During the French Revolution, the National Assembly abolished the traditional structure of the Catholic Church in France and reorganized it as an institution within the structure of the new French government through the Civil Constitution of the Clergy. One of the new requirements placed upon all clergy was the necessity of an oath of loyalty to the State before all foreign influences such as the Pope. This created a schism within the French clergy, with those taking the oath known as , and those refusing the oath known as non-juring clergy or refractory clergy. Background In the centuries preceding the French Revolution, the Church had functioned as an autonomous entity within French borders. It controlled roughly 10% of all French land, levied mandatory tithes upon the populace, and collected revenues from its estates, all of which contributed to the Church's total income which it was not obliged to disclose to the state. Under the ancien regime, France was divided into three Estates, and the clergy occupied the First Estate, with the aristocracy comprising the Second Estate, and the commoners the Third Estate. As one of the first two privileged Estates, the Church was exempt from all taxation, although every five years the Assembly of the Clergy met and arranged a don gratuit (free gift) to be given to the King on behalf of the Church. Over the course of the 18th century, France fell into deeper and deeper financial crisis. On multiple occasions, the state attempted to revoke the Church's tax-free status in order to tap into its significant financial resources, with official declarations calling for formal surveys of the Church's wealth and subsequent taxations being levied in 1749 and 1780. Both were successfully rebuffed by the Church, whose infrastructure, organization, man-power, and influence were unrivaled in France. Nonetheless, these events show that a desire to check the power and privileges of the Church was gaining momentum before the Revolution erupted. During the French Revolution In an attempt to find a peaceful resolution to mounting popular unrest and calls for reform, King Louis XVI first convened the Assembly of Notables in 1787 and then revived the Estates-General in 1789. During the 1787 Assembly, clerical representatives strongly opposed any reforms directed towards the Church, but by the meeting of the Estates-General, internal divisions began to form. Bishops and other ‘high clergy’ (who were often of noble stock) allied strongly with the