26 Facts About Florian Desprez

Julien Florian Felix Desprez, who used the name Florian Desprez was a French prelate of the Catholic Church, who became a bishop in 1850, first in Reunion from 1850 to 1857 and then in Limoges until 1859.

Florian Desprez spent 36 years of his ecclesiastical career as archbishop of Toulouse from 1859 to 1895.

Florian Desprez was born in Ostricourt, Nord, on 14 April 1807.

Florian Desprez was the eldest of three children born to a family of modest means; an uncle was a priest and an aunt a religious sister.

Florian Desprez studied at the Royal College of Douai from 1819 to 1824.

Florian Desprez received his episcopal consecration on 5 January 1851 in his parish church in Roubaix from Rene-Francois Regnier, archbishop of Cambrai.

Florian Desprez chose as his motto, "Our hope is steadfast".

Florian Desprez sailed from France on 6 March; he disembarked on 21 May and took possession of his see on 25 May 1851.

Florian Desprez concentrated initially on diocesan organization, establishing the independence of the Church from government authorities who had heretofore been allowed to interfere, and creating societies for the men and women in each parish.

Florian Desprez made his ad limina visit to Rome en route to Paris and was honored with the title Assistant at the Papal Throne on 28 March 1854.

Florian Desprez spent most of his time in France, but visited Rome to participate in the proclamation of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception on 8 December 1854 and the consecration of the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls two days later.

Florian Desprez founded an orphanage, two colleges staffed by the Jesuits, and a shelter sufficient to accommodate 400 patients with leprosy.

Florian Desprez was transferred to the see of Limoges on 19 March 1857.

Florian Desprez moved more slowly with respect to doctrine, aligning the diocesan catechism with Roman ideas, including papal infallibility, in 1868.

Florian Desprez participated in the First Vatican Council and joined the majority in support of that dogma.

In 1862, Florian Desprez provoked a firestorm of protests by proposing a religious observance to mark the 300th anniversary of events that occurred in Toulouse during the Wars of Religion, when Catholic forces massacred several thousand Huguenots who had been granted safe conduct.

Florian Desprez wrote that the Church had a duty to remember "the most remarkable events of its history" and would celebrate "a glorious act" of three hundred years ago.

Florian Desprez' announcement described the grand scale of past celebrations, though not Voltaire's protest that the 1762 celebration was held to "thank God for four thousand murders".

The Journal des debats reviewed the events of 1562 in detail and called Florian Desprez's planned festival "a deplorable anachronism and a danger to the public peace".

Florian Desprez said he was completely surprised at the reaction and that the Church would never glorify the violence of past centuries.

Florian Desprez's position was that the Catholics of Toulouse should celebrate the fact that their prayers had been answered in 1562.

Florian Desprez pressed the case for the canonization of the recently beatified Saint Germaine of Pibrac, a 17th-century shepherd girl abused by her step-mother in a village just west of Toulouse.

Florian Desprez took possession of his titular church on 25 September 1879.

Florian Desprez reported being told several times that Desprez was the biological son of Emperor Napoleon, though "it was pretty generally agreed that he had not inherited the great intellectual gifts of his supposed father".

Florian Desprez died of heart disease on 21 January 1895 in Toulouse; he was the oldest and longest-serving French bishop.

Florian Desprez was made a knight of the Legion of Honor on 31 December 1854 and promoted to officer on 15 August 1868.