Photographer: John L. Bechet

Msgr. Robert Frederick Trisco
(1929–2023)

THE CATHOLIC
HISTORICAL REVIEW
VOL. 109

SUMMER 2023

NO. 3

In Memoriam
A Life in the Service of Church History
By
Robert Frederick Trisco
(as told to Nelson H. Minnich)

R

OBERT FREDERICK TRISCO was born on 11 November 1929, the son
of Richard Edward Trisco (1893–1981) and Harriet Rose Hardt
(1902–52). His father was a construction superintendent who earlier
worked as a carpenter foreman on large buildings for commercial, governmental, and industrial agencies (department stores, airports, etc.). Robert
grew up in the Ravenswood neighborhood on the North Side of Chicago
in the parish of Queen of the Angels, where he attended grammar school
(1935–43). His family lived in and owned an apartment building. He was
an only child and enjoyed going to the local library, where he was an avid
reader, and to the museums and the planetarium. Over the years, he tried
various sports, even taking lessons in golf, but the sport he liked best was
swimming. In his parish he was a server at Mass. The Dominican sisters
who taught him encouraged him to become a Dominican priest. On graduating from Queen of the Angels, he decided to study for the diocesan
priesthood. His father had hoped he would become a medical doctor, but
did not stand in the way of his clerical vocation. Robert attended Quigley
Preparatory Seminary (1943–48), living at home and taking the subway
and elevated to school. He did his high school and first year of college
studies there, graduating in 1948. It was reported in the Seminary’s publication The Candle (vol. XXIV, nr.14, April 13, 1946): “Robert Trisco of
3C with the almost unbelievable average of a 100 led the school in studies,
when report cards were passed out last week.” While a student at Quigley,
Robert attended a performance of Giuseppe Verdi’s Aïda at the bandshell
in Grant Park. He fell in love with opera, especially bel canto music, and

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started to go to the Chicago Lyric Opera. For the rest of his life, he
looked for opportunities to frequent the opera. On graduating from
Quigley in 1948, he moved on to St. Mary of the Lake Seminary in
Mundelein, Illinois, where he received a BA in 1951, after studying philosophy for three years, being taught mostly by Jesuits. His parents could
visit him once a semester.
Around graduation time, the rector called him aside to ask if he would
be willing to study theology in Rome. For thirty years, no seminarian from
the Chicago archdiocese had been sent there for study, and Cardinal
Samuel Stritch, an alumnus of the North American College, was being
pressured by his fellow cardinals (e.g., Francis Spellman) to send a student.
Robert secured his parents’ permission and had an interview with Cardinal
Stritch before departing. Robert found the cardinal very fatherly and developed an affection for him over the years. Robert’s parents accompanied
him by train to New York to see him off at the dock. It would be the last
time he saw his mother, who died within a year. She would write to him
almost every other day and Robert would reply weekly—he still has the letters. He sailed on the U.S.S. Constitution with twenty fellow American
seminarians to Naples, where they did some sight-seeing on their way to
Rome. The last three weeks of September and the first two of October he
stayed at the Villa Santa Caterina, a summer get-away for the North
American College, which was located near the papal residence in Castel
Gandolfo. It had a swimming pool, tennis courts, a grove of trees, and a
view of the Tyrrhenian Sea. It was later sold to Opus Dei, which restored
and developed it. In the fall of 1951 Robert began his studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University, living for two years in the North American
College located on the via dell’Umiltà (near the University) and in his third
and fourth year moving to the new facility on the Gianicolo, which was
blessed on its opening in 1953 by Pope Pius XII. While on summer vacation in Switzerland in 1952 he received word that his mother had suddenly
died, and was told it would be too difficult for him to return to Chicago in
time for the funeral. He received his STB in 1953 and the STL in 1955.
On December 8, 1954, Robert was ordained at the North American
College by its rector, Bishop Martin J. O’Connor. [The rector later became
nuncio to Malta and held various curial positions. In 1971, Robert traveled
with him aboard the ship Raffaello, in first class, concelebrating Masses and
sitting at the same table for meals.] Robert’s first Mass in Rome was a
solemn high Mass at the Church of Sant’Agnese fuori le Mura (the titular
church of Cardinal Stritch), with his fellow Chicagoan Paul Marcinkus as
deacon; his classmate and Swiss friend Hans Küng as subdeacon; one of

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the servers was Edward Egan, then a seminarian and later cardinal archbishop of New York; and the archpriest was Msgr. Ernest J. Primeau, the
rector of the Collegio Santa Maria del Lago (the residence on the via
Sardegna 44, for post-graduate priests from the Chicago archdiocese
studying in Rome, founded in 1934 by Cardinal George William
Mundelein because the accommodations in Rome for priests of his diocese
were inadequate. The three-floor house had an apartment for the cardinal
while he was in Rome that was otherwise occupied by Msgr. Andrew
Landi. The building was later sold by Cardinal John Patrick Cody and
today it houses a bank). Robert’s father and step-mother, Helen Bilstein (a
cousin of his mother), were in attendance. In July of 1955, Robert finished
his studies at the Gregorian University, receiving the STL degree. He was
awarded a bene merenti medal in recognition of his outstanding academic
record at the Gregorian that was later mailed to him. After final examinations, he made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, Lebanon, Egypt, and
Greece with classmates and others organized by the Franciscan Commissariat for the Holy Land. On Robert’s return to Chicago in August of
1955, he celebrated his first Mass in the diocese. Cardinal Stritch told him
to stay with his parents to rest and catch up on family matters.
Cardinal Stritch decided that Robert should go back to Rome for doctoral studies. He left it up to Robert to choose the field. Because the diocese already had an abundance of theologians and canonists, Robert
thought he could be of best service if he trained as a church historian.
Msgr. Harry C. Koenig, who had an STD from Mundelein but had studied Christian archeology in Rome, taught church history and served as
librarian at Mundelein, and he would need a successor. Robert proposed to
the cardinal that he study church history and his proposal was approved.
Robert sailed back to Italy aboard the Andrea Doria to Naples and took up
residence at the Collegio Santa Maria del Lago. There he met guests who
came to meals, including Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, who was a friend of
Primeau. Msgr. Andrea P. Landi of Brooklyn, who also resided there and
was head of Catholic Relief Services in the Mediterranean Basin, likewise
brought numerous guests to dinner at the “Chicago House.” At the Gregorian University Robert followed the prescribed courses in church history,
receiving his Hist. Eccl. L. in 1957 and his Hist. Eccl. D. in 1962. He
never had the opportunity to take a course in American church history,
because it was not offered. He chose as his dissertation director the only
faculty member who had some expertise in American church history, the
German Jesuit Ludwig Hertling, who published in 1954 by the MorusVerlag in Berlin the 333-page Geschichte der katholischen Kirche in den
Vereinigten Staaten. Robert had difficulty deciding on what topic to write.

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Koenig advised Robert to join the American Catholic Historical Association, which he did, and Robert then wrote to its secretary, Msgr. John
Tracy Ellis, for advice. He mentioned to him that he would be spending
the two summer months at the Church of Our Lady of the Assumption
and St. Gregory on Warwick Street in downtown London. Archbishop
Martin O’Connor had suggested to Robert that he needed some pastoral
experience, and through the good office of the American Apostolic Delegate in Great Britain, Archbishop Gerald P. O’Hara, he found him this
position. On his way to England, Robert spent four days at Bayreuth,
where he attended a performance of Richard Wagner’s Ring cycle. When
he arrived in London, he found that the church on Warwick Street had few
resident parishioners, for it was in a commercial area and serviced mostly
those who came there for Mass and confessions on weekdays. When Ellis
came to London that summer, he invited Robert to dinner at his hotel,
where he suggested that Robert study the issue of the juridical status of the
Jesuits who provided pastoral care to the American colonists before the
establishment of a diocese. Robert checked the archives of the Westminster Archdiocese where he found little material on the American colonies
that had not already been utilized by scholars. Ellis was so impressed by
Robert that, with authorization from university officials and the Department of History, he went personally to Cardinal Stritch to request that he
release him to join the History Department at the Catholic University of
America. A faculty member there, Father Henry [Harry] J. Brown, a priest
of the archdiocese of New York, suggested to Robert that he work in the
archives of the Propaganda Fide in Rome. Because of the one-hundred
year rule, they were open only up to the 1850s. Robert decided to study
how the papacy dealt with the nascent church in the old Northwest: Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Missouri in the second
quarter of the nineteenth century. Robert sent a draft of his dissertation to
Ellis to read and suggest any revisions. In June of 1959, Robert defended
his dissertation orally. In a revised form it was published in 1962 as volume
125 in the series Analecta Gregoriana by the Gregorian University Press in
Rome as The Holy See and the Nascent Church in the Middle Western United
States, 1826–1850, pp. xii, 408. While working on the dissertation Robert
spent part of his summers outside Rome: in 1957 taking the cours d’été at
the Institut Catholique de Paris as a boursier du Gouvernement Français
and visiting the village of Ste. Jean d’Arc, and in 1958 at the LudwigMaximilians-Universität München, studying German literature while
living with a German family and taking his meals at the nearby parish rectory. While in Paris in 1957 he learned that Cardinal Stritch was flying
there, and so he went to the airport to welcome him on the tarmac. A representative of the nuncio to France was also there and he invited the car-

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451

dinal and Robert to dinner at the nunciature. Stritch later invited Robert
to his hotel, where they discussed the position at Catholic University. The
cardinal asked Robert if he wanted to accept the post. Robert had visited
the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in 1948, but had not
taken notice of the adjacent university. Robert told the cardinal that he
would follow his advice. Stritch replied, “I think you should go.” When the
cardinal left Paris by train, Robert accompanied him to the station. On
parting, the cardinal leaned out the window to tell him, “Don’t worry about
arrangements at the university, Sonny. I’ll take care of them for you.”
In May of 1958 while Robert was still in Rome, he became part of the
team that cared for Cardinal Stritch, who had been appointed Pro-Prefect
of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, and while on board
the ship to Italy had experienced an occlusion in his right arm. Robert and
Primeau met the ship in Naples and brought the cardinal to a hospital in
Rome, where the doctors amputated the cardinal’s arm. Robert would visit
him regularly in the clinic, reading to him. Eventually Stritch was brought
to the Chicago House, where he tried to learn to eat with his left hand. But
he experienced a heart attack and was returned to the clinic. In the middle
of the night, Robert was told that the cardinal was near death. He rushed
to his bedside to be with him at the end. The funeral was in the Church of
Sant’Ignazio, which Robert attended. Because Stritch had given permission to Robert to teach in Washington, it was not clear if the new archbishop of Chicago would agree to this arrangement. Trisco wrote to Cardinal Albert Meyer explaining the situation and asked him if he still
wanted Robert to go to Catholic University. Meyer checked the previous
correspondence of Stritch and told Robert to go. Before departing Rome,
he was given an audience (baciamano or “kissing the hand”) with Pope John
XXIII through the good offices of Msgr. Primeau. Robert seized the
opportunity to say that it would be good if the archives for the pontificate
of Pius IX were opened to scholars. To which Pope John responded:
“Anch’io sono di questo parere.”
In September of 1959 Robert took up his position at the Catholic University of America. His room was on the north side of the fourth floor of
Caldwell Hall, facing west, with his meals in Curley Hall, where he was
assigned a place at the table of Msgr. Aloysius Ziegler, a priest from Milwaukee who was head of the History Department. Over the years he also had
among his assigned table-mates Father Meletius Wojnar, a Ukrainian, who
on occasion would experience epileptic seizures during meals and go silent,
but then return to normal. Another assigned dining companion was Father
Bernie Deutsch, who would tease Robert because he was an alumnus of the

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North American College. This stopped when Father Deutsch suddenly left
to marry. Robert would celebrate morning Mass in the National Shrine of
the Immaculate Conception, and he was on hand when in November of
1959 the upper church was dedicated. The History Department was housed
in offices in the southwest corner of the third floor of Mullen Library,
together with the office of the American Catholic Historical Association
(ACHA) and the Catholic Historical Review, for which Robert was
appointed in 1960 as an associate editor with responsibility for the book
review and periodical literature sections, having already been appointed assistant secretary of the ACHA at its December 1959 meeting, effective in
1960, becoming the executive secretary (1961–2006, 2007–09) and its treasurer (1983–2006, 2007–09). Robert was appointed part-time archivist
(1959–62) and taught the seminarians American church history (to fill in for
Ellis, who was on sabbatical). Ziegler also assigned Robert to teach medieval
English church history since Brian Tierney had just left the University. In
addition to getting up these new courses and working in the archives and for
the ACHA and CHR, Robert was appointed to the board of the New
Catholic Encyclopedia, planning the articles on American church history and
being assigned to write the entry on the Second Vatican Council.
When the American bishops planned their participation in the Council, they followed the suggestion of Bishop Primeau of Manchester, NH,
and the General Secretary of the NCWC, Msgr. Paul Tanner, that they be
assisted by a peritus who was a church historian, namely, Robert Trisco.
The National Catholic Welfare Council therefore appointed Robert to
work for all the US bishops. Robert sailed to Europe aboard the Queen
Mary, landing in France. He traveled by train to Leuven, where he visited
Canon Roger Aubert, who invited Robert to lunch and advised him to
keep a diary while serving at the Council—something Robert did assiduously. When Robert arrived in Italy, he offered to teach a two-week minicourse on American church history to the seminarians of the North American College at their summer retreat, the Villa Santa Caterina in Castel
Gandolfo. The rector, Bishop Martin O’Connor, was happy to take up his
offer. The University declined to pay Robert’s expenses at the Council, and
the NCWC therefore paid them. Also serving as periti from CUA were:
Fr. Frederick McManus, canonist and expert on the liturgy, Father
Meletius Wojnar of the Order of St. Basil the Great and an expert on Oriental canon law, and Msgr. Joseph C. Fenton of Springfield MA, a dogmatic theologian. Robert was assigned to the staff of the NCWC whose
head was Msgr. Paul Marcinkus of Chicago (who also served in the Segreteria di Stato as a secretary of the Nunciature of the first class) and whose
administrator was Msgr. Joseph Emmenegger of Milwaukee, former rector

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of the Casa Santa Maria. Robert lived at the Casa Santa Maria while serving as peritus. He was assigned to the Press Panel. He attended all the general congregations, which usually lasted from 9:00 am to noon at which he,
sitting in a loggia, took notes summarizing the speeches. His years of
studying at the Gregorian University, where classes were taught in Latin,
prepared him for this task. Initially a rule of strict secrecy was imposed
whereby he could report only what was said but not who said it. Paul VI
later lifted this rule. Fr. William Keeler of the Harrisburg Diocese also
served as a general peritus, not being assigned to any particular congregation. Beginning in 1963 their notes were then compiled into a digest that
was mimeographed and widely distributed among readers of English. The
Press Panel was open every day that the Council met. Given Robert’s
extensive knowledge of what was transpiring at the Council, he was interviewed for R.A.I. (Italian television) by Giuseppe Alberigo and Paolo
Prodi. Robert also served the American delegation by translating the
speeches of bishops into Latin, typing them up, and helping the bishops
on their delivery. He kept a diary of his experiences at the Council, which
became the basis for his article in the Jurist.
Initially the council was envisioned as continuing into the spring of
1963, but it was prorogued to the autumn, and so Robert returned to
CUA, where he was appointed editor of the CHR. Msgr. Ellis had
resigned the position. He found himself at odds with the university’s
rector, Bishop William Joseph McDonald, whom Ellis felt did not esteem
scholarship, taking offense at the way he introduced Ellis to a visiting
bishop as “Oh, he writes books.” Ellis went to the University of San Francisco, where he had friends and where the Jesuits provided him with an
apartment. Because Robert had returned to CUA too late to have classes
assigned to him, he spent his time working at the CHR with paternal
assistance from Dr. Martin Maguire. Robert continued the policies Ellis
had set at the journal. The one innovation he made was in the design of the
journal’s cover, replacing the mono-green cover with one that was white
with a different illustration for each issue. In the spring of 1963, his good
friend Fr. Hans Küng was touring the States, giving lectures on the Council, and Robert secured for him an invitation to lecture at CUA. During
the Holy Week/Easter vacation, they went together to Mexico City and
Acapulco where Hans suffered a serious sunburn.
In the fall semesters of 1963–65, Robert was back at the Council as
peritus. In 1963 he sailed to Genoa and took the train to Trent, where he
attended the conference commemorating the 400th anniversary of the close
of the Council of Trent, and met on that occasion the famed historian of

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the Council, Msgr. Hubert Jedin. In 1965 on his way to Rome, he stopped
in Vienna to attend the International Congress of Historical Sciences—
thereafter he made it a point to attend the Congress every five years wherever it was held. In Vienna he met his former colleague Msgr. Ellis and
another former CUA faculty member and now professor at the University
of Vienna, Dr. Friedrich Engel-Janosi, who took them to a local Heuriger.
Back at the Council, Robert found exciting the exposure to different ideas
and the animated discussions. He personally was confident that the
reforms enacted by the Council would bring about desirable changes, especially in the area of the liturgy. At the end of the Council, Robert together
with the other periti was granted an audience with Paul VI, who gave to
each as a memento of their service at the Council a copy of the New Testament in Greek. Msgr. Fenton was, however, disillusioned by the Council
that did not adopt his type of theology. He resigned his post at CUA and
returned to his diocese where he became a pastor.
Back at CUA, Robert was a member of the History Department. He
was an instructor (1959–63), assistant professor (1963–65), associate professor (1965–75), and ordinary professor (1975–96). He taught the
Catholic and Counter-Reformations, English History from the Elizabethan Settlement to the Nineteenth Century, Modern Papal History
from the French Revolution to the First Vatican Council, a three-semester
survey of American Catholic church history, plus seminars. Among his
close friends on the History Department faculty were Monsignors Ziegler
and Joseph Moody, Father Antonine Tibesar, OFM, and Dr. John Zeender. Robert directed over two dozen dissertations (more than his predecessor Msgr. Ellis), mostly on American and English topics, and even one in
the Spanish language. If need be, he would suggest a topic for a dissertation and was careful to return corrected chapters promptly. Two of his doctoral students, Frs. Joseph C. Linck and Raymond J. Kupke, edited a
Festschrift in his honor, entitled: Building the Church in America (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1999), presenting it to
him after a Mass in the Basilica at a banquet hosted in the Archiepiscopal
residence in Baltimore by Cardinal William Keeler on the occasion of
Robert’s seventieth birthday. His former student the then-Archbishop of
Milwaukee, Timothy Dolan, obtained for him the honor of protonotary
apostolic. The diploma announcing this was presented to him in a ceremony during the 2005 meeting of the ACHA in Philadelphia by Archbishop Dolan, with Cardinals Justin Rigali and William Keeler joining in.
In the summer of 1966, after the close of the Second Vatican Council,
Robert was invited by Msgr. Theodore McCarrick, the rector of the Pon-

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tifical Catholic University of Puerto Rico in Ponce, to give to a university
audience a series of lectures on the Council. Robert knew Msgr. McCarrick
from the time he came to CUA in 1959 and met McCarrick, then a doctoral student in sociology, living in Curley Hall, and holding the office of
Dean of Students. As an administrator McCarrick would sit in a prescribed
seat at the administrators’ table on a dais in the dining room of Curley Hall.
Robert gave lectures not only at the university in Ponce, but also at the
branch university in Mayagüez, and at the sisters’ College of the Sacred
Heart in San Juan. While on the island, he also engaged in ecumenical dialogue with representatives of the Protestant churches there. Years later, in
October of 2008, he was visiting lecturer at Peking University.
Soon after the Second Vatican Council, the rector of CUA, Bishop
William Joseph McDonald, proposed establishing an institute for ecumenical studies at the university and asked Robert to head it. Robert
declined on the grounds that he lacked expertise on the topic. McDonald
dropped the idea. He next decided to rearrange the top administration of
the university because Msgr. Joseph B. McAllister of Washington, the
vice-rector, needed to take a leave for health reasons. McDonald proposed
making him now Executive Vice-Rector, Robert Academic Vice-Rector,
and Msgr. James Magner of Chicago as Vice-Rector for Business and
Finance. The post of Academic Vice-Rector lacked a description of its
duties. With the help of Dr. Martin Maguire, Robert drew one up and sent
it to McDonald for his approval which was never formally given. Robert
presided over the consultative elections of unit heads. When the Board of
Trustees decided not to renew the contract of Fr. Charles Curran, Robert
was never consulted, but the rector called in McAllister and Magner as
witnesses when he told Curran that his contract would not be renewed.
This decision set off a faculty and student strike. The Board of Trustees was
unhappy with the bad publicity and pressured the Chancellor, Cardinal
Patrick O’Boyle, to back down and have McDonald grant Curran tenure.
When McDonald’s second term as rector expired in the summer of 1967,
he returned to the Archdiocese of San Francisco as an auxiliary bishop. He
had alienated many of the faculty. Fr. John Whelan of the School of Sacred
Theology was appointed as acting rector. Trisco asked his permission to
take a course offered by the University of St. Louis for a week in the fall
semester of 1967 for university administrators, which he gave, and Robert
went to St. Louis. On his return Robert attended the 1968 spring meeting
of the CUA Board of Trustees in St. Louis at which Whelan proposed,
without consulting Trisco, that his position as Academic Vice-Rector be
abolished. It was. Trisco was thus the first and only Academic Vice-Rector
in the history of the university. Finding Whelan too devious, Cardinal

