[6] At the end of 1735, Attems obtained from Pope Clement XII the Provostship of the collegiate church of Bettenbrunn (Switzerland), in the territory of the Prince Furstenberg.

[8] Von Attems was ordained a priest in Rome on 6 January 1737, by Joaquín Fernández de Portocarrero y Mendoza, Patriarch of Antioch.

[9] When Jacobus Sigismundus von Rainach was appointed Bishop of Basel (Switzerland) on 30 September 1737,[10] he vacated the provostship, a canonicate, and a prebend in the cathedral Chapter.

In protracted negotiations, one suggestion was that the two powers should alternately nominate the Patriarch of Aquileia, but Pope Benedict XIV was not friendly to the idea.

[20] On 29 November 1749, Pope Benedict announced in a papal consistory that he intended to nominate a Vicar Apostolic for the territories of the Patriarchate of Aquileia which lay in the control of the Empire.

[27] In 1756, with the support of Count Giovanni Battista della Torre, he opened the "Ospedale di San Raffaele", to provide assistance to the aged infirm and to abandoned children.

[28] In 1757, with the permission of the pope[29] and the Empress Maria Theresa, he founded a seminary, for the education (free, for a year) of priests who were undertaking assignments involving the care of souls.

[31] In replying to a letter from the archbishop on 6 April 1766, asking for his prayers for her in her family problems, the Empress Maria Theresa announced that she was setting to work to procure the dignity of Prince of the Empire for him.

[33] In June 1768, due to increasingly serious health problems, Archbishop Attems requested both Vienna and Rome to provide him with a coadjutor bishop.

The Dean of the cathedral Chapter of Gorizia, Count Rudolf von Edling, was appointed and named titular Bishop of Capharnaum (Palaestina) on 20 November 1769;[34] he was consecrated by Archbishop Attems on 4 September 1770.