Bishopric of Saint-Flour
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The diocese of Saint-Flour is a Roman Catholic ecclesiastical territory in France. The episcopal see is located in Saint-Flour, Cantal.
[edit] History
The diocese was erected in 1317. It was juridically speaking suppressed and immediately re-established by the Holy See in accordance with the Napoleonic Concordat of 1801, the boundaries of the re-established diocese being now aligned to coincide with those of the civil département of Cantal. The diocese established in the area by the Civil Constitution of the Clergy in 1790 had indeed been of Cantal, which was sometimes referred to at that period as the diocese of Saint-Flour, after its episcopal seat. ) Diocese comprising the Department of Cantal, and is suffragan of the Archbishopric of Bourges. Re-established by the Concordat of 1802, by which the Department of Haute-Loire was brought into this diocese, this department was detached from it in 1823 by the reestablishment of the See of Le Puy. The traditions relative to St. Florus (Flour), who is said to have been the first Bishop of Lodève and to have died at Indiciat (later Saint-Flour) while evangelizing Haute-Auvergne, have been the subject of numerous discussions. In two documents concerning the foundation of the second monastery of St-Flour, drawn up in 1013 and 1031, and in a letter written to Urban IV in 1261 by Pierre de Saint-Haon, prior of Saint-Flour, St. Flour is already considered as belonging to the Apostolic times, and the "Speculum sanctorale" of Bernard Gui in 1329 relates at length the legend of this "disciple of Christ". M. Marcellin Boudet believes it more likely that St. Flour lived in the fifth century, and that it was he who attended the Council of Arles in 450 or 451.
At the close of the tenth century there was already a monastery at Indiciat. A local seigneur, Astorg de Brezons, surnamed "the Red Bull", gave this monastery to Odilo, Abbot of Cluny, and the donation was confirmed by Gregory V (996-99). Amblard de Brezons, his nephew, surnamed "le Mal Hiverné", seized the monastery and destroyed all of it except the church. Amblard and Astorg, from 1010 to 1013, gave this church and its fief to St. Peter's at Rome, together with the monastery of Sauxillages, governed by Odilo; but later Amblard considered this donation as void, and constructed a fortress, a remnant of which is now the sacristy of the cathedral, upon the site of the old monastery; afterwards Amblard, seized with remorse at Rome, between 1025 and 1031 gave back to Odilo all he possessed, and a large monastery was again founded. Urban II, after the Council of Clermont (1095), consecrated the church of this new monastery. The church collapsed in 1396, and no remains of it exist. Pope Callistus II passed some time there.
In August, 1317, pope John XXII detached Haute-Auvergne from the bishopric of Clermont and raised St-Flour to the rank of a bishopric, the first ordinary of which was his chaplain Raymond de Montuéjols. Among his successors were Pierre d'Estaing (1361-67), afterwards Archbishop of Bourges and cardinal in 1370; Louis-Siffrein-Joseph de Salamon (1820-29), former counseiller-clerc to the Parliament of Paris, who during the French Revolution had secretly acted in France as the pope's agent, a rôle concerning which he has left very important memoirs.
The Abbey of Aurillac is located in the diocese territory.