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Patrick O’Boyle of Washington, the chancellor of the university, saw to it
that he was not given a second year as rector. Robert returned to full-time
teaching. Brother Nivard Scheel, C.F.X., became acting rector. He had
Trisco represent him as an observer in the hearings at which faculty members who signed the letter opposing Humanae Vitae in 1968 were asked to
explain their position. Trisco said nothing at these meetings, except to
point out to a philosophy teacher, the Rev. Dr. Russell Ruffino, that the
decision not to renew his contract was made before he signed the letter.
In the early 1970s the University set up a committee headed by Dr.
John Zeender that recommended collecting the units that taught ecclesiastical subjects, such as the former School of Sacred Theology, the School of
Canon Law, and the Department of Religion and Religious Education in
the School of Arts and Sciences, and merge them into a new School of
Religious Studies. Together with Cardinal William Baum (the archbishop
and chancellor) and Fr. Carl Peter, Robert was a member of the search
committee for the new dean. It chose the church historian Colman Barry,
O.S.B., of Saint John’s Abbey and University. The new Department of
Church History was initially administered by Drs. Catherine Cline, Berard
Marthaler, O.F.M., Carl Peter, and Robert until its faculty was large
enough to have its own chair. Robert was the first member of the department, joining it in 1976. In January 1977 Dr. Nelson H. Minnich was
added, and soon after Fr. Robert Eno, S.S., was given a joint appointment,
at which time Robert became the department’s first chair (1976–78). He
was appointed the Kelly-Quinn Professor of Ecclesiastical History in
1999–2000.
Robert served the US Bishops’ Conference in various ways. He was
appointed a consultant to the planning committee for the Bicentennial in
1976. He recruited scholars to write essays that were published on a weekly
basis in Catholic newspapers and magazines. Later he collected them for a
volume titled Catholics in America, 1776–1976 (Washington, DC: National
Conference of Catholic Bishops, 1976). A Ukrainian bishop complained
to Robert that the volume failed to contain an essay on his rite and wanted
him to re-issue the volume with the missing essay. But funding was not
available for such a project. Robert was also appointed to the planning
committee for the Quincentenary of the Discovery or Evangelization of
America. It met in several places including Mexico City during a bitterly
cold time in January where the lodgings were not heated. One proposal was
to update Joseph B. Code’s Dictionary of the American Hierarchy (1964), but
the Archbishop of Baltimore, William Borders, vetoed the proposal.
Instead, the committee commissioned Dr. Christopher Kauffman to com-

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pile a two-volume history of the Church in America. Robert served on the
Bishops’ Committee for Priestly Life and Ministry (1968–71) and produced a lengthy article on “Bishops and Their Priests,” which was published first in a volume edited by Msgr. Ellis and later as a separate book.
Robert was also the press secretary for the bishops’ semi-annual meetings
(1969–72). Robert served too on various ecumenical dialogues. He was a
member of the consultation with the American Baptist Convention (1966–
72) that produced a pamphlet comparing the Baptists’ believers’ baptism
with the Catholic sacrament of Confirmation. When Robert served on the
Consultation with the Presbyterian and Reformed Churches (1972–75), he
felt at times that some of his Catholic colleagues on it espoused positions
more Protestant than they themselves held. He found very pleasant the
conversations he had on the Consultation with the Episcopalians (2002–
07), but they produced no results. He also served on the section of the
Pontifical Council for Promoting the Unity of Christians that dealt with
the Orthodox Churches. At its meeting in Emmittsburg, MD, he found
that the Orthodox were often in disagreement among themselves so that
no agreements with the Catholics could be reached. In addition, the representative of the patriarch of Moscow, Hilarion Alfayev, openly attacked
Cardinal George Leo Cassidy over the Catholic Church’s effort to have
restored to it the property confiscated by Soviet regimes. The Archdiocese
of the Military Services appointed him to the historical commission for the
cause of beatification of Father Vincent Capodanno, and the Diocese of
Raleigh for that of Father Thomas Frederick Price.
Robert’s skills as an administrator were highly prized. He was
appointed to numerous university committees over the years, e.g., selfstudies, Faculty Handbook, budget, appointments and promotions, library
and archives, editorial board of the press, etc. For almost a half-century he
managed the affairs of the American Catholic Historical Association and
served as editor of the Catholic Historical Review. Back in his archdiocese
of Chicago he was elected a member of the Presbyteral Senate (1975–76).
He was approached by Cardinal John Cody to see if he would be willing to
serve as vice-rector of Mundelein Seminary, but he declined, feeling he
could serve the Church better as a church historian.
Robert was for many years a member of the Pontifical Committee of
Historical Sciences. He first came in contact with it during the International Congress of Historical Sciences when it met in Bucharest in 1980.
There he met its president, Msgr. Michele Maccarrone, who invited Robert
to join the members in a visit to the patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox
Church. During the visit, the patriarch, a tool of the Communist govern-

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ment, was asked about providing churches in the new suburbs of cities. He
claimed there was no need for them, because many churches existed in the
inner city that the faithful could attend. But that was difficult because the
government reduced public transportation on Sundays. After the Bucharest
meeting in 1982, Robert was invited to join the Pontifical Committee on
which he faithfully served until his mandatory retirement in 2009 at 80.
Robert was a regular attendee at national and international conferences on church history. He attended all annual and most of the spring
meetings of the American Catholic Historical Association, where he gave
his reports as secretary and eventually also as its treasurer, until his retirement. He paid his own travel and lodging expenses and thus helped the
ACHA to build up its endowment. In recognition of his extraordinary
contributions to the Association, he was awarded the Centennial Award at
the ACHA’s annual meeting in Chicago in 2019. As mentioned earlier, he
also regularly attended the every quinquennial meeting of the International
Congress of Historical Sciences, where he joined the International Commission for Comparative Ecclesiastical History, becoming the liaison for
the United States, president of the American sub-commission, and
member (assessor) of the Commission’s Bureau (1980–2010).
Many of Robert’s scholarly publications were the result of requests for
them by editors or learned societies. The Pontifical Committee of Historical Sciences, the Canon Law Society of America, the Catholic Theological
Association, the Roosevelt Library in Hyde Park, NY, the editors of the
Jurist and Concilium and major reference works (American National Biography, Dictionnaire d’Histoire et de Géographie Ecclésiastiques, Dictionary of
American History, Encyclopedia Americana, Encyclopedia Britannica, Encyclopedia of the Reformation, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, New Catholic
Encyclopedia, etc.), in addition to leading scholars such as Hubert Jedin and
Giuseppe Alberigo, all requested from him contributions to their publications. He was considered an expert on such topics as bishops: procedures
for choosing them, synods and annual meetings, relations with their
canons and clergy and laity; priestly life and ministry; and particular
prelates. For the Folger conference on Carlo Borromeo, he prepared a
paper tracing the cardinal’s relationship to the Council of Trent. On the
request of Cardinals Pio Laghi and Achille Silvestrini, he examined the
private papers of Cardinal Amleto Giovanni Cicognani preserved in the
diocesan archive at the seminary of Faenza. Cardinal Laghi got Robert
permission to use this material. While Robert was working in Faenza, Cardinal Laghi came to the city and addressed a congregation in the cathedral
celebrating the feast of the Madonna delle Grazie. He told his listeners

ROBERT FREDERICK TRISCO

459

that there was a scholar in the audience, Robert Trisco, who would tell
Americans how devoted to Mary the people of Faenza were. Later
Alberigo asked Robert to present a paper at a Bergamo conference on the
relationship between Cardinal Cicognani and Pope John XXIII. Diplomatic relations between the Vatican and America were the study of two of
his articles: a history of the construction during the Depression of the
expensive building housing the Apostolic Delegation (later nunciature) in
Washington (1994) and the relationship between the State Department
and the Apostolic Delegation during World War II (2003).
One of Robert’s more popular publications was his A Guide to American Catholic History (1982), co-edited with Msgr. John Tracy Ellis. Msgr.
Peter Guilday had a long-standing desire to see such a publication. His last
doctoral student, Father John Paul Cadden, O.S. B., had written a dissertation on American Catholic historiography that included a substantial
bibliography. On Guilday’s urgings Father Cadden planned to enlarge and
publish it, but was taken away from academic pursuits when he became a
military chaplain during World War II. Msgr. Ellis then took up the task,
publishing in 1947 his A Select Bibliography of the History of the Catholic
Church in the United States. It was revised as A Guide to American Catholic
History (1959). Two decades later Ellis asked Robert to help produce a
newly revised, updated, and enlarged, second edition. Robert combed various bibliographies for materials missing in the earlier editions and for
works that had been published since them. The new edition was jointly
published in 1982 by the American Bibliographical Center of Santa Barbara, California, and by Clio Press of Oxford, England.
Two of the topics Robert investigated on his own initiative both related
to his home diocese of Chicago. For the Ellis Festschrift, of which he was a
co-editor, he studied the origins of the Independent Polish National
Church in the parish of St. Hedwig on Chicago’s Northside (1985). To
deepen an understanding of the factors that led to this schismatic church,
Robert went to Rome and sought access to the relevant documents in the
archives of the Propaganda Fide. Because these were closed for the pontificate of Leo XIII, Robert initially sought a special access permission from
the secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of the Peoples,
Archbishop Sergio Pignedoli, who politely insisted on following the rule.
Robert mentioned his difficulty to his friend Archbishop Paul Marcinkus
who obtained from the pope’s secretary, Msgr. Ettore Macchi, a letter
requesting that the secretary make an exception for Robert. When Robert
returned to the archives, its archivist, Fr. Josef Metzler, told him that the
secretary would like to see him. In a cold and almost sarcastic tone of voice,

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A LIFE IN THE SERVICE OF CHURCH HISTORY

Archbishop Pignedoli informed Robert that he now had permission to look
at the pertinent documents in the archives. The other Chicago-based article
had to do with Cardinal Mundelein, who in a speech on May 18, 1937,
condemned Adolf Hitler’s religious persecutions and referred to him as “an
Austrian paperhanger,” a comment that drew protests from the German
government with authorities in Washington and the Vatican. He found in
the Vatican archives of the Sacred Congregation for Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs and the Secretariat of State many documents that revealed the
Holy See’s handling of the delicate affair. He presented his findings at a
conference held at Brown University in October of 2010 and his paper was
published in Pius XI and America, edited by Charles P. Gallagher, David I.
Kertzer, and Alberto Melloni (Vienna and Berlin: LIT Verlag, 2012). For
a collection of essays on reform and authority in the late medieval and Renaissance church, he returned to a topic on which he had written his licentiate’s thesis back in 1957. With fresh research he studied the proposals of
Emperor Ferdinand I to the Council of Trent for a reform of the Roman
Curia. Almost 200 printed pages in length, it was more a monograph than
a chapter in a book (1981).
Robert’s two principal forms of entertainment were opera and travel.
He attended operatic performances in such places as Rome, Paris,
Bayreuth, Munich, Bucharest, New York, and Washington, and festivals
at Castleton (Virginia), Charleston (Spoleto), Glimmerglass, and Glyndebourne. Among his favorite composers were bel canto Vincenzo Bellini, D.
Gaetano M. Donizetti, and Giocchino A. Rossini and the Romantics
Giuseppe Verdi, Richard Wagner, and Giacomo Puccini. He also loved
international travel. For many years he would travel with Msgr. Harry
Koenig, but when his friend’s health failed Robert would join groups
organized by travel agencies. He usually took a major trip or cruise every
year, visiting all the continents (except Antarctica) and including such
places as North Africa, the Middle East, India (four times), Southeast
Asia, the Far East, Russia, Latin America—for he had already visited the
major and many minor sites in Europe. He was able to do this into his
senior years because he kept himself physically fit by regular exercise such
as weight-lifting and aerobic exercise under the guidance of a trainer. For
over forty years, early in the morning, no matter what the weather, he
would walk from his residence in Curley Hall on campus to the National
Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, where he celebrated in the crypt
church the 7:00 am Mass.
Among the many honors he received over the years were an honorary
H.L.D. from Belmont Abbey College (1992), an honorary membership in

ROBERT FREDERICK TRISCO

461

the Accademia di San Carlo (Milan) (1986– ), a second bene merenti medal
(for twenty-five years of service at the Catholic University of America),
being named on the recommendation of Cardinal James Hickey, Archbishop of Washington and Chancellor of the University, an honorary
prelate of His Holiness (1992), and on the recommendation of Archbishop
Dolan of Milwaukee Protonotary Apostolic Supranumerary (2005) by
Pope John Paul II. He has been a Knight of the Equestrian Order of the
Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem since 1993 and a Knight Commander since
1998. He received the Founders’ Award of the Alumni Association of the
Pontifical North American College (2017), and the Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award (2018) in Who’s Who in the World.
In his final years, Robert had problems with the veins in his legs. He
had some ablated, but then incurred wounds that would not heal. He
underwent repeated treatments for the wounds and had twice a week
rebandagings. He was forced to wear a boot that his doctor claimed
impaired his ability to drive and his driver’s license was suspended. He
insisted on getting around and would use a walker and even purchased an
electric scooter to get him from his residence in Curley Hall to the CHR
office in Mullen Library where he regularly carried out his duties to the
very end. He left on his desk in the CHR office his unfinished pastings of
entries for the Periodical Literature section of the Summer issue and died
suddenly in residence in Curley Hall on the evening of July 29.
His wake was held on Sunday, August 6 in the Vincent P. Walter
Room of Curley Hall, under the apartment in which he had lived since
1962. He was laid out in in a simple pine coffin he had purchased from the
Trappists, wearing his priestly robes with a chasuble decorated with the
Cross of Jerusalem, the insignia of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre. Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York and former doctoral student of Msgr. Trisco, celebrated the funeral Mass and gave the homily on
Monday, August 7 in the Crypt Church of the Basilica of the National
Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, where Robert celebrated the morning Mass for many decades. He was buried in St. Joseph’s Cemetery in
River Grove outside Chicago on Belmont Avenue in a grave plot next to
his parents, whose graves he had faithfully visited over the years.
As part of his legacy, Msgr. Trisco donated to the Catholic University of America $650,000 in support of the John K. Mullen of Denver
Memorial Library and the study of Church History at Catholic University. The majority of this bequest will establish The Msgr. Robert Frederick Trisco Church History Library Endowment. Msgr. Trisco’s gift will

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A LIFE IN THE SERVICE OF CHURCH HISTORY

allow the University to continue to add to its impressive collection and
ensure that future historians have the materials they need to continue his
life’s work. The remainder of his bequest will be used to process archival
materials he bequeathed to Mullen Library, including his personal papers
and correspondence, as well as papers from the American Catholic Historical Association and The Catholic Historical Review. He also joined with
his colleague, Nelson H. Minnich, in establishing the Robert F. Trisco
and Nelson H. Minnich Prize for Editing Works in Catholic Church
History to be given on an annual basis by the American Catholic Historical Association.
May this good and faithful servant be welcomed into the heavenly paradise where he may see face to face his smiling Lord and and be lovingly
embraced by all those he has served so well over his ninety-three years.

Bocche Inutili: Abandoned Children, Warfare,
and Civic Religion in Siena
SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO*
This article examines the hospital of Santa Maria della Scala in Siena,
Italy during a siege in 1554–1555 to explore two related threads
within the historiography of charity: the treatment and perception of
abandoned children, and the intersection of hospitals and civic religion
in a time of crisis. Dedicated to the Virgin Mary, people viewed the
hospital and its children as a reflection of Siena’s piety and devotion to
its patron saint. During the siege, the designation of the hospital’s children as bocche inutili and the resulting perceptions of the city’s failure
in its performance of charity towards abandoned children enabled the
hospital’s rector to use rhetoric around foundlings and charity to protest
policy and negotiate resolutions. This incident allows us to see how,
during times of crisis, abandoned children, through their physical presence in processions and as objects of rhetoric, could hold an important
place in civic religious devotions and discourse.
Keywords: charity, civic religion, foundlings, children, Siena
Introduction
In early September of 1554, the Italian city of Siena found itself under
a second month of siege and rapidly losing ground against the encroaching
Spanish and Florentine forces.1 With promised military reinforcements at
least three months away and an insufficient food supply, the city’s hope of
enduring a long siege dwindled. Siena’s governing council, the Balìa, consulted with Piero Strozzi and Blaise de Monluc, the two foreigners heading
Siena’s defense, and together agreed that the city’s population needed to

* Sarah Loose Guerrero is an assistant professor of history at Brigham Young University
in Provo, Utah. Her email address is: sarah_loose@byu.edu.
1. For an overview of the War of Siena, see Fausto Landini, Gli ultimi anni della Repubblica di Siena, 1525–1555 (Siena, 1994); Roberto Cantagalli, La Guerra di Siena (1552–1559)
(Siena, 1962); Arnaldo D’Addario, Il problema senese nella storia Italiana della prima metà del
Cinquecento (La Guerra di Siena) (Firenze, 1958).

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464 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

decrease.2 Accordingly, the government established a committee of four
men to conduct a census of Siena’s inhabitants. Its purpose: to identify individuals capable of participating in the war effort and distinguish them from
those unable to contribute.3 The committee designated those who fell into
the latter category as bocche inutili, or useless mouths.4 This phrase, used in
times of war, signified individuals who, through illness, injury, or age, were
considered little more than mouths to feed. In this case, the census committee applied the term to a number of elderly, sick, lame, and poor citizens of
Siena.5 The committee also designated a specific group of children as bocche
inutili: the “innocent little children of the Scala hospital.”6
Through examining the inclusion of these children as part of the city’s
useless mouths during the siege of Siena, this article explores the treatment
and perception of abbandonati, or abandoned children, and the intersection
of hospitals and civic religion during a time of crisis. Foundlings have been
a natural focus for studies of charity across the late medieval and early
modern periods, and although it is often difficult to access the lived experiences of these children, the sources available do allow us to examine how
institutions (and the broader public) viewed and treated abandoned boys
and girls.7 Furthermore, scholars have shown how the work of charitable

2. Blaise de Monluc, Commentaires de Blaise de Monluc, Mareschal de France, Edition
Critique, ed. and annotator Paul Courteault, 3 vols. (Paris, 1911–25, here 1913), II: 1551–
1563, 41, 55.
3. A record of the survey can be found in the Archivio di Stato di Siena (hereafter
ASSi); those designated as useful mouths included individuals with professions like stone
mason or carpenter, or those who had private stores of money and grain. See ASSi, Balìa,
no. 955.
4. The phrase is used in numerous documents from the time, including letters and
deliberation records, as well as the writing of chroniclers like Orlando Malavolti and Alessandro Sozzini; see Malavolti, Dell’historia di Siena scritta da Orlando di m. Bernardo Malavolti
gentilhuomo sanese, La Terza Parte (Siena, 1599) and Alessandro di Girolamo Sozzini, Diario
della cose avvenute in Siena dal 20 luglio 1550 al 28 giugno 1555, ed. Giovanni Pietro Vieusseux
(Firenze, 1842).
5. The “uselessness” of these individuals stood in contrast to those referred to as “noncombatants.” Non-combatants were non-military who were able-bodied and capable of providing some valuable service or contribution to the war effort. For more on the status of noncombatants see: Christopher Allmand, “War and the Non-Combatant in the Middle Ages,”
in: Maurice Keen, ed., Medieval Warfare: A History (Oxford, 1999), 253–72.
6. This phrase comes from the chronicle of Orlando Malavolti, who made particular
mention that among the useless mouths there were many “innocenti figliuoli dello Spedale
della Scala”; see Malavolti, Dell’historia di Siena, 164. All translations from primary sources,
unless otherwise noted, are the author’s own.
7. See examples such as: John Boswell, The Kindness of Strangers: The Abandonment of
Children in Western Europe from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance (New York, 1988); Philip

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465

institutions and foundling hospitals often served as a measure of a city’s
piety and fulfillment of its spiritual obligations.8 In Siena, Santa Maria
della Scala’s dedication to the Virgin Mary meant that people viewed the
hospital’s works, including the care of abbandonati, as a reflection of Siena’s
dedication to its patron saint. By examining the case of Siena during the
siege of 1554 this study shows how connections between foundlings and
civic piety were employed to navigate communal strain and crisis. The designation of the hospital’s abandoned children as bocche inutili and attempts
to expel them from the city enabled Santa Maria della Scala’s rector to use
rhetoric around foundlings and charity to protest policy and negotiate resolutions with the government and military leaders. Dismay at the city’s
failure in its performance of charity towards the hospital’s children as
expressed in chronicles indicates that such rhetoric was not only used by
hospital leadership, but also employed more broadly. Understanding these
events in Siena demonstrates that even (or especially) during times of crisis,
abandoned children, through their physical presence in processions and as
objects of rhetoric, could hold an important place in civic religious devotions and discourse.
Santa Maria della Scala’s Foundlings and Siena’s Civic Religion
To properly analyze the events of the siege, it is helpful to first provide
context regarding the hospital, its children, and Siena’s civic religion. By
the sixteenth century, the care of foundlings held a significant place among
the charitable services performed by Santa Maria della Scala, as attested by
various sources.9 Visual evidence of this comes from several frescoes in the
hospital’s Pellegrinaio (central hall) which indicate that the connections
Gavitt, Charity and Children in Renaissance Florence (Ann Arbor, 1990); Anne E. C.
McCants, Civic Charity in a Golden Age: Orphanage Care in Early Modern Amsterdam (Urbana,
1997); Brian Pullan, “Orphans and Foundlings in Early Modern Europe,” in: Poverty and
Charity: Europe, Italy, Venice, 1400–1700 (Aldershot, 1994), 5–28. Nicholas Terpstra, Abandoned Children of the Italian Renaissance (Baltimore, 2005).
8. For examples of this specific to Italy, see the works cited in the previous note, as well
as David Herlihy, Medieval and Renaissance Pistoia: The Social History of an Italian Town (New
Haven, 1967), and David M. D’Andrea, Civic Christianity in Renaissance Italy: The Hospital of
Treviso, 1400–1500 (Rochester, NY, 2007). For a comparison between Italy and cities elsewhere in Europe, see Andrew Brown, “Civic Religion in Late Medieval Europe,” Journal of
Medieval History, 42, no. 3 (2016), 338–56.
9. Santa Maria della Scala was a multi-service institution, offering daily alms to the
poor, running infirmaries for men and women, providing housing for pilgrims, and taking in
abandoned children. A good overview of the hospital and its functions can be found in: Beatrice Sordini, Dentro l’antico Ospedale: Santa Maria della Scala, uomini, cose, e spazi di vita nella
Siena medieval (Siena, 2011).

