Crown Grand Cross in the Order of the Holy Sepulchre Grand Cross in the Order of the Double Dragon : Grand Cross in the Order of the White Eagle : Imperial Order of the Rising Sun : Legion of Honour : Order of Christ Order of Saint Anna Order of Carol I : Order of the Sun of Peru : Order of Isabella the Catholic : Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice Red Cross Medal of the United States Imperial Order of the Double Dragon, Qing Dynasty China Views Inter-Belgian relations Mercier is known for favoring French speakers and opposing the use of Dutch. Though in general social minded, he was blind to the social aspects of the Flemish Movement and opposed many of its aims. Two examples. (1) Claiming that Dutch could never be a full-fledged cultural language, he fought all attempts to have Flemish high school and university students educated in their native Dutch. He relented only when overwhelmed by the political pressure the Flemish Movement was generating. He managed to have Pope Benedict XV address him a letter in which he admonished priests that they should not address arguments extraneous to their supernatural commitment nor publish on secular subjects without their superior's permission. Mercier promptly published this letter. Church and science Mercier recognized the mathematical talent of Georges Lemaître as a young seminarian, and urged him to study Einstein's theories of relativity. Lemaître became an early expert in general relativity as it applied to cosmological questions. He went on to propose an expanding model of the universe, based on both Einstein's and de Sitter's models. Abbé Georges Lemaître developed his "primeval atom" hypothesis, together with researchers of the University of Louvain, and Gamow, Alpher and Herman into the better known Big Bang theory of the origin of the universe. References Sources Further reading Johan Ickx. 2018. La guerre et le Vatican: Les secrets de la diplomatie du Saint-Siège (1914-1915), Paris: Les éditions du Cerf. Sophie De Schaepdrijver. 1999. De groote oorlog: het koninkrijk België tijdens de Eerste Wereldoorlog. 7th ed. Amsterdam: Olympus. Jan De Volder. 2018. Cardinal Mercier in the First World War. Belgium, Germany and the Catholic Church. Leuven: Leuven University Press. External links The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church Catholic-Hierarchy 1851 births 1926 deaths People from Braine-l'Alleud Belgian cardinals 20th-century Belgian Roman Catholic theologians Roman Catholic archbishops of Mechelen-Brussels 20th-century Roman Catholic archbishops in Belgium Belgian