cahn

In the previous post Charles II found AITA:

Look, I, m, believe in live and let live. (And in not going on my travels again. Had enough of that to last a life time.) Why can't everyone else around me be more chill? Instead, my wife refuses to employ my girlfriend, my girlfriend won't budge and accept another office, my brother is set on a course to piss off everyone (he WILL go on his travels again), and my oldest kid shows signs of wanting my job which is just not on, sorry to say. And don't get me started about Mom (thank God she's living abroad). What am I doing wrong? AITA?

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From:

mildred_of_midgard

Speaking of Henri IV, one of the things I was curious about when I read his bio was, "Given that everyone knew he was converting to Catholicism for the sake of winning the kingdom, what language did he use to pay enough lip service to the idea of it being sincere that it actually accomplished the purpose of making him an acceptable king?"

To paraphrase loosely from memory, the official proclamation was along these lines:

I, Henri, totally said a long time ago that I wanted to sit down with some priests and ask them questions and learn more about the Catholic faith, so I could make an informed decision about the salvation of my soul. But it was never a good time, because the country was at war, so I was too busy campaigning ~~and wooing my mistresses~~. But now that my subjects seem inclined to peace, [translation: the Catholic League, led by the Guises, are about to elect a king that isn't me] I have the leisure to learn more about this faith that I've always been extremely interested in.

And apparently he kept a straight face while saying all this, and everyone pretended to believe him, except for the people who didn't, and he gained Paris for the price of a mass, and eventually lost his life.

Because those people who didn't? We apparently have multiple accounts of diehard Catholics asking their confessors if regicide could ever be justified, and the priests either giving a noncommittal answer like "I'm sure God's forgiveness is infinite," or straight up rationalizing it as, "Well, one of the Ten Commandments is 'thou shalt not kill,' true, but that's like commandment number 5, but commandment number ONE is 'thou shalt have no other gods before me,' and a Protestant king who's only pretending to be Catholic for the sake of power clearly has gods before the one true God. And one comes before five. So in conclusion, my son, God will not only forgive you for regicide, but he fully expects you to commit regicide in his name. P.S. Don't forget this is a holy war and your soul is at stake. Godspeed."

So Henri survived something like 16 assassination attempts (depending on what you count as an "attempt"), and the seventeenth was fatal.

Btw, just before his conversion, I was struck by the phrasing of one of his Catholic supporters, who said to him, "Sire, the Catholic party in France as well as our Catholic neighbors are against you, and all you've got is a miserable few Huguenots. Now, I wouldn't dare say this to you if you were the sincerely religious type. But you live in good fellowship with us Catholics, which means we can't suspect that you're driven strictly by your conscience."

I was impressed by the Catholic saying he wouldn't have tried to convert a sincerely religious Protestant, but then it was, after all, the moderate Catholics who were on Henri's side in the first place.

From:

selenak

Also a useful reminder, this wasn't the first time Henri had changed his religion, though the first few times hadn't been his idea: born Cathoic, became Protestant as a child when his mother Jeanne D'Albret did (you know her from Sarah Gristwood,

cahn), became Catholic after the St. Bartholomew Massacre, promptly declared himself to be Protestant again once he was no longer in polite Valois custody. This also contributed to universal scepticism as to the sincerity of his last conversion.

When young Armand du Plessis (future Richelieu the Cardinal) went to Rome to get an dispensation for becoming a bishop while still way below the newly raised by the Council of Trent age, he was questioned by the Pope as to the sincerity of his monarch's Catholicism, which was a challenge and one of those in theory no good answer situations - remember, he's supposed to get the Pope to make him bishop (which is family's entire income depends on right then), so he can't afford to piss off the Pope, but if he agrees that Henri is a heretic in disguise, he's a disloyal subject and also can kiss any chance of a French career goodbye. However, apparantly young Armand was up to the task, and the Pope commented approvingly "Henricus Magnus Armandus Armando" and licensed him becoming a bishop.

(The irony is that he hadn't even wanted to be, at first. Young Armand was never meant for the church. He was a third son. His oldest brother, Henri, was the one who got the (modest - the du Plessis were a deeply provincial nobility on Dad's side, and Mom wasn't even that, she was from Beamtenadel) title, and brother No.2, Alphonse, was the one meant for the church. Alphonse actually loved his faith too much, i.e. he was all for becoming a priest, but he absolutely refused to make a career in it, he became a monk. This was a big problem for the family, because Dad was dead (another duel - did I mention Richelieu really had good reason to loathe duels?), and the family income partly came from the bishopry of Lucon, which they had a lockhold on, but when Uncle previous bishop died and Alphonse absolutely refused to become more than a monk, Mom, Suzanne, who was one tough lady, drafted teenage Armand out of his Parisian cadet school (where he was supposed to make a military career) and into the church, where he had to study theology in record time, and then go to Rome to convince the Pope that despite the recent reforms of the Council of Trent, which were designed to prevent among so many other things young men without any experience becoming bishops in name only, reaping the cash but not doing the work, he should be granted the office. Young Armand did just that by managing to defend Henri IV without insulting the Pope. Presto, Armand du Plessis, Bishop of Lucon at 21.

