ABELLY, LOUIS. - French theologian and writer whose exact year of birth (1603, 1604, 1606) and place of birth (in the Vexin or in Paris) are not known. Died October 4, 1691 in Paris. He was an opponent of the Jansenists and the Gallicans. From the earliest years of his priesthood he placed himself under the direction of St. Vincent de Paul, on whose advice he accepted the position of vicar general of the bishop of Bayonne, François Fouquet (1640-43). When the latter was transferred to Agde, A. returned to Paris, where he became parish priest of Saint-Josse, then spiritual director of the General Hospital. Elected bishop of Rodez (1664), after three years, following an attack of hemiplegia, he resigned. Saint-Lazare in Paris housed him for the remainder of his life, which he spent in study and prayer.
He composed some forty works, which can be grouped into three main categories: theological and ascetical writings, to which his first and best-known works belong; polemical writings, in defense of the dignity and prerogatives of the Most Holy Virgin, of the ecclesiastical hierarchy and of eucharistic worship; historical writings, especially on heresies.
Three works earned him particular fame: 1) the Medulla Theologiae... (approved by the doctors of the Sorbonne, in 2 vols., Paris 1650: 13 editions), which earned him, from Boileau (Lutrin, IV), an ironic label (le mailleux A.), but which St. Alphonsus himself recommended for the formation of the clergy (cf. letter to Di Costanzo, Jan. 17, 1782: Lettere di s. Alfonso, II, Rome 1887, p. 623); 2) La Couronne de l'Année Chrétienne, ou Méditations sur les principales et les plus importantes vérités de l'Évangile de J. C. disposées pour tous les jours de l'année, in 2 vols. (Paris 1657), constantly reprinted until the second half of the last century: 45 editions; 3) La vie du Vénérable Serviteur de Dieu Vincent de Paul, in 3 vols. (Paris 1664), judged by Coste "the most pious and the most exact," so that A. has passed into history as the first biographer of the great saint.
Interesting for the positive method adopted is the work on the Madonna: La tradition de l'Église touchant la dévotion particulière des chrétiens envers la Très-Saïncité Vierge Marie, Mère de Dieu... (Paris 1652). To ecclesiastics he addressed the Sacerdos christianus, seu ad vitam sacerdotalem pie instituendam manuductio (Paris 1656), which also had many editions.
For the effectiveness of his action and of his writings, A. must be considered as one of those who, in the 17th century, did the most to re-establish ecclesiastical discipline in France.
Bibliography4 works
Igino Cecchetti