Louis Rendu
French Roman Catholic bishop of Annecy and a scientist
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Louis Rendu (9 December 1789 in Meyrin – 20 August 1859) was a French Roman Catholic bishop of Annecy and a scientist.
Most Reverend Louis Rendu | |
|---|---|
| Bishop | |
| |
| Church | Catholic Church |
| Diocese | Roman Catholic Diocese of Annecy |
| In office | 1842-1859 |
| Predecessor | Pierre-Joseph Rey |
| Successor | Charles-Marie Magnin |
| Orders | |
| Ordination | 19 June 1814 |
| Consecration | 29 April 1843 by Alexis Billiet |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 9 December 1789 Meyrin, Geneva |
| Died | 21 August 1859 (aged 69) Annecy, Savoy |
Life
Louis Rendu was born at Meyrin, a small town a mile northwest of Geneva, on 9 December 1789.[1]
He received his priestly education at the Grand Séminaire de Chambéry.[2] He was ordained a priest on 19 June 1814, and appointed a teacher of belles lettres at the Collège royale de Chambéry.[3] From 1821 to 1829, he was a professor of Physics.
He was a founding member of the Académie des sciences, belles-lettres et arts de Savoie in 1819, along with Alexis Billiet, future archbishop of Chambéry, and the society's permanent secretary.[4]
His first book, Traité de Physique, was published at Chambéry in 1825.[5] In 1828, he published Théorie électrique de cristallisation, which was awarded a prize by the Institut de France.[6] In 1829, the Collège de Chambéry was handed over to the Jesuits, and Rendu was named a canon of the cathedral Chapter of Chambéry.[7]
He was nominated bishop of Annecy by King Charles Albert of Sardinia on 25 August 1842, and approved by Pope Gregory XVI on 27 January 1843.[8] He was consecrated a bishop in the cathedral of Annecy on 29 April 1843, by Archbishop Alexis Billiet of Chambéry.[9] As bishop, he chose to send his best priestly students to the University of Turin, to take degrees in Canon Law,[10] under Giovanni Nepomuceno Nuytz, until Nuytz's views were condemned by Pope Pius IX in his apostolic brief of 22 August 1851.[11]
In a diocese which contained around 300 parishes, he built and consecrated 102 new churches.[12]
Bishop Rendu was a Chevalier de l'Ordre du Mérite civil de Savoie, and a Commandeur de l'Ordre des SS. Maurice et Lazare.
Bishop Rendu died on 20 August 1859.[13] His almoner, François Marie Guillermin, who was present at the death-bed, says it was 21 August.[14]
Works
Rendu was the author of Theorie des glaciers de la Savoie,[15] an important book on the mechanisms of glacial motion. The Rendu Glacier, Alaska, U.S. and Mount Rendu, Antarctica are named for him.
His ethnological and religious-themed works include:
- De l'influence des Moeurs sur les Lois, et de l'influence des Lois sur les Moeurs, 1833
- Moeurs et coutumes de la Savoie du Nord au XIXe siècle, 1845
- Lettre à S. M. le Roi de Prusse (sur la situation religieuse de l'Europe), 1848
- Des efforts du protestantisme, (in French) Paris: Louis Vives 1855.[16]
- "Mandements et instructions pastorales." (in French). Collected in: Jacques-Paul Migne, Collection intégrale et universelle des orateurs sacrés du premier et du second ordre. Volume 85. Paris: A l'imprimerie Catholique du Petit-Montrouce, 1856. Pp. 103-395.