LACROIX, CLAUDE. - Jesuit, eminent moral theologian, b. at Dahlem (Luxembourg) on 7 Apr. 1652, d. at Cologne on 1-2 June 1714. He taught philosophy for three years at Cologne; then moral theology at Münster, whence he moved to teach the same subject at Cologne.
His name is linked to his splendid Theologia moralis (8 vols., Cologne 1797-14), in which he follows the celebrated Medulla of Fr. H. Busembaum, while greatly expanding and commenting upon it, with exquisite order, ample information, sound learning, practical experience, and clarity of solutions. Owing to these qualities, the work went through many editions (25 in fewer than 50 years) and became the most sought-after text.
The Lyons edition of 1729, edited by Fr. F. Montauzon, who made several additions to it, and reprinted in 1757, prompted the Jansenists to denounce various propositions by the author concerning regicide and homicide, exploited as incitement to crime; thus the work was publicly burned, and in 1758 there was also burned the writing of Fr. A. Zaccaria: Apologie de la théologie morale des pp. Busembaum et Lacroix Jésuites (s. l. 1758). This apologia, however, is irrefutable, and L.'s work continues to retain its value. The best and most complete editions, also updated with regard to the decrees of the Holy See, are: that of A. Zaccaria (6 vols., Ravenna 1761) and that of P. Dion (4 vols., Paris 1874-75).