Holy See
The Holy See called the See of Rome, is the apostolic episcopal see of the bishop of Rome, known as the Pope, ex cathedra the universal ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the worldwide Catholic Church, a sovereign entity of international law. Founded in the 1st century by Saints Peter and Paul, by virtue of Petrine and Papal primacy according to Catholic tradition, it is the focal point of full communion for Catholic bishops and Catholics around the world organised in polities of the Latin Church, the 23 Eastern Catholic Churches, their dioceses and religious institutes; as a recognised sovereign subject of international law, headed by the Pope, the Holy See is headquartered in, operates from, exercises "exclusive dominion" over the independent Vatican City State enclave in Rome, Italy. The Holy See maintains bilateral diplomatic relations with 172 sovereign states, signs concordats and treaties, performs multilateral diplomacy with multiple intergovernmental organizations, including the United Nations and its agencies, the Council of Europe, the European Communities, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe the Organization of American States and the Organization for African Unity.
The Holy See is administered by the Roman Curia, similar to a centralised government, with the Cardinal Secretary of State as its chief administrator, in addition to various dicasteries, comparable to ministries and executive departments. Papal elections are carried out by the College of Cardinals. Although the Holy See is sometimes metonymically referred to as the "Vatican", the Vatican City State was distinctively established with the Lateran Treaty between the Holy See and Italy to ensure the temporal and spiritual independence of the Papacy; as such, ambassadors are accredited to the Holy See and not the Vatican City State. Conversely, Papal nuncios to states and international organisations are recognised as representing the Holy See and the integrity of the Catholic Church along with its 1.3 billion members, not the Vatican City State, as prescribed in the Canon law of the Catholic Church. The "Holy See" thus refers to the See of Rome viewed as the central government of the Catholic Church.
The Catholic Church, in turn, is the largest non-government provider of education and health care in the world, while the diplomatic status of the Holy See facilitates the access of its vast international network of charities. The word "see" comes from the Latin word "sedes", meaning "seat", which refers to the Episcopal throne; the term "Apostolic See" can refer to any see founded by one of the Apostles, when used with the definite article, it is used in the Catholic Church to refer to the see of the Bishop of Rome, whom that Church sees as successor of Saint Peter, the Prince of the Apostles. While Saint Peter's Basilica in Vatican City is the church most associated with the Papacy, the actual cathedral of the Holy See is the Archbasilica of Saint John Lateran within the city of Rome; every see. In Greek, the adjective "holy" or "sacred" is applied to all such sees as a matter of course. In the West, the adjective is not added, but it does form part of an official title of two sees: besides the Diocese of Rome, the Bishopric of Mainz bears the title of "the Holy See of Mainz".
The apostolic see of Rome was established in the 1st century by Saint Peter and Saint Paul the capital of the Roman Empire, according to Catholic tradition. The legal status of the Catholic Church and its property was recognised by the Edict of Milan in 313 by Roman Emperor Constantine the Great, it became the state church of the Roman Empire by the Edict of Thessalonica in 380. After the Fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476, the temporal legal jurisdisction of the Papal primacy was further recognised as promulgated in Canon law; the Holy See was granted territory in Duchy of Rome by the Donation of Sutri in 728 of King Liutprand of the Lombards, sovereignty by the Donation of Pepin in 756 by King Pepin of the Franks. The Papal States held extensive territory and armed forces in 756–1870. Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne as Roman Emperor by translatio imperii in 800; the Papal coronations of the emperors of the Holy Roman Empire from 858 and the Dictatus papae in 1075 mark the peak of the pope's temporal power claims.
