Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 13.djvu/750

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SEGARELLI


682


SEGHERS


known, according to Mgr. Duchesne, is Passivus, who assisted at four councils after the year 533. As bishops of Seez the following merit mention: St. Raverennus (date uncertain), whom Mgr. Duchesne does not include in the episcopal list; St. Aunobertus (about 6S9); St. Lotharius and St. Godegrandus (Chrodegang), assassinated, whose double episcopacy ^Igr. Duchesne assigns to the close of the seventh or the beginning of the eighth century; St. Adalhelmus ( Adelin ) , aut hor of a work on the life and miracles of St.


Thk Cathedral, S^ez

Opportuna; Gervaise (1220-28), a Premonstraten- sian, who had the confidence of Celestine III, Inno- cent III, and Honorius III; Jean Bertaut (1607-11), who, with his fellow-student and friend, Du Perron, contributed greatly to the conversion of Henry IV, and who was esteemed for his poetical talents; for the occupation of the See of Seez in 1813 by Guillaume Baston (1741-1825), see Baston, Guillaume-Andr6- Ren6.

St. EvTOul, a native of the Diocese of Bayeux, founded, after 560, several monasteries in the Dio- cese of a/icz ; one of them became the important Abbey of Sf-Martin-<ie-Seez, which, owing to the influence of Richelieu, its aflmini.strator-general, was reformed in 1636 by the Benediftines of St-Maur. Rotrou II, Count of Perche, in fulfilment of a vow, established in 1 122, at Soligny, the Abbey of I>a IVappe, in favour of which Bulls were issued by Eugene III (1147), Alexander III (1173), and Innocent III (1203), and which was reformed in 1662 by Abbot y\mand Jean le Bouthillier de Ranc6 (q. v.). During the Revolu- tion the Trappists went with Dom Augustin de l^/ostranges. 26 April, 1791, into Switzerland, where they founrjefl the convent of La Val Sainte, but re- tumwi to Soligny wwn after the accession of lAiuin XVIIl. Among the abbots of the Trappist monas- ferj' at Soligny were: Cardinal Jean du Bellay, who held a number of bishoprics and resigned his abbatial dignity in l.'<38; the historian Dom Gervai.se, superior of the abbey from 1 69(^-8. On the occasion of the Ma.s.sacreof St. Bartholomew (\T)12) Matignon, lea/lcr of the Catholics, succeeded in saving the lives of the Protestants at Alen5on. The cathedral of S6ez dates


from the twelfth century; that of AlenQon was begun in the fourteenth. The following saints are the object of special devotion: SS. Ravennus and Rasyphus, martyred in the diocese about the beginning of the third century; St. C6ronne (d. about 490), who founded two monasteries of nuns near Mortagne; St. Cenericus, or Ceneri (d . about 669 ) , born at Spoleto, founder of t he monaster\' of St. Cenericus; St. Opportuna, sister of St. Chrodegang, and her aunt, St. Lanthilda, abbesses of the two monasteries of Almeneches (end of the seventh or beginning of the eighth centur>') ; St. Evre- mond (d. about 720), founder of the monasteries of Fontenay les Louvets and Montmevrey; St. Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury (d. 1099), who, as Comte de Sc^ez, had followed William the Conqueror into England.

The chief pilgrimages in the diocese are: Notre- Dame des Champs at Seez, Notre-Dame du Vallet, Notre-Dame du Repos, near Almeneches, three very ancient shrines; Notre-Dame de Lignerollcs, a pil- grimage of the seventh century; Notre-Dame de Recouvrance, at Les Tourailles, dating beyond 900; Notre-Dame de Longny, established in the sixteenth century; Notre-Dame du Lignon, a pilgrimage of the seventeenth century. In 1884 Mgr Buguet, cure of Montligeon chapel, founded an expiatory society for the abandoned souls in Purgatorj^, since erected by Leo XIII into a Prima Primaria archconf rat emit y, which publishes six bulletins in different languages and has members in every part of the world. Notre Dame de la Chapelle Montligeon is also a place of pilgrimage. The Grande Trappe of Soligny still exists in the Diocese of Seez, which before the applica- tion of the law of 1901 against religious congregations had different teaching congregations of brothers, in addition to the Redemptorists. Among the congrega- tions of nuns originating in the diocese may be men- tioned: the Si.sters of Providence, a teaching and nursing institute founded in 1683 with mother-house at Seez; the Sisters of Christian Education, estab- lished in 1817 by Abb6 Lafosse, mother-house at Argentan, and a branch of the order at Farnborough in England; the Sisters of Mercy, founded in 1818 by Abbe Bazin to nurse the sick in their own homes. At the close of the nineteenth century the religious congregations had in the diocese: 2 infant asylums, 24 infant schools, 3 workshops, 1 school for the blind, 1 for the deaf and dumb, 4 boj's' orphanages, 11 girls' orphanages, 2 refuges, 16 hospitals, 16 con- vents of nuns devoted to the care of the sick at home, and 1 insane asvlum. At the time of the destruction of the Concordat (1905) the diocese contained 326,952 inhabitants, 45 cures, 467 succursal churches, 135 vicarates towards the support of which the State contributed.

GaUia Chrisliaria (nom), XI (1759), 674-711, instr. 1.51-200; Duchesne, Pastes ipiscopaux, II, 229-.34; Fisquet, France ponti- ficale, diocise de Siez CPann, 1866); Hommey, Hisloire Gfnirale, ecdesiastique el civile du diocese de Siez (Alpncon, 1899-1900); Marais and Beaddouin, EsKni historique sur la calhidrale et le chapUre de SSez (Alencon, 1878) ; Blin, Vie des saints du diocise de Siez et histoire de leur cuUe, I (LaigUs 187.3).

Georges Goyau.

Segarelli, Gerard. See Apostolici.

Seghers, Charles John, Bishop of Vancouver Island (to-dav Victoria), Apostle of Alaska, b. at Ghent, Belgium, 26 Dec, 1839; d. in Alaska, 28 Nov., 1886. Left an orphan at a very early date, he was brought up by his uncles. After having studied in locaL institutions and in the American Seminary at Ix)uvain, he was ordaincul jjriest on 31 May, 1863. On 14 Sept. of the same year he left for Vancouver Island, where for the space of ten years he was en- gaged in valuable missionary labours among the pion- eer whites and the natives. On 23 March, 1873, he was apj)ointed to succeed Bishop Demers (q. v.). One of the first cares of the new prelate was to visit the territory of Alaska, after which he turned his attention towards the west coast of Vancouver Island,