466 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

FIGURE 1. Vecchietta, The Dream of the Mother of the Blessed Sorore, 1441, fresco,
located in Santa Maria della Scala. Image copyright and permissions by Alinari
Archives, Photo Credit George Tatge, Art Resource, NY.

between abbandonati, the performance of charity, and civic piety were wellrecognized by the fifteenth century. These frescos, commissioned by the
hospital administration, communicated to audiences past (and present) the
ways in which the institution envisioned itself and desired to be perceived.
One painting, part of a series on the east wall detailing the history of the
hospital, places abandoned children at the center of its founding (see
Figure 1). Records from the eleventh century indicate that Santa Maria
della Scala began as a pilgrim’s hostel and infirmary, not as a home for
orphaned children.10 However, by the time that Lorenzo di Pietro, known
as il Vecchietta, painted this cycle in the fifteenth century, the story of the
hospital’s foundation had altered. As depicted by Vecchietta, the story
began not with the Blessed Sorore, the legendary founder, caring for pilgrims and their broken shoes, but instead with a dream given to his
mother. In this dream, Sorore’s mother saw the charitable work her son
10. The earliest documentation for Santa Maria della Scala is a deed of gift that dates
to 1090 and refers to the hospital as a xenodochium et hospitalis de Canonica Sancte Marie; for
more on this and the early history of the hospital see Michele Pellegrini, La comunità
ospedaliera di Santa Maria della Scala e il suo più antico statuto (Siena, 2005), 27.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

467

FIGURE 2. Domenico di Bartolo, Education and Marriage of the Foundlings,
1441/1442, fresco, located in Santa Maria della Scala. Photograph permissions by
White Images, Scala, Art Resource, NY.

would someday perform, represented by a line of toddlers climbing a ladder
to the heavens. Vecchietta’s depiction of this dream included Sorore
steadying the ladder at the bottom while the children climbed safely into
the open arms of the Virgin Mary, who waited at the top.11 The choice to
tell the story of Santa Maria della Scala’s founding with an emphasis on the
care of abandoned children gave this charitable activity prominence and
underscored the important place this care occupied within the hospital’s
daily life by the fifteenth century.
Another fresco that emphasized the importance of the hospital’s
abbandonati is part of a series on the Pellegrinaio’s west wall (see Figure 2).
Placed between scenes of feeding the poor and caring for the sick is a fresco
by the artist Domenico di Bartolo, crafted to display the array of good
works Santa Maria della Scala provided for Siena’s foundlings. In the
11. For more on the legend of Sorore see Alessandro Orlandini, Gettatelli e pellegrini:
gli affreschi nella sala del Pellegrinaio dell’Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala di Siena: itinerario
didattico su una summa figurativa dell’assistenza ospedaliera fra Medioevo e Rinascimento (Siena,
1997), 45–46; also Henk W. Van Os, Vecchietta and the Sacristy of the Siena Hospital Church:
A Study in Renaissance Religious Symbolism (The Hague, 1974), 1–3.

468 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

center, the rector receives a swaddled newborn into the hospital’s care; in
one corner there are wet nurses caring for infants and toddlers while nearby
a schoolmaster instructs children studiously at work. A final scene shows
the rector giving one of the hospital’s daughters in marriage, complete with
a coin purse in his hand, representing the dowry given to the girl’s new
husband. As a whole, the fresco demonstrates how the hospital received,
nourished, educated, and financially supported its abandoned children. It
also indicates that raising foundlings was not viewed as a temporary
responsibility, but, rather, a long-term commitment. In her analysis of this
fresco, Diana Bullen Presciutti argues that di Bartolo’s imagery and
iconography drew on the medieval artistic vocabulary of the Acts of Mercy
and the life of the Virgin Mary. Presciutti states that by using these frameworks, the fresco “envisions the care of foundlings as a lifelong cycle of
tutelage,” and conveys “. . . an idealized image of foundling care.”12 The
imagery and practices displayed in the fresco “make the claim that this
charitable work has received divine sanction.”13
These frescos make it clear that the hospital’s foundlings and the care
it provided them formed a crucial part of its identity as a charitable institution. What, then, do we know about the hospital’s children at the time
of the war? Unfortunately, many specifics regarding the children are difficult to gather since the numbers received, names, and ages are found in
records rather intermittently until the late sixteenth century.14 However, it
is clear that Santa Maria della Scala took in and raised both male and
female abbandonati, and records suggest that most of the children residing
at the hospital ranged in age from two to twelve years old, with a fair
number of teenagers (mostly girls) present as well. As represented in the
frescos, infants were a significant group of foundlings. The hospital placed
12. Diana Bullen Presciutti, Visual Cultures of Foundling Care in Renaissance Italy (New
York, 2015), 52–53.
13. Presciutti, Visual Cultures of Foundling Care, 53. For her entire analysis of the fresco,
see pages 51–60. Presciutti also analyzes two more of the Pellegrinaio frescoes in her book,
both of which depict the payment of Santa Maria della Scala’s wet nurses. Dating to the late
1570s, these paintings were created several decades after the siege of Siena but indicate the
continued importance of foundling care to the hospital and its charitable mission. See Presciutti, Visual Cultures of Foundling Care, 190–202.
14. There are several excellent assessments of the hospital’s records and what we can
know about its abandoned children during the late Middle Ages; see especially Maura
Martellucci, “I bambini di nessuno: L’infanzia abbandonata al Santa Maria della Scala di
Siena (secoli XIII–XV),” Bullettino Senese di storia patria, 108 (2003), 9–221, and Pellegrini,
“More filiorum: The Problematic Integration of Young Foundlings into the Familia of a Late
Medieval Hospital,” in: Adoption and Fosterage Practices in the late Medieval and Modern Age,
eds. Maria Clara Rossi and Marina Garbellotti (Rome, 2015), 85–105.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

469

newborns with both urban and rural wet nurses with whom babies
remained until they were weaned, and sometimes even beyond.15 Infants
thus counted as part of the hospital’s total number of children, but many
were unlikely to reside at Santa Maria della Scala itself. An inventory from
1599 lists the names of approximately three hundred children residing at—
and, for a few of the older teenagers, working in—the hospital.16 In his
chronicle of the war, Alessandro Sozzini gave the number of children
belonging to Santa Maria della Scala in 1554 as 250, not including
infants.17 Considering these two sources alongside a letter written during
the war which claimed that the children and the women who cared for
them numbered around three hundred individuals, it is likely that the
number of Santa Maria della Scala’s foundlings during the 1550s was
somewhere between two and three hundred.18
The hospital and the individuals who supported it treated the care of
these two- to three-hundred children as an important part of Siena’s devotion to the Virgin Mary. Both the hospital’s dedication to Mary and its
proximity to the Cathedral promoted Santa Maria della Scala as a locus of
Siena’s civic religious devotions. The Sienese preacher San Bernardino
once described the piazza occupied by the hospital and cathedral as the face
of the city: “I remind you that [the Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala] is
one of the eyes of your city; the right is the Episcopate, while the left eye
is the hospital. Look how the piazza in between is sort of long, like a nose.
Hear me! Citizens, give charitably to the hospital!”19 The implication that
the hospital and the church were observant eyes reminded the people that
the Virgin, patron of the hospital and the Cathedral, watched their pious
devotions. The association of the hospital with the Virgin was further
enhanced by Santa Maria della Scala’s acquisition in 1359 of a large collection of relics that included the Virgin’s belt. The hospital constructed a new
15. For more on wet nursing and Santa Maria della Scala see Martellucci, “I bambini
di nessuno,” 93–103.
16. ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Visite 3086, fols. 4r–8r.
17. Alessandro di Girolamo Sozzini, Diario delle cose avvenute in Siena dal 20 luglio
1550 al 28 giugno 1555: con altre narrazioni e documenti relativi alla caduta di quella repubblica
(Firenze, 1842), 306.
18. ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fol. 52v.
19. As quoted in Roberto Parenti, “Santa Maria Della Scala: Lo Spedale in forma di
città,” in: Storia di Siena, I. Dalle origini alla fine della Repubblica, eds. Roberto Barzanti, Giuliano Catoni, and Mario De Gregorio (Siena, 1995), 239–52, here 239. Cynthia Polecritti has
detailed how this sermon was given in 1427 the day before another on peacemaking. She
states that “The implicit message of these two sermons is that charity unites citizens and protects them from external danger.” See Cynthia Polecritti, Preaching Peace in Renaissance Italy:
Bernardino of Siena and His Audience (Washington, D.C., 2000), 225.

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ARTICLETITLE

FIGURE 3. Jastrow, Façade of the former Hospital Santa Maria della Scala, now a
museum. Piazza Duomo, Siena, 2005, photograph. Photographer has released the
image into the public domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Facade_
Santa_Maria_della_Scala.jpg

chapel for the relics and commissioned local artist Bartolomeo Bulgarini to
paint a special altarpiece. The new chapel and altarpiece (depicting the
Assumption of the Virgin) promoted Santa Maria della Scala as an even
more appropriate setting for the city’s annual celebration of the feast of the
Annunciation, a responsibility given to the hospital in 1359.20 As part of
the festival, participants gathered in the piazza between Santa Maria della
Scala and the cathedral to view the relics, lifted and shown through a small
window in the hospital’s façade.21
Leading up to the siege of 1554, Sienese festivals and devotions to Mary
based in and around the hospital, its relics, chapel, and foundlings increased.
20. For more on the relics see Anne McClanan, “Bulgarini’s Assumption with Doubting
Thomas: Art, Trade, and Faith in Post-Plague Siena,” in: A Faithful Sea: The Religious Cultures
of the Mediterranean, 1200–1700, eds. Adnan A. Husain and Katherine E. Fleming (Oxford,
2007), 65–75.
21. The celebration of this Marian feast was second only to the feast of the Assumption,
the city’s primary and most important civic religious celebration; see Diana Norman, Siena
and the Virgin: Art and Politics in a Late Medieval City State (New Haven, 1999), 15.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

471

Beginning in the 1550s, the children of Santa Maria della Scala, and particularly the girls, actively participated in government-sponsored and mandated
devotional processions.22 For example, in 1550 the Balìa voted that, as an act
of devotion to Mary, the city government should provide dowries for fifty
young women, half of whom should be daughters of Santa Maria della Scala.
In November, this act was celebrated with a procession that included the
dowry recipients, followed by young boys and girls crying out “Holy Mary,
Mother of God, pray for us!”23 Likewise, as the siege began in 1554, the
daughters of Santa Maria della Scala participated in two processions, one in
August and one in September. The August procession was led by 150 young
girls, barefoot, dressed in white, with hair disheveled to indicate their distress.24 The sights and sounds of the August procession were then repeated
in September, when both older and younger girls from Santa Maria della
Scala again walked barefoot through the city, singing lauds soliciting peace
and mercy that, apparently, reduced the crowd to tears.25 As John Koenig has
argued, processions like these put the “victimization” of these young orphans
on display for the entire city and acted as a plea to both Christ and the Virgin
for divine mercy as crisis encompassed Siena.26
The good will and peace that civic devotions aimed to produce were
already growing urgent as war broke out in 1552, initiated by the Sienese
22. Government sponsored devotions as a means of seeking unity became common
across the early sixteenth century. From 1525 to 1552 the city government was reformed
ten times, and as political debate roiled Siena, civic devotion to Mary was employed to
unite disagreeing parties. Between 1483 and 1555 the Sienese re-dedicated the city and
gave the keys of Siena to the Virgin on four occasions, a ceremony reserved only for the
most desperate times. For more on this see Gerald Parsons, Siena, Civil Religion, and the
Sienese (London, 2004), 14–15. For more on the political divides in Siena, see Christine
Shaw, “Popular Government and the Petrucci,” in: L’ultimo secolo della Repubblica di Siena:
politica e istituzioni, economia e società, eds. Mario Ascheri and Fabrizio Nevola (Siena,
2007), 19–29.
23. John Koenig, “Saving Siena: A Renaissance State’s Religious Response to Political
and Military Crisis,” Bullettino Senese di Storia Patria, 111 (2004), 40–204, here 170.
24. Sozzini, whose eye-witness chronicle describes the procession, states that it was
performed specifically to ask for Mary’s intercession; see Sozzini, Diario, 275.
25. “Dal Duomo, partì la processione con l’immagine del Crocifisso: avanti a tutti le
citole dello Spedale grande, scalze, intonando laudi, com poste per l’occasione da un devotissimo predicatore della chiesa, che chiedevano a Cristo misericordia e pace; era un canto così
drammatico, triste e melodioso che strappava il pianto a chiunque lo ascoltasse,” Sozzini,
Diario, 291–92.
26. Koenig, “Saving Siena,” 183. Religious processions in general were a common tool
employed by city governments to navigate times of crisis. For another example, see Pascale
Rihouet’s analysis of plague processions in Perugia; see Rihouet, Art Moves: The Material Culture of Procession in Renaissance Perugia (London, 2017), 167–226.

472

ARTICLETITLE

rebellion against the Imperial troops of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.
The ostensible purpose of the troops, sent to Siena in 1525, was to keep the
peace between political factions. In practice, however, the soldiers established an imperial foothold in the city that lasted until 1551 when the
Sienese, tired of Spain’s presence and interference in local affairs, rose up
and drove the imperial force out of the city. Hostilities then commenced
between the Sienese and their French allies on one side, and the Spanish
with their Florentine allies on the other. As the war progressed, the
appearance of Santa Maria della Scala’s children and their participation in
processions devoted to the Virgin were integral to the spectacle and practice of civic religion. The abbandonati occupied this significant space as the
sights and sounds of the religious processions emphasized the link between
the children, Mary, and the piety of Siena’s people.27 During the war and
the siege of 1554, it was precisely these connections that provided a point
of protest and source of rhetoric for Scipione Venturi, the hospital’s rector,
as he sought to negotiate with civic and military leaders. The sights and
sounds of the abandoned children also provided imagery that Sienese
chroniclers drew on to explain the horrors of the siege and place the blame
for Siena’s loss of the war on the city’s lack of devotion.
The Siege of 1554–1555: Abbandonati and Negotiating a Crisis
As rector of the hospital, Venturi’s need to negotiate arose from the
struggle to fulfill all the demands placed on Santa Maria della Scala. From the
start of the war, Siena’s military and civic leaders used the hospital as a tool
for the city’s survival, adding new roles to the institution’s usual charitable and
civic activities. For the army, the hospital provided medical services and use
of its fortified farms outside the city for housing and staging troops. The city
government, meanwhile, relied on the hospital’s grain stores to supplement
Siena’s food supply. As Venturi and the hospital’s other administrators sought
to meet these demands, they continued the usual charitable services, including
the care of abbandonati. However, adjustments had to be made due to the
crisis of war, many of which can be seen in hospital records from the time.
During the early stages of the conflict, one of Venturi’s many priorities
was to determine how the hospital could best ensure the safety of its
foundlings. In addition to making arrangements about livestock and food
supply, Venturi prepared for the possibility of a siege by placing more chil27. For more on children and the sounds of charity, see Dolly MacKinnon, “Hearing
the Poor: Experiencing the Sounds of Charity in Early Modern England,” in: Experiences of
Charity: 1250–1650, ed. Anne M. Scott (Farnham, Surrey, England, 2015), 239–56.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

473

dren than usual on farms and properties in the countryside. Under normal
circumstances, abbandonati were often sent to the farms, but this was typically done in small numbers, with most hospital properties housing only a
few children at a time. However, inventories from the annual visit to the
hospital’s farms in 1552–1553 indicate that during this year at least fiftythree children were sent from the city to farms southwest and southeast of
Siena.28 The hospital placed these children not only in its own farmhouses,
but also with the families of its sharecroppers. For instance, the central
farmhouse at Castelluccio, where the farm’s administrator resided along
with other staff, took in two boys, sixteen and five years old, as well as one
four-year-old girl. Then, from among the twenty parcels of land rented to
sharecroppers at Castelluccio, seven families took in one abandoned girl
each. It appears that officials took into account the family’s size when
deciding where to send the girls; the seven families at Castelluccio that
took in foundlings had between two and three children of their own, while
families with five or more children were not asked to participate.29 Based
on the few instances where ages were given in the records, it seems that
girls from ages four up to twenty were placed as part of this effort.30
Accompanying the push to house more children safely outside the
city, Santa Maria della Scala’s administrators also planned an unusually
high number of marriages with sharecroppers for their daughters during
1552–1553. In the same volume that details the placement of children on
farms, record-keepers also identified sharecroppers, or their sons, who
should be given a hospital daughter to wed. Officials selected four men
farming land belonging to the farm of Montisi, one at Castelluccio, and
three men at Cuna, making a total of eight potential marriages for hospital
daughters. It is not clear if all of these marriages took place; scribes wrote
only brief notes such as “give a wife from the daughters of the hospital to
the son of Biagio,” implying that these were prospective, but not certain,
matches.31 Records of dowry payments made to the husbands of hospital

28. These included the farms, or grance, of Montepescali, San Giusto, Serre, Montisi,
Cuna, Castelluccio, Spedaletto, and San Quirico. The number is likely higher than the fiftythree this author has counted, since there are “fanciulli di casa” listed as being sent to Montepescali, but a specific number for this group is not provided; see ASSi, Ospedale di Santa
Maria della Scala, Visite 3066, fol. 4r.
29. ASSI, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Visite 3066, fols. 69v–79r.
30. This is not the only crisis during which children were sent from the city to the hospital’s farms; an outbreak of plague in 1523, for example, saw the hospital sending multiple
children to reside in the countryside. See ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Visite
3065, fols. 52r, 70r, 92, 118r.
31. ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Visite 3066, fols. 46r.

474 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

daughters list only one of these marriages, the union of Jacomo di Giovanni, a farmer at Cuna, with Faustina, in 1553.32 The hospital’s dowry
payments paused altogether in 1554, so it is difficult to tell if any of the
other potential marriages took place that year. Regardless of whether the
marriages occurred, the evidence that administrators sought them out
demonstrates a concerted effort to move hospital daughters safely out of
the city. In combination with the placement of young children in the countryside, this shows that during the early stages of the war, Santa Maria
della Scala’s administrators treated the lives of abbandonati as a priority.
As the war intensified in the spring and summer of 1554, it was no
longer easy to send children out of the city and food supply became a serious concern. Pressure mounted on the hospital as its responsibilities of
foundling care and the provision of food collided. From July through
August of 1554, the Balìa repeatedly called on Santa Maria della Scala to
provide grain from its stores for the public. Deliberation records report that
the hospital’s granary delivered at least 200 moggia of grain to the government in the space of two months.33 As Florentine and Spanish conquests
cut off supply routes, Piero Strozzi led what became the last major food
convoy into the city on September 18. Later, in November, the enemy also
took the castle of Crevole, ending its use by French troops as a base for
blockade activities. These events made it virtually impossible for supplies to
reach Siena and only small amounts of food trickled into the city.34 In
response to the situation, Siena’s civic and military leaders, led by Strozzi,
Monluc, and the Balìa, took steps to control the remaining food supply
within the city walls, including the stores of Santa Maria della Scala.
On September 28, the Balìa ordered the hospital to cede its grain
stores to the Uffizio dell’Abbondanza (the office that regulated the price and
sale of grain in Siena) and give the keys of the hospital’s granaries to the
Capitano del Popolo “for the sustenance of the citizens and the use and
defense of the city.”35 This order coincided with a citywide search con-

32. ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Sposalizi 1348, fol. 48v.
33. ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Deliberazioni 28, fols. 25v–27v. The
moggio was a measurement of volume frequently used for dry goods like grains. In sixteenthcentury Siena, one moggio was equal to approximately 872.4 liters. This would make 200
moggia about 174,480 liters or 92,474 kilograms, a significant amount of grain.
34. Simon Pepper and Nicholas Adams, Firearms and Fortifications: Military Architecture and Siege Warfare in Sixteenth Century Siena (Chicago, 1986), 130–31.
35. “. . . il publico intende valersi del grano d’esso spedale per sostentatione dei cittadini
e utile et difesa del[l]a città. . . .” ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Deliberazioni 28,
fol. 28r; also Cantagalli, La Guerra di Siena, 333–36, 345.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

475

FIGURE 4. Piero Strozzi (c. 1510–58), maréchal de France en 1554, sixteenth century,
oil on panel, 12.5 × 8.2 (32 cm × 21 cm), located in the Palace of Versaille, MV
4069. Image is in the public domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:
Piero_Strozzi.jpg

ducted by the communal government and French representatives to assess
supplies and discover any hidden stores the government could
appropriate.36 Additionally, the military claimed sole use of Santa Maria
della Scala’s medical services for the treatment of wounded and ill soldiers.
This order created a heavy burden for the hospital’s infirmary, which took
in as many injured as possible by placing up to four men per bed.37
The requisition of both the infirmary and the granaries represented an
extension of government authority beyond usual bounds. Orders to supply
the city with grain did not contradict tradition, but requiring Venturi to
surrender the granary keys was abnormal. As rector of Santa Maria della
Scala, Venturi understood the institution’s responsibility to serve the city,
but the overworked and under-supplied condition of the hospital raised
concerns. In a letter to Strozzi, Venturi articulated the hospital’s situation
and expressed the difficulty of complying with the Balìa’s orders: though

36. According to Orlando Malavolti’s chronicle, the search included “case, conventi, e
altre luoghi,” Malavolti, Dell’historia di Siena, 164.
37. Sozzini, Diario, 270.