Several contemporary states still trace their own sovereignty to recognition in medieval Papal bulls. Sovereignty of the Holy See was retained despite multiple sacks of Rome during the Early Middle Ages. Yet, relations with the Kingdom of Italy and the Holy Roman Empire were at times strained, reaching from the Diploma Ottonianum and Libellus de imperatoria potestate in urbe Roma regarding the "Patrimony of Saint Peter" in the 10th century, to the Investiture Controversy in 1076-1122, settled again by the Concordat of Worms in 1122; the exiled Avignon Papacy during 1309-1376 put a strain on the Papacy, however returned to Rome. Pope Innocent X was critical of the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 as it weakened the authority of the Holy See throughout much of Europe. Following the French Revolution, the Papal States were occupied as the "Roman Republic" from 1798 to 1799 as a sister republic of the First French Empire under Napoleon, before their territory was reestablished. Notwithstanding, the Holy See was represented in and identified as a "permanent subject of general customary international law vis-à-vis all states" in the Congress of Vien
Roman Catholic Diocese of Nancy
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Nancy and Toul is a diocese of the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church in France. After a considerable political struggle between Louis XV, Louis XVI, the Dukes of Lorraine, the diocese was erected by Pope Pius VI on 17 December 1777; the diocese is suffragan to the Archdiocese of Besançon. The title of count and the rights of sovereignty of the medieval Bishops of Toul originated in certain grants which Henry the Fowler gave St. Gauzelin in 927. During the Conflict of Investitures in 1108, the chapter became divided: the majority elected Riquin of Commercy as bishop. Henry V granted Conrad the title of bishop, with the stipulation that he did not exercise episcopal office. In 1271 grave differences broke out again in the chapter of Toul. In 1278 Pope Nicholas III appointed Conrad of Tübingen as bishop. Thereafter, it was the Holy See which appointed the bishops, alleging various reasons as vacancies arose; as a result, many Italian prelates held this important see until 1552, when Toul was occupied by France.
In 1597 Charles III, duke of Lorraine asked Pope Clement VIII for the dismemberment of the See of Toul and the creation of a see at Nancy. In the end, Clement VIII decided that Nancy was to have a primatial church and that its prelate would have the title of Primate of Lorraine and wear episcopal insignia, but should not exercise episcopal jurisdiction. In 1648 according to the Treaty of Westphalia the bishoprics of Metz and Verdun became French cities; the duchy of Lothringen, surrounded by French territories and occupied by French troops fell to the French, Lorraine became a French province. The population of Toul was around 10,000 persons in 1688. After the French revolution of 1789 France was divided into departments—Lorraine consisted of the departments of Meurthe, Meuse and Vosges. Nancy, Verdun and Epinal became the capitals of these departments. In 1688, the Cathedral of Toul had a Chapter with forty Canons. In the city of Toul there were seven parishes, seven houses of male religious and four monasteries of monks.
The diocese had around 200 parishes. In 1777, the Cathedral of Nancy had a Chapter in which there were three dignities and twenty-four Canons. In the city of 30,000 persons there were 7 parishes, twelve houses of male religious, ten monasteries of monks. All cathedral chapters in France were abolished in 1790 by the Constituent Assembly. In 1777 and 1778 Toul lost territories out of which were formed two new dioceses: Saint-Die and Nancy, both of them suffragans of Trier; the Concordat of 1802, suppressing Toul, made Nancy the seat of a vast diocese which included three Departments: Meurthe and Vosges. The diocese of Nancy was abolished during the French Revolution by the Legislative Assembly, under the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, its territory was subsumed into the new diocese, called'Meurthe', part of the Metropolitanate called the'Metropole du Nord-Est'. The Civil Constitution mandated that bishops be elected by the citizens of each'département', which raised the most severe canonical questions, since the electors did not need to be Catholics and the approval of the Pope was not only not required, but forbidden.
Erection of new dioceses and transfer of bishops, was not in the competence of civil authorities or of the Church in France. The result was schism between the Roman Catholic Church; the legitimate bishop of Nancy, Anne Louis Henri de La Fare, refused to take the oath, therefore the episcopal seat was declared vacant. On 13 March 1791 the electors of Meurthe were assembled, elected the Lazarist P.-F. Chatelain, a Professor at the Seminary in Toul. After some considerable consideration, he refused the election; the electors therefore returned to their deliberations, and, on the recommendation of the Ecclesiastical Committee of the National Assembly, on 8 May 1791 chose the Oratorian Luc-François Lalande of Saint-Lô, a theologian and student of Hebrew. He was consecrated a bishop at Notre Dame in Paris on 29 May by Jean-Baptiste Gobel, the titular Bishop of Lydda, installed as Constitutional Bishop of Paris. On 3 June he made his official entry into Nancy, where he began a war of pamphlets with Bishop de la Fare, in exile in Trier.
