Church Life - Angelo Roncalli and Giovanni Mastai Ferretti

Two Good Popes

Last September 3rd the Church proclaimed Blessed John XXIII and Pius IX. “By divine design their beatification links these two Popes who lived in very different historical contexts but, beyond appearances, share many human and spiritual similarities.” John Paul II said during his homily

BY ANDREA TORNIELLI

“‘You are good and forgiving.’ Today we contemplate, in the glory of the Lord, John XXIII, the Pope who impressed the world with the friendliness of his manner that radiated the remarkable goodness of his soul.… Everyone remembers the image of Pope John’s smiling face and two outstretched arms embracing the whole world. How many people were won over by his simplicity of heart, combined with a broad experience of people and things!”
With these words, on Sunday, September 3rd, John Paul II summed up the characteristic traits of Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli, newly proclaimed Blessed along with his predecessor Pius IX, Archbishop Tommaso Reggio, Father Guillaume-Joseph Chaminade (founder of the Marianist Family), and the Benedictine Abbot Columba Marmion.

John XXIII

It is remarkable that Pope John Paul II, in his homily during the ceremony celebrated in front of the Vatican basilica, chose to highlight especially the “goodness” of Pope John. This was an emphasis that bothered some traditionalists, who accuse him of having yielded to modernity and to Communism and thus to have been too good; that is to say, ingenuous. But it was not received favorably in progressive circles either, by those who in recent decades have contributed to constructing on paper the figure of a revolutionary Pope John XXIII, the “ideologue” of the renewal initiated by the Council which–they claim–Paul VI then brought to a halt. And so, for John Paul II what remains in everyone’s memory is “a smiling face” and “two arms open wide to the world.” This may look like an idealistic holy picture to many intellectuals who, perhaps even inside the Church, view him patronizingly, but it corresponds perfectly with the image of Pope John that has been stamped on the hearts of millions of the simple faithful. If the criterion for obtaining the honor of altars were only the “reputation of sanctity” among God’s people, there is no doubt that Angelo Roncalli would have been proclaimed Blessed a long time ago. The Pope, who at the ripe age of 80 had the courage to convoke a council, who wrote Mater et magistra and Pacem in terris, but also encyclicals to revive devotion to the Rosary (Grata recordatio) and the use of Latin in the liturgy (Veterum sapientia), endures in the memory of the faithful for his ability to speak directly to the hearts of all. On December 26, 1958, John XXIII devoted one of his first excursions outside the Vatican to the prisoners in Regina Coeli penitentiary in Rome. “I am Giuseppe, your brother,” he said to the emotionally stirred prisoners. “I have put my eyes in your eyes, I have placed my heart next to yours.” More than in his words, it was his eyes and his simple manner that made those present feel God’s mercy toward them. At the end of the meeting, Pope John asked to visit the upper sections of the prison. On his way there, as he walked between the two rows of inmates kneeling in wait for him to pass, at a certain point he stopped in front of a young man who had been sentenced for murder. The boy was bent over double, sobbing and stammering incomprehensibly. Pope John drew closer, bending his head and trying to understand. Finally the boy whispered through his tears, “But is what you just said true for me too? Can there be pardon also for me?” John XXIII, moved, said nothing, but enveloped the young prisoner in a loving embrace.

“Who am I, where did I come from, where am I going?”

It is not possible to remain unmoved, hearing Pope John say in front of the TV cameras that he dedicates the third mystery of his daily Rosary to all the children born on that day, because in this way when a child is born anywhere in the world, “he already has the Pope’s prayer for him.” And all one has to do is see the images of the crowds pressing into the railway stations and along the tracks during his extraordinary pilgrimage to Loreto to understand how greatly beloved was this elderly Bishop of Rome. A Pope whose faith was traditional and simple, who at the age of 20 wrote in his Journal of a Soul a beautiful page, filled with wonder at having been called into life: “Who am I, where did I come from, where am I going?… I am nothingness. Everything I own, being, life, intellect, will, memory, all this was given to me by God, and yet everything belongs to Him… Even only twenty years ago, everything that surrounds me was here: the sun, the moon, the stars, the mountains, seas, deserts, animals, plants, people. Things proceeded in an orderly manner in the world under the watchful eye of divine Providence. And I? And I was not here. Everything went on without me, no one thought of me, no one imagined anything about me, not even in dreams, because I was not. And you, my God, by the ineffable reach of your love… you pulled me out of my nothingness, you gave to me being, life, a soul.”