476 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

he did not begrudge the government’s use of the grain supply, he wanted
Siena’s leaders to understand that they had placed the men, women, and
children of the hospital, who he always referred to as the hospital’s family,
in a dangerous position.38
Tensions between Venturi, Strozzi, and the Balìa only increased with
the next step taken to preserve the food supply: the identification and
expulsion of the “useless mouths.” As described at the outset of this study,
Siena’s leaders convened in late September 1554 to determine how the city
might survive an additional three months until promised reinforcements
arrived from France. Strozzi, Monluc, and the Balìa declared that the noncombatant population within the city walls should be reduced from 25,000
to 15,000 and they formed a commission of six men to identify individuals
who should be turned out of the city. The commission conducted its census
and produced a list of approximately 4,400 names. This led to the first
expulsion order and an evacuation of 1,000 people on September 22,
1554.39 These refugees successfully left the city, but they were the first and
last to do so; two days later Spanish and Florentine troops halted another
company of evacuees outside of Siena and did not permit them to pass.
From the end of September onward, imperial troops forced anyone
attempting to leave the city to turn back, and they executed any blockaderunners unlucky enough to be apprehended.40
These actions were, of course, part of the opposition’s strategy to either
starve the city into submission or provoke Strozzi and Monluc into a final
fight. The tradition of targeting non-combatants and using them to wage
psychological warfare on the opposition was common during the late
Middle Ages, though the morality of the tactic was increasingly debated in
the sixteenth century.41 However, Strozzi and Monluc were not to be
deterred. Despite the unsuccessful evacuations of late September and the
punishment of blockade-runners, the military commanders prevailed upon
the Balìa to move forward with the expulsion of more useless mouths. On
38. ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Deliberazioni 28, fol. 28. Venturi was
not alone in his use of family and household language to discuss the inhabitants of Santa
Maria della Scala. Such language was commonly used in hospitals throughout Italy. For the
example of the Ospedale degli Innocenti in Florence, see Phillip Gavitt, Charity and Children in Renaissance Florence: The Ospedale degli Innocenti. 1410–1536 (Ann Arbor, 1990),
143–44.
39. ASSi, Balìa, no. 955.
40. Landi, Gli ultimi anni della Repubblica di Siena, 194–95.
41. For a succinct treatment of this topic, see Allmand, “War and the Non-Combatant
in the Middle Ages,” 253–72.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

477

October 4, Strozzi and the Balìa ordered that all remaining bocche inutili be
turned out of the city.42
This time, the expulsion order included the foundlings of Santa Maria
della Scala as part of the useless mouths. On the morning of October 5,
1554, Venturi sent a group that reports say included 250 of Santa Maria
della Scala’s children, ranging from six to ten years in age, to join the
departure from Siena. Unlike many refugees in the group, the hospital’s
children almost certainly had places to go once they left the city. There are
no records describing Venturi’s exact plan, but earlier efforts to send children to the hospital’s farms suggest that these were likely their destination.
Unfortunately, neither the foundlings nor the other exiles made it very far.
Once outside the city’s walls, enemy troops ambushed the caravan just over
a mile from the city, quickly overwhelmed their small military escort, and
wounded a number of people. The survivors made their way back to Siena
and appeared, traumatized and distraught, outside the Fontebranda gate.
In his chronicle of the war, Sozzini offered a description of the returning
refugees, stating that the sight of the children “thrown on the ground,
robbed, wounded, and stricken, would have made even Nero cry,” and he
estimated that over one hundred citizens perished in the attack. Though
phrased for dramatic effect, Sozzini’s words convey a sense of disapproval
for the events experienced by the children as part of the expulsion, which
did actually produce some tragedy. When the returning foundlings were
counted, staff discovered that five were missing: two had died in the attack
and three had been taken by Spanish troops. Venturi’s response to this disastrous exodus was swift and firm. He confronted Strozzi the following day
and informed him that unless the army could find a more secure road out
of the city, the hospital refused to expel any more children.43
While the loss of these children and the failure of the expulsion was
upsetting, the experience of the hospital’s foundlings in these events
became an important point Venturi could use in his communications with
civic and military leaders. In his letters, Venturi drew on the suffering of
the children and used it as leverage in negotiations over grain supplies. On
October 14, less than two weeks after the failed expulsion, Venturi
attempted to convince officials to provide the hospital with its full (and
42. The hospital received warning of a potential expulsion in late September, including
a visit by two officers of Siena’s military on September 28 to discuss the levying of grain from
the hospital’s stores and the upcoming expulsion; see ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della
Scala, Deliberazioni 28, fol. 28.
43. Sozzini, Diario della Guerra di Siena, 307.

478 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

promised) allowance of grain. The hospital, he argued, had fully complied
with government orders to reduce the number of Santa Maria della Scala’s
occupants to 300 mouths and to suspend one of the hospital’s most consistent and pious charitable acts: the daily distribution of alms. In return for
this, Monluc promised the hospital a grain allowance of fifteen moggia per
month, an amount, according to Venturi, that was insufficient for the
“tanta famiglia,” or large family, remaining in the hospital.44
In his letters, Venturi used the language of family to add impact to his
attempts to bargain. It was common across Italy for charitable institutions
to employ paternalistic rhetoric and the concept of family to those within
their walls. According to Terpstra, this kind of language “was not empty
rhetoric, but powerful” and could be used as “an inducement to action.”45
Furthermore, although Venturi used the term “bocche,” he never employed
the phrase “bocche inutili.” Instead, he referred to “le bocche che si è disegnato cavare,” or “the mouths designated to be thrown out.” This choice
of words seems deliberate: he refrained from calling these mouths useless,
only admitting that others designated them so. Venturi always referred to
the children as part of Santa Maria della Scala’s family, reinforcing for the
officials reading his letters that the abbandonati were part of the hospital,
its dedication to Mary, and its charitable and pious works.
This language and its message of family were echoed in another letter,
this one addressed to the enemy: the Marquess of Marignano, a commander
of the Florentine troops. Perhaps in anticipation of additional expulsion
attempts, Venturi told Marignano that: “I was moved, perhaps through
divine inspiration, to plead with you . . . to grant me your permission of safe
conduct so that I may securely send all the young boys and girls of this most
pious [hospital] between the ages of five and eleven out of the city, accompanied by some matrons to care for them . . . in total about 300 mouths.”46
A grant of safe conduct, Venturi explained, would allow the children to be
44. “. . . io con tutto il cuore supplico a vostra eccellentia che dia subito ordine à Mons.
di Monluch che riduca i feriti secondo l’ordine sopra detto a nostri dia sicurta per quanto e
possibile di poter cavare della città le boche che si è disegnato cavare . . . dar ordine ch’io
habbia quella quantita del grano che e necessaria per il sostentammento d’una tanta fameglia
[sic],” ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fols. 51v–52r.
45. Terpstra, Abandoned Children, 285.
46. “Mi son mosso e forse per divina ispiratione à suplicarla che . . . si degni concedermi
permesso di suo salvocondotto che io possi cavar sicuramente fuora de la città tutti li fanciulli
e fanciulline di questa piissima casa delo spedale da l’eta di cinque anni in fino ali xi con compagnia d’alquante matrone à lor governo che faranno in tutto il numero d’intorno a boche
300,” ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fol. 52v.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

479

removed to a place where they might “live more comfortably, to the honor
of God and his most holy Mother.” Not only did Venturi emphasize that
the children of the hospital, through their lives, honored God and Mary,
but he also referenced Mary as the “particular protectress” of the “most
holy” hospital.47 Thus, whether communicating with Siena’s leaders or those
of the opposing armies, Venturi remained consistent in his emphasis on the
religious role of the hospital and his portrayal of its children as a representation of piety and charity.
Venturi also employed this rhetoric when he appeared in person
before the Balìa to express his discontent with the actions of the government. He reminded the council of the agreement to send provisions and
informed the members of his communications with the Florentines
regarding safe conduct.48 Unfortunately, these efforts did not have the
desired effect. Ten days later, on October 24, the city government confiscated all the grain remaining in Santa Maria della Scala’s storehouses,
leaving enough to sustain only two hundred people.49 This was less than
the three hundred people who occupied the hospital, so it was accompanied by a second expulsion order that directed Venturi to turn out the rest
of the hospital’s useless mouths. These orders seem to have pushed Venturi to a breaking point: he informed the members of the Balìa that if they
wanted to expel more children, they could do it themselves and he then
returned to his home and declined to have anything further to do with
hospital business, essentially resigning from his administrative duties.50
Clearly, in this instance, the military’s demands for food supply outweighed the rhetoric Venturi had hoped would sway the government in
the hospital’s favor.
Venturi’s sudden resignation had a quick impact on the Balìa, which
decided to finally intervene with Stozzi and Monluc to ensure that Santa
Maria della Scala would receive the grain supply agreed upon in previous
47. “. . . per condurle in luogo dove possino piu comodamente vivere a honor di dio e
del[l]a sua santissima madre particolar protettrice di questa piissima casa,” ASSi, Ospedale di
Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fol. 52v.
48. The word the scribe used to describe Venturi’s attitude during this meeting was
“scontenta,” meaning displeased or dissatisfied; see ASSi, Balìa, Deliberazioni 159, fol. 12v.
49. Sozzini, Diario della Guerra di Siena, 314.
50. It is possible that Venturi’s refusal to follow orders means that this was a forced resignation, rather than a resignation by choice, and later references to the issue suggest that this
may have been the case. However, there is no overt evidence to substantiate a forced resignation, there is only an acknowledgement that he refused to follow orders; see ASSi, Balìa,
Deliberazioni 159, fol. 55r–v.

480 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

discussions.51 However, caught between the hospital and the city’s defense,
the members of the council also moved to enforce Strozzi and Monluc’s
orders for yet another expulsion. With Venturi absent, on October 31, the
Balìa oversaw the expulsion of forty-five boys between the ages of ten and
fifteen years old from Santa Maria della Scala. This small group left the city
during the day with no escort and a few possessions, only to be found again
at the city gate a while later, barefoot and dressed in nothing but their
shirts. The Imperial army encountered them on the road, stopped them,
stripped them of their belongings, including shoes and clothing, and sent
them back to the city. Confronted with another failed expulsion, the government had no choice but to allow the boys to return to Santa Maria della
Scala, which they did, walking two-by-two, as if in a religious procession.
In another dramatic recounting of events, Sozzini recorded that the citizens who observed the boys were moved to tears and wept openly in the
streets.52 Sozzini’s choice to depict the return of the boys in this way shows
that Venturi was not alone in his use of the abbandonati as a rhetorical tool
to express the seriousness of the crisis and protest the expulsions. Sozzini’s
description of the crowd’s weeping suggests that at least some of Siena’s
citizens understood what the foundlings represented and were upset by the
treatment of the children. This interpretation is substantiated by the way
Sozzini relates the events that followed.
In the wake of Venturi’s departure, the Balìa authorized the hospital’s
treasurer to act in his place.53 But this was no more than a formality since,
on November 2, the Balìa authorized the Quattro del Biado (officials over
Siena’s grain supplies) to take the keys to Santa Maria della Scala itself and
remove any last grain in the hospital’s stores.54 This left the hospital family
entirely dependent on Strozzi, Monluc, and the government to send the
promised rations of grain each month. Aside from one disbursement that
arrived at the end of October, no additional provisions followed. To avoid
starvation, the young girls would go out of the hospital in groups each
morning to collect wood and any other scraps they could use to barter for
food. Describing these events, Sozzini drew an explicit connection between

51. On October 30, the Balìa petitioned Monluc to send ten moggia of grain to Santa
Maria della Scala “. . . per sostentamento in parte delle bocche che stanno nello spedale.” See
ASSi, Balìa, Deliberazioni 159, fol. 51v.
52. Sozzini, Diario della Guerra di Siena, 317. See also Cantagalli, La Guerra di Siena,
345.
53. ASSi, Balìa, Deliberazioni 159, fol. 55r–v; see also ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria
della Scala, Deliberazioni 28, fol. 28v–29r.
54. Cantagalli, 345; also Sozzini, Diario della Guerra di Siena, 318–19.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

481

the children, the hospital, the Virgin, and the outcome of the war. The
sight of these starving young girls troubled the wider public, he explained,
especially since the Sienese hoped for the Virgin Mary to intercede and
preserve their liberty. According to Sozzini:
The citizenry were disturbed by the fate of these children of the city, first
received and raised in the house of mercy that was thought to be the foundation of the hope that men had regarding the intercession of the Glorious Madonna with her only-begotten Son to liberate Siena from the
danger of destruction and now instead, from hunger and from despair.55

There are several significant correlations that Sozzini makes here, including
his reference to the foundlings as “children of the city” and his portrayal of
the hospital as the “foundation” of the city’s hope for the intervention of
the Virgin on Siena’s behalf. Just as Venturi sought to cultivate the image
of Santa Maria della Scala and its children as representatives of Siena’s
dedication to Mary, Sozzini’s chronicle does the same. The connections
made by Venturi and Sozzini are further supported by the chronicler
Orlando Malavolti, who wrote of the “innocenti figliuoli dello Spedale
della Scala,” and described how, with “inhuman cruelty,” they were abandoned and exposed to evils that included enemy attacks, wild dogs, wolves,
hunger, and death.56
The treatment of Santa Maria della Scala’s foundlings as part of the
expulsions of bocche inutili and its portrayal in these sources suggests the
importance, even in times of crisis, of the practice of charity towards
abbandonati as a gauge for civic piety. Venturi, Sozzini, and others in Siena
used the treatment of Santa Maria della Scala’s children and their representation of devotion to Mary as a means to protest the importance the
government placed on the physical, rather than the spiritual, resources of
the hospital. Just as the Sienese ascribed their great military victory at the
battle of Montaperti in 1260 to the Virgin’s intervention, in this hour of
crisis they attributed their struggles to misplaced civic priorities. That the
city government and military leaders allowed the starvation of these same
55. “La cittadinanza era turbata dalla sorte di questi figli della Città, prima accolti e
cresciuti nella casa della misericordia che si pensava fosse il fondamento della speranza che
l’uomo aveva affinché la Madonna Gloriosa intercedesse presso il suo unigenito Figliolo per
liberare Siena dal pericolo di distruzione e ora, invece, alla fame e alla disperazione.” Sozzini,
Diario, 319.
56. Though it is doubtful that any of the hospital’s children suffered attacks by wolves
or wild dogs, the fact that Malavolti would assert such speaks to the horror felt by the Sienese
regarding the treatment of the children; see Malavolti, Dell’historia di Siena, 164v. See also
Parsons, Siena, Civil Religion, and the Sienese, 15.

482 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

orphaned girls, who just months earlier had processed through the streets
as a representation of Siena’s pious devotion to the Virgin, seemed a sufficient reason for Mary to abandon the city.
Conclusions
Drawn out of his temporary retirement by mid-December, Venturi
continued using this rhetoric as he resumed negotiations with Strozzi,
Monluc, and the Balìa. In his arguments with them over food disbursement and supply, Venturi emphasized the importance of the hospital
family (including the children) as a source of religious devotions.57 Imploring government officials to keep their promise to provide Santa Maria della
Scala with sufficient provisions, Venturi constantly reminded them of the
hospital’s connection to Mary and its role as a religious house. In a letter
dated to December 17, 1554, Venturi plead with Strozzi to send grain to
the hospital, with particular emphasis on the suffering of its family and its
religious role:
Wherefore, seeing this most religious house in such great extremity,
which ought to have hope in God for the preservation of the city, because
of the good works and piety on which it was founded, which act as a sacrifice to continually placate the anger of God, I cannot prevent my heart
from grieving greatly seeing that I lack the power befitting my office and
seeing continually the troubles of the whole city, which cannot be
endured without great sorrow. The poor lack places to go, and the sick
who come to us daily can no longer be received by the hospital; the abandoned boys are dispersed throughout the city and dying of hunger, while
the orphaned girls, lacking bread, remain in danger of death by starvation
or some other evil, wherefore I beg and I beseech you that . . . my family
and I will not have to die of hunger. . . .58
57. As noted earlier, the author has yet to find any document that fully explains Venturi’s resignation and return. Neither the hospital’s nor the Balìa’s records indicate the exact
date of his return to administrative office.
58. “. . . onde vedendo io in tanto esterminio questa religiosissima casa, nella pietà e santissime opere nela quale era fondata (siccome io credo) buona parte della speranza che si deveva
havere in Dio per la conservatione di questa città e quasi un sacrifitio che continuamente placava l’ira di Dio, non posso fare che di cuore non mene ramarichi massimamente vedendomi a
forza mancare di quanto si conviene all’offitio mio e vedendo continuamente la mestitia e il cordoglio che ha tutta la città di questo fatto la quale non puo se non con gravissimo dolore
soportare il vedere cacciare i poveri mandarne via l’infermi che vi erano, non dar ricetto a quelli
che giornalmente vi vengono, andare i fanciulli dispersi per la città morendo di fame e le povere
fanciulle stare in pericolo mancando loro il pane di morir di fame ò a forza capitar male, onde
con tutto’l cuore la prego e supplico che . . . la mia famiglia ed io insieme non habbiamo a morir
di fame,” ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fols. 53v–54r.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

483

Following this description of conditions within the hospital, Venturi insinuated that Santa Maria della Scala’s condition was the fault of Strozzi and
the Balìa. He reminded Strozzi of the hospital’s compliance with all the
government’s requests and the failure of civic officials to respond in kind.
According to Venturi, the grain the city government sent in October lasted
for only twenty days and was clearly insufficient to sustain the hospital
through an entire month.59
Underscoring these complaints, Venturi appealed to the hospital’s
piety as a reason for its preservation. With the image of cast out and starving foundlings as his backdrop, Venturi called the hospital a “most religious house” and described the righteousness and charitable works on
which Santa Maria della Scala was founded as “a good part of the hope that
ought to be had in God for the conservation of this city.” Through its pious
good works, he asserted, the hospital “placates the anger of God,” and
keeps destruction at bay.60 Referencing the possibility that Siena might
lose the war if the Virgin abandoned it, Venturi argued that by removing
the hospital’s food supply and largely ignoring its cries for help, Strozzi,
Monluc, and the Balìa increased the anger of God and thereby decreased
their chances of success. Venturi’s description of the suffering of the
foundlings depicted them, in a sense, as twice abandoned. Their first abandonment came when their parents left them at the hospital, and the second
when the city government and military leaders enacted policies that subjected them to the dangers of starvation and potential death.
With the siege growing more serious and in the wake of the failed
expulsions, it seems that Venturi’s rhetoric, and the disapproving reactions
of Sienese citizens to the sight of the hospital’s starving children, finally
moved the city government to action. On December 20, 1554, the Balìa
held council and formally recognized the sufferings of “the most pious
house of Santa Maria della Scala,” making special note of its lack of provisions and financial resources. The members of the council acknowledged
Venturi’s efforts to maintain the institution and voted to exert their energies on the hospital’s behalf.61 Accordingly, they sent representatives to
Monluc to discuss Santa Maria della Scala’s situation and remind him of
59. “. . . altro che moggia xv di grano qual non bastò a quella famiglia oltre a li xx giorni
di detto mese di ottobre. . . .” ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fol.
53v.
60. ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fol. 53v.
61. Their actions, the deliberation records explain, should be for the good service and
restoration of the hospital: “benefitio servitio et reparatione del detto spedale.” See ASSi,
Balìa, Deliberazioni 159, fol. 146v.

484 ABANDONED CHILDREN, WARFARE, AND CIVIC RELIGION IN SIENA

promises made regarding provisions for the hospital. On Christmas day
1554, Monluc agreed to pay Venturi for the grain owed to the hospital.62
Then, in January of 1555 Strozzi and Monluc agreed to raise Santa Maria
della Scala’s grain allotment from fifteen to twenty moggia per month.63
These arrangements alleviated tension for a time, but the relief never fully
materialized as the siege carried on and the food supply in Siena dwindled.
The sum Monluc offered in repayment for the seized grain was insufficient
and by February, a desperate Venturi begged Strozzi to send the hospital
more provisions, stating that “in your hand rests the lifting of this most
religious house from extreme ruin.”64 A few months later, on April 22,
1555, Siena was forced to surrender to the Florentine and Spanish armies
and the long siege finally came to an end.
As Siena underwent the crisis of siege, it is clear that government officials, hospital administrators, and citizens like Sozzini understood that the
children of Santa Maria della Scala embodied the city’s devotion to the
Virgin Mary. Despite this, anxieties over food supply led to extensions of
government authority and military orders that included seizing the hospital’s grain, designating foundlings as bocche inutili, involving the children in
failed expulsions, and contributing to their starvation by failing to send
promised supplies. In response, Venturi, as hospital rector, consistently
reminded Siena’s leaders that Santa Maria della Scala’s foundlings, the
hospital’s role in civic devotions, its dedication to Mary, and its provision
of charity, were critical to Siena’s survival. Venturi invoked the conditions
of the hospital and the treatment of its foundlings as a means to protest
government policies and negotiate disagreements. The sight of starving
orphans in the streets made clear to the people of Siena that the crisis of
war had altered traditional norms of civic devotion, and Venturi harnessed
these emotions and rhetoric in his communications with city leadership.
Venturi’s pleas did yield some success and prompted the Balìa, on
more than one occasion, to adjust policies and seek to enforce previously
neglected agreements. At the same time, where Venturi succeeded in convincing the city government to express concern for the hospital, his rhetoric largely failed with Strozzi and Monluc. Although their repeated
removal of food from the hospital and multiple attempts to turn its children out of the city derived primarily from their focus on the military
62. ASSi, Balìa, Deliberazioni 159, fol. 161r.
63. ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fol. 58v.
64. Monluc offered 250 scudi, but Venturi argued that this sum was less than half the
sum actually owed; see ASSi, Ospedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Copialettere 436, fol. 58r–v.

SARAH LOOSE GUERRERO

485

aspects of the war, this alone does not account for Strozzi and Monluc’s
actions. Venturi’s petitions did not always sway Strozzi and Monluc
because these men were outsiders who lacked resonance with Siena’s civic
religion, as embodied by the hospital’s children. This case, then, is also an
example of how civic religion was firmly embedded in particular spaces.
Even as the significance of civic devotions heightened in times of crisis,
their importance might be recognized, but not necessarily felt, by those
outside the community.
The treatment and perception of Santa Maria della Scala’s abbandonati
during the siege thus establishes the importance of foundlings as a symbol
of civic piety and suggests that their significance in this role could increase
during times of trouble. As scholars continue to study hospitals and seek to
understand how and why communities practiced charity in certain ways, it
is worth continuing to examine how the bodies and images of recipients of
charity, like foundlings, were employed as representative and rhetorical
tools. This study also suggests that there is much to be learned from seeking to understand the practice of charity, the experiences of foundlings,
and the roles of charitable institutions in times of crisis.

