Alfons de Requesens

Alfons de Requesens y Fenollet (1570 – 8 April 1639) was a Spanish prelate of the Catholic Church who served as the bishop of Barbastro from 1627 to 1639. Holding a titular title of the bishop of Duvno from 1610 to 1627, de Requesens served as an auxiliary bishop of Olomouc from 1610 to 1621 and Toledo from 1621 to 1627. Before his service in Toledo, de Requesens held several duties in Franciscan provinces in Germany and Austria and also served as a diplomat for Emperor Ferdinand II.

Origin
Little is known about de Requesens' origin. He was born either in Antwerp in present-day Belgium or Cervera in present-day Spain. His mother was Catalina Fenollet (d. 1625). Pascal Hollaus suggests that she was a noble family member from Fenouillet, Pyrénées-Orientales. His father's surname, de Requesens, indicates he belonged to the nobility of Catalan. The de Requesens family gave several notable figures in Catalonia during the 15th and 16th centuries, while their loyalty to the Spanish royalty enabled them to wear the crown on their family coat of arms. De Requesens mentions in a letter that his brother Luis died in 1625 and left four orphans.

Franciscan Order
De Requesens was at first a member of the Low German Franciscan Province, which had friaries in present-day Netherlands, Belgium and northern Germany. He was a member of the friary in Antwerp, where he was known as a good preacher. Afterwards, de Requesens was transferred to the Franciscan Province of Cologne, where on 16 September 1603, he was appointed a definitor and a guardian of the friary in Cologne. During his short tenure, he finished the construction of the friary church.

The reason why de Requesens changed province is unclear. Hollaus suggests that the reason could be that either his friary in Antwerpen was demolished during the religious turmoil in the region at the time or, more probably, due to his desire to fund the friaries of the Recollects whom he supported, which caused a conflict in his home province. The latter is supported by de Requesens and the other two friars trying to reform the friary in Cologne by force. After his failure to reform the friary, de Requesens went to Vienna with his like-minded friar Ägidius Smurit and asked Emperor Rudolf II to assign him to a reformed friary. In December 1603, he reported to the provincial of the Franciscan Province of Tyrol in Prague that he was about to find a friary. He succeeded and was appointed the guardian of the Our Lady of Snows friary in Prague.

At the same time, on 12 December 1603, de Requesens was appointed the general commissioner for Upper Germany, Austria, Bohemia, Hungary, Poland and Croatia by the Franciscan Curia. His duty was to support the Franciscan province, make visits and preside over chapters as the representative of the Franciscan general. Just eight days later, he expressed his interest in visiting the Tyrolean provincial and probably visited the friary in Innsbruck somewhat later. Due to his office, he travelled a lot and made important decisions. He served as well as the military vicar of the Austrian Imperial Army.

In November 1609, he permitted Father Antonius Remerarius to leave Vienna following complaints and an edict from Archduke Matthias. Participating in the 1606 General Chapter in Toledo, he encountered disagreement with Father Franziskus Rensinck over the Cologne friary. On his return from Spain, he visited the Clarisses and Franciscan friary in Freiburg im Breisgau.

In the same year, he led various provincial chapters, including those in Bohemia and Graz, where he was unexpectedly elected provincial for three years on October 3. He founded the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception during his provincial tenure and issued a clergy study order. He also served as an advisor to Emperors Rudolf II and Matthias.

In 1609, during the Order's assembly in Madrid, de Requesens intended to resign as the general commissioner. Testimonials from Tyrolean Provincial Bernard Rast praised his observant adherence to rules, discipline, and religious zeal and described his lifestyle as saintly. He was allowed to resign, with the condition of leading chapters in the Upper German and Tyrolean Provinces, though he couldn't attend the latter in 1610 due to receiving episcopal honours.

Episcopate
For his services, he was awarded the nomination as the titular bishop of Duvno by Emperor Mathias, and received papal confirmation on 30 August 1610. He succeeded György Zalatnaky, who was only nominated to the office but was never installed. De Requesens was consecrated by Cardinal Franz von Dietrichstein in Vienna. He was allowed not to reside in his diocese because of the Ottoman occupation, and received 500 guilders from the Archdiocese of Eger, also under the Ottoman occupation. Since he was only a titular bishop, de Requesens resided in the Franciscan friary of St. Jerome in Vienna and served as an auxiliary bishop in the Archdiocese of Olomouc under Cardinal von Dietrichstein. Since de Requesens wasn't a residential bishop in Duvno, the diocese was administered by the bishops of Bosnia who were granted a general jurisdiction over the diocese by the Holy See. From 1615, they entrusted the administration to Bartul Kačić, the bishop of Makarska.

In this office in 1613, he consecrated the castle chapel in Frohsdorf and the altars in the Church of St. Blasie in Klein-Wien (present-day Paudorf and Furth bei Göttweig). The church of St. Blasie still has a reliquary with a seal from de Requesens as a certificate of authenticity. In 1618, he also consecrated several altars for the Göttweig Abbey in the churches of St. Philipp and Jakobus in Brunnkirchen, St. John in Hellerhof and St. Wolfgang in Fürth.

In 1621, de Requesens was sent by Emperor Ferdinand II to the court of Philip IV of Spain as an extraordinary emissary. From the same year, he served as an auxiliary bishop in the Archdiocese of Toledo. He was probably commissioned by Philip III of Spain to support his son Ferdinand, who had become cardinal and archbishop of Toledo on 1 March 1620 at the age of ten.

On 11 August 1625, he was nominated the bishop of Barbastro, and received papal confirmation on 6 October. During his term of office, he gave, among other things, the Diocesan constitutions and had a new organ built in the Barbastro cathedral. On 18 January 1639, he was nominated the bishop of Vic. However, he died before receiving confirmation on 8 April 1639 in Zaragoza. His confirmation, which was issued on 2 May, remained without effect. He is buried in Barbastro.