Louis II of Lorraine, Cardinal of Guise

Louis II de Lorraine, cardinal de Guise was a French prelate, Cardinal and politician during the latter French Wars of Religion. The third son of François de Lorraine, duke of Guise and Anne d'Este, Louis was destined for a career in the church. His uncle Cardinal Lorraine resigned his offices of Archbishop of Reims to him in 1574, and the death of his other uncle Louis I de Lorraine, Cardinal de Guise passed his ecclesiastical empire on to him upon his death in 1578. At which time, the king made him Cardinal. Cardinal Guise actively involved himself in the first Catholic Ligue that rose up in opposition to the generous Peace of Monsieur which brought the fifth war of religion to a close in 1576. The ligue succeeded in resuming the civil war the next year and a harsher peace was concluded. Over the following years of peace, he would feud with Épernon, and receive Henri III's new honour when he was made a chevalier de l'Ordre du Saint-Esprit in 1578 among the first cohort. Finally reaching the ecclesiastical age at which he could assume his responsibilities as Archbishop of Reims in 1583, he entered the city in triumph and oversaw a council at which he pushed for the promulgation of the Tridentine Decrees.