envoy of the duke, to help convince him.173 The Capuchin was sent to Rome on business in the winter of 1599, mostly likely at the insistence of the duke’s officials. By this point, in the eyes of the Protestants, the damage had been done, and for the Catholics, the mission had enough momentum to continue without him. The Catholic mission’s advocacy of oral debates and public spectacles, not to mention their skillful manipulation of local opinion after the events, demonstrated an overall dedication to the highly tangible elements of their faith, especially the Eucharist, images of purgatory, and the crucifix, which were very successful fostering reactions in an audience. This type of religious experience appealed to the audience’s senses and engaged their emotions in a way that the Reformed ministers apparently did not. Since the Catholics continued to reach out to the people of the duchy of Chablais with public preaching and sensual celebrations, the inhabitants viewed the priests as more sincere and committed to their faith than the seemingly aloof Calvinist pastors. 170

 Duke of Savoy to Governor Lambert, 21 December 1597, reprinted in “Deux autographes de Charles-Emmanuel I,” 71–72. In the letter, the duke uses the phrase “les menaces” to refer to the actions of Chérubin against the Protestant population. 171  Duke of Savoy to Governor Lambert, 2 February 1599, reprinted in Vuy, “A Propos de Saint François de Sales,” 13–14. 172  “est tumbé en une tres lamentable Infirmité”; “cest accident, et pour la valeur de la personne, qu’il rend inutile.” F. de Sales to Claude de Granier, January 1599, de Sales, Œuvres, 12:4–5. 173  Duke of Savoy to Governor Lambert, 2 February 1599 reprinted in Vuy, “A Propos de Saint François de Sales,” 13–14. Gaspard de Genève was the marquis de Lullin (1548–1619).

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Ongoing Mission

The acclaimed success of the Forty Hours Devotions did not vanquish the Catholics’ fear that Protestantism would again dominate the duchy of Chablais. De Sales warned Duke Charles-Emmanuel I in March 1598 after the Annemasse devotion that the Catholics of the region had informed him of the Protestants’ pleas to the Bernese for more ministers.174 He appealed to the papal nuncio in Turin, Jules-César Riccardi, for more money for the parishes to ensure that the new Catholics did not lapse and that conversions continued. Returning people to the Catholic fold remained de Sales’s primary concern, and he was willing to employ political and economic pressures to attain this goal. He warned that the “Genevans and other nearby enemies” were still a threat and continued to spread rumors of war and to distribute Calvinist books to the populations.175 The Catholics needed to apply continuous pressure to ensure victory in the battle for the souls of the faithful. During Père Chérubin’s semi-exile to Rome, he had received the pope’s permission to celebrate a Jubilee in Thonon. The leaders saw the value of lavish ceremonies and the power they could have over the population. De Sales wrote, Truly, if at the conclusion of the peace, one makes an effort to make brilliant the exercise of the Catholic cult and doctrine in this country, I am sure that we will see the glory of God and that perhaps, according to the law, the possessions will be returned to their former masters during this Jubilee.176 He assured the papal nuncio that Bishop Granier would be in Thonon to ensure that the Jubilee was planned properly. But the diocesan leaders viewed a lavish celebration as more “powerful, efficacious, and persevering.”177 Catholicism remained a sensual faith, and the church

 F. de Sales to Duke Charles-Emmanuel I, end of March 1598, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:327.  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 24 August 1599, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:17–22. 176  “Vraiment, si dans la conclusion de la paix on fait un effort pour faire resplendir l’exercice du culte et la doctrine catholique en ce pays, je suis sûr que nous verrons la gloire de Dieu (Jn 11,40) et que peut-être, selon la Loi, les possessions seront, pendant ce Jubilé, restituées à leurs anciens maîtres (Lv 25,10; 27,24).” F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 24 August 1599, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:20. 177  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 24 August 1599 and 15 November 1599, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:20, 36. 174 175

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leaders knew this aspect was one of their most powerful weapons against Protestantism. The duke’s public support of the mission continued into the first decade of the seventeenth century, including a series of ordinances prohibiting the public exercise of Protestantism in the towns of Chablais where the Catholic cult had been reestablished. He also took steps to deprive Protestants of public office.178 Like the clergy, the duke desired religious hegemony, but only at this point did the political situation allow him to pursue such a goal. It is not clear how many people converted to Catholicism as a result of the added pressure from the government, but Protestants remained in the region. In June 1601, the Senate of the Savoy registered patent letters of the duke that ordered people of Chablais, Ternier, and Gaillard “to listen and assist in the sermons of the Capuchins and others and bring their women and children.”179 Yet even the dual pressure from church and state failed to suppress the Protestants completely. A visitation account from 1617 for St.-Gingolph, a parish in Chablais, revealed that the curé was told to “exhort the heretics in the knowledge of the church in which God made his miracles.”180 The close proximity to Geneva and the handful of remaining Protestant towns allowed some people to hold onto their faith despite the unwelcoming environment created by the Catholics. With Chérubin as the lead negotiator, plans proceeded for establishing a permanent mission house in the duchy of Chablais.181 The Abbey of Abondance promised financial support by offering to the project two of its vacant prebends.182 Duke Charles-Emmanuel and the bishop presented the proposal for the holy house to the president of the Senate and advised the body on what was needed to make it happen.183 The establishment of the mission house was not without its hurdles, the most significant being when Henri IV and his army entered the region in August 1600, a move that allowed Protestants back into the  Gonthier, La Mission de Saint François de Sales, 165, 172.  ADS, B1436: Répertoire des édits-bulles 1598–1606, fol. 147. 180  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:353. 181  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 9 December 1599, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:38. 182  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 17 January 1600, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:47–48. 183  Duke Charles-Emmanuel I to F. de Sales, 28 April 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:458. 178 179

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Chablais.184 During the French occupation in 1600, de Sales reported that a few curés left their parishes, but those of the mission remained. He also claimed that most of the new converts remained Catholic.185 Still, rumors were rampant and the diocesan officials were very nervous about the fluid political situation and how it would impact their goals for the region. The diocese reached out to influential religious and political leaders including Bonaventure Secusio, the patriarch of Constantinople, to plead for aid. Secusio was a special nuncio and had helped negotiate the Treaty of Vervins of 1598, which had brought about a temporary suspension of the fighting in the region.186 De Sales wrote, The rumor is widespread in the Diocese of Geneva that his very Christian majesty has concluded with the Republics of Berne and Geneva an accord by which he authorized those to seize, guard, and possess the bailliages of Chablais and of Ternier. If this is true, it would be the total ruin of the Catholic cult in this region. He pleaded for Secusio to intervene with Henri IV, imploring, “Do not let them [Chablais and Ternier] be delivered into the hands of the heretical republics.”187 Diocesan officials must have believed that the risk of falling under Protestant control was very real. De Sales asked Secusio to ensure that there would be no change in religion if the area did go to the Protestant republics.188 Catholic leaders continued to fear that Henri IV would use his alliance with Protestant cities to conquer Savoy. The diocese pursued multiple channels of potential aid by also contacting Cardinal François de Joyeuse and Nicolas de Sancy, one of Henri IV’s leaders in the occupation of the region and someone who

 de Sales, Œuvres, 12:50n1.  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 26 August 1600, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:50–51. 186  Martin, Trois Cas de Pluralisme Confessionnel, 69. 187  “Le bruit s’est répandu, dans le diocèse de Genève, que Sa Majesté très Chrétienne a conclu avec la république de Berne et de Genève un accord, par lequel elle autorise celle-ci à saisir, garder et posséder les bailliages de Chablais et de Ternier. S’il est vrai, ce serait la ruine totale du culte catholique en cette région … ne pas les livrer entre les mains de ces républiques hérétiques,” F. de Sales, on behalf of Claude de Granier, to Bonventure Secusio, patriarch of Constantinople, nuncio extraordinary, September 1600, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:409–11; and ibid., 12:409n1. 188  F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Bonventure Secusio, patriarch of Constantinople, nuncio extraordinary, September 1600, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:411. 184 185

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went back and forth between confessions. De Sales informed the cardinal that through three years of constant missionary work, they had converted fourteen to fifteen thousand people and asked the cardinal to plead with King Henri on behalf of the diocese to preserve the mission work done in the area.189 In the case of Nicolas de Sancy, de Sales described the destruction the war had caused in the area in general and to many of the churches in particular.190 Sancy took possession of the fort in Allinges in the name of the king of France on 18 December 1600, the same fort de Sales had used as his base during the early days of the mission in the duchy of Chablais, but the Frenchman soon departed and left the fort under Protestant control.191 De Sales informed Sancy that in his absence the Huguenots had used violence to spread “their heresy” and injured people. He claimed that the preachers from Geneva had come to “desecrate and to profane our churches, to overturn the altars and to steal the bells and other sacred objects.” Altars were often the primary focus of Protestant iconoclasm.192 De Sales wanted Sancy to enforce the resolution that would ensure that the Huguenots no longer harassed Catholics or their churches.193 The fighting over sacred spaces was renewed as warfare disrupted the boundaries between the two confessions. External factors and international disputes continued to shift confessional boundaries and the working relationship between church and state. The signing of the Treaty of Lyons between France and Savoy at the beginning of 1601 gave renewed hope to the Catholics of ending the Protestant presence in Chablais. De Sales detailed to Father Juvenal Ancina, a member of the Congregation of the Oratory, and to Nuncio Riccardi in Turin how both clerical and lay inhabitants of the region had suffered under the French occupation and how there had been instances of iconoclasm by the Protestants. De Sales named Baron de Montglat, Robert de Harlay, a Huguenot official of the king, as the leader of the 189

 F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Cardinal François de Joyeuse, September– October 1600, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:412–13. 190  F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Nicolas de Sancy, 6 November 1600, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:415–16. 191  de Sales, Œuvres, 12:419n1. 192  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 120. 193  F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Nicolas de Sancy, January 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:419–20.

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aggression against the Catholics.194 Even with this setback, de Sales continued to be optimistic, at least in his assuring the papal nuncio in Turin that in spite of the war with France, there were more converts since Christmas, few converts had left Catholicism, and among those few who did, none were of any social rank.195 With military conflict halted in the region, the mission returned to establishing a permanent presence in the region. The Holy House of Thonon, launched with great fanfare in the summer of 1601 with the authorization of Pope Clement VIII and Duke Charles-Emmanuel, was envisioned as a place of refuge for those who abandoned Protestantism and as a center for the continued renewal of Catholicism. The mission house was to move forward and even expand on the work begun by the missionaries in the duchy of Chablais. The charter called for the house to have theologians, preachers, a school, and job training for the refugees. The duke helped with its establishment and provided a substantial financial contribution with promises of continued support, and the house was to enjoy the special protection of the pope and Catholic princes.196 Pope Clement VIII sent the mission six Jesuits, who reportedly preached, heard confession, and taught the children belles-lettres and articles of faith. According to de Sales, their efforts resulted in the return of more than five hundred people to Catholicism in only five weeks. The peace agreement between France and Savoy would have put pressure on some previously reluctant Protestants to change their minds.197 Some Protestants may have held out hope that Henri IV would have preserved the Reformed faith in the Chablais, but once the French king ceded the region to the duke, there were few options—convert or leave. Diocesan officials requested more preachers and a College of Jesuits in Thonon that could possibly serve as a seminary.198 The Catholic clergy certainly possessed high hopes for the mission project in Thonon, 194

 F. de Sales to Juvenal Ancina, 3 February 1601, and de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 18 March 1601 and 28 June 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:55, 58, 63. 195  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 28 June 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:63. 196  The charter was signed in Turin on 31 July 1601; ADHS, H22.1: La Charte de la Sainte Maison de Thonon. 197  The truce between Savoy and France resulted in the Treaty of Lyons. See chapter 4 for a full discussion. 198  F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Pope Clement VIII, mid-July 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:421–23;.

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claiming that the Holy House “will trample and break the venomous head of the serpent which has taken refuge in Geneva and Lausanne.”199 While the pope appears to have supported the mission, the same cannot be said for the local notables. The Holy House had problems of money and manpower from the beginning. The duke became distracted by affairs of state and expensive wars, and failed to provide the monetary and moral support he had promised. Once François de Sales became bishop, he too had other preoccupations and obligations that kept him from being involved constantly in the running of the mission. Others failed to deliver on promised support, including the Abbey of Abondance, which had promised two prebends, but a year later de Sales mentioned to the papal nuncio that he was still trying to collect the income from the Abbey.200 The bishop complained to the Duke of Savoy that the syndics of Thonon refused to hand over the priory of St. Hippolyte to the Jesuits because during the French occupation “a handful” of Protestants had come back into the administration of the town.201 The duke had ordered the priory and its goods joined to the Holy House at its foundation.202 The clerical leaders of the diocese continued to press for more Jesuits in the region, reminding the duke of the need for a Jesuit college in Thonon. In the interim, they sought the duke’s permission to request the general of the order to send a few Jesuits to the college in Annecy, who could then be easily transferred to Thonon when a college was established there.203 The diocese continued to place high value on the preaching orders when it came to the front lines of missionary work. The Jesuits’ tenure in Thonon was not as long-lived or successful as the diocesan officials initially had hoped. Lack of financial support was one of the main reasons the Society of Jesus departed and the Barnabites replaced them at the mission house in 1616. The duke promised 199  “foulera et brisera la tête venimeuse du serpent qui s’est réfugié à Genève et à Lausanne.” F. de Sales to Conrad Tartarini, papal nuncio in Turin, 21 December 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:89–94. 200  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 18 March 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:59. 201  F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Charles-Emmanuel I, 30 July 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:426. 202  ADS, B1436: Repertoire des edits-bulles, 1598–1606, fol. 196, Register of patent letters of Duke Charles-Emmanuel I by the Senate of the Savoie concerning the establishment of the Holy House of Thonon, 31 July 1601. 203  F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Duke Charles-Emmanuel I, 14 September 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:436–37.

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the revenue from the priory of Contamine in an effort to support the Barnabites in a better standard than the Jesuits had experienced.204 The Barnabites had been installed in the College of Annecy in 1614, and the bishop and the duke hoped that the introduction of the Barnabites would revitalize both the College in Annecy and the mission in Thonon.205 Yet funds for the Holy House remained scarce. Damage done by warfare to the buildings inhabited by the mission still had not been repaired, and the Council of the Mission continued its effort to obtain benefices from the Order of SS. Maurice and Lazarus and the priory of Contamine.206 The mission that had seen so much success with the Forty Hours Devotions was two decades past, and by 1620 the Holy House of Thonon was barely functioning.207 François de Sales provided a very dire picture to the Prince of Piedmont Victor-Amadeus in December 1620. The bishop described extreme poverty, claiming that the children being educated at the mission had no shoes or warm clothes. The Barnabites were not suitably housed or clothed and barely had enough to eat, leading to “a lamentable disunion” among all those who lived there because they fought among themselves over what little money and provisions there were. De Sales pleaded for more financial support, reminding the prince that the state had promised the Holy House 4000 écus annually at its establishment, but since then, the amount had been greatly reduced. The bishop suggested replacing the secular preachers there with members of the Congregation of the Oratory and had broached this idea with the counsel of the mission house earlier in the year.208 He claimed that this move would reduce expenses by 300 ducats, since members of the oratory could live in common. He also continued to encourage the duke’s yet unfulfilled plan to apply prebends from the priory of Contamine to the support of the Barnabites, but the most immediate need appeared to be funds to cover “the pressing necessities of the Holy House,” even asking the prince to provide the carrier of the letter with any money  F. de Sales to Duke Charles-Emmanuel I, 26 April 1616, in de Sales, Œuvres, 17:197–98.  F. de Sales to Duke Charles-Emmanuel I, 8 July 1614, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:189–91. 206  ADHS, H22.2: Fragment d’un registre de délibération du Conseil de la Sainte Maison de Thonon, 1617–1619. 207  Truchet, Vie du Père Chérubin de Maurienne, 236. 208  F. de Sales to the Prince of Piedmont, Victor-Amadeus, 11 December 1620, in de Sales, Œuvres, 19:399–400; and F. de Sales to the Messieurs of the Council of the Holy House of Thonon, 22 July 1620, in ibid., 284–85. The Congregation of the Oratory, founded in 1575, was an order of secular priests that founded communities that followed the Rules of St. Philip Neri. 204 205

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he could.209 Limited access to revenue-producing assets continued to plague the diocese and the bishops’ plans. In the summer of 1621, the bishop toured the Holy House of Thonon along with senate officials.210 De Sales reported their findings to the duke and prince, again emphasizing the poor state of things at the mission house and the need to replace the eight preachers of the secular congregation there with priests from the Congregation of the Oratory, a common strategy used to reinvigorate a locality. The bishop also mentioned that while the current priests held a daily mass, they did not observe the canonical hours. He mentioned a “notable defect” at the Holy House in the lack of a place of refuge for recent converts and reminded the rulers of Savoy that this was one of the main reasons they had erected the mission house.211 In another appeal for the Holy House, de Sales pleaded with the prince to save the place and pointed out how, if the mission was put in proper order, it would increase the reputation of the House of Savoy.212 One senses from his correspondence that François de Sales was making a last-ditch effort to save the mission of Thonon for which he had such high expectations when it was established twenty years before. Until his death in 1622, de Sales continued to plead for pensions for those who converted to Catholicism and for the entry of the Oratory into Thonon. The mission house continued to limp along well into the seventeenth century, but fell far short of the grand designs its founders envisioned. The duke’s commitment to the Counter-Reformation, while perhaps sincere in the abstract, possessed a fickleness that made him a less-than-ideal partner in the battle for Protestant souls. On the surface, the relationship between the clergy of the Diocese of Geneva and Duke Charles-Emmanuel I may look like a “pragmatic alliance” between church and state, as Schilling and Hsia see it; yet too often the duke pursued his own agenda without considering or consulting the Catholic leaders. 209

 F. de Sales to the Prince of Piedmont, Victor-Amadeus, 11 December 1620, in de Sales, Œuvres, 19:399–400. 210  The senate officials were the president of the Chamber of Accounts of Savoy, Georges de Lescheraine, and the master auditor of the chamber, André Bertier. 211  F. de Sales to the Duke of Savoy, Charles-Emmanuel I, and the Prince of Piedmont, VictorAmadeus, 12 June 1621, in de Sales, Œuvres, 20:99–103. Included with the letters was a memorandum recounting the situation in Thonon and François de Sales’s proposed remedies; ibid., 100nn1–2. 212  F. de Sales to the Prince of Piedmont, Victor-Amadeus, 31 August 1621, in de Sales, Œuvres, 20:140–41.

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Charles-Emmanuel had his moments in the heady aftermath of the Forty Hours when he encouraged and even supported the clergy of the diocese, such as when he informed de Sales how happy he was to hear about recent converts in the Chablais, and how he hoped the rest would do the same. He even promised de Sales that to ensure his success he had ordered the president of the Senate of the Savoy to help establish more curés.213 Yet even Pope Clement VIII appeared to realize that the duke’s support of the Counter-Reformation wavered at times. Fearing that he had been maligned to the pope, the duke complained of the situation to Bishop de Sales in October 1603. Duke Charles-Emmanuel I instructed the bishop to send Clement an account of the activities in the diocese, and explain to the pontiff how many Protestants there had been and how Catholicism had been reestablished. The duke wanted the pope to know that the “pretend religion had been pushed back to the gates of Geneva.” François de Sales was to have the cathedral canons and other prominent clergy sign the document to attest to its truthfulness.214 This tension between the pope and duke would have been in the aftermath of the disastrous Escalade. De Sales did as his secular ruler asked and wrote a glowing letter to Pope Clement VIII about the duke’s contributions to the mission and the Catholic cause.215 Whether de Sales believed all this praise or not, he was pragmatic enough to know that he had a better chance of success if the pope and his secular ruler remained on good terms. The overall success of the mission in the duchy of Chablais is surprising considering the often-chaotic state of the region for much of the sixteenth century. Why was a small group of priests so successful in returning the region to its former faith? Why did their message find fertile ground with the villagers who had no direct memories of Catholicism? In the duchy of Chablais, with the crucial but hardly constant assistance of legislation by the duke, the Protestant populations were reduced to a small minority by the beginning of the seventeenth century. Catholic parishes in the duchy of Chablais saw the establishment of new confraternities dedicated to the rosary and the Eucharist in the decades after the reestablishment of Catholicism. Even though the missionaries in the Chablais had some support from their temporal ruler in  Duke Charles-Emmanuel I to Bishop de Sales, 28 April 1600, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:458.  Duke Charles-Emmanuel I to Bishop de Sales, 25 October 1603, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:459. 215  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, 15 November 1603, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:229–38. 213 214

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their efforts to spread Catholicism, this support did not come without conditions and limitations. The political and financial realities of the day were an ever-present force, and could help or hinder the goals of the Catholic missionaries. The bishops faced constant shortages of money to repair and restore parishes and religious houses, and to attract quality clergy. The secular rulers were often unwilling or unable to provide the moral, political, and monetary support the religious leaders wanted. Yet a small and creative band of missionaries recognized that aspects of the Catholic faith had an emotional appeal to the people that perhaps the Reformed faith lacked. The best way to reach their audience was through live voices offering a simple but powerful message that centered on a few topics such as the suffering of Christ and Catholicism’s historical ties to the community. The successful purveyors of the Catholic Reformation consciously used the emotional and tangible nature of Christianity, especially the crucifix and the Eucharist, to win over their audience. For the inhabitants of the villages of the Chablais, the confessional boundaries shifted, leaving many of those who remained loyal to the Reformed ideas excluded from the revitalized Catholic communities. Church and state both desired religious hegemony as an ultimate goal, but their intermediate goals could be quite different. The relationship between the Duke of Savoy and the Diocese of Geneva reveals not a joint venture between two powers, but rather two separate forces vying for allegiance—one for the allegiance of souls to its version of the path to salvation, the other carving out national territories in the hotly contested region. Yet, as demonstrated by the three Forty Hours Devotions, when the two were in agreement, the results were quite impressive.

4

Shifting Borders Savoyards Become French

T

he dual forces of the Treaty of Lyons and the Edict of Nantes had far-reaching consequences on both the Reformed populations in the Pays de Gex (see map 4) and the Catholic Savoyard villages that suddenly found themselves French at the beginning of the seventeenth century. After the success of the mission in the Savoyard-controlled duchy of Chablais, Catholic officials hoped to expand their proselytism into Gex in a further attempt to restore the ancient boundaries of the diocese. The papal nuncio in Turin had informed François de Sales in May 1597 that he believed Pope Clement VIII would soon give the order to reestablish the mass in Gex and several other provinces.1 The diocese had to wait until 1602 for the political situation to become favorable for a plan of action, and the political maze through France would be a difficult journey for François de Sales, his allies, and his successors. Henri IV of France signed the Edict of Nantes in spring 1598, offering a renewed framework for Catholic and Protestant populations of France to somehow coexist peacefully. The majority of the provisions had been included in previous peace treaties, but Henri’s straddling of the Catholic/Protestant divide and the battle fatigue on both sides brought new hope to the process of reestablishing coexistence between confessions.2 The crown appointed regional commissioners to carry out 1  Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, to F. de Sales, 11 May 1597, in de Sales, Nouvelles Lettres, Paris ed., 1:201. 2  Luria, Sacred Boundaries, 3–10, provides a recent clear and concise discussion of the edict. See also the classic Garrison, Essai sur les Commissions d’Application. Holt, French Wars of Religion, 166–77, places the edict in the larger context of the Wars of Religion.

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Map 4: The Pays de Gex

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the difficult negotiations and to intervene in confessional disputes before they escalated into violent confrontations. Historians have examined the edict’s implementation in several regions, focusing on how the commissioners attempted to bring about community stability with negotiations and compromise between the Catholic and Protestant populations.3 Daniel Hickey points out that application of the edict could vary greatly between regions based on local situations. Gabriel Audisio notes that the parlement of Provence showed resistance to the edict and was willing to at least slow the process of implementation of the measures ordered by Nantes. Marc Venard finds that in villages where the Huguenots had a large majority, there was great resistance to the full implementation of the Edict of Nantes.4 Gex was unique since it was not French during the Wars of Religion, and as a result, the region was not subject to the previous French edicts. In addition, by the time Gex was added to France, “almost all Catholics reluctantly acknowledged the authority of the king to grant legal toleration to the Huguenots.”5 The clergy of the diocese could not simply suppress the Reformed populations of Gex and could not expect King Henri to revoke their political rights as the Duke of Savoy had done in Chablais. The Protestants of Gex had little connection to the Reformed Church in France, instead having closer religious, social, and historical ties to the Protestant cities of Geneva and Berne. These circumstances made both the reintroduction of Catholicism and the maintenance of Protestantism more complicated. The finalization of the Treaty of Lyons in January 1601 between Charles-Emmanuel I and Henri IV made the Rhône River the divide between the two countries, and the new political boundaries offered new challenges to both religious confessions. The agreement explicitly stipulated that Savoy permanently cede the Pays de Gex to Henri IV on the condition that the king would integrate the territory into the dominion of France so it would not fall into the hands of any of Henri’s Protestant allies.6 While the duke surely did not enjoy relinquishing territory once controlled by  Regional studies of the implementation of the edict include Rabut, Le Roi, L’Église et Le Temple; and Hickey, “Enforcing the Edict of Nantes,” 65–83. 4  Hickey, “Enforcing the Edict of Nantes,” 65; Audisio, “La Réception de l’édit de Nantes,” 281; and Venard, “L’Église catholique bénéficiaire de l’édit de Nantes,” 298–99. 5  Baumgartner, “Catholic Opposition to the Edict of Nantes,” 536. 6  Gautier, Histoire de Genève, 339–40. As discussed in chapter 2, Berne had introduced the Reformed faith into Gex. 3

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his ancestors, by stipulating its incorporation into France he hoped to isolate Geneva further, making the city an easier conquest. Successive generations of Catholics and Protestants who lived along the Rhône River debated whether the Pays de Gex had freely embraced the Reformed faith or whether the Bernese had forced it upon the inhabitants of the region. Michael Bruening’s work on the nearby Pays de Vaux clearly shows that the introduction of Reformed practices into the region faced strong resistance from the local populations. Despite initial promises of religious freedom, in 1536, “The ‘old faith’ was on the way out, in spite of the popular enthusiasm for it. The shift to the ‘new faith’ occurred by governmental fiat.”7 Beginning with the evangelism of Guillaume Farel during the 1530s, the Protestants of the region came more under the guidance of Geneva.8 When clergy from the Diocese of Geneva reentered the region at the beginning of the seventeenth century, the conflict took on a new tenor as Protestants now accused Catholics of using force in matters of faith. This debate was replayed, most often through competing pamphlets, each time there was a new crisis in Gex. Whether by force or by persuasion, the Bernese introduced the Reformation in the Pays de Gex in 1536 and quickly dismantled the ecclesiastical properties belonging to the monasteries and parishes in Gex, selling many of them to citizens of nearby Geneva.9 Since the Burgundian Wars of the 1470s, the region had been the stage for frequent multinational wars.10 Military conflict was exacerbated by the Reformation, and as a result, Gex faced repeated hardships throughout much of the sixteenth century. After the assassination of Henri III of France, the Duke of Savoy, in his ongoing conflict with France, took advantage of the ensuing chaos in late summer 1589 to send troops to the Pays de Gex who terrorized the civilian populations. Armies from across Europe, including Italian and Spanish mercenaries, instituted a brutal occupation in 1589/90.11 Geneva fought on the side of Henri of Navarre’s forces against Savoy, and the Protestant republic found itself betrayed by its religious compatriots in Berne, who made  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 130.  Gordon, Swiss Reformation, 150–53; and Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 8. Bruening states that Farel came from the circle at Meaux to spread Reformed ideas for the Bernese. 9  Brossard, Histoire Politique et Religieuse, 279–80. 10  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 26–29. 11  Villard, Journal du Syndic Jean du Villard, 270–71. 7 8

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peace with the Duke of Savoy and left Geneva to defend itself, its financial interests in the Pay de Gex, and the Protestant inhabitants of the region.12 Gex and Geneva’s fortunes were deeply intertwined, and during times of crisis, the inhabitants of Gex turned to the city of Geneva for aid. Berne may have brought the Reformation to the region, but by the end of the sixteenth century, the churches of Gex looked to Geneva for help, guidance, and personnel. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, Geneva still controlled many of the income-producing properties in Gex and provided preachers for the villages. The city held out hope that former Protestant and ongoing ally Henri IV would hand over the territory or at least protect Geneva’s economic interests there, once Savoy relinquished it.13 But the French king recognized that the border region around the Rhône was an important passage for Spain to reach its northern holdings; once the region was in his possession, Henri was not about to let it go.

The Introduction of the Mass

The Diocese of Geneva had been waiting in the wings with its mission plan and wasted no time using provisions from the Edict of Nantes to reintroduce the mass into Gex and to begin challenging the Protestants’ rights to properties once controlled by the Catholic Church. Marc Venard and Elisabeth Rabut remind us that the primary goal of the Edict of Nantes was to reestablish Catholicism in areas where it had been suppressed; ironically, most modern scholarship on the edict focuses on its provisions related to Protestantism. However, as Venard’s work on diocesan reform demonstrates, bishops quickly made efforts to implement the Edict of Nantes and restore Catholicism in areas where it had been suppressed by Protestants.14 In the eyes of the Diocese of Geneva, Gex was a spiritual and financial wasteland that needed to be restored to its former splendor within the Catholic fold. De Sales reported to the papal nuncio in Turin in June 1601, a mere six months after the treaty’s completion, that the region was currently all Huguenot and occupied by Geneva, and he wanted the king of France to force the Huguenots

 Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 6:20 (5 August 1589), 6:24–25 (29 September 1589).  Colladon, Journal d’Esaie Colladon, 13–16, 21–22. 14  Venard, “L’Église catholique bénéficiaire de l’édit de Nantes,” 283–84; and Venard, Réforme protestante, réforme catholique, 639. 12 13

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to return goods taken from the Catholic Church.15 Diocesan officials appeared anxious and hoped that the combination of economic and spiritual pressures along with the public support of the French monarchy would bring about the same kind of success in Gex as they had seen in Chablais. In July 1601, Baron de Lux, Edmé de Mâlain, lieutenant to the king in Burgundy, called a conference to discuss the reestablishment of Catholicism for Gex.16 Luria found a similar situation in Poitou as the first commissioners, who arrived in 1599, set out to reintroduce Catholic services in a region that had not seen them for decades.17 Restoring Catholicism throughout the kingdom had the support of the French crown, but the execution was rarely easy. After the initial enthusiasm over the prospect of regaining Gex, it soon became apparent that the Catholic mission would be a much more troublesome project than the one in the duchy of Chablais. De Sales informed Pope Clement VIII that they were in the process of “conquering” the bailliages of Thonon, Ternier, and Gaillard, but Gex would be a more difficult task, being “situated between the governments of Berne and Geneva as between two pestilent swamps, [and] it has drunk their poisonous water.”18 The imagery of a landscape polluted by the neighboring Protestants is vivid in de Sales’s correspondence with like-minded Catholics. Geneva did not sit back idly while the Catholics made their move towards Gex, but sent its own representatives to meet with Baron de Lux.19 As royal lieutenant in Burgundy, the baron appears to have tried to appease both sides of the confessional divide; he promised Geneva that no Protestants in Gex would be forced to convert, but was less accommodating on property issues, acknowledging that properties would be restored to the Catholics.20 Hickey found that commissioners in Poitou-Aunis made similar pleas to both sides of the confessional divide to accept the decisions of royal officials in implementing

 F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 28 June 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:65–66. 16  F. de Sales to some friends, end of July 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:69, 12:80n1. 17  Luria, Sacred Boundaries, 17–18. 18  “Situé entre les gouvernements de Berne et de Genève, comme entre deux marais pestilentiels, il s’abreuve à leurs eaux empoisonnées.” De Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Pope Clement VIII, mid-July 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:424. 19  Colladon, Journal d’Esaie Colladon, 21 (21 July 1601). 20  Ibid., 23 (July 1601). 15

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the edict.21 The commissioners wanted to defuse conflict, not exacerbate it as they applied the edict to local situations. By August things were progressing from the Catholic perspective, with François de Sales recounting to the nuncio in Turin that Baron de Lux had taken possession of Gex for the crown and claimed that the king wanted the “Catholic cult” practiced there. De Sales continued to complain that Geneva, which had occupied the area on behalf of the king of France for the past fifteen years, resisted returning ecclesiastical goods.22 The Protestants of Gex sent a small delegation headed by Pierre Prevost, the pastor of Ornex, to the French court.23 Meanwhile, Bishop Granier and his coadjutor used all channels to influence royal policy in favor of the Catholic cause, pleading their case to high-ranking church officials and Henri IV personally concerning the necessity of recovering church revenue in Gex.24 They asked the papacy to use its influence with the king to convince him that Geneva’s relinquishment of the properties was central to reestablishing Catholicism in the towns.25 De Sales claimed that there had been twenty-six Catholic parishes in Gex before the Reformation, but now the properties attached to the benefices were either in the hand of “heretic ministers” or citizens of Geneva.26 The colloquy of Gex had only eleven ministers active in the area, so the majority of the properties were controlled by private citizens.27 By repeatedly making their claims to officials at all levels of church and state, Catholic officials hoped to add credence to their cause of returning the diocese to its ancient boundaries, regardless of the confessional composition at the beginning of the seventeenth century.  Hickey, “Enforcing the Edict of Nantes,” 77.  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 20 August 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:70–72. 23  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 8:96–98 (August 1601). Venard found that the most difficult task for Catholic officials was reclaiming church properties; “L’Église catholique bénéficiaire de l’édit de Nantes,” 299. 24  F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Henri IV and Gaspard Silingardo, papal nuncio in France, August 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:428–29; and F. de Sales (on behalf of Claude de Granier) to Cardinal Pierre Aldobrandini, 11 August 1601, in ibid., 12:433–35. 25   F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 20 August 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:70–72. 26  F. de Sales to Conrad Tartarini, papal nuncio in Turin, 21 December 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:91. 27  Aymon, Tous les synods nationaux, 1:293. The records from the national synod of the French Reformed Church for 1603 list eleven towns with ministers. 21 22

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The actual process of reestablishing functioning Catholic parishes was excruciatingly slow for the diocese, but they did have support from the king. In a letter to diocesan officials in October 1601, Henri requested that Catholic clergy be sent to Gex, but he asked that this step not lead to disruption in the area. The king warned that he expected the priests to live exemplary lives and not enter into disputes with the local population.28 As Mack Holt has noted, the Edict of Nantes was viewed as an interim solution and Henri believed that in order to restore peace and stability to France, he needed to reunite France to the Catholic faith.29 Nonetheless, Henri had to use caution to try and maintain the tenuous peace only recently achieved, and he was not willing to allow the diocese to use the same confrontational methods that had brought it success among the Calvinists in the duchy of Chablais in his newly acquired lands in Gex. Claude de Granier and François de Sales appear to have recognized the delicate political situation of the French king and tried some political maneuvering of their own. While in Lyons to meet with Baron de Lux, de Sales sought the aid and influence of Cardinal Pierre Aldobrandini, claiming that the king wanted to find a way to return the revenue held by Geneva to the diocese without “offending the heretical Swiss cantons and the Queen of England” by making it appear that the king had no choice in the matter.30 Whether this claim was true or not, de Sales hoped that if enough powerful church figures pressured the recently reconciled king, he would relent on the issue of Geneva and force the Protestants to hand over the properties. After all, the pope was very unhappy when Henri issued the edict after Clement had given the king absolution;31 perhaps Henri might relent on issues in Gex to appease the pope. De Sales also suggested to Cardinal Aldobrandini that he write letters to the bishop of Geneva and the papal nuncio of France encouraging them to advocate on this matter with Henri.32 In his position of missionary and coadjutor, de Sales appears to have developed  Dussieux, Lettres Intimes de Henri IV, 357–58.  Holt, French Wars of Religion, 156. 30  F. de Sales to Cardinal Pierre Aldobrandino, 10 November 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:81–83. 31  Haan, “Les réactions du Saint-Siège à l’edit de Nantes,” 353–55, 362–63. Aldobrandini was a nephew of Pope Clement VIII and had helped negotiate the Treaty of Lyons; Mellinghoff-Bourgerie, François de Sales, 278. 32  F. de Sales to Cardinal Aldobrandini, 10 November 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:83. The papal nuncio in France at the time was Innocent del Bufalo, bishop of Camerino; ibid., 12:83n2. 28 29

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some political skills that proved crucial to his maneuvering between a multitude of political and religious interests. For the most part, the diocese appeared circumspect about its prospects of making dramatic headway in winning back the Protestant villages of Gex. It focused its early efforts on simply offering the important public statement of returning Catholicism to the region and having the sacraments available for the small number of Catholics living there. De Sales let it be known to Baron de Lux that the diocese had good preachers reserved for the mission to Gex and was just waiting for the okay from the crown to dispatch them.33 The efforts panned out by the end of 1601 when the diocese placed three of its cathedral canons—Louis de Sales, Claude Grandis, and Antoine Bochu—in the towns of Gex, Farges, and Asserans, respectively, to commence celebrating Catholic sacraments.34 At the beginning of the seventeenth century, there were rising expectations that canons would participate in more pastoral duties.35 Despite vigorous protests from the Calvinists, the king issued a proclamation allowing for the Catholic seizure of several churches and the division of cemeteries between the confessions.36 Keith Luria finds, however, that “they [the commissioners] appear in various places to have allowed instead the (at least temporary) sharing of common [cemeteries] or, more often, they sponsored the division of old cemeteries into two adjacent burial grounds.”37 Reintroduction of the mass barred Protestants from using the church buildings in these towns, forcing them to hold their services in barns.38 Henri IV confirmed the three parishes with patent letters on 19 September 1602 and the parlement in Dijon registered the king’s edict in March 1603.39 The Catholics achieved success in their first strike  F. de Sales, on behalf of Claude de Granier, to the Baron de Lux, 8 October 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:439–40. 34  F. de Sales to Conrad Tartarini, papal nuncio in Turin, 21 December 1601, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:90, 100. Note 1 provides the full names of the canons sent to Gex. In a letter to Claude de Quoex on 3 January 1602, de Sales wrote, “Nous avons laissé à Gex messieurs les chanoynes de Sales, Grandis, Bochuti.” Ibid., 12:100. It does not appear that there was a Reformed minister in Asserans at this time. 35   Venard, Réforme protestante, réforme catholique, 683. 36   Claperède, Histoire des Eglises Réformées, 60. 37  Luria, Sacred Boundaries, 117. 38  Colladon, Journal d’Esaie Colladon, 30 (20 November 1601). 39  de Sales, Œuvres, 12:128n1. ADCO, B12088: Enregistrements des Édits et Ordonnances, fol. 7, gave François de Sales the right to reestablish Catholicism in the villages of Gex. 33

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against the Reformed churches, but this relatively small change in the confessional makeup began a protracted struggle between Catholics and Protestants. They fought, for the most part, before courts, parlement, commissions, and only occasionally face to face to maintain or reestablish their sacred domains in the region. For François de Sales, the establishment of three churches began a long journey through a complicated political maze that took him from the parlement in Dijon to the royal court of Paris and lasted throughout his tenure as bishop (1602–22). He became the diplomatic face of the diocese at the beginning of 1602 as Bishop Granier was nearing the end of his life and de Sales, having been coadjutor with right of succession since 1599, increasingly assumed duties of leadership and set out to solidify and expand the diocese’s claims against multiple Protestant interests in Gex. De Sales joined Charles de Gontaut, Marshal de Biron, and Baron de Lux in Dijon, and they gave him letters of introduction to take on to Paris for his meetings at the royal court; once de Sales arrived in Paris, the papal nuncio introduced the future bishop to the king.40 De Sales praised Lux, claiming his piety showed through in all his negotiations, but the Savoyard cleric was always on the lookout for other men in positions of power who might help him sway the king. De Sales recruited Cardinal Arnaud d’Ossat, who had played a crucial role in Henri IV’s reconciliation to Rome and the annulment of the king’s marriage to Marguerite de Valois, to use his influence in Rome to further the diocese’s plans.41 But Geneva was unwilling to give up its interests in Gex quietly and the city had its own powerful allies, including François de Bonne, Duke of Lesdiguières, who served as a military leader under both Henri IV and Louis XIII.42 The Protestant Lesdiguières had led Henri’s troops against Savoy for several years and was well known to and certainly feared by the Catholic Savoyards. The diplomatic world of Paris was new and unfamiliar territory to François de Sales and presented many challenges. Shortly after his arrival in Paris, de Sales reported to Bishop Granier that he had given his “fundamental request” to the royal council, and he had to wait and see 40  Claperède, Histoire des Eglises Réformées, 58; and Brossard, Histoire Politique et Religieuse, 371–72. 41  F. de Sales to Claude de Quoex, 3 January 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:98–99, 12:99n1. For a full discussion of Henri IV’s reconciliation with Rome, see Wolfe, Conversion of Henri IV. 42  F. de Sales to Claude de Quoex, 3 January 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:100, 12:100n4.