The Vatican Ecumenical Council II

“The breath of newness he brought certainly did not concern doctrine,” Pope John Paul II explained in his homily. John XXIII was a faithful custodian of the Depositum fidei. The innovation, John Paul II went on, concerned “rather the way to explain it; his style of speaking and acting was new, as was his friendly approach to ordinary people and to the powerful of the world. It was in this spirit that he called the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, thereby turning a new page in the Church’s history: Christians heard themselves called to proclaim the Gospel with renewed courage and greater attentiveness to the ‘signs’ of the times. The Council was a truly prophetic insight of this elderly Pontiff who, even amid many difficulties, opened a season of hope for Christians and for humanity.” Deeply devoted to Mary and to St. Joseph, close to the devotional practices of God’s people, he summed up his testament in these few words: “What counts the most in life is blessed Jesus Christ, his holy Church, his Gospel, truth and goodness.” “We too wish to receive this testament,” said John Paul II, “as we glorify God for having given him to us as a Pastor.” To clear the field of all the controversy and the comparisons between John XXIII and Pius IX, it should be sufficient to recall the great devotion that Pope John felt for his predecessor Pius IX. “By divine design their beatification links these two Popes who lived in very different historical contexts but, beyond appearances, share many human and spiritual similarities.” Pope John’s deep veneration for Pius IX, to whose beatification he looked forward, is well known. During a spiritual retreat in 1959, he wrote in his diary, “I always think of Pius IX of holy and glorious memory, and by imitating him in his sacrifices, I would like to be worthy to celebrate his canonization.” (Journal of a Soul) Numerous letters and speeches by John XXIII testify to this great devotion. During a public audience on August 22, 1962 (as Archbishop Loris Capovilla recalled in the July-August issue of the monthly journal 30 Days), Pope John said of Pius IX: “A lofty and noble pastor, of whom it was even written, in comparing him to the image of our Lord Jesus Christ, that no one was more loved or more hated by his contemporaries. But his deeds and his dedication to the Church shine today more brightly than ever; admiration of him is unanimous. May the Lord grant me the great gift of being able to decree the honor of altars, during the XXI Ecumenical Council, for the one who called and presided over the Twentieth Council, Vatican I.”

Pius IX

A great deal, too much, has been written in recent weeks about the Pope of the Syllabus. It has been said that he was an “anti-modern,” “anti-Risorgimento,” and even “anti-Semitic” pastor, despite the known fact that it was Pius IX who improved the living conditions of Jews in Rome. Some wounds resulting from the unification of Italy and the fall of the Papal State seemed to have been healed by now, to the point that figures of the stature of the late Republican Senator Giovanni Spadolini in the mid-1980s had communicated to the Holy See that historians had nothing to say against the beatification of Pius IX. And yet, the figure of Pius IX and his beatification have been subject to numerous attacks. John Paul II, to clear the air of any misunderstanding and to avoid being drawn into the controversy, declared at the outset, “Holiness lives in history and no saint has escaped the limits and conditioning which are part of our human nature.” “In beatifying one of her sons,” the Pope added, “the Church does not celebrate the specific historical decisions he may have made, but rather points to him as someone to be imitated and venerated because of his virtues, in praise of the divine grace which shines resplendently in him.” The honor of altars for Pius IX, then, does not mean a beatification of the contingent historical choices he made, about which discussion is legitimate (though it should not erect barricades or become involved in anachronistic battles).

