Imperial Catechism — 4 avril 1806

A single catechism, imposed on every diocese, taught that 'to honour and serve our Emperor' was a duty towards God and threatened 'eternal damnation' to those who failed in it. Saint Napoleon's day was fixed on 15 August, the Emperor's birthday and the feast of the Assumption. Rome never approved the text, which fed the conflict with Pius VII.

A single catechism for the whole Empire

The Concordat had restored worship, not docility. Each diocese still taught its own catechism, inherited from the Ancien Régime. The decree of 4 April 1806 imposed a single text on every church in France, drawn from Bossuet's catechism and approved by the legate Caprara.

The essential lay in one lesson: that of the fourth commandment, 'Honour thy father and thy mother'. It was extended to the sovereign.

Obey on pain of damnation

The faithful learned there that they owed Napoleon 'love, respect, obedience, fidelity, military service and the tributes ordered for the preservation and defence of the Empire'. Those who failed in this would 'render themselves worthy of eternal damnation'.

The same movement fixed, by a decree of February 1806, Saint Napoleon's day on 15 August: the feast of the Assumption became also the sovereign's feast and the anniversary of his birth. The national holiday of the Empire was thus set on the liturgical calendar.

The price of a text

Rome never approved this catechism, which would remain an item for the prosecution in the open conflict between Napoleon and Pius VII, up to the annexation of the Papal States and the excommunication of 1809.

At home the effect was ambiguous: part of the clergy taught it half-heartedly, and the text fed the charge of an imperial cult imposed through the Church. Abolished in 1814, it remains the most frequently cited example of the regime's use of religion.