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what happened. The diocese’s need for funds was constant and pressing, and de Sales hoped he would not have to stay too long in Paris because of the expense.43 De Sales soon voiced frustration about the king’s council, who he believed had hindered his efforts on Gex and dismissed his demands.44 Despite the lack of attention from the king’s men, the everindustrious Savoyard did utilize the influence of Baron de Lux in his efforts to establish a priory in Gex. Yet de Sales was an outsider at the court of Paris because of his lack of training in the art of diplomacy and his status as a Savoyard. He also faced serious opposition from Geneva, which had sent its own diplomatic corps to Paris with François de Chapeaurouge (Monsieur Dauphin) and Jacob Anjorrant, arriving in Paris in March to protest the Catholic demands and make their own requests concerning Geneva’s exemption from taxes and tolls on their property in Gex.45 Pierre Prevost, the Protestant minister of Ornex, was again at court to champion the Reformed churches of Gex.46 By April, François de Sales believed his efforts concerning Gex were failing. But personally, de Sales had made a good impression on the king and members of court. Henri invited the future saint to preach for him; he also preached before the queen and her entourage numerous times during his stay in Paris.47 De Sales was more comfortable navigating the spiritual terrain than he ever was the political one. With the death of Claude de Granier on 17 September 1602, de Sales was recalled to Annecy before he had completed all his negotiations with Henri IV. De Sales voiced disappointment to Pope Clement VIII that his time in Paris had brought only the king’s approval to provide annual revenue for three parish priests.48 While François de Sales’s mission began with this small success, not every request he made to the  F. de Sales to Claude de Granier from Paris, 8 February 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:101–2.  F. de Sales to Claude de Quoex from Paris, 9 March 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:104. 45  F. de Sales to Claude de Granier from Paris, 26 March 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:107; and Colladon, Journal d’Esaie Colladon, 33–35. Colladon mentions that Dauphin and Anjorrant left for court on 4 March 1602, and Geneva received a letter on 30 March that they have been received by the chancellor. Colladon mentions on 12 April that the two men saw the king on the issues of taxes and tolls. 46  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 8:143 (30 April 1602). The colloquy of Gex requested a minister from the Company of Pastors in April 1602 for Ornex and another village because Pierre Prevost was in France to handle the churches’ affairs. 47  F. de Sales to Claude de Granier, 10 April and 18 April 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:105, 12:108–10. 48  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, end of October 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:128. 43 44

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French crown was met with approval. Catholicism was introduced into other villages with great caution, and in certain instances, the Protestants were successful in slowing the process and maintaining their existing rights and boundaries. The Protestant inhabitants of Gex viewed Geneva as their protector and believed, along with Geneva, that Henri IV, despite his conversion to Catholicism, would enforce the Edict of Nantes that allowed them to continue practicing their Reformed faith.49 Yet Henri’s support of Protestant populations did not prevent a rough transition for the inhabitants of Gex as they became part of France.

The Protestants of Gex

The Reformed churches in Gex were in turmoil at the turn of the seventeenth century as the changing political fortunes in the region instigated shifting national boundaries that pulled the Pays de Gex from a Genevan orbit to a French one.50 Berne had introduced the Reformation to the region and had grouped the parishes into a classe, but by the end of the sixteenth century, the churches of Gex looked to Geneva for help, guidance, and personnel.51 The Reformed churches in Gex soon realized that in Geneva they lacked an unwavering advocate with the French crown, as the representatives of the city focused their lobbying efforts on keeping property and exempting property owners from French taxes and tolls, and only secondarily on protecting the liberty of conscience of the Protestant faithful living in the region.52 The Reformed population of Gex faced the dual tasks of incorporating itself into the French church and simultaneously maintaining its long-held independent status. The preexisting cultural boundaries in Gex did not necessarily coincide with the new political and religious ones created by the Treaty of Lyons. For the most part, Protestants found themselves to be unwelcome additions  Claperède, Histoire des Eglises Réformées, 63, 66–67.  Brossard, Histoire politique et religieuse, 279–80, 285, 370–71; Aymon, Tous les synods nationaux, 1:293; and Claperède, Histoire des Eglises Réformées, 341–44. In 1603 there were eleven appointed pastors, but the colloquy was accorded thirteen pastors; Claperède asserts that the Protestant churches and pastors served several villages. Aymon listed the parishes as Sessy, Gex, Thoiry, Ornex, Divonne, Chalex, Collonges, Versoix, Farges, Saconnex, and Crozet. 51  Bruening says, “The primary purpose of the classe system was to ensure that the ministers in each area were doing their jobs”; Calvinism’s First Battleground, 170. 52  Colladon, Journal d’Esaie Colladon, 19–22, 32–35. His journal entries for 1601 and 1602 concerning Gex mostly mention the financial issues. See particularly his entries for 21 July 1601 and 12 April 1602. 49 50

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to the province of Burgundy, and the French Reformed church officials tended to view Gex’s local practices as unacceptable and expected Gex to bring its churches into conformity with those found in France. But the Protestants of Gex were not anxious to give up their way of doing things or their autonomy. At a regional synod meeting for the Burgundy province held near Lyons in June 1603, representatives for the church of Gex claimed that it had always held a separate synod while under Berne, the Duke of Savoy, and Geneva. The freedom to hold a separate synod was a long-standing practice recognized by previous secular authorities. The colloquy of Gex asked the assembly at Lyons that it be allowed to continue meeting independently because of the financial hardship of traveling to regional gatherings and “the danger of leaving their church unattended.”53 It is not surprising that the church leaders did not want to be away from their congregations very long considering the Catholics were pressing in on their villages, properties, and faithful, but under the Reformed Church in France, Gex was not able to maintain the same autonomy in church matters as it had prior to the Treaty of Lyons. The differences between Gex and the French Reformed Church went beyond supervision and administration of its churches as Gex found its religious devotions subject to new scrutiny from the provincial synod. One problem concerned the rituals associated with the Lord’s Supper: Gex used unleavened bread instead of the leavened form used in the French church.54 Gex’s representatives defended their use of unleavened bread, claiming it was a custom the people liked, but Burgundy was unwilling to allow the continuation of this regional variation and exhorted Gex to conform and move towards “pure doctrine.” Furthermore, if the churches of Gex did not conform to these practices, the provincial synod threatened them with further reprimands from the national synod.55 Disputes over the performance and interpretation of the Lord’s Supper continually plagued Christian groups throughout Europe since the Reformation and contributed to the proliferation of denominations.56 In the eyes of the French Reformed Church, Gex  “le danger du laisse leur Eglise despourvent”; UGL, Ms Fr 417: Correspondance écclesiastique, fol. 55v. 54  According to Raymond Mentzer, “each person received a piece of ordinary table bread, not a special host, from the pastor”; “Laity and Liturgy,” 81. 55  “la cene du pain”; “pain sans levain cuit entre deux fois”; UGL, Ms Fr 417: Correspondance écclesiastique, fol. 56–56v. French church is “pain levé.” 56  The Lord’s Supper had numerous regional variations. For a discussion of one aspect of this 53

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maintained too many practices that hinted at Catholicism, including the observance of feast days devoted to the nativity and conception, but these practices had been a part of the churches of Gex since the introduction of the Reformation by the Bernese in the 1530s.57 The following year, even though Gex did not send a representative to the provincial council held in Grenoble, the colloquy’s practices remained under scrutiny. The churches of Gex wanted to continue long-standing baptismal practices that were deemed superstitious by the Reformed Church of France.58 When a conflict arose over the acceptability of a particular godparent in 1607 as a result a baptism in Thoiry, the colloquy of Gex sought advice and guidance from the pastors of Geneva after its methods of ascertaining the suitability of godparents were deemed incompatible with the discipline of the French church.59 These differences came to the attention of the national synod in 1607 when representatives for Gex voiced reservations about signing the discipline, arguing that some of the articles were impossible to maintain in their region.60 It is not clear why it was difficult for them to conform to the French discipline’s rules on godparents, but it remained challenging for Gex to reconcile its regional practices to the national will of the Reformed Church. The Protestant leaders in Gex kept closer ties to Geneva than their French brethren and continued to turn to the Company of Pastors there for staffing Gex churches.61 The redrawn national boundary did not make the Protestants of Gex feel that they were part of France. On 30 April 1602, the colloquy of Gex requested help from the Company of Pastors in obtaining a minister for Ornex and another village because Pastor Pierre Prevost was away handling affairs for the Protestants at the French court. The company informed Gex that it could not send ministers, but would send several students to fill in for Pastor Prevost.62 In July the company dispute, see Nischan, “The ‘Fractio Panis’”; and for a thorough discussion of the differences between Lutheran, Reformed, and Catholic observances of the Eucharist, see Wandel, Eucharist in the Reformation. Lee Palmer Wandel notes, “So, too, the three Churches [Lutheran, Reformed, and Catholic] differed on the interplay of faith, the substance of the element(s), and the person of the believer”; Eucharist in the Reformation, 259. 57  UGL, Ms Fr 417: Correspondance écclesiastique, fol. 56v. The provincial synod “exhorts” them to stop these observances. 58  UGL, Ms Fr 417: Correspondance écclesiastique, fol. 109v, regional synod 10 May 1604 59  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 10:49. 60  Aymon, Tous les synodes nationaux, 1:329. 61  Colladon, Journal d’Esaie Colladon, 18 (22 June 1601). 62  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 8:143 (30 April 1602).

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had to warn one of its own, Jacob Brun, not to preach in neighboring Gex without permission, since it was now a French territory.63 In October 1602, the Company of Pastors helped find suitable candidates for several vacant parishes in Gex, including Etienne Gros for Collonges and David Piaget.64 It is natural that the Protestant faithful of Gex would prefer ministers from Geneva over those trained in France since it was more likely that their backgrounds and education would be similar to those of previous ministers. This problem of staffing churches across international borders posed similar problems for the Catholics, as shall be discussed later. Neither Gex nor the French church appeared overly willing to embrace each other. The province of Burgundy later censured David Piaget, the minister from the colloquy of Gex, but Geneva came to the minister’s defense attesting to his reputation at the national synod of 1603 and asking it to restore his honor.65 Geneva’s efforts are not that surprising considering that Piaget had received his training in the city and the Company of Pastors had sent him to Gex in the first place. The churches of Gex again consulted the Company of Pastors in 1606 when problems arose over the amount of a pension to be paid to a widow of a Gex minister.66 Because of their different practices, their location on the far eastern border of France, and their relationship with Geneva, the Protestant churches of Gex remained largely outsiders in the French Reformed Church. At the turn of the seventeenth century, the pastors of Gex were in limbo between Savoy and France and faced an uncertain future. While they tried to maintain their autonomy, a few more radical Catholics of the region, perhaps emboldened by their successes in the Chablais, wanted to do more than make their sacraments available to existing Catholics; they wanted to increase their number and appear to have used coercion in the process. The mission in the duchy of Chablais had garnered a great deal of positive publicity with the public conversion of Protestant minister Pierre Petit so the Catholics were surely on the lookout for a Reformed minister in Gex to convert. This brings us to the case of Arnoul Martin, a Reformed minister of Gex who disappeared from  Ibid., 8:155 (9 July 1602).  Ibid., 8:163–64, 164nn202–3 (22 October 1602). Colladon, Journal d’Esaie Colladon, 43 (22 October 1602), mentioned that a minister from Gex asked the Company of Pastors for three theology students to fill vacancies in their churches. 65  Aymon, Tous les synodes nationaux, 1:283, spells it both as Piaget and Peager. 66  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 9:187–88, 324–25. 63 64

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his church and ended up in Rome. It was during the spring of 1600, a turbulent and confusing time surrounding peace negotiations between Duke Charles-Emmanuel and King Henri IV, that Pastor Arnoul Martin went missing from the Reformed Church of Gex. Both the Company of Pastors and the Council of Geneva noted Martin’s sudden disappearance from Gex and his subsequent reappearance in Rome; Geneva’s jurisdiction over the churches of Gex was rather unclear at this point due to the ongoing negotiations between the secular powers of France and Savoy, a complication recognized by the ministers.67 The company assumed the worst about Martin, remarking on “the scandal of his desertion and flight,” and quickly took steps to replace him.68 Geneva’s quick condemnation of Martin is telling about the state of the Reformed faith in the region and the blow dealt by the Catholic mission in Chablais to the confidence of the Protestants. News of Martin’s “conversion” emerged in 1601 with the publication in Paris of a pamphlet detailing his embrace of the Catholic faith. Luria notes that in this tract, Martin claims that the Catholic Church has “marks” of its authenticity. These signs include the church’s antiquity, miracles, and even exorcisms.69 Not surprisingly, this publication disturbed the powers of Geneva and the company appointed theologians Antoine de la Faye and Jean Diodati to respond to Martin’s profession of faith; however there is no evidence they published a response.70 The story of Martin’s conversion does not end there though. In 1602 Geneva received word from a papal mole named Marc-Antoine Pascal that Martin had been held against his will with several others, brought before the Inquisition in Rome, and pressured to convert.71 Martin eventually left Rome and returned to the Savoy region. Soon after, he began petitioning Geneva to allow him to return to the Reformed fold. The company 67  For discussion of Geneva’s questionable jurisdiction, see Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 8:11–12. The Council of Geneva notes Martin’s disappearance; RC 95 Mi B465, fol. 52v (7 April), fol. 55 (15 April), and fol. 61v (25 April 1600). 68  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 8:18–19; and RC 95 Mi B465, fol. 74 (16 May 1600). Pastor Jean Jappé was offered and ultimately accepted the position in Gex. 69  Luria, Sacred Boundaries, 268–69. 70  The account was published in Paris in 1601 under the title Declaration des cause qui ont meu Arnoul Martin, jadis ministre entre les calvinistes, d’embrasser la foy catholique; see Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 8:129, n43. 71  RC 97 Mi B467, fol. 56 (19 April 1602); Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 8:129n43, says that Pascal had gained the trust of Cardinal Aldobrandini.

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did not immediately welcome him back, questioning his sincerity and noticing that he was reportedly still taking money from the papacy.72 With questions surrounding the funds resolved by the end of November 1603, Martin was welcomed back into the Reformed Church, prompting Geneva to publish a pamphlet detailing this reunion.73 In this publication, Martin is vague about his journey to Catholicism, which he claims included time with the Jesuits in Milan and Chérubin’s taking him to see the pope, who gave him money. In his plea to be allowed to return to the Reformed Church, Martin exhorts, “I am voluntarily returning to this holy house of God, returning from the Synagogue of the anti-Christ, where I saw only abomination, idolatry, hypocrisy, and ambition.”74 It is unclear how Martin made it to Rome and what role officials from the Diocese of Geneva played in the intrigue. The conversion ultimately failed, demonstrating that coercion would not work in the absence of sustained spiritual and/or material comfort offered by the opposing confession hoping to win over a valuable public figure. For the most part, despite various hardships, the ministers of Gex appear to have remained steadfast and devoted to their churches.

Funds, Properties, and Jurisdiction

While differences of belief continued to divide the Pays de Gex, the various parties vested in Gex spent a great deal of energy bickering over money and property. It is not surprising that an area such as Gex, which had suffered great material deprivation and was in flux, would invite a feeding frenzy over income-producing properties. The Catholics did not just battle with the Protestants; they battled among themselves as well. Royal commissioners and local elites worked to resolve divisions of property in biconfessional communities to avoid having conflicts escalating into violence.75 The Edict of Nantes offered a mechanism for resolving property disputes between Catholics and Protestants, but in  Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 8:255 (16 September 1603).  UGL, Ms Fr 417: Correspondance écclesiastique, fols. 70–71 (20 August 1603), Martin’s letter to the church of Geneva; and Registres de la Compagnie des Pasteurs, 7:261, 273, 479–80, copy of Martin’s letter. The Company of Pastors received a report from a surprising source, the Jesuits, that seems to have alleviated their minds concerning the source of Martin’s money. 74  “Je suis volontairement retourné en ceste sainte maison de Dieu, me retirant de la Synagogue de l’Antechrist, où Je n’ay veu qu’abomination, idolatre, hypocrisie & ambition.” UGL, Martin, Declaration d’Arnoul Martin jadis ministre de la parole de Dieu, 8–10, 69. 75  Hickey, “Enforcing the Edict of Nantes,” 71. 72 73

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some cases the commissioners had to settle disagreements between rival Catholic institutions. Both the bishop of Geneva and the archbishop of Bourges laid claim to a piece of property in Gex; the bishop asserted that it had been ceded to the diocese, but the archbishop claimed that the land was part of his benefice. De Sales traveled to Dijon during Lent of 1604 to resolve the conflict with the archbishop and to pursue some pensions he claimed were held by inactive Reformed ministers.76 In another dispute with fellow Catholics, the Order of St. John of Jerusalem claimed a chapel in the village of Crozet had belonged to it before the Protestants came. Claude de la Verchère, chevalier and commander of the order, pleading his cause to de Sales, asserted that the chapel had never been part of a parish and that the ecclesiastical goods of Gex should be restored to their status prior to the Reformation.77 In an apparent effort to reach a compromise, Chevalier de la Verchère promised Bishop de Sales that he would send someone to celebrate mass in Crozet on the day of foundation, but he said he was unable to entertain a priest fulltime for the chapel. The Order of St. John appealed the case of the chapel to the royal commissioners, who left the property in the hands of the diocese.78 The evidence suggests that both the diocese and the Order of Saint John maintained rights to the chapel. The commander of the chevaliers visited the chapel 29 October 1614 and reported that he did not say mass there since all people present were Huguenots.79 Authorizing the reestablishment of the mass in Crozet did not mean that Catholics actually lived in the village. When in June 1663 the bishop of Geneva, Jean d’Arenthon d’Alex, visited Crozet and other parishes in the Pays de Gex, it was the first visit to the churches since 1517.80 A Catholic bishop returned to Crozet only after a 1662 royal proclamation by Louis XIV ordered the Protestant church there pulled down.81  F. de Sales to Antoine des Hayes, 16 January 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:251–54. Antoine des Hayes was a counselor to Henri IV. 77  Chevalier Claude de la Verchère to François de Sales, January 1613, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:394–96. 78  de Sales, Œuvres, 15:395n4, quoting Procès-verbal de Gex. Claude Girod acted on behalf of the Order for the appeal. 79  de Sales, Œuvres, 15:396n1, quoting Procès-verbal de la visite de Crozet et Maconnex from the Archives du Rhône, H. 260n86. 80  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:166. 81  Claperède, Histoire des Eglises Réformées, 123–24. After 1662 until the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, the Protestants of Gex could only worship in Sergy and Fernex. 76

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The French part of the Diocese of Geneva remained a contentious place, forcing the bishop to travel periodically out of Savoy and out of his diocese to conduct administrative and spiritual duties. François de Sales walked a tightrope at times between Savoy and France. At the beginning of 1604, the bishop tried to alleviate conflict with the duke by notifying him in advance of a planned trip to Dijon to address the parlement on matters pertaining to Gex. The duke did not like a Savoyard bishop and his subject traveling to the lands of an adversary. In an effort to mollify the Savoyard ruler, de Sales told the duke how he wished that Gex would be returned to Savoy and reminded him that the trip into France was necessary if the entire diocese was to return to Catholicism.82 The situation made it necessary for the bishop to have good communication with both rulers as well as with their legislative bodies, but this task proved to be a formidable one. De Sales recounted his difficulties to Pope Clement VIII, going to great lengths to justify his need to be absent from his diocese and seeking the pope’s permission and approval.83 After all, the Council of Trent called for a bishop to reside in his diocese, to leave only when absolutely necessary, and to obtain permission from superiors for any travel.84 Bishop de Sales was following this decree: he promised to keep the papal nuncios of both France and Savoy informed of his progress while in Burgundy, and he hoped that his trip would last only two months.85 The journey would be difficult because de Sales was traveling to another country that was not always open to his requests. The French parlement of Dijon in Burgundy viewed him as a Savoyard—a foreigner—making it more difficult to gain members’ support and trust.86 His status as an outsider would hamper all his negotiations within France, even when he successfully challenged the rights of the Reformed Church. It appears that de Sales had some success with matters in Gex; in a letter to Antoine de Revol, bishop of Dol, de Sales recounted how the Baron de Lux and several members of the Dijon parlement had come to Gex on behalf of the king to settle a dispute between the Catholics

 F. de Sales to Duke Charles-Emmanuel I, February 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:256.  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, end of February 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:259. 84  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 6th sess., chap. 1 (pp. 47-48). 85  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, end of February 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:259. 86  Ibid., 12:257–58. 82 83

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and Calvinists.87 Conflict had arisen over the partitioning of a cemetery and clerical housing, and ultimately the commissioners intervened and the parlement in Dijon issued a decree on 11 May 1604 in an effort to force both parties to accept the partitions.88 But problems concerning the division of cemeteries continued for decades. The churches of Gex complained at the national synod of the French Reformed Church in 1637 that the Catholics continued to refuse those of the Reformed faith burial in the cemeteries despite having agreed to the divisions confirmed by the king in 1612. Furthermore, according to the grievances of the Protestants of Gex, the intendant of Burgundy at the time, in addition to defying the orders of the commissioners, also denied Reformed churches access to common money and the hospital.89 The contestation over burial rights and the uneven enforcement based on the region’s personnel greatly shaped how the Edict of Nantes was interpreted and enforced at the local level. As Fredrik Barth observes, cultural boundaries do not remain static and opposing groups must continually maintain them.90 Simon Ditchfield, in his work on sacred space in Rome, notes that space was not fixed and that concepts of public/private and domestic/institutional spaces frequently overlapped.91 Even when it appeared that boundaries had been established by official proclamations between the two confessions, disputes could linger for decades, only to be renewed and intensified by new officials who threatened coexistence. Solutions were often only temporary, and each time de Sales crossed the border from Savoy into France, he risked angering the duke, or worse. On a return trip from the French territory of the Pays de Gex in September 1609, de Sales, in a fit of what the bishop himself in hindsight called “impudent boldness,” passed through Geneva rather than taking a slower route back to Annecy. Claiming at the gates that he possessed the right to enter the city based on his predecessors’ position as bishop-prince of Geneva, de Sales caught the attention of city leaders. They in turn informed Duke Charles-Emmanuel, who was not amused at the bishop’s claim of ancient privilege and accused de Sales of trying

 F. de Sales to Antoine de Revol, 18 August 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:296.  de Sales, Œuvres, 12:296n1. 89  Aymon, Tous les synodes nationaux, 1:598–99. 90  Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries, 14–15. 91  Ditchfield, “Reading Rome as a Sacred Landscape,” 190. 87 88

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to retake temporal authority in the city.92 If anyone was going to reclaim secular authority in Geneva, the duke reserved that right for himself. No anonymous entrance into the city was possible for Bishop de Sales, and his use of his ancient title overstepped legal boundaries, angering both the Reformed city and his Catholic sovereign. Shifting political boundaries caused problems among the Catholic laity in lands given to France in the peace settlement. They found themselves no longer inhabitants of Savoy, but continued to view themselves as Savoyard and thus wanted what their French rulers considered a “foreign curate,” but France required that clergy be naturalized French to hold a benefice in the country.93 Peter Sahlins, in his work on foreigners and the process of naturalization in France, found that clergy made up the largest group of individuals seeking naturalization.94 De Sales first addressed this issue during his visit to the royal court of Paris in 1602 when he was coadjutor of the diocese, but the problem continued. The bishops of Geneva had difficulty filling these positions, as their available pool of clergy was mostly Savoyard. De Sales grew frustrated with his continued treatment as a foreigner by the parlement of Dijon when he took up diocesan business. The bishop wrote to Bénigne Milletot, a counselor of the king in the parlement of Burgundy, on his right to confer the benefices in his diocese on whomever he saw fit. I believe that one will consider that there is no law in the world which would prevent me from using my ecclesiastical authority in the administration of the benefices of my diocese; and so as the archbishop of Lyons expects in Burgundy, the bishop of Grenoble in Savoy and in Chambéry also, not withstanding their residence in the kingdom [France], I also must enjoy the authority in the kingdom, although I live in Savoy. The bishop pleaded with Milletot for his protection in this matter.95 De Sales believed that his fundamental authority to assign clergy within  F. de Sales to Antoine des Hayes, 4 December 1609, in de Sales, Œuvres, 14:216.  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, end of February 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:257–58. De Sales addressed the issue concerning nationality of priests in a letter to Claude de Quoex during his visit to Paris in 1602; ibid., 12:106. 94  Sahlins, Unnaturally French, 142–43. 95  “Je croy que l’on considererea qu’il n’y a pas de loy au monde qui m’ayt privé de l’usage de mon authorité ecclesiastique en la provision des benefices de mon diocese; et que, comme M. l’Archevesque 92 93

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his diocese was at stake. The problems with the benefices and clergy in the French portion of the diocese remained a chronic problem. De Sales referred to “our poor Gex” when he informed Gilles Le Mazuyer, a Catholic in the king’s council, about the problems of the curés’ nationality. People challenged the priests’ rights to hold benefices by challenging their status in France. De Sales claimed that people “attack these poor curés in order to have their benefices, choice meats in these times, with the most incapable wanting them the most.”96 When states redraw national boundaries during peace negotiations, they rarely consider the often enduring difficulties placed on local populations. Restrictions on Bishop de Sales and his successors’ authority in France went beyond personnel decisions; they also found their authority curtailed when conducting pastoral visitations in the French part of their diocese. De Sales complained to Pope Clement VIII that he was not allowed to collect money from the people for construction and repairs of churches.97 Most churches that had been converted to Protestant houses of worship lacked an altar and appropriate decoration.98 The visitations of Agen and Toulouse examined by Venard also note the sad state of the buildings and sources of income for many parishes.99 De Sales visited the French part of his diocese in October and November 1605, and many of his accounts look very much like those for the Savoy portion of the diocese and even include specific references to the Council of Trent. Jean Rosetain, curé of Charvornay and vicar-general for the French part of the diocese returned to the region in early summer 1614. The accounts of Rosetain’s visits follow a format similar to those of de Sales and note injunctions not fulfilled from the bishop’s previous visit in 1605, but the accounts reveal some noticeable differences that emerged

de Lyon pourvoit en Bourgoine Comté, M. l’Evesque de Grenoble en Savoye et a Chambere mesme, non obstant leur residence au royaume, des mesme dois-je jouir de l’authorité de pourvoir dans le royaume, quoy que je sois habitant en Savoye.” F. de Sales to Monseigneur Bénigne Milletot, 13 May 1612, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:213–14. 96  “attaqueront ces pauvres curés pour avoir leurs benefices, viande si friande en ce tems, que les plus incapables en veulent plus avoir.” F. de Sales to Gilles Le Mazuyer, 14 November 1612, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:295–97. 97  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, end of February 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:259. De Sales complained to the pope about the money issues. 98  Bruening finds that in the episodes of destruction in the nearby Pays de Vaud at the hands of evangelicals, the iconoclasts focused on altars and crucifixes; Calvinism’s First Battleground, 117–23. 99  Venard, “L’Église catholique bénéficiaire de l’édit de Nantes,” 289.

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between the administration of Savoy and French parishes. In France, the visitor gave a copy of the injunctions to the local official of the king, perhaps signifying greater oversight of diocesan affairs by the crown. A telling difference between Rosetain’s accounts from the 1614 visits and those of de Sales’s tour of the French parishes the previous decade was the absence of the explicit order for parishes to purchase missals and other service books of the Council of Trent. France’s reluctance to promulgate the decrees of Trent meant the visitors had to be circumspect in the introduction of reforms. King, royal advisors, bishops, and theologians of France all weighed in on the power and validity of councils, and while many of the French clergy saw Trent as a way to reform that was compatible with the Gallican church, the monarchy ultimately could not.100 Specific references to the Council of Trent continued to be much more prevalent in the visitation accounts from the Savoy parishes conducted around the same time. Rosetain did issue injunctions calling for missals and rituals, presumably those ordained by Trent, and he ordered the priest from the parish of Echallon to teach the catechism.101 However, overall the written visitation accounts are less thorough than those for the Savoy portion of the diocese, which raises the question of whether the visits themselves were less detailed or if the recording was the issue. Perhaps due to greater scrutiny by the state, the diocese was more judicious about what it put in writing. François de Sales was a Tridentine bishop administering to parishes in a place where the crown did not fully embrace the council, and where Protestantism was officially tolerated; both these factors made it more difficult for the bishop to go about his work in the French portion of his diocese.

Stalled Progress

Both the existing Catholic parishes and the Protestant villages, despite their close proximity and the same new French nationality, remained very different places that required different actions from the bishops. Even with some public support from the French crown for reestablishing Catholic parishes in Gex, the clergy made few inroads among the local populations. De Sales wrote to the bishop of Dol that a few Huguenots had converted, some had doubts, and several people had made a general  Tallon, France et le Concile de Trente, 2:819–20.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:418.

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confession. He claimed that several parishes wanted the “Catholic cult,” but were afraid to ask for it, though he does not elaborate on what they feared. According to de Sales, Henri IV said that the process had to be slowed “for the consideration of the malice of the given time.”102 The king was not going to let the evangelizing goals of a Catholic bishop disrupt a fragile peace. The Reformed churches continued to hold their ground and their followers remained faithful. In 1609 de Sales complained to his friend Antoine Favre that the ministers challenged him and Baron de Lux—who had become a close ally of the bishop—on nearly every issue. One hopeful sign for de Sales was his celebration of mass in the parish of Cessy for the first time in seventy-three years. He told Favre that the following day he would do the same in two other parishes.103 While de Sales began reintroducing Catholicism in Cessy, Péron, Challex, and Versonnex in 1604, it was not until five years later that he received a decree from the king’s royal council giving the churches and cemeteries of Cessy, Péron, and Versonnex to the Catholics. The Protestant ministers successfully resisted in Challex until 1611 when the Duke of Bellegarde, governor of Burgundy, returned the church to the Catholics. Despite the loss of property, Cessy and Challex continued to have active Reformed churches.104 De Sales offered his former mentor, the Jesuit Antonio Possevino, an honest assessment of the situation, stating that no more “heretics” existed in the duchy of Chablais where sixteen years before almost all the population had been; in Gex, however, most of the inhabitants remained Huguenots. De Sales remained hopeful, since he had reestablished five Catholic parishes and had recently converted “a gentleman of mark.” He placed the blame for his lack of progress on Geneva, asserting that “the reason of state” kept Geneva from seeing that Catholicism was the better religion and fear of being put to death by the city kept many inhabitants in Geneva from embracing Catholicism.105 De Sales had to recognize the continuing ties between Gex and Geneva, and the

 “pour des considerations que la malice du tems donne.” F. de Sales to Antoine de Revol, bishop of Dol, 14 August 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:296. 103  F. de Sales to Antoine Favre, 21 September 1609, in de Sales, Œuvres, 14:196. 104  de Sales, Œuvres, 14:196n1; and Aymon, Tous les synodes nationaux, 1:293, 2:232, 418. Cessy and Challex were included in the list of parishes for the colloquy of Gex at the national synods of 1603, 1620, and 1626. 105  F. de Sales to Antonio Possevino, 10 December 1609, in de Sales, Œuvres, 14:221–22. 102

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influence the Reformed city maintained with the populations despite the change in the national boundary. The death of Henri IV in 1610 does not appear, at least initially, to have changed the policy or the confessional boundaries in Gex, and during the unsettled period following the king’s assassination, de Sales confided to his old friend Antoine Favre that he was apprehensive about traveling to Gex. He was worried about war and “wondered if at this time he should go out of state and among the Duke of Bellegarde and the Baron de Lux.”106 Tensions were again growing between France and Savoy, and de Sales did not want to get caught in France in the company of two powerful French officials if hostilities broke out. Even though de Sales had developed a good working relationship with the Baron de Lux, at a time of war they would be on opposite sides. De Sales told Favre that he had to put his service to God first and hoped that he could accomplish his business quickly.107 De Sales was also worried about how Duke Charles-Emmanuel would react to his leaving Savoy for France at this time, writing the Marquis de Lans, a nephew of the duke who had been recently named governor and lieutenant general in Savoy, to explain the necessity of his travel to Gex.108 Once in Gex, Bishop de Sales always seemed to find the state of affairs more complicated than he expected. He reported to Jeanne de Chantal that complications had emerged that forced him to stay longer than he anticipated, yet he remained hopeful that someday the place would be rid of heresy. De Sales recounted how he had reestablished the mass in Divonne the day before, and in the next few days, he planned to do the same in two other places; he still believed that his preaching would reach a few people.109 Each parish that the diocese reestablished came with its own set of difficulties, and holding Catholic services did not mean that many inhabitants of the villages had left Protestantism. After de Sales had reestablished the mass in Divonne, the Reformed church remained active and Catholic clergy there continued to bicker over  “estre mal a propos pour cett’occasion d’aller hors l’Estat et parmi monsieur le Grand et monsieur de Lux.” F. de Sales to Antoine Favre, 30 April 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:48. 107  F. de Sales to Antoine Favre, 30 April 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:48. 108  F. de Sales to Marquis de Lans, 30 April 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:49. 109  F. de Sales to Mère Jeanne de Chantal, 10 May 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:57; and ibid., n107. Taylor points to the importance of finding a good preacher especially for places where there was heresy to combat; Soldiers of Christ, 20–22. 106

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property rights and revenues.110 A priory in Divonne was restored in 1601, but it had been damaged severely during the religious violence of the sixteenth century.111 After reestablishing the mass there, de Sales requested funds from the monastery to help pay a priest and to furnish the parish church.112 The prior of St. Claude informed de Sales that he was happy that the mass had been reestablished in Divonne and would furnish money to decorate the altar and make other repairs, but as to the salary of a curé, the prior was not willing to furnish a forty-franc increase that de Sales wanted. The prior said the monastery could not afford as large a pension as the one paid to the priest in Cessy because there were other financial obligations to the papacy and to Paris. Furthermore, the priory had only recently received property back from the Protestants. The prior hinted that Bishop de Sales may have exercised rights over the parish that had in the past belonged to the priory, but he promised to acknowledge de Sales’s authority since it had been granted by the pope.113 In the case of Divonne, there was not much cooperation between secular and regular clergy in reestablishing pastoral activities. All parties with claims to property, both Catholic and Protestant, fought to obtain what they believed rightfully belonged to them. No transfer of money or property was ever easy and most came with a long history of claims in an area of contested jurisdictions and changing boundaries. De Sales’s fears were realized on his return to Annecy when he had to defend himself against accusations from the Duke of Savoy that he was keeping company with the enemy. He protested that his duty required him to go to Gex for “preaching, disputing, reconciling the churches, consecrating altars, [and] administering the sacraments.” The bishop tried to appease the duke by providing him information that discounted a rumor that France was interested in conquering Geneva, and he offered his opinion of the Swiss Catholic cities, claiming that he

110  Aymon, Tous les synodes nationaux, 2:232, 418. Divonne is listed as having a pastor at the national synods of 1620 and 1626. 111  de Sales, Œuvres, 15:59n2. 112  F. de Sales to grand prior and religious of St. Claude, 17 May 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:59– 60. The priory of Divonne was under the Priory of St. Claude, established in the fifth century and long a beneficiary of the kings of France. 113  Prior and religious of Saint-Claude to François de Sales, 20 May 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:386–87.

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thought they would turn away from Berne. De Sales said he provided the duke what information he had, but claimed “I have a great aversion to worrying about matters of state.”114 Being caught between two hostile countries and with loyalties to both, de Sales coped with complicated and volatile political situations that seemed far removed from spiritual reform and renewal. Despite the problems he faced at home over his association with Gex, de Sales continued to work diligently to amass church buildings and revenues for the parishes there with hopes that converts would soon follow. Both Joseph Brossard and Théodore Claparède assert that de Sales was fanatical in his desire to regain sources of income.115 Controlling property was a sign of power and influence and gave the dioceses greater financial ability to attract quality clergy to Gex. Venard contends, “Often, it was the usurpation of the goods of the clergy and ecclesiastical revenue which caused the interruption of the Catholic cult and parish services.”116 Taking property at the expense of local Protestants and citizens of Geneva would have surely been an incentive as well. Perhaps winning a property battle offered de Sales a more tangible sense of accomplishment than the stalled battle to win souls. Claude de Montluel, abbot of Bonmont, a Cistercian monastery near Divonne, had offered the cathedral canons of Geneva a small benefice he controlled in Gex valued at around twenty-five écus. De Sales asked the bishop of Montpellier, Pierre Fenouillet to help him expedite the matter with the French crown since Fenouillet was in Paris at the time.117 The bishop of Geneva probably hoped that Fenouillet, as a French bishop, would have more influence with the crown than a Savoyard one. The fact that the cathedral canons resided in Savoy and the benefice was in France complicated the matter, but the canons had played a vital role in the mission in Gex, being the first priests back into the area. Perhaps this small benefice was a reward for their work in Gex. Fenouillet was successful  “j’ay une trop grande aversion au tracas des choses d’Estat.” F. de Sales to Duke CharlesEmmanuel, 12 June 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:66–68. 115  Claperède, Histoire des Eglises Réformées, 64–65; and Brossard, Histoire politique et religieuse, 374–81. 116  “Mais plus souvent, c’est l’usurpation des biens du clergé et des revenus ecclésiastiques qui est cause de l’interruption du culte catholique et du service paroissial.” Venard, “L’Église catholique bénéficiaire de l’édit de Nantes,” 291. 117  F. de Sales to Pierre Fenouillet, bishop of Montpellier, 15 June 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:69–70. 114

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in obtaining the authorization from the crown for the union of the benefice to the cathedral canons on 6 July 1611.118 In this case, nationality and boundary problems were negotiated successfully. The confessional dispute continued as negotiations between the two camps became almost institutionalized. In 1611 Marie de Médicis, as regent for her young son, Louis XIII, appointed two new commissioners, one Protestant and one Catholic, to hear complaints of the regions concerning the execution of the Edict of Nantes.119 Both confessions had representatives in place to present their interests to the various governing bodies. De Sales again returned to Gex at the request of the ecclesiastics in residence there and on his arrival reported to Jeanne de Chantal that he had seen a “poor errant flock.”120 The trip to Gex was necessary to combat the Huguenots’ claim that the Edict of Nantes was not being properly carried out in the region. This accusation periodically emerges, as it did again in 1637 at the national synod of the French Reformed Church.121 In 1611, a Capuchin represented the diocese’s interest before the commission concerning property in Gex, and to the bishop’s disappointment, the commissioners decided to leave some property in the hands of the Protestants.122 The queen’s representatives tried to preserve some balance in the region, and both confessions were surely frustrated as the Protestants tried to hold onto power and property they had possessed for over sixty years while the Catholics tried to regain it. Catholics hoped the Queen Mother would be more sympathetic than her late husband to their plight in Gex. The bishop sent a letter to the regent along with a statement from the Catholic people of Gex presenting strategies for reducing the Protestant population and increasing the Catholic one.123 De Sales tried to utilize the regent’s apparent sympathy for the Catholics to bolster a recent convert, Madame SaintCergues, informing her that the Queen Mother had written him to say

 de Sales, Œuvres, 15:70n6.  Ibid., 15:127–28n1. 120  F. de Sales to Marquis de Lans, 28 November 1611, and F. de Sales to Jeanne de Chantal, 11 December 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:124–26. 121  Aymon, Tous les synodes nationaux, 1:596–99. 122  F. de Sales to the Marquis de Lans, 13 December 1611, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:127–30. Notes say that the Capuchin was probably P. Genand, also called François de Chambéry. 123  F. de Sales to the Queen Mother Marie de Médicis, 12 February 1612, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:166–67. In the letter, the statement from the Catholic people is referred to as “un cahier animé.” 118 119

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she “will give back all our churches and all our benefices of Gex occupied by the ministers.”124 Bishop de Sales had made steady progress in obtaining buildings; in August 1612, he informed the Marquis de Lans that the diocese had received back all the churches that had been held by Protestant ministers except for the ones in the custody of Geneva, which expressed shock that it was expected to turn over goods the city had held for France. He forwarded this information concerning Geneva’s refusal onto the royal council of France.125 De Sales offered letters of thanks to Marie de Médicis and the Duke of Bellegarde for their support of Catholicism in Gex.126 To the duke, de Sales further proclaimed that the king had given his authorization “for the execution of the Edict of Nantes in Gex,” continuing to assert his right to reestablish parishes in the region under the edict.127 De Sales acknowledged to Bellegarde that “heresy” remained a problem in Gex, but the Catholics of the region were hopeful that progress would be made. The letter to Bellegarde contained a profession of loyalty to France, claiming that the Catholics of Gex “are so happy to be under your government.”128 This of course was not what the bishop told the Duke of Savoy, but since his diocese had been divided between two kingdoms, de Sales had to split his allegiance. Shortages of funds continued to plague both confessions in Gex with each grappling for limited resources. Because the Huguenots lost their churches in Gex, the government ruled that they could keep threefourths of the ecclesiastical revenue for a year to help them build new places of worship.129 De Sales voiced frustration to the bishop of Dol over his inability to obtain the goods from the ministers, claiming that both the regular and secular clergy in Gex were currently in “holy uselessness” but would be rewarded for their work in the afterlife.130 The 124  “rendra toutes nos eglises et tous nos benefices de Gex occupés par les ministres.” F. de Sales to Madame de Saint-Cergues, 26 February 1612, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:171–72. Jeanne de Cartal had left her husband for the Reformed faith and moved to Geneva. She returned to Catholicism in early 1611 under the guidance of de Sales after twenty-four years as a Protestant. See foreword in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:vii. 125  F. de Sales to the Marquis de Lans, 2 August 1612, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:254. 126  F. de Sales to the Queen Mother Marie de Médicis, beginning of August 1612, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:255. 127  F. de Sales to the Duke de Bellegarde, 10 November 1612, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:293. 128  Ibid., 15:293–95. 129  de Sales, Œuvres, 16:49n1. 130  F. de Sales to Monseigneur Antoine de Revol, bishop of Dol, 12 September 1613, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:69–70.