Abandoning oneself to Providence

“Amid the turbulent events of his time,” John Paul II continued, “he was an example of unconditional fidelity to the immutable deposit of revealed truths. Faithful to the duties of his ministry in every circumstance, he always knew how to give absolute primacy to God and to spiritual values. His lengthy pontificate was not at all easy and he had much to suffer in fulfilling his mission of service to the Gospel. He was much loved, but also hated and slandered. However, it was precisely in these conflicts that the light of his virtues shone most brightly: these prolonged sufferings tempered his trust in divine Providence, whose sovereign lordship over human events he never doubted. This was the source of Pius IX’s deep serenity, even amid the misunderstandings and attacks of so many hostile people. He liked to say to those close to him: ‘In human affairs we must be content to do the best we can and then abandon ourselves to Providence, which will heal our human faults and shortcomings.’”
John Paul II then recalled that Pius IX, “sustained by this deep conviction, called the First Vatican Ecumenical Council, which clarified with magisterial authority certain questions disputed at the time, and confirmed the harmony of faith and reason. During his moments of trial Pius IX found support in Mary, to whom he was very devoted. In proclaiming the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, he reminded everyone that in the storms of human life the light of Christ shines brightly in the Blessed Virgin and is more powerful than sin and death.” “In Pius IX’s mind,” Spadolini has written, “religious concerns took precedence over diplomatic considerations, and his purpose was to strengthen Catholic doctrine.” As Pope, Pius IX gave an enormous boost to the missionary activity of the Church, rebuilt the Catholic hierarchy in England and Holland, raised numerous Blessed and saints to the glory of altars (among them Hilary of Poitiers, Francis de Sales, and Alfonso de Liguori), favored the traditions and rites of the Eastern Churches, protected Father Bosco, and proclaimed St. Joseph to be the universal patron of the Church. At the beginning of his priesthood, the young Mastai Ferretti vowed, “All my work will be in God, with God, and for God.”

Libertas Ecclesiae

As to the question of his “contingent choices,” talking with General Karl Kanzler, Pius IX said, “Temporal power is a sacred thing; I will defend it to my death, but it is a great bother.” Giulio Andreotti has demonstrated clearly in his books (the latest, Sotto il segno di Pius IX [Under the Sign of Pius IX], has just been published by Rizzoli) that the defense of Rome was a symbolic act and that the Pope wanted to avoid bloodshed. Pius IX’s defense of the Papal State (whose fall would be called “providential” by Paul VI) was determined solely by his intention to safeguard the freedom and independence of the Church, and only in 1929, with the first Concordat, was the way found for guaranteeing the Pope’s liberty. “It was thus not a question of territory,” the Bishop Emeritus of Senigallia Odo Fusi Pecci has observed, “but of independence.”
As a head of state, he was anything but a tyrant; taxation in the papal territories oscillated between 20 and 22 francs, while in Piedmont it was between 30 and 32, in France it reached 40, and in England even 80 francs. Pius IX, besides reopening the Jewish ghetto, drained the marshes at Ostia and Ferrara, supplied the city of Rome with drinking water and gas lighting, had over 400 kilometers of railroad tracks laid, and built hospitals, bakeries for the distribution of bread at controlled prices, charitable institutes, dormitories, and workers’ housing. And, finally, concerning the accusation that he was “anti-patriotic” because he did not want to take part in the war for the unification of Italy, it is sufficient to read what he wrote to the municipal council of Rome: “I have not declared unjust nor condemned the current war in Italy. I only said that I have no intention of doing so and, what is more, I do not have the strength to impede the urge of my subjects who want to participate in it. This does not imply a declaration of injustice and condemnation. It is known to everybody that I recognize that the feeling of nationality is natural to man. I would be very pleased if Italy were to rise up and become independent, but I myself cannot become involved in a war to which, when I have not been attacked and religion is not in danger, I must remain extraneous.”