Two Enlightenment Dominicans among the
Freemasons in Eighteenth-Century Vienna
V ILIAM Š TEFAN D ÓCI, O.P.*
Two Austrian Dominicans, Albert Tschick and Franz Poschinger,
belonged to Freemasonry in the 1780s. Although their shared interest
in the Enlightenment led them to join, they took different paths as
members of the association. The article outlines the brief biographies of
the two Friars Preachers, sketches their development as Enlightenment
preachers, and presents the Masonic period of their lives in the context
of the history of Austrian Freemasonry. It contributes to a more
nuanced view of the relationship of the Catholic clergy and the Friars
Preachers to Freemasonry in the eighteenth century.
Keywords: Freemasonry, Catholic Enlightenment, Dominican
Order, Austria
Introduction
The German Dominican friar Ludovicus Greinemann is quite well
known in historical research because of his anti-Masonic sermons in
Aachen in March, 1779, which contributed to a temporary closure of the
local lodges.1 His Neapolitan confrere, Gregorio Maria Rocco (1700–82),
very popular among the people for his social commitment, is reported to
have tried to influence King Charles VII (King of Naples 1734–59) not to
allow lodges in his kingdom.2 It is hardly surprising that the Dominicans
* The author is the president of the Historical Institute of the Order of Preachers in
Rome, teaches Church History at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, and is a
Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Historical Theology at the University of
Vienna. He thanks the anonymous reviewers of this article for their valuable comments. His
email address is vsdoci@institutumhistoricum.op.org.
1. August Pauls, Geschichte der Aachener Freimaurerei: Die Aachener Freimaurerei in der
reichsstädtischen Zeit (bis Ende September 1794) (Clausthal-Zellerfeld, 1928), 136–39. For
additional biographical details see Reinhard Markner, “Ludovicus Greinemann (1737–?),” in:
Handbuch der Verschwörungstheorien, ed. Helmut Reinalter (Leipzig, 2018), 122–25.
2. José Antonio Ferrer Benimeli, Masonería, iglesia e ilustración: un conflicto ideológicopolítico-religioso, 4 vols. (Madrid 1976–77, here 1977), III, 17–18. For Rocco’s biography, see
Dizionario biografico degli italiani, 100 vols., 88 (Rome, 2017), Pasquale Palmieri, “Rocco,
Francesco Antonio Maria.”

486

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

487

tried to fight the Masonic movement in various ways, especially after it was
condemned by the Bulls of Pope Clement XII, In Eminenti in 1738 and of
Pope Benedict XIV, Providus in 1751. Religious indifference and strict
secrecy about the presumably immoral activities of the lodges, which would
be harmful to society, were identified as the greatest dangers promoted by
the association.3 Probably, after thorough research, one could compose a
very long list of the friars of the Order of Preachers who in the course of
the eighteenth century distinguished themselves to various degrees as
opponents of Masonry on account of their strict commitment to orthodox
Catholic doctrine and the papacy.
An historian, who is not necessarily interested in representations of
homogeneous history, is pleased to discover cases that are considered exceptions to a rule and, as such, point to the complexity of a historical reality.
For an historian, therefore, discovering those friars of the Order who had
sympathies for the Freemasons, even to the point of joining them, is an
attractive object of research. The distinguished scholar of the history of the
relations between Freemasonry and the Catholic Church, José Antonio
Ferrer Benimeli, published in the fourth volume of his work Masonería, iglesia e ilustración a list of the Masonic clergy of the eighteenth century, in
which twenty-seven clerics are explicitly identified as Dominicans.4 However, at least one such identification is missing: it is the Viennese friar Franz
Poschinger (1745–96),5 who, together with another friar of the Order’s
Austro-Hungarian Province,6 Albert Tschick (1741–1802),7 belonged for a
time to the Masonic circles in Vienna. Tschick’s and Poschinger’s affiliation
to Masonry in 1783 can be seen as the culmination of their development as
reform-minded and enlightened priests which had begun in the 1770s.
The author of this article places the two friars within the “Catholic
Enlightenment,” broadly understood in the sense of Ulrich L. Lehner and
3. José Antonio Ferrer Benimeli, “Freemasonry and the Catholic Church,” in: Handbook of Freemasonry, eds. Henrik Bogdan and Jan A. M. Snoek, [Brill Handbooks on Contemporary Religion, 8] (Leiden, 2014), 139–54, here 139–42. It is important to note the
author’s reference to placing the papal condemnations in the context of the actions of other
European rulers against the Freemasons.
4. Ferrer Benimeli, Masonería, IV (1977), 59–180.
5. Ferrer Benimeli, Masonería, IV, 155.
6. For the establishment of the Order’s province with its official name Provincia Hungariae, see Isnard W. Frank, “Zur Errichtung der Österreichisch-ungarischen Dominikanerprovinz zu Beginn des 18. Jahrhunderts und zu ihrer Vorgeschichte (1569-1704),” Archivum
Fratrum Praedicatorum, 43 (1973), 287–341, here 332–41.
7. Ferrer Benimeli, Masonería, IV, 175 (here the spelling: Tschinck).

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TWO ENLIGHTENMENT DOMINICANS

Shaun Blanchard,8 as well as Jeffrey Burson:9 a movement consisting of
Catholics who entered into dialogue with eighteenth-century Enlightenment thought and culture in various ways and to varying degrees in order
to contribute to the reform of the Church and the improvement of society.
On the basis of some of their sermons from the 1770s,10 both Tschick and
8. Ulrich L. Lehner and Shaun Blanchard, “Introduction: The World of Catholic
Enlightenment,” in: The Catholic Enlightenment: A Global Anthology, eds. Ulrich L. Lehner
and Shaun Blanchard, [Early Modern Catholic Sources, 3] (Washington, D.C., 2021), 1–18,
especially 10–15. Here, on pp. 11–12, the authors clarify the portrayal of the Catholic
Enlightenment as a global movement presented by Ulrich L. Lehner in his book The Catholic
Enlightenment: The Forgotten History of a Global Movement (New York, NY, 2016), namely
that it was not a kind of homogeneous school. In his book, Lehner was essentially concerned
with showing that there were people in the Catholic milieu who were striving for a reconciliation between traditional Catholicism and modernity. For other accounts of “Catholic
Enlightenment” as a historiographical category, see e.g., Ulrich L. Lehner, “The Many Faces
of the Catholic Enlightenment,” in: A Companion to the Catholic Enlightenment in Europe, eds.
Ulrich L. Lehner and Michael Printy (Leiden, 2013), 1–61; Norbert Jung, “Die Katholische
Aufklärung—Eine Einführung,” in: Katholische Aufklärung und Josephinismus. Rezeptionsformen in Ostmittel- und Südosteuropa, eds. Rainer Bendel and Norbert Spannenberger (Cologne,
2015), 23–51; and Jürgen Overhoff, “Die Katholische Aufklärung als bleibende
Forschungsaufgabe: Grundlagen, neue Fragestellungen, globale Perspektiven,” Das
Achtzehnte Jahrhundert, 41, no. 1 (2017), 11–27. However, the category and recent historiography of the Catholic Enlightenment is also critically examined, as for example in the contribution by Patrizia Delpiano, “Un nuovo revisionismo. A proposito di Catholic Enlightenment,”
Rivista storica italiana, 131, no. 1 (2019), 333–58, or Christoph Schmitt-Maass, Gideon
Stiening, and Friedrich Vollhardt, “Einleitung: ‘Katholische Aufklärung’?—Möglichkeiten,
Grenzen und Kritik eines Konzepts der Aufklärungsforschung,” Aufklärung, 33 (2021), 7–16.
9. Jeffrey D. Burson, “Catholicism and Enlightenment, Past, Present, and Future,” in:
Enlightenment and Catholicism in Europe: A Transnational History, eds. Jeffrey D. Burson and
Ulrich L. Lehner (Notre Dame, IN, 2014), 1–37, here 14.
10. From numerous sermons delivered by Tschick and Poschinger, a few—held on special occasions—were published in print. While four sermons by Tschick are known to have
been handed down, in the case of Poschinger there are nine; moreover, there are other sermons of Poschinger from the journal Wöchentliche Wahrheiten für und über die Prediger in
Wien. All of them date from the period 1773–83. Although a comparison between the two
preachers is only possible to a limited extent in view of the different number of sermons that
have survived in both cases, it can be said that Poschinger leaves the impression of a more
moderate reform preacher whose sermons were theologically better founded. Some sermons
have already been studied, e.g., in Viliam Štefan Dóci, “«…das lehret uns der Catholische
allein seeligmachende Glaub…» Theology in the Sermons of Austrian and Hungarian
Dominicans in the 18th Century,” Revue d’histoire ecclésiastique, 115 (2020), 204–34; Id.,
“Religion, Tugend und Pflicht. Zur Morallehre in Predigten der österreichisch-ungarischen
Dominikaner im 18. Jahrhundert,” in: Kulturen der Moral: Beiträge zur DGEJ-Jahrestagung
2018 in Paderborn, eds. Kristin Eichhorn and Lothar van Laak (Hamburg, 2021), 85–100.
On the journal mentioned, see Bernhard M. Hoppe, Predigtkritik im Josephinismus: Die
»Wöchentlichen Wahrheiten für und über die Prediger in Wien« (1782–1784), [Studien zur Theologie und Geschichte, 2] (St. Ottilien, 1989).

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

489

Fr. Franz Poschinger OP (1745–96), n.d., graphic. Artist unknown. Stored in
Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Bildarchiv und Grafiksammlung.
Reproduced with permission.

Poschinger could also be described as adherents of the philo-Jansenist
“Reform Catholicism,” “‘enlightened’ in its way,” as portrayed by Dale Van
Kley.11 In light of other sources, however, they also supported Enlightenment ideas that would be considered heterodox from the perspective of
“Reform Catholicism” in the Van Kley sense, though perhaps not both to
the same degree. Following Harm Klueting’s distinction in his article on
the Catholic Enlightenment in Austria,12 perhaps they would have to be
called “Enlighteners in Catholic Austria” and not “Catholic Enlighteners.”
A broad concept of “Catholic Enlightenment” allows one to talk about
the affinity between the Catholic Enlightenment and Freemasonry. In a
recent study, Kenneth Loiselle stated that the Catholic Enlightenment
“was also a cultural movement where ordinary men and women created
institutions like Freemasonry where they could live their faith in ways that
11. Dale Van Kley, Reform Catholicism and the International Suppression of the Jesuits
(New Haven, CT, 2018), 46–56, here 51.
12. Harm Klueting, “The Catholic Enlightenment in Austria or the Habsburg Lands,”
in: A Companion to the Catholic Enlightenment in Europe, eds. Ulrich L. Lehner and Michael
Printy (Leiden, 2013), 127–64, here 143. This standard differentiation of the scholar can be
found recently in Harm Klueting, “Über die Vereinbarkeit von Aufklärung und Katholizismus. Standortbestimmung zur katholischen Aufklärung im 18. Jahrhundert,” Aufklärung, 33
(2021), 119–43, here 124.

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TWO ENLIGHTENMENT DOMINICANS

were useful, practical, and individual.”13 In the lodges in France, he underlined the presence of the clergy, and in particular the religious clergy.14 This
was also the case in Vienna, as shown below. In addition, Loiselle highlighted criticism voiced by the Catholic Freemasons of the philosophes and
their atheistic and materialistic views, as well as the Catholic Freemasons’
emphasis on the person of Jesus Christ as the model and teacher of true
morality.15 On the one hand, the critical remark of Loiselle16 regarding the
findings of Margaret Jacob—if the latter would like to claim general validity—that Freemasons at best kept “the residue of the Christian heritage,”17
is to be agreed with. On the other hand—and Loiselle does not deny
this—many Catholic Freemasons, including members of the clergy, moved
away from some of what were generally believed to be “the” Catholic doctrines: a good example of this is the French Abbé Claude Yvonne (1714–
91), who became a founding member of the lodge Concordia Vincit Animos
in Amsterdam during his exile there from 1752 to 1762.18 Whether this
was actually the case with Poschinger and Tschick is difficult to say. In any
case, there is a connection between their sympathies for reform ideas,
which called for a reasonable Christianity and its practical and useful contribution to society on the one hand, and their affiliation with Masonry,
which saw its task in working for moral perfection and the happiness of
universal humanity, on the other hand.
Enlightened Preachers
The surviving sources allow for more or less brief biographical sketches of
the two Dominicans. In particular, based on some of their preserved sermons
delivered in the course of their priestly ministry, a development and intensification of the Enlightenment attitude in both of them can be observed.
The older of the two, Albert Tschick (another spelling found in the
sources: Tschigg) was born on April 20, 1741 in Burgau in Styria and bap13. Kenneth Loiselle, “Freemasonry and the Catholic Enlightenment in EighteenthCentury France,” The Journal of Modern History, 94, no. 3 (2022), 499–536, here 533.
14. Ibid., 503 and 505.
15. Ibid., 514–16. On the defense of the Christian character of Masonry by Baron
Louis Théodore-Henri de Tschoudy (1727–69) and Joseph de Maistre (1754–1821), see
Jérôme Rousse-Lacordaire, Rome et les Francs-Maçons. Histoire d’un conflit (Paris, 1996), 70–
74. Rousse-Lacordaire pointed out that de Maistre, unlike Tschoudy, was ready to accept
papal authority on the question of Masonry.
16. Loiselle, “Freemasonry and the Catholic Enlightenment,” 534.
17. Margaret Jacob, The Secular Enlightenment (Princeton, 2019), 4.
18. Jeffrey D. Burson, The Culture of Enlightening: Abbé Claude Yvon and the Entangled
Emergence of the Enlightenment (Notre Dame, IN, 2019), 125–40.

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

491

tized on the same day with the name Franz Xaver.19 He was admitted to
the Order as filius of the convent in Graz and, after completing the novitiate, he made his profession on October 24, 1760.20 After his ordination
to the priesthood, Tschick carried out higher studies at the studium generale
in Graz; according to the provincial catalogue of 1767, he was studens formalis at that time.21 In 1767 the Provincial appointed him as the festival
preacher at the Dominican convent in Leoben in Styria.22 Tschick later
returned to Graz when he was appointed as a regular preacher at the
Dominican nunnery of St. Leonhard in 1772.23 His oldest preserved
sermon comes from the time he held this office. It was delivered on June
29, 1773 in the parish church in Graz in honor of St. Peter the Apostle.
Among other things in this sermon, Tschick spoke of Peter’s denial of
Jesus: this sin, that is, the experience of his own weakness, was an important lesson for Peter. Peter had to acknowledge that he was dependent on
divine grace and needed God’s forgiveness. Thus, the future chief shepherd
learned that he had to have patience and love in dealing with sinners.24 It
is remarkable how the preacher used the story of Peter to urge the audience
to be patient with the weak, sinful members of the clergy.
The loftiness of our state, the excellencies of our character, the Lord,
God, who has sanctified us in an excellent anointing; all command us to
be examples of salvation. However, have we become angels through the
laying on of holy hands? Are we by our anointing, here among the throng
of the wicked, in grace, without more possible falls, as there, the
fortresses of Zion, immovably established? Do we not always, like you,
mockers, yourself, carry around the human being in our bosom? Duties
increased by the sanctity of our state give you the right to demand their
fulfillment at our hands; but are not danger and occasions of falls more
possible where those are more numerous? And, if the worldly man who
has sinned deserves pity, can the cleric be contemptible to your evil eyes?
19. Regestum provinciae Hungariae fratrum Praedicatorum inchoatum 28. Aprilis 1765 sub
provincialatu admodum reverendi ac eximii P. Fr. Antonini Thuille, stored in Vienna, the
Dominican Convent Archives (hereafter referred to as DCA), Bücher Nr. 55, fol. 102r; Liber
baptizatorum ad parochiam in Burgau ab anno 1720, stored in Graz, Archives of the Diocese
Graz-Seckau, Sign. 6221, on April 20, 1741, available online: https://data.matriculaonline.eu/de/oesterreich/graz-seckau/burgau/6221/?pg=41.
20. Regestum provinciae Hungariae sub provincialatu P. Fr. Antonini Thuille, stored in
Vienna, DCA, Bücher Nr. 55, fol. 102r.
21. Catalogus personarum et officiorum sacri ordinis Praedicatorum provinciae Hungariae
[…] pro anno Domini 1767 (Munich, n.d.), 9, stored in Vienna, DCA, Kataloge, Hungaria.
22. Regestum provinciae Hungariae sub provincialatu P. Fr. Antonini Thuille, fol. 206r.
23. Ibid., fol. 220v.
24. Albert Tschick, Lobrede auf den hl. Petrus Fürsten der Aposteln, und ersten Oberhirten
der Kirche […] (Graz, [1773?]), 11.

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TWO ENLIGHTENMENT DOMINICANS
How? Is the respect for us, which is your duty towards us, obliterated by
the fault? Is the respectfulness a fruit of our customs; or the prerogative
of the essential character? And what sin, what power of hell itself, can
tear away this seal of eternity from our souls?25

The crucial point in this passage is that members of the clergy have the
fundamental right to be respected by lay people, apart from their moral
qualities. It was a sermon with zero reform-minded or enlightened ideas.
A completely different position was taken by Tschick two years later in a
sermon delivered in Preßburg (today’s Bratislava) in honor of St. John of
Matha on February 8, 1775. At this time and since 1774, he was exercising
his priestly activity outside the Dominican context as the military chaplain
to the Grand Ducal Toscana Dragoon Regiment. One can only speculate
about the reasons for assuming this position, but this sermon could serve
as an indication that he had doubts about the usefulness of a ministry
within the Order, which was similar to other adherents of the Catholic
Enlightenment. In the sermon, he was very critical of religious and members of the clergy who were negligent in fulfilling their obligations, but
demanded respect from people because of their status.
For, my listeners, to leave the world and what is theirs, only to tear oneself away from the hustle and bustle of laborious business, and to consume the fruits of other people’s labor in a leisurely indolence? This
would be the base intention of a good-for-nothing, who deserves disgust
among people who are bound to the sweat of their brow after their fall,
and according to the expressions of the apostle he should not eat, because
he does not work [In 2 Thess. 3]. To leave the world and its own, in order
to make for oneself, in a venerable garment, a lofty precedence, founded
by reverence and confidence in the sanctity of status; in order to place
oneself, at least according to one’s dress, in a higher place, since one
makes no effort to tear oneself away from the rabble according to one’s
thinking and one’s manners: this is done only by the insolence of an
impudent man, who disgraces the most venerable of religion, and is a
desecrator of the altar.26

Tschick now obviously shared the opinion of many supporters of the
Enlightenment that the monasteries and clergy were also obliged to contribute to the welfare of its population since they enjoyed various privileges from the state. One of the commonplaces of the Catholic Enlight25. Tschick, Lobrede auf den hl. Petrus, 12–13.
26. Albert Tschick, Lobrede auf den heiligen Johann von Matha, Stifter des Ordens der
allerheiligsten Dreyfaltigkeit von Erlösung gefangener Christen […] (Preßburg, [1775?]), 7–8.

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enment was to view obligations to the state and the general public as religious obligations. Quite clear are Tschick’s words about Providence, by
which God “gives to mankind the great and enlightened spirits, who do
honor to mankind, and as teachers of people, are their excellent benefactors.”27 St. John of Matha was depicted as one such enlightened spirit. In
the sermon Tschick preached in 1783 on the occasion of Emperor Joseph
II’s name day to his regiment in the Dominican church in Sopron (Ödenburg in the sources, the German name of the town), Hungary,28 he
praised the reforms of the monarch, and among them he also spoke
approvingly of the abolition of “monasteries that do nothing for the
common good.”29 Tschick explicitly glorified Joseph II as the one who
would bring the morning of the Enlightenment, which had dawned under
Maria Theresa, to its brightest noon.30 The published sermon received a
very positive review in the journal Wöchentliche Wahrheiten für und über die
Prediger in Wien: “Few preachers among us have thought and spoken as
honestly for his monarch and as zealously for the best of the Enlightenment as this man.”31 However, the reviewer also mentioned both approving and disapproving reactions that immediately followed the sermon in
the church.32
Franz Poschinger was born on August 4, 1745 in Friesach,33 a town
in Carinthia. As the feast of St. Dominic, the founder of the Order of
Preachers, was celebrated on that day, one could say it was providential.
About a month later, he was baptized with the name Dominicus
Vinzenz.34 Poschinger was able to get to know the Order directly in his
birthplace, where a convent had been located since 1220. He made his
religious profession as filius nativus of the convent in Friesach on October
27. Tschick, Lobrede auf den heiligen Johann von Matha, 11.
28. Albert Tschick, Joseph der Zweyte für den Geist und die Herzen seiner Nationen […]
(Wien, 1783).
29. Ibid., 23.
30. Ibid., 12: “[Maria Theresia] nahm mit einer mütterlichen Gnadenhande, das zu
schwer drükkende Joch von den tief gebeugten Nakken des Landvolkes, (auflebende Freiheit
ist das Frühlingsalter zur Aufklärung). . . . Diesen Morgen anbrechender Aufklärung wird
uns die Wohlbegierde Josephs für sein Volk zum hellen Mittage fortschaffen.”
31. L[eopold] A[loys] Hoffmann, ed., Wöchentliche Wahrheiten für und über die Prediger
in Wien, 9 vols. (Vienna, 1782–84, here 1783), V, 245–54, here 245.
32. Hoffmann, Wöchentliche Wahrheiten, V, 253–54.
33. Regestum provinciae Hungariae sub provincialatu P. Fr. Antonini Thuille, fol. 80r.
34. Tauf-Buch bey der Stift- und Stadtpfarrkirche st. Bartlmae zu Friesach vom Jahre 1652
bis 1758, vol. 1, stored in Klagenfurt, Gurk Diocesan Archives, Friesach Parish Archives,
Geburtsbuch 1652–1758, p. 341, on September 4, 1745, available online: https://data.matricula-online.eu/de/oesterreich/gurk/friesach/F11_001-1/?pg=347.