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Reformed churches of Gex found little support for their financial plight from their brethren of Burgundy. When a proposal at the national synod of 1612 suggested distributing extra money to the impoverished churches of Gex because of the recent seizure of their buildings by the Catholics, the other colloquies of Burgundy complained that the move would take precious resources from other needy churches.131 Despite the challenges to their faith, the Protestants of Gex appear to have remained firm in their faith and maintained their churches and communities. De Sales wrote of the Protestants, who continued to ignore his Catholic message, “But it is a marvel as these serpents stop their ears so they will not hear the voice of the charmer.”132 Despite his claims of the clergy’s uselessness, de Sales took steps to reestablish religious houses in Gex as an important step towards placing Catholicism back in the center of the communities. De Sales commenced trying to restore a Carmelite monastery that had been pushed out of Gex by the Bernese in 1536, a portion of which had been turned into a cabaret.133 The bishop first approached the idea with Henri IV and received positive news from the Baron de Lux in March 1607 that the king was willing to allow the reformed Carmelites into Gex.134 De Sales soon asked the French Cardinal de Givry to send a mission of the order to Gex since the king had agreed to the move, and it would benefit the region.135 This mission never arrived and as of 1612, de Sales had made little headway concerning the Carmelites. He wrote Marie de Médicis that the people of Gex would like to see the restoration of the monastery; he said the move would have a positive impact on the region by helping increase the Catholic faith there.136 Yet after a decade of negotiations when the return of the Carmelites was close to fruition the Bishop appeared to lose some of his enthusiasm. De Sales wrote to King Louis XIII in 1618 that he hoped over time that the monastery would be able to reclaim its property but that it should be done “little by little” so no  Aymon, Tous les synodes nationaux, 1:431, 439.  “car c’est marveille comme ces serpens bouchent leurs oreilles pour n’ouyr point la voix du charmeur.” F. de Sales to bishop of Dol, 12 September 1613, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:69–70. 133  Brossard, Histoire politique et religieuse, 279. 134  Baron de Lux to F. de Sales, 18 March 1607, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:385–86. 135  F. de Sales to Cardinal Anne de Péusse d’Escars de Givry, 6 August 1607, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:382–83. 136  F. de Sales to the Queen Mother Marie de Médicis, ca. 1612, in de Sales, Œuvres, 15:316–17. 131 132

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one would be inconvenienced. The “no one” in this case was the Diocese of Geneva as the Carmelites’ financial demands were the source of de Sales’s waning interest in bringing the order back. He informed the young king that the diocese would not be able to provide the 300 livres the Carmelites had requested because all the available money was needed for the parish churches. Despite his general support of religious orders, Bishop de Sales had to put the needs of the secular clergy first since they were central to pastoral duties. De Sales even went so far as to say another religious order such as the French Congregation of the Oratory might be better suited for the monastery and the region.137 After all, a congregation of the oratory would have made available more preachers, something de Sales desperately needed. Perhaps the oratory was also more frugal or could supply its own funds. Despite the late-stage reservations by the bishop, the Carmelites reentered Gex on 30 July 1618.138 In 1614, King Louis XIII made a public gesture of support for the Catholic Church in Gex by providing alms of 300 écus. François de Sales thanked the king and told him that the money would be used for the “extremely miserable” church “at the end of the kingdom.”139 According to Brossard, Louis XIII was more likely than his father to grant the wishes of François de Sales.140 Yet support for Catholicism remained uneven, and the Protestant populations continued to assert their rights. Bishop de Sales voiced his anger to Baron du Villars, a royal official for Gex, over the possibility of Protestant clergy representing the First Estate at the assembly of the regional Estates General. De Sales asserted that “the Huguenots” were not part of the clergy and it was offensive that Protestant preachers would represent “the sacred thing that it signifies.”141 Protestants viewed themselves as members of the community and were not going to give up their position in society without a fight. Examining the Estates General of 1614, J. Michael Hayden found widespread perceptions at the time that numerous Huguenot deputies represented the Second and Third Estates, and he was able to 137  F. de Sales to King Louis XIII of France, 21 January 1618, in de Sales, Œuvres, 18:153–55. The French Congregation of the Oratory, established by Cardinal Pierre de Bérulle in 1611, followed the model of St. Philip Neri. 138  de Sales, Œuvres, 18:155n1. 139  F. de Sales to King Louis XIII of France, 1614, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:176–77. 140  Brossard, Histoire politique et religieuse, 381. 141  F. de Sales to Baron François du Villars, 1 August 1614, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:195–96.

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identify nine Huguenots in the Second Estate. The representative from Gex for the First Estate ended up being Maximian de Molins, superior Capuchin of the mission of Gex, someone who most likely met with de Sales’s approval.142 The bishop’s concern that Protestants would represent the First Estate at the national level was unfounded, as the Catholic clergy ended up putting forth a rather united front at the meeting of the Estates General when it tried unsuccessfully to convince the other two estates to pass decrees for the reception of the Council of Trent in France.143 While the case of Gex proves that Catholic clergy could bicker and fight over scarce resources, when it came to major issues like the decrees from Trent, members could put their differences aside. The long struggle in Gex took its toll on the parish priests and problems arose within the Catholic clergy. A priest in the Pays de Gex certainly faced a difficult and uncertain task with the chronic shortage of funds and an unresponsive population. Not surprisingly, it appears to have been difficult to attract good-quality clergy to the region, and the priests of Gex appeared unable or unwilling to police themselves. Bishop de Sales wrote to the curé of Gex, Étienne Dunant, asking him to tell the clergy “to remove promptly the women that they have in their houses.”144 De Sales had already confronted one of the offenders, Claude Jacquin, treasurer of Gex, who had assured the bishop that he had remedied the situation, but from the correspondence, it does not appear that Père Jacquin had solved the problem. Some of the priests even had the audacity to claim the right to have a female housemate under Gallican liberties. The bishop’s response was unequivocal here, stating that the French church was part of the universal church and thus the priest could not claim a privilege that was so contrary to the principles of the Catholic Church.145 While both ecclesiastical and political Gallicanism existed, neither one supported this misuse of Gallican ideals in a feeble attempt by lax clergy to justify universally unacceptable behavior.146 As  Hayden, France and the Estates General of 1614, 78–79, 239.  Ibid., 156–58. 144  “retirer promptement les femmes quilz ont peut estre en leurs maysons.” F. de Sales to Étienne Dunant, curé of Gex, 11 May 1617, in de Sales, Œuvres, 18:1–3. 145  F. de Sales to Étienne Dunant, curé of Gex, 11 May 1617, in de Sales, Œuvres, 18:1–3. 146  Salmon, “Gallicanism and Anglicanism,” 156–57. Salmon defines ecclesiastical Gallicanism as “the independence of the French Catholic church from king as well as pope,” while political Gallicanism was “an alliance of church and crown to limit papal authority.” 142 143

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Tallon points out, despite the French crown’s ultimate decision not to embrace Trent, “The themes of the Council, from church reform, to the reunion of Christians, were not hollow words for the French of the time or for their king.” De Sales vowed that he would establish ecclesiastical discipline in Gex and would enforce the order dating back to the Council of Nice that only female family members such as a mother, aunt, and sister could live with a priest. For the priests of Gex, keeping unsuitable female housekeepers was not their only lapse in conduct; they were also not in compliance with the synodal statutes concerning the distribution of holy oil. De Sales realized that the local clergy left in charge were not reforming from within and needed outside help, informing Père Dunant that he was sending a Capuchin from Chambéry to help implement the bishop’s orders.147 De Sales again turned to the religious orders he had counted on many times in the past when he needed members of the clergy who held similar views of reform and pastoral duties. Failings within the Catholic clergy of Gex just added to the complications. In June 1617, the bishop informed his close friend Antoine Favre that he was leaving for La Roche, Thonon, and Gex to oversee the affairs in these towns.148 François de Sales continued to take a hands-on approach to the more complicated issues of the diocese. Without adequate funds or followers to support the parishes, questions arose over the diocese’s grand plan for Gex. Etienne Dunant, the curé of Gex, in his report to the bishop in October 1618, questioned the wisdom of continuing to reestablish Catholic parishes in towns where there was little support among the population. In order to conserve scarce funds, the curé suggested that rather than attempting to reestablish all the parishes in Gex, the diocese should focus on the towns that had requested a priest. Dunant also wanted to pool all the revenues assigned to the Pays de Gex and distribute them to the parishes according to need, focusing on paying the curés, servicing the debt, and making repairs. Perhaps the inequality of salaries had led to conflict among the priests and being on the ground in Gex, Dunant saw the interpersonal problems firsthand. According to Dunant, the Catholics of Versoix  F. de Sales to Étienne Dunant, curé of Gex, 11 May 1617, in de Sales, Œuvres, 18:1–3. The priest’s name was spelled Jacquin or Jacquier. “Les thèmes du concile, de la réforme de l’Église, de la réunion des chrétiens ne sont pas des mots creux pour un Français de l’époque, ni pour son roi.” Tallon, La France et Le Concile de Trente, 2. 148  F. de Sales to Antoine Favre, 21 June 1617, in de Sales, Œuvres, 18:21–24. 147

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“complained greatly” that a priest named Gobet held no services. In his defense, Gobet claimed he had no income, no place to live, and no place to hold services. Dunant had tried to remedy the situation himself, instructing Gobet to hold services in the nearby church of Souvernier so that “he could console all the good Catholics from parts beyond.” Dunant also revealed his own conflict with another priest: Dunant claimed that a Monsieur Paris had lived for free with him and used his garden, but now refused to return Dunant’s keys and the robes worn by the children during mass. Dunant does not say why Paris had taken the robes, but it was most likely to sell them. These petty squabbles reveal that the priests battled each other as they failed to make much progress among the local populations. Dunant provided a very revealing account about the curé from Divonne who had never been able to hold services in his assigned parish because the people there would not permit it; they had even attacked him on the road and tried to kill him.149 Larissa Taylor calls preaching a “dangerous vocation,” showing that sermons could encourage and provoke violence against others and against the preachers themselves.150 The injured priest from Divonne had not pursued the incident with the authorities because he believed that the legal system in Gex was too difficult and slow.151 Divonne continued to have an active Reformed population that could make one lone priest feel quite unwelcome. For a Catholic parish to function, it needed the spiritual and financial support of its laity; with the towns of Gex offering neither, the curés lacked any clear purpose for being there. Bishop de Sales does not appear to have been overly sympathetic to the difficulties faced by the priests of Gex and voiced his displeasure over the problems of the clergy in Gex to Gérard de Tournon, a Capuchin. De Sales claimed the priests of the Pays de Gex suffered from a “great breach of gentleness,” and he did not understand why they could not “moderate their passions.” De Sales himself had faced hostile Protestants during the early days of the mission in the Chablais, and he may have felt if he could endure it, so could the priests in Gex. In the end, the bishop recognized the untenable position of Etienne Dunant, telling 149  M. Etienne Dunant, curé of Gex, to F. de Sales, 13 October 1618, in de Sales, Œuvres, 18:426–29. 150  Taylor, “Dangerous Vocations,” 91–92. 151  M. Etienne Dunant, curé of Gex, to F. de Sales, 13 October 1618, in de Sales, Œuvres, 18: 426–29. Dunant questions de Sales’s desire to establish a church in the town of Sacconex.

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him not to take any action against the priests Jacquin and Paris until de Sales’s planned visit to Gex after Easter. The bishop had not given up on finding a suitable parish for Jacquin. He hoped to place the priest soon in Grilly, a goal that came to fruition 16 February 1619.152 François de Sales appeared resolved to push on in Gex despite the reservations of men like Dunant who had to cope with the problems on a day-to-day basis. The bishop asked the Capuchin Gérard for his input on parish and personnel matters for Gex, and claimed he still aspired to resolve the conflict among the three priests. The bishop was enormously frustrated, referring to the state of Gex as a place of “all our imbecility and misery,” but claimed he had to continue to practice patience.153 Yet patience was not enough for de Sales even to begin to reach his goals in Gex as the populations remained primarily Protestant and openly resistant to the Catholic efforts. The ultimate aim of the Edict of Nantes may have been to reintroduce Catholicism throughout France, but in the corner that contained Gex, the lack of funds and followers made the goal a very long-term one. The ministers of Gex faced their own difficulties but appear to have remained more united in their faith and weathered the difficulties better than their Catholic rivals. There was continuity in tenure of office, with the same families holding pastor positions for several generations.154 The marginal nature and relative isolation of the Protestants of Gex may have increased their sense of belonging to the local community. Religious faith needs a group of believers to thrive, and by maintaining a united community, the Protestants were able to continue. At the same time, the Catholics failed to win many converts, making it impossible to create a critical mass of clergy or laity. With so little support or progress made, members of the Catholic clergy devolved into squabbles among themselves over money and material goods. The Reformed churches in Gex also maintained their ties across national boundaries with Geneva, which had sustained the preachers through their transition to French nationality and membership in the French Reformed Church. Furthermore, both Geneva and Berne maintained economic and political interests in Gex. 152  F. de Sales to Père Gérard de Tournon, Capuchin, end of 1618 or beginning of 1619, in de Sales, Œuvres, 18:328–30, 329n1. 153  Ibid., 18:329–30. 154  Aymon, Tous les synodes nationaux, 1:293, 2:232, 325; and Claperède, Histoire des Eglises Réformées, 341–45.

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As of 1630, the parlement of Burgundy was still issuing arrêts condemning inhabitants of Berne who refused to hand over ecclesiastical goods they held in Gex.155 Meanwhile, Catholic officials could not gain a foothold in the villages. The parish of Gex, toured by Charles-Auguste de Sales in 1647, was the only one visited in the Pays de Gex by a Catholic official between the last general visit of the diocese before the arrival of reformers in 1516 through 1518, and 1663.156 Bishop Jean d’Arenthon d’Alex visited the Catholic parishes of the Pays de Gex in 1663, only after Louis XIV declared in a royal edict on 22 August 1662 that the Edict of Nantes had no bearing on Gex since it had become part of France after Nantes’s execution. The king allowed the Protestants to worship in the villages of Sergy and Fernex, but ordered the rest of their churches to be pulled down.157 Gex Protestants saw increased aggression from the crown in the 1660s and Bishop d’Arenthon appeared to have the ear of the king.158 Arenthon’s actions illustrate what Frederic J. Baumgartner observes, that Catholic clergy never embraced toleration of Protestants and “worked almost as diligently to prevent the edict from being effective as it had to prevent it from being enacted.”159 Arenthon was the first Savoyard bishop of Geneva to succeed in establishing closer ties with the French crown. This burgeoning relationship between bishop and king corresponds to Farr’s suggestion that the confessionalization thesis works better for France if the period includes the revocation of the Edict of Nantes when there existed “a relatively consistent state policy of catholicization.”160 Yet even the revocation of the Edict of Nantes does not appear to have prevented the Protestants of Gex from continuing their worship and continuing their ties to Geneva. An anonymous memoir written as a guide for Catholic clergy sometime after the revocation complained of secret Protestants in Gex who continued to attend Reformed services in nearby towns, who sent their children to school in Geneva, and who failed to observe Lent.

 ADCO, B12235: Registre des Arrêts Définitifs, 1630–1631, fols. 28, 42–43, 46, 163.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:127–53, table of pastoral visits made in each of the parishes of the Diocese of Geneva. 157  Brossard, Histoire Politique et Religieuse, 397–98. Jean d’Arenthon d’Alex was bishop from 1661 to 1695. 158  Coutin, “Journal de Mgr. Jean d’Arenthon.” In 1663, Arenthon launched a royal mission into the Protestant villages of Gex. 159  Baumgartner, “Catholic Opposition to the Edict of Nantes,” 534. 160  Farr, “Confessionalism and Social Discipline in France,” 291. 155 156

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These Protestants also prevented their servants from attending Catholic services and frequented taverns during mass. The author even questioned their loyalty to the king and claimed that some of them should be viewed “not only as enemies of religion but also enemies of state.”161 Farr reminds us that “the Huguenot experience in France forces us to explain how confessional organization and confessional identity can emerge and develop in the absence, and even when facing the hostility, of the state or its agents.”162 These accusations demonstrate the very weak state of Catholicism that was forcefully imposed upon the populations of Gex despite the united efforts of church and state by the 1660s. When Bishop Jean-Pierre Biord visited the thirty-three parishes of Gex in the 1760s, twenty-two of them still had no confraternity.163 The inhabitants of Gex may have been nominally and publicly members of the Catholic Church after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, but they never embraced its institutions, rituals, or its confessional identity. By taking a glimpse into the political labyrinth diocesan officials navigated, as they tried to insert a reinvigorated Catholicism into the Reformed portion of the diocese, we are reminded of the ofteninseparable characters of religion and politics during the early modern period. But interconnected did not always mean cooperating. Even the participants did not have a clear understanding of the often-confusing channels of power and influence. The conflicts and complexities of state often imposed themselves on the ecclesiastics, and while men like François de Sales viewed themselves solely as men of the church, they rarely refused secular intervention if it would help their causes, and complained of state interference only when it hindered their agendas. Additionally de Sales willingly utilized various channels of both church and state simultaneously in his efforts to implement Tridentine programs in all parts of his diocese. In the duchy of Chablais, with the essential if inconsistent assistance of the Duke of Savoy, the Catholic mission reduced the Protestant population to a small minority. On the other hand, after spending the first two decades of the seventeenth century reestablishing the mass in the villages of the Pays de Gex, the 161  “non seulement comme les ennemis de la religion mais encore de l’etat.” ADCO, B1280: no 44 Mémoire touchant le miserable Etat de la Religion Chretienne au Pais de Gex à cause des abus, et scandales cause par les Heritiques. 162  Farr, “Confessionalism and Social Discipline in France,” 291. 163  Devos, “Chapelles,” 85.

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bishops saw little success. At the end of François de Sales’s life, the two mission projects that had consumed so much of his time and energy were at very different places. With the toleration outlined in the Edict of Nantes, the continued support of Geneva, and the recognition by the French crown and parlement, the villages of Gex remained primarily Protestant and openly resistant to the Catholic efforts. There is little evidence that Catholicism ever took hold in the Pays de Gex. Catholic missionaries in Chablais were able to use the baroque communal processions and celebrations to highlight and differentiate their faith from those of their Protestant adversaries, but in Gex the tenuous peace held together by the Edict of Nantes prevented Catholic clergy from demonstrating its faith in public forums and surely contributed to the failure of Catholicism there. Furthermore, the Catholic priests were worn down by their daily, material struggles, despite the unrelenting efforts of François de Sales, who did not have to deal with the daily disappointment and conflict like his parish priests. The very different outcome within two areas of the same diocese demonstrates how the local context of the Reformation is crucial to understanding the reform process in particular times, places, and under varying circumstances. Before wars and the Reformation, the duchy of Chablais and the Pays de Gex had both been part of the same country, confession, and diocese. Because of the very different political, financial, and religious situations that emerged, the processes of religious conquest, reform, and renewal were dramatically different in the two places.

5

Cleaning Houses Reform of the Clergy

D

uring the Catholic reform movement of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, members of both the regular and secular clergy faced increased scrutiny of their education, behavior, and suitability for a religious life. The three bishops serving the Diocese of Geneva during this time took to heart the mandates of the Council of Trent that called for a better-trained and more devout clergy, and they were committed to pastoral care. All three men took important steps toward improving the quality of the clergy under their supervision despite resistance from both lay and clerical camps, lack of resources, and a tumultuous political environment. The case of this diocese reveals the complexity of clerical reform and the difficulty of bringing about substantive change to long-standing practices and institutions.

The Parish Priest

No one held a more central role in the early modern village than the parish priest. He was present for most of the important events of the community, including baptisms, marriages, deaths, and feast days. In the Catholic belief system, the priest served as mediator of the sacred between God and man. The villagers’ direct link to salvation was not the pope or the bishop, but the local priest. In addition to being mediator between God and his faithful, the parish priest also acted as the bridge between diocese and village. He was the diocese’s primary conveyor of official doctrine and was expected to be the bishop’s eyes and ears in the parish. At no time was the priest’s role more important than in the period after the Reformation. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, all denominations were pushing toward more standardization 138

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of beliefs and practices; within the Catholic Church, the parish priest found himself at the center of a transformation of village religious life.1 The priest was expected to reform the existing parish practices to fit in with the new Tridentine Catholicism, and because of the increased pastoral burden placed upon them, his performance was more closely scrutinized than ever before. A curé’s job performance had long been the object of reproach and even ridicule, and Rome had been aware of problems within the priesthood for centuries. During the Middle Ages, critics of the church singled out for special criticism the parish priest who did not know Latin, broke the vow of celibacy, or neglected to perform the sacraments due to absence or incompetence. The Fourth Lateran Council, held in 1215, had placed the burden of salvation of the laity squarely on the shoulders of the priests. Thus church leaders recognized that the lower clergy needed a minimum level of education.2 From the thirteenth century onwards, there were attempts, at least in some dioceses, to build a competent clergy through training at annual synods and the statutes issued there. There were also preaching manuals printed that used mnemonics to aid the priests in memorizing ritual that accompanied the sacraments.3 After the Council of Trent, there was a proliferation of these manuals since the decrees from the council did not include specific guidelines for creating sermons and preaching.4 The Diocese of Geneva apparently created a manual for its parish priests to guide them in their duties.5 While it is difficult to measure what the priest came to know as a result of this educational effort, the few surviving wills reveal that most priests possessed few books and only inexpensive ones.6 Certainly on the eve of the Reformation, many local curés relied on a limited knowledge of ritual learned in an apprentice relationship with another priest. The Council of Trent called for better-educated and more qualified priests, as they would be the main agents of reform and renewal within 1  Comerford, Reforming Priests and Parishes, xv; and Greenshields, “Introduction to the Pastoral Visit Project,” 52. 2  Le Mâitre, “Les livres et la formation du clergé,” 122. 3  Ibid., 118–20. 4  Norman, Social History of Preaching, 138. 5  A number of the transcripts for the parish visits mention that the priest needed to obtain the manual of the practices of Trent. 6  Le Mâitre, “Les livres et la formation du clergé,” 124.

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the confines of a Catholic parish. The framers of Trent acknowledged that some priests failed to perform their duties for a variety of reasons including illiteracy or poor training for their positions due to lack of access to education. The reformers at Trent to a certain extent viewed this group as blameless, and proclaimed that a priest who was ignorant was to receive instruction and even be assigned a curate during the educational process. A priest who led a “disgraceful and scandalous life,” however, was to be dealt with more harshly. If this priest did not change his ways, he could be denied his benefice.7 The clerical leaders at Trent recognized that while some curés could be turned into adequate shepherds of their flock, others who had taken priestly vows were just not suited for their profession. Through proper education and oversight, Catholic leaders hoped to create a body of clergy who would not only perform the sacraments, but whose conduct would be an example to all Christians. Like bishops and other members of the clergy assigned to a specific domain, a priest was not to leave his parish without just cause and written permission from a superior. Even with a good reason such as continuing education, a curé was not to be absent from his parish longer than two months.8 In being a daily example to his parishioners, a priest was expected to conduct himself very modestly, dressing appropriately, avoiding gambling and taverns, abstaining from luxury, and observing all sacraments and ceremonies. Venard finds that there was more focus on how priests lived and behaved, and greater emphasis on the appearance of living in an honorable manner, which included their houses.9 The Council of Trent demanded that his outward actions “inspire reverence” in his flock.10 A parish priest was to be a constant and ever-present reminder of how a faithful Catholic behaved. The reformers from Trent believed like those who had broken away from the Catholic Church that people were more likely to listen to someone they viewed as moral and worthy of respect. While scholars may still debate the exact changes that occurred within the Catholic villages, whatever did take place, the priest was at the center. A. G. Dickens asserts that “parish priests and preachers, normally  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 21st sess., chap. 6 (pp. 139–40).  Ibid., 23rd sess., chap. 1 (pp. 164–66). 9  Venard, Réforme protestante, réforme catholique, 656–57. 10  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 22nd sess., chap. 1 (pp. 152–53). 7 8

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though not universally religious conservatives, remained the regular channels through which ideas reached rural society.” Malcolm Greenshields sees the role of local priests as “central to discussions of popular and elite culture and religion.”11 The early modern priest had the dual tasks of serving both the Catholic hierarchy’s desire for reform and his parishioners’ spiritual wants and needs, which were at times very different. Does this mean that reforms issued from Rome, whether popular with the laity or not, were imposed on the parishes by the bishops and their agents, the parish priests? Philip Hoffman concludes that because the local curé was the primary agent of reform at the parish level, the Counter-Reformation transformed the relationship between parish and priest from members of the same community, to a leader apart from his flock.12 Yet in Germany, Marc Forster finds that the reform of the parishioners was left to the local priest, who normally was not willing to repress popular practices and alienate those with whom he had to live.13 The Diocese of Geneva offers another venue to explore where the priest fit in a post-Tridentine parish. If the priest was the primary enforcer of new religious practices and the suppressor of old ones, then historians need to further explore exactly how he accomplished this daunting task. To understand more fully where the parish priest fits into this changing milieu of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, it is important to understand his interaction with his superiors and his parishioners and how both perceived him. Social psychologist Jean-Pierre Deconchy points out that parishioners recognize a Catholic priest, because of his status in the hierarchy of the church, as an embodiment of orthodoxy, and this recognition of a priest’s power and status allows him a wide range of actions within the orthodox system, even if some people might view these actions as “marginal or audacious.”14 A closer examination of communal religious practices encouraged or allowed by early modern priests may reveal a greater diversity than previously found in other studies.

 Dickens, Counter Reformation, 190; and Greenshields, “Introduction to the Pastoral Visit Project,” 52. 12  Hoffman, Church and Community, 72, 87, 96, 129. 13  Forster, Counter-Reformation in the Villages, 38, 58–59, 78, 96, 116. 14  Deconchy, “Rationality and Social Control in Orthodox Systems,” 430. 11

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Because of its poverty, the Diocese of Geneva was not able to fulfill Trent’s goal of establishing a seminary in the diocese until 1663.15 Geneva was not alone in the struggle to find funds to provide formal training for its clergy; Kathleen Comerford found that the dioceses of Tuscany were not very successful in providing seminary education to their priests but still offered “a number of alternative paths to the priesthood.”16 But as the priest was on the front line of Catholicism, his competence was a primary concern for reform-minded bishops. Thus, the primary ways priests received instruction during the years under investigation for this study were through individual tutoring and the annual diocesan synods held to discuss the state of the parishes and the priests’ duties there. Annual synods commenced in the diocese during the episcopate of Claude de Granier and his successors continued the practice.17 At these synods, diocesan officials issued statutes and constitutions concerning such matters as which festivals were to be celebrated in the parishes, new devotions to be introduced, and, of course, proper conduct of the priests. The date of the synod was announced several months in advance and all clergy of the diocese, both secular and regular, were expected to attend. The meeting opened with great fanfare that included a mass celebrated by the bishop, musicians, and a general procession of the clergy. With the formalities completed, the roll was called and those absent were issued an act of default. Next, clergy were appointed as examiners and regional visitors to observe curés in their home parishes. These peer priests were supposed to visit parishes under their jurisdiction twice a year and make any necessary corrections in the local curé’s conduct. This was the process Charles-Auguste de Sales described when his uncle, François de Sales, was bishop, but there is little evidence on how vigorously these procedures were followed.18 Bishop Jean d’Arenthon d’Alex compiled and published synodal constitutions and institutions for the diocese in 1695 based on those established by de Sales.19  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 23rd sess., chap. 28 (pp. 175–79) addressed the establishment and maintenance of seminaries. 16  Comerford, Reforming Priests and Parishes, xvi. 17  “An Account of the State of the Diocese of Geneva,” sent to Pope Paul V, November 1606, in de Sales, Œuvres, 23:315. In the report, de Sales mentioned that Claude de Granier began the practice of annual synods. Diocese registers show annual synods during the tenure of François de Sales. 18  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:364–68. 19  D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales. 15

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If a priest lacked skills deemed necessary to fulfill his duties to the parish, he might be sent away for further training or education. In a 1614 letter to the Baron of Cusy, Bishop de Sales justified the absence of the curé from the village, claiming the parishioners were better off without him until he received more training. De Sales sent a curate to the parish until the curé could complete his training and return.20 For the most part, it was not feasible to send all parish priests off for training, and most likely only those in dire need of further education were actually taken out of their parish. Through this makeshift process of an often-informal education, annual synods, and peer review, the diocese built a body of reasonably competent clergy. According to one of his biographers, François de Sales administered rigorous examinations for those who wished to enter the priesthood, and during his tenure as bishop, he ordained close to nine hundred priests.21 But diocesan leaders still needed to see a curé at work in his own parish church to obtain an accurate picture of the state of the clergy. Ecclesiastical visitations offer a picture of the parish priest and his role in the local religious environment because during the visitation process the priest interacted with the diocesan officials, local elites, regular clergy, and the rest of the parishioners. He entered into a dialogue with people possessing diverse goals and backgrounds. Strauss sees the main purpose of parish visits to be general reform, but the visits could also be used to solve conflicts between individuals in the community and general behavioral problems.22 Visitation records have the potential to help the historian understand where the parish priest stood in this dialogue about religious practice and devotion. The visitor arrived in a parish with certain goals in mind concerning the parish priest and possessed a series of specific questions and instructions handed down by the bishop himself. Recognizing that the curé was a vital part of the parish, visitors closely scrutinized the curé for any signs of failure to perform his duties, and for any moral or spiritual failings.23 After all, it was the curé’s parish, and he held the salvation of his flock in his hands. He was also the one person in the parish over whom the bishop possessed direct power; diocesan officials could punish  F. de Sales to the Baron Jean-Bérold of Cusy, 8 August 1614, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:202–3.  Ravier, Francis de Sales, 129–31, 239. 22  Strauss, Luther’s House of Learning, 255. 23  Forster, Counter-Reformation in the Villages, 78; and Luria, Territories of Grace, 56. 20 21

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an errant priest in a number of ways, including fines, deprivation of benefices, and even excommunication. The visitor surely had preconceived ideas of what qualities “le bon curé” should possess. A parish priest was to be competent in his abilities to perform all his duties, including Sunday mass, baptism, confession, feast days, catechism classes, and any other necessary ceremonies. He was also expected to introduce new devotional practices to his flock. He must make sure that the church was kept repaired and clean and had all the necessary accessories to perform the services. He was to live a celibate and reserved life absent of excessive drinking, cursing, or gambling. As a pious and holy man, he was to be an example and disciplinarian to his flock, and was to keep them on the right path towards salvation and away from the dangers of superstition or, worse, heresy. In turn, the parishioners turned to him during their times of need. According to the manual of Louis Pinelle, bishop of Meaux, from the diocesan synod of 1511, “le bon curé” should have a copy of the synodal statutes, Jean Gerson’s Opus Tripartitum from which he read a passage on Sunday, and the diocese manual. He should know the normal prayers in French, inquire into the faith of his parishioners, and should welcome authorized preachers and refuse those who were not.24 The evidence obtained from the visits of the Diocese of Geneva shows that most curés fell short of this model, and their activities within the village often went well beyond their spiritual duties. Certain curés did a better job fulfilling their duties and were praised in the visitation reports for it.25 In addition, the diocesan representative hoped the curé would inform on his flock and the parishioners on their priest. From this process, the visitor could find and correct problems, solve conflicts, and punish where necessary. Ultimately he wanted to make the parish a fitting place for the worship of God. When the visitor found the curé not fulfilling all his duties, he was given an official order—an injunction—by the bishop to improve or alter his performance. The most frequent injunctions addressed improper decoration of the church and the failure to teach the catechism. Failure to fulfill these types of injunctions rarely led to more serious punishments. The majority of the curés did not implement  Cited in Le Mâitre, “Les livres et la formation du clergé,” 120–21.  Strauss also found commendations for good preachers in the visitation records of German Protestants; Luther’s House of Learning, 265. 24 25

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the catechism after repeated injunctions and diocesan officials took no other actions during the period under study.26 Two of the most serious offenses were failure to live in the parish and failure to celebrate the mass, and they always brought a threat of punishment from the visitor. The fundamental duty of any curé was to perform the sacraments; without regular services, the entire village was lost to Catholicism. Claude de Granier’s visitation accounts from the 1580s were the first of the diocese that included a list of services required of the curés or rectors.27 Successive visitors explored with increasing scrutiny the duties of the parish priest. In La Balme de Thuy, the rector was enjoined “to make residence hereafter in his parish on pain of five livres and excommunication.”28 After his visit of 1624, Bishop Jean-François de Sales ordered the curés of Thollon and Chevenoz to live in their parishes or be denied their benefices. The curé of Chevenoz seemed to have been in serious trouble; he was also ordered to appear at the next synod or face an “arbitrary penalty.”29 In 1607, François de Sales enjoined Jean d’Arenthon, the rector of the chapel dedicated to St. Magdalene in the parish of Alex, to renovate, inventory, and conduct services in the chapel on pain of ten livres and excommunication.30 Memet Favre, rector of the Chapel of the Holy Spirit in the parish of St. Jean de Sixt, was also ordered to perform his duties or risk a fine of five livres and excommunication.31 Residing in the village and performing the sacraments were the most basic duties of a priest and failure to fulfill these duties put the entire parish at risk spiritually. Many of the visitation accounts provide a description of the priest’s duties listed under “charges of the curé.” For example, in the account of the visit made by Jean-François de Sales to the parish of Cons-SaintsColombe in August 1626, the priest was expected to say High Mass on Sundays and feast days, hold matins and vespers on solemn days, have

 For a fuller discussion of the catechism, see chapter 6.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:98. 28  “sera residence, par cy apres, en sa cure, a peyne de cinq livres et dexcommunication.” Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:72. 29  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 88 (Thollon) and fol. 98 (Chevenoz). 30  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:24–25. This rector has the same name as the future bishop of the diocese, who wasn’t born until 1620. This Arenthon is most likely a relative. The patron of the chapel was listed as a seigneur of Alex. 31  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:24–25, 560. 26 27

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a Low Mass on Mondays for the dead and on days when there was a vigil, hold a High Mass at vespers on the day of the patron or for the dedication of a new altar, and finally, hold catechism instruction every Sunday.32 The duties almost seem too much for one man, and the visitations reveal disagreements among laity and parish priests over services to be performed. Jean-François de Blonay, in his 1617 visit in Abondance, reported that the parishioners expected their curé, Jean Mocand, with the help of his curate, to say High Mass on Sundays and festival days as well as for burials; however, the curé denied that he was bound to perform all these services.33 In the town of Evian in 1617, the visitor Blonay asked the curé if he preached on Lent and Advent; he replied “no” and told the visitor to ask the syndics of the town why. The visitor obviously listened to the priest, because he requested that the syndics provide a summary of the revenues, charges, and offices of the parish and chapels. In addition, the visitor asked the syndics “to offer their advice on how to proceed in reestablishing [the parish] to its premium state.” While the injunctions for this visit of Evian are lost, it is evident from this exchange that there were problems between lay leaders and parish priest over his duties and salary, and the visitor attempted to get both sides of the dispute. On a followup visit in 1620, the visitor Jean Mocand noted that the curé was doing a good job in administering the services and sacraments “to the great contentment of all the bourgeois nobles of the town.”34 Apparently the various parties had reached some agreement pleasing to all. There is a sense that negotiations often occurred between bishop, priest, and parish as to what sacred rites the priest would conduct and this arbitration varied from village to village. The parishioners expected their priest to observe all holy days celebrated by the community and were not afraid to seek recourse from the bishop or his representative when he failed to do so. Keith Luria noted that even though it had been two hundred years since an extensive visit in the Diocese of Grenoble when Bishop le Camus made his tour, the parishioners did not appear afraid to talk. 35  ADHS, 2MI82 Visites pastorales...1623–1635, fol. 110.  Jean Mocand was the bishop’s visitor during the follow-up visits of 1620; Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:257. 34  “au grand contentement de tous les nobles bourgeois de ladicte ville.” Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:295. 35  Luria, Territories of Grace, 50, 54. 32 33

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No visitation produced complaints that the priest held too many masses. Corrie E. Norman reminds us that “lay people often wanted to accommodate the church because they understood its teachings to be of central importance to their well-being.”36 The parishioners wanted salvation, and they had a sense of what they needed from their curé to achieve it. Most reformers realized that beyond the ritual of the sacraments, the laity needed to be better educated about Catholic orthodoxy, and this knowledge primarily came through sermons given by the clergy. Due to the proximity of the Protestant city of Geneva, preaching was a central concern to the bishops of the Diocese of Geneva. The instructions to the priests handed down by the synods for the Diocese of Geneva stressed the importance of preaching and reminded the priests that they were condemned for the sins committed out of ignorance by people under their care.37 Prior to the Reformation, it was not that common for a bishop to preach even though offering sermons was one of his primary pastoral duties.38 After the Council of Trent, church leaders expected bishops to preach regularly, offering themselves as examples to the priests under their supervision. François de Sales was an advocate of adroit preaching and by all accounts was quite good in the pulpit himself. As bishop, he continued to give sermons regularly and offered advice to other clergy on the art of preaching. Jean-Pierre Camus, bishop of Belley, used de Sales as a model for his own episcopal career.39 In a 1604 letter to André Frémyot, archbishop of Bourges, de Sales revealed his views on preaching and the elements he believed necessary for a good sermon. He wrote that a sermon should always be first and foremost true to scripture, then to the church fathers and councils. While content was central to de Sales, one is struck by how conscious he was of style and keeping the attention of the laity. For example, he found the short and forceful phrases of St. Augustine very useful and easier for the listener to understand than those of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, who he thought ought to be paraphrased into simpler French, if used at

 Norman, “Social History of Preaching,” 174.  D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales, 173. 38  Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, 37. 39  Worcester, Catholic Sermons, 24. De Sales consecrated Camus when he rose to the episcopate of Belley in 1609. They were friends and their dioceses were adjacent to each other. Camus wrote a six-volume biography of de Sales to promote his canonization. 36 37

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all.40 Larissa Taylor observes that “Criticism by Catholic and Protestant reformers about the elaborate medieval style encouraged even the most orthodox to simplify the format of their sermons.”41 De Sales never forgot the importance of the listener and believed that stories should be lively and clear. Examples should be neither too short, so that they fail to explain fully, nor too long, so that they bore the listener. He found excerpts from saints’ lives useful, especially those of the province where one was preaching. When telling any story, de Sales reminded the archbishop not to lose the major point. Sincerity was central to effective preaching: “In a word, speak affectionately and devoutly, simply and candidly, and with confidence.” De Sales asserted that sermons that stressed love and compassion were the most effective, even when preaching to the Huguenots.42 Taylor says that post-Reformation Catholic preachers “described a religion based on sin and atonement that offered the possibility of salvation to everyone willing to do what was in him.”43 While the turn of the seventeenth century saw less fiery rhetoric in sermons, preachers would still preach against the errors of the Protestants.44 Bishop de Sales also offered the archbishop advice on when to prepare a sermon; he found evening best for composing and morning best for reflecting on what one wanted to say.45 He advocated continuing education for all priests whatever their place in the church hierarchy. The synodal statutes stated that curés should continue to study the Bible and moral theology and specifically recommended the works of SS. Gregory the Great, Bernard of Clairvaux, and Thomas Aquinas, as well as sixteenth-century theologians Spanish Jesuit Luis Molina and Dominican Luis de Granada for the instruction of preaching.46 To the archbishop  F. de Sales to Monseigneur André Frémyot, archbishop of Bourges, 5 October 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:311–12. Frémyot was the brother of Jeanne de Chantal. This particular letter is well known and offers a very extensive and detailed guide to creating a post-Tridentine sermon. 41  Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, 70. 42  “En un mot, parler affectionnement et devotement, simplement et candidement et avec confiance.” F. de Sales to Monseigneur André Frémyot, archbishop of Bourges, 5 October 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:313, 321–23. 43  Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, 84. 44  Worcester, Catholic Sermons, 26–27. Worcester found this in the sermons of Camus, and de Sales certainly saw the importance of challenging Protestants in sermons. 45  F. de Sales to Monseigneur André Frémyot, archbishop of Bourges, 5 October 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:323. 46  D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales, 156. 40

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of Bourges, de Sales suggested the writings of famous preachers of the Middle Ages like Aquinas and Antoninus Florentinus, archbishop of Florence, and more contemporary clergymen like Osorius Jerome, a Portuguese Dominican, Salmeron Alphonse, a Spanish Jesuit, and Barradas Sebastien, a Portuguese Jesuit.47 Preachers from the mendicant orders remained important sources of inspiration for de Sales. Despite his numerous duties as bishop, de Sales continued to study and read to improve his preaching, and he expected others to do the same. In addition to the quantity of services and the content of sermons, the quality of the curé’s performance while administering the sacraments came under scrutiny during parish visits. Louis Châtellier asserts that reformers realized that in order for the mass to be appealing it had to be well-performed and dramatic, almost like theater.48 Lee Palmer Wandel notes that the performance of the eucharistic ritual “placed the priest in the position of Christ,”49 which heightened the importance of performing the ritual well. In four of the parishes visited in the duchy of Chablais between 1617 and 1621, the visitor noted that several of the curés’ hands trembled when they performed the sacraments. The visitor noted that the curé from Thollon was very old, but this fact did not seem to make any difference to Bishop de Sales when he issued his injunctions. The visitor observed four priests in Feternes perform a sacred ceremony to see if their hand trembling was so noticeable as to make the service appear irreverent.50 Trent reaffirmed the centrality of the eucharistic ceremony to all Catholics, and claimed the sacrament should be celebrated “with special veneration and solemnity.”51 Catholicism remained a highly visual faith full of rituals, images, and evocative ceremonies, and the diocesan officials believed that for a religious ceremony to have meaning for the laity, it had to be performed with the proper drama and reverence. This sense of theater was an aspect of Catholicism that clearly distinguished it from the Reformed confession.

47  F. de Sales to Monseigneur André Frémyot, archbishop of Bourges, 5 October 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:323. 48  Châtellier, Europe of the Devout, 39. 49  Wandel, Eucharist in the Reformation, 25. 50  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:300, 343, 366, 386. Trembling hands noted in Feternes, Novel, Thollon, and Vinzier. 51  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 13th sess., chaps. 5, 8 (pp. 76–80).

