 During the French Revolution the Diocese of Cahors was abolished and its territory subsumed into a new diocese, coterminous with the new 'Departement de Lot' and a suffragan of the 'Metropole du Sud' in the departement of Haute-Garonne, with its seat at Toulouse.The clergy were required to swear and oath to the Constitution, and under the terms of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy a new bishop was to be elected by all the voters of the departement, who were not even required to be Catholics.This placed them in schism with the Roman Catholic Church and the Pope.