In September 1792 Lalande was elected a delegate to the Convention, where, on 7 November, he renounced his functions. In 1795 he became a member of the Council of 500. In 1801 he wrote a letter of submission to Pope Pius VII. At the end of 1799, an assembly of Constitutional priests elected Francois Nicolas of Epinal as a successor to Lalande. Nicolas, all the Constitutional Bishops, were required to resign in May 1801 by First Consul Bonaparte, negotiating a treaty with Pope Pius VII, the Concordat of 1801. Nicolas never recanted. Once the Concordat went into effect, Pius VII was able to issue the appropriate bulls to restore many of the dioceses and to regulate their boundaries, most of which corresponded to the new'départements'; the Concordat of 1802, suppressing Toul, made Nancy the seat of a vast diocese which included three Departments: Meurthe and Vosges. In a Bull of 6 October 1822, Pope Pius VII re-established the Dioceses of Verdun and Saint-Dié, detaching from the diocese of Nancy the departments of Meuse and Vosges.
Since 1824 the bishops of Nancy have borne the title of Bishops of Nancy and Toul, since nea
Protestant Reformed Church of Alsace and Lorraine
The Protestant Reformed Church of Alsace and Lorraine is a Reformed denomination in Alsace and Northeastern Lorraine, France. As a church body it enjoys the status as an établissement public du culte; the EPRAL adheres to the Apostles Creed, Nicene Creed, Heidelberg Catechism and the Second Helvetic Confession. The EPRAL has 33,000 members in 52 congregations served by 50 pastors. Congregations holding services in German language use the current German Protestant hymnal Evangelisches Gesangbuch issued by the Protestant church bodies in Austria, France and Luxembourg, in a regional edition including traditional hymns from Alsace and Moselle. In 2006 the EPRAL formed with the EPCAAL the Union of Protestant Churches of Lorraine; this is no united body. However, the two churches maintain their own organisation; the EPRAL is member of the Protestant Federation of France and of the World Communion of Reformed Churches, the World Council of Churches. The EPRAL was a founding member of the Conference of Churches on the Rhine in 1961, which now functions as a regional group of the Community of Protestant Churches in Europe.
The EPRAL has close fellowship with the Reformed Church of France. The first Reformed congregation in the area was founded by John Calvin in Strasbourg in Alsace, it has its origin in the early times of the Reformation. In the 16th and 17th centuries, the populations in a number of small imperial estates or free imperial cities including their governments had adopted the Reformed confession. Reformed confession spread in the northern and eastern part of the area with concentration in Mulhouse and Metz. In Strasbourg and some enclaves in northern Alsace and the Vosges, Reformed Christians form only small minority communities, but the Republic in Mulhouse was reformed at the time of the French Revolution, when all the area had become a part of France. After the conclusion of the Concordat of 1801 with the Vatican applying to French Roman Catholicism, in 1802 Napoleon I decreed the organic articles which constituted the other then-existing major religious groups in France, the Calvinists and Lutherans, as recognised public religious bodies.
These bodies all followed a similar model with semigovernmental leading bodies, such as the Reformed Central Council in Paris, the Lutheran General Consistory in Strasbourg and the Israelite Central Consistory in Paris. Subordinate to the chief bodies there were regional consistories each comprising several congregations altogether counting at least 6,000 souls; the organic articles shaped the constitution of the pre-1905 Reformed Church of France. The representatives of the Reformed church accepted the governmentally imposed structure, since it did not put the Reformed church in a worse position than the other creeds. However, Napoleon's model of hierarchical parastatal governance was a harsh breach with many crucial Reformed presbyterial and synodal traditions. Pastors were not employed and paid by the church people, constituted in the congregations, but were chosen and paid by the government and subordinate to the government-appointed members of the consistories. Napoleon's law did not provide for a general synod, the only body relevant in taking decisions in matters of doctrine and teaching for all the church, while the law de jure provided for regional synods combining representatives of at least five consistorial ambits the government de facto never allowed their convocation.