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The visitors noted other inadequacies that hindered a priest’s performance of his duties. In Montigny the curé was away at the time of the visit and the visitor recorded that the curate was not suited to perform mass or administer the sacraments.52 In Chevenoz, catechism classes were not held because of the priest’s “incompetence.”53 The account of the visit to the parish of Ugine in 1626 stated that because of the cureés “indisposition,” most likely illness, he was no longer able to perform his duties to the parish, so the visitor ordered a Capuchin to take his place and function as priest.54 The bishops strove to have a body of clergy capable of performing all their duties within the parish. The personal morality of the priests had long been a concern for church leaders, and clerical celibacy received close attention following the Council of Trent. Keith Luria notes that Bishop Etienne Le Camus reported eighty-five cases of sexual misconduct in a diocese of approximately three hundred parishes during his visit of Grenoble in the 1670s.55 Results were very different in the Diocese of Geneva. There were rare problems as when François de Sales visited the parish of Pringy in 1610 and heard the complaints of parishioners who said that an inappropriate maid lived with the priest. The bishop ordered the maid to leave the residence within eight days.56 According to the synods, an “appropriate” housekeeper included a mother, aunt, sister, or grandmother.57 Out of the twenty-seven parishes visited in the Chablais region between 1617 and 1621, only two curés were reported to have improper females in their households. In Marin the visitor ordered a “suspect woman” out of the curé’s house immediately in the presence of the priest from nearby Publier and the local notables.58 In the parish of Novel, the visitor discovered that the priest had two maids: one for the house and one for the barn, even though he did not seem to have any animals. The visitor issued an injunction for the expulsion of the two maids, but as the expanded discussion below will reveal, this was only one of the

 Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:332.  Ibid., 1:285, “impuissance.” 54  ADHS, 2MI82: Visites pastorales...1623–1635, fol. 129. 55  Luria, Territories of Grace, 48. 56  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:507. 57  D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales, 131. 58  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:323. 52 53

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shortcomings reported to the visitor about the curé from Novel.59 A more widespread problem appeared in the newly reestablished parishes of the Pays de Gex.60 For the most part the diocesan officials appear to have put an end to priests openly living with women. Marc Forster also found in Speyer that by the first decade of the seventeenth century, open concubinage had disappeared.61 Both church officials and parishioners, at least in this area, recognized that celibacy was part of a priest’s vows. Misapplication of revenue could get a priest into trouble with diocesan officials as well. The rectors in the village of Thônes were ordered “to not appropriate for themselves the oblation” given to the chapels under their supervision on penalty of excommunication. Another priest in Thônes was accused of taking revenue that was not part of his prebend, his allowance or stipend, and was told to declare this revenue or risk excommunication.62 There is little evidence that the threats were carried out; after all, the diocese had a chronic shortage of priests, and denying someone his benefice would have been used only after every other means to reform the priest had been exhausted. Out of approximately 1048 parish visits made during the tenure of the three bishops, examples of serious problems with parish priests were relatively rare. A few parishes where problems did emerge are worth examining more closely. In Novel, located just south of Lake Geneva, during the visit of 1617, the parishioners had a long list of complaints, in addition to his maids discussed above, about their curé, Jean Million, whom the visitor identified as a “religious of St. Bernard.”63 The visitor described the church building as “very poorly built” and in danger of falling down from the rain. The great altar was ill-decorated and lacked the “missal and ritual of the Council [of Trent].”64 The parishioners claimed that the priest baptized one child in the previous two years and that he had possession of the collection box, which was empty. He left  Ibid., 1:342–43.  See the discussion of the problems in Gex in chapter 4. 61  Forster, Counter-Reformation in the Villages, 82. 62  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:678–79. 63  Dieringer, “St. Bernard of Menthon”; and Donnet, “Notes sur Les Archives le L’Hospite du Grant St. Bernard.” St. Bernard of Menthon (sometimes referred to as Bernard of Montjoux) established the first Alpine Hospice (known as the Hospice of Grand St. Bernard or of Montjoux) in the eleventh century for religious pilgrims who traveled along the mountain route to Rome. The monks who manned these hospices were Augustinian canons. 64  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:341. 59 60

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the parish for a month and consequently, no services were held. He had a habit of replacing the wheat offerings left in bags at the altar with straw. The people also claimed that he frequented taverns and drank too much in the lakeside village of St.-Gingolph, a neighboring parish. Beyond his moral failings, the visitation account also stated that the priest was deaf, his hands trembled, and he was not very good at administering the sacraments, especially absolution. The priest described by the parish appears to be almost a stereotype of a bad cleric. For all his faults, there is no evidence in the visit accounts that he was removed from his parish; rather, the visitor issued injunctions against him concerning the chambermaids and his lack of residence, and there was a call to investigate further the embezzlement of the wheat.65 One wonders what was going on in Novel, and a closer reading of the visit reveals a much more complex conflict that included the provost of the Hospice of St. Bernard, Monsieur de Montjoux, and a nearby priory affiliated with the Order of St. Bernard, the Abbey of Meillerie.66 Nicholas Fernex was the only person mentioned by name as being present at the visit, and he was there as Montjoux’s representative. Fernex inquired about the revenues produced by the parish’s properties because Provost Montjoux claimed that he had primary control over the administration of the parish. This control included the collection of all parish revenues and appointing and removing the curé. Furthermore, the religious at the Abbey of Meillerie performed the sacraments of marriage, penitence, and baptism, minus a baptismal font, at a chapel endowed by Monsieur de Montjoux at their abbey without permission from the diocese. Montjoux had a proprietary view of the parish church at Novel, and if the people there received their sacraments from the abbey rather than the parish priest, then the fees for these services would follow. The visitor threatened the religious from the abbey with excommunication if they performed the sacraments for anyone except the religious of Montjoux.67 Novel presented numerous problems for the visitor and the diocesan officials. Here was the leader of a religious order who did not reside  Ibid., 1:342–43.  Meillerie (Mellérée in the visitation accounts) was a nearby town on the banks of Lake Geneva and the priory there was affiliated with the Hospice of St. Bernard. Monsieur de Montjoux was the provost of the entire order and probably resided at the original hospice in Aosta. 67  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:342–43. 65 66

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in the Diocese of Geneva asserting control over the spiritual matters of a parish. While some of the complaints against the curé were most likely true, it is probable that Monsieur de Montjoux and his supporters embellished the man’s faults, even though Jean Million was a member of the order of St. Bernard. Perhaps placing an ineffectual member of the order as a parish priest got him out of the order’s hair and offered the nearby abbey an opportunity for more revenue. The visitor appears to have realized that not all the accusations were legitimate since he did not issue injunctions against the priest for all the complaints lodged and was willing to challenge the religious of Meillerie’s right to carry out the sacraments. While the Abbey of Meillerie was located in the diocese, the Order of St. Bernard’s leaders were located in the Dioceses of Aosta and Sion, both of which bordered the Diocese of Geneva. According to the Council of Trent, the Abbey of Meillerie would have fallen under the jurisdiction of the bishops of Geneva, but the inhabitants of the abbey viewed the leader of the order, in this case Provost Montjoux, as their direct church superior. So while the diocese threatened the religious with excommunication, there is little evidence that the abbey fell within the bishop’s sphere of influence. Visitors returned to Novel in 1619 and 1620 to note the progress in fulfilling the injunctions issued as a result of the visit of 1617.68 The parishioners had made progress on the needed repairs to the church structure, but there is no reference to the curé Jean Million by name, of Monsieur de Montjoux, or of the Abbey of Meillerie. Jean-François de Sales arrived in Novel in August of 1624, and he also visited the Chapel of St. Bernard in Meillerie the same day. The account contained little mention of the previous visit or of the many problems seen a few years before. Jean Million was still the curé and Monsieur de Montjoux was mentioned in the context of jointly controlling a piece of land with the parish, but Jean Million still faced problems with diocesan officials. He was enjoined to bring the register of baptisms, marriages, and burials to the bishop in six weeks. Conceivably the accusation made in the previous visit that the priest was not performing baptisms was being investigated further. Jean Million was also ordered to replace the straw in the bags left in the church with wheat.69 68  Ibid., 1:344–45. A visitor tried to visit Novel again in November 1621, but snow prevented him from getting to the parish. Instead the visitor consulted with the priest of nearby St. Gingolph, who assured the visitor that the parish was continuing to make good progress on the earlier injunctions. 69  ADHS, 2M180: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fols. 79–80.

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The lost wheat was the only specific reference to the many complaints made by the parish in the previous visit. Perhaps the parish had managed to solve some of the conflict on their own, or perhaps the diocesan officials decided to address only the most serious charges and avoid confrontations with the respected Hospice of St. Bernard. The case of Novel demonstrates the overlapping boundaries and jurisdictions that could exist in one small parish in the Alps. Parish priests could find themselves in trouble with their church superiors if they offended the local elite. An episode appeared in a visit conducted by Jean-François de Sales in November 1623 where the actions of the priest caused the prominent parishioners to unite against him. In the French parish of Seyssel, “the majority of the bourgeois” complained to the bishop about the “scandalous behavior” of Curé François Bojat. Unfortunately, the visit does not reveal the exact offense, but it must have been rather serious, as Curé Bojat was ordered to pay a forty livres fine.70 This amount was rather high considering that most fines ranged between five and ten livres. Even though Jean Bojat had been priest for at least a decade, he had apparently violated accepted norms of behavior within the parish structure and the laity saw to it that the bishop learned of the offense.71 Jean Bojat’s conflicts went well beyond the boundaries of his parish; he also found himself at odds with the parlement of Dijon in 1627 when it issued an arrêt condemning him for passing information to the cathedral canons of St. Peter of Geneva informing them of their rights to a chapel in Seyssel. The parlement had confirmed the rights of the canons to the benefice attached to the Chapel of St. Nicholas in Seyssel, but it obviously was not pleased at having Savoyard canons in control of a French benefice.72 Perhaps Curé Bojat had passed on this intelligence to the cathedral canons in hopes of regaining some favor of the bishop or perhaps he maintained closer ties with his Savoy brethren, but the act led him into conflict with secular authority. Bojat faced great difficulties straddling the national boundaries of Savoy and France, and navigating the lines between sacred and secular authority.

 ADHS, 2M182: Visites pastorales...1623–1635, fols. 6–7.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:391. In the visit made in May 1614, François Bojat was listed as

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curé.

 ADCO, B12232: Registre de Arrèts Definitifs, 1627–1628, fols. 286, 291. See discussion of this benefice in chapter 4. 72

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Sometimes conflicts arose between the curé and parishioners over issues not exclusively religious. Not surprisingly, many of these cases had to do with the administration of parish revenue. In the parish of St. Jean d’Aulph, the visitor in 1617 reported that “the people [are] very harsh [towards] and have little affection for their priest.” The real issue in St. Jean d’Aulph seems to have been control of parish funds as the laity possessed the “box” of revenue that was to be used for repairs to the church, for candles and habits needed for processions, and for payment to a priest to lead the processions. However, the laity used the money as they saw fit “without any license from the curé.”73 Typically the visitors placed the responsibility for repairs to a priest’s house on the parishioners, and in St. Jean d’Aulph, the parishioners were supposed to provide two hundred florins for the reconstruction. In an effort to free itself of the responsibility for the repairs, the laity claimed that their priest, Jean Louie, had caused great damage to his residence. The parishioners tried financial blackmail when it told the visitor that if the priest accepted three florins and six sols for adult burials and thirty sols for a youth who had received first communion, then they would turn over the two hundred florins. The curé stated that he did not want to agree to this arrangement without the consent of the bishop since in the past the burial fee was seven or eight florins. Continuing to malign the character of their priest and perhaps to show his fiscal irresponsibility, the parishioners informed the visitor that Jean Louie had made a financial agreement with Laurent Decollonge, priest of the nearby parish of Morzine, without their consent, and they opposed the agreement because they believed it was a financial hardship for the parish. The visitor sided with the curé; he ordered the parish to hand over the money for repairs and appointed two priests from neighboring parishes to help oversee the work, but he does not mention any resolution for the burial fees or for the agreement with the priest of Morzine. The visitor also concluded that the parishioners who controlled the revenue had not been careful with it, and he ordered the priest to issue a monitory letter and to use all his authority to get the parish’s property and revenue in order. The visitor even mentioned the possibility of monitory letters from a clerical superior and excommunication against the parishioners if the situation was not remedied. The visitor must have sympathized with the priest’s difficult situation because he stated in his account that the revenue of the  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:355–58.

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church was too small to support the priest who had to conduct services for 1500 people.74 One wonders whether it was originally financial matters or a personality clash that led to the conflict between priest and parish. There were three follow-up visits to St. Jean d’Aulph between 1619 and 1622. The accounts of the visits that took place in 1619 and 1620 are very brief and both reported that the parishioners were making good progress towards the injunctions issued in 1617. The account of 1620 said that almost all the preceding injunctions had been accomplished and the rest would be completed in the near future. The visitor, Jean Mocand, claimed that the church was well ordered and adorned, that the chapels were well maintained, and that the services were being conducted “to the great contentment of the people.” The parishioners complained to Mocand that the priest was not teaching the catechism, but this is the only problem mentioned. The curé promised he would begin holding catechism lessons and complete the walls of his house or risk losing revenue from his benefice. This statement leads one to believe that the parishioners had handed over at least a portion of the two hundred florins. These two follow-up visits focused on the parishioners’ injunctions, but during the visit in May 1622, the problems over the property reemerged. From the visit made by Claude Cullaz, curé of Abondance, and Pierre Vallet, curé of Vacheresse, it is evident much work remained on the part of diocesan officials to get the property of St. Jean d’Aulph in order. Jean Louie had failed to make all the required improvements to his residence, and a new curé, Claude Falconnet, had arrived in St. Jean d’Aulph. The account offered no clues as to what happened to Jean Louie but reported that despite his efforts, Louie had been unsuccessful in collecting the papers that the previous visitor had ordered. The two visiting priests ordered the new curé, Falconnet, “to obtain a monitory letter against whoever knows where the goods, rights, or documents of the parish are retained and to pursue them up to the last fulmination.”75 The inability of both the diocesan officials and the local priest to force 74  Ibid., 1:357–58. A monitory letter was a proclamation issued by a church official who had jurisdiction over the person or persons, to compel the person or persons, usually on threat of some punishment, to reveal what they knew about a crime. 75  “dobtenir un monitoire contre ceux ou celles qui sçavent ou retiennent les biens, droicts ou documens de la cure, et les poursuivre jusques a la derniere fulmination.” Ibid., 1: 359–61. There were visits on 1 July 1619, 3 August 1620, and 22 May 1622.

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the parishioners to relinquish control of and the records for the parish property demonstrates the limits of reform and the laity’s ability to resist unwanted change to parish structure. If the laity continued to withhold funds, a priest might be forced to call on civil justice to enforce injunctions against them. Such an example is found in the parish of Feternes where the curé was told in a visit of 1621 to use the “secular arm” after the parish had repeatedly failed to fulfill an injunction from a previous visit ordering it to hand over money for church renovations, including repairs to the priest’s house and the purchase of a new bell, even though the funds were available.76 It is not really surprising that the most drawn-out disagreements between priest and parishioners occurred over control of money and not over the priest’s behavior or the services he performed. Most conflicts over money did not escalate to the level they did in St. Jean d’Aulph and Feternes. Typically the disagreements were minor, concerning exact amounts owed to the priest for particular services, including baptism and funerals. By far the most common was the burial fee. As in St. Jean d’Aulph, the curés usually claimed there was a customary amount while the parishioners said any payment was much lower or even voluntary. For example, in the parishes of Feternes, Larringes, and Publier, the curés charged five florins for burials while the parishioners claimed there was no such custom.77 The parishioners believed that they were the best judges of what the priest’s services were worth and what they could afford to pay. Squabbles over payments for the priest’s services and support appear in many of the visit accounts. The laity had a sense of ownership of their parish and controlling the money was often a sign of their power; parishioners rarely were willing to turn all rights over to the curé. Many of the priests displayed concern for the happiness and wellbeing of their flock and vice versa. Priests pleaded the villagers’ poverty to the bishop when the parishes could not fulfill financial obligations placed on them as a result of the visits.78 The account of the visit to Allinges in September 1624 mentioned that the curé had the “goodwill

 Ibid., 1:302; this step was taken after a series of visits to the parish between 1617 and 1621.  Ibid., 1:298, 306, 347. 78  Poverty of parishes is mentioned in Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:263–64 for Bernex, and for Bonneveaux in ibid., 1:273. 76 77

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and devotion of the parishioners.”79 In Morzine, the bishop ordered the parishioners to hand over the offering box to the priest because he was poor, but the priest “having regard for the goodwill of his parishioners had been content with what they gave [him].” The parishioners preferred to keep the offering box, but were willing to give to the curé a set amount agreeable to all parties. In a follow-up visit, the parishioners still had the box and were allowed to keep it. The priest and parishioners of Morzine preferred compromise to conflict over revenue.80 Curés encouraged and protected local veneration of saints. In Vacheresse, the curé established a shrine to the Savoyard St. Bernard of Menthon “at the instigation of the inhabitants of the Ubenaz mountain,” in an attempt to heal the sick cows of the area.81 The well-being of the cattle was vital, as dairy products were a crucial part of the regional economy. In his work on local religion in Spain, William Christian found that holy places were frequently placed in natural surroundings near water, trees, or mountains, which he saw as a community’s way of trying to assert control over its environment.82 The chapel was probably no more than a shack and, according to the visit account, was poorly furnished. The priest had to carry the altar and other sacred objects from the main church to the shrine in order to hold services there, which prevented him from performing scheduled observances at the parish church. The curé of Vacheresse went to a great deal of effort to fulfill the spiritual needs of his flock, and Bishop François de Sales recognized his effort, ruling that the parishioners could indeed hold services at the shrine if they properly decorated the chapel and found an appropriate time for services that did not conflict with mass at the main church.83 François de Sales did not forbid this shrine or deem it superstitious, even though its purpose surely bordered on the limits of orthodoxy. Priests also protected long-standing customs as demonstrated in Abondance where the visitor’s account revealed a conflict between 79  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 163. Allinges had been the fortress where François de Sales had first stayed in the early days of the mission in the duchy of Chablais. 80  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:329–34. 81  “a instigation des communiers de la montagne appelee Ubenaz.” Ibid., 1:381–82. St. Bernard of Menthon was a noble Savoyard who lived in the tenth century and established a hospice and monastery in the region. He also is the namesake for the mountain rescue dogs of the Alps. See Butler, Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Other Principal Saints, 2:646. 82  Christian, Local Religion in Sixteenth-Century Spain, 91, 176. 83  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:382, 385.

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parishioners and a nearby monastery concerning which day the parishioners would hold a procession that passed by the monastery. The traditional procession day was no longer convenient for the monastery, so the curé was expected to act as mediator and find a solution that was agreeable to both sides. The follow-up visit reveals that the curé had worked out the problem to the “contentment” of the people and that the procession would be performed.84 Church officials on all sides allowed a certain level of flexibility in how a community observed a valued local religious celebration. In the diocese of Geneva, curés faced the daunting task of providing spiritual leadership in small, often isolated parishes. Many priests coped with small salaries, inadequate housing, and too much work, but these were the same conditions facing many of their parishioners. Standing at the intersection between his superiors and his flock, the early modern priest faced a difficult situation. The diocesan officials had increased expectations of a curé’s duties in the parish and this included closer scrutiny of his behavior, training, and performance of the sacraments. In turn, the parish priest was expected to implement reforms and assert more control over parish administration, two concepts often unpopular with the laity. The priest faced repercussions from both sides when his actions displeased them. Yet the priests managed for the most part to negotiate their way through the complexities of the early modern community, coping with economic and social issues and with local variations on religious practices. As Michael Hayden points out, “old beliefs, sometimes ascribed to peasants and described as ‘popular religion’ were, in fact, shared by all parts of society, including priests.”85 Despite the changes thrust upon him by the upper hierarchy of the Catholic Church, the curé managed to remain a member of his parish.

Religious Houses

The bishops of Geneva set out to reform all the clergy under their supervision, including those who were members of religious orders. When François de Sales toured his diocese from 1604 to 1610, he visited many of the religious houses. The majority of the houses were very small and many had not seen any outside scrutiny since before the Reformation.  Ibid., 1:256–59.  Hayden, “Pastoral Visit Project,” 68.

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The exceptions were houses of the Order of Cluny and the Observants of the Order of St. Bonaventure, which appointed their own visitors roughly every ten years to visit each of their houses within the diocese.86 While the visitation accounts offer little of the specific criticism that François de Sales’s correspondence revealed, they still provide a sense of the bad material condition and uneven state of the religious houses within the diocese. Many were priories with only two or three religious and the largest were the Abbey of Hautecombe with twenty-four inhabitants, the Priory of Talloires with twenty monks, and the College of La Roche with fifteen secular canons.87 At the start of the Reformation, monasteries in the nearby Pays de Vaud, located on the northern and southeastern banks of Lake Geneva, were very small—most with fewer than ten monks—and poor, and many of their properties had been severely damaged by the Burgundian Wars of the late fifteenth century.88 Like the rest of the church property of the Diocese of Geneva, most of the priories and abbeys were in various states of disrepair and in need of major refurbishing. The clergy, whether secular or regular, were frequently expected to perform pastoral duties, so in many ways these men who had vowed to live under monastic rule were not that different from the parish priests. François de Sales is well known for his relationship with female religious and his establishment of the Order of the Visitation (Visitandines) with Jeanne de Chantal in 1610, yet female houses were virtually nonexistent within his diocese for much of his tenure as bishop.89 At the start of the Reformation, Bruening found only three women’s houses for the entire Pays de Vaud.90 For the Diocese of Geneva, there is the well-

86  ADS, B1432: Repertoire des matieres contenues au present registre scavoir des edits, patentes bules, transactions depuis le 25 Nov. 1577 jusqu’au 4 Novembre 1579, fols. 174–200, provisions from the abbot general of Cluny authorizing visitation of all Cluniac monasteries under the duke; B1435: Repertoire des matieres contenues au present registre tant edit, bulles, patentes qu’autres actes depuis 1587 jusqu’en 1597, fol. 75, letters of commission for Pierre Pondielly to visit convents of the Observance in Savoy, 21 August 1589. B1437: Registre des edits, patentes, bulles, transactions, 1605–1611, fol. 3, allow the visitor from Cluny to visit its monasteries in the Savoy, 3 March 1607. 87  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:326, 543, 665. 88  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 99–100. 89  For a brief discussion of the founding of the Order of the Visitation, see Wright, “Visitation of Holy Mary.” 90  Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 98. There were the Poor Clares of Orbe and Vevey and a Cistercian house near Lausanne.

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known case of the convent of the Poor Clares, who were forced to leave Geneva in 1535 and settled in Annecy.91 The nuns’ plight was chronicled by one of their own, Jeanne de Jussie.92 The convent does not play a significant role in either the pastoral visitation records or in de Sales’s extensive correspondence. In his report to Pope Paul V in 1606, de Sales made mention of only five female religious houses.93 With the level of military conflict and religious disruption that occurred in the area between the 1470s and the 1590s, it is not surprising that there were few women placed in convents in the region during this period. In a letter to the papal nuncio Riccardi in Turin in May 1597, de Sales mentioned the poverty and very real hunger of the Poor Clares of Evian.94 Female religious did not begin to achieve any prominence in the region until de Sales began introducing new post-Tridentine orders for women in the seventeenth century.95 Beyond helping establish the Order of the Visitation, de Sales inspired others involved in female religious organizations. In 1622 Louise de Ballon, a Savoyard nun at the Cistercian house of St. Catherine near Annecy, began reforming the house under the direction of de Sales, but after resistance from the abbess, Ballon established a new house in Rumilly known as the Congregation of Bernardines of Divine Providence.96 This started a reform movement that would spread throughout Savoy and into France. De Sales also influenced the ministry of Vincent de Paul. The two men met in Paris in late 1618, and in 1622,  See Klaus, “Architecture and Sexual Identity.”  For a recent English translation of the account, see Jussie, Short Chronicle. 93  de Sales, Œuvres, 23:320–21. The houses listed were the Poor Clares of Annecy and Evian, the Convent of St. Catherine near Annecy and the Abbey of Bonlieu (the last two under the Order of Citeaux), and a Carthusian House in Mélan. 94  Letter to Jules-César Riccardi, archbishop of Bari, papal nuncio in Turin, 31 May 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:291–300. The Poor Clares of Evian had been forced to leave Orbe in 1555. 95  There has been important scholarship on François de Sales’s and Jeanne de Chantal’s establishment of the Order of the Visitation, including Elizabeth Rapley’s work, which explores the establishment of the order and its unsuccessful attempt to avoid clausura; The Dévotes, 34–41. Wendy Wright has traced the relationship between the two future saints that led to the establishment of the community; Bond of Perfection. Clausura comes from the Latin word “claudere,” meaning “to shut up,” and refers to the requirement that nuns remain behind convent walls rather than being out in the world and performing active mission work. 96  F. de Sales to Jean-François de Sales, July–August 1622, in de Sales, Œuvres, 20:337; F. de Sales to Pernette de Cerisier, abbess of St. Catherine, 29 August 1622, in ibid., 20:347–49; F. de Sales to Louise de Ballon, religious of the Abbey of St. Catherine, mid-September 1622, in ibid., 20:365–66; and F. de Sales to Louise de Ballon, superior of the Bernardines of Rumilly, mid-October 1622, in ibid., 20:382. De Sales died in late December 1622. 91 92

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de Sales asked de Paul to oversee the Visitation house in Paris.97 Vincent de Paul and Louise de Marillac, taking a lesson from the papacy’s forcing the Order of the Visitation to accept clausura and change its mission, launched a successful campaign to avoid enclosure of the Daughters of Charity, allowing the group to retain their vocation and active mission.98 There is no doubt that de Sales was a crucial source of inspiration for the reforming and revitalization of women religious in Savoy and France throughout the seventeenth century, but most of his tenure as bishop focused on male religious, in large part because of their pastoral duties. Diocesan leaders introduced new male orders into the region as well, the majority of them associated with the Catholic reform movement, namely the Capuchins, Jesuits, and Barnabites. Despite the bishops’ faith in these new congregations, they had only mixed success within the diocese. The Jesuits left the Holy House of Thonon after barely ten years there and were replaced by the Barnabites. The parishioners of Bellecombe, Crestvoland, and Combloux complained repeatedly to successive visitors about the Jesuits of Chambéry, who had taken over the priory of the nearby village of Megève, claiming they had taken revenue from the parishes.99 This negative reaction was not uncommon. Marc Venard found that after Antonio Possevino helped install the Jesuits in Avignon in 1569, the order faced serious opposition, including a popular uprising in an effort to expel them and a rumor campaign against Possevino.100 The Society of Jesus’ only other house in the Diocese of Geneva was in La Roche. The Capuchins, while key to the mission in Chablais, had a permanent presence in just three parishes, as did the Barnabites (see tables 5.1 and 5.2). Reformers like the bishops of Geneva believed the orders promoted in the wake of the Reformation were central to the revitalization of parish religiosity, yet in the case of the Diocese of Geneva, their numbers were small and their influence sporadic. Most priories, abbeys, and colleges were small and needed some sort of reform in the eyes of the bishops. They were entrenched members of the communities in which they were located, while newly introduced religious houses could disrupt community balance.  Dodin, François de Sales, Vincent de Paul, 10–11.  Dinan, Women and Poor Relief, 30. 99  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:79, 234; and ADHS, 2MI81: Visites pastorales...1626, fols. 68, 73, 95–98. 100  Venard, Réforme protestante, réforme catholique, 507–14. 97 98

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The Council of Trent gave the bishop more control over regular clergy, including visitation rights and the power to reform. A bishop could visit a religious house annually if it was not properly observing its rule; even if a house held privileges and exemptions the bishop was expected to do whatever was necessary to reform the place.101 Special attention was to be given to monasteries that had pastoral duties, and a bishop could punish a monk who committed a crime outside of his house if his superior would not.102 Before the Reformation monasteries had often kept to themselves, apart from the rest of the diocese, and many houses had special exemptions from the rules and regulations issued by the bishop. The decrees of Trent instructed religious houses to conform to the diocese where they were located and required the regular clergy to observe all censures and feast days of the diocese.103 Monks fought to continue long-held behaviors and customs considered inappropriate after the Council of Trent, creating conflict between diocesan reformers and monasteries that wanted to be left alone. The Table 5.1: Male Religious Houses in the Diocese of Geneva, by Order Order Type of House and/or Town

Number of Members Additional Information

Barnabite Annecy

unknown

Bonneville

unknown

Thonon

unknown

est. 1614 Cluniac priories of Bellevaux and Contamine united into Barnabites of Thonon in seventeenth century

Benedictine Priory of Anglefort

2

dependent on Abbey of Amburnes

Priory of Bellevaux Priory of Belmont Deaconate of Ceysérieu

1 unknown

Priory of Chindrieux

2

Priory of Grésy sur Aix

2

dean not in residence

 Decrees and Canons of the Council of Trent, 21st sess., chap. 8 (p. 141).  Ibid., 25th sess., chap. 11 (p. 224); chap. 14 (p. 226). 103  Ibid., 25th sess., chap. 12 (p. 225). 101 102

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Order Type of House and/or Town

Number of Members Additional Information

Priory Lovagny

unknown

Priory of St. Claire

unknown

Priory of St. Paul

2

Priory of St.-Robert

0

Priory of Talloires

20

Priory of Ville en Michaille

unknown

Capuchin Annecy

unknown

est. 1592

La Roche

unknown

est. seventeenth century

Rumilly

unknown

est. seventeenth century

Carthusian Aillon

unknown

Présilly

unknown

Le Reposoir (Scionzier)

unknown

Vallon

unknown

united to Augustinian Priory of Ripaille in 1623

Cistercian Abbey of Chézery

12

Abbey of Hautecombe

24

Abbey St. Jean d’Aulph

12

Priory of St. Innocent

unknown

Cluny Priory of Bonneguête Priory of Chêne Priory of Contamine Priory of Bellevaux (Chablais)

6 unknown 12 unknown

Priory of Reignier

5

Priory of Rumilly

3

Priory of Sillingy

3

Priory of Talissieu Priory of Vaulx

4 unknown

Cordeliers Annecy

unknown

Cluses

unknown

dependent on Abbey of Hautecombe

Cleaning Houses Order Type of House and/or Town

m 165 Number of Members Additional Information

Cordeliers, continued Evian

unknown

Dominican Annecy

unknown

Jesuit Megève

unknown

took over existing priory

La Roche

unknown

took over existing priory

Unknown Priory of Ardon

1

Priory of Léaz

unknown

Priory of Thiez

unknown

Priory of Vaulx

unknown

Priory of Chiésaz

unknown

inactive

Regular Canons Abbey of Abondance Abbey of Filly Abbey of Entremont

7 unknown 5

Priory of Molard de Vion

unknown

Priory of Notre Dame l’Aumône

unknown

Priory of Peillonnex

unknown

Priory of Poisy

4

Abbey of Sixt

unknown

Cathedral Canons of St. Peter Annecy

30

from Geneva

Secular Canons College of Annecy

12

College of La Roche

15

College of Sallanches

13

College of Samoëns

10

Priory of Seyssel

unknown

Priory of Chamonix

unknown

Priory of Héry sur Ugine

unknown

united to cathedral canons of St. Peter of Geneva

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Table 5.2: Female Religious Houses in the Diocese of Geneva, by Order Order Type of House and/or Town

Additional Information

Carthusian Mélan

est. in 1283

Cistercian St.-Catherine-du-Semnoz Abbey of Bonlieu Poor Clares Annecy

from Geneva in 1535

Evian

from Orbe 1555

Unknown Priory of St. Ennemond

united to Abbey of St. Peter in Lyons

Houses Founded after François de Sales became bishop Annonciades Annecy Bonneville Thonon Bernardines (reform movement began in 1620s by a Savoyard nun) Annecy La Roche Rumilly Ursuline Sallanches Thonon Gex Visitation Annecy Rumilly Thonon Seyssel

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evidence reveals that religious houses resisted reform much more vigorously than their parish counterparts; regular clergy frequently involved secular authority in disputes, both as mediators between the parties or as advocates of one side. Nowhere was this type of dispute more complex and prolonged than the one between the bishops of Geneva and the Benedictine house of Talloires. The Priory of Talloires Located in the province of Genevois along the banks of Lake Annecy, the Priory of Talloires was established as a Benedictine monastery in the first part of the eleventh century. The church of the monastery was dedicated in 1031. The archbishop of Vienne authorized the house and made it a dependent of the Benedictine Abbey of Savigny located in the Diocese of Lyons. The king and queen of Burgundy, Rudolph and Ermengarde, were Talloires’s primary patrons and while the later Middle Ages saw the monarchs of Burgundy disappear, the Counts of Genevois and later the Dukes of Savoy replaced them as noble benefactors of Talloires.104 The monastery remained a favored object of pious donations for all the rulers of the region. The priory never had more than twenty or thirty religious, but it became wealthy and powerful as it increased its holdings throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The seeds of corruption were planted as the influence of the small priory continued to expand, with individual properties and the revenue they produced becoming attached to specific offices within the monastery, including the sacristan, the overseers of the laborers and the infirmary, and of course the prior. Beginning in 1426, the Charansonary family held the office of prior for more than a century.105 In addition, lay offices that came with prebends also became hereditary.106 Not surprisingly, these positions were highly prized as they offered a steady source of revenue for local villagers. Talloires’s influence went well beyond its walls and its property. In 1448 Duke Louis I of Savoy granted the monastery the right of final punishment, which allowed a judge from Talloires to preside in Chambéry over the supreme court of the duchy; by the fifteenth century the priory  Pérouse, L’Abbaye de Talloires, 13, 18, 25.  Ibid., 35. 106  Ibid., 27, 30, 32. 104 105

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had become a very powerful vassal of Savoy.107 In the sixteenth century, the priory’s ties to the House of Savoy became even closer when Jacques of Savoy was made prior in 1537. He was absent from the monastery most of the time and was not away on priory business; by all accounts he lived less than a monastic life.108 Like so many monastic houses established in the Middle Ages, by the sixteenth century Talloires was no longer a place of devout and ascetic piety. The problems between diocese and monastery commenced with the first attempt to reform the Priory of Talloires by an enthusiastic young monk, who in 1572 on his return from studying in Rome, first attempted the implementation of Tridentine reforms. This monk, Claude de Granier, had been made prior of Talloires the year he departed for Rome. According to his biography, fifteen of the twenty monks living in the monastery were hostile to his intended reforms, including stricter diets, more ascetic living, and better observance of the canonical hours. Another major problem concerned the lay officers of the priory who received prebends for certain duties such as cooking, caring for the horses, and performing the duties of the office of justice; some of these local villagers did not do the services required of them. Prior Granier attempted to remedy this matter but was met with resistance by those of the town who held these stipends.109 Comerford notes, “Education, pastoral life, and even commerce were regularly affected by the work of the religious orders, even the smaller ones, and the suppression of one or another had obvious consequences on the towns near the houses.”110 The young reformer certainly faced an uphill battle with both the monks and the villagers opposed to his proposed changes. The monastery served the needs of those within the walls as well as those on the outside who benefited financially from its unreformed state. Claude de Granier’s efforts to reform his monastery took a new path in 1579 when he became bishop of Geneva in an unusual move authorized personally by Pope Gregory XIII. Ange Justinian, who was bishop of Geneva, became prior of Talloires.111 When Bishop Granier  Ibid., 34, 35.  Ibid., 43. 109  Constantin, La Vie du Reverendissime et Illustrissime Evesque Claude de Granier, 25, 32, 37, 75–76. 110  Comerford, Reforming Priests and Parishes, 25. 111  Constantin, La Vie du Reverendissime et Illustrissime Evesque Claude de Granier, 93. 107 108

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visited his former monastery in 1581 during his general tour of the diocese, he was not particularly welcome. The visitation account revealed that the priory of Talloires protested the presence of Granier, who informed the monks that the Council of Trent gave him the right to scrutinize and correct the religious of the priory.112 This was the last visit Granier made to his former monastery. Instead he shifted his attention to other projects, including the reform of the parishes under his care and the missionary project in the duchy of Chablais, leaving the problems at the priory to his successors. François de Sales addressed the issue of monastic reform even before he became bishop. Papal Nuncio Riccardi wrote Provost de Sales in September 1598 asking for specific information related to replacing lax monks with more diligent ones in existing religious houses and wanting to know what prebends would be used. Would they bestow vacant ones on the new religious or would they deprive the errant monks of theirs?113 There are the practical questions of what to do with errant monks. Do you cast them out of the clergy completely, or do you punish and try to reform them? If they refuse to leave, do you expel them by force? As the reform efforts of the Diocese of Geneva demonstrate, it was extremely difficult to make monks who were unwilling to change their ways do much of anything. A year later, the papal nuncio reminded de Sales that he still awaited his response about converting conventual prebends to theological ones.114 Bishops faced stiff resistance when they tried to convert existing prebends to theological ones.115 The diocese and certainly Provost de Sales were pursuing the possible expulsion of lax monks from their monasteries in the region well before that process commenced. Soon after he assumed the see of Geneva in 1602, François de Sales described to his superiors the state of the religious houses under his jurisdiction. In a letter to the papal nuncio in Turin, de Sales reported that the majority of the monasteries in the diocese had lax discipline, the  ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582, fol. 204.  Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, to F. de Sales, September 1598, in de Sales, Nouvelles Lettres, Paris ed., 1:232. 114  Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, to F. de Sales, November 1599, in de Sales, Nouvelles Lettres, Paris ed., 1:237. The idea behind a theological prebend was to have someone with the knowledge and training to teach scripture to other clergy. 115  Venard, Réforme protestante, réforme catholique, 678–79. 112 113

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exception being the Carthusians.116 In a letter to Pope Clement VIII, de Sales wrote, “There is nothing better than good religious, nothing worse than bad [ones].” Monasteries had deep ties to the communities around them and surely de Sales believed that their influence was strong whether they offered bad or good examples. The bishop informed Clement of his distress over so many monasteries of various orders that had inhabitants who were not observing their discipline, when the close proximity of Geneva made it of the utmost importance that the diocese possessed strong clergy.117 He viewed the problems in his diocese as so serious that no simple solution would solve them.118 Bishop de Sales provided papal officials with several alternatives for reform, depending on the circumstances in each house. Some houses needed the existing orders replaced with different ones, like the Carthusians or the Feuillants, a strict branch of the Cistercians established in 1589. According to de Sales, these orders were “embraced and enflamed by the fire of the Holy Spirit.”119 Other houses needed to have their monks replaced with secular clergy or perhaps canons. Another option de Sales proposed was to place a remiss house under the supervision of an already reformed congregation in its order. The final suggestion he offered was to require a house to follow the Ordinary rule of its order, that is, the rule before the introduction of exemptions and customary practices. Obviously de Sales had thought a great deal about how best to correct problems he perceived as long-standing and pervasive. François de Sales knew that this would be no easy task for whoever undertook the reform mission. The individual would have to possess great power exercisable without possibility of appeal to prevent the monasteries from eluding reform. In addition, the reformer would have to hold the full support of the duke and the Senate in Chambéry, since secular power could either help enforce monastic reform, or, in some cases, could impede it.120 De Sales favored these broad powers because many of the monasteries were dependent on houses that were themselves unreformed, including the Priory of Contamine, the Abbey of

 F. de Sales to Paul Tolosa, papal nuncio in Turin, end of 1603, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:240–43.  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, 27 October 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:371–72. 118  F. de Sales to Paul Tolosa, papal nuncio in Turin, end of 1603, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:240. 119  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, 27 October 1602, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:372. 120  F. de Sales to Paul Tolosa, papal nuncio in Turin, end of 1603, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:240–43. 116 117

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Entremont, and of course the Priory of Talloires.121 Since the superiors would not reform, the dependent houses certainly would not. Few monasteries willingly allowed an enthusiastic proponent of reform like François de Sales to enter their walls. When François de Sales turned his focus on Talloires, nothing had really changed there since the days of Claude de Granier. Surprisingly, the account of de Sales’s visit to the monastery in October 1607 did not address the problems that his later correspondence revealed. The visitation account is rather mundane, listing the names of the twenty religious, the services required of them, and the income of each prebend. The injunctions included orders for repairs to buildings and an order to the religious to “conduct the divine offices [required religious services] in the chapels under their charge.”122 This last injunction was the only one that hinted at the monks’ less than sincere observance of their duties. The time and effort spent on this reform project by the bishops, the papacy, and the House of Savoy shows that Talloires was an important part of the diocese. Charles-Auguste de Sales, in his biography of his uncle, said that de Sales wanted to reform the monastery because of its age and prestige in the region.123 Certainly the long history of royal patronage and the association of St. Bernard of Menthon, a favored local saint, made the monastery important to all parties. Even before he was bishop, de Sales had more than a passing interest in Talloires. In March 1595, Antoine Favre, president of the Senate of the Savoy and a close friend of de Sales, wrote to him that the prior of Talloires had died and that, although he [Favre] had hoped that de Sales would become prior, the son of Baron de la Batie, intendant of the hospital, had been appointed instead.124 As bishop, de Sales finally had his chance to oversee the priory. Claude-Louis-Nicolas de Quoex was appointed prior of Talloires in June 1609. He had been born in the village of Talloires and in the early 1590s had taken the Benedictine habit at the Royal Benedictine Abbey of St.-Martin de Savigny, located in the Diocese of Lyons. François de Sales saw in this young monk a promising instrument for the reformation of  Ibid.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:667–68. 123  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 2:41. 124  Antoine Favre to F. de Sales, March 1595, in de Sales, Lettres, Paris ed., 1:134. 121 122

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Talloires.125 The de Quoex family had long been associated with the priory, holding the secular position of barber at the monastery for generations. The House of Savoy eventually ennobled the family and at the end of the sixteenth century, Jean de Quoex, father of Nicolas, was surgeon to Duke Charles-Emmanuel I.126 The de Quoex family’s long-standing connection to both the Dukes of Savoy and the House of Talloires made the young Nicolas the logical choice to be prior, and both bishop and duke hoped he would implement Tridentine reforms at the monastery. A month after the new prior’s appointment, the bishop offered some advice on commencing reform by telling the prior to begin reforming the monks by setting a good example. Bishop de Sales reminded the prior that change took time, and offered the symbolic examples of Jesus’s having only a small number of disciples after thirty-three years and the palm’s need for a hundred years to produce fruit. More pragmatically, the bishop instructed de Quoex to have the monks examine their consciences every evening and to teach them to obey their director. He also wanted to ensure that all those in the monastery received communion at least once a month and modified their habits “in the fashion of the reformed Benedictines.”127 This letter reveals that the monastery had made few lasting steps toward implementing Tridentine reform since Claude de Granier had been prior and that de Sales was putting his hope in de Quoex. In 1610, in an effort to expedite the reform of Talloires, both the Sovereign Senate of the Savoy and Pierre-François Costa, the papal nuncio in Turin, became more directly involved. Costa issued a letter of commission for Bishop de Sales, giving him the authority to visit the priories of Talloires and St. Jorioz in order “to reform the disorder into which they have fallen; to reestablish the divine service that is almost extinct; also to reform the morals of the religious.”128 Father Jacques de Pendes, vicar to the abbot of St. Martin de Savigny, was to accompany the bishop as the abbot’s representative and aid in the “correction of the morals of

 de Sales, Œuvres, 14:172–73n1.  Pérouse, L’Abbaye de Talloires, 70–71. 127  F. de Sales to Claude-Louis-Nicolas de Quoex, 10 July 1609, in de Sales, Œuvres, 14:172–74. 128  ADS, B1437: Registre des edits, patentes, bulles, transactions, 1605–1611, fol. 190, letters of commission registered by the Senate of the Savoy from Pierre-François Costa, papal nuncio in Turin, 31 March 1610. Copy of letters in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:385–86. 125 126

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the religious of Talloires.”129 The Senate registered both of these letters and sent one of its senators, Jean-François de Buttet, to join the two clergymen on this visit. The three men went to Talloires on 25 October 1610.130 According to Charles-Auguste de Sales, Bishop de Sales assembled the religious at the monastery and told them they must reform. He informed them that it was evil for a monk to desert his vows, and by doing so, he risked his soul. Charles-Auguste claimed that some listened, but others were “obstinate in their wickedness.”131 One would think that the visit of these three high-ranking representatives of both church and state would have had some effect on the recalcitrant monks, but rather than facilitating reform, the visit appears to have caused more conflict. In a letter to Prior Nicolas de Quoex sometime between 1611 and 1613, François de Sales referred to two monks in particular who were involved in some scandal, writing that news of the two offenders’ conduct had reached the Savoy Senate, which called for the two young men’s removal if they did not change their ways. François de Sales did not want the secular government to make these types of decisions and encroach upon the domain of the Catholic Church. While he had asserted in his letter to the papal nuncio in 1603 that the support of secular authority was crucial to successful monastic reform, he did not want the Senate to make decisions about clergy personnel.132 The Senate of the Savoy had been involved off and on in the conflict of Talloires since Claude de Granier was prior, but de Sales argued that it would be a “great shame” if the laity took this action and that the prior and ultimately de Sales himself would be blamed for the disorder. 133 There is no indication of the monks’ offenses, but de Sales referred several times to their youth and reiterated to Prior de Quoex the need to reform the two monks. He asked to be kept informed of further developments in the brewing scandal.134 Despite the blurring of boundaries between church and state 129  ADS, B1437: Registre des edits, patentes, bulles, transactions, 1605–1611, fol. 200, patent letters registered by the Senate of the Savoy for Jean-François de Buttet and letters of commission registered for Jacques de Perdes, to accompany de Sales to Talloires, end of June 1610. 130  F. de Sales to Philippe de Quoex, mid-December 1613, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:113–14n3. 131  “obstinez en leur meschante liberté.” C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 2:42. 132  F. de Sales to Paul Tolosa, papal nuncio in Turin, end of 1603, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:240–43. 133  F. de Sales to Claude-Louis-Nicolas de Quoex, sometime between 1611 and 1613, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:127. 134  Ibid., 16:128.

