Louis-Adolphe Paquet

Louis-Adolphe Paquet (French pronunciation: [pɑkɛt]; also Pâquet;[n 1] August 4, 1859 – February 4, 1942) was an influential French-Canadian theologian from the late 19th early 20th century, and a major North American proponent and actor in the rebirth of Neo-Scholasticism.

Although nowhere as politically influential as his uncle Benjamin Pâquet had been, he was well respected and his opinion helped shape the doctrines and policies of the Canadian church in the early 20th century.

Joseph-Louis-Adolphe Paquet[n 2] was born on August 4, 1859, to a farmer couple, Adolphe Pâquet and Éléonore Demers, on the family domain in Saint-Nicolas, on the southern shore of the Saint Lawrence River opposite Quebec City.

[1] Louis-Adolphe came from an influential family: two of his uncles, Benjamin and Louis-Honoré Pâquet, were notable churchmen, and one of his cousins, Étienne-Théodore, would later be elected to the provincial legislature.

[10] Paquet's Le Droit public de l'Église codified a lot of the French-Canadian catholic doctrine of the time, to the point that one commenter, Dominican Ceslas-Marie Forest, the dean of Université de Montréal's faculty of philosophy, described it as "Sacro-saint", "untouchable", "integrist" and "reactionary"; amongst other things, it was the source of the major arguments against mandatory public education (which Paquet characterized as a Freemason plot).

[14] Although he voiced strong opinions (but in fact mostly echoed the prevalent conservative views of the French-Canadian clergy and elites of his time),[15] Paquet had—unlike his uncle Benjamin—fairly little direct involvement in the religious politics of the period, a state that might have changed had the plan to counteract the Irish Catholic influence in Rome succeeded.