The History of the Church through 100 Masterpieces

Peace Revisted

The History of the Church 194 Peace Revisted The political compromise effected by the Edict of Nantes guaranteed liberty of conscience, but a liberty that was strictly circumscribed. Protestant worship and practice was only authorized in the locations where the Huguenots were a majority of the population, as well as within the domains of Huguenot nobility. It was forbidden in cities where bishoprics had their sees, such as Paris. Thus, in the very Catholic city of Nantes, where the edict was signed—the last bastion of the League—Protestant worship was forbidden except in four places. The city of Lyons was a special case. While the town had been taken by the Huguenots in 1562 and temporarily made the capital of Protestantism in France, the surrounding province remained staunchly Catholic. The Temple of Paradise, one of the first examples of Protestant architecture, was erected two years later in the city. But when Lyons was seized by the League, it experienced its own version of the Saint Bartholomew massacre, known as the Lyonnaise Vespers. The Temple of Paradise, destroyed and then rebuilt, functioned until the Edict of Nantes was revoked. French, Anonymous (seventeenth century) The Paradise, Protestant Temple in Lyons Public and University Library, Geneva ...