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at various points during the reform efforts, Bishop de Sales wanted ultimate decisions about Talloires’s reform and church renewal in general to stay within the jurisdiction of the church. The bishop took more active steps to regain control of Talloires, although he had been discussing the measure for years, when he tried to introduce the Feuillants into the monastery. While both papal and secular powers in Turin appear to have supported this proposition, both the prior of Talloires and the Abbey of Savigny opposed this move and wanted to reform the priory on their own terms.135 Philippe de Quoex, the brother of the prior and rector of a chapel in Thonon, joined the efforts to block the Feuillants’ introduction. Bishop de Sales was aware of the disagreement when he wrote to Philippe in December 1613 explaining in a friendly but firm tone that introducing the Feuillants was the best way to reform Talloires and mentioning that the process had worked in other houses. De Sales wished there could be some way to compromise, but he reminded Philippe de Quoex of the decree from Trent granting the bishop authority to judge situations such as this one within his diocese. François de Sales knew that Philippe was going to Rome to pursue the issue further, so he wished him a safe trip and told him he respected him. The bishop mentioned that there was someone else “less discreet and charitable” who had said many things against de Sales.136 This reference reveals how heated the debate had become. It is unclear who de Sales is referring to, but by 1613 all parties involved in the reform of Talloires had taken sides.137 Philippe de Quoex was in Rome in January 1614 to plead Talloires’s case. De Quoex and another advocate of the priory, a Monseiur d’Albon, met with the ambassador from France, François Savary de Brèves, where they presented a letter from the abbot of Savigny explaining their predicament. The ambassador said he did not want to get involved unless “honor and victory” could be achieved.138 With France entering the fray over Talloires, a Savoyard monastery dependent on a French abbey, the dispute crossed national boundaries. The Abbey of Savigny was in  F. de Sales to Philippe de Quoex, mid-December 1613, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:113–14n3.  Ibid., 16:114–16. 137  de Sales, Œuvres, 16:116. Note 2 states that this comment may refer to the monks of Talloires who had criticized de Sales to the Senate of the Savoy. 138  Letter from Philippe de Quoex to his brother Claude, 18 January 1614, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:403–9. The abbot of Savigny was François d’Albon, so this is probably a relative; ibid., 403n4. 135 136

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French territory, and at least in the past, was subject to royal patronage, so it is not surprising that the French crown took an interest in the matter. The French ambassador suggested that de Quoex and d’Albon visit the procurator general of the Feuillants and inform him of the contents of the letter from the abbot of Savigny and of the French ruler’s interest in the matter. Philippe de Quoex told his brother that he excused himself from this mission because he thought it was “so furtive,” and that he and his companion planned to visit Cardinal Robert Bellarmine to explain the entire situation. De Quoex wrote that he would inform Bellarmine that those who were willing to reform should never be forced to leave the monastery; only those who would not change their ways. Furthermore, he would tell the cardinal that his brother, the prior, would no longer want to live at Talloires if the proposed changes occurred. Political intrigue that could be interpreted as treason in Savoy does not seem to have appealed to Philippe, who preferred going through traditional channels of the church for his appeals rather than rival secular powers like France. Nevertheless, both members of the Quoex family wanted to continue the reform of Talloires under their more traditional interpretation of the Rule of St. Benedict. 139 It is striking how many individuals and institutions across national divides were willing to weigh in on the reform of one religious house. Bishop de Sales continued his correspondence with Philippe de Quoex while the rector was in Rome, notifying him that the papal nuncio in Turin had requested a report on the “true state” of Talloires and the bishop had forwarded the requested information. The entire matter was then turned over to Cardinal Scipion Caffarelli-Borghese, secretary of state, for his decision. François de Sales told Philippe de Quoex that they both must wait patiently for God’s will in the matter.140 It is evident that the bishop still respected and trusted the rector because he had de Quoex handle other business for the diocese while in Rome and entrusted him with letters to deliver. Both men were sincere in their desire to reform Talloires; they just did not agree on how to go about it. Ultimately, the Feuillants were not introduced into Talloires. Cardinal Borghese ruled in favor of the priory in August 1614 and allowed it

 Philippe de Quoex to F. de Sales, 18 January 1614, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:406–7.  F. de Sales to Philippe de Quoex, 27 January 1614, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:147.

139 140

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to continue reform under the less strict discipline.141 Charles-Auguste de Sales claimed in his account of the matter that those who refused to reform had to leave the monastery.142 Gabriel Pérouse asserted that it was Senator Buttet who informed the monks that they must either embrace the reform or leave the house in three months.143 This outcome corresponds with the sentiments expressed by both François de Sales and Philippe de Quoex in their letters, but there is no evidence on how many men left the monastery. Pérouse claimed, “Almost all declared that they would remain, and the bishop embraced them tenderly.”144 De Sales was a bishop who respected his superiors’ decisions even when he did not necessarily agree with them, as again was the case two years later in 1616, when Denis-Simon de Marquemont, archbishop of Lyons, ruled that the Order of the Visitation could not live a semicloistered life but rather had to observe strict enclosure like other orders of female religious.145 François de Sales did not turn his back on the priory that resisted his proposed methods of reformation. In 1616 the bishop wrote to VictorAmadeus, Prince of Piedmont, and son and heir of Charles-Emmanuel I, pleading on behalf of the religious of Talloires against a requisition of three hundred coupes of wheat for the prince’s army.146 De Sales informed the prince that they first had to feed themselves so they might continue divine services and that their land barely supplied the priory’s needs.147 Despite their previous battles, de Sales remained loyal to his fellow religious and defended Talloires against unreasonable secular incursions. For all its effort, the diocese did in fact make some progress on the reform at Talloires. In 1621 Duke Charles-Emmanuel I issued a patent letter that praised Talloires for its progress in reform and its “strict observance of the Rules of St. Benedict,” and called for the spread of reform into other Benedictine monasteries in the diocese. He declared François de Sales  Cardinal Caffarelli-Borghese to F. de Sales, 22 August 1614, in de Sales, Œuvres, 16:397–98.  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 2:44. 143  Pérouse, L’Abbaye de Talloires, 76. 144  Ibid. 145  Letter to F. de Sales from Monseigneur Denis-Simon de Marquemont, archbishop of Lyons, 20 January 1616, in de Sales, Œuvres, 17:405–7, appendix C. For an exploration of de Sales’s efforts to avoid complete clausura for the Order, see Rapley, Dévotes, 34–41. 146  A coupe is a standard measure of grain for the period. 147  F. de Sales to Victor-Amadeus, Prince of Piedmont, 24 October 1616, in de Sales, Œuvres, 17:296–97. 141 142

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head of all reformed Benedictines and authorized him to visit and reform the other houses of the order, especially Bellevaux, Chindrieux, and St. Paul. Bishop de Sales was to establish better observance of the Rule, and of duties to God and to the people, which included preaching, hearing confession, and administering the sacraments. Each house was to have enough religious to fulfill its duties, and the duke warned the monks that failure to implement the reforms would lead to loss of revenues.148 François de Sales was unable to lead this new charge to revive the monasteries since he died in 1622. After all the time and effort spent on monastic reform, only Talloires, the monastery that had received the prolonged scrutiny of church and state, showed positive results. Ultimately, Talloires survived as a Benedictine monastery into the eighteenth century. The priory was made an independent abbey in 1637 after yet another protracted negotiation that began in 1624 under Pope Urban VIII.149 Not surprisingly, the French Abbey of Savigny, as the superior house, opposed the separation of the Savoyard monastery from its control and was the primary reason for the delay.150 Bishop Jean-François de Sales visited the parish of Talloires in May 1627 but did not visit the monastery. Had the monastery regained some independence from the bishop? The visit mentioned that there was a dispute between the curé of the parish and Prior Nicolas de Quoex over what role the monks of Talloires would play in a village procession.151 Perhaps the stricter observance by the monks had led to a distance between the priory and the village. While Talloires certainly faced the most scrutiny, the diocese attempted to reform other monasteries. The Abbey of Notre Dame of Abondance was a point of particular concern for diocese and papacy. Like the Priory of Talloires, the Abbey of Abondance resisted the visit of Bishop Granier in 1580, claiming an exemption, but Granier asserted his authority according to the Council of Trent.152 In January 1597, the papal nuncio in Turin informed de Sales that the pope planned to remove the monks at Abondance and replace them with reformed  Patent letter from Duke Charles-Emmanuel I, 20 October 1621, in de Sales, Œuvres, 20:403–5.  ADS, B1441: Repertoire des edits-bulles, 1622–1627, fol. 349, register of the apostolic brief with a decree from the Senate of Savoy. 150  Pérouse, L’Abbaye de Talloires, 77–78. 151  ADHS, 2MI82: Visites pastorales...1623–1635, fol. 308. 152  ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582, fol. 21. 148 149

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Benedictines.153 In a letter to Pope Clement VIII in the spring of 1597, de Sales mentioned that many abbeys, especially those of Aulps and Abondance, needed reform. Abondance had angered de Sales when it refused to provide a prebend to support a preacher for a recently reestablished parish in the duchy of Chablais.154 In 1604, Bishop François de Sales informed Clement that the abbot of Abondance, Vespasien Aiazza, had suggested—probably with de Sales’s encouragement—bringing the Feuillants to Abondance.155 Pope Paul V authorized this change in September 1606 and the Feuillants arrived at the abbey the following spring, in 1607. Six canons left the abbey for other houses in Savoy.156 In the meantime, when Bishop de Sales visited the abbey in September 1606, just as the changeover was about to take place, he was not particularly welcome, with the abbey again protesting the visit of the bishop who, like his predecessor, asserted his right to visit according to Tridentine decrees. The visitation account listed seven religious present, in addition to the abbot.157 One of these was the parish curé of Abondance, who would stay on after the Feuillants took possession of the monastery.158 The others left the house for greener pastures or at least less strict discipline. Future visits in 1617 and 1624 reveal that the introduction of the Feuillants disrupted the abbey’s relationship with the parish of Abondance. In the visit by Jean-François de Sales in 1624, the exact role of the new religious within the community was still under negotiation.159 The monastery of Sixt also tried to avoid reform by the bishops of Geneva. The abbot of Sixt protested to the archbishop of Vienne, claiming exemption from correction by the bishop. Obviously this resistance upset Bishop François de Sales; in a letter of April 1606 to the prior and other monks who resided at the monastery of Sixt, the bishop referred to the “iniquity of his [the abbot’s] design” and asked the other religious to submit to the bishop’s authority, asserting that it was just for  Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, to F. de Sales, January 1597, in de Sales, Nouvelles Lettres, Paris ed., 1:178. 154  F. de Sales to Jules-César Riccardi, papal nuncio in Turin, 31 May 1597, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:292. De Sales’s letter to the pope is mentioned in this letter to the papal nuncio. 155  F. de Sales to Pope Clement VIII, 27 October 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:371–72. 156  de Sales, Œuvres, 12:373n1. 157  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:5–6 (September 1606). 158  Jean Mocand was still the curé in the visits of 1617 and 1624. 159  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:256–60; and ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fols. 116–19. 153

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the monks to do so and it was best for the monastery.160 When JeanFrançois de Sales visited the parish of St. Jean d’Aulph, he attempted to visit the Cistercian abbey there as well, but appears to have been met at the abbey gate by the prior. The prior provided an account of the duties and activities of the ten monks, but claimed immunity from the visitation requirement of the Council of Trent. The prior claimed that there were no scandals within the walls and the abbey provided only edification and devotion to the people.161 The account makes no mention of any further challenge on the part of the bishop to enter the monastery’s gate, and he went on to his next visit. No monastery within the boundaries of the Diocese of Geneva appears to have embraced reform; rather they preferred to continue long-standing practices deemed unacceptable in the post-Tridentine world. In a letter to his brother Jean-François de Sales, François referred to an apparently ongoing issue concerning the possible excommunication of those in a monastery that allowed women inside their walls. De Sales acknowledged to his brother that the religious in question would do all in their power to resist the process of excommunication. He cited a case of the archbishop of Tarantaise who had proceeded against a single convent in a similar situation.162 The letter hints that François de Sales was hesitant to carry the matter as far as his brother wanted to. The bishop seemed very aware of the realities of proceeding against a group of people who often had the power and influence to resist. In most cases, diocesan officials faced organized opposition when trying to implement Tridentine reforms in existing monasteries. The houses rarely complied with the bishop’s desires. Reform was a lengthy process, with the monks using all their abilities to resist reform and loss of independence. Because of their ties to prominent people in the outside world, recalcitrant monks were very effective in opposing change they did not want. By the time all the interested parties—including bishops, monks, popes, and kings—became involved in the process, easy and efficient reform was nearly impossible to achieve. While the reform of Talloires could be called a success for the diocese, the efforts commenced under Claude de Granier in 1572, but substantive changes were  F. de Sales to prior and monks at Sixt, April 1606, in de Sales, Œuvres, 13:169–70.  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 134. 162  F. de Sales to Jean-François de Sales, 2 March 1617, in de Sales, Œuvres, 13:350–51. 160 161

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not evident until the 1620s, after countless officials of both church and state had weighed in on the process. No diocese had the manpower or the energy to pour those kinds of resources into every monastery that needed improvement. All three bishops included in this study aspired to create a body of clergy that would lead the inhabitants of the parishes in a revitalized Catholicism. Thus both the regular and secular clergy of the diocese of Geneva faced rising expectations and increased scrutiny of their conduct and their training. Diocesan officials had better results from their efforts to improve the behavior of the parish priests or at least their performance of required services. Parish priests faced the correction of the bishop one on one and could not hide behind walls or influential friends. Monks, on the other hand, effectively used their connections to those in power and called upon a variety of allies in the world to prevent the bishops from even entering a monastery’s walls. The boundary of the parish proved easier to cross than the threshold of a monastery gate. In the end the parish priest ended up being close to what Trent envisioned, while the monk remained an independent force within the diocese. It would be left to the local curé to bring Tridentine reform to the laity.

6

Defining Spaces Reform of the Laity

W

hile much of the reform movement that grew out of Trent focused on the clergy, church officials targeted the parish priest in their reform efforts—in part so that he in turn could reinvigorate and direct his parish. Catholic reformers wanted parish priests, through the catechism, to educate their flocks on doctrine and proper practice, centering on the sacraments performed within the official boundaries of the parish. The bishops also wanted parishes literally to rebuild themselves, which included restoring, constructing, and refurbishing church structures and properties. Diocesan officials expected the laity to provide financial support for this physical reform of the parish and to properly endow and maintain chapels and altars. Reformers also scrutinized lay practices because the decrees of Trent hoped to eliminate behavior judged excessive or irreverent and religious activities conducted independent of the clergy. Reformed-minded clergy faced many obstacles, most notably preexisting local practices and relationships, in their efforts to establish orderly parishes. Lay devotion continued to manifest itself much as it had in the High Middle Ages, through participation in communal functions of confraternities, processions, and pilgrimages. Ideally reformers wanted parishes to clearly delineate between sacred and profane time, space, and activity; however, the laity rarely saw these delineations as clearly or as sharply as did church elites. Scholars have made much of the issues of discipline and social control of the people in post-Reformation Christianity. The major tools the Catholic Church possessed to regulate and educate the laity were the catechism, confession, and punishments in the form of fines and 181

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excommunication. Certainly both Catholics and Protestants sought to create populations that were loyal and disciplined, which was beneficial to both church and state.1 Historians such as Hsia view the clergy as using these three methods, often with the support and even aid of the secular elites, to bring the non-elites into line with the “orthodox confession.”2 Yet none of these disciplinary measures were for the laity exclusively, and many bishops, including those steering reform of the Diocese of Geneva, lacked the clerical manpower to scrutinize all the parishioners’ behaviors and practices that might be on the outer bounds of orthodoxy as defined by the Council of Trent. Parish revitalization was more than disciplining the people, and the laity continued to define for themselves what it meant to be Catholic.

Catechism

One of the primary ways both Catholics and Protestants educated their faithful was through catechization. The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries are considered to be the age of catechisms, even though late medieval Catholic educators had also utilized them. Jean-Claude Dhôtel traces to the Middle Ages an expectation of mothers that priests will teach children basic Catholic doctrine.3 Luther and other Protestant reformers quickly saw the need to instruct their followers in the new doctrine, and Christendom witnessed a proliferation of catechetical guides from both Catholics and Protestants.4 Dhôtel sees Calvin as the spark that initiated the Catholic catechetical movement in the French language and divides French Catholic catechisms into two periods: those from the latter part of the sixteenth century that tended to focus on combating Calvinism, and those from the seventeenth century that focused on reducing ignorance of Catholic beliefs and improving morals.5 The Council of Trent acknowledged the need and purpose of the catechism and expected bishops to ensure that the laity under their care, through proper instruction, came to understand the significance and 1  See Reinhard, “Reformation, Counter-Reformation, and the Early Modern State”; Hsia, World of Catholic Renewal; Strass, Luther’s House of Learning; and Schilling, Civic Calvinism. 2  Hsia, World of Catholic Renewal, 75. 3  Dhôtel, Origines du catéchisme moderne, 18. 4  See Bast, Honor Your Fathers; Kingdon, “Catechesis in Calvin’s Geneva”; and Mentzer, “Laity and Liturgy.” 5  Dhôtel, Origines du catéchisme moderne, 13, 17.

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efficacy of the sacraments. The bishop was expected to closely supervise the parish priests, who in turn were to offer catechism lessons in a language and manner that the parishioners could understand.6 Jesuit Peter Canisius published a larger catechism in 1555 and a shorter version in the following year, and the Catechism of the Council of Trent first appeared in 1566. Robert Bast asserts that the catechism of the Council of Trent and the one authored by Canisius were the first ones to challenge Luther’s in the years after the Reformation. Canisius’s short catechism spread along with the Jesuit order in the sixteenth century, and appeared in more than two hundred editions in twenty-five languages between its initial publication in 1556 and the author’s death in 1597.7 One edition of Canisius’s catechism was even published in Annecy for the Diocese of Geneva.8 The Catechism of the Council of Trent established the pattern for future Catholic catechisms, yet none was more influential in the Catholic camp than those of Cardinal Robert Bellarmine.9 According to the latter’s biographer James Brodrick, Cardinal Francesco Maria Tarugi asked Bellarmine to write out his method of catechizing during the papacy of Clement VIII, which coincided with the beginning of parish reform in the Diocese of Geneva.10 Bellarmine completed his small catechism, Compendium of Christian Doctrine (Dottrina Christiana breve) in 1597, and the next year completed a larger one entitled An Explanation of Christian Doctrine written in the form of a Dialogue, for the use of those who teach it to children and to other simple people to serve as a teaching manual for clergy. Both were published initially on 15 July 1598 and were translated into French in 1600. Brodrick claims that Bellarmine’s catechisms were the only ones François de Sales used in his diocese.11 Certainly Charles-Auguste de Sales asserted this view in the biography of his uncle, and it is evident from de Sales’s correspondence that he favored Bellarmine’s method.12  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 24th sess., chap. 7, p. 197.  Bast, Honor Your Fathers, 196–97. 8  Dhôtel, Origines du catéchisme moderne, 80–81. 9  Clark, Thinking with Demons, 500; and Brodrick, Life and Work of Cardinal Bellarmine, 1:390. 10  Tarugi was a member of the Oratory and was an active reformer. For more on Tarugi, see Wright, Early Modern Papacy, 86–88; and Donnelly, “Congregation of the Oratory,” 195–204. 11  Brodrick, Life and Work of Cardinal Bellarmine, 1:390, 395–96. 12  F. de Sales to Peter Canisius, 21 July 1595, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:143; Peter de Villars, Archbishop of Vienne, 15 February 1609, in ibid., 14:115; and C-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux, 1:370. 6 7

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One of the significant changes formal catechization brought to both confessions was the shift from the seven deadly sins to the Ten Commandments as a morality system. According to John Bossy, the Decalogue was helpful in the education of the laity because it was more precise in its declarations of right and wrong, and thus allowed church leaders to place more emphasis on offenses against God.13 Stuart Clark finds that Catholic leaders like Bellarmine viewed the Ten Commandments as “the best possible statement of Christian laws, on the grounds of its authorship, antiquity, universality, immutability, necessity, and solemnity.”14 Furthermore, catechists singled out the first commandment for particular consideration because it focused Christians on their relationship with God and denounced anything that interfered with the bond between God and man. Clark notes that Cardinal Bellarmine pointed to infidels and witches as individuals who violated the first commandment.15 Because catechisms contained explanations of particular points of doctrine and the meaning of the sacraments, catechetical instruction was a crucial method for both Protestants and Catholics to distinguish their faith from that of their rivals. Though Martin Luther and Robert Bellarmine envisioned heads of households catechizing their children and servants, both confessions soon realized that the clergy were better equipped for teaching doctrine. Raymond Mentzer finds that in France, laypeople who were members of Protestant consistories were involved in religious training.16 In most places, it was enough of a challenge for church officials just to convince parents to send their children for catechism instruction.17 For the Catholic reform movement, it was left entirely to the clergy to figure out how to use catechisms to make doctrine accessible to young children with little or no education. Catechisms present doctrine topically in the form of questions and answers. In Bellarmine’s short catechism, the teacher asked the questions of the pupil, while in the larger one, the pupil asked the instructor questions. While the two versions of Bellarmine’s catechism were composed for populations with different levels of

 Bossy, “Moral Arithmetic,” 215–17.  Clark, Thinking with Demons, 503. 15  Ibid., 501, 507. 16  Mentzer, “Printed Catechism and Religious Instructions,” 95. 17   Bossy, Christianity in the West, 119. 13 14

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knowledge, both taught Catholic doctrine through the “three theological virtues”: faith, demonstrated through the Apostle’s Creed; hope, through the Our Father and Hail Mary; and charity, through the Ten Commandments and the sacraments. The little catechism also addressed practical issues such as those associated with receiving the sacraments, even telling what to do if the Host became stuck to the roof of the mouth.18 The clear and direct explanation of doctrine and a straightforward teaching method made Bellarmine’s catechisms popular throughout Catholic Europe. Proper teaching of the catechism was of great interest to the Diocese of Geneva. After the initial spread of printed catechisms, there was increased attention paid to the method of instruction. Antonio Possevino addressed teaching the catechism in a widely circulated letter that he included in a later published work. Dhôtel notes that Possevino wrote De theologia catechetica sive de juvandis Domesticis fidei while in Padua during the same time he was confessor to de Sales. De Sales’s time in Padua and relationship with Possevino places him at the center of the spread of catechetical instruction.19 Bishop de Sales’s commitment to implementing the catechism can be seen in his efforts to transmit new methods for religious instruction, especially those that originated with members of the Jesuits and the Oratory. His colleagues, such as JeanPierre Camus, who became bishop of Belley, continued their mentor’s commitment to teaching the catechism. According to the instructions handed down at the annual diocesan synods for Geneva, teaching the catechism to the young was a curés most important ministry. François de Sales provided a clear example by teaching the catechism personally in Annecy.20 The catechism was to include the commandments of God and the Catholic Church, rules concerning the reception of the sacraments, and the proper method and use of prayer. The synods recommended using the catechisms both of Cardinal Robert Bellarmine and from the Council of Trent if a parish had “heretics” as neighbors. Heads of households were to be made aware that it was a mortal sin not to have their children and servants instructed in Christian doctrine.21 In  Brodrick, Life and Work of Cardinal Bellarmine, 391–92.  Dhôtel, Origines du catéchisme moderne, 117–18, 176. 20  F. de Sales to Baronne Jeanne de Chantal 11 February 1607, in de Sales, Œuvres, 13:266. De Sales mentioned in the letter that he had just completed teaching the catechism to the children. 21  D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales, 181–87. 18 19

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the eyes of the Catholic bishops, the close proximity of Geneva made effective catechizing in the parishes even more essential. Charles-Auguste de Sales described the method his uncle used in catechism lessons and its emphasis on catechizing the young. De Sales’s method was to call the people together by ringing the church bell sometime before vespers at a time convenient for the parishioners. The priest should wait at the door for people bringing children because it gave the priest the opportunity to teach the proper greeting; the salutation included saying “God give us peace” and forming the sign of the cross with holy water. The children were to recite the Lord’s Prayer and a Hail Mary; those who did not know them were to make the sign of the cross in front of the main altar before going to sit down. The priest should allow two hours for the catechism, and the classes should be held in a church or school.22 John Calvin also created an afternoon Sunday worship that focused on catechization of children.23 Since Sunday was a day of rest, children should have been free from work obligations. The ever-practical François de Sales ordained that a catechism instructor should have no more than four to six students; thus the head priest should have several clergy to help with the catechism, but he should carefully observe them to ensure they were capable of instructing. Initially, the children were to listen and observe in silence, but after several weeks of classes, they should attempt disputation. Prior to a formal disputation, the priest should recite the oration traditionally made before a dispute, and once the students had participated in disputations during class, they were to go somewhere public to demonstrate what they had learned. The priest was to offer the audience a brief explanation of the process and the doctrine to be disputed. The children would then recite their assigned parts; some asked questions while others responded.24 After this public display, someone was to read from “the small constitution of good morals” for all those present, followed by an oration, and finally make a list of who was absent and ill. The students should then return to the church where the priest would instruct them to remember what they had learned and to return to the church on the next holiday at a specified hour so they might display their new knowledge. Children  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 1:370.  Mentzer, “Laity and Liturgy,” 84. 24  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 1:370–71. 22 23

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who had been especially diligent would receive a reward of some sort, but the priest reminded all that they could do better. The catechism class ended with a sermon from the priest. In an attempt to have oversight of the catechism classes throughout the parish, the bishop wanted each teacher to send a representative monthly to report to the bishop on the progress of inculcation.25 It is hard to believe that this level of diocesan supervision would have been feasible for many of the parishes, since the vast majority had only one priest with no curate and the geography of the region frequently made travel impractical. From the evidence offered by the visitations, it seems that the diocese began making a tentative effort to implement the catechism at the parish level during the episcopate of François de Sales. The accounts from de Sales’s first tour of his diocese made only two references to the catechism. During the visit to Lompnieu, he enjoined the curé to teach the catechism to the children on Sundays in the manner ordained by the former bishop, Claude de Granier, and at Thônes, he ordered the parish priest to employ three curates who could teach the catechism “according to the synods.”26 In the tour of the sixty-eight French parishes in 1614, only the visitation account for the parish of Echallon included an order for the priest “to teach the catechism.”27 Commencing with the visitation of the parishes located in the duchy of Chablais in 1617 to 1622, the reports addressed the catechism in virtually all of the villages. The duchy’s proximity to Geneva and its confessional boundaries, still fragile after the mission project, made teaching the catechism a greater priority there than in other parts of the diocese. Most parishes did not appear to be teaching the catechism to the satisfaction of the diocesan officials, because out of the twenty-seven parishes visited during this period, reports for only five mentioned the curés holding catechism classes and fourteen claimed no such classes occurred. The reasons given for this failure varied among the parishes. In Bernex, the blame fell upon the priest who was enjoined to hold catechism lessons, “such being the desire of the people.”28 In Feternes, the laity took the blame as the curé offered “to do the catechism,” but the parishioners  Ibid., 1:372.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:375, 671. 27  “d’enseigner le catechism.” Ibid., 1:418. 28  “tel estant le desir du peuple.” Ibid., 1:263. 25 26

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responded that they could not attend because they lived too far away. Nevertheless the bishop ordered the priest to hold the classes and for the people to attend.29 The visitor did not find distance a good excuse for laity not to be properly catechized because most parishes held the classes after Sunday mass, which all faithful Catholics were expected to attend. Sometimes the priest’s lack of training or skill was the cause for there being no classes, as in Chevenoz where the visitation account cites the “ineffectiveness of the curé” as the reason for no catechism training.30 In this case, the visitor gave no order to hold the catechism, since it was believed that improper instruction in Catholic doctrine could be as harmful as ignorance. In many cases, the parishioners and curés played a blame game over who was responsible for the failure to have catechism instruction. In most of the villages, the parishioners who talked with the visitor appeared willing to attend the catechism lessons. It is impossible to know whether the villagers told the diocesan visitor they wanted the catechism because that is what he wanted to hear or whether they really desired instruction in Catholic doctrine. Most villagers wanted to be good Catholics, but catechism classes took precious time away from a rare day of rest. For the two parishes where there were catechism lessons, the visitor complimented the priests in the visitation account and wrote that the classes were “to the contentment of the parishioners.”31 Yet despite de Sales’s dedication, implementation at the parish level remained a daunting task. When Jean-François de Sales became bishop in 1622, the nagging problem of the catechism remained. Out of the twenty-two parish visits conducted by the younger de Sales between August 1626 and May 1627, sixteen visitation reports contained injunctions ordering the curé to teach the catechism, four made reference to the catechism in the duties of the priest, and two made no mention of it at all.32 It is questionable whether the curé held catechism lessons in the four parishes where the visitor listed it under the duties of the priest. Two of the four parishes made no reference to any injunctions for the curé, which

 Ibid., 1:298–99.  “a cause de l’impuissance du curé.” Ibid., 1:285. 31  Ibid., 1:259, 266. The catechism was taught in Abondance and Le Biot. 32  ADHS, 2MI82: Visites pastorales...1623–1635. There are twenty-four parish visits in this visitation ledger, but the first two, Seyssel and Rumilly, were not made in conjunction with other visits. 29 30

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means that the scribe may have included them with the duties.33 By this point the onus appears to have been placed primarily upon the priest, with Jean-François de Sales including the order for the catechism with the injunctions for the curé rather than the ones for the parishioners, whereas in the earlier visits both parties were held accountable. It is not completely clear whether this was truly a shift in the responsibility for the instruction or just a change in recording. In contrast to the visits conducted during the tenure of François de Sales, where the accounts often include the reasons for there being no instruction, Jean-François de Sales was silent on why there was no catechism. After two decades of issuing injunctions, the bishop probably believed there was no justifiable excuse for the lack of instruction. In parish after parish, the bishop enjoined the priest to hold the catechism every Sunday. It is open to debate whether the failure of this reform was due more to an unwilling clergy or an unwilling laity, but most likely it was a combination of both. Nevertheless, the unsuccessful implementation of the catechism reflects a lack of support for such reforms at the local level. The catechism did not offer laypeople the same sort of spiritual fulfillment as a mass or a procession might and was not an activity that had a high priority in their already busy lives.

Confession

Church leaders hoped that education through the catechism would bring about a more devout flock who would understand the importance of observing the sacraments in attaining salvation. Annual confession had been the standard goal of church leaders since the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 and Trent reaffirmed this tenet.34 The yearly confession normally took place during Lent and was required before participating in Easter communion.35 There is debate among scholars as to the level of social control general confession fostered within a community.36 Certainly the Catholic Church wanted to encourage behavior deemed appropriate for the period, but since its origin, Christianity has always 33  ADHS, 2MI82: Visites pastorales...1623–1635, fol. 110 (parish of Cons-Saints-Colombe), fol. 230 (parish of Dérée). 34  Bériou, “Autour de Latran IV (1215),” 73–74. 35  For a complete discussion of sin and penance, see Bossy, Christianity in the West, 45–46. 36  Both John Bossy in several works, including Christianity in the West and “Social History of Confession in the Age of Reformation,” and Thomas N. Tentler, Sin and Confession on the Eve of the Reformation, engage in the debate over the issue of social control and the Catholic Church.

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been involved in modeling acceptable behavior for society. As Hervé Martin notes, confessor manuals reflected the social issues of the time, and confession could be both a tool to “control the collective behavior” and “a personal affair.”37 By the sixteenth century, there is an increasing distinction between an annual general confession at Easter and private confession, with the general confession being more for venial sins and teaching the laity about examining his/her conscience.38 The Reformers challenged the scriptural basis of confession, but still wanted tools to regulate people’s actions. As Philippe Denis observes, there were similarities between confession and the new Reformed discipline, especially when it came to encouraging appropriate behavior within a community.39 While the framers of Trent hoped that the Catholic faithful would regularly examine their consciences and confess their sins, especially their mortal ones, more often than annually if necessary, church leaders realized that the majority of Catholics would only confess once a year.40 But to encourage more frequent confession, Catholic leaders took steps to make the sacrament more accessible and more private. The confessional as a structure is associated with post-Tridentine Catholicism. While the first confessional appeared shortly before the Council of Trent, Carlo Borromeo was the first to offer specific dimensions for the structure, and his writings were crucial to its spread.41 His Instructions aux confessuers de sa ville et de son diocèse was important not only to the clergy in the archdiocese of Milan, but also heavily influenced confession manuals in France.42 The synodal statutes of 1584 for Carpentras are the earliest records from north of the Alps to make mention of the confessional. By the middle of the seventeenth century, many of the dioceses of France required that churches have confessionals.43 The statutes from the synods of Geneva followed the instructions of Borromeo concerning construction and called for each parish to have one or two

 “contrôle des comportements collectifs.” Martin, “Confession et contrôle social,” 129, 133. Martin examines the major arguments of Tentler. 38  Le Maître, “Pratique et signification de la confession communautaire,” 154. 39  Denis, “Remplacer la confession,” 174. 40  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 14th sess., chap. 5, pp. 92–94. 41  Voelker, “Borromeo’s Influence on Art and Architecture,” 179. 42  Bernos, “Saint Charles Borromée et ses ‘Instructions aux confessuers,’” 186–87. 43  Venard, “Influence of Carlo Borromeo,” 219–20. 37

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confessionals.44 François de Sales did not appear overly concerned with confessionals in his initial tour of his diocese; he issued only two injunctions, calling for the parishes of Menthon and St. Felix to build seats for confession. St. Felix was given the option of providing seats or confessional booths.45 Conceivably most parishes already had a serviceable place to hold confession, and building confessionals may have been too much of a financial burden coupled with the other expenditures expected. These were after all very poor parishes, and the majority of the visits ordered numerous repairs to church buildings and priests’ dwellings, as well as the purchase of basic supplies. Confessionals were not at the top of the list yet. The concern for such structures increased over the tenure of François de Sales. In the visit to the parishes of the duchy of Chablais (1617– 22), reports from nine of the parish visits made mention of the sacrament of confession, and six of the accounts have injunctions ordering the parish to build one or two confessionals. The visitors ordered the parish of La Thouviere to make two confessionals in the initial visit of 1617 and again in the follow-up visits of 1620 and 1621.46 Only two inventories make explicit reference to confessionals: the inventory of Saint-Gingolph listed a confessional near the high altar, and the inventory of Marin stated that no confessional existed.47 Most likely priests offered the sacrament even without a confessional, but the priest of Larringes was told to make himself available “to hear the penitents in confession.” While parishioners were unwilling to provide the funds for the confessional structures, they did want the sacrament available. The visit account of Publier mentioned that some people from neighboring villages received the sacraments from the curé of Publier when they were ill but went to Marin to confess at Easter.48 Confession in two different places violated the delineated boundaries of the parish, and reformers wanted the laity to receive all its sacraments from the same parish priest.

 D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales, 17.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:418, 537. François de Sales visited Menthon in October 1607 and St. Felix in June 1606. 46  Ibid., 1:299 (Feternes); 321, 324, 325 (Marin); 333 (Morzine); 368 (Thollon); 372 (La Thouviere); and 383 (Vacheresse). 47  Ibid., 1:321, 351. 48  Ibid., 1: 308, 348. 44 45

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Bishop Jean-François de Sales continued to address confession and confessionals during his tenure. The visit to Bonnevaux in the summer of 1624 mentioned that the parish still held communal confession during Easter, and the injunctions issued to Le Biot and Vallier included orders to build confessionals. The visitation account for St. Nicolas Véroce from August 1626 contained orders to both the priest and parish to construct a confessional.49 Since confessionals were not necessary to receive the sacraments, they did not receive the same emphasis as other improvements to the church structure, but the bishops did try slowly to introduce them and the private confession into parishes.

Excommunication

Beyond providing proper instruction to the laity, priests were supposed to convey to their flock other parish responsibilities, many of them financial. If appealing to the religious devotion of the parish members failed to convince them of their duties, then visitors often used the threat of punishment. Excommunication had long been the most powerful disciplinary tool of the Catholic Church because it took away the victim’s access to the sacraments and thus all hope of salvation. Elisabeth Vodola traces the origin of excommunication to the curse, which “entailed social exclusion,” pointing out that “in a community whose members depended on one another for the necessities, social ostracism might itself mean death.”50 The biblical foundation for excommunication is found in the Gospel of Matthew, where a Christian is to admonish a sinner, in public if necessary. As the church developed the process and it was shaped by pope, jurist, and king, “severance of the relation of individual and group remained the essence of excommunication.”51 With the advent of the Reformation, however, exclusion from the church and Catholic community no longer held the same power. With multiple confessions came various paths to salvation, and exclusion from one community could send an individual into the hands of a rival faith, especially in a region like the one under study where confessions competed for members. The Council of Trent recognized the negative ramifications of excommunication and called for it to be used sparingly. 49  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fols. 106, 122, 137; and ADHS, 2MI81: Visites pastorales...1626, fol. 150. 50  Vodola, Excommunication in the Middle Ages, 2. 51  Ibid., 5–6, 191.

