desservant

"Desservants" was the name of a class of French parish priests. Under the old regime, a priest who performed the parochial duties in a vacant parish, or where the parish priest was under censure of some kind was known as a desservant; he was the vicar, or économe-curé, whom the Council of Trent desired to be appointed in each vacant parish. After the Concordat of 1801, however, the name desservants was applied to a second class of parish priests who were named by the bishop without the sanction of the Government, but could also be removed at any time by the bishop. This institution owed its origin to custom rather than any law, though later on it was fully legalized. Article 9 of the new concordat decreed that "the bishops are to make a new circumscription of the parishes in their diocese...