MONTI-LAURIER, DIOCESE OF
Diocese in the province of Québec. As soon as he took possession of his see at Ottawa, Bishop Charles-Hugues Gauthier set to work organizing a new diocese. Monti-Laurier, carved out of Ottawa, was erected by Pope Pius X on 21 April
1913. Its first bishop was Bishop F
S. Brunet (1913–22). The cathedral is dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary.A suffragan of Ottawa, the diocese numbers 54,185 Catholics: 51,185 French-speaking, about 800 English-speaking, and about 1,300 of other languages. Non-Catholics number 2,200; 100 diocesan priests and 50 religious (Jesuits, Oblates, Priestly Fraternity) exercise the sacred ministry there. There are 7 male and 10 female congregations.
The diocese has a minor seminary, 57 churches and chapels, 50 parishes, 10 missions, 4 hospitals, 3 orphanages, a school of pedagogy, a school of arts and crafts, a school of agriculture, a scholasticate, and 2 novitiates.
The area of the diocese is 5,600 square miles.
Benedictine abbey situated on the island of Montmajour northeast of Arles, surrounded by marshes that gave it in Provençal the name of Saint-Pierre “de la Sagno.”
The abbey originated with some hermits who took charge of digging graves and guarding the cemetery established there under the patronage of Saint Peter. The monastery first appears in the mid-10th century as dependent on the Chapter of Saint-Trophime, cathedral of Arles, from which it was purchased on 7 October 949 by a pious woman named Teucinda, who died in 977, as is read on her tombstone. In 960 its first abbot was Mauring; it then received gifts and privileges and was directly dependent on the Holy See. Clement IV (1265–68) designated the abbot from among the Benedictines, and in the 14th century it became a benefice whose collation was reserved to the Holy See. In the 16th and 17th centuries it became a benefice of the d’Ornano family; the dispersed abbey had several priors scattered throughout Provence.
The double abbatial church dedicated to Saint Peter, on the southern flank of the hill, was built in the 10th century, comprising two naves, one of which was hewn from the rock; the other consists of a nave with three bays. On the other flank of the mountain, a new church dedicated to the Blessed Virgin and All Saints was begun by Abbot Archinricus on 30 May 1016 and completed under Abbot Roland (1059–72). In 1030 the crypt of the Holy Cross was consecrated there. The two churches were demolished in the 12th-century works, when around 1150 construction began on the present church of Notre-Dame, finished around 1153; it consists of a nave with two bays, a transept, a semicircular apse inside and polygonal outside, two lateral apses, and a rock-hewn crypt with an ambulatory opening onto five small apses. To the north transept a chapel was added by Abbot Bertrando de Maussang (1298–1316), while to the east a tetraconch chapel of the Holy Cross was erected in the second half of the 12th century. Beside the church the cloister was built, showing affinities with that of Saint-Trophime in Arles; it was restored several times, as in the time of Abbots Pons de l’Orme (1368–80) and Cardinal Pierre de Foix (1450–62); the capitals display historical scenes or chimeras.
From the late 16th century, the abbey in commendam fell into such decay that the archbishop of Arles, Bishop J. Jaubert de Barroult, entrusted it in 1639 to the Benedictines of Saint-Maur, who renewed the buildings, later damaged by a fire in 1726; a new plan was approved in 1755. The abbey was secularized by the Revolution in 1790. After some parts were saved by a private individual, the city of Arles began its redemption after the Restoration, and restorations were begun in 1872.
On 19 April 1030, under Abbot Ramberto Pons de Marignane, archbishop of Arles, the “Pardon of Montmajour” was instituted on the occasion of the construction of the crypt dedicated to the Holy Cross in the basilica of Notre-Dame for all the faithful who had contributed to its construction. The indulgence was extended in subsequent years to the pilgrimage held on 3 May, the Invention of the Holy Cross; it remained thereafter. Pope Julius II (bull of 6 February 1504) granted a plenary indulgence when 3 May fell on a Friday. Pius IX (bull of 14 July 1851) restored the pilgrimage, which had been suspended since the French Revolution. At present, by decree of the Sacred Congregation of Rites, the indulgence is transferred to the church of Saint Anthony in Arles.