Maurice Noël Léon Couve de Murville | |
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Archbishop of Birmingham | |
Archdiocese | Birmingham |
See | Birmingham |
Appointed | 22 January 1982 |
Installed | 25 March 1982 |
Term ended | 12 June 1999 |
Predecessor | George Patrick Dwyer |
Successor | Vincent Gerard Nichols |
Orders | |
Ordination | 29 June 1957 |
Consecration | 25 March 1982 by Bruno Heim |
Personal details | |
Born |
St Germain-en-Laye, France |
27 June 1929
Died | 3 November 2007 Littlehampton, West Sussex |
(aged 78)
Denomination | Roman Catholic |
Styles of Maurice Noël Léon Couve de Murville |
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Reference style | The Most Reverend |
Spoken style | Your Grace |
Religious style | Archbishop |
Maurice Noël Léon Couve de Murville (27 June 1929 – 3 November 2007) was the seventh Roman Catholic Archbishop of Birmingham from 25 March 1982 until his retirement on 12 June 1999, having formerly been a priest of the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton and chaplain of Fisher House, Cambridge.
Maurice Couve de Murville was born in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, west of Paris, into a distinguished French family who moved to Mauritius at the end of the 18th century. He was a cousin and namesake of Maurice Couve de Murville (1907–1999), a French politician in the Huguenot branch of the family, who served as Foreign Minister (1958–1968) and briefly Prime Minister under General Charles de Gaulle. In 1936, his father took him from France along with his mother and twin brothers to settle at Leatherhead in Surrey, at the age of 7. His mother died in 1945 in England. She was buried alongside other Souchon family members in Effingham, Surrey.
Educated initially at The John Fisher School, Purley, then by the Benedictines at Downside School near Bath, he read history at Trinity College, Cambridge (MA). He studied at the seminary of Saint-Sulpice, and earned his Licentiate of Sacred Theology (STL) from the Institut Catholique in Paris. He was influenced by the worker-priest movement in France, and became lifelong friends with Jean-Marie Lustiger, future Cardinal Archbishop of Paris.