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The framers of Trent acknowledged that in the past when the punishment was used too quickly or for petty reasons, its power was greatly diminished; they viewed excommunication as the punishment of last resort for only the most serious of offenses. An excommunicated person was to be excluded not only from the sacraments, but from all interactions with other Catholics. Once the sentence had been handed down, however, the individual was expected to repent or risked being accused of heresy.52 According to the institutions of the diocesan synods, the clergy were to use excommunication only in the most serious offenses, and fines were the preferred punishment.53 In the Diocese of Geneva, excommunication or even the threat of it was a rare occurrence. Out of the 303 parishes and 53 annexes visited by François de Sales during his tour of his diocese from 1605 to 1610, only nine parishes received threats of excommunication, but almost every visit contained an order or a threat of a fine. The transgressions listed in the visits of de Sales concerned the clergy and laity in almost equal number and the laity were enjoined as individuals and groups. Neither church nor legislative records provide much evidence that the penalty was carried out with any frequency. One case appeared before the Senate of the Savoy in 1679. In 1619, Duke Charles-Emmanuel I had given the Barnabites of Annecy the proceeds from a tax on meat sold within the city to support their newly established college. By the 1670s, at least one butcher was not turning over this money and the Barnabites filed a grievance with the Senate, who upheld the privilege and ruled against the butcher, claiming that the tax was for the maintenance of the college. The butcher was excommunicated.54 This case appears to have been a rarity, and the guilty party was expelled from the Catholic Church only after the violation of a royal proclamation of the duke and conviction by the Senate. Excommunication was a public and painful process to be avoided if at all possible. Visitors did not hesitate to use the threat of excommunication, but were rarely willing to carry it out. One has to wonder how much fear the threat ultimately held if the penalty was almost never fully imposed within the diocese.  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 25th sess. (pp. 235–36).  D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales, 123. 54  ADS, B2059: Barnabites d’Annecy. 52 53

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Sacred Space

If there was one subject of ongoing conflict between the bishop and the laity, it was the furnishing and repairs of the church. All three bishops faced parishes that did not see the link between devotion and clean linens, new missals, and undamaged images, and the visitation accounts are full of this conflict. For Catholicism, the church was the center of eucharistic devotion, and as a result, “the objects surrounding and in contact with the body of Christ had to be purified.”55 François de Sales enjoined the parish of Chavornay to furnish chasubles, linens, and other articles necessary for the priest to perform the sacraments and to repair the church nave and doors in six months or risk a fine of twenty-five livres and excommunication.56 The parishioners of Vongnes were ordered to provide a container to place on the high altar for the Blessed Sacrament, to repaint the image of their patron saint Eugen, and to purchase a missal, chasuble, stole, and maniple. These same injunctions had been given by François de Sales in the preceding visit; this time, the parish had six months to complete these tasks or risk a fine of ten livres and excommunication.57 Parishes frequently failed to fulfill injunctions from previous visits concerning repairs to church property, and the next visitor normally repeated the injunction without carrying out any penalty. Pollieu faced a hundred livres fine and excommunication, while Lavours risked twenty livres and excommunication over repairs to the church building. The parishioners of Lavours were told to use the revenue from a Holy Spirit confraternity for church repairs, and the visitor gave both parishes three months to fulfill the injunctions.58 Parishioners preferred to ignore injunctions that came with financial obligations, but spoke up if they thought something was not their responsibility. The injunctions of 1607 to the parish of Chêne-en-Semine ordered the parishioners to furnish a banner to hang over the main altar, but they protested that the prior of St. Nicolas was responsible for it.59All these cases demonstrate a debate between diocesan officials and parishioners over how sacred space should be treated. The visitor believed existing funds should be

 Bruening, Calvinism’s First Battleground, 103.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:175. 57  Ibid., 1:466, 2:765. The stole, chasuble, and maniple are priestly vestments worn during services. 58  Ibid., 1:460, 463. 59  Ibid., 2:177–78; “un confaron” was a banner over the main altar. 55 56

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used to refurbish the physical properties, while the laity did not feel a need for pristine church properties to commune with the sacred. Yet the laity wanted divine services, and it was quite willing to request them from the bishop. When de Sales visited the French parish of Grand Albergement in 1605, two local elites complained that vespers were not being held on holy days, and both were willing to donate funds to ensure that the services took place; Jean Charpy agreed to give two-hundred florins and Pierre Bertet, fifty florins. The bishop allowed this foundation and a royal notary present at the visit authorized it.60 In Petit Albergement, the parishioners requested that they be allowed to celebrate the parish’s dedication day on the Sunday after Low Sunday and the bishop agreed.61 Parishioners viewed church services as much more important for their salvation and central to their lives than a welldecorated sanctuary, so while they often resisted providing monetary support for repairs, they were more willing to support a mass. A visitor sometimes had to address issues over properties that were not exclusively religious. The prior of St. Paul complained that the parishioners had three bell towers that they rang indiscriminately. The prior wanted a designated parishioner hired to ring the bell only for divine services. In a follow-up visit, the parishioners claimed that they wanted to continue to ring the bell as was customary in the village.62 This conflict between priory and parishioners demonstrates how local traditions could clash with ideas of religious observance. In Bernex, a local lord reportedly redirected a stream, an operation that shut off access to land that belonged to the priest’s benefice. The visitor told the curé to order the lord to return the water to its original course and to seek the help of the local syndics if the lord refused.63 The visitor viewed the lord’s action as not only a danger to the priest’s livelihood, but also a challenge to the church’s authority in the village. In trying to gain control over all aspects of parish life, no matter concerning property was beyond the bounds of reformers.

 Ibid., 2:17–18.  Ibid., 2: 20. Low Sunday or Quasimodo, was the Sunday after Easter in the Catholic liturgical calendar. 62  Ibid., 1:363–64. 63  Ibid., 1:264. 60 61

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Chapels and Altars

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Chapels and altars remained an important outlet for lay devotion during the early modern period, and the visitation records provide excellent information on the state of these spaces of lay devotion. The records typically include accounts of the physical condition of the structures, inventories, lists of revenues, names of the patrons and rectors, and registers of the services performed. All the bishops who are part of this study concerned themselves with the chapels and altars of each parish, attempting to make them fitting places for worship. The visitors issued injunctions for repairs and items needed, and even threatened patrons and rectors with deprivation of the chapel if they failed to fulfill the orders. Unique issues emerged because each rector, patron, and village had their own issues and the visitor had to judge each parish accordingly, with the overarching goal of improving the physical state of sacred spaces. The parishes held chapels of varying states. When François de Sales entered the village of Bonne in September of 1606, he found thirteen chapels in terrible shape. Few were holding services and most were without rectors or revenue. A Marian chapel had both a patron and a rector, but the patron asked the visitor to name a new rector since the current one no longer lived in the area. Bishop de Sales described one chapel in the village as “entirely lacking habits and ornaments.” From the rest of the account, it is evident that Bonne had suffered from the armed conflicts of the region; the account even mentions a house ruined by war in the list of revenue.64 The account of Claude de Granier’s visit to Bonne from September 1580 reveals some of the chapels needing repairs and lacking a patron or rector, but the situation clearly deteriorated further between that visit and the one of François de Sales twenty-six years later.65 Jean-François de Sales’s visit in 1631 found the chapels of Bonne still in need of improvement, and he issued a general injunction to all the chapel patrons and the syndics of the town enjoining them to get the chapels in order.66 Once a village had seen extensive destruction, it was difficult for its inhabitants to find the means to restore the place. On the other hand, the visit to Combloux in July 1606 revealed five chapels all with patron, revenue, and rector; most had decent furnishings  Ibid., 2:105–8.  ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582, fol. 80. 66  ADHS, 2MI83: Visites pastorales...1631–1635, fols. 52–53. 64 65

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and held the required services.67 The majority of the parishes possessed chapels that fell somewhere in between Bonne and Combloux, neither all ruined nor all in good shape. Creating a clearly defined and well-furnished sacred place was the central theme that guided the bishops’ approach to parish chapels. Diocesan leaders strove to revitalize chapels that had revenue, but they also wanted to rid the parish churches of those not properly endowed, decorated, or in an unsuitable place. The bishops frequently warned parishes that if chapels were not adequately funded and services conducted, they would be pulled down and the revenue added to the main altar. The parish of Allonzier was told to move services from an unconsecrated altar to the main one.68 Depending on the specific circumstances, patrons or rectors were normally given one to three months to fulfill injunctions. The standard method for a chapel with an unknown patron, rector, or revenue was for the curé to mention the chapel from the pulpit for three consecutive Sundays and see if anyone knew its history. If no one came forward, the chapel was pulled down and any ornaments were given to the parish.69 In the process of restoring chapels, visitors sometimes uncovered thefts of church property. As stealing violated a commandment of the Decalogue, Christianity had long viewed it as an especially grave sin. The Council of Trent ordained that anyone who stole church property or misused church revenue could be anathematized until restoration of the item.70 A parishioner from Veyrier du Lac, Claude Ducrest, was ordered to restore a chalice to a chapel in two weeks or risk excommunication.71 Jean Rosetain found a chapel in the French parish of Hauteville in a state of disrepair because members of the community had taken the goods and revenue of the chapel. He ordered the inhabitants of Hauteville to provide donations for repairs to the chapel and issued a warning to those who harbored goods and revenue belonging to the chapel that he would “fulminate excommunication against them.”72 Most charges  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:206–7.  Ibid., 2:28. 69  This was the common method in both the visits of Bishops François de Sales and JeanFrançois de Sales including the visits to Chilly and Frangy in 1607 and to Thonon and Concise in 1624. Ibid., 2:188, 306; and ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fols. 4, 9. 70  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 22nd sess., chap. 11 (p. 158). 71  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:732. 72  Ibid., 1:427. 67 68

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against parishioners concerning the chapels were not so serious and concerned neglect rather than actual malfeasance. Sometimes patrons simply needed a little scrutiny to be motivated to fulfill their duties. In the parish of Amancy, there was a chapel dedicated to the Virgin Mary and St. Peter that was properly furnished and had a patron named Pierre Dumonal, but lacked a rector. The visitor gave Dumonal a month to find a rector, but the patron immediately suggested the curate from the parish of La Roche as the chapel’s new rector.73 A similar instance occurred in Chanay where the curé was nominated on the spot as rector of a chapel.74 The parish of Andilly possessed a chapel described as almost falling down, and François de Sales told the parish to remedy this situation in a month or the chapel would be razed. Local parishioner François Fusier stepped forward and offered to act as patron of the chapel; the offer was accepted “in the presence and with the consent of the syndics and parishioners.”75 Diocesan officials appear to have preferred restoring chapels to tearing them down, and often an appeal to religious and civic obligations was enough incentive for a patron to take responsibility. At other times, the bishops were forced to resort to stronger measures with reluctant patrons. In the visitation account from 1605 for Vovray-en-Michaille, the patrons of the chapels were enjoined to justify their rights and titles and to name rectors in six weeks because four of five chapels had no revenue or rector. If the patrons did not fulfill the bishop’s orders, the chapels were to be declared vacant and united along with their revenue to the main altar. The chapels would then be torn down and the materials made property of the parish church.76 Two families of Feternes were ordered to repair their pews in the parish church; when on a follow-up visit, it was found that the families still had not performed the repairs, the visitor told the curé to involve civil authorities and a local seigneur to assist in enforcing the injunctions.77 In Larringes, the bishop ordered a man who was a châtelain and notary deprived of his burial chapel because he refused repeated orders to

 Ibid., 2:29–30.  Ibid., 2:152. 75  “en presence et du consentement desdicts scindicq et parrochains.” Ibid. 2:31–32. 76  Ibid., 2:59. 77  Ibid., 1:303. 73 74

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make repairs to another chapel.78 When Jean Rosetain visited the French parish of Champfromier in 1614, he gave the patron of the Chapel of St. Sebastian three months to make repairs or be denied burial there.79 With civic leadership positions came certain duties and responsibilities, so if a family founded a chapel or altar, the church expected the patron to decorate and maintain it for the veneration of God. By not maintaining their chapels, local elites failed to uphold their proper position in the community or the integrity of sacred space. Sometimes conflict over sacred space arose among parishioners concerning the chapels of their churches. In Bonneville, a problem existed between the syndics of the nearby village of Ayse and the Monet brothers over burial in a chapel dedicated to SS. Peter and Paul. Charles du Monet claimed that his family had the right to be buried in the chapel, but the syndics of Ayse asserted that the chapel was only for them. Monet claimed he had proof that the chapel was exclusively for his family, but the visitor did not believe his claim and “exhorted” Monet to be satisfied with burial outside the chapel. Clearly, the status of burial place remained important to elites. Also in Bonneville, two families claimed the rights to a Chapel of St. Antoine, and the village of Annemasse, a center of the diocese’s missionary activities in the 1590s, had two people who wanted to be patron of the Chapel of the Holy Trinity.80 In the parish of Ruffieu, several chapels had patronage problems. The services of a Marian chapel had been moved to the Chapel of St. John the Baptist, but the patron of that chapel, Claude Chablod, was not fulfilling his duties. He was ordered to assume responsibility for the chapel because his “predecessors” had founded it; even though he opposed this obligation, he was ordered to offer proof of his rights to the chapel in six months. Another chapel in Ruffieu dedicated to St. John the Baptist had no rector, revenue, or furnishings, but Claude Rolet, the châtelain of the Château de Neuf, offered to assume the chapel for his family.81 Ruffieu reveals families attempting to free themselves from the responsibility for chapels and others willing to embrace new obligations. The visitors were rarely able to order blanket reforms concerning chapels; rather they had  Ibid., 1:52.  Ibid., 2:415. 80  Ibid., 2:46, 112–13. 81  Ibid., 2:521. 78 79

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to examine each one to find a workable solution with the objective of creating a parish space suitable for devotion. Chapels of a parish could be fluid sacred spaces; new chapels continued to be established and new devotions emerged in the Diocese of Geneva at the beginning of the seventeenth century. The visit to Hotonnes revealed a new Chapel of St. Bernard with the Billod family as patron; the chapel was consecrated at the visit on 4 November 1605.82 The laity as a group took initiative with existing chapels as demonstrated in the village of Champfromier where the parishioners asked if the altar of a Marian chapel with no known rector, patron, or revenue could remain for their usage if they provided offerings. The bishop agreed on the condition that the laity furnish the chapel appropriately, since at the time of the visit it was deemed indecent; he further stipulated that if they failed these conditions, the altar was to be pulled down.83 The village of Pers also had a chapel without rector or revenue where devotions for deceased children were held.84 The parish of Echallon had four chapels with no rector or revenue, but the one dedicated to St. Claude was listed as “entertained by the parishioners, out of devotion.”85 Parishioners were proactive in defining their sacred places and devotions as they continued to maintain and to establish places of worship. The laity possessed its own expectations of the clergy and did not hesitate to let the visitor know if the clergy failed to fulfill their duties to chapels. In Epagny, a parish near Annecy, the procurator of the parish complained to François de Sales in 1608, on behalf of the syndics and parishioners, that the rector of the Chapel of St. Antoine had not held services and had let the chapel fall into ruin. The patrons of the chapel were the curé and parishioners of the village and the rector was Jehan Baudillion, curé of Cilingie. The procurer asked that the rector be enjoined to repair and furnish the chapel, and conduct the services. The rector responded to the charges, claiming that it was impossible to make the repairs with so little revenue, but de Sales ordered the rector to make the repairs in two months as he had been instructed in previous visits. Furthermore, if the rector failed to fulfill the injunction, the revenue of  Ibid., 2:342.  Ibid., 2:148. 84  “Sus les tribunes de Léglise il y a une chappelle de Nostre Dame, sans rectuer ny revenu, en laquelle se font plusiers devotions pour les enfants morts, et services pour les Trespasses.” Ibid., 2:493. 85  “entretenue par les parrochains, par dévotion.” Ibid., 2:256. 82 83

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the chapel would be seized for repairs. Baudillion opposed these orders, but the bishop ordained them anyway.86 Like the rest of the parish, chapels were a communal responsibility, and the bishops realized that both clergy and laity had to do their part for the chapels to thrive. The state of chapels of the diocese reveals a dynamic landscape that produced a lively debate among parish priest, visitor, and parishioners over what defines a sacred space and how it should be treated.

Confraternities

Lay confraternities of the Catholic faith have long sparked the interest of scholars exploring the communal nature of religion, but their varied roles in early modern Catholicism needs further investigation. Historians generally assert that the Catholic clergy, armed with the Council of Trent, encouraged confraternities dedicated to the Eucharist and the rosary and discouraged or even suppressed groups that had flourished in the Middle Ages, such as those devoted to the Holy Spirit.87 Other scholars have focused on the political nature of confraternities at the expense of their spiritual purposes, such as with confraternities connected with the French Catholic League.88 Ann W. Ramsey sees a link between the “Catholic activism” of the Holy Sacrament confraternities in Paris during the time of the Catholic League and the growth of a French national identity.89 Despite the apparent abundance of confraternities, the authors of Trent specifically mentioned confraternities only twice. One canon stated that the bishops had the authority to visit “all manners of hospitals, colleges, and confraternities of laymen.” The other decree called for an annual accounting of the finances of all church institutions, including confraternities.90 Certainly other canons and decrees from Trent are applicable to lay confraternities, most notably those concerning the proper veneration of saints, relics, and images. In one session, the Council of Trent ordained that the laity should be instructed in the proper “intercession and invocation of saints, the veneration of relics, and the legitimate uses of images.” Additionally, all profit, superstition, reveling, and drunkenness associated

 Ibid., 2:270.  Gutton, “Confraternities, Cures and Communities,” 206–7. 88  Harding, “Mobilization of Confraternities”; and Torre, “Politics Cloaked in Worship.” 89  Ramsey, “From Ontology to Religious Experience,” 141. 90  Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 22nd sess. (pp. 156–57). 86 87

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with processions and pilgrimages were to be abolished.91 Many of the specific disciplinary actions imposed on confraternities seem to have emerged from individual diocesan synods rather than originating with the Council of Trent. One of the most influential reformers of confraternities was the archbishop of Milan, Carlo Borromeo, whose efforts to bring confraternities under episcopal supervision served as an example to future bishops.92 During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, church officials aspired both to revitalize fraternal organizations within parishes and to more closely monitor their activities. These two tasks, however, were not always compatible; the confraternities most popular among the laity were frequently the ones most resistant to clerical interference in their devotional activities.93 The Diocese of Geneva provides a good place to explore the state of confraternities during the transition from medieval Catholicism to the form of worship encouraged during the Catholic Reformation. The three bishops of the diocese included in this study, as avid proponents of Tridentine reform, were quite active in the establishment of new confraternities. Religious brotherhoods were institutions important to every level of Catholic society, and an examination of their state during this crucial period of reform can offer insight into postTridentine lay spirituality as well as the often-complex relationships between the various ranks of the clergy and the laity. When studying any institution of the past, it is useful to have a definition in mind. In his work on confraternities in Italy, Christopher Black broadly defines a confraternity or sodality as “a voluntary association of people who come together under the guidance of certain rules to promote their religious life in common.”94 This general definition certainly encompasses the brotherhoods of the area under investigation, and the visitation records of the Diocese of Geneva reveal a wide variety of confraternities present in the Alpine region. The accounts from François de Sales’s grand tour of his diocese between 1605 and 1610 mention brotherhoods dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament and the Holy Rosary in almost equal number. The visitation reports still make references  Ibid., 25th sess. (pp. 215–17).  Bossy, “Counter-Reformation and the People of Europe,” 59. 93  Christopher Black found that existing and very independent fraternities in Italy opposed pastoral visitations by a bishop; “Confraternities and the Parish,” 9. 94  Black, Italian Confraternities, 1. 91 92

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to the older Holy Spirit confraternities, including several registered as inactive, but none of the Holy Spirit sodalities appears to have been singled out for suppression during the bishop’s visit. There were also various confraternities dedicated to individual saints present in the parishes in the decades prior to the Council of Trent; the confraternity of St. Julien in Menthon, a parish on the banks of Lake Annecy, was holding devotional activities as early as the first half of the sixteenth century.95 With a number of confraternities active in the diocese, no particular brotherhood appears to have dominated at the beginning of the seventeenth century. For the parish of Thônes, a representative example of the region, the account of the 1607 visit listed four active confraternities: a Holy Rosary, a Blessed Sacrament, one dedicated to St. Alex, and one dedicated to St. Crespin.96 The diocese contained old and new confraternities functioning side by side, often within the same parish. The diocesan officials certainly possessed specific expectations of the sodalities. The constitutions and instructions handed down by the synods of the diocese for the supervision of confraternities were clearly guided by the decrees of the Council of Trent, decrees that refocused the devotional activities of sodalities toward church sacraments and away from festive communal celebrations. The diocese wanted to bring the confraternities under tighter clerical control, and the clergy were to scrutinize the brotherhoods with “great vigor.” Creation and administration of all confraternities, including those of the regular clergy, required diocesan permission. There was to be an annual accounting of each group’s revenue in the presence of the curé, and any excess funds were to be used to “help the honest poor” and to “assist prisoners.”97 Scandalous living could get a confrere expelled from the ranks of a confraternity because the clergy believed that a bad reputation of one member would infect the others.98 Despite the official vigor of this oversight, evidence offered by the visitation accounts and other supporting documents reveal only a handful of confraternities consistently subjected to this intense scrutiny.

 Bortoli, “La Confrérie de Saint-Julien,” 32.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:671. 97  D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales, 44. 98  Ibid., 45. 95 96

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Synodal decrees provide evidence of clerical expectations, but offer only a glimpse of the structure and function of the sodalities. A better source for understanding the hierarchy and the sanctioned activities of the confraternities are their statutes. Tridentine reform required that all confraternities have written statutes that had been approved by the bishop, but few of these records are extant for the diocese. The two most complete are for confraternities established in the 1590s, and from these we can get some idea of what was envisioned by the clerical elite of the diocese for the post-Tridentine sodalities.99 When François de Sales was provost of the cathedral canons of the diocese, he established a confraternity of the Holy Cross in Annecy in 1593. The following year a confraternity in honor of the Five Wounds of Christ was founded in the parish of Talloires, a nearby parish also on the banks of Lake Annecy. Both brotherhoods appear to have modeled their statutes closely after other Tridentine groups, and François de Sales wrote the statutes for the one he started in Annecy.100 The founding of these new confraternities was authorized by the bishop, Claude de Granier, and the pope. Membership was open to all men and women who were of “good reputation” and the statutes make no mention of a set membership fee that would have precluded the poorer parishioners from joining. While many confraternities were open to women, their participation was probably more restricted. Black found that women were allowed to join confraternities in the fifteenth century, excluded in the next century, and then allowed to join again in the seventeenth century.101 It is hard to tell from the statutes and visitation accounts what roles women played in the confraternities, but they were members and presumably participated in the processions, confession, and communion. The cathedral canons of St. Peter supervised the confraternity of the Holy Cross in Annecy with one canon acting as first officer; a rector oversaw the confreres of Talloires. The clerical leader performed all divine services associated with the confraternity and was to resolve all quarrels between confreres and to choose those members who were to 99  ADS, B5419: Confreries, diocese de Geneve. The statutes for the confraternity of the Holy Cross in Annecy are summarized by C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 68–73. 100  F. de Sales to Antoine Fevre, around 28 May 1594, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:65–67, 67n1, provides the date of foundation for the confraternity. 101  Black, Italian Confraternities, 34–35.

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visit the ill and prisoners.102 Both sodalities followed the directive from Trent, at least on paper, that the primary control of the group should be in the hands of the clergy. The confraternity members elected lay officers who participated in the administration of the organization, but the ultimate arbiter of decisions was expected to be the clerical leader.103 These confraternities participated in a full range of religious activities, including processions and festivals on designated holy days. The Confraternity of the Holy Cross’s celebrations included feast days dedicated to the Holy Cross, to Sts. Peter and Paul, and to the conception of the Virgin, while the confreres dedicated to the five wounds of Christ celebrated Holy Thursday, and the days of St. Sebastian and the assumption of the Virgin. Members of the two groups were also expected to attend confession and mass at their altars on other days designated throughout the year. Both brotherhoods escorted the bodies of dead confreres to the churches and held requiem masses for the souls of the departed.104 One of the primary reasons people joined confraternities was to have the comfort of knowing that when they died, someone would accompany their bodies to the church and pray for their souls.105 When the confreres performed their various devotions, both the male and female members of the confraternity dressed in habits and marched in a solemn procession while chanting the litanies.106 The two sets of statutes stressed the Tridentine tenets of regular confession, Marian devotion, and eucharistic piety. Like so many of the devotional activities encouraged during the Catholic Reformation, the pious activities of these two confraternities focused on the Eucharist.107 Because the interpretation of the sacrament was a major point of disagreement between Protestants and Catholics, public devotions to the Blessed Sacrament affirmed the Catholic belief in the real presence and the centrality of the sacrament to the Catholic faith. Confraternities dedicated to the Eucharist spread throughout

 C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 71–72; and ADS, B5419.  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 73; and ADS, B5419. 104  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 68, 70–71; and ADS, B5419. 105  Flynn, Sacred Charity, 43. 106  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 68; and ADS, B5419. 107  Black, “Confraternities and the Parish,” 13. 102 103

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Catholic Christendom and served as an important communal bond.108 The confreres of the Holy Cross from Annecy were expected to display the Eucharist on their altar “publicly and honorably” and guard it all day on their days of celebration.109 The Eucharist became a focal point in regional and national struggles over both religion and politics, and “became a touchstone of attitudes towards community, family, virtue— and politics.”110 Thus the communal celebrations of this sacrament were a natural manifestation in Catholic parishes so close to Calvinist Geneva. Mortification of the flesh played an important role in penitential brotherhoods, especially those established in areas influenced by Protestantism.111 While both of these groups under discussion called themselves penitents, no evidence from the statutes reveals that either confraternity participated in any flagellation. This is not surprising considering the groups’ association with François de Sales, whose devotional writings and correspondence reveal his dislike of physical discipline. His advice to a nun who wanted to walk barefoot in the winter was that she should cover her feet and expose her heart.112 Andrew Barnes found that in Marseille, devotion to the cross and social welfare activities had mostly replaced self-flagellation by the middle of the seventeenth century.113 Bortoli found that Savoy contained only “a few rare associations that truly merited the name of penitent.”114 Rather discipline appears to have been tied to the confreres’ participation in the sacraments and commitment to pious living as stated in the rules of the organizations. In his study of confraternities in Bologna, Nicholas Terpstra points out that the statutes of such groups reflected the goals of and desires for the organizations, but the practices of confraternities could diverge from the statutes.115 In the case of the two sodalities discussed above, being in and around Annecy under the watchful eye of the bishop would certainly

108  Galpern, Religions of the People in Sixteenth-Century Champagne, 158; Rubin, Corpus Christi, 351–52; and Ramsay, “From Ontology to Religious Experience,” 139. 109  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 68. 110  Rubin, Corpus Christi, 347. 111  For a discussion of French penitents, see Barnes, “Religious Anxiety and Devotional Change”; Barnes, Social Dimension of Piety; and Schneider, “Mortification on Parade.” 112  F. de Sales to Baronne Chantal, mid-December 1609, in de Sales, Œuvres, 14:232. 113  Barnes, Social Dimension of Piety, 199–201. 114  Bortoli, “Confrérie de Saint-Julien,” 31. 115  Terpstra, Lay Confraternities and Civic Religion, 50.

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minimize some of the common problems found in other confraternities. The rest of the brotherhoods of the diocese did not receive the constant involvement of the church leaders from Annecy, and the sources reveal that most groups fell short of the reformers’ aspirations. For a confraternity to be successful, it had to provide devotional activities that appealed to the villagers. Having a variety of confraternities from which to choose allowed individuals to select one suitable to their devotional preferences and needs.116 Diocesan officials could face difficult obstacles when attempting to establish a new confraternity in the presence of a popular older group. The parish of Morzine offers an example of how the introduction of a new confraternity did not always attract the interest of the parishioners. The visitation account of 1617 listed a Blessed Sacrament brotherhood with no activity and a Holy Spirit brotherhood with annual activities of distributing proceeds from the sale of cheese to the poor, to the church for candles, and to the convent of Cluses as alms for masses on the day of St. Gregory. A follow-up visit of 1622 revealed a confraternity dedicated to the Holy Rosary that had been established on 4 July 1619.117 The Holy Rosary confraternity was introduced as a new alternative, one certainly encouraged by diocesan officials, but the established Holy Spirit brotherhood continued to perform its traditional devotional activities and remained popular with the parishioners. When Jean-François de Sales visited the parish in 1624, the Holy Spirit group was still offering its various alms and the Blessed Sacrament group was still dormant. The devotional activities of the new confraternity of the Holy Rosary included celebrating the days of the Virgin Mary, holding masses for the dead, and furnishing candles for the altar. The confreres were also ordered to make repairs to their altar.118 It is unclear whether the Blessed Sacrament brotherhood declined in popularity or the parishioners never embraced it, but this episode demonstrates that the laity was not a passive flock of sheep who allowed the clergy to dictate what was sacred and impose devotional practices at will. Even when a new sodality established by a clerical leader attracted the attention of the parishioners, it still had to compete with older traditions. The account of the visit to Evian in 1624 made mention of  Barnes, The Social Dimension of Piety, 27.  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:331, 334; and ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 127. 118  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 27. 116 117

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confraternities of St. Nicholas, St. André, and St. Joseph as well as one for the Blessed Sacrament that was established by François de Sales during the 1590s.119 The visitation report of 1617 mentioned that the brotherhood of the Blessed Sacrament had forty to fifty female members and twenty men, and the visitor claimed that the “confraternity is a great edification to the place.” However, the organization dedicated to St. André, which the visitor described as “extremely poor,” had around five hundred members of unspecified gender and possessed indulgences granted by Rome. These confreres of St. André were to maintain six large candles for their days of indulgence and also to hold funeral offices for their dead members. They also were the patrons of a bell in the village.120 As A. N. Galpern points out, in rural communities, confraternities may have handled some of the routine responsibilities for the parish, acting in concert with local clergy rather than as independent entities.121 For many people, a confraternity was the primary focus of their religious devotion over other parish activities.122 Perhaps because of its duties in the village and its tie to the ferry trade, the older confraternity of St. André remained popular, at least with the male parishioners, and very active in the community of Evian even if it was not the favored brotherhood of the diocesan officials. As women were not active in the ferry trade, they may have joined the Blessed Sacrament more readily because it offered them access to devotional activities that the older confraternities of Evian did not. In addition to promoting Tridentine orthodoxy through new confraternities, the Catholic Church established sodalities whose expressed purpose was to celebrate Catholic festivals literally in the face of Protestants. Included with the establishment of the Holy House of Thonon in 1601 was a Marian confraternity dedicated to Our Lady of Compassion. This brotherhood was attached “in perpetuity” to the Holy House by the pope. The confreres were to celebrate the major festivals of the Virgin Mary, which included the assumption, nativity, purification, and annunciation. They were to assist in the processions held by the parish on Holy 119  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:293; ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fols. 21–30. In the account of François de Sales’s visit in 1606, the Chapel of St. André is listed as holding the altar of the confraternity of the ferry men; Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:282 120  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:293–94. 121  Galpern, Religions of the People in Sixteenth-Century Champagne, 59. 122  Barnes, Social Dimension of Piety, 182.

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Thursday and during the Octave of the Eucharist and were to say the rosary at the burials of fellow confreres and at masses for the dead.123 For all its devotion, the confraternity received a forty-day indulgence in 1612 from Pope Paul V.124 R. Po-chia Hsia argues that the Marian cults that emerged after Trent were often the most militant of the new confraternities and that the earliest of these new Marian brotherhoods can be traced to the Society of Jesus, which was instrumental in the establishment of the Holy House of Thonon.125 In some cases, it appears that parishioners took the initiative to establish a new sodality in their village, rather than waiting for a cleric to do it. During the 1606 visit to Larringes, the parishioners asked for and received the bishop’s permission to use a chapel dedicated to St. Antoine and its existing revenue for a confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament.126 In August 1624, Jean-François de Sales found a confraternity holding activities in the Chapel of St. Antoine and ordered the parishioners to furnish the chapel and provide a light for the altar.127 The laity of Larringes wanted a confraternity dedicated to the Eucharist, and diocesan officials were surely pleased that parishioners embraced valued Catholic devotions. Beginning with Carlo Borromeo, archbishop of Milan, reformers attempted to organize confraternities into federations with centralized diocesan control and discipline;128 however, there is little evidence of formal groupings of confraternities in the Diocese of Geneva. In his biography of his uncle, Charles-Auguste de Sales mentions a union between the confraternity of the Holy Cross of Annecy and a brotherhood of the same devotion in Chambéry, which made sense because both groups recognized François de Sales as their common father. According to the account, the two groups made a pilgrimage to Aix-enSavoy (Aix-les-Bains) to “see and adore the Holy Cross” on the last day of June and there made a public acclamation of their unification.129 While it was the capital of the Savoy, Chambéry was part of the Diocese of Grenoble, 123  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 8. Corpus Christi celebrations often lasted eight days. 124  ADHS, 22H.1: La Charte de la Sainte Maison de Thonon. 125  Hsia, World of Catholic Renewal, 202–3. 126  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:355. 127  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 66. 128  Bossy, “Counter-Reformation and the People of Catholic Europe,” 59. 129  C.-A. de Sales, Histoire du Bien-Heureux François de Sales, 86, 89. For further discussion of this pilgrimage, see pp. 219–20.

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and this joint journey to Aix may have been an attempt to establish ties between the religious and political capitals of Savoy. One of the most compelling examples of Tridentine reform in the Diocese of Geneva is the proliferation of confraternities and other devotions dedicated to the Holy Rosary. François de Sales’s visitation reports from the first decade of the seventeenth century mention brotherhoods of the Blessed Sacrament in almost equal number to those of the Holy Rosary, and de Sales personally established several eucharistic sodalities. The visits of 1614 to the French parishes mention rosary devotions in almost one-third of the churches (see table 6.1). In the visit reports of Jean-François de Sales during the 1620s, there appears to be a confraternity of the Holy Rosary in most of the larger parishes. In his study of the Diocese of Grenoble, which borders the Diocese of Geneva, Keith Luria found that confraternities devoted to the rosary were more popular than those dedicated to the Eucharist during the later seventeenth century.130 The Diocese of Geneva seems to have promoted the rosary brotherhood almost exclusively in subsequent decades; by the later seventeenth century, confraternities of the Holy Rosary accounted for half of all sodalities in Savoy.131 Why did the diocese shift its support so dramatically to the confraternities of the Holy Rosary? Perhaps the spread and fame of the Order of the Visitation and its dedication to the Virgin Mary inspired lay Marian devotion. While most of the confraternities erected by diocesan officials during the period of this study were those promoted by champions of Tridentine reform, each brotherhood, whether old or new, appears to have been judged on an individual basis. Rather than suppressing a confraternity just because it was dedicated to the Holy Spirit, the clergy seemed to have preferred more indirect methods of ending an old brotherhood that failed to meet the standards of reform-minded bishops. Some of the older organizations were phased out and replaced by new ones, and sometimes the diocese established new brotherhoods in an attempt to pull membership away from the older groups. The parish of Arith possessed two confraternities; one dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament and the other to the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit brotherhood’s only annual activity occurred on Pentecost, yet they had two hundred  Luria, Territories of Grace, 40.  Froeschlé-Chopard, “Les Confréries de la Provence à la Savoie,” 58.

130 131

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Table 6.1: French Parishes with Rosary Devotions as of 1614 Chapels with Rosary Devotion

Parish

Reference in visitation accounts in 1614

Arlod Champfromier Brenod

Holy Spirit

Champdor Corcelles Cormaranche Sutrieu Grand Albergement Hotonnes Songieu

Yes St. Catherine Notre Dame of Compassion

Passin

St. Anne

Chemilieu

St. Sebastian

Belmont

St. Francis

Fitignieu Vieu

Yes St. Sebastian & Our Lady

Pollieu

Altar

Cressin

Holy Trinity

Ceyerieu

Holy Spirit

Culoz

Holy Spirit

Yes

source: Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:389–484.

florins of income. The bishop ordered that the money be handed over to the Blessed Sacrament sodality, which had monthly activities plus a celebration during the Octave of the Eucharist. According to the visitation account, this change was made with the consent of the confreres.132 Perhaps the majority of the parishioners who comprised the membership of the Holy Spirit had subsequently joined the Blessed Sacrament, so the shift had already been accepted by the confreres. This method of promoting new confraternities met with only mixed success because  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:62.

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parishioners were often very resistant to abandoning valued local customs. Those older confraternities that remained active and performed important functions within a parish often continued their traditional devotional activities. In the seventeenth century, the majority of the Holy Spirit confraternities within the Diocese of Geneva appear to have continued the medieval practice of communal alms distribution, meaning all of the community could receive alms, usually foodstuff, on a particular holy day, often Pentecost or Corpus Christi.133 But no devotional practice belonged exclusively to a particular confraternity; in the Chapel of Abondance, the parish as a whole performed a yearly distribution of bread and cheese on Corpus Christi Day.134 At the same time, in some parts of France, charity appears to have declined as a focus for confraternities after the Middle Ages. In Lyons, diocesan officials attempted to suppress communal almsgiving, and shift acts of charity exclusively toward the poor.135 In his research on parishes in Champagne, Galpern describes an annual act of charity by a Blessed Sacrament confraternity in the parish of Chaource as “most unusual.”136 Perhaps because of the widespread poverty, the rural nature of this rugged Alpine region, and the unique nature of Savoy reformers, the Diocese of Geneva continued to tolerate the traditions of general alms. The annual distribution of alms was not without its controversies in several parishes. During the visit of 1617, some of the parishioners of Vacheresse complained that the Holy Spirit brotherhood’s general distribution of bread and cheese on Corpus Christi Day interfered with the mass of that day, because the confreres attended to the preparation of their alms dispersal instead of attending mass. Reformers wanted mass to be the most important sacred activity in which parishioners participated, and the time and place set aside for the sacrament was to always take precedence over other devotional activities. Diocesan officials attempted to reach a compromise rather than suppress the devotional

133  Ibid., 1:331. Medieval theologians believed charity was best expressed by distributing alms; Flynn, Sacred Charity, 45. 134  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:277. 135  Hoffman, Church and Community, 108; Gutton, “Confraternities, Curés, and Communities,” 205; and Galpern, Religions of the People in Sixteenth-Century Champagne, 63. 136  Galpern, Religions of the People in Sixteenth-Century Champagne, 63.

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act in question, and the bishop enjoined the group to distribute food on another holy day.137 The problem was not unique to the Holy Spirit confreres of Vacheresse. A similar complaint was made concerning the parishioners from Abondance and its annex, the Chapel of Abondance, during the visits there in 1617. Abondance had a tradition of distributing general alms on the day of Pentecost and, as in Vacheresse, some people failed to attend mass on that day. The curé made the people postpone the alms distribution until the following Tuesday. The monks from the Abbey of Abondance also complained about the almsgiving, affirming that the distribution must be done on a different day and that the procession done in conjunction with the almsgiving should no longer go around the walls of the monastery. The visitor ordered the priest to ensure that the procession would be undertaken with “the most propriety and convenience as will be possible.” On a follow-up visit in 1622, Claude Cullaz reported that the procession would continue with the agreement of all parties.138 The Chapel of Abondance had a custom of general alms of bread and cheese on Corpus Christi Day and there too some parishioners chose to skip mass. There was no mention of the problem with the alms on a repeat visit to the annex in 1619, but the issue did surface again in 1622. The visitor reported that he found “goodwill” to change the day of the alms to during the Octave of the Eucharist or another day.139 The account goes on to reveal that because of the “great poverty” of the present year, alms of wheat would be distributed only to the poor. The parishioners agreed to the change for the current year because they wished to show obedience to their prelate, but in the future the laity wanted to return to “the former devotion,” i.e., general alms.140 In examining almsgiving in Perugia and Venice, Black notes that most confraternities made their own decisions about how to distribute alms to the poor and probably saw little interference from parish priests.”141 It is clear in the Diocese of Geneva that villagers possessed their own understanding of sacred time

 Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:382–83, Parish of Vacheresse.  Ibid., 1:256, 258. 139  Ibid., 1:277, 283, La Chapelle d’Abondance. 140  Ibid., 1:283. 141  Black, “Confraternities and the Parish,” 15. 137 138

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and space within the parish community and that alms distribution held a lofty place in their religious worldview. Conflicts over devotions were not quickly resolved and often took years of negotiations. François de Sales had been aware of the problems around Abondance since he became bishop. In a letter to Antoine Durant, the parish priest of Abondance, written sometime during 1603 or 1604, the bishop told the curé to address the problems and to change the day of general alms from Pentecost to a “less celebratory” holy day. The bishop appears to have understood the origins of the problem: “those of the place are very distracted by their duties and devotion, to the prejudice of the honor that is owed to a day of so great solemnity.”142 Barnes finds reform-minded bishops to be “unsympathetic, if not outright antagonistic, to all lay devotional activities that retained vestiges of the ritualistic piety of the late Middle Ages.”143 While de Sales might have appreciated the laity’s attachment to the almsgiving, he expected the parishes of his diocese to observe the sanctity of Sunday mass. The visitation reports by Claude de Granier from 1580 and those by François de Sales from 1606 make no mention of the problem with the alms distribution.144 Yet from his correspondence, it is clear that de Sales already viewed the processions and almsgiving as a point of concern. The parishes of Abondance, the Chapel of Abondance, and Vacheresse were close to the Abbey of Abondance, which Bishop de Sales deemed to be in such a lax state that the Feuillants were introduced there by authorization of Pope Paul V in 1607.145 The visit to Abondance in 1617 made specific reference to the complaints by the reverends Feuillants.146 Most likely the introduction of the stricter order into the area had made the problem with the alms more of an issue and demonstrates that reforms could disrupt long-standing communal understandings of sacred space. Bishop de Sales’s letter to parish priest Dunant in 1603 or 1604 about changing the day of the alms distribution had little impact on the 142  “ceux du lieu sont fort distraitz de leurs devoirs et devotions au prejudice de lhonneur qui est deu a un jour de si grande solemnité.” F. de Sales to Antoine Dunant, curé of Abondance, 1603 or 1604, in de Sales, Œuvres, 12:250. The letter mentioned both Abondance and the chapel, but only referred to Pentecost, even though it is clear from the visits that the chapel’s almsgiving was on Corpus Christi Day. The editors of the letter for the Annecy edition also note this. 143  Barnes, Social Dimension of Piety, 37. 144  ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582, fols. 20–21; and Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:5–8. 145  For a discussion of the introduction of the Feuillants, see chapter 5. 146  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:256.

