After schooling at the College of Cardinal Lemoine, Richer went on to study at the Sorbonne University. There he served as doctor of theology and trustee (syndic) of the Theological Faculty. After the condemnation by the Parlement of Paris of Cardinal Bellarmine"s treatise on the Temporal power of the Pope (1610), Richer developed, in his Libellus de Ecclesiastica et Politica Potestate (in French as De la puissance ecclésiastique et politique, Paris, 1611) the theory that the government of the Church should be aristocratical, not monarchical.
Maria de" Medici, then regent in France, opposed Richer.
And, when he had been censured by an assembly of bishops held at Sens, presided over by Cardinal du Perron, she had him deposed, and a new syndic elected (1612). Imprisoned, he retracted in 1629 his views, under pressure from Cardinal Richelieu.