The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Auch, otherwise known in antiquity as Augusta Auscorum, is an archdiocese of the Latin Rite of the Catholic church in France. The archdiocese now comprises the department of Gers in south-west France. It now is officially Auch, Condom, Lectoure and Lombez. The archdiocese is a suffragan of the Archdiocese of Toulouse, and the current bishop is Maurice Marcel Gardès, appointed in 2004.
Originally erected in the 6th century as the diocese of Auch, the diocese was elevated in 847 to an archdiocese. As a metropolitan see at the time, it had ten suffragan sees: Acqs (Dax) and Aire, afterwards united as the Diocese of Aire; Lectoure, later reunited with the Archdiocese of Auch; Couserans, afterwards united with the Diocese of Pamiers; Oloron, Lescar, and Bayonne, united later as the diocese of Bayonne; Bazas, afterwards united with the Archdiocese of Bordeaux; Comminges, united later with the Archdiocese of Toulouse; and Tarbes.
Up to 1789 the Archbishops of Auch bore the title of Aquitaine, though for centuries there had been no Aquitaine.
The Archdiocese of Auch, re-established in 1882, was made up of the former archdiocese of the same name and the former Dioceses of Lectoure, Condom, and Lombez. Condom was previously a suffragan of Bordeaux, and Lombez of Toulouse; thenceforth the suffragans of Auch were Aire, Tarbes, and Bayonne.
A local tradition that dates back to the beginning of the twelfth century tells us that Taurinus, fifth Bishop of Eauze (Elusa), abandoned his episcopal city, which was destroyed by the Vandals, and transferred his see to Auch. Eauze, in fact, probably remained a metropolitan see till about the middle of the ninth century, at which time, owing to the invasions of the Vikings, it was reunited, to the Diocese of Auch, which had existed since the fifth century at and then became an archdiocese.
The first Bishop of Auch known to history is the poet, St. Orientius (first half of the fifth century), in honor of whom a famous abbey was founded in the seventh century. Cardinal Melchior de Polignac, author of the "Anti-Lucrèce," was Archbishop of Auch from 1725 to 1741.
Auch Cathedral, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary, is a Gothic structure with a Byzantine façade, but in spite of this incongruity, very imposing; its fifteenth-century windows are said to be the most beautiful in France.