In June 2022, Pope Francis ordered an apostolic visitation to the diocese amid concerns over the pastoral health of the diocese regarding Ravel’s management style. One local Catholic journalist described that style as “very authoritarian” and “very managerial,” akin to “certain HR managers in the lucrative private sector.”
In April 2023, Ravel, 65 at the time, submitted his resignation, which was accepted by both Pope Francis and President Emmanuel Macron.
The ancient Archdiocese of Strasbourg dates back to the 4th century and is located in the historically contested mixed Franco-German region of Alsace.
The archbishop is selected in a power-sharing agreement by both the pope and the president of France, a process resulting from the 1801 concordat between Napoleon and Pope Pius VII. While abrogated in the rest of France in 1905, it remained in force in the region of Alsace as it was annexed by the Germans in 1871. Alsace was returned to France at the end of the First World War.
After Ravel’s resignation in 2023, Pope Francis appointed the Archbishop of Metz, Philippe Ballot, as apostolic administrator.
The archdiocese faced another high-level episcopal departure earlier this year when on Feb. 14 Pope Francis accepted the resignation of the 51-year-old Auxiliary Bishop Gilles Reithinger.
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