Christophe de Beaumont

Christophe de Beaumont du Repaire (1703–1781), French ecclesiastic and archbishop of Paris, was a cadet of the Les Adrets and Saint-Quentin branch of the illustrious Dauphin family of Beaumont. He became bishop of Bayonne in 1741, then archbishop of Vienne in 1745, and in 1746, at the age of forty-three, archbishop of Paris. An austere man with no wish for glory, had to be summoned three times by Louis XV before he would leave his diocese of Vienne and move to Paris.

Beaumont is noted for his struggle with the Jansenists. To force them to accept the bull Unigenitus (1713) which condemned their doctrines, he ordered the priests of his diocese to withhold sacraments from those who would not recognize the bull, and to deny funeral rites to those who had confessed to a Jansenist priest. This measure had severe, damning implications for Jansenists, provoking widespread outcry against such intolerance from the Jansenists themselves, the philosophes, the parlements, and the larger public.

While other bishops sent Beaumont their adhesion to his crusade, the Parlement of Paris threatened to confiscate his temporalities. Louis XV of France forbade the Parlement to interfere in these spiritual questions, and upon its proving obdurate it was exiled (18 September 1753). The royal chamber, which was substituted, having failed to carry on the administration of justice properly, the king was obliged to recall the parlement, and the archbishop was sent into honorable exile to Conflans, where he remained from August 1754 until October 1757. Efforts were made to induce him to resign the active duties of his see to a coadjutor, he refused despite the most tempting offers - including a cardinal's hat. As the dispute between the king and the Parlements continued, de Beaumont was exiled from Paris a second time, from January 1758 to October 1759. He eventually returned, having conceded none of his principles. 'Let them erect a scaffold in the midst of the court' he said, 'I would ascend it to maintain my rights, fulfil my duties and obey the laws of my conscience.'

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