However, young Armand wasn't done. He also was one of life's workoholics. He did take the office seriously and put the fear of God into the sleepy Lucon administration which wasn't used to a Plessis actually showing up for work instead of appointing a local to do it, completely reorganized it, guilt tripped and scared the local nobility into contributing, too - this was an uphill battle, because Lucon, which happens to be not THAT far from La Rochelle, was surrounded by more Protestants than Catholics at this point, and the Catholic nobles weren't invested in doing something for Lucon since the Plessis family - not locals - had had that lockhold on the bishop seat -, all of which meant that at age 30, when Henri IV got murdered and a general assembly for France was called for the last time before the French Revolution, Armand du Plessis, Bishop of Lucon, was the guy voted for as one of the representatives. He went to Paris, spoke in front of the General Assembly and the new Regent Maria de' Medici, and the rest is history.

Decades later, when he was Cardinal Richelieu and thus the most powerful church official in France, with the corresponding clout in Rome, he forced brother Alphonse to leave his monastery, and had him appointed a cardinal by the Pope, too. Alphonse still absolutely did not want to, and Richelieu had to lean hard on his abbot to make that happen, but he did, and Alphonse had a nervous breakdown. To be fair, that was another family problem. An uncle, Alphonse and Armand's younger sister Nicole would all end up deemed insane. When Nicole had her final breakdown, and her husband just wanted to leave her in that state, Richelieu put the fear of God into him, too, and gave strict (and in terms of Nicole, very tender) instructions of how she could be cared for, which were very atypical for a time not known to deal well with people suffering from mental illness. But if he was a good brother to Nicole, he definitely triggered Alphone's breakdown by forcing him out of the monastery and into a Cardinal title, and if there is another explanation for this than "payback for destroying teenage Armand's dreams by refusing an ecclesiastical career", I haven't come across it yet.

From:

cahn

he can't afford to piss off the Pope, but if he agrees that Henri is a heretic in disguise, he's a disloyal subject and also can kiss any chance of a French career goodbye. However, apparantly young Armand was up to the task

Man, this seems... super in character.

Suzanne, who was one tough lady, drafted teenage Armand out of his Parisian cadet school (where he was supposed to make a military career) and into the church, where he had to study theology in record time, and then go to Rome to convince the Pope that despite the recent reforms of the Council of Trent, which were designed to prevent among so many other things young men without any experience becoming bishops in name only, reaping the cash but not doing the work, he should be granted the office.

Wooooow. That's awesome.

he forced brother Alphonse to leave his monastery,

Me: Omg, I am absolutely going to ask whether this was Richelieu's revenge on his brother --

and if there is another explanation for this than "payback for destroying teenage Armand's dreams by refusing an ecclesiastical career", I haven't come across it yet.

Me: Orrrrr I guess I don't have to! :)

Richelieu put the fear of God into him, too, and gave strict (and in terms of Nicole, very tender) instructions of how she could be cared for, which were very atypical for a time not known to deal well with people suffering from mental illness.

Now this is great. (And as usual I really like hearing about people who could be really nice and also really ruthless.)

From:

cahn

But now that my subjects seem inclined to peace, [translation: the Catholic League, led by the Guises, are about to elect a king that isn't me] I have the leisure to learn more about this faith that I've always been extremely interested in.

Lol!

but commandment number ONE is 'thou shalt have no other gods before me,' and a Protestant king who's only pretending to be Catholic for the sake of power clearly has gods before the one true God. And one comes before five. So in conclusion, my son, God will not only forgive you for regicide, but he fully expects you to commit regicide in his name. P.S. Don't forget this is a holy war and your soul is at stake. Godspeed."

Wow, that is... impressive.

"Sire, the Catholic party in France as well as our Catholic neighbors are against you, and all you've got is a miserable few Huguenots. Now, I wouldn't dare say this to you if you were the sincerely religious type. But you live in good fellowship with us Catholics, which means we can't suspect that you're driven strictly by your conscience."

Heh. I like that.