Lacking a general synod, last convened in 1659, with no provincial synods convoked, the Reformed congregations formed the only decision-taking body, though restricted to local church matters, legitimised by the Reformed doctrine. Until 1852 the law did not recognise Reformed congregations but considered them as indistinct local outposts of the parastatal consistories. On 26 March 1852 Napoleon III signed a decree, influenced by Charles Read, which still did not provide for a general synod, but at least made the Reformed congregations distinct legal entities, whose governing bodies - according to Reformed doctrine - were elected by the male adult members; the new Central Council established in 1852, the supreme executive body of the Reformed Church of France, was staffed with incumbents appointed by the government, a practice contradicting the presbyterial and synodal doctrine of Calvinism. In the course of the 19th century, Calvinists in France clung to different theological movements, such as traditionalist Calvinism, rationalist theology, Christian revival or Liberal Christianity.
So the pre-1905 Reformed Church of France entered into heavy controversies on doctrinal and teaching matters which could not be resolved due to the lacking general synod. Many Calvinists were adherents of the Christian revival movement colliding with proponents of religious liberalism; the congregations still could not employ the pastors, since the advowson was with the parastatal consistories. When the consistories appointed pastors of a particular theological leaning to a congregation whose members and elected bodies clung to another opinion, it created hefty quarrels. Two pastoral conferences were convened each by proponents of one of the two main currents in Fren
Grand Est
Grand Est Alsace-Champagne-Ardenne-Lorraine, is an administrative region in eastern France. It superseded three former administrative regions—Alsace, Champagne-Ardenne, Lorraine—on 1 January 2016, as a result of territorial reform, passed by the French legislature in 2014. Alsace-Champagne-Ardenne-Lorraine was a provisional name, created by hyphenating the merged regions in alphabetical order. France's Conseil d'État approved Grand Est as the new name of the region on 28 September 2016, effective 30 September 2016; the administrative capital and largest city is Strasbourg. The provisional name of the region was Alsace-Champagne-Ardenne-Lorraine, formed by combining the names of the three present regions—Alsace, Champagne-Ardenne, Lorraine—in alphabetical order with hyphens; the formula for the provisional name of the region was established by the territorial reform law and applied to all but one of the provisional names for new regions. The ACAL regional council, elected in December 2015, was given the task of choosing a name for the region and submitting it to the Conseil d'État—France's highest authority for administrative law—by 1 July 2016 for approval.
The provisional name of the region was retired on 30 September 2016, when the new name of the region, Grand Est, took effect. In Alsace and in Lorraine, the new region has been called ALCA, for Alsace-Lorraine-Champagne-Ardennes, on the internet. Like the name Région Hauts-de-France, the name Région Grand Est contains no reference whatsoever to the area's history or identity, but describes its geographical location within metropolitan France. In a poll conducted in November 2014 by France 3 in Champagne-Ardenne, Grand Est and Austrasie were the top two names among 25 candidates and 4,701 votes. Grand Est topped a poll the following month conducted by L'Est Républicain, receiving 42% of 3,324 votes; the names which received a moderate amount of discussion were: Grand Est français, a term used to refer to the northeast quarter of Metropolitan France, although this term refers to a geographic region larger than just ACAL. The term has been used and topped the polls mentioned above. Grand Est Europe, a variant of Grand Est that alludes to the region being a gateway to Europe both through trade and since Strasbourg is home to several European institutions.
However, the name was mocked for. Austrasie, which refers to an historical region spanning parts of present-day northeast France, the Benelux, northwest Germany. Quatre frontières. Grand Est is the sixth-largest of the regions of France. Grand Est borders four countries—Belgium, Luxembourg and Switzerland—along its northern and eastern sides, it is the only French region to border more than two countries. To the west and south, it borders the French regions Hauts-de-France, Île-de-France, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté. Grand Est contains ten departments: Ardennes, Bas-Rhin, Haute-Marne, Haut-Rhin, Meurthe-et-Moselle, Moselle, Vosges; the main ranges in the region include the Vosges to the Ardennes to the north. The region is bordered on the east by the Rhine. Other major rivers which flow through the region include the Meuse, Marne, Saône. Lakes in the region include lac de Gérardmer, lac de Longemer, lac de Retournemer, lac des Corbeaux, Lac de Bouzey, lac de Madine, étang du Stock and lac de Pierre-Percée.
