GRÉGOIRE, HENRI. — French constitutional bishop, born on 4 December 1750 at Vého (Lorraine), died on 26 May 1831 in Paris. He studied theology at the Seminary of Metz and was ordained a priest in 1775. Vicar at Merimont and parish priest at Emberménil, he was elected deputy to the Estates-General in 1789. A member of the clergy’s order, he was among the first to join the Third Estate, and on the night of 4 August 1789 he became an ardent advocate of the abolition of ecclesiastical privileges and supported above all the suppression of annates.
imbued with Gallican ideas, he was among the most strenuous supporters of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy. He deluded himself that he could reconcile the Catholic religion with the extremism of the new ideas and was the first to take the required oath. Elected constitutional bishop in the departments of Sarthe and Loir-et-Cher, he opted for the see of Blois (1790). G. realized the error he had committed too late: only at the session of 17 Brumaire of Year II, when the bishop of Paris, Gobel, frightened by the revolutionaries’ threats, came to the tribune to abjure his faith and lay aside his episcopal insignia, did G. indignantly refuse to follow his example and, in the name of freedom of worship, proclaimed the right to remain faithful to religion.
After the fall of Robespierre, he spoke in favor of religious freedom and, although his words met with the opposition of the Assembly, the Convention nevertheless shortly afterward approved a law guaranteeing the right to celebrate worship publicly. This positive aspect of G.’s conduct is, however, overshadowed by the continual struggle he waged against the Holy See and against the Catholics who had remained faithful to the visible Head of the Church. He remained a resolute supporter of the constitutional Church; he formed a Comité des évêques réunis; he founded a dedicated newspaper, the Annales de la religion; he promoted the election of bishops in accordance with the provisions of the law on the Civil Constitution of the Clergy; he extended this law to the French colonies in America and established new dioceses there, appointing their incumbents himself. After the Concordat of 1801, G. had to relinquish the administration of the diocese of Blois. He left France together with the Jansenist Degola, his friend, and traveled through England, Holland, and Germany. On returning to his homeland, he was appointed senator for life by Napoleon; but, mindful of the Concordat, which had forever destroyed his hope of separating the French Church from Rome, he systematically opposed imperial policy. After the Restoration, he stood as a candidate in the Chamber elections of 1819 and was elected deputy, but because of his past the election itself was annulled. At the point of death, he refused to retract the oath he had taken to the Civil Constitution of the Clergy and therefore was not given a religious burial. He wrote extensively: the Histoire des confesseurs, des empereurs, des rois et d'autres princes and the Histoire des sectes religieuses are listed in the Index (decrees of 11 June 1827 and 18 August 1828).