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practice of almsgiving; the visitation reports from 1617 again address the problem and include injunctions issued in all three parishes. When Jean-François de Sales visited the three places in 1624, the visitation report suggests that only Abondance had fulfilled the order, as there was no mention of the alms in the visit account.147 In Vacheresse, the confraternity of the Holy Spirit still had failed to transfer their general alms from Corpus Christi to another day. The visitation report said that the confreres continued to leave mass early to assist in preparations for the procession for food distribution, and the bishop found that the same situation remained in the Chapel of Abondance.148 The local priests must have been unable or unwilling to force the laity to give up its traditions. Parishioners had their own ideas about devotion and viewed their procession and almsgiving as sacred as Sunday mass, and individuals within the parishes were willing to defy the diocesan officials to protect a local tradition. Jean-François de Sales does not appear to have been as understanding as his brother. He threatened the Holy Spirit confraternity of Vacheresse and the laity from the Chapel of Abondance with excommunication if they did not comply with his injunctions to change the day of their alms distribution.149 These cases demonstrate that disagreements between confreres and diocesan officials often resulted in extended dialogues among the interested parties and only after years of debate and prolonged resistance did the bishop threaten the parishioners with serious punishment. Far from being discouraged, the Holy Spirit brotherhood in the parish of Saint-Gingolph, located on Lake Geneva, received special praise from diocesan officials. According to the visit of 1617, the Holy Spirit confraternity was “very old in the place and of great devotion for being at the gates of the heretics.” Furthermore the visitor ordained that the confreres, because of their piety, should have as alms for the rest of their lives the cheese from the mountain of Lavenet.150 Perhaps this reward for piety indicates that the diocese acknowledged that parishioners could be attracted to Protestantism and offered the cheese as a reward for resisting Calvinism or even as an incentive to publicly do  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 118.  Ibid., fols. 104, 114–15. 149  Ibid. 150  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:351–52. 147 148

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so. In a biconfessional area, there was not a more sacred activity than to defy the rival faith. The visitor rewarded the confreres for reinforcing confessional boundaries.151 The bishops appear to have possessed greater toleration for popular “unreformed” devotional practices when Protestants lived nearby. Another goal of Tridentine reform was to rein in the lay confraternities that were too independent of diocesan control. In the parish of Thollon, a Holy Spirit brotherhood appears to have been a point of concern for diocesan officials. Thollon had an old company of the Holy Spirit reportedly with good revenue though controlled by its members without the license of the curé.152 In this case, François de Sales ordered a priest from the nearby parish of Bernex to investigate how the brothers used their money, but the bishop did not order their disbanding. Scholars have asserted that one of the ways reformers tried to exercise social control over confraternities was by gaining access to the group’s money, and Trent gave diocesan leaders the right to conduct an annual accounting.153 The case of the Thollon confraternity appears to have been rather isolated because the visitations from other parishes do not mention similar fiscal problems. The Holy Spirit brotherhoods were far from dead, and neither priest nor parish nor visitor appeared to want their demise. Issues of proper supervision, however, were not limited to Holy Spirit brotherhoods. When Jean-François de Sales toured the parish of Feternes, he found problems with the use of donations received by the confraternity of the Holy Rosary. The group had received several donations that were to be used for specific masses, including one from the Baron of Feternes, Charles de Compoix, who had established a monthly mass as ordained in the statutes of the confraternity, and another man had given twenty livres for a mass for the dead. The prior of the confraternity was ordered to use the donations according to the statutes.154 The confraternity must have received the money, but the masses were not being performed. Reformers expected the clergy to increase its

151  Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries, 14–16. Barth reminds us that boundaries are not static and need to be maintained continually. 152  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:366–67. 153  Hoffman, Church and Community, 108; and Gutton, “Confraternities, Curés, and Communities,” 205. 154  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 93.

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supervision over lay confraternities, but it also had greater responsibility; as a result it was the prior who received the order about the donations. There appear to have been few excessive or inappropriate celebrations in conjunction with the devotional activities of confraternities. Peter Burke asserts that many devotional activities popular with the laity were condemned as superstitious and immoral.155 It is unclear whether most parishes in the Diocese of Geneva were free of serious moral failing or if parishes were able to hide the indiscretions of their confraternities from the diocesan officials. During a visit to the parish of Seythenex in 1626, a “public scandal” came to the attention of the bishop where a Holy Spirit confrere committed a “scandalous act” during a celebration on the Monday of Pentecost. The bishop ordered the guilty party to stop the act, and the members of the confraternity were told to prohibit any public act the people considered scandalous, on pain of excommunication.156 Most likely the confrere had offended other parishioners with his behavior, and they informed on him to the bishop; perhaps it was an ongoing problem that the parish was not able to solve on its own. Other less serious offenses included the Holy Rosary confraternity of Domancy conducting its services at a portable altar that was unconsecrated; François de Sales noted this irregularity but did not order any remedy.157 With a few exceptions, the visitations are silent on the vices of individual confraternity members. Even when diocesan officials were aware of behavior connected with religious activity that they considered inappropriate, as the discussion of processions below reveals, it was not always easy to end. Overall, great diversity remained among the confraternities present in the Diocese of Geneva between 1580 and 1640. Confreres embraced new practices that enriched their spiritual lives, protected valued local customs, and resisted changes not to their liking. The bishops may have envisioned parishes where confraternities centered on the Eucharist and rosary devotions would replace those of the Holy Spirit and patron saints of trades, but the time and scrutiny to implement and oversee such changes was not available. As the bishops were unable to  Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe, 209–12.  ADHS, 2MI82: Visites pastorales...1623–1635, fol. 92. 157  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:248. 155 156

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visit the parishes of their diocese as frequently as the framers of Trent envisioned, the injunctions imposed against confraternity activities were rarely followed up on in a timely manner. Barnes notes that until the eighteenth century, few bishops had the time or resources to rein in confraternities.158 If the devotional activities of an ancient Holy Spirit confraternity fell short of the bishop’s expectations, at least the members were still dedicated Catholics, which in his eyes was preferable to their being part of the Reformed Faith.

Sacred Space beyond the Parish

Lay piety went beyond activities centered on the parish. Processions and pilgrimages, whether connected with a confraternity or a parish-wide tradition, remained an important part of Catholicism and fell under the eye of reformers.159 The synodal statutes, visitation reports, and correspondence reveal how the inhabitants of the Diocese of Geneva, both cleric and lay, viewed these religious activities. For the most part, diocesan officials held a rather realistic view of processions. The synod statutes stated that diocesan officials had to participate in the devotion if the procession required that the parishioners return at night or sleep out of doors. Processions should be planned the Sunday before, and the participants were to undertake the journey in a serious and reverent manner. The other major guideline concerning behavior was the prohibition of people dressing like an apostle or in a “superstitious manner.”160 Clerical leaders of the diocese were aware that many processions had a long history in a particular parish and that the laity was often very attached to the practice. The synodal statutes mention that if there existed a long-standing custom of carrying an image or statue in a procession, it could continue, but recommended that the procession be done only rarely and that the people be made aware of the proper veneration of images when carried in processions. The statutes left the final judgment on the specific directions for a procession to the parish priest, allowing for the continuation of local variation.161 Diocesan officials acknowledged that there were limits to reforms of valued traditions  Barnes, Social Dimension of Piety, 216.  Bossy, “Counter-Reformation,” 62. 160  D’Arenthon d’Alex, Constitutions et Instructions synodales, 46–47. 161  Ibid., 15. 158 159

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that the laity would tolerate. Certainly the clergy wanted behavioral excesses long connected with processions and other devotions to cease, but compromise was the normal path. In Vacheresse during a followup visit of 1622, the priest was told to exclude people who participated in “debauchery, dances, and revelry” while in procession to a popular shrine.162 In the parish of Menthon, François de Sales enjoined the laity to assist in the traditional processions, but not to dance in the fields of the curé.163 The bishop hoped that the parish priest would curtail the actions of his flock considered inappropriate, but appeared to recognize that the best approach was to only censor the most excessive behaviors. The visitations offer examples of processions that were a normal and even central part of a community. The account of the visit to the French parish of Saint-Germain-de-Joux in 1614 made note that the syndics were not present for the visit because they were leading a procession of St. Claude.164 During a visit to the parish of Larringes in 1617, the visitor toured a chapel dedicated to St. Thomas that was dependent on the Priory of St. Paul, which had a great reputation of devotion in the region “even [in] the town of Evian.” Neighboring parishes came in procession to the chapel every year. The visitor ordered the prior of St. Paul, Jean-François Deblonnay, to ensure that the chapel was properly maintained so that he could hold mass there once a week.165 Diocesan officials recognized an important local center of devotion and took steps to encourage its maintenance and continued edification. The best evidence of how the diocese generally viewed processions comes from a letter of François de Sales written to his good friend Senator Antoine Favre. De Sales dispatched this letter in May 1594, shortly before they both embarked on a procession with the confraternity of the Holy Cross to view a piece of the true cross in Aix-les-Bains (de Sales had helped establish the brotherhood in Annecy in 1593 and erected a chapter in Chambéry the following year). He wrote that the confreres would leave from Annecy on the Monday of Pentecost and the procession would follow a pattern of previous pilgrimages to Aix-les-Bains. He described how the group would chant litanies together as they walked  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:385.  Ibid., 2:418. 164  Ibid., 1:419. 165  Ibid., 1:310–11. 162 163

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and would hold no profane conversations during the journey. The group was to dine together along the way under the same roof “modestly and frugally.” Always practical, François de Sales said the confreres would walk barefoot, but only for the final few miles as they approached the shrine. He hoped that the group would arrive at their destination by ten or eleven in the morning and meet up with the group led by Antoine Favre coming from Chambéry.166 In his letter, de Sales revealed that some aspects of the procession were hard to control. He complained to Senator Favre that he could not provide an exact time for the arrival of the confreres from Annecy because “against our will, a numerous crowd has joined us for this pilgrimage, principally several women for whom all our arguments have never been able to change from resolution, being members of our confraternity from the beginning, [and] admitted to the Communion and other pious exercises.”167 Obviously the actions of the women were not condoned by François de Sales, but they were members of the confraternity and he was either unable or unwilling to exclude them from participating in the procession and pilgrimage of the brotherhood. His own involvement in the trip to Aix-les-Bains shows that he supported and even encouraged lay participation in communal devotions. Much has been made of how the Reformations reined in customs practiced among the laity. While most historians no longer concur with Jean Delumeau’s assertion that much of Europe was pagan until the Reformations, the idea that the elites wanted to suppress “popular religion” is still widespread. The dichotomy between elite and popular, however, is too black and white to help one understand the disagreements over practices that emerged between the clergy and the laity in the Diocese of Geneva. One area where reformers and parishioners often held incompatible views was in the designation and use of sacred space. The bishops wanted devotion to center around the main parish church and the Sunday mass held there, while the laity often preferred the veneration of local saints at separate chapels or shrines, or using the day of rest for other activities. Most of the disagreements that made it into the  F. de Sales to Antoine Favre, 28 May 1594, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:65–68.  “une foule nombreuse s’est jointe à nous pour ce pèlerinage, principalement quelques dames que tous nos arguments n’ont jamais pu faire changer de résolution, notre Confrérie les ayant, dès le commencement, admises à la Communion et autres pieux exercices.” F. de Sales to Antoine Favre, 28 May 1594, in de Sales, Œuvres, 11:66–67. 166 167

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visitation accounts and correspondence were over control of and the proper uses of parish space. Creating a separate time and place for performance of the sacraments was a difficult task since most of the villagers’ lives and livelihood revolved around the demands of the agriculture cycle; from its inception, the Catholic Church had acknowledged this reality and had structured its calendar to reflect the busy times on a farm. Edward Muir explains, “The last half of the year can be viewed as a ritual retreat into the local and particular, the world of work and village or town life, in contrast to the focus of the first half on the church’s systematic representation of the universal.”168 Despite the church’s recognition of the agricultural calendar, parish priests continued to struggle with the limitations it placed on the time parishioners had available for devotional activities. In the eyes of the bishops the most pervasive problem was the failure to observe the third commandment, keeping the Sabbath holy.169 In the parish of Copponex, the bishop ordered the men to enter the church and “assist in the divine service” on pain of ten livres and excommunication, and in Jarsy, the parishioners were told not to walk out during divine offices. The bishop enjoined the parishioners of Petit-Bornand to help with the divine offices and processions or be subject to a ten-livres fine and excommunication, unless one was ill or had another legitimate excuse. The parishioners of Thônes received the same threat for their lack of participation on holy days.170 Failure to attend church services was a problem for Protestants as well, with Gerald Strauss noting that the need for services and frequency of attendance at services was a point of contention between church officials and people.171 Diocesan officials believed that attending services in the parish church was necessary for salvation, and they wanted all members to be present and accounted for. Beyond attending church services, the laity was to abstain from certain activities on Sundays and feast days. Secular business was not to be carried out on holy days or on church property. In the parish of Jarsy, the bishop ordered the sergeants not to “execute any letters” on holy days on pain of excommunication, and François de Sales also warned  Muir, Ritual in Early Modern Europe, 57–71.  Protestants considered this the fourth commandment. 170  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:215, 346, 495, 692. 171  Strauss, Luther’s House of Learning, 284. 168 169

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the parish of Arbusigny that if they sold anything while in the church, they risked a ten livres fine.172 During his visit in August 1624, JeanFrançois de Sales enjoined the parishioners of Morzine “not to hold council in the church nor make any assemblies there.”173 The syndics and other town officials in the parish of Thônes were ordered not to hold meetings or conduct town business during times of worship, and the laity was to stop holding its markets in the cemetery, selling goods, and frequenting taverns on Sundays and feast days.174 The parish of Thônes, at least in the view of the diocesan officials, did not keep holy days or demonstrate proper reverence toward sacred sites. Bishops saw a clear line between sacred and profane activities, while parishioners tended to see the community gathering together for services as a convenient time to conduct necessary business and to socialize. While frequenting taverns is mentioned in only a small number of the visit accounts, participating in this activity on holy days was an offense the bishops tried to stop. In the report on his visit to Craz in August 1581, Bishop Claude de Granier forbade the parishioners from going to taverns during church offices.175 During the tour of the parishes of the duchy of Chablais in 1617, two of the four threats of excommunication concerned visiting taverns. The visitor Jean-François de Blonay reprimanded the parishes of Feternes and Larringes about eating and drinking during divine services. In Larringes, husband and wife tavern owners were dubbed “public sinners” because she had a “bad reputation” and he “gets drunk very often.” The official ordered the couple to not make their refreshments available during church services on pain of excommunication.176 Obviously the visitor realized that it was easier to control the laity on this matter if the temptation was not there in the first place. The bishops wanted the parishioners to show proper reverence toward all church properties, not just the sanctuary and chapels. Conflicts arose between religious exigencies and the demands of agriculture because parishioners appear to have taken a more pragmatic view of

 Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2: 51.  ADHS, 2MI80: Visites pastorales...1624–1626, fol. 126. 174  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:346, 692. 175  ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582, fols. 178–79. 176  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:303, 310. 172 173

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some parish property. The visitation reports made by Claude de Granier, though often brief, did contain orders forbidding villagers from grazing their animals in the cemetery.177 Both Claude de Granier and François de Sales enjoined parishioners of Craz not to walk through the cemetery during divine services.178 In the report on the October 1607 visitation to the parish of Les Clefs, the injunctions included an account of a cemetery with forty bodies where people kept removing a cross and sowing seeds of some sort. François de Sales stated that this was “not suitable” and ordered the parish to replace the cross and threatened them with a fine of fifty livres if they planted the area again. The bishop reminded them that they must keep the cemetery as a place of rest for the bodies of the deceased.179 Even the religious at the priory of Sillingy received a reprimand from the bishop for grazing their animals on the grounds of the priory and in the cemetery.180 The injunctions from the October 1606 visit to the parish of La Côte d’Hyot include a prohibition from sleeping or storing crops in the church during the grape harvest. The promised penalty if the practice continued was a ten-livres fine and confiscation of the harvest.181 It is unclear whether the people used the church out of convenience or in hope that God would favor their harvest, but either way, the parishioners again confounded agriculture with clerical enterprises of the sacred. It was difficult to clear even a tiny plot of land in this rugged mountainous area and the need for cultivable land resulted in practices that religious authorities could not accept. The temptation to use land set aside for sacred purposes for agriculture must have been high. Survival in this Alpine region depended on producing healthy crops and animals. Rural people of France often viewed their animals almost as part of the family, and it was common for people to call on saints for the prosperity and health of their livestock, and for aid in producing healthy crops.182 In the parishes of Corbonod and Craz, François de Sales reprimanded the parishioners for offering the cord of their livestock on saints’ days. In Corbonod, the people venerated St. Blaise for  ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582, fol. 46 (La Gieta), fol. 46 (Bellecombe), fol. 48 (Ugine), fol. 52 (Priory of Vieu), fols. 178–79 (Craz). 178  ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582, fols. 178–79; and Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:228. 179  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:196. 180  Ibid., 2:643. 181  Ibid., 2:116. 182  Sébillot, La Faune et La Flore, 103–5. 177

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the preservation of their animals. According to the 1605 visit account for Corbonod, “They have the custom of drinking sacred wine in this place and of offering the cord of the livestock.” In Craz, the parishioners offered the tether on the day of St. Hilaire. The bishop called the devotional act in both places “indecent” and prohibited the practice.183 There had been no mention of the practice in the visits to the two parishes in 1581, but most likely this was an old practice that had just come to the attention of the bishop.184 In the process of parish reform, the bishops tried to carve out space to be used exclusively for sacred purposes. Yet even they sent mixed signals. Ultimately, reform had limits because images, saints, and processions remained central to Catholic devotion even though the practices were the source of conflicting views of the sacred. The bishops acknowledged that the agricultural cycle was central to the lives of the laity and gave people permission to work on holy days during planting and harvesting seasons. The accounts of François de Sales’s visits to the parishes of Domancy and St.-Nicolas de Véroce mentioned that the curé had the authority to allow people to tend their crops on holy days during planting and harvesting.185 For the parishes of Sallanches and St. Gervais, the power for deciding who could work during the crucial periods of cultivation was in the hands of the canons from the College of Sallanches. De Sales reminded the canons that the decision should be based on urgency, and the parishioners could not be released from religious services on the day of St. Sebastian or of St. Nicholas.186 The very survival of these parishes depended on the villagers’ bringing in a successful harvest. At the urging of some of his parishioners, the priest of Vacheresse established a shrine to St. Bernard of Menthon (a local Savoyard saint) in an attempt to heal the sick cows of the area. Bishop de Sales allowed the parish to hold services at the shrine, despite its location on a hillside far from the parish church, as long as the laity properly decorated the chapel and found an appropriate time for services that did not take the curé away from mass at the main church.187 The parishioners took comfort from being proac-

 “le lien du bétail.” Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2:216, 228,  ADHS, 2MI75: Visites pastorales...1580–1582, fols. 146–47, 178–79. 185  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 2: 248, 579. 186  Ibid., 2:547, 606. 187  Ibid., 1:381–83. 183 184

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tive in their devotion on behalf of protecting their livelihood. The diocese tried to balance obligation to the church with the realities of eking out a living in the harsh environment. A few incidents emerge from the visitation accounts for the duchy of Chablais from the second decade of the seventeenth century that could be taken as attempts to control “popular customs.” In the account of the visit to Saint-Gingolph, the visitor de Blonay inquired about superstitions in daily devotions and claims of miraculous events. He was most likely following up on a previous report or rumor. The priest was told to exhort the offenders in the teachings of the church and remind them that miracles only came from God.188 In the account of the 1617 visitation of Le Biot, an entry stated that the people of the village had a tendency to turn to faith healers despite the warnings of their curé. A woman of Monthey and one from Megevette were mentioned as the ones who had performed the superstitious acts. The woman of Monthey was mentioned again in the visit of Novel in connection with an offering to St. Pancrace and again in the bishop’s comments concerning the Morzine visitation.189 The bishop noted that the priest reported the woman and wanted her to be “discouraged” from her actions.190 No further mention was made of her or of any further reprimands even though she appeared in parishes throughout the region, and there was no reference to heresy or witchcraft in any of the accounts concerning this woman. While diocesan officials certainly did not approve of “superstitious” activities, they did not take aggressive actions against the offenders and left the matters to be resolved by the parish priests. In rare instances visitors addressed complaints about behavior among the laity that the Catholic Church had long considered immoral. In Bonnevaux, the visitation report details charges made against the laity, including a woman accused of adultery, a “bastard” possessed by a devil who forced himself on innocent women, an unwed mother who refused to name her baby’s father, and parishioners who gambled, played cards, and blasphemed. The bishop ordered the woman accused of adultery to return to her husband since he was willing to take her back.191  Ibid., 1:351, 353.  See Butler, Lives of The Fathers, Martyrs and Other Principal Saints, 502. Butler listed a St. Pancras, who was a teenage boy who was martyred under Diocletian in the fourth century. 190  Rebord, Visites pastorales, 1:266, 332, 342. 191  Ibid., 1:271–72. 188 189

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These people had committed acts that violated behavior norms long recognized by the Catholic Church, the local parish, and the community in general, but these types of problems rarely made it into visitation accounts because most communities probably resolved them without outside interference. Someone in Bonnevaux felt the need to involve the visitor in the village’s problems. Nowhere are the efforts to revitalize Catholicism more evident than in the reformers’ interaction with parishioners. The bishops surely envisioned gaining oversight over all aspects of parish life, including management of the properties, and participation in the sacraments and lay devotional activities. The bishops introduced the catechism, built confessionals, and ordered numerous repairs to church buildings—all in an attempt to create communities that revolved around a clearly defined parish. The bishops encouraged lay devotion through chapels, confraternities, and processions, but they wanted all such celebrations to be led by the clergy. The reformers hoped the laity’s ideas of sacred and profane would come to mirror their own, but parishioners had definite—often different—ideas about the role of the divine in their lives. The laity viewed their parish church as their own and wanted it to meet their spiritual needs as they perceived them, not as the needs ordained by the bishop.

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Table 6.2: Confraternities in the Diocese of Geneva, 1604–1635 F = French parish

Parish

Confraternity

1. Abondance

Blessed Sacrament

2. Chapel of Abondance

Blessed Sacrament

3. Allion

Holy Rosary

4. Annecy

St. Barbe St. Sebastian Holy Cross Holy Rosary

5. Annecy le Vieux

Holy Spirit

6. Annemasse

St. Sebastian

7. Anthy

Holy Rosary

8. Araches

Notre Dame

9. Arith

Blessed Sacrament (converted from a Holy Spirit confraternity)

10. Armoy

Holy Rosary

11. Ayse

Holy Rosary

12. La Balme de Thuy

Holy Rosary

13. Bellecombe

Holy Spirit (inactive) Holy Rosary

14. Beon (F)

Holy Spirit

15. Le Biot

Blessed Sacrament (newly erected)

16. Boege

Holy Spirit (Penitents)

17. Bogeve

Blessed Sacrament

18. Bonne

Blessed Sacrament Holy Rosary

19. Cernex

Holy Rosary

20. Ceysérieu (F)

Notre Dame Blessed Sacrament (united to Holy Spirit chapel)

21. Chamonix

Holy Rosary

22. Chatelard

Holy Spirit

23. Chatillon-sur-Cluse

Holy Rosary

24. Chemilieu (F)

Holy Rosary

25. Chevrier

Holy Spirit (inactive)

26. La Clusaz

Holy Rosary Notre Dame

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Parish

Confraternity

27. Cluses

St. Eloi St. Crespin

28. Le Clez

Holy Rosary

29. Combloux

Name of Jesus Holy Spirit

30. Contamine

Holy Rosary

31. Cordon

Notre Dame

32. Cressin

Holy Rosary

33. Cruseilles

Holy Rosary

34. Culoz (F)

Holy Spirit Holy Rosary

35. Domancy

Holy Rosary

36. Doussard

Holy Rosary

37. Ecole

Holy Spirit St. Peter Holy Rosary Blessed Sacrament

38. Evian

Blessed Sacrament St. Nicholas St. André St. Joseph

39. Faverges

Holy Rosary Blessed Sacrament St. Anne White Penitents

40. Feternes (Feternaz)

Blessed Sacrament Holy Rosary

41. Fillinge

Holy Rosary

42. Fitignieu (F)

Holy Rosary

43. Fleyrier

Blessed Sacrament

44. La Giettaz

Holy Spirit

45. Grésy sur Aix (parish)

Blessed Sacrament

46. Grésy sur Aix (priory)

Black Penitents (joined with St. Mary of Rome)

47. Hauteville (F)

Notre Dame

48. Hotonnes (F)

Holy Rosary

49. Jarsy

Blessed Sacrament (ordered to convert from a Holy Spirit confraternity) Holy Rosary

Defining Spaces Parish

m 229 Confraternity

50. Larringes

Blessed Sacrament in Chapel of St. Anthony

51. Lavours (F)

Holy Spirit

52. Lugrin

Holy Spirit

53. Lullin

Holy Rosary

54. Mareche

Holy Spirit—no services in thirty years

55. Margincel

Holy Rosary

56. Marin

Holy Spirit—water ruined most income

57. Megevette

Holy Rosary

58. Menthon

St. Julien Holy Rosary

59. Morzine

Blessed Sacrament Holy Spirit (est. 1498) Holy Rosary (est. 1619)

60. Passy

Holy Spirit St. Sebastian

61. Petit-Bornand

Holy Rosary

62. Pringy

Holy Rosary

63. Rumilly

Holy Rosary St. Eloi St. Crespin

64. St. Felix

Blessed Sacrament

65. St. Gervais

Holy Rosary

66. St.-Gingolph

Holy Rosary Holy Spirit

67. St. Jean d’Aulph

Blessed Sacrament

68. St. Laurent

Holy Rosary

69. St. Maurice of Thone

Holy Spirit

70. St. Offenge-Dessous

Blessed Sacrament

71. Sallanches (College of St. James)

St. Crespin Cordonniers (cobblers) Blessed Sacrament

72. Scionzier

Notre Dame of Assumption

73. Serraval

Holy Rosary

74. Seyssel (F)

St. Eloi

75. Seythenex

Holy Rosary Holy Spirit

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Parish

Confraternity

76. Talloires

Five Wounds of Christ

77. Thollon

Holy Spirit

78. Thônes

Holy Rosary Blessed Sacrament St. Alex St. Crespin Holy Trinity

79. Thonon

Our Lady of Compassion

80. Thorens

St. Sebastian

81. La Thouviere of Evian (Touviere)

St. Crespin

82. Ugine

Holy Rosary

83. Priory of Ugine

Holy Rosary Blessed Sacrament

84. Vacheresse

Holy Rosary Holy Spirit

85. Vieu (F)

Notre Dame

86. Vieu pres Faverges

Holy Rosary St. Sebastian St. Anne White Penitents

87. Ville (F)

St. Crespin

88. Vailly

Holy Spirit Holy Rosary

sources: Visitation accounts of Bishops Claude de Granier, François de Sales, and Jean-François de Sales, in Rebord, Visites pastorales; and ADHS, 2MI80, 2MI81, 2MI82, 2MI83, Visites pastorales for 1624–1626, 1626, 1623–1635, and 1631–1635, respectively.

7

Reform Ideals and Reality

P

rograms of religious reform and renewal in the later Reformation era were complicated and multifaceted, and they had to respond to and evolve in local environments. At the parish level, neither laity nor clergy blindly accepted new rules or practices imposed from above. Rather, attempts to implement change in local religion were often met with inquiry, resistance, and negotiation. Whether the bishops of Geneva tried to convert Protestants, confront religious rivals, restore parish chapels, reform a monastery, or introduce the catechism, they faced populations who questioned and challenged their actions. Claude de Granier, François de Sales, and Jean-François de Sales all attempted to introduce measures they viewed as improvements to the religious life of their diocese. By the 1580s, diocesan officials were pursuing policies of reform within the parishes, including closer scrutiny of priests and their duties, repairs to church structures, and the purchase of new ceremonial linens. By the 1590s, the preaching orders of the Jesuits and Capuchins had joined forces with the diocese and with government officials of Savoy in a missionary effort to win back those in the duchy of Chablais who practiced the Protestant faith. In the first decades of the seventeenth century, church officials expanded the diocese’s Counter-Reformation measures into the Protestant and newly French Pays de Gex. The Catholic populations saw efforts to modify dramatically the behavior of the parish priests, monks, and canons, and to introduce new practices to the laity, including confraternities, catechism, and the confessional, yet few of the reform goals were achieved completely or uniformly. The conversion of the Reformed populations who lived within the diocese was the most difficult feat the clerical leaders faced, but the 231

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project was also of paramount importance to the Catholic clergy. After all, in the bishops’ eyes, the Protestants faced certain damnation if they did not return to the Catholic Church and their presence prevented the diocese from being restored to its pre-Reformation boundaries and economic state. The Counter-Reformation was so intertwined with the secular matters of the region that the clergy could make no moves towards the Protestant populations without first seeking the approval and support of secular authority. The property in the Protestant regions that had belonged to the Catholic Church had fallen into the hands of others—the majority to citizens of Geneva—who were not willing to give it back without a fight. Despite the obstacles, the clergy of Geneva, with the support of Capuchin and Jesuit missionaries, vigorously pursued the reestablishment of Catholic parishes in Protestant areas and the restoration of properties. The missionaries adeptly used the rituals, visual images, and evocative services of Catholicism to appeal to the inhabitants of the duchy of Chablais and contrast their faith with that of the Protestants. This process also led the Catholics to define themselves apart from the Protestants within a community and even confront their religious rivals in formal disputations. Yet the cooperation of the rulers of Savoy and France with the bishops of Geneva was never consistent and varied greatly, and the secular rulers were willing to undermine the projects of the Catholic Church to further their goals of state. Duke Charles-Emmanuel I spent much of his reign trying to regain his patrimony from the Protestant cities and France, and at times the goal of the Catholic leaders to end Protestantism within the boundaries of the diocese did not coincide with the duke’s plans. Only when the duke stepped forward to publicly participate at the Forty Hours celebration of Thonon and subsequently enacted legislation to prohibit the Protestants’ participation in public life did Catholics gain the upper hand in bringing the Protestants of Chablais into their fold. The combined pressure of preaching by the missionaries, lavish public devotions, and oppressive legislation by the duke had produced the desired results for the Catholics. François de Sales’s visits to the duchy of Chablais in 1606 make little mention of a Protestant presence. The French Protestants were not so malleable, since the Edict of Nantes gave them the right to worship and maintain their property in the Pays de Gex. The monarchy of France was unwilling to allow Catholic clergy to do anything that might undermine the fragile peace that

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had been achieved after the Wars of Religion. Reformed populations had their own representatives with access to the king, or men who had his ear, and were able to challenge any moves made by the Catholic leaders of the diocese that threatened their holdings in the region. While representatives of Geneva may not have always had the interests of the Reformed populations of the Pays de Gex as primary points during their diplomatic negotiation with the French crown, they did keep Protestant concerns at the forefront of their discussions. Diocesan leaders faced resistance from Protestants and fellow Catholics in their efforts to regain ecclesiastical properties in the Gex region, and without the active and public support of the secular rulers and the force of legislation, the Counter-Reformation made little progress in the region. François de Sales spent his entire tenure as bishop trying to make some headway among the Protestants of the Pays de Gex, but his efforts bore little fruit in either converts or revenue. In the last few years of his episcopate, de Sales expended his energy coping with a disgruntled and demoralized Catholic clergy in the villages of the Gex region. Protestantism remained entrenched in the region and no actions of church or state moved many of the inhabitants to return to Catholicism until the brutal suppression of the Reformed faith there in the 1660s. The bishops never possessed the sense of urgency about reforming Catholic parishes as they did about converting Protestants. Diocesan leaders made progress in the reform of the existing Catholics yet not to the extent that the framers of Trent envisioned. It was not feasible to visit parishes and monasteries frequently enough to offer the oversight necessary to achieve the goals issued at Trent. Without cooperation at the local level from both priests and laity, the diocese lacked the manpower to provide the supervision essential to suppress practices deemed inappropriate. The rugged geography and harsh environment made regular visitation difficult and even dangerous for much of the winter and spring of the year. Allyson Poska found similar problems in the Spanish diocese of Ourense.1 The bishops had little control over external factors such as natural environment, war, disease, and political policies, and these factors often hindered the churchmen’s ability to inspect their parishes on a regular basis. The council did not take into account the geographic and situational restrictions of individual dioceses when it  Poska, Regulating the People, 160.

1

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called for a tour of a diocese to be completed at least every two years.2 Only the parishes near Geneva received more than one visit in a decade. A single tour of the diocese was all the three bishops of Geneva could personally manage during their episcopates. While the injunctions issued against parishioners and clergy reveal a desire by the bishops to introduce a full range of new practices and regulations, the willingness to take punitive action was not as strong. The visitors issued injunctions regularly but there is little evidence that the threats of fines and excommunication were ever carried out. Following up on problems reported in previous parish visits was made more difficult when twenty-five years elapsed between appearances by a bishop or his representative. The poverty of both the clerical and lay inhabitants of the Diocese of Geneva made the collection of revenues and fines difficult, if not impossible. The bishops, who had lost much of their livelihood when Catholic clergy left Geneva, spent much of their time preoccupied with the economic problems of the region so they were certainly aware of the scarcity of funds at all levels of society available for parish improvements. Parish priests were the first among those who remained loyal to Rome to find themselves under the intense scrutiny of the reforming bishops. Catholic leaders envisioned the local priest as the main purveyor of doctrine and practice to the laity. There were certainly rising expectations over the decades in the Diocese of Geneva. Claude de Granier inquired into the religious services required of the curé when he made his cursory tour of the parishes, and he began the painstaking process of restoring the chapels to their former splendor, which included enforcing the clergy’s obligations. He instituted diocesan synods at which he issued proclamations on doctrine and practice that parish priests were to carry back to their villages. François de Sales continued these practices, but placed even more duties on the parish priests, requiring them to teach the catechism in their churches. De Sales also instituted the examination of clerical candidates. Jean-François de Sales raised the bar even higher for the local parish priest, including the purchase and maintenance of all the physical objects needed for the performance of the sacraments with the proper reverence. The diocese did not have the resources to establish a seminary, but through the above measures, the   Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, 24th sess. (p. 193).

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bishops were able at least to require priests to live in their parish, perform basic church services, and abandon their concubines. Under the leadership of three reforming bishops, the parish priests of the Diocese of Geneva became better educated, more competent in their duties, and subject to more oversight, yet they remained part of the communities where they lived and worked. Members of religious houses were more successful than their parish brothers at resisting unwanted change to their lifestyles. Many of the monasteries of the diocese had been free of outside intervention for centuries and were comfortable with their interpretation of their rules, which were often rife with customaries and exemptions. When the bishops tried to impose new regulations, monks and canons fought long and hard to prevent the disruption of their lives, and they frequently had the education and connections in the secular world to put forth a strong defense. The bishops introduced stricter orders into a handful of houses that they had deemed lax, but only after overcoming great resistance that came to involve papal and secular leaders. Yet these efforts caused disruptions within the larger community that the bishops may not have foreseen. Sometimes the laity did not like the introduction of a new religious order because it disturbed existing relationships between the religious and the lay members within a parish. Ultimately, the diocese preferred the establishment of religious orders like the Jesuits and the Capuchins that had emerged from the reform movement leading up to Trent rather than coping with the problems of the old orders, but preaching orders’ numbers remained small in the region, limiting their influence. Indeed, many of the existing houses were able to go on with little ongoing intrusion from outside. Flexibility remained in the enforcement and implementation of new religious observances, and few oppressive measures were used to halt existing rituals. The visitors may have entered each parish with preconceived ideas of what needed to be done, but when they faced the communities of clergy and laity, the church officials had to judge each situation individually. The laity negotiated the allocation of revenues, the proper day for processions, and even the time of day for mass. If a parish placed a high value on a local custom such as a procession associated with a Holy Spirit confraternity, diocesan officials faced an uphill battle in trying to end or modify the practice. Poska asserts that reformers found it very difficult to overcome “culturally distinct local religions”

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that were deeply rooted in society.3 Even after repeated injunctions and threats of excommunication, the laity continued to cling to valued local concepts of sacredness. If the goal of the reformers after the Council of Trent was to suppress local religious practices and make Catholicism uniform, then the parishes of the Diocese of Geneva were not successfully reformed by the middle of the seventeenth century. The decrees of Trent, however, were the ideals for reform. Trent in practice, as revealed in the implementation of reform, faced obstacles that made the standards impossible to achieve. Bishops readily adapted reform measures to fit the unique situations of their dioceses in hopes of meeting some of the goals established by Trent. For the most part, diocesan leaders of Geneva were more concerned with maintaining and even expanding Catholicism in the face of a Protestant threat than with rigorously regulating it. The local priest appears still to have played a vital role in the community, frequently appealing to the bishop on behalf of his parishioners to protect valued local practices. Very often, parishioners embraced new practices such as rosary devotions that enriched their spiritual lives, and successfully resisted changes that did not. As of the 1630s, local support for the catechism by the priests and parishioners was far from unanimous, few confessionals had been built, and Holy Spirit confraternities continued. A rich and varied spiritual life existed that included all levels of a community. Perhaps the three bishops in this study were more tolerant of local practices that deviated from church ideals than bishops in the later seventeenth century, when secular authority was encroaching on all aspects of society, including religious practices. François de Sales had the reputation for being gentle and he encouraged religious expression by the laity, especially women. Philip Hoffman asserts that de Sales was more accepting of certain popular practices than other reformers.4 Yet de Sales went to great lengths to suppress Protestantism, to introduce new measures to the laity, and to reorder lax religious houses. He strongly supported the secular authority’s use of political and economic pressure on the Protestant populations when preaching had failed to convert them. Leaders within the Catholic Church contemporary to de Sales acknowledged him as one of the most important figures of the  Poska, Regulating the People, 160.  Hoffman, Church and Community, 90.

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Counter-Reformation in France. The failure of certain reform measures was not from a lack of effort on the part of the bishops. Specific circumstances such as location, confessional composition, and shifting boundaries that shaped reform in the diocese may not have been present in other jurisdictions, but the situation in Geneva still provides important insight into the religiosity of the post-Reformation world. The Diocese of Geneva lay in the middle of critical religious and political changes and had as its leader during this crucial time François de Sales, one of the most important figures of the Reformation era. Despite all their goals and efforts, Catholic reformers remained more concerned with practice and performance than with doctrine among the laity. For the most part a good Catholic was someone who participated in the religious services of the parish. While Catholic clergy remained committed to the decrees of Trent, the complexities of local political and religious environments forced the reformers to compromise and alter their programs and goals of reform. Further research may better illuminate how successful officials of other dioceses were in remaking parish life and how typical the process of reform was in the diocese of Geneva. All dioceses faced particular local opportunities and obstacles. Only a comparison of regional studies throughout the Catholic world could offer comprehensive interpretations about the impact of Tridentine reforms on early modern Catholicism. Yet the process of reform in the Diocese of Geneva reveals that local religion and politics exerted more influence on reform than did national policy or tenets ordained by popes, and the boundaries of faith at the parish level continued to respond and to shift to the forces of the early modern world.