Grand Est climate depends of the proximity of the sea. In Champagne and Western Lorraine, the climate is oceanic, with mild summers, but Moselle and Alsace climates are humid continental, characterized by cold winters with frequent days below the freezing point, hot summers, with many days with temperatures up to 32°C. Grand Est is the result of territorial reform legislation passed in 2014 by the French Parliament to reduce the number of regions in Metropolitan France—the part of France in continental Europe—from 22 to 13. ACAL is the merger of three regions: Alsace, Champagne-Ardenne, Lorraine; the merger has been, still is opposed by some groups in Alsace, a large majority of Alsatians. The territorial reform law allows new regions to choose the seat of the regional councils, but made Strasbourg the seat of the Grand Est regional council—a move to appease the region's politicians; the region has an official population of 5,555,186. The regional council has limited administrative authority concerning the promotion of the region's economy and financing educational and cultural activities.
The regional council has no legislative authority. The seat of the regional council will be Strasbourg; the regional council, elected in December 2015, is controlled by The Republicans. The elected inaugural president of the Grand Est Regional Council is Philippe Richert, the President of the Alsace Regional Council; the current president is Jean Rottner. The region has five tram networks: Strasbourg tramway Reims tramway Nancy Guided Light Transit Mulhouse tramway Saarbahn The region has four airports: EuroAirport Basel M
Mediomatrici
The Mediomatrici were an ancient Celtic people of Gaul, who belong to the division of Belgae. Julius Caesar shows their position in a general way when he says that the Rhine flows along the territories of the Sequani, Triboci or Tribocci, Treviri. Ptolemy places the Mediomatrici south of the Treviri. Divodurum was the capital of the Mediomatrici. Besides Metz, settlements in France include the oppidum of Hérapel, the well-preserved examples of Pierrevillers and Vitry-sur-Orne. Other settlements and oppida in Germany were thought to be Saarbrücken, Speyer and Rodalben, although today the ascription of Speyer, Homburg und Rodalben is hotly disputed; the name "Mediomatrici" has been explained as "the people between the Matrona and the Matra." The diocese of Metz represents their territory, accordingly west of the Vosges, but Caesar makes the Mediomatrici extend to the Rhine, in his time they occupied the country between the Vosges and the Rhine. This agrees with Strabo, who says that the Sequani and Mediomatrici inhabit the Rhine, among whom are settled the Triboci, a Germanic nation which had crossed over from their own country.
It appears that part of the territory of the Mediomatrici had been occupied by Germans before Caesar's time. Elements of the Mediomatrici may have settled near Novara, in northern Italy, where place-names allude to their presence, e.g. Mezzomerico; this article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Smith, William, ed.. "Belgae". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. London: John Murray
Lorraine
Lorraine is a cultural and historical region in north-eastern France, now located in the administrative region of Grand Est. Lorraine's name stems from the medieval kingdom of Lotharingia, which in turn was named for either Emperor Lothair I or King Lothair II, it was ruled as the Duchy of Lorraine before the Kingdom of France annexed it in 1766. From 1982 until January 2016, Lorraine was an administrative region of France. In 2016, under a reorganization, it became part of the new region Grand Est; as a region in modern France, Lorraine consisted of the four departments Meurthe-et-Moselle, Meuse and Vosges, containing 2,337 communes. Metz is the regional prefecture; the largest metropolitan area of Lorraine is Nancy, which had developed for centuries as the seat of the duchy. Lorraine borders Germany and Luxembourg, its inhabitants are called "Lorrains" in French and number about 2,356,000. Lorraine's borders have changed in its long history; the location of Lorraine led to it being a paramount strategic asset as the crossroads of four nations.
