Catholic University of Mechelen

Peter de Ram, the only rector of the Catholic University of Mechelen and in 1835 the first rector of the new Catholic University of Leuven.
Pope Gregory XVI, cofounder with the bishops of Belgium of the Catholic University of Malines in 1834, which would later be the Catholic University of Leuven.

The Catholic University of Mechelen (Latin: Universitas catholica Belgii) was a university that was founded in Mechelen (French: Malines), Belgium, on November 8, 1834 by the bishops of Belgium.

The bishops aimed to create a university "to accommodate any doctrine from the Holy Apostolic See and to repudiate anything that does not flow from this august source". The first and only rector was the priest and historian Peter de Ram.

The announcement of the bishops' founding of the University in Mechelen provoked serious riots in the cities of Ghent, Leuven and Liege as it was feared that the State education system would be destroyed by the bishops.

The university was short-lived, as the bishops already moved the university headquarters to Leuven on 1 December 1835, where it took the name Catholic University of Leuven. This led to further consternation among the Belgian liberal society, which was afraid to see this new (conservative) university usurp the past of the former Old University of Leuven.[1] It also reinvigorated demands for the foundation of a secular university in Brussels which would lead to the foundation of the Free University of Brussels.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ According to Maurice Voituron, who wrote in his Le parti libéral joué par le parti catholique dans la question de l'enseignement supérieur, (Brussels, 1850): "et alors aurait paru plus évidente encore aux yeux du pays l'intention du parti catholique de tuer l'enseignement de l'État, afin de ne laisser debout que l'Université catholique de Malines, qui allait prendre le titre d'Université de Louvain, pour y usurper la renommée de l'ancienne, ainsi que ses fondations de bourses. Cependant, malgré lui, le parti catholique laissa échapper cet espoir par la bouche de son rapporteur M. Dechamps, lorsqu'il disait : "la confiance entourera de telle façon les établissements privés que les Universités de l'État, par exemple, deviendront à peu près désertes"

References and bibliography

Coordinates: 51°01′49″N 4°28′45″E / 51.030180°N 4.479036°E / 51.030180; 4.479036

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