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24, 1763.35 At the studium generale in Vienna, he studied philosophy
(1763–65) and then theology for three years.36 After his ordination to the
priesthood on August 10, 1768,37 Poschinger was appointed by his superiors to continue his studies, which he completed on December 29, 1769
with a lectorate exam: the corresponding entry in the register book of the
studium generale praises his tireless zeal and great talent.38 Already a few
days earlier, on December 23, he had passed the first exam pro cura animarum.39 His superiors designated him for tasks in pastoral care and
preaching at the Dominican church in Vienna. He was also appointed
assistant librarian of the Gschwind Library, a public library existing at the
Dominican convent.40 They must have been very pleased with him, since
the Austro-Hungarian Provincial had applied to the Master of the Order
for Poschinger’s transfiliation to the convent of Vienna, which was
granted on July 18, 1772.41 From this formal assignment one can read the
intention of his superiors to let Poschinger work in Vienna for a longer
period of time.
In Franz Poschinger’s oldest known sermon, delivered in Vienna in
1773, one finds a reminder that the interests of the state may well be in
conflict with the interests of religion; what seems beneficial to the society
35. Regestum provinciae Hungariae sub provincialatu P. Fr. Antonini Thuille, fol. 80r.
In an obituary of Poschinger, published in Intelligenzblatt der Allgemeinen LiteraturZeitung vom Jahre 1796, no. 87, July 9, 731–32, it is written that he made his profession in
1763 in the Dominican convent of Neukloster (Novi Klošter in present-day Slovenia). This is
possible. It does not exclude the fact that he was accepted for the convent of Friesach. This
article’s author has not been able to verify the information through the archival sources that
he is aware of. It should be noted that the obituary gives an incorrect date of Poschinger’s
birth (September 4).
36. Regestum studii generalis Viennensis Ordinis Praedicatorum erectum anno Domini
MDCLXXXVII, stored in Vienna, DCA, Bücher Nr. 34, fols. 208v [p. 410], 214v [p. 422],
226v [p. 426]. This manuscript contains two different paginations, one continuous and the
other not, but both are incorrect. The author notes here the foliation; however, for the sake
of clarity when checking the citations, the continuous page numbering contained in the manuscript is given in the brackets.
37. Regestum studii generalis, stored in Vienna, DCA, Bücher Nr. 34, fol. 227r [p. 447].
38. Ibid., fol. 230r [p. 453].
39. Ibid., fol. 230r [p. 453].
40. Intelligenzblatt der Allgemeinen Literatur-Zeitung vom Jahre 1796, no. 87, July 9,
731. Unfortunately, the author has not found a source for this appointment in the archives of
the Vienna convent. On the library, see Walburga Oppeker, “Zur wechselvollen Geschichte
der Bibliotheca Windhagiana,” Studien zur Wiener Geschichte. Jahrbuch des Vereins für
Geschichte der Stadt Wien, 69/70/71 (2013/2014/2015), 159–309, here 187–88.
41. Regestum literarum patentium 1768–1809, stored in Rome, Archivum Generale
Ordinis Praedicatorum (hereafter referred to as AGOP), IV.240, Prov. Hungariae, p. 5.

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may be highly detrimental to the faith.42 In the sermon on St. Boniface in
1775, Poschinger complained about the sciences that were forming free
spirits out of the Christians of his century.43 When he preached a sermon
on the patron saints of the county of Tyrol in 1778, he addressed the
“strong spirits” of his century with sharp words, accusing them of putting
their proud reason above the Gospel.44 Of course, these are not formulations in which a trace of Enlightenment can be found. It is different, however, with the sermon on St. John of Nepomuk that Poschinger delivered
in Trieste in 1778, in which he clearly distinguished the piety of the saint
from raptures and superstition. He said:
There is a false zeal which, under the pretense of goodness, plunges us
into a thousand errors, which sometimes become ridiculous to the reasonable, and at other times annoying. Certain devotions of the rabble
give evidence of this, where one omits the essential without conscience,
and instead idolizes freaks of God’s service, which either a pious selfinterest or a never excusable stupidity has hatched. This false zeal, even if
it seems to be holy, is always a rejected zeal: because God is the truth, and
only in the truth wants to be worshipped.45

On April 7, 1778, at the request of the Provincial,46 the Master of the
Order granted Poschinger the title praedicator generalis,47 a title that
expressed formal recognition of his preaching activity and was associated
with various prerogatives in the Order. The list of Poschinger’s merits,
which was presented to the Master of the Order when the application was
made, also states that he had preached an Advent sermon in the Court
42. Franz Poschinger, Lobrede auf den heiligen Domitian Erzherzogen in Kärnten […]
(Vienna, [1773?]), sigs. A4v–B1r.
43. Franz Poschinger, Lobrede auf den heiligen Bonifacius Erzbischof zu Maynz und Martyrer […] (Vienna, [1775?]), sigs. A4v–B1r: “Kaum hat er [= Boniface] sich die Vollkommenheiten des Ordens eigen gemacht, so fängt er mit grossen Schritten die glänzende Laufbahne
der Wissenschaften an. Sind es vielleicht jene schöne Wissenschaften gewesen, die unsern
Jahrhunderte einen ewigen Schandfleck versetzen, die aus den christlichsten Herzen ganz
langsam die ausgelassenste Freygeister bilden? Nein! Der Himmel hat ihn vor dieser Seuche
bewahret.”
44. Franz Poschinger, Lobrede auf die Schutzheiligen der gefürsteten Graffschaft Tyrol […]
(Vienna, 1778), 12.
45. Franz Poschinger, Lobrede auf den heiligen Blutzeugen Joannes von Nepomuk […]
(Trieste, 1777), 10.
46. See the letters of the Provincial Hyacinth Dauderlau to the Master of the Order
from December 22, 1777 and February 26, 1778, stored in Rome, AGOP, XIII.79414 (Prov.
Hungariae).
47. Regestum literarum patentium 1768–1809, stored in Rome, AGOP, IV.240, Prov.
Hungariae, p. 7.

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Chapel that very much pleased the Empress. Furthermore, it is noteworthy
that the Italian Dominican Pietro Maria Gazzaniga, who had held the
Thomistic chair at the Theological Faculty in Vienna since 1760, was mentioned as a possible witness to what was on the list.48 It would be interesting to know what opinion Gazzaniga had of Poschinger, especially since
he was a Thomist critical of the decayed Scholasticism of the eighteenth
century and an advocate of a reform of theological studies.49
As in Tschick’s sermon on St. John of Matha mentioned earlier, criticism of religious neglecting their duties and being lazy about work can also
be found in Poschinger’s sermon on St. Ulrich, Bishop of Augsburg, delivered in Vienna in 1779. Typical of an Enlightenment sermon is the
emphasis on St. Ulrich as a man who not only practiced asceticism but also
faithfully fulfilled his duties, as well as the bold assertion that “a pious idler
on earth is as much as a damned man in hell.”50 Especially remarkable is
the praise of the saint as an exemplary citizen, loyal to the ruler and the
state; in this way Ulrich followed the example of Jesus, “who for thirty
years, so to speak, forgot his divinity, so that he would be occupied only
with the observation of the duties of the common best.”51
Poschinger’s fame and career continued to grow in the 1780s. After
Emperor Joseph II had introduced an institute for the poor in Vienna and
Lower Austria on June 2, 1783, under the name Vereinigung aus Liebe des
Nächsten [Association for the Love of Neighbor],52 Poschinger advertised
it in several sermons. He presented the support of poor fellow citizens as a
48. Merita R.P. Fr. Francisci Poschinger, stored in Rome, AGOP, XIII.80530 (Prov.
Hungariae), Personalia aa. 1716–1781. The document was an annex to the Provincial’s
request of December 22, 1777 (see above footnote 46).
49. Thomas M. Wehofer, “Der Dominikaner und Wiener Universitätsprofessor Petrus
Gazzaniga über den pädagogischen Wert der scholastischen Methode des achtzehnten
Jahrhunderts,” Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für deutsche Erziehungs- und Schulgeschichte, 8
(1898), 191–97. For a biography of Gazzaniga, see Agostino Selva, “Padre Pietro Maria Gazzaniga, O.P. (1722–1799), grande teologo bergamasco, accademico eccitato,” Atti dell’Ateneo
di Scienze Lettere ed Arti di Bergamo, 43 (1982–83), 259–84. For more on Gazzaniga’s activities in Vienna, see Peter Hersche, Der Spätjansenismus in Österreich, [Veröffentlichungen der
Kommission für Geschichte Österreichs, 7], (Vienna, 1977), 109–18.
50. Franz Poschinger, Rede auf den heiligen Udalrich, Bischof von Augsburg […] (Vienna,
[1779?]), sigs. B2v–C1v.
51. Poschinger, Rede auf den heiligen Udalrich, sig. C3v.
52. Martin Scheutz, “Demand and Charitable Supply: Poverty and Poor Relief in Austria in 18th and 19th Centuries,” in: Health Care and Poor Relief in 18th and 19th Century
Southern Europe, eds. Ole Peter Grell, Andrew Cunningham, and Bernd Roeck (London,
2017), 52–95, here 64.

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497

contribution to universal happiness, whereby the individual ultimately does
the best for himself.53 Poschinger gained special recognition in enlightened
Catholic circles through his sermons characterized by sober rhetoric and
aimed essentially at improving the morals of Christians in society. An
example of positive reviews is found in the journal Wöchentliche Wahrheiten.
In the issue of September 18, 1783, it was said that Poschinger could
increasingly be compared to Socrates, who drew philosophy down from the
unearthly heights to the people.54 In November 1783, his superiors
assigned him the office of professor eloquentiae,55 and thus also the responsibility of the rhetorical training of the friars in the convent. His good reputation, and presumably Emperor Joseph II’s own experience of him,
finally led the emperor to appoint Poschinger as his Court Preacher in
November 1783, which he retained until his retirement in 1795.56 In the
satirical Oesterreichische Biedermannschronik, published anonymously in
1784, this appointment was presented as an acknowledgment of
Poschinger, who was not appreciated by ecclesiastical superiors.57
The World of Vienna Freemasonry
When Tschick and Poschinger became affiliated with Freemasonry58 in
1783, the brotherhood already had a tradition of more than forty years in
53. Hoffmann, Wöchentliche Wahrheiten (here 1783), VI, 91–98, here 92.
54. Hoffmann, Wöchentliche Wahrheiten (here 1783), VII, 77–81, here 77.
55. Liber consiliorum conventus Viennensis 1773–1815, stored in Vienna, DCA, Bücher
Nr. 47, p. 54, entry on November 4, 1783; Rerum gestarum gubernante almam provinciam
Hungariae sacri ordinis Praedicatorum admodum reverendo ac eximio ss. theologiae magistro P. Fr.
Hyacintho Dauderlau, priore provinciali dignissimo, series ab anno 1775, stored in DCA, Bücher
Nr. 57, fol. 202v.
56. Cölestin Wolfsgruber, Die k. u. k. Hofburgkapelle und die k. u. k. Geistliche Hofkapelle
(Vienna, 1905), 312 and 336–37.—As part of his church reforms, when the emperor planned
to establish a general seminary in the Dominican convent, it was allegedly Poschinger who dissuaded him from this plan. Sebastian Brunner, Der Prediger-Orden in Wien und Oesterreich […]
(Vienna, 1867), 16–17n25. It is uncertain whether the report that Brunner knew from only oral
tradition corresponds to reality. When Joseph II visited the convent on January 17, 1783 to
inspect the facilities, Poschinger did not yet have his position at court. The emperor’s visit is documented in Regestum studii generalis stored in Vienna, DCA, Bücher Nr. 34, fol. 257v [p. 508].
57. Oesterreichische Biedermanns-Chronik. Ein Gegenstück zum Fantasten- und PredigerAlmanach (Freiheitsburg [i.e., Vienna], 1784), 162–63. However, in the sources from the
Vienna Dominican Convent Archives there is no indication that Poschinger would have been
elected prior of the convent, nor would his superiors not have confirmed the election.
58. A significant moment in the history of international Freemasonry was the formal
founding of the Grand Lodge in London, dated by traditional historiography to 1717. However, according to recent research by Andrew Prescott and Susan M. Sommers, it only
occurred in 1721. For the argument that James Anderson’s account of the founding of the

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Ignaz Unterberger, Initiation ceremony in Viennese Masonic Lodge, during reign of
Joseph II, 1789, oil painting. Currently stored in the Vienna Museum at Karlsplatz,
with a copy hanging in the Austrian Museum of Freemasonry in Schloss Rosenau
(Waldviertel). Painting is in the public domain.

Vienna. The first lodge in the capital of the Habsburg Empire, Aux Trois
Canons, was founded on September 17, 1742 at the suggestion of the canon
and later bishop of Breslau, Philipp Gotthard von Schaffgotsch (1716–95),
himself a Freemason. It happened four years after the 1738 condemnation
by the Bull In Eminenti, which had not been published in Austria because
of the lack of the Sovereign’s placet. Presumably, behind the scenes of this
non-action was Duke Francis Stephen of Lorraine, who since 1736 was
Maria Theresa’s husband and the son-in-law of the reigning Emperor
Charles VI (1711–40), as well as himself a member of Masonry. Nonetheless, the lodge Aux Trois Canons only had a short duration because it was
closed by order of Maria Theresa (1740–80) in March 1743. The force
lodge in 1717 is an invention, see Andrew Prescott and Susan M. Sommers, “En busca del
Apple Tree: una revisión de los primeros años de la masonería inglesa,” Revista de Estudios
Históricos de la Masonería Latinoamericana y Caribeña, 9, no. 2 (2017), 22–49. See also their
paper “1717 and All That.” Retrieved on June 13, 2023, from https://www.quatuorcoronati.
com//wp-content/uploads/2018/01/1717-And-All-That-Prescott-Sommers.pdf.

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

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Clement XII, In eminenti apostolatus specula (Vatican, April 28, 1738), 1.

behind the intervention was the Papal Nuncio Camillo Paolucci. He also
instructed preachers in Vienna to make known the Bull In Eminenti and to
preach against the Masons during Lent of 1743. According to the nuncio,
there was no longer any reason for the Freemasons to base their excuses on
an alleged ignorance of the papal condemnation.59 Also, the anti-Masonic
Bull of Benedict XIV, Providus of 1751, did not receive a placet in Austria.
However, this did not mean that the circumstances were favorable to the
Masons. Nonetheless, despite difficult conditions in the 1750s and 1760s,
the activity of the Masons persisted in becoming even more intensive in the
1770s, even though it was illegal. As a result, in 1780 there were six lodges
in Vienna with about two hundred members.60
59. José A. Ferrer Benimeli, “Rom und die Verfolgung der Freimaurer in Österreich,”
in: Beförderer der Aufklärung in Mittel- und Osteuropa. Freimaurer, Gesellschaften, Clubs, eds.
Éva H. Balász, Ludwig Hammermayer, Hans Wagner and Jerzy Wojtowicz (Berlin, 1979),
87–102, here 87–95; Helmut Reinalter, Aufklärung, Humanität und Tolleranz. Die Geschichte
der österreischichen Freimaurerei im 18. Jahrhundert, [Quellen und Darstellungen zur europäischen Freimaurerei, 18] (Innsbruck, 2017), 43–45.
60. Reinalter, Aufklärung, 102–03. There were the following lodges: Zur gekrönten Hoffnung [Crowned Hope], Zu den drei Adlern [Three Eagles], Zum Palmbaum [Palm Tree], Zum
heiligen Joseph [Holy Joseph], Provincial Lodge of Austria, and Zur Beständigkeit [Steadfastness]. See Eugen Lennhoff, Oskar Posner and Dieter A. Binder, Internationales Freimaurerlexikon, 5th ed. (Munich, 2006), 904.

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The Holy Roman Emperor Francis Stephen (1745–65) originally protected the Freemasons. Elevated to co-regent with Maria Theresa after his
father’s death, Joseph II used his influence in favor of the Masons.61 Once
he took over the sole reign of the government in 1780, a period of greater
flourishing for the lodges in Vienna began. Still, the meetings of the lodges
remained formally illegal until the issuance of the imperial handbillet
(Freimaurerpatent) on December 11, 1785. Only by this document were
the meetings legally permitted. Paradoxically, this recognition that Joseph
justified due to the positive contributions Freemasonry made to society,
also meant putting them under state control and restricting the activities of
the lodges to the provincial capitals of the monarchy. Although some
Masons took a positive stance on the Freimaurerpatent in publications,
there were numerous critical reactions. Among the most challenging provisions of the handbillet was the order to submit directories of the brethren
to state authorities on a regular basis. Apparently, the fear of many that
their affiliation with Freemasonry would become public led them to leave
the lodge. However, several Viennese brethren decided to leave due to the
tensions and conflicts that arose among them due to the transformations in
Freemasonry caused by the Josephine document.62
Regarding the character of the Viennese lodges, it can be said that they
were a kind of gentleman’s club because they attracted numerous men, both
noble as well as non-noble, of various professions. The members met to discuss intellectual, social, and religious topics, to hold common meals, and, last
but not least, to carry out charitable activities (collections for the needy).63
With regard to Christianity, they emphasized its practical aspects, “useful
morals,” while they were little interested in speculative questions. In general,
they were not declared opponents of the Church. Thus, one understands that
reform-minded clerics who were interested in interacting with educated,
like-minded men subjectively saw no obstacle in joining Masonry.64 There is
61. Concerning a statement of 1777, in which Joseph II objected to the proposal of the
State Chancellor Wenzel Anton Kaunitz about prohibition of Masonic activities in the Austrian
Netherlands, see Derek Beales, Joseph II, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 1987–2009, here 1987), I, 486.
62. Reinalter, Aufklärung, 178–94. On Joseph’s relationship to Freemasonry, see also,
e.g., Beales, Joseph II, II, 526–43.
63. Beales, Joseph II, II, 532–33.
64. Franz Wehrl, “Der ‘Neue Geist’ Eine Untersuchung der Geistesrichtungen des
Klerus in Wien von 1750–1790,” Mitteilungen des Österreichischen Staatsarchivs, 20 (1967),
36–114, here 73–81. In the conclusion, on p. 107, the author states: “Freemasonry was until
the time 1785–87 a primarily social element in Vienna. Therefore, if a clergyman was a
member of the lodge, this did not have to be the criterion of his lack of orthodoxy or even of
his anti-faith attitude, as was evident from the relevant chapters and biographical notes.”

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

501

Anton von Maron, Portrait of Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor, 1775, oil painting,
95.3  67.9 (242  172.5 cm). Currently located in the Kunsthistorisches Museum
in Vienna, accession no. GG_6200.

even an example of what amounts to a self-defense by the former Jesuit Karl
Josef Michaeler, in Beruhigung eines Katholiken über die päpstlichen Bullen
wider die Freymäurerey von Bruder M*** (Kosmopolis 5782 [Nürnberg,
1782?]).65 Active in Innsbruck until 1782 and then in Vienna, he argued
against the reasons given in the Bull Providus for prohibiting the participation of Catholics in Masonic activities. Nonetheless, those who joined
Masonry had to be aware that their conservative fellow priests, and in particular their superiors, would disapprove of them. Reinhard Taute cited several examples of priests in the Archdiocese of Vienna who were reproved for
membership in Freemasonry by Archbishop Cardinal Anton Christoph
Migazzi.66
Among the lodges that existed in Vienna in the 1780s, the best information comes from the sources about Zur wahren Eintracht [True Concord],
65. Wehrl, “Der ‘Neue Geist,’” 84–85; Reinalter, Aufklärung, 46–49 and 195–96.
66. Reinhard Taute, Die katholische Geistlichkeit und die Freimaurerei: Ein kulturgeschichtlicher Rückblick, 2nd ed. (Leipzig 1895), e.g. 26 (Melchior Blarer), 76–77 (Andreas
Schwarzenbach).

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founded on March 12, 1781.67 In this case, it has been clearly established
that a strong anticlerical spirit prevailed in the lodge. Furthermore, many of
the brethren belonging to it also departed from the orthodox Christian
faith.68 Ideas that strongly relativized Christianity as the religion of truth and
salvation found their way into the lodge, especially through brethren who
also belonged to the Illuminati Order founded in 1776. Among them was
Ignaz von Born, who worked as the Master of Zur wahren Eintracht 1783–
85.69 Pierre-Yves Beaurepaire drew attention to a high dynamism that distinguished this lodge, especially in the frequency of meetings, pointing out
the difference on average of eight meetings per month in Zur wahren Eintracht and a very good average of ten times per year in French lodges.70 The
members of the lodge had a very high self-imposed educational demand evidenced by founding a lodge library, organizing lectures, and publishing. The
training lodges initiated by von Born in 1782 had great success and shaped
the reputation of Zur wahren Eintracht as an academic lodge. In these lodges
the brethren were to give lectures on learned topics (theological controversies
and state-political issues were explicitly excluded). These lectures were published in the Journal für Freymaurer issued from 1784–87.71
An antipole to Zur wahren Eintracht was represented in Viennese
Freemasonry by Zur Beständigkeit, founded in 1779.72 Unfortunately,
67. Ludwig Abafi, Geschichte der Freimaurerei in Österreich-Ungarn, 5 vols. (Budapest,
1890–99, here 1893), IV, presented the history of the lodge from 1781 to 1785 on pp. 278–
318, for the date of foundation see 279. A comprehensive picture of the activity of the lodge
is offered by the edition of the minutes of the meetings by Hans-Josef Irmen, ed., Die Protokolle der Wiener Freimaurerloge “Zur wahren Eintracht” (1781–1785), [Schriftenreihe der
Internationalen Forschungsstelle “Demokratische Bewegungen in Mitteleuropa 1770–1850,”
15)], (Frankfurt am Main, 1994). In the introduction, on p. 8, 1782 is erroneously given as
the year of foundation.
68. See the chapter on religious views in the lodge in Wilgert Te Lindert, Aufklärung
und Heilserwartung: philosophische und religiöse Ideen Wiener Freimaurer (1780–1795) (Frankfurt am Main, 1998), 72–100, here 72.
69. Irmen, Protokolle, 15; Helmut Reinalter, “Ignaz Edler von Born und die Illuminaten in Österreich,” in: Der Illuminatenorden: (1776–1785/87): Ein politischer Geheimbund
der Aufklärungszeit, ed. Helmut Reinalter, [Schriftenreihe der Internationalen
Forschungsstelle “Demokratische Bewegungen in Mitteleuropa 1770–1850,” 24], (Frankfurt
am Main, 1997), 351–91.
70. Pierre-Yves Beaurepaire, L’Europe des francs-maçons (XVIII e–XXI e siècle), 2nd ed.
(Paris, 2018), 239.
71. Irmen, Protokolle, 16–18. For more about the training lodges and the Journal see
Markus Meumann, “Logenreden und Übungslogen. Zur Praxis des Sprechens und
Schreibens über vorgegebene Themen in der Freimaurerei des 18. Jahrhunderts,” Aufklärung,
28 (2016), 239–74, here 260–70.
72. Abafi, Geschichte der Freimaurerei, IV, 318–27.