This, along with its political alliances, marriage alliances, the ability of rulers over the centuries to choose sides between East and West, gave it a tremendously powerful and important role in transforming all of European history. Its rulers intermarried with royal families over all of Europe, played kingmaker, seated rulers on the thrones of the Holy Roman Empire and Austro-Hungarian Empire Austria-Hungary, others. In 840, Charlemagne's son Louis; the Carolingian Empire was divided among Louis' three sons by the Treaty of Verdun of 843. The middle realm, known as Middle Francia, went to Lothair I, reaching from Frisia in Northern Germany through the Low Countries, Eastern France, Provence, Northern Italy, down to Rome. On the death of Lothair I, Middle Francia was divided in three by the Treaty of Prüm in 855, with the northern third called Lotharingia and going to Lothair II. Due to Lotharingia being sandwiched between East and West Francia, the rulers identified as a duchy from 870 onward, enabling the duchy to ally and align itself nominally with either eastern or western Carolingian kingdoms in order to survive and maintain its independence.
Thus it operated as an independent kingdom. In 870, Lorraine allied with East Francia. In 962, when Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor, restored the Empire, Lorraine was designated as the autonomous Duchy of Lorraine within the Holy Roman Empire, it maintained this status until 1766, after which it was annexed under succession law by the Kingdom of France, via derivative aristocratic house alliances. The succession within these houses, in tandem with other historical events, would have restored Lorraine's status as its own duchy, but a vacuum in leadership occurred, its duke François Stephen de Lorraine took the throne of the Holy Roman Empire, his brother Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine became governor of the Austrian Netherlands. For political reasons, he decided to hide those heirs who were not born by his first wife, Archduchess Maria Anna of Austria, deceased when he took office; the vacuum in leadership, the French Revolution, the political results and changes issuing from the many nationalistic wars that followed in the next 130 years resulted in Lorraine becoming a permanent part of the modern Republic of France.
Because of wars, it came under control of Germany several times as the border between the nations shifted. While Lorrainian separatists do exist in the 21st century, their political power and influence is negligible. Lorraine separatism today consists more of preserving its cultural identity rather than seeking genuine political independence. With enlightened leadership and at a crossroads between French and German cultures, Lotharingia experienced tremendous economic and cultural prosperity during the 12th and 13th centuries under the Hohenstaufen emperors. Along with the rest of Europe, this prosperity was terminated in Lorraine in the 14th century by a series of harsh winters, bad harvests, the Black Death. During the Renaissance, a flourishing prosperity returned to Lotharingia until the Thirty Years' War. France annexed Lorraine by force in 1766, it retains control in the early 21st century. Due to the region's location, the population has been mixed; the north is Germanic, speaking Lorraine Franconian and other Germanic dialects.
Strong centralized nationalism had only begun to replace the feudalist system which had formed the multilingual borders, insurrection against the French occupation influenced much of the area's early identity. In 1871, the German Empire regained a part of Lorraine Bezirk Lothringen, corresponding to the current department of Moselle); the department formed part of the new Imperial German State of Alsace-Lorraine. In France, the revanchist movement developed to recover this territory; the Imperial German administration discouraged the French language and culture in favor of High German, which became the administrative language It required the use of German in schools in areas which it considered or designated as German-speaking, an arbitrary categorisation. French was allowed to remain in use only in primary and secondary schools in municipalities considered Francophone, such as Château-Salins and the surrounding arrondissement, as well and in their local administration, but after 1877, higher education, including state-run colleges, universities an
Protestant Church of Augsburg Confession of Alsace and Lorraine
The Protestant Church of the Augsburg Confession of Alsace and Lorraine is a Lutheran church of public-law corporation status in France. The ambit of the EPCAAL comprises congregations in the Lorrain Moselle department; the EPCAAL adheres to the Apostles Creed, Nicene Creed, Luther's Small and Large Catechisms, the Formula of Concord, the Tetrapolitan Confession. The EPCAAL has 210,000 members in 208 congregations. Congregations holding services in German language use the current German Protestant hymnal Evangelisches Gesangbuch in a regional edition that includes traditional hymns from Alsace and Moselle. In 1961 the EPCAAL was a founding member of the Conference of Churches on the Rhine, which now functions as a regional group of the Community of Protestant Churches in Europe; the first conference took place in EPCAAL's conference centre, the former convent of Liebfrauenberg near Gœrsdorf. Since 2006, the EPCAAL has been a member of the Union of Protestant Churches of Alsace and Lorraine, an administrative umbrella with the Protestant Reformed Church of Alsace and Lorraine.