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About the Author Jill R. Fehleison received her PhD from Ohio State University in early modern European history. Currently, she is associate professor of history at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut.

m 253 l

Index t = table

A

Abondance abbey, 49, 91, 95, 165t, 178 Feuillants sent to, 170, 174, 176, 178–79, 214 Abondance chapel, 212–15 Abondance parish, 59–60, 146, 158–59, 188n, 213, 227t agriculture/farming care/blessing of livestock, 158, 223–24 in Geneva diocese, 23–24 and parish revenue, 49 vs. sacred space/devotions, 11, 221–25 Aiazza, Vespasien (abbot), 178 Aillon parish, 164t Aix en Savoy (Aix les Bains) parish, 209–10, 219–20 Aix-en-Provence diocese, 47 Aldobrandini, Ippolito. See Clement VIII (pope) Aldobrandini, Pierre (cardinal), 107 Alex parish, 49–50, 145 Allinges, fortress of, 39, 53–54, 93, 157–58 Allion parish, 227t Allonzier parish, 197 alms-giving. See under social welfare Alphonse, Salmeron, S.J., 149 altars/chapels, 196–201, 220–21, 224 Amancy parish, 198 Ancina, Juvenal (priest), 93 Andilly parish, 198 Anglefort priory, 163t Annecy le Vieux parish, 227t Annecy parish, 38, 40, 95–96, 163t–166t, 183, 204–7, 227t Annemasse parish, 61, 64–66, 65n, 199, 227t

Annonciades convent, 166t Anthy parish, 227t Aquinas, Thomas (saint). See Thomas Aquinas (saint) Araches parish, 227t Arbusigny parish, 222 Ardon priory, 165t Arias, Francis, S.J., 41 Arith parish, 210, 227t Armoy parish, 227t Audisio, Gabriel, 102 Augsburg Confession, 14 Aulps abbey, 178 Avignon, 45, 48–49, 162 Avully, Antoine de Saint-Michel, 59–60, 84–85 Ayse parish/village, 199, 227t

B

Bachelard, Gaston, 69 Ballon, Louise de (nun), 161 Balmont parish, 49 baptism, in Reformed churches, 113 Barberini, Maffeo. See Urban VIII (pope) Barnabites Angelic Sisters and married couples of St. Paul, 36–37 files grievance for tax revenue, 193 and irregularities in Novel parish, 152–53 male religious house, 163t post-Tridentine ministries of, 34, 36–37, 64, 162 in Thonon, 95–96 Barnes, Andrew, 206, 214, 218 Barth, Fredrik, 9, 12, 14, 119 Bast, Robert, 183 Baudillion, Jehan (rector), 200–201 Baumgartner, Frederic J., 135

255

Index

256  l Beaume, Esprit de (Capuchin), 61–62 Bellarmine, Robert, 184–85 Bellarmine, Robert, catechisms of Compendium of Christian Doctrine, 183 Controversies, 56 Explanation of Christian Doctrine…, 183 Bellecombe parish, 162, 227t Bellevaux parish, 72, 163t–164t, 177 Belmont parish, 163t Benedict, Philip, 15–16, 23 Benedictine Order, 38, 163t, 167, 176–78 Beon parish, 227t Bernard of Clairvaux (saint), 148 On Consideration, 41 Bernardines, 166t Berne, 26–27, 103–4, 111, 135 Bernex parish, 187, 195, 216 Bertet, Pierre (layman), 195 Beza, Theodore, 62–63, 66, 82–88 Bible Book of Maccabees, 83 Genesis 4:7, 56 Gospel of Matthew, 192 Billod family (patrons), 200 Binz, Louis, 47 Biord, Jean-Pierre (bishop), 136 Bireley, Robert, 7 bishops, responsibilities/duties of, 37–38, 45–46, 118, 147, 163, 174, 178 Black, Christopher, 75, 202, 213 Black Penitents confraternity, 228t Blessed Sacrament confraternity, 202–3, 207–12, 227t–230t Blonay, Jean-François de (visitor), 51, 146, 222, 225 Bochu, Antoine (priest), in Gex, 108 Boege parish, 227t Bogeve parish, 227t Bojat, François (priest), 154 Boncompagni, Ugo. See Gregory XIII (pope) Bonne, François de (duke), 109 Bonne parish, 196, 227t Bonneguête priory, 164t Bonnevaux parish, 192, 226, 229 Bonneville parish, 163t, 166t, 199

Borghese, Camillo, of Siena. See Paul V (pope) Borromeo, Carlo (archbishop), 38, 46–47, 64, 202, 209 Acta Ecclesiæ Mediolanensis, 47, 51 Instructions aux confessuers …, 190 Bortoli, Constant de, 206 Bossy, John, 184 boundaries anthropology of, 10 fluidity of, in Geneva, 12 physical landscape, 23–25 secular landscape, 26–29 Brèves, François Savary de (ambassador), 175 Brodrick, James, 183 Brossard, Joseph, 126, 130 Bruening, Michael W., 73, 103, 160 Brun, Jacob (Reformed preacher), 114 Bruno, Giordano, 31 Burke, Peter, 8, 217 Buttet, Jean-François de (senator), 173, 176

C

Caffarelli-Borghese, Scipion (cardinal), 175–76 Calvinists, 56, 59 Camus, Jean-Pierre (bishop), 185 Canigiani, Alexandre (archbishop), 46 Canisius, Peter, S.J., 34, 56, 183 canons, 165t, 204–5 Capuchins, 34–36, 39, 64, 162, 164t, 231, 235 Carioni, Battista (Dominican), 36, 37, 37n Carles, Emilie, 17 Carmelite Order, 129–30 Carpentras synod, 190 Carthusian Order, 164t, 166t, 170 Castelli, Giovanni Battista (nuncio), 46 catechisms of Bellarmine, 183 of Canisius, 183 Catechism of the Council of Trent, 183 injunctions to teach, 51, 144–46, 186–87 lay views of, 10 as reforming tool, 5, 56, 122, 181–89

Index cathedral canons of St. Peter, 165t, 204–5 Catholic Church, diocesan structure, and historical studies, 5–6 Catholic League, 28, 201 Catholic Reformation. See also CounterReformation of curial institutions, 29–33 and elites, 13–15, 20–22, 55–64 as historiographical terminology, 3–4 ideals and reality, 122–37, 231–37 literature of, 41–42 and Treaty of Nyon (1589), 28 Catholicism appeal of, 6, 67, 76, 99, 115 baroque, 63–64, 66 as emotional, 73 Forty Hours Devotions, 64–80 historiography of, 2–9 reestablished, 28, 64, 80 three theological virtues of (faith, hope, charity), 185 as visual/reverent/dramatic, 149 Cernex parish, 227t Cessy parish, 123 Ceysérieu deaconate, 163t parish, 227t Chablais duchy Forty Hours Devotions in, 64–80 map, 54 mission house established in, 91 post-Tridentine visitations to, 51, 187, 225 pre-Reformation landscape of, 23–26, 25 (map) reform of, under F. de Sales, 40, 51, 55–64, 98–99 as spiritual battleground, 12, 18, 21, 26–27, 31, 53–64, 232 Challex parish, 123 Chambéry parish, 27–28, 209 Chamonix priory/parish, 165t, 227t Champfromier parish, 199–200 Chanay parish, 198 Chantal, Jeanne de, 42–44, 124, 127, 160 Chapeaurouge, François de (Protestant), 110 chapels/altars. See altars/chapels

m 257 Charansonary family, 167 charity. See social welfare Charles III (duke), 26–27 Charles of Geneva (Capuchin), 65–69, 74, 78 Charles the Bold (duke), 26 Charles-Emmanuel I (duke) Escalade of, against Geneva, 28–29, 77 fickle toward Counter-Reformation, 97–99, 232 and Forty Hours Devotions, 65, 70–71, 79, 98 Protestant appeals to, 80 public support of: Chablais Duchy mission, 91; Holy House of Thonon, 91, 94 territorial aspirations of, 28–29 and Treaty: of Lausanne, 80; of Lyon, 18–19, 102 view of F. de Sales, 58–59, 74–75, 118–20 Charpy, Jean (layman), 195 Chatelard parish, 227t Châtellier, Louis, 149 Chatillon-sur-Cluse parish, 227t Chavornay parish, 194 Chemilieu parish, 227t Chêne priory, 164t Chêne-en-Semine parish, 194 Chérubin de Maurienne (Capuchin), 36, 55, 61 challenges Company of Pastors, 85–89 as colorful and contentious, 63–65, 86, 88–89 disputation with Lignaridus, 82–85 Forty Hours preaching of, 68–69, 71–74, 78 Jubilee celebration of, 90 leads mission house project, 91 Chevaliers of SS. Maurice and Lazarus, 39, 59, 61, 96 Chevenoz parish, 150, 188 Chevrier parish, 227t Chézery abbey, 164t Chiésaz priory, 165t children catechism, 94, 183–84, 186–87 poverty of, 96

258  l children, continued Protestant, 135–36 robes of, for mass, 133 Chindrieux priory, 163t, 177 Christian, William, 8, 158 Christine of France, 29, 43 church property. See properties church-state relationships and Chablais mission, 98–99 and Charles-Emmanuel I, 79, 97–98 confessional framework for, 12 conflicts/complexities of, 136–37 imagery of, in Forty Hours Devotions, 78 and military conflict, 93–94, 103 Cilingie parish, 200 Ciocchi del Monte, Giovanni Maria. See Julius III (pope) Cistercians, 161, 164t, 166t Claparède, Théodore, 126 Clark, Stuart, 184 clausura of female religious, 162, 176 Clement VII (pope), 35, 37n Clement VIII (pope) and F. de Sales, 40, 60–61, 178 and Forty Hours Devotions, 64 and Holy House of Thonon, 94 post-Tridentine activities of, 31–32 view of: Charles-Emmanuel I, 98; Jesuits, 34–35 Clermont College, 40 Cluses convent, 207 Cluses parish, 228t College of La Roche, 160 Combloux parish, 162, 196–97, 228t Comerford, Kathleen, 142, 168 Company of Pastors (Reformed), 69, 76, 82–89, 113–14 Compoix, Charles de (baron), 216 confession, sacrament of, 51, 189–92 confessional identities, 6, 12–19, 135–36 confraternities, 201–18 Forty Hours processions, 64, 67, 78–79 lay participation in, 181, 201–17 post-Tridentine establishment of, 9, 51, 98, 136 promoted by Capuchins, 36 support of chapels, 50, 194

Index table of, 227–30 Congregatio de Propaganda Fide, 32 Congregation of the Oratory, 96–97, 130n Congregation of Bernardines of Divine Providence, 161 Cons-Saints-Colombe parish, 145–46 Constantin, Boniface, 38–39 Contamine parish/priory, 96, 163t–164t, 171, 228t convents. See religious houses conversions of clergy, 76 of community elites, 55–64 at Forty Hours Devotions, 76, 79–80 at Holy House of Thonon, 91, 94–96 sociopolitical considerations, 12–19, 56–58, 87, 91 Copponex parish, 221 Corajod, Jean (Protestant), 82 Corbonod parish, 223 Cordeliers, 164t–165t Cordon parish, 228t Cordonniers confraternity, 229t Costa, Pierre-François (nuncio), 172–73 Coster, Will, 9, 22 Costerus, Franciscus, S.J., 41 Council of Constance, on pastoral visitation, 45 Council of Nice, on women, 132 Council of Pisa, on pastoral visitation, 45 Council of Tarragon, on pastoral visitation, 44 Council of Trent Catechism of the Council of Trent, 183 on church attendance, 206, 212–14, 220–21 and confessionalization, 14 on confraternities, 201–4 on devotion to the cross, 206 discipline/social control of laity, 181– 82, 185 (see also laity) and eucharistic celebration, 64 on excommunication (see excommunication) Gallican opposition to, 14–15 Jedin’s view of, 3 obstacles to implementation of, 122– 37, 231–37

Index and political/sociopolitical concerns, 12–19, 56–58, 87, 91, 107–10, 125–27, 131n Counter-Reformation. See also Catholic Reformation as historiographical terminology, 3–4 Craz parish, 222–24 Cressin parish, 228t Crestvoland parish, 162 Cross of Philiberte, 68 Cruseilles parish, 228t Cullaz, Claude (visitor), 51, 156 Culoz parish, 228t Curia, post-Tridentine reform of, 29–33

D

d’Angeville, Claude (visitor), 48 d’Arenthon d’Alex, Jean (bishop), 117, 135, 142, 145 Daughters of Charity, 162 Davis, Natalie Zemon, 8, 12 Deblonnay, Jean-François (prior), 219 Decollonge, Laurent (priest), 155 Deconchy, Jean-Pierre, 9, 141 Delumeau, Jean, 4–5, 220 Denis, Philippe, 190 Deprez, Claude (syndic), 87 de Sales. See Sales Devos, Roger, 27 Dhôtel, Jean-Claude, 182, 185 Dickens, A. G., 140–41 Diefendorf, Barbara, 12 Diodati, Jean (theologian), 115 disputation, Catholic/Reformed views of, 80–89 Ditchfield, Simon, 119 Divonne parish, 124–25 Domancy parish, 224, 228t Dominicans, 36–37, 41, 148–49, 165t d’Ossat, Arnaud (cardinal), 109 Doussard parish, 228t Ducrest, Claude (layman), 197 Dumonal, Pierre (lay patron), 198 Dunant, Étienne (priest), 131–34 Durant, Antoine (priest), 214–15

E

ecclesiastical visitations. See visitations Echallon parish, 50, 187

m 259 Ecole parish, 228t elites converting of, 55–64 and popular piety, 6–8, 181, 199, 220–21 Emmanuel-Philibert (duke), 27–28 emotion, Catholic/Reformed views of, 73, 88–89 Entremont parish, 165t Epagny parish, 200 Ermengarde (queen), 167 Eucharist. See also Lord’s Supper devotional furnishings for, 49–50, 122, 145, 151, 194–95, 200 emphasis of: by Jesuits, 34; by Trent, 205–6 Forty Hours celebrations, 36–37, 64, 66–67, 71, 74, 77–78 Host as focal point of, 67, 71 as missionary appeal, 66–67 performance of, 149 Evennett, Henry Outram, 3–4 Evian parish, 165t–166t, 207–8, 219, 228t excommunication cases of, 193, 197 as post-Tridentine threat, 50, 144–45, 151–55, 179, 182, 192–94, 215, 221, 234

F

Falconnet, Claude (priest), 156 Farel, Guillaume (Reformed pastor), 81, 103 Farfein, Pierre (visitor), 48 Farr, James R., 15–16, 135–36 Faverges parish, 228t Favre, Antoine (senator), correspondence with F. de Sales, 53, 55, 58, 123– 24, 132, 171, 219–20 Fenouillet, Pierre (bishop), 126–27 festivals, 70, 142, 205, 208 Feternes parish, 149, 157, 187, 198, 216, 222, 228t Feuillants, 170, 174, 176, 178–79, 214 Fillinge parish, 228t Filly abbey, 165t Five Wounds of Christ confraternity, 204–5, 230t Fleyrier parish, 228t

260  l Florentinus, Antoninus (archbishop), 149 Forster, Marc, 13, 141, 151 Forty Hours Devotions, 36–37, 39, 64–80 celebrations of: in Annemasse, 65–66; in Thonon, 70–76 founded by Joseph of Ferno, 64 as missionary device, 64 papal plenary indulgence for, 71 penitential aspect of, 72–73 Protestant opposition to, 69–70 France and confessionalization, 15–16 and Edict of Nantes, 100 Gex ceded to, 102 on nationality of clergy, 120 occupation of Savoy/Piedmont, 27 opposed to Tridentine decrees, 14–15, 32, 50–51, 122, 131 parishes with confraternities, 210, 211t, 227–30, 227t–230t Protestants of, 232–33 on reform of Talloires, 175 visitations in, 50–51, 120–22, 210–11 Franciscan Order, 35, 35n. See also Capuchins Frémyot, André (archbishop), 147 furnishings. See properties Fusier, François (lay patron), 198

G

Gaillard parish, pressured to hear sermons, 91 Galilei, Galileo, 33 Gallicanism, 14–15, 32, 131, 131n Galpern, A. N., 208, 212 Geneva, city of. See also Company of Pastors bans Catholicism, 26 Catholic/Reformed disputation in, 80–89 consistory punishes Forty Hours attendees, 70 Escalade attack by Charles-Emmanuel I, 28–29, 77 and Gex, 104–5, 111–12, 123–24 hinders Catholic reform, 123–24 military conflict with Savoy, 103–4 primary historical sources of, 21

Index as Protestant island, 25 and Swiss Confederation, 26–27 Geneva, diocese of civil court of, 26 compare/contrast reforms in Chablais and Gex, 136–37 and dukes of Savoy, 14, 26 and Edict of Nantes, 31 as historical laboratory, 7–8 landscape of: physical, 23–25, 187, 233; secular, 26–29 Pays de Gex conflicts (see Gex) political boundaries of, 18 post-Tridentine policies in, 29–33, 144 poverty of, 24–25, 39, 96, 142, 157, 161, 212–13, 234 pre-Tridentine visitations, 47 primary historical sources of, 20–21 religious fluidity of, 17 Savoyard/French conflict in, 116–22 sociocultural climate of, 9–19 synods of, 142 Genevois province, 167 geography. See Geneva, diocese of: landscape of, physical Gerson, Jean, Opus Tripartitum, 144 Gex ceded to France, 102 and Edict of Nantes, 18–19, 100, 232–33 F. de Sales work in, 104–11, 233 map, 101 mass introduced in, 104–11 military occupation of, 103 pamphlet wars in, 103 Protestants of, 111–16, 232–33 quality of clergy in, 131–34 Reformation introduced in 1536, 103 relationship with Geneva, 123–24 Savoyard/French contention in, 116–22 as spiritual battleground, 12, 24–25, 31, 232–33 and Treaty of Lyon, 18–19, 100 godparents, in Reformed churches, 113 Gontaut, Charles de, 109 Goulart, Simon (Protestant), 82 Granada, Luis de (Dominican), 41, 148 Grand Albergement parish, 195 Grandis, Claude (priest), in Farges, 108

Index Granier, Claude de (bishop) on confraternities, 204 consecrates church in Thonon, 71 and Forty Hours Devotions, 65–66 life/death of, 2, 38, 110 reforming efforts of: in Chablais, 38– 39; in Gex, 106–7; in Talloires, 168–69 synods of, 142 on teaching catechism, 187 visitation practices of, 31, 47–48, 223 visits: Abondance abbey, 178; Bonne parish, 196; Craz, 222 Gratian, Decretum, 44–45 Greenshields, Malcolm, 141 Gregory I (pope, saint), 148 Morals and Pastoral Care, 41 Gregory XIII (pope), 30–31, 35, 38, 169 Gregory XV (pope), 32 Grésy sur Aix priory, 163t, 228t Gros, Etienne (Reformed pastor), 114 Guérin, Juste (bishop, Barnabite), 37

H

Hanlon, Gregory, 15 Harrington, Joel F., 17 Hautecombe abbey, 160, 164t Hauteville parish, 197, 228t Hayden, Michael, 159 Henri III (king), 28 Henri IV (king, Henri of Navarre) aids Geneva in warfare, 28 betrayed by Berne, 103–4 and Edict of Nantes (1598), 100 occupation of Chablais, 91–92 as protector of Protestants, 60–61 supports Catholics in Gex, 107 and Treaty of Lyon, 18–19, 102 view of reforming efforts, 123 Héry sur Ugine priory, 165t Hickey, Daniel, 102, 105 historiography of Catholic Reform, 2–9, 11, 141–42 confessionalization thesis, 12–19 of effects of Edict of Nantes, 102 and popular religion, 4–5, 19–22, 141–42 and regional studies, 5–6, 102 sources, 20–21, 43, 143

m 261 Hoffman, Philip, 6, 50–51, 141, 236 Holt, Mack, 15–16, 107 Holy Cross confraternity, 204–7, 219–20, 227t Holy House of Thonon, 35, 91–92, 94–97, 162, 208 Holy Rosary confraternity, 202–3, 207, 210, 211t, 216, 227t–230t Holy Sacrament confraternity, 201–3 Holy Spirit confraternity, 194, 201–2, 207, 210–12, 215–16, 227t–230t Holy Trinity confraternity, 230t Hotonnes parish, 49, 200, 228t Hsia, R. Po-chia, 13, 97, 182, 209 Huguenots. See Protestants

I

iconoclasm in Allinges, 93 in Chablais, 68 in Gex, 103 in St. Cergue, 72–73 iconography, veneration of the cross, 69 Ignatius Loyola, 4, 34 Index of Prohibited Books, 37 indulgences, for confraternity devotion, 209 injunctions on alms giving, 213–15 on catechism, 51, 144–46, 150, 156, 187–89 on cemetery visits, 223 to chapel patrons and syndics, 196–201 on church building usage, 223 against concubinage, 151–52 to conduct mass, 145, 171, 219 on confessionals, 191–92 against consecration of livestock, 223–24 and denial of burial, 198–99 against embezzlement, 152–54 enforced in civil action, 157, 198–99 and fines, 154, 193, 221–23, 234 to hear confession, 191 to improve Eucharist, 149 for laity to assist with divine services, 221 to live in parish, 145 on parish boundaries, 191

262  l injunctions, continued on prebend income, 171 on priests’ performance, 144, 146, 151–52 on processions, 213 to produce parish records, 153–54, 157 to repair altar, 207 to repair chapel, 200, 209, 219 to restore stolen property, 197 on revenue, 155–58 on Sabbath-keeping, 221–22 for sacramental furnishings, 49–50, 122, 145, 151, 194–95, 200 against scandalous offences, 217 against superstition, 225 against tavern owners/visits, 222 against theft, 197–98 and threat of excommunication (see excommunication) for upkeep of property, 48–50, 121–22, 144, 151, 155–56, 171, 194, 196 Innocent III (pope), 45 Inquisition, and pressure to convert, 115

J

Jacques of Savoy (prior of Talloires), 168 Jarsy parish, 221, 228t Jedin, Hubert, 2–3 Jerome, Osorius (Dominican), 149 Jesuits complaints against, 162 education methods of, 34–35, 185 in La Roche, 162 and Marian cults, 209 as missionaries, 39, 231 as post-Tridentine, 64, 162, 235 religious houses of, 165t in Thonon, 61, 94–96, 209 Jones, Leonard Chester, 82 Joseph of Ferno (Capuchin), 64 Joyeuse, François de (cardinal), 92 Julius III (pope), 36 Jussie, Jeanne de (nun), 161 Justinian, Ange (bishop), 38, 169

L

La Balme de Thuy parish, 145, 227t La Clusaz parish, 227t La Côte d’Hyot parish, 223

Index La Faye, Antoine de (theologian), 69, 77, 82, 86, 115 La Giettaz parish, 228t La Roche parish, 162, 164t–166t La Thouviere of Evian parish, 230t La Thouviere parish, 191 La Verchère, Claude de (chevalier), 117 laity chapels/altars for, 196–201 and confraternities, 202–18 expectations of: for clergy, 141–42, 200; for divine service, 194–95, 225–26 influence on parish life, 5, 8, 10–11, 21–22, 49, 146–47, 218–26 injunctions against, 187–88, 197–98, 221–22 post-Tridentine views of, 6, 10–11, 42, 147, 204–5, 214, 218–19, 235–36 as understudied, 8 Lambert, Jérôme de (governor), 73, 88 Larringes parish, 157, 191, 198–99, 209, 219, 222, 229t Latreille, André, 20 Lausanne diocese, 47 Lavours parish, 194, 229t Le Biot parish, 192, 225, 227t Le Clez parish, 228t Le Mazuyer, Gilles (king’s counselor), 121 Le Reposoir (Scionzier) parish, 164t Léaz priory, 165t Leo X (pope). See Medici, Alexander de’ (cardinal) Les Clefs parish, 223 Lignaridus, Herman (Protestant professor), 82–85 Lompnieu parish, 187 Lord’s Supper, in Reformed churches, 112–13. See also Eucharist Louie, Jean (priest), 155–56 Louis I (duke), 168 Louis XIII (king), 29, 129–30 Louis XIV (king), orders destruction of Protestant church, 117 Lovagny priory, 164t Loyola, Ignatius, 4, 34 Lugrin parish, 229t

Index Lullin parish, 229t Luria, Keith “Politics of Conversion,” 76–77 Sacred Boundaries, 12, 84, 105, 108, 115 Territories of Grace, 6, 50–51, 146, 150, 210 Lux, Baron de (Mâlain, Edmé de), 105– 10, 118, 124 Lyons diocese of, 47 treaty of, 17–19, 21, 28, 93, 94n, 100, 102

M

Mâlain, Edmé de. See Lux, Baron de Maniglier, Jean (priest), 61 Mareche parish, 229t Margincel parish, 229t Marguerite de France, 27 Marian devotion/confraternities and Capuchins, 36 chapels, 196, 199–200 in Holy House of Thonon, 208 and Jesuits, 209 statutes of, 205 Marillac, Louise de (nun), 162 Marin, Claude (fiscal procurer), 70 Marin parish, 191, 229t Marquemont, Denis-Simon de (archbishop), 176 Martin, Arnoul (conversion of), 114–16 Martin, Hervé, 190 mass clerical/lay views of, 220–21 donations for, 216 post-Tridentine emphasis on, 145, 149, 194–95, 212–14 Maurice of Savoy (cardinal), 29 Maurienne, Chérubin de. See Chérubin de Maurienne Mazouer, Charles, 66 Medici, Alexander de (cardinal), 75–76, 78 Médicis, Marie de’ (regent), 127, 129 Megève parish, 165t Megevette parish, 225, 229t Meillerie abbey, Novel parish, 153 Meillerie abbey, 152 Menthon parish, 151n, 158n, 171, 191, 203, 219, 224, 229t

m 263 Mentzer, Raymond, 184 military conflict properties lost to, 39–40, 196 and reforming efforts, 57, 93–94, 103 Milletot, Bénigne (king’s counselor), 120 Million, Jean (Bernardine), 151, 153 miracles, 42, 76, 91, 115, 225 missionaries, 12, 53–55, 104–11. See also under Sales; Granier Mocand, Jean (visitor), 51, 146, 156 Molard de Vion priory, 165t Molina, Luis, S.J., 148 Molins, Maximian de (Capuchin), 131 monasteries. See religious houses Monet brothers (laymen), 199 Monter, William, 18 Monthey parish, 225 Montjoux, Monsieur de, in Novel parish, 152–54 morals/morality Gregory the Great’s Morals and Pastoral Care, 41 shift from seven deadly sins to Decalogue, 184 small constitution of, 186 as Tridentine concern, 144, 150, 152, 173, 219 visitation reports of, 225–26 Morzine parish, 155, 158, 207, 222, 225, 229t Muir, Edward, 67, 221 Mullett, Michael, 7 music, and Forty Hours celebrations, 64 mystery plays/performances, 74

N

Name of Jesus confraternity, 228t Norman, Corrie E., 147 Notre Dame of Abondance abbey, 40, 42, 91, 95, 165t, 178 Notre Dame of Assumption confraternity, 229t Notre Dame l’Aumône priory, 165t Notre Dame confraternity, 227t–228t, 230t Novel parish, 150–54, 225 nuncios, post-Tridentine elevation of, 30–31, 33

264  l

O

Ochino, Bernardino, 35 Olwig, Kenneth, 19 O’Malley, John W., 3 Oratory of Eternal Wisdom, 36 Order of the Annunciation, 44, 44n Order of Cluny, 160, 164t Order of St. Bernard Hospice, 152 Order of St. Bonaventure, 160 Order of St. John of Jerusalem, 117 Order of the Visitation, 33, 42, 160, 162, 166t, 176 orthodoxy, expanded definition of, 9 Our Lady of Compassion confraternity, 208, 230t

P

paganism, Delumeau’s view of, 4–5 pamphlet wars, in Pays de Gex, 103, 115–16 papacy Avignon, and visitation, 45 plenary indulgence for Forty Hours attendance, 71 post-Tridentine challenges, 29–33 and visitation process, 44–45 Pascal, Marc-Antoine (papal mole), 115 Passion of Christ, and Forty Hours Devotions, 73 Passy parish, 229t pastoral visitation. See visitations patrons/patronage for chapels, 145n, 198–99 royal: for monastery, 171; Savigny abbey, 175; for Tallories, 167 Paul, Vincent de, 161–62 Paul V (pope) authorizes Feuillants in Abondance abbey, 178, 214 correspondent of F. de Sales, 161 grants indulgence, 209 political policies of, 31–32 Pays de Gex. See Gex Pays de Vaux, resistance to Reformed practices, 103 peace treaties. See treaties Peillonnex priory, 165t Pendes, Jacques de (vicar), 173 Penitents of the Holy Cross confraternity, 67–68, 202–3, 227t

Index Péron parish, 123 Pérouse, Gabriel, 176 Perrot, Charles (Protestant), 82 Petit, Pierre (convert), 76–77, 114 Petit, Pierre (Reformed minister), conversion of, 76–77 Petit Albergement parish, 195 Petit-Bornand parish, 221, 229t Piaget, David (Reformed pastor), 114 piety and processions/pilgrimages, 218–29 rewarded with alms, 215 ritualistic vs. post-Tridentine, 214, 218–26 pilgrimages, 202, 218–29 pilgrims, to Forty Hours Devotions, 74 Pinelle, Louis (bishop), 144 Pius IV (pope), 38 Pobel, Thomas (bishop), 73 Poisy priory, 165t Pollieu parish, 194 Poncet, Pierre, conversion and renunciation of, 56–57 Poor Clares convent, 160–61, 166t popular religious/social customs conflicts over, 195, 225–26 and elites, 7–8, 13, 199, 220–21 historiography of, 4–5 prevalence of, 159, 181, 211–17, 235–36 superstitions/miracles, 225 tolerated near Protestant areas, 215–16 Poska, Allyson, 8–9, 23, 235–36 Possevino, Antonio, S.J. confessor/mentor of F. de Sales, 34, 55, 57, 123, 185 De theologia catechetica …, 185 spiritual director, 40, 162 on teaching of catechism, 185 poverty. See under Geneva, diocese of preaching F. de Sales advice on, 147–49 and Forty Hours celebrations, 64 post-Tridentine emphasis on, 147–48 post-Tridentine orders of, 33–37 prebends, 91, 95–96, 151, 167–69, 171, 178 Présilly parish, 164t Prevost, Pierre (Reformed pastor), 106, 110, 113

Index priests and celibacy, 139, 144, 150–51, 235 education/ordination of, 139–40, 142–44 inadequacies of, 131–37, 150–52 injunctions/threats against, 51, 144–46, 149–51 (see also injunctions) mutual care of parishioners, 157–58 nationality of, and assignment, 120–21 payments for services, 152, 155, 157 personal morality of, 144, 150, 173 post-Tridentine education of, 6, 139– 40, 144, 148–49 post-Tridentine reform of, 6, 49, 138 ff., 139–40, 159, 180, 234–35 roles/responsibilities of, 138–46, 184–89 Pringy parish, 150, 229t processions at Forty Hours Devotions, 67, 71–72, 77–78 post-Tridentine view of, 201–2, 218– 19, 235–36 to view true cross fragment, 219–20 properties. See also injunctions; revenues cemeteries/burial grounds, 108, 119, 123, 199, 223 church buildings, 123, 128 clerical housing, 119 clerical/lay views of, 222–23 and corruption, 167–68 destruction of, 121, 121n for divine worship, 49–50, 122, 145, 151, 194–95 hospitals, 119 impoverishment of religious houses, 159–62 lost in military conflicts, 39–40, 196 lost to/reclaimed from Reformers, 1, 39–40, 103–8, 126–28, 232 post-Tridentine expectations for, 181 Reformers’ view of, 195 sacred vs. profane, 11, 119, 194–95 Savoyard/French disputes over, 116– 22, 126–28 Protestants. See also Reformed faith as challenge to Catholic reformers, 232–33

m 265 church attendance, 221 and Estates General, 130–31, 232–33 forced conversions around Geneva, 72–73 and Forty Hours Devotions, 69, 72, 74 of Gex, 102, 104–5, 111–16, 129, 134–35 iconoclasm of, in Allinges, 93 insult Forty Hours attendees, 74 interaction with Genevan Catholics, 21 laity as catechists, 184 legal toleration of, 102 prohibited in Chablais, 91 revenue for new churches, 128 Protestants mentioned, Anjorrant, Jacob, 110 Provence, and Edict of Nantes, 102 Publier parish, 157, 191

Q

Quoex, Claude-Louis-Nicolas de (prior), 177 appointed to Talloires, 172 correspondent of F. de Sales, 173 Quoex family, and Talloires priory, 172–73 Quoex, Philippe de (rector) correspondent of F. de Sales, 174–76 and Talloires’s reform, 174–75

R

Ramsey, Ann W., 201 Reddy, William M., 88 Reformed faith. See also Protestants challenge of, to Catholic reformers, 231–32 differences between Gex and the French, 111–16 feast day observation, 113 transition to France, 134–35 vulnerable to Catholic attacks, 56–57 regional studies of confessional identities, 6–7 popular/elite dichotomy, 6–8, 13, 220–21 Regular Canons Order, 165t Regular Clerics of St. Paul. See Barnabites Reignier priory, 164t Reinhard, Wolfgang, 13–16 religious houses, 163t–166t Annonciades convent, 166t

266  l religious houses, continued Cluses convent, 207 Convent of the Poor Clares, 160–61 female, 166t focus on male religious, 162 forced clausura of, 162, 176 as impoverished, 159–62 post-Tridentine oversight of, 163, 170–71 resistance to Trent, 167, 180, 235 (See also Talloires priory/parish) royal patronage for, 171 and Rule of St. Benedict, 177 St. Catherine near Annecy (Cistercian), 161 Ursuline convents, 166t visited by F. de Sales, 159–60, 170–171 revenues from agriculture, 49 for chapels/altars, 197, 201 for church repairs, 194 of confraternities, 203, 209, 211, 216–17 controlled by Chevaliers, 58–59, 61 and corruption, 167–68 grievance filed for tax revenue, 193 injunctions to manage, 151, 155–58 lost to/recovered from Protestants, 106–7, 119, 125–26 for new Protestant churches, 128 scarcity of, 234 theft of, 197–98 visitors’ concern for, 48–50, 52 Revol, Antoine de (bishop), 41, 118 Riccardi, Jules-César (archbishop), 58, 90, 93, 161, 169 Richelieu (cardinal), 29 Rolet, Claude (layman), 199 Rosa, Susan, 57 rosary devotions, 23, 202, 207, 210, 211t Rosetain, Jean (visitor), 50, 121–22, 197, 199 Rudolph (king), 167 Ruffieu parish, 199 Rule of St. Benedict, 177 Rumilly parish/priory, 164t, 166t, 229t

S

Sabbath/Sunday observance, 221–22

Index sacred spaces beyond the parish, 218–26 chapels/altars, for laity, 196–201 conflicts over, 119, 194–95, 214, 220–26 Sales, Amédée de (canon), 43 Sales, Charles-Auguste de (bishop) biographer of F. de Sales, 53, 183, 186, 209 on devotion to the cross, 69 on Forty Hours Devotions, 66, 74 on including laity in rituals, 67–68 on synod activity, 142 on Talloires reform, 171–73 visits Gex, 135 Sales, François de (bishop) in Allinges fortress, 39, 53–54 appointed as head of Benedictines, 177 approves services at shrine, 158 born in Thorens, 40, 42 canonization of, 42, 53n as catechist, 185, 186 conducts annual synods, 142 on confessional identities, 18 on confraternities, 202 correspondence of, 41–42, 56, 60–61 death of, 177 dislike of physical discipline, 206 on education of priests, 143 effect of Edict of Nantes on, 136–37 as embodiment of reform, 2, 12, 39–42 escorts cross to village, 68 Forty Hours sermons of, 72, 74, 78–79 founder of: confraternities, 204, 208–9, 219–20; Order of the Visitation, 33, 160 in Gex, 104–11, 117, 131–34 introduces post-Tridentine female orders, 161 Introduction to the Devout Life, 41 and Jesuit counsel, 34 miracles associated with, 42 ordains 900 priests, 143 oversight of Talloires, 171–80 pleads for support of Holy House of Thonon, 96–97 political/diplomatic maneuverings of, 107–10, 125–27 preaches before Henri IV, 110

Index preaching advice/style of, 147–49 on reform of monasteries, 170–71 reform of religious houses, 169–82 relationship with France, 118 as spiritual guide, 41, 47 in Thonon procession, 68 travels through Geneva, 119 unwelcome at Abondance, 178 unwelcome at Sixt, 179 uses Bellarmine’s catechism, 183 visitation practices of, 47–51, 53–60 visitation records of, 20–21 visits religious houses, 159–62 winning converts in Chablais, 55–64 Sales, Jean-François de (bishop) born in Thorens, 40, 42 on confraternities, 202–3 injunctions to teach catechism, 188–89 ordination and career of, 2, 42–44 visitation records of, 20, 43, 51–52, 145, 153–54 visits Feternes, 216–17 visits Larringes, 209 visits Morzine, 222 visits Sixt, 179 visits Talloires parish, 177 Sales, Louis de (priest), 53 and Forty Hours Devotions, 66–68, 79 in Gex, 108 Sales, Louis de (brother of François), 43 Sallanches college, 165t–166t, 224 Sallanches parish, 224 Samoëns college, 165t Sancy, Nicolas de (French leader), 93 Saunier, Jean, S.J., 61 Savigny abbey. See St. Martin de Savigny abbey Savoie, Jean de (bishop), visitation practices of, 48 Savoy, House of ancient claims to Geneva, 26 benefactors of Talloires, 167 boundaries of, affected by treaties, 100–101 cedes Gex to France, 102–3 criminal jurisdiction of, 26n Order of the Annunciation society, 44, 44n

m 267 regional confessional variations, 17–19 Senate at Chambéry, 27–28, 91, 171–73 territorial aspirations of, 26–29 Savoy Senate excommunication case, 27–28 and Talloires priory reform, 172–73 Schilling, Heinz, 13, 15–17, 19, 97 scholarship of Catholic Reformation (see historiography) sociocultural, 4–5 Scionzier parish, 229t Secular Canons, 165t secular governments, and reformers, 155, 173–74, 176–77 Secusio, Bonaventure (patriarch), 92 Senate of the Savoy, 27–28 Seripando, Girolamo (archbishop), 68 sermons, as combining verbal/visual imagery, 68, 74 Serraval parish, 229t Seyssel parish/priory, 154, 166t, 229t Seythenex parish, 217, 229t shrines, 158 Sillingy priory, 164t, 223 Sixt abbey, 165t, 179 Smith, Helmut Walser, 17 social customs. See popular religious/ social customs social discipline/control and church-state relationships, 13–14 and confraternities, 206–7 goals of, 18 and sacrament of confession, 189–90 social welfare alms giving, 212–14 by confraternities, 48–49, 207 food distribution, 213, 215 post-Tridentine emphasis on, 206 Society of Jesus. See Jesuits sociocultural boundaries, and religious identities, 9–19, 57 space, sacred/profane roles of, 10–11, 119 Spain aids Savoy in warfare, 28 local religion in, 8 Spicer, Andrew, 9, 22

Index

268  l spirituality of F. de Sales, 41 as impetus for reform, 4 and lay brotherhoods, 202ff. spirituality and religious brotherhoods, 202ff. St. Alex confraternity, 203, 230t St. André confraternity, 208, 228t St. Anne confraternity, 228t, 230t St. Anthony chapel, 229t St. Augustine Church (near Thonon), 71, 73, 75, 78 St. Barbe confraternity, 227t St. Bernard of Menthon, 151n, 158, 158n, 171, 224 St. Blaise veneration, 223–24 St. Cergue parish, 72–73 St. Claire priory, 164t St. Crespin confraternity, 228t–230t St. Eloi confraternity, 228t–229t St. Ennemond priory, 166t St. Felix parish, 191, 229t St.-Germain-de-Joux parish, 219 St. Gervais parish, 224, 229t St.-Gingolph parish, 91, 191, 215, 225, 229t St. Hippolyte Church, 75, 78–79, 95 St. Innocent priory, 164t St. Jean d’Aulph parish, 229t Cistercians in, 164t visit of J.-F. de Sales, 179 visitor’s injunctions in, 155–56 St. Jean de Sixt parish, 145 St. Jorioz priory, 173 St. Joseph confraternity, 208, 228t St. Julien confraternity, 203 St. Julien (Menthon) confraternity, 203, 229t St. Laurent parish, 229t St. Martin de Savigny abbey, 167, 173–75, 177 royal patronage of, 175 St. Maurice of Thone parish, 229t St. Nicholas confraternity, 208, 228t St.-Nicolas de Véroce parish, 224 St. Offenge-Dessous parish, 229t St. Paul priory, 164t, 177, 195, 219 St. Peter confraternity, 228t

St. Peter’s Basilica, Urban VIII’s support of, 33 St.-Robert priory, 164t St. Sebastian confraternity, 227t, 230t Strauss, Gerald, 13, 15, 20, 143, 221 superstition, 225–26 Swiss Confederation, relationships with Berne and Geneva, 26–27 synods, as educational events, 142

T

Talissieu village, 164t Talloires priory/parish, 160, 164t, 167–80, 204, 230t Tallon, Alain, 15, 132 Tarugi, Francesco Maria (cardinal), 183 taxation, F. de Sales recommends suspension of, 62 Taylor, Larissa, 74, 133, 148 Ten Commandments, in catechisms, 184 Ternier parish, pressured to hear sermons, 91 theater, Forty Hours celebrations, 63–64, 66, 71–76 Thiez priory, 165t Thirty Years’ War and Savoy, 29 Thollon parish, 216, 230t Thomas Aquinas (saint), 148–49 Thomas of Savoy (prince), 29 Thônes parish/village, 151, 203, 221–22, 230t Thonon parish confraternities in, 230t de Granier’s relationship to, 47, 71, 78 F. de Sales’s mission in, 55, 58, 90–99 Forty Hours Devotions in, 64, 70–80 Holy House of (see Holy House of Thonon) as Protestant, 28 religious houses in, 163t, 166t return to Catholicism, 87 Ursulines in, 166t Thorens parish, 40, 42, 230t Tolet, François, S.J., 38 Torelli, Ludovica (countess), Barnabite benefactress, 36, 37n Tournon, Gérard de (Capuchin), 133 Touviere parish, 230t

Index treaties Edict of Nantes, 100: effect of, in Gex, 31, 104–11, 135–37; and Gex, 232–33; and Pope Clement VIII, 31; on property disputes, 116–17 effect on missionary work, 57–58, 100, 104, 127 of Lausanne, 80, 80n of Lyon (1601), 17–19, 21, 28, 93, 94n, 100, 102; effect on Protestants in Gex, 111–12 of Nyon (1589), 28 Tuan, Yi-Fu, 11, 19 Turenne, Henri de la Tour d’Auvergne, vicomte de, returns to Catholicism, 57

U

Ugine parish/priory, 230t University of Padua, 40 Urban VIII (pope) and decline of church reform, 32–33 view of Jesuits, 35 Ursuline convents, 166t Ursulines, 166t

V

Vacheresse parish, 158, 212, 219, 224, 230t Vailly parish, 230t Vallet, Pierre (visitor), 156 Vallier parish, 192 Vaulx parish, 164t–165t Venard, Marc, 48, 51, 102, 104, 121, 126, 140, 162 veneration of images/saints/relics, 201–2 Versoix parish, 132–34 Versonnex parish, 123 Veyrier du Lac parish, 197 Victor-Amadeus I (duke) correspondent of F. de Sales, 176 marries Christine of France, 29, 43 Vieu parish, 230t Ville en Michaille priory, 164t Ville parish, 230t

m 269 Vincent de Paul, 161–62 violence, against pilgrims, 74 Viret, Pierre, 81 visitations. See also injunctions Borromeo’s methods of, 46 clergy/laity conflicts, 155, 173–74, 194–95 and Councils of Constance, Pisa, and Tarragon, 44–45 duties/goals of visitors, 47–48, 143–45 manuals for, 45 peer review of priests, 142–43 and physical landscape, 23–25, 187, 233 post-Tridentine practices of, 38–39, 45–52 records of: as historical sources, 20, 48–52, 143; vs. correspondence about, 171–73 Savoyard/French compared, 121–22 Vodola, Elisabeth, 192 Vongnes parish, 194

W

Wandel, Lee Palmer, 149 war. See military conflict White Penitents confraternity, 228t, 230t women in confraternities, 204, 208 correspondence with F. de Sales, 42 procession/pilgrimage participation of, 220 relationship to clergy, 131–32, 150–51, 179 religious orders/houses of, 33, 42, 160–61, 166t Wright, A. D., 30

X

Xavier, Francis, S.J., 34

Z

Zaccaria, Antonio Maria, founder of Barnabites, 36–37 Zeeden, Ernst Walter, 15