MICHAEL FELIX KORUM. — Bishop, b. 2 Nov. 1840 at Wickersweier near Colmar, d. 4 Dec. 1921 at Trier. After completing his studies at Innsbruck, he was ordained priest in 1865 at Strasbourg and taught philosophy and theology in that city’s minor seminary. In 1881 he became Bishop of Trier. In 1886 he reopened the Felician Seminary, which he expanded.
In 1890 he appointed a commission of experts to refute the interpretation advanced in 1876 by Wilmowsky regarding the Holy Tunic, the relic of Christ preserved at Trier. The commission declared that the examination of the relic had yielded no results contradicting the most ancient traditions, and Bishop K. therefore ordered the relic’s public exposition. More than a million pilgrims came to Trier on that occasion, and, as K. himself recounts, various miraculous cures occurred. When a conflict arose in 1903 between the bishop and the Prussian government over religious instruction, Cardinal Kopp acted as mediator; K., interpreting this intervention as not entirely favourable to him, tendered his resignation to the Holy See, but it was refused. K. played a leading role in the question of trade unions, maintaining that Catholic workers could not belong to associations that were confessionally agnostic. After the First World War he devoted himself to the welfare of the Saar territory.