Leo Meurin

Johann Gabriel Leo Meurin SJ (23 January 1825 – 1 June 1895), was a German Roman Catholic priest, missionary in India, educator, vicar apostolic and then archbishop of Bombay (1868–1886), archbishop of Port-Louis (Mauritius) from 1887 until his death in 1893.

Biography

Leo Meurin was born in Berlin, Kingdom of Prussia. Shortly after his ordination to the priesthood in 1848, Leo Meurin was appointed private secretary to Cardinal Johannes von Geissel, Archbishop of Cologne. On April 8, 1853, he entered the novitiate of the Society of Jesus. His studies took him to Bonn, Rome and Tübingen.

Sent with a group of German Jesuits to India, he landed in Bombay on October 27, 1858. He was successively military almoner in Pune, parish priest in Candolim (Goa), and helped found the new St. Francis Xavier Jesuit College in Cavel (which later moved to Dhobitalao to become, in two separate units, the St. Xavier Secondary School and University Faculties of Bombay).

An attack of cholera took him on long leave in the Khandala mountains between Bombay and Pune. Recovering, he was appointed pro-vicar of the Bombay diocese when Walter Steins was sent to the Apostolic Vicariate of Bengal (March 31, 1867).

Meurin was consecrated bishop on February 2, 1868, in Bombay (titular bishop of Ashkelon) and visited Goa (1869) before setting sail for Europe, where he was called to take part in the First Vatican Council. He played a significant role in the minority opposed to a dogmatic definition of Papal infallibility. He voted against the Pastor aeternus decree.

With the Council suspended on October 20, 1870, Meurin returned to Bombay, arriving there before the end of the year. He was very active there, launching in 1872 two magazines for Catholics, the Pastoral gazette in English and India Católica in Portuguese. In 1876, he was apostolic visitor to the Eastern Catholic Churches of Kerala. Between 1881 and 1885 he founded the parish of Sainte-Anne, a new mission in Kendal, an institute for the deaf and dumb and the Trombay leprosarium (in Bombay). A new magazine was also launched: the Messenger of the Sacred Heart.

Encouraging new educational institutes, both for young men (Collège universitaire Saint-Francois-Xavier) and for young women (Saint-Mary's College), and insisting on good training for Catholics, Meurin gave new visibility to Catholicism in Bombay. He was also an erudite lecturer, an accomplished musician and a good preacher, even in the Marathi language. Pastorally close and much loved by the Catholic faithful, he also enjoys excellent relations with Protestants.

He was very active in the campaign to abolish the power of the Padroado outside Portuguese territories in India, believing this institution to be archaic and an obstacle to modern evangelization. This led to the signing of a new concordat between the Holy See and Portugal (June 23, 1886).

A strong personality, and although a Jesuit himself, he frequently clashed with the order religious superior of the region, often over questions of personal jurisdiction over missionaries. On September 27, 1887, he was appointed Archbishop (in a personal capacity) of the diocese of Port-Louis in Mauritius. He worked there with the same zeal until his death on June 1, 1895. Archbishop Leo Meurin is buried in Port-Louis Cathedral.

Works

• God and Brahma (1865)
• On the idea of the infinite (1876)
• Purity of the Roman Catholic Faith (1879)
• The Padroado Question (1885)
• The Concordat Question (1885)
• Zoroastre and Christ (1882)
• Mémorial to the R.H. the Secretary of State for India in Council (1883)
• Ethics (1891)
• La lutte de l’enfer contre le ciel (1890)
• Select Writings with a Biographical Sketch of his Life by P. A. Colaço (1891)
• La franc-maçonnerie, synagogue de Satan (1893)

References

• Gense, James H. (1960). "Bishop Leo Meurin." In: The Church at the Gateway of India, 1720-1960. Bombay: St. Xavier's College, pp. 276–322.
• Portalié, Eugène (1893). "La Franc-maçonnerie, synagogue de Satan", Études religieuses, philosophiques, historiques et littéraires, 30e année, tome 59, pp. 489–501.
• Rothe, Alfred (1957–1958). "Erzbischof Johann Gabriel Leo Meurin S.J. Ein Berliner Missionsbischof aus dem 19. Jahrhundert," Wichmann Jahrbuch, Vol. XI-XII, pp. 121–30.
• Santos Hernández, Ángel (2000). Jesuitas y Obispados. Madrid: Universidad Pontificia Comillas, pp. 188–90.
• Schatz, Klaus (1994). "Meurin, Johann Gabriel Leo". In: Neue Deutsche Biographie (NDB). 17. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, p. 270.
• Väth, Alfons (1920). Die deutschen Jesuiten in Indien. Regensburg: Kösel & Pustet.

External links

• Archbishop Johann Gabriel Léon Louis Meurin, S.J.

Catholic Church titles
Preceded by Walter Steins Bisschop	Apostolic Vicar of Bombay 1867–1886	Succeeded by George Porter
Preceded by Ignazio de' Bisogno	Titular Bishop of Ashkelon 1867–1887	Succeeded by Domenico Maria Valensise
Preceded by Vincenzo Tizzani	Titular Archbishop of Nisibis 1887–1887	Succeeded by Giuseppe Giusti
Preceded by William Benedict Scarisbrick	Archbishop of Port-Louis 1887–1895	Succeeded by Peter Augustine O'Neill