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

503

much less is known about their activities than those of their sister lodge.
However, in the book Briefe eines Biedermanns an einen Biedermann, published anonymously in 1786 by Leopold Aloys Hoffmann, himself a
Freemason, one finds a description of several Viennese lodges, including
these two. Zur wahren Eintracht, according to Hoffman, was a group of
very wise and worthy men who promoted the work of Masonry primarily
through their scholarship.73 He did not have a great opinion of Zur
Beständigkeit, because the lodge was too pious and its members spoke
strongly of Christ. According to Hoffmann, Zur Beständigkeit lacked the
true spirit of the Masonry. It had numerous enemies among members of
other lodges who spoke ill of its work.74 At the conclusion of his fictional
letter to a friend who might wish to become a Mason, the author gave a
recommendation:
But if you love the company of scholars, or if you want to expand your
knowledge in whatever subject, and finally, in view of your knowledge,
attain the high grace of being stretched to the yoke of service, then I
advise you to apply to the Eintracht for admission. If, finally, you wish to
become quite pious, or if you have other attacks of hypochondria, then I
know of no better advice to give you than to let yourself be accepted the
sooner the better at the Beständigkeit im Orient; only do not imagine that
you (you may be accepted wherever) are a true mason because of this.75

Also, according to another contemporary testimony, Zur Beständigkeit
was hardly respected by other lodges of Vienna because of “its bigotries.”76
Deserving of attention is Eva Huber’s research on the social structure
of the Viennese Freemasons, especially on confessional affiliation and the
proportion of clergy in the total number of members. Between 1780 and
1790, she identified a total of fifty-six members of the clergy among the
brethren of the Vienna lodges: among these were fifty-three Catholic
priests,77 two Lutheran ministers, and one Reformed pastor. The increase

73. Briefe eines Biedermanns an einen Biedermann (Munich, 1786), 39–40.
74. Ibid., 39–42.
75. Ibid., 43–44.
76. Ignaz Aurelius Fessler, Fessler’s sämmtliche Schriften über Freymaurerey: Wirklich als
Manuscript für Brüder, 2nd ed. (Freiberg, 1805), 289–90.
77. Huber thus specified the figure of “about 50” (Catholic) clerics found in Wehrl,
“Der ‘Neue Geist,’” 56. However, Wehrl drew attention to the fact that the figure, which had
been estimated much higher by earlier authors, can hardly be definitively established. Only
the persons mentioned in the surviving lists and minutes of the lodges are for certain to be
considered members.

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in the percentage of clerics within this period reached its peak in 1787,
when they represented 5.9% of all brethren. After that, the percentage
decreased to 4% in 1790.78 Probably, this drop related to the crisis of
Masonry after the Freimaurerpatent. One wonders, however, how to interpret the percentage increase immediately after the publication of the document in 1785. Although Zur wahren Eintracht was mostly Catholic (75
percent in 1781, about 85 percent in 1785), there were also Lutherans and
Reformed Christians among the members.79 On the other hand, Huber
found from the information available that all the brethren of Zur
Beständigkeit had exclusively belonged to the Catholic Church.80 As far as
the number of clergymen is concerned, Zur wahren Eintracht had the highest number among all Viennese lodges, 7.3 percent. It was followed by Zur
Beständigkeit with 6.7 percent. To a religious order belonged 2.5 percent of
the members of Zur wahren Eintracht and 1.1 percent of the members of
Zur Beständigkeit. Zur wahren Eintracht was the only lodge before the
Josephine Freemasonry Reform of 1785 in which non-Catholic clergy
were also present.81
Tschick and Poschinger among the Masonic brethren
Tschick and Poschinger joined these two lodges situated on different
poles of Viennese Masonry. Tschick opted for Zur wahren Eintracht.82
Franz Wehrl, who studied the presence of the Viennese clergy among the
Freemasons, wrote that “it is hardly to be expected that we will come across
personal statements by clergymen, confessions in which they justify their
participation in Masonry.”83 From this perspective, Albert Tschick is a fortunate find. On August 5, 1783, he wrote a letter to Joseph Ludwig Freiherr von Born,84 Captain of the Military Academy in Wiener Neustadt,
the brother of Ignaz von Born, the Master of Zur wahren Eintracht, and
also a member of the same lodge. Tschick explained that through good
acquaintances during his service in the military, as well as through his reading, an interest in the Freemasons had been awakened in him. He confessed what he had recognized to be their purpose:

78. Eva Huber, Sozialstruktur der Wiener Freimaurer: 1780–1790, 5 vols. (Phil. Dissertation, University of Vienna, 1991), I, 613–15.
79. Ibid., 299.
80. Ibid., 284.
81. Ibid., 613–17.
82. Irmen, Protokolle, 8–20; Abafi, Geschichte der Freimaurerei, IV, 278–318.
83. Wehrl, “Der ‘Neue Geist,’” 77.
84. For a brief biographical note, see Irmen, Protokolle, 322.

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

505

In a certain equality situation of human beings, otherwise so confused
outside, but here so amiably harmonized, to make them so happy even
among themselves, that just by this, through this intimately united
brotherly love, they become, according to their gifts of happiness and
spirit, the happiness of their fellow human beings.

Therefore, Tschick asked Captain von Born, whom he knew personally, for
help in becoming a member.85 This goal of the brotherhood, mentioned by
Tschick, can certainly be described as Christian in character. As Jeffrey D.
Burson wrote in his book on Abbé Yvon, Catholic clergy might have their
good reasons for considering “their roles as Freemasons to be generally
compatible with their clerical vocation.”86
After a favorable vote was taken on him at the meeting of Zur wahren
Eintracht on August 24, 1783,87 Albert (Franz Xaver) Tschick was admitted to the lodge on August 29.88 In a letter written on October 8, 1783, in
Sopron (Ödenburg), Hungary, where his regiment was stationed, Tschick
asked the Lodge Master for admission to higher degrees. Tschick hoped
that his request could already be fulfilled at the end of October, when he
should be in Vienna. Tschick admitted that his request for a double promotion was somewhat audacious, but he hinted at a possible transfer in the
future, which might make it more difficult to get to Vienna from a more
distant location.89 In fact, on October 31, Tschick was promoted from the
first degree of Entered Apprentice to the second degree of Fellow of the
Craft.90 In an undated letter to the Master and members of the lodge, he
thanked them for granting him the second degree and asked for admission
to the third degree. At the same time, he apologized for not always being
able to be present at the meetings due to “profane circumstances.”91 This
expression, which denoted all non-Masonic activities,92 is remarkable,
85. Albert Tschick, Letter to Joseph Ludwig Freiherr von Born, stored in Vienna, Österreichisches Staatsarchiv, Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv, Kabinetsarchiv (hereafter referred to
as ÖStA, HHStA, KA), Vertrauliche Akten 68-3-155, fols. 369 and 372.
86. Burson, The Culture of Enlightening, 128.
87. Irmen, Protokolle, no. 203, pp. 156–57.
88. Irmen, Protokolle, no. 205, p. 157.
89. Albert Tschick, Letter to the Lodge Master of Zur wahren Eintracht from October 8,
5783 [= 1783], stored in Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 65/1-1-43, fols.
258-59.
90. Irmen, Protokolle, no. 222 and 223, pp. 167–68.
91. Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 68-3-284, fols. 633 and 635.
92. After passing through the initiation ritual, which was understood as a separation
from the profane world, the brethren saw themselves as belonging to the sacred space of the
lodge. Kenneth Loiselle, Brotherly Love: Freemasonry and Male Friendship in Enlightenment
France (Ithaca, NY, 2014), 53–60.

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TWO ENLIGHTENMENT DOMINICANS

because obviously Tschick counted his duties as a military chaplain among
the “profane” ones as well. Eventually, he reached the third degree of
Master Mason on November 14, 1783.93
However, even before this promotion, Tschick himself played the role
of a mediator in the admission of a new member of the lodge. In the abovementioned letter of October 8, he informed the Master of the Lodge about
a conversation with Baron Sigismund von Enzenberg,94 a senior lieutenant
of the same regiment where Tschick served as chaplain. Once, when
Tschick found von Enzenberg reading the Masonic book Der flammende
Stern,95 he asked von Enzenberg if he was a Freemason. The Senior Lieutenant’s response was that he was not but would like to be. However, he
did not know anyone who could help him. Tschick interrupted the conversation at this point without letting himself be recognized as a Mason. Now
Tschick asked the Master of the Lodge in his letter how to act in this case,
pointing out that von Enzenberg was “not a miracle according to his head,
but his heart is one of the best,” which sounded like a recommendation.96
The following October 13, von Enzenberg wrote Tschick a letter. After
addressing Tschick as “Dearest friend!” von Enzenberg continued, “I certainly hope to be that in your heart—a true sincere friend! In mine, you are
it, in the most genuine sense.” He praised the priest’s helpfulness and philanthropy, well-known in the regiment. He confessed that he suspected
Tschick was a Freemason, but he was not certain. In case Tschick were,
von Enzendorf asked him to help him to “the happiness of being associated
with the most worthy people.”97 The letter is an interesting testimony of
the good reputation that Tschick enjoyed among the members of the regiment, and of his personal charisma that the young nobleman positively
perceived. Further, it reveals von Enzenberg’s longing for friendship, a
motivation for men to join Masonry that should not be underestimated.98
At the same time, one notes that great importance was given to secrecy
concerning the membership of the lodge. According to the minutes of the
93. Irmen, Protokolle, no. 227 and 228, pp. 171–72.
94. For a brief biographical note, see Irmen, Protokolle, 323–24.
95. The book L’étoile flamboyante, ou La société des francs-maçons, considéré sous tous les
aspects by Louis Théodore-Henri de Tschoudy, published in Frankfurt and Paris in 1766, 2
vols., was subsequently published in German in 1779 in Berlin under the title Der flammende
Stern: Oder die Gesellschaft der Freymäurer von allen Seiten betrachtet, 2 vols., trans. Johann
Wilhelm Bernhard von Hymmen.
96. Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 65/1-1-43, fols. 258–59.
97. Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 68-3-64, fols. 165–66.
98. Kenneth Loiselle, devoted himself to this topic, in the context of French Masonry,
in his study Brotherly Love: Freemasonry and Male Friendship in Enlightenment France.

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

507

lodge Zur wahren Eintracht, twenty-seven-year-old Sigismung von Enzenberg was accepted as Entered Apprentice on November 7, 1783.99
At this occasion, Tschick gave a speech, Über die Denkart der Maurer
[On the masons’ way of thinking], the handwritten original of which has
been handed down.100 Basically, it praises Freemasons as tireless disciples
of wisdom, seekers of truth, and disinterested benefactors of humanity, and
such as, the opposite of “priests [who] have profiteered with sacrifices of
religion.” Tschick accused the churchmen, “who let themselves be
solemnly anointed as heralds, teachers, and guardians of the truth,” of
having prevented the spread of enlightenment and of having pushed the
rising people back into ignorance.
This they did, these often purple, often miter-wearing stranglers of
reason, these sworn enemies against nature and human feeling, who,
under the most unreasonable prejudices, forgot what thinking is, and
what men feel through their benevolent mother nature, have laid up with
unholy oaths. It was they, through whose most colorful religious teachings people lost the charming image of the greatest Master Builder, this
loving Father of all his works; and instead received the horror image of a
tyrant, who, armed with a vengeful cudgel, should be able to laugh at the
eternal howling and chattering of his children’s teeth. They were the ones
who, with a foolish moral system, gathered us humans into a mass of sins,
and dreamed up a general material of vice, in order to put us, from the
first human being on, through all ranks of generations, into the most possible mischief by means of syllogisms.101

Tschick did not spare sharp expressions in the series of accusations
that continued. Afterwards, however, he came back to the Freemasons:
In our holy halls, my dear brothers, truth in light, beauty in actions, true
merit, and proper dignity of man are covered against all darkness of prejudices, against all intrigues of hypocrisy and malice.—Ages of the world,
revolutions, malice, and violence are not able to scare away existing truth
and virtue from our temple, where prudence and discretion are the
guards, brotherly love with the most intimate union of mind and heart is
the supporting staff in our progress, wisdom, beauty, and strength are the
guide of our stride.102
99. Irmen, Protokolle, no. 226, pp. 170–71.
100. Albert Tschick, Über die Denkart der Maurer, stored in Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA,
KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 69-3-6-13, fols. 19–20. See the mention of the speech in Irmen,
Protokolle, no. 226, p. 171.
101. Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 69-3-6-13, Tschick, Über die
Denkart der Maurer, fol. 19rv.
102. Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 69-3-6-13, Tschick, Über die
Denkart der Maurer, fol. 20r.

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In the cited sources, discretion was mentioned as a characteristic of the
Freemasons. It should be remembered that this speech was not intended for
the public.103 According to the minutes, Tschick delivered this speech to
forty men present. Presumably, he would have never used such harsh words
about members of the clergy and church hierarchy outside a closed circle of
people. However, the question arises, what led him to such a judgment?
Was it simply a representation of an image that circulated among Enlightenment thinkers and Freemasons, or did Tschick speak out of deep conviction based on his own experience? An answer cannot be given. However, it
is worth remembering his sermon of 1773, in which he defended the
priestly dignity of weak clerics. What a difference in speaking about priests!
From the minutes of the lodge one learns that Tschick frequently
attended the meetings in 1784. On October 4, he again acted as a “proposer”
for a “seeker” from his regiment, Lieutenant Hannig.104 At the meeting on
October 18, the brothers present dealt with an incident that could have had
unpleasant consequences for Tschick. It was about the fact that a member of
the lodge Zur Beständigkeit, Leopold Federl, who was a priest and a professor
of poetics at the University of Vienna,105 performed a cantata, composed by
a Freemason, in the Dominican convent. When a Dominican noticed the
origin of the cantata, he threw the sheet away—whereupon Federl confessed
to being a Freemason and said that there were several Freemasons also
among the Dominicans, mentioning Tschick by name. The brothers of the
lodge decided to report Federl to the district lodge because his indiscretion
could get Tschick into possible trouble.106 What reactions there were in the
Dominican convent afterwards, it is not known.
Poschinger’s ascent up the ladder of degrees in Zur Beständigkeit 107
cannot be followed in the same way as Tschick’s. It is known only from two
letters of the then-member and representing secretary Johann Baptist von
Cronberg to the secretary of Zur wahren Eintracht David Heinrich Gottfried von Pilgram that Poschinger was to be proposed for membership on
103. As stated above, some of the speeches delivered in the Lodge were published in
the Journal für Freymaurer, issued from 1784 to 1787. The intended audience was Freemason
brethren, although it had to be expected that the publications would also reach people outside
the Masonic circles. In any case, Tschick’s speech was not among the published contributions.
104. Irmen, Protokolle, no. 315, pp. 224–25.
105. The minutes of the meeting, according to the custom, mention only his surname.
For the identification see Abafi, Geschichte der Freimaurerei, IV, 319 and Wehrl, “Der ‘Neue
Geist,’” 59 (here the spelling Föderl).
106. Irmen, Protokolle, no. 318, pp. 226–28, here 227.
107. Abafi, Geschichte der Freimaurerei, IV, 318–27.

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

509

September 26, 1783,108 and was apparently admitted to the lodge on October 1 after a positive vote.109 In the meeting records of the lodge Zur
wahren Eintracht, there are not only entries about Tschick’s participation
in meetings of his own lodge, but also entries about Poschinger’s participation as a visiting brother.110
A noteworthy testimony about Albert Tschick and Franz Poschinger
as figures of the Viennese Freemasonry is the diary of the Lutheran theologian, church historian, and Freemason Friederich Münter from Copenhagen, who stayed in Vienna from August 30 to October 20, 1784.111 His
repeated presence in the Dominican convent112 and the hospitality shown
to him by the two friars says something about their awareness of belonging
to the “universal republic of Freemasons.”113 In Münter’s estimation,
Tschick and Poschinger were “very bright, and enlightened minds.”114 He
must have been particularly impressed to find works read by Poschinger by
authors such as Georg Joachim Zollikofer, Johann Friedrich Wilhelm
Jerusalem, and Johann Lorenz von Mosheim, famous Protestant authors of
the Enlightenment period. Regarding his conversations with the Dominicans, he noted:
We talked about the current Enlightenment. They both said that the
Catholic clergy would soon get further in the Enlightenment than we
would, because they had been brooding under pressure for a long time
108. Johann Baptist von Cronberg, Letter to David Heinrich Gottfried von Pilgram from
September 16, 5783 [= 1783], stored in Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 693-1, fol. 55. See also Irmen, Protokolle, no. 211, p. 160–61. For a biogram of von Pilgram, see
ibid., 333.
109. Johann Baptist von Cronberg, Letter to David Heinrich Gottfried von Pilgram from
September 28, 5783 [= 1783], stored in Vienna Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche
Akten, 69-3-1, fol. 53.
110. Irmen, Protokolle, passim on p. 157–282 (Tschick), passim on pp. 228–312
(Poschinger).
111. Øjvind Andreasen (ed.), Aus den Tagebüchern Friedrich Münters: Wander- und
Lehrjahre eines dänischen Gelehrten, 3 vols. (Kopenhagen, 1937), I, 55–124. For a biography of
Münter, see Viktoria Strohbach-Hanko, “Münter, Friedrich Christian Carl Heinrich,”
Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon, 6 (1993), 323–29.
112. At one point Münter made an amusing remark about how, while smoking in the
cloister, he memorized a piece of one of Luther’s sermons: “perhaps the first of Luther’s sermons of which a piece was memorized in a Dominican convent.” Andreasen, Aus den Tagebüchern Friedrich Münters, 72.
113. On this feature of Masonry see Pierre-Yves Beaurepaire, “La république universellè des francs-maçons entre «culture de la mobilité» et basculement national (XVIII e–
XIX e siècle),” Revue de synthèse, 123 (2002), 37–64.
114. Andreasen, Aus den Tagebüchern Friedrich Münters, 60.

