Background
Peter Paul Lefevere was born in Roulers, Belgium, the son of Charles Lefevere, a farmer in easy circumstances, and his wife, Albertine-Angeline Muylle.
Peter Paul Lefevere was born in Roulers, Belgium, the son of Charles Lefevere, a farmer in easy circumstances, and his wife, Albertine-Angeline Muylle.
He made his preliminary studies for the priesthood with the Lazarists in Paris. Lefevere came to the United States in 1828 and completed theological course at The Barrens in Perryville, Missouri.
Lefevere was ordained November 20, 1831. Although stationed for a few months at New Madrid, Missouri, his career began with his appointment to the Salt River mission in the fall of 1832. Making his headquarters in this tiny settlement in Ralls County, Missouri, he ministered to the Catholic immigrant population of northeastern Missouri, southern Iowa, and western Illinois. For some years he was the only priest on the Mississippi from St. Louis to Dubuque. Despite his utter poverty, and the appalling hardships encountered in the care of this untouched mission field, he knew no respite until his health became seriously impaired in 1840. In that year he returned to Belgium to recuperate, sailing from New York with his superior, Bishop Rosati, who was on his way to Rome. The prelate arrived while the Roman authorities were dealing with Bishop Rese's proffered resignation from the See of Detroit. They decided to appoint a coadjutor bishop to administer the diocese, and through the influence of Bishop Rosati, Father Lefevere was chosen. As titular bishop of Zela, and administrator of Detroit, he was consecrated in St. John's Church, Philadelphia, November 21, 1841, by Bishop Francis Kenrick, assisted by Bishops England and Hughes.
When he entered upon his charge, he had seventeen priests, two parishes in Detroit, and sixteen more in the diocese. At his death there were eighty-eight priests, eleven parishes in the city, and 161 organized Catholic groups in the state. He was fitted to cope with this phenomenal expansion by his unlimited capacity for work, his firmness in governing, and his bent for order and discipline. The temporalities of the diocese, left in a precarious condition by his predecessor, were placed on a secure basis. He convened two diocesan synods to establish the polity which had been lacking. To supply his urgent need of priests, he became associated with Bishop Spalding of Louisville in the founding of the American College at Louvain. Its first three rectors were priests from the diocese of Detroit. In his efforts to build up a Catholic school system, he fostered the development of a diocesan community, the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and introduced into his diocese the Ladies of the Sacred Heart, the Sisters of Notre Dame, and the Christian Brothers. He conducted a vigorous but unsuccessful campaign in 1852-1853 to obtain for his schools a proportionate share of the public funds devoted to education. To supply the lack of charitable institutions in Detroit, the Sisters of Charity were brought in, and with his help founded a hospital, an orphanage, and an asylum for the insane.
He was deeply interested in the Indian population of his diocese, and strove to provide it with schools and missionaries. In protest against the drunkenness which he noticed in Detroit on his arrival, he publicly took the total-abstinence pledge. Every day at a fixed hour he could be found in his confessional. He died of erysipelas in St. Mary's Hospital in Detroit, and lies buried under the altar of the church of St. Peter and St. Paul, which he built and used as his cathedral.
During his time as Bishop the number of parishes and priests in the diocese increased significantly. He established St. Thomas Seminary and the American College at Louvain in Belgium. He built Saints Peter and Paul Church in Detroit, which became his cathedral in 1848, replacing Ste. Anne de Detroit. He also helped to establish several charitable institutions.
Personally, the Bishop was simple and unaffected in demeanor, frugal in his habits, austere in his mode of life.
