Meur, Vincent

Meur, Vincent a noted French divine, the inspirer of French foreign missions, was born at Tonguedec, in the diocese of Frdzuier, France, in 1628. When yet a young man, he obtained the post of almoner to the court of Louis XIV. Tiring, however, of the idleness which frequently intervened in the discharge of his duties, he induced several other ecclesiastics, his friends and colleagues, to unite with him in founding an institution to prepare zealous apostles and effective preachers of the Word, and by this movement originated the French Board of Foreign Missions. In its incipiency, twelve persons assembled for consultation and deliberation in a small house in the Rue de la Harpe. Meur presided at this meeting. The Jesuits, comprehending the advantages which their society would derive from cooperative work with such auxiliaries, in 1652 affiliated with them. Meur, the moving spirit of these Roman Catholic missionaries, advised that work be inaugurated in South-eastern Asia, and, to obtain the approval of pope Alexander VII, in 1657 repaired to Rome. The pontiff warmly approved the project. Meur himself, however, instead of accompanying his associates, returned to Paris, and there engaged in theological discussions. He attacked Jansenius and his followers; in 1664 was appointed superior of the Seminary for Foreign Missions; assumed the priorate of St. Andre, in Brittany; and went on some religious missions to Dijon, Auxerre, and other cities of Burgundy, where he had friends. He had just returned from Brittany, to receive property bequeathed to him by his father and his brother, when he died, at Vieux-Chateaux-en-Brie, in 1668. See Richard et Giraud, Biblioth. Sacrae; Hoefer, Nouv. Biog. Generale, s.v.