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TWO ENLIGHTENMENT DOMINICANS
and would now suddenly break loose. They would also no longer be
bound to any symbol, and thus would be free of compulsion. We talked
a lot about the eternity of hell’s punishments, whether one should leave
the idea to the people, about the finiteness or infinity of sins, etc.115

According to Münter, actually, Poschinger and Tschick were “the only
two Dominicans of head and ability in Vienna”116 who were among
numerous members of the Masonic circle whom he encountered during
conversations, meals, and so forth. The Lutheran theologian, however,
especially appreciated Poschinger, even if Poschinger’s monkish appearance was not congenial to him: “One sees immediately that he is a monk.
Even his bright look is set in an enormous monk’s face, which admittedly
has much that is noble and firm.” But at the same time, from Münter’s perspective, he could hardly have found a better compliment for the Dominican: “I believe that Luther in his first male age looked like him.”117 In
Tschick, Münter missed Poschinger’s maturity as well as his “true and
practical view.” He did, however, acknowledge Tschick’s potential to
“accomplish much” on the condition that “he would become quiet in his
village parish, and work.”118 Here, Münter referred to the parish in
Burgschleinitz, which Tschick was to take over just in that period, after
having left the military chaplain office.119
After Joseph II had decreed a reorganization of Freemasonry in his
hereditary lands with the handbillet of December 11, 1785, the activity of
the lodges Zur wahren Eintracht and Zur Beständigkeit was terminated. On
January 6, 1786, the Zur Wahrheit [Truth] was solemnly opened, uniting
in itself the lodges Zur wahren Eintracht, Zu den drei Adlern, and Zum
Palmbaum.120 However, some members of other former lodges also joined
115. Ibid., 60–61.
116. Ibid., 65. At this point, Münter adds regarding Poschinger that “the Very Reverend Cardinal Archbishop [i.e., Christoph Anton von Migazzi] teased him not a little.”
117. Ibid., 117.
118. Ibid., 120. Also, in a letter to Münter from Maria von Born, daughter of Ignaz
von Born, Master of Zur wahren Eintracht, one finds a short mention of Tschick, which suggests the presence of Tschick in the circle of von Born’s family and his sympathies for Münter.
Helmut W. Flügel, Maria von Born (1766–1830). Biographie einer emanzipierten Österreicherin
in einer Übergangszeit (Berlin, 2013), 26.
119. Presentation letter for Fr. Albert Tschick’s appointment as pastor in Burgschleinitz from
October 21, 1784, St. Pölten, stored in Diocesan Archives (hereafter referred to as DA), Pfarrund Klosterakten, Burgschleinitz 1. This parish, which had originally belonged to the diocese
of Passau, became part of the new diocese of St. Pölten established by Emperor Joseph II in
1784–85.
120. Irmen, Protokolle, 19–20. The only other lodge that existed in Vienna after the
reform was called Zur neugekrönten Hoffnung [New-Crowned Hope]. Helmut Reinalter,

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

511

the lodge Zur Wahrheit, like Franz Poschinger, whose name can be found
in the list of those present at the inaugural assembly.121 Poschinger, as well
as his confrere, Albert Tschick, attended the meeting on January 20.122
Poschinger’s habit of visiting Masons is also attested by the Hungarian
writer and Freemason Ferenc Kazinczy, who in 1786, during his stay in
Vienna, met the Dominican in the house of the famous writer, Aloys
Blumauer,123 on the occasion of a reading circle held there.124 Regarding
the religious practice of the Freemasons, it is worth noting what Kazinczy
noted about Poschinger in another place, namely that he had once heard
Blumauer’s confession when the latter had been lying ill.125
In the attendance records of Zur Wahrheit kept from 1786–87,
Poschinger’s name figures more frequently than Tschick’s; both appear for
the last time in the list of May 29, 1787.126 On June 5, 1787, Poschinger
informed Johann Baptist von Puthon, the Deputy Master of Zur
Wahrheit, that “profane business” no longer allowed him to attend meetings and “urgent causes” moved him to leave the lodge.127 Could it be that
“Ignaz von Born als Freimaurer und Illuminat,” in: Die Aufklärung in Österreich: Ignaz von
Born und seine Zeit, ed. Helmut Reinalter, [Schriftenreihe der Internationalen
Forschungsstelle “Demokratische Bewegungen in Mitteleuropa 1770–1850,” 4] (Frankfurt
am Main, 1991), 33-67, here 57.
121. Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 77-1, fol. 1r. See also, the “List
of Selected Members,” dated January 5, 1786, stored in ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche
Akten, 65/1-2-17-7, for Poschinger fol. 227v.
122. Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 77-1, fol. 2r.
123. Elisabeth Rosenstrauch-Königsberg, Freimaurer im Josephinischen Wien: Aloys
Blumauers Weg vom Jesuiten zum Jakobiner (Vienna, 1975).
124. Ferenc Kazinczy, Pályám emlékezete [Memories of My Career], ed. László Orbán,
[Kazinczy Ferenc Művei: Első osztály: Eredeti művek: Kritikai kiadás (Works of Ferenc Kazinczy: First Class: Original Works: Critical Edition)], (Debrecen, 2009), 598 and 767. For
the chronological classification of the encounter, see ibid., 994. The editor is apparently
unaware that Zur wahren Eintracht no longer existed in 1786.
125. Kazinczy, Pályám emlékezete, 74.
126. Attendance register of the lodge Zur Wahrheit, stored in Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA,
KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 77-1, fol. 16r. Surprisingly, Poschinger’s name is missing in several
membership directories in which Tschick, under his baptismal name Franz Xaver, appears:
Membership directory of the lodge Zur Wahrheit (1786), stored in ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 72-7-4, fols. 16-31; Membership directory of the lodge Zur Wahrheit (1786),
73-1-1, fols. 1–20; and Membership directory of the lodge Zur Wahrheit (1786), 73-1-30, fols.
241–59. However, there is a directory of the lodge members in which both are listed:
Poschinger as a priest of the Dominican Order and court preacher, Tschick as a parish priest
in Burgschleinitz: Membership directory of the lodge Zur Wahrheit (1787?), 72-7-7, fols. 49–
122: Poschinger at fol. 76v, Tschick (spelled Tschük) at fol. 85v.
127. Franz Poschinger, Letter to Johann Baptist von Puthon from June 5, 5787 [= 1787],
stored in Vienna, ÖStA, HHStA, KA, Vertrauliche Akten, 70-2-50, fols. 385–86.

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at this point the Dominican recognized membership in the lodge as
incompatible with his religious and clerical state? Was this decision
related to his role as Court Preacher? Unfortunately, Poschinger did not
leave any further explanations. At that time, it is certain, however, that
Viennese Masonry was in crisis. Several important members had already
left the lodge Zur Wahrheit, which was definitely dissolved in 1789.128
There also is no further information available about the Masonic activities
of Albert (Franz Xaver) Tschick.
Both Dominicans continued their official ministry. Poschinger was
Court Preacher, even under Joseph II’s successors Leopold II and Francis
II, until 1795, when he retired for health reasons.129 He died in his convent
on January 24, 1796.130 Tschick remained a pastor in Burgschleinitz and,
in addition, he was appointed vicar forane of the Eggenburg district in
September 1787.131 He held these two offices until his death in 1802.132
Tschick thus never returned to a convent, although formally he never
ceased to belong to the Order of Preachers.
Concluding Remarks
The relationship between the Dominicans in Vienna and the Catholic
Enlightenment has not gone unnoticed by researchers, but its study has been
limited to noting an affinity between the philo-Jansenist reform circles and
the Order, with attention mainly devoted to Pietro Maria Gazzaniga, who
held a chair at the university from 1760 to 1780.133 The present study broad128. Reinalter, “Ignaz von Born als Freimaurer,” 60-64.
129. Wolfsgruber, Die k. u. k. Hofburgkapelle, 336-37.
130. Intelligenzblatt der Allgemeinen Literatur-Zeitung vom Jahre 1796, no. 87, July 9,
731–32; Brunner, Der Prediger-Orden, 13.
131. Protocollum expeditorum, stored in St. Pölten, DA, Konsistorialkanzlei, Protokolle
1787, fol. 68v.
132. The exact date of death is uncertain. According to one source Tschick died on
February 21; see Series parochorum in Burgschleinitz. Composita a Wilhelmo Bielsky Can. Regulari S. Augustini in Herzogenburg, stored in St. Pölten, DA, Pfarr- und Klosterakten,
Burgschleinitz 1. Another source cites 10 April; Rerum gestarum gubernante almam provinciam
Hungariae [...], stored in Vienna, DCA, Bücher Nr. 57, fol. 228r.
133. Hersche, Der Spätjansenismus in Österreich, 109-18; Adam Seigfried, “Die Dogmatik im 18. Jahrhundert unter dem Einfluss von Aufklärung und Jansenismus,” in: Katholische Aufklärung und Josephinismus, ed. Elisabeth Kovács (Vienna, 1979), 241–65, here 257–63;
Klueting, “The Catholic Enlightenment in Austria,” 135–36 and 151; Lydia Bendel-Maidl,
“Reflexionen über das Gebet in theologischen Lehrbüchern der Aufklärung,” in: Katholische
Aufklärung und Josephinismus. Rezeptionsformen in Ostmittel- und Südosteuropa, ed. Rainer
Bendel and Norbert Spannenberg, [Forschungen und Quellen zur Kirchen- und Kultur-

VILIAM ŠTEFAN DÓCI

513

ens the view of this relationship by devoting attention to two friars, Albert
Tschick and Franz Poschinger, whose sympathies for the Enlightenment
eventually led them to join Freemasonry. Strictly speaking, only Poschinger
belonged to the Viennese Dominican convent. Therefore, Tschick leads to
possible expanded research on the attitude of the Dominicans of the Order’s
province in Austria and Hungary to the Enlightenment and Freemasonry.
The research into the history of the Dominican studium generale and the academic-intellectual activities of the friars in the capital of the Habsburg
monarchy in the eighteenth century, which the author of this article is currently carrying out, probably will shed more light on the relationship
between the Order and Catholic Enlightenment as well. One would like to
know more about the religious and academic milieu in which Poschinger was
formed and from which he never distanced himself. Of course, the same
question of religious and intellectual formation exists regarding Tschick, but
in his case one would have to deal with another studium generale of the
Dominican Province Hungaria, namely the one in Graz.
The stories of Tschick and Poschinger confirm what the historians
Burson and Loiselle (and others) stated regarding the conviction of many in
the eighteenth century about the possible compatibility between a clerical
vocation and Masonic activity. Anyway, among a broader group of Masonic
clergy in Vienna in the 1780s, they were the only Dominicans. Although
the reason for joining is explicitly documented in the sources only in
Tchick’s case, it seems to be fundamentally true for both of them that they
wanted to have active fellowship with others—that is, also with other
priests—who shared Enlightenment ideals, and to promote these ideals
with them. As far as it can be judged, their decision for their respective
lodges seems to correspond to the character and intensity of their Enlightenment attitude, preserved in the important testimony of their sermons.
Most notable is the evolution of Tschick’s attitude, whose deeply clerical St. Peter’s sermon of 1773 contrasts sharply with the anticlerical
speech he delivered in 1783 at his lodge, Zur wahren Eintracht. The fact
that he lived outside of a religious community exercising the priestly ministry from 1774 until his death in 1802 also raises the question of a possible
connection between personal dissatisfaction with the religious way of life
and his criticism of ecclesiastical authorities. His human character seems to
have had positive aspects according to the testimony of a member of his
geschichte Ostdeutschlands] (Cologne, 2015), 185–98, here 186–90. Gazzaniga, however,
belonged to the Dominican Province of Lombardy and returned to his province in 1781.
Selva, “Pietro Maria Gazzaniga,” 270.

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TWO ENLIGHTENMENT DOMINICANS

regiment, Baron von Enzenberg, although the scholar Münter noted
Tschick’s lack of maturity and balance. A complex personality!
In terms of their Enlightenment attitudes, Münter noted higher personal qualities in Poschinger, even if he observed similarities between
Tschick and Poschinger. Perhaps Münter’s observation that Poschinger
had a “practical view” refers to the fact that Poschinger strove for a middle
ground between tradition and reform by not taking too radical a stance,
and so could make a greater contribution in advancing the Enlightenment
reforms. There are indications that Poschinger was interested in a middle
course and was able to take it: his sermons; joining the lodge Zur
Beständigkeit, which—according to Leopold A. Hoffmann—was too pious
and in which the members spoke strongly about Christ; keeping his office
of the Court Preacher under the Reform Emperor Joseph II and his two
successors Leopold II and Francis II; and living in his religious community
until the end of his life.
Most likely Tschick and Poschinger were aware of the papal bulls condemning the association. However, in the specific state-church context of
the Habsburg monarchy, in which the bulls were not officially published,
they may not have felt obliged to be bound by them. One should not forget
that their contemporary, canonist Joseph Valentin Eybl, provided various
arguments against absolute papal power in his writings since the 1770s.134
Little is known about the position of the Viennese (Austrian) Dominicans
on Regalism. However, it is just as highly probable that Tschick and
Poschinger were aware of possible inconveniences in their ecclesiastical
and religious milieu, as indicated in the above-mentioned cantata event in
the Dominican convent concerning Tschick. However, they do not seem
to have feared the Freimaurerpatent’s order to submit lists of lodge members to the state authorities. They did not react to the reorganization of the
association by quitting immediately, as several other members of the lodges
did. What finally led to their separation from the brotherhood remains
open, as does the role the ideals of the Catholic Enlightenment played in
the rest of their lives.

134. For Eybl, see David Sorkin, The Religious Enlightenment. Protestants, Jews, and
Catholics from London to Vienna (Princeton, NJ, 2008), 215–59.

Questions about the Priestly and
Missionary Vocation and the Ordination of
John Nepomucene Neumann
RUDOLF SVOBODA*
Several publications are devoted to John Nepomucene Neumann
(1811–60), bishop of Philadelphia and the first American male saint.
The emphasis in these texts is mainly on his time in the United States
since 1836. On the contrary, the time of his youth and maturation in
Europe, in Bohemia, is somewhat neglected. However, his decision to
pursue the priesthood, becoming a missionary, and going to the United
States before receiving holy orders were the most significant events preceding everything else which followed in the young man´s life. In the
hagiographic and professional literature, these decisions are mentioned
in various contexts and often contradict each other. Based on research
from contemporary sources stored in European and American archives,
this study shows the accurate chronology of Neumann’s decisions, as
well as their demonstrable causes, based not only on his decisions but
also on the specific situation in his native Diocese of Budweis, and also
complicated relations between the Catholic Church and the state.
Keywords: John Nepomucene Neumann, missionary, priesthood,
vocation, ordination
Introduction to the Topic
Presenting in more detail the life of John Nepomucene Neumann
(1811–60) is not so much needed in the Catholic environment. A native of
Prachatice in South Bohemia (today’s Czech Republic, at the time part of
the Austrian Empire), a missionary and later a bishop of Philadelphia, he
has a firm place in the history of the nineteenth-century Church.
After studying at the gymnasium and philosophical lyceum in Budweis
(1823–31, today České Budějovice), he first began his local theological stud* Dr. Rudolf Svoboda is associate professor of church history at the Faculty of Theology,
University of South Bohemia, Czech Republic, email: svobodar@tf.jcu.cz. This article is published as an outcome of the research grant of Botstiber Institute for Austrian-American Studies/BIAAS, “The Missionary Neumann between the Old and the New Worlds.”

515

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

John Neumann, photograph, c. 1860, photographer unknown. Printed with
permission of the Redemptorist Archives, Philadelphia.

ies (1831–33), which he then completed in Prague (1833–35). He arrived in
the United States in the spring of 1836. He was ordained a priest in New
York, and was sent to serve in Williamsville near Niagara Falls. Among
other things, he was in charge of local German-speaking immigrant communities. In 1840 he joined the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer
(Redemptorists) in Pittsburgh. In 1847 he became head of the Redemptorist
province and served in Baltimore. In 1852, he became bishop of Philadelphia, in which position he remained until his sudden death in 1860.
As early as 1886, the diocesan part of the process leading to his canonization, which took place in 1977, began in Philadelphia and Budweis,
making him the first male American saint. His legacy is still alive, especially
in the American, Czech, Austrian, and German environments. Due to his
Czech-German origins, Neumann became, among other things, a bridge
for understanding and reconciliation between Czechs and the Germans
who were expelled from the territory of former Czechoslovakia after World
War II. He is considered one of the chief architects of American Catholic
education. Many educational institutions around the world carry his name.
Many authors, mainly from the Redemptorist congregation, have so
far devoted themselves to Neumann’s life and spiritual legacy. Rather
hagiographic works predominate, but we can also find purely academic

RUDOLF SVOBODA

517

studies. In these professional studies, attention was paid mainly to his
priestly and episcopal work, i.e., from his arrival on missions to the United
States of America in 1836 until he died in 1860.1 However, there are significant gaps in the knowledge of the previous stages of his life, i.e., his
childhood years, studies, and decision-making for the profession of priest
and missionary.2 One of the reasons was the practical impossibility of
examining some sources in the former Czechoslovakia (today’s Czech
Republic), which was behind the Iron Curtain from 1948 to 1989. It was
in these years when Neumann was beatified (1963) and subsequently canonized (1977) that academic interest in Neumann’s figure was at its peak
worldwide. The totalitarian communist regime persecuted the Catholic
Church in Czechoslovakia; Catholic Church historiography practically did
not exist at that time, let alone address the figure of Neumann.3

1. Almost complete older inventories of the Neumann bibliography can be found in the
journal Spicilegium Historicum Cogregationis SSmi Redemptoris (hereinafter referred to as
SHCSR). See Andreas Sampers, “Bibliographia Neumanniana, 1860–1962,” SHCSR, 11, no.
1 (1963), 261–72; Andreas Sampers, “Bibliographia Neumanniana, 1963–1976,” SHCSR, 24,
no. 2 (1976), 512–20.
For the latest updated list, see Adam Owczarski, Joannes Nepomuc Neumann (1811–
1860) (2022), 50 pp., manuscript, stored in the Archivium Generale Historicum Redemptoristarum, Roma (hereinafter AGHR Roma).
It should be mentioned that the golden period of the professional study of the character
and work of John Nepomucene Neumann was the ‘50s to ‘80s of the last century, i.e., a time
closely linked to his beatification and canonization. Among the key authors of this period who
built their work on source research are Michael J. Curley, Nicola Ferrante, André Sampers,
and Alfred C. Rush—all Redemptorists. Their professional work is still appreciated. Newer
authors mainly focus on Neumann’s theological and spiritual legacy. See, for example,
Richard Andrew Boever, The Spirituality of St. John Neumann, C.Ss.R., Fourth Bishop of
Philadelphia (unpublished PhD diss., St. Louis University, 1983); Richard Andrew Boever,
“A Pressing Need of the German Immigrants: the Proposed German Seminary to Train Men
for Ministry in America,” Redemptorist North American Historical Bulletin, 37 (2010), 2–5;
Richard Andrew Boever, “St. John Neumann´s Spirituality,” SHCSR, 59 (2011), 35–66;
Joseph F. Chorpenning, He Spared Himself in Nothing: Essays on the Life and Thought of St.
John Nepomucene Neumann, C.Ss.R. (Philadelphia, 2003); Mary Teresa Tenbusch, Saint John
Nepomucene Neumann and Divine Providence (Michigan, 2010); Gilbert A. Enderle, “St. John
Nepomucene Neumann (1811–1860)—A Brief Memorial Biography of the Redemptorist
Missionary Priest and Bishop, Commemorating the 200th Anniversary of His Birth and the
150th Anniversary of His Death,” SHCSR, 59 (2011), 3–34.
2. A study by Rudolf Svoboda deals with the current state of research in this period. See
Rudolf Svoboda, “John Nepomucene Neumann and Europe. Actual State and New Perspectives of Research Issue,” Theologos, 23, no. 2 (2021), 61–69.
3. Texts by Czech authors, which were nevertheless written in Czechoslovakia before
1989, were published in samizdat and were distributed illegally. Others were written by Czech
emigrants and published abroad. In general, however, it can be said that Czech Catholic historiography at that time was outside the mainstream of the world academic debate about Neumann.

518

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

The consequence, however, is that the circumstances of the very key
moments of Neumann’s life that make his character what he is are not
entirely clear in the available literature: his decision for the priesthood, his
decision for the missionary vocation, and finally his departure to the
United States of America before he received the higher ordinations, i.e.,
subdeacon, deacon, and priestly ordinations. These fundamental decisions
of Neumann’s life are usually placed in various contexts but without the
factual background given by the clear language of the sources. This lack of
facts causes the authors to provide only basic or partial information; moreover, upon comparison, the data they provide contradict each other.4
This study, based on research from the sources, will try to clearly show
Neumann’s path to the priesthood and missionary vocation, and clarify the
circumstances directly related to his departure to the United States. It will
present these fundamental decisions of Neumann not only in the right
chronological context, but also their demonstrable causes, which were determined not only by his desires and decisions but especially by the external circumstances of the relationship between the Catholic Church and the state,
as well as the specific situation in his native Diocese of Budweis. Hence, the
results of current historical research devoted to the history of the Diocese of
Budweis5 and Neumann’s figure6 are essential sources for this article.
4. The collection of studies dedicated to Neumann, according to the available lists that
are practically complete and constantly updated, can be found in the archives and library of
the Istituto Storico Redentorista, Roma.
Since it would not make sense to cite several hundred publications of all kinds for this
study, this paper will limit itself to the general statement that until about the 1950s, all
authors draw data for the topic from Neumann’s first biography, written by his nephew
Johann Berger. See Johann Berger, Leben und Wirken des hochseligen Johannes Nep. Neumann,
aus der Kongregation des allerheiligsten Erlösers, Bischofs von Philadelphia (New York, 1883);
Johann Berger, Life of Right Rev. John N. Neumann, D. D., of the Congregation of the Most Holy
Redeemer, Fourth Bishop of Philadelphia (New York, 1884). From the 1950s onwards, the
authors often refer to a high-quality monograph by Michael J. Curley, later to the book by
the postulator general Neumann’s beatification and canonization, Nicola Ferrante, and the
published Neumann autobiography. See Michael J. Curley, Bishop John Neumann, C. SS. R.
Fourth Bishop of Philadelphia (Philadelphia 1952; or under the name Ven. John Neumann,
Washington, 1952); Nicola Ferrante, Il beato Giovanni Nepomuceno Neumann, Vescovo di
Filadelfia (Rome, 1963); S. Giovanni Neumann CSsR, Pioniere del Vangelo, Vescovo di
Filadelfia, 2nd ed. (Roma, 1977).
5. In recent years, fundamental monographs have been published on the history of the
Diocese of Budweis, which deal with the topic in a broader European context. Among other
things, they work with a wide range of professional studies dealing with the cultural and social
environment of the time, of which there is not space to mention in this text. See Miroslav
Novotný et al., Die Diözese Budweis in den Jahren 1851–1907: Das Aschenputtel unter den Diözesen II (Berlin, 2021); Miroslav Novotný, Rudolf Svoboda, Lenka Martínková, Tomáš Veber,

RUDOLF SVOBODA

519

The Beginning of Neumann’s Path to the Priestly Vocation
Many authors have tried to show in their texts that it was Neumann’s
piety that he brought from his father’s house which led him to the priestly
career directly from childhood. This leads to the impression that Neumann’s childhood and youth were the definitive factors in the trajectory of
his spiritual life, when in fact they were only one part of his road to holiness;7 indeed, his autobiography, written just before the episcopal ordination (1852),8 and his spiritual journal, which he kept during and shortly

and Marie Ryantová, Die Diözese Budweis in den Jahren 1785–1850: Das Aschenputtel unter den
Diözesen (Berlin, 2018); Rudolf Svoboda, Počátky českobudějovické diecéze (Prague, 2014).
These monographs are devoted to the figures of the bishops of Budweis, who, with their
episcopates, are connected with Neumann’s life. See Rudolf Svoboda, Jan Valerián Jirsík: In
the service of God, Church and Country (Berlin, 2019); Rudolf Svoboda, Nebroušený diamant:
Třetí českobudějovický biskup Josef Ondřej Lindauer (Prague, 2015); Rudolf Svoboda, Johann
Prokop Schaffgotsch: Das Leben eines böhmischen Prälaten in der Zeit des Josephinismus (Frankfurt
am Main, 2015); Rudolf Svoboda, Arnošt Konstantin Růžička: Josefinista na českobudějovickém
biskupském stolci (Budweis, 2011).
6. This is regarding mainly studies devoted to the period of Neumann’s study in Budweis in the years 1823–33 and Neumann’s study of theology in Prague in the years 1833-35.
See Rudolf Svoboda, “John Nepomucene Neumann in Budweis 1823–1833: Study at Gymnasium, Institute of Philosophy and Episcopal Priestly Seminary,” SHCSR, 71, no 1 (2023),
67–117; Kurt Augustin Huber, “John N. Neumann’s Student Years in Prague, 1833–1835,”
Records of the American Historical Society of Philadelphia, 89, nos. 1–4 (1978) 3–32; the same
study was published in German