GASPARD MERMILLOD. — Cardinal, born at Carouge (diocese of Geneva) on 22 Sept. 1824, died at Rome on 23 Feb. 1892. Ordained priest in 1847, he served as vicar at the parish of Saint-Germain in Geneva. In the canton of Geneva, where intolerance and radical Calvinism reigned unchallenged, M. resolutely asserted and defended the rights of Catholics. In 1848 he protested indignantly against the expulsion of Bishop Marilley.
With the support of French and Piedmontese Catholics, encouraged by his preaching, he succeeded in 1857 in opening in Geneva—where 20,000 Catholics were confined to a single parish—the new church of Notre-Dame, of which he became the first parish priest. To combat Calvinist rationalism, he founded the *Annales catholiques*. Appointed titular Bishop of Hebron, he was entrusted with the care of all Catholics in the canton of Geneva; but this step, intended as the first move toward the restoration of the Catholic hierarchy in Switzerland, was not followed up because of the persistence of Protestant intolerance. Indeed, from 1870 onward the oppression of Catholics intensified, as the cantonal authorities sought to impose upon them the establishment of a national church (1872). Mermillod’s appointment as bishop was declared illegal, and he was ordered to resign. Since he refused, on 17 Feb. 1873 he was expelled from the canton and forced to take up residence at Monthon near the frontier (cf. on these events G. Goyau, *Une ville église: Genève*, II, 3rd ed., Paris 1919, pp. 149 ff.).
In 1881 Leo XIII entrusted him with a visitation of the Catholic churches in Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. In 1882 he became Consultor of the Congregation of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs, and the following year he was named Bishop of Geneva and Lausanne and created a cardinal in 1890.
He recognized the importance of the social question and, both in word and writing, maintained that it could be resolved only through the aid of religion, which alone, in his view, could bring workers and employers, the poor and the rich, closer together. In 1882 he was entrusted with directing a commission charged with examining, in the light of Catholic doctrine, all questions of social economy—especially those concerning workers—and with determining the true principles, assessing their value and the means by which they might prevail in society. He thus played a significant role in preparing the ground for *Rerum Novarum*.