LAVIGERIE, CHARLES-MARTIAL. - Cardinal, b. at Huire, near Bayonne, on 13 Oct. 1825, d. at Algiers on 25 Nov. 1892. Ordained priest on 2 June 1849, he was for three years a professor at the Sorbonne; then, following the advice of Fr. de Ravignan, he accepted the direction of the schools of the East. This gave him the opportunity to undertake a charitable expedition in Syria, during which he had a meeting, which has remained famous, with the celebrated emir 'Abd el-Qādir. Above all, the L. then came into contact with the East and with Islam, and indeed discovered within himself a missionary vocation.
Having arrived in Rome, he was appointed auditor of the Rota, then consultor to the Commission for the Oriental Rites, and shortly afterward bishop of Nancy. In 1867 he accepted the French government's proposal for his appointment as archbishop of Algiers, with the intention "of making Algeria the cradle of a Christian nation, of spreading the light of the Gospel and of carrying it beyond the deserts, to the center of the immense continent."
Struggling with force, he won the freedom of apostolate among the Muslims of Algeria, and Napoleon III had to yield to his plans. In order to carry out among these peoples a discreet but effective ministry, L. founded two missionary congregations: that of the White Fathers and that of the White Sisters. He sent his missionaries, across the Sahara, toward Timbuktu; twice over he made martyrs of them. The White Fathers were to reach the Sudan only in 1895, in the wake of the French army.
The L. had better fortune in the apostolic expeditions toward equatorial Africa, and it is his imperishable glory to have opened the center of the African continent to the Gospel, where the first White Fathers arrived in 1879.
His pastoral cares were directed also to those who were closest to him; in the archdiocese of Algiers he caused numerous churches to rise and established many religious communities there; in Tunisia, he revived the ancient see of Carthage, built the cathedral in Tunis and the basilica of St. Louis in Carthage. He became primate of Africa. But once again the East called him: the French government offered him the custody of the sanctuary of St. Anne in Jerusalem. Thus were founded the seminaries in which the White Fathers devote themselves to the formation of the Greek-Melchite clergy.
The reward of so many services rendered to the Church was, in 1882, his creation as cardinal of the Holy Roman Church by Pope Leo XIII. He used his word, so authoritative and powerful, to preach a double antislavery campaign. Leo XIII was able to affirm of him that he had been one of the men most deserving of Catholicism and of civilization.
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Giovanni B. Canet