As early as 1647 the king foresaw the coming creation of a bishopric in New France, for he constituted the Upper Council “of the Governor of Quebec, the Governor of Montreal and the Superior of the Jesuits, until there should be a bishop.”  A few years later, in 1656, the Company of Montreal obtained from M. Olier, the pious founder of the Seminary of St. Sulpice, the services of four of his priests for the colony, under the direction of one of them, M. de Queylus, Abbe de Loc-Dieu, whose brilliant qualities, as well as the noble use which he made of his great fortune, marked him out naturally as the probable choice of his associates for the episcopacy.  But the Jesuits, in possession of all the missions of New France, had their word to say, especially since the mitre had been offered by the queen regent, Anne of Austria, to one of their number, Father Lejeune, who had not, however, been able to accept, their rules forbidding it.  They had then proposed to the court of France and the court of Rome the name of Francois de Laval; but believing that the colony was not ready for the erection of a see, they expressed the opinion that the sending of an apostolic vicar with the functions and powers of a bishop in partibus would suffice.  Moreover, if the person sent should not succeed, he could at any time be recalled, which could not be done in the case of a bishop.  Alexander VII had given his consent to this new plan, and Mgr. de Laval was consecrated by the nuncio of the Pope at Paris, on Sunday, December 8th, 1658, in the church of St. Germain-des-Pres.  After having taken, with the assent of the sovereign pontiff, the oath of fidelity to the king, the new Bishop of Petraea said farewell to his pious mother (who died in that same year) and embarked at La Rochelle in the month of April, 1659.  The only property he retained was an income of a thousand francs assured to him by the Queen-Mother; but he was setting out to conquer treasures very different from those coveted by the Spanish adventurers who sailed to Mexico and Peru.  He arrived on June 16th at Quebec, with letters from the king which enjoined upon all the recognition of Mgr. de Laval of Petraea as being authorized to exercise episcopal functions in the colony without prejudice to the rights of the Archbishop of Rouen.

Unfortunately, men’s minds were not very certain then as to the title and qualities of an apostolic vicar.  They asked themselves if he were not a simple delegate whose authority did not conflict with the jurisdiction of the two grand vicars of the Jesuits and the Sulpicians.  The communities, at first divided on this point, submitted on the receipt of new letters from the king, which commanded the recognition of the sole authority of the Bishop of Petraea.  The two grand vicars obeyed, and M. de Queylus came to Quebec, where he preached the sermon on St. Augustine’s Day (August 28th), and satisfied the claim to authority of the apostolic vicar.