This is not a united body, but it provides a common decision-making structure and a common body of pastors. However, the two churches maintain their own organisation; the EPCAAL is a member of the Fédération protestante de France and of the Lutheran World Federation, the World Council of Churches. The EPCAAL had close fellowship with the Evangelical Lutheran Church of France. In the early 16th century Alsace and northeastern Lorraine were part of the Holy Roman Empire with the region being partitioned into many different imperial states. Most were monarchies, but several republics and portions of certain ecclesiastical principalities. While the prince-bishops tried to suppress any change towards the Reformation, the monarchies either adopted it or fought it, depending on the positions of their lords; the free imperial cities went through a process of discussion and conflict, winning over a majority of the burghers for the Reformation or not. The Free Imperial City of Mulhouse adopted Calvinism and joined the Swiss Confederation until the French blockade forced the city to accept French supremacy in 1795.
In 1523 and 1524, the Free Imperial City of Strasbourg became the next state in Alsace to adopt Lutheranism. Most publishers in Strasbourg agreed to diffuse new ideas by issuing Reformers' tracts and numerous pamphlets; this allowed well-known preachers such as Matthäus Zell, priest at the Strasbourg Cathedral, to propagate Reformatory theses to a large, enthusiastic community. In the same year theologians and exegetes including Wolfgang Capito, Caspar Hedio, Martin Bucer and built up the Reformatory movement amongst craftsmen and the moderately well to do of Strasbourg. In 1524, St. Aurelia, the market gardeners' parish, asked Bucer to become its preacher. Bucer adopted his ideas, he helped implement the Reformation in the Free Imperial City of Wissembourg in Alsace, which resulted in his excommunication by George of the Palatinate, the bishop of Speyer, his conviction as outlaw. In 1523 he found asylum in Strasbourg, where he set up Bible reading classes and in 1529, presented the Reformation.
He received John Calvin, expelled from Geneva in 1538. Bucer tried to safeguard the unity of the Church, but failed in reconciling Luther and Zwingli, or bringing Catholics and Protestants to agree at least on some points. At his urging, the city of Strasbourg granted asylum to the persecuted anabaptists. By 1525 the Reformation was spreading not only into the countryside possessions of Strasbourg, but into territories of other overlords. Although most capitular canons in the Great Chapter, the chapters of Strasbourg's Old St. Peter's and Young St. Peter's, like much of the traditional clergy, rejected the Reformation, the prince-bishop of Strasbourg, William III of Hohnstein, failed to satisfy the demand for change. Before the start of the Reformation, adherents of the Bundschuh movement in Alsace had demanded the right to elect their pastors on their own; the Lutheran church was the state church in the Free Imperial City of Strasbourg, administered by the city government. The city government passed laws on preaching and appropriated the Strasbourg Cathedral for the Lutheran state church in 1524.
It granted the Lutheran church the right to induct pastors in the seven parishes in the town and took the responsibility attributed to deacons, of supporting the poor. In 1529 the city government, supported by a large part of the population, decided that the Holy Mass should be abolished. Violent iconoclasm spread – notably among craftsmen – destroying many religious images; the Church of Strasbourg built up its liturgical and ecclesiastical structures. The church authorities instituted a bimonthly meeting of the pastors and three representatives of the Magistrate, in order to deal with all matters concerning teaching and doctrine. Upon more reflection, some liturgical aspects of iconographic nature as well as other abolished traditions of church life were reintroduced. On the occasion of the Diet of Augsburg in 1530, where Lu
Lorraine topics
