Saturday, October 17, 2009

Cardinal Binet (1869 - 1936)

Charles Henri Joseph Cardinal Binet was Bishop of Soissons from 1920 to 1927 and Archbishop of Besançon from 1927 until his death. He was created Cardinal-Priest of S. Prisca by Pope Pius XI in the consistory of December 19, 1927.


A photo from 1920: "The newly appointed bishop of Soissons"






6 comments:

Gregor said...

So who are the little guys in the copes?

The Saint Bede Studio said...

Leo, can you offer a view on why in the first picture, +Soissons appears in black choir dress and is wearing an Award instead of pectoral cross?

leo said...

@ Gregor: That's a really good question, which I already asked myself. I was hoping one of my readers might shed some light on that custom.

@ Michael: Since the caption says "... newly appointed...", maybe they didn't have a photo of Bishop Binet in episcopal dress yet and took an older one, depicting him as a cathedral canon.

Anonymous said...

I would guess the award is actually the pectoral cross that was assigned to that cathedral chapter. I notice a lot of chapters use a common design cross, often suspended from a ribbon insteaf of a cord or chain. A lot of bishops and cardinals from the 1700s (such as Card. DeBullion below), suspended what appears to be a pectoral cross from a ribbon. I wonder when the cord was first used?

Father G said...

great pics!
It would seem that the boys are vergers for the procession. As to the particular custom here...I would imagine that their function was only ceremonial and not practical,that is,maintaining order in the procession. Whatever it is, I like it...

Voraussetzungslosigkeit said...

In the case of Cardinal De Bouillon, what he is wearing suspended on a blue ribbon is not his pectoral cross but the ribbon of the French Order of the Holy Spirit. It was customary for the order to have 8 Ecclesiastical members and it so happens that His Eminence was Grand Almoner to Louis XIV, so he was very eligible for membership. I've seen Cardinal Richelieu wearing the same decoration.