Ancient According to
Louis Duchesne, the See of Tours was probably founded in the time of
Constantine; however,
Gregory of Tours says it was founded in the reign of Emperor
Decius by
Gatianus. made by Pope Adeodatus (672–676). The document survives only in two copies which differ significantly between them; both are suspect.
Medieval In May 858, which was the third year of his pontificate, Archbishop Herardus held a diocesan synod, in which a codification was issued of the
capitula ('regulations') of the diocese. The document contained 140 chapters. On 21 January 1216,
Pope Innocent III confirmed an agreement entered into between the Archbishop of Tours and the Chapter of the cathedral on the election of a Dean and Provosts. After the death of Archbishop Jean de la Faye in April 1228, there appears to have been considerable difficulty in finding a new archbishop. Jean Maan, Dean of Mans, was brought to Tours, but he refused the see, or was unable to muster sufficient votes. Then the see was offered to Master Pierre de Collomedio of Champagne, a Canon of Thérouanne and Papal Legate, but, though the election was canonically carried out, he refused the offer.
Revolution The leaders of the
French Revolution, as part of their program, planned to bring the religions in France under their control. The Roman Church was rich, and therefore powerful. The Revolution needed to redirect that power and acquire that wealth to finance their own projects. One device was to transfer old loyalties by breaking up the traditional units of political, social and religious organization. The property of the religious organizations was to be confiscated for the benefit of the people of France, and all clergy would become state employees, with their salaries fixed and paid by the government. The new political unit was to be the "
département", of which eighty-four were planned. It was determined by the
Constituent Assembly that the Church was overloaded with bishops; therefore the number of dioceses needed to be reduced, from the 135 of the Ancien Régime, to 82 or 83, and that to the extent possible they were to have the same borders as the new political departments. The Diocese of Tours was therefore abolished and subsumed into a new diocese, coterminous with the new 'Departement d'Indre-et-Loire', which was to be a
suffragan of the 'Metropole du Centre' (composed of the dioceses of Allier, Cher, Creuse, Indre, Indre-et-Loire, Loire-et-Cher, Nièvre and Vienne, with its center at Bourges) in the "
Constitutional Church". The clergy were required to swear and oath to the Constitution, and under the terms of the
Civil Constitution of the Clergy a new bishop was to be elected by all the voters of the département, who did not even need to be Catholics. This placed them in schism with the Roman Catholic Church and the Pope. Archbishop de Conzié of Tours refused to take the oath, and his bishopric was therefore declared to be vacant. On 13 March 1791 the electors of Indre-et-Loire met in Tours in the cathedral. They were harangued by members of the Société des Amis de la Constitution, who pressed for the election of their president, a former Oratorian by the name of Ysabeau, who, however, could not muster a majority. Instead on the next day the electors chose Pierre Suzor, the curate of Ecueillé. He proceeded to Paris, where he was consecrated a bishop on 10 April by Constitutional Bishops
Massieu, Delcher, and Sibille. His consecration was valid, but uncanonical and schismatic, and brought him excommunication. As bishop, he was at first conservative and somewhat rigorous, refusing to sanction the marriage of clergy, but later he succumbed to pressure. At the end of 1793, when Religion was abolished and replaced by Reason and the churches closed, most of the 360 clergy of Indre-et-Loire abdicated or apostasized. Religion was restored in 1795, but Suzor did not regain possession of the cathedral until 13 May 1797. Suzor suffered a stroke in 1797; the bishops of the Metropolitanate were allowed to assemble at Bourges in 1800 to find him a successor. On 1 February 1801 Hyacinthe Tardiveau accepted the position, and Suzor died on 13 April 1801, having approved of his successor. Tardiveau was never bishop, since he made his acceptance conditional upon receiving the traditional bulls from the pope, which never happened. In May 1801 First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte required the resignation of all Constitutional bishops; he was in the process of completing a
concordat with the Papacy, and the Constitutional Church was an obstacle. After 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 closely to the new 'départements'. The Diocese of Tours, which was coterminous with the Department of Indre-et-Loire, had as suffragans: Le Mans, Angers, Rennes, Nantes, Quimper, Vannes, Saint-Pol, Treguier, Saint-Brieux Saint-Mâlo and Dol.
Pilgrimages The main pilgrimage sites in the diocese besides the grottos of Marmoutier, are: Notre-Dame-la-Riche, a sanctuary erected on the site of a church dating from the third century, and where the founder St. Gatianus is venerated; Notre-Dame-de-Loches; St. Christopher and St. Giles at St-Christophe, a pilgrimage dating from the ninth century; the pilgrimage to the
Oratory of the Holy Face in Tours, managed by
Priests of the Holy Face canonically erected on 8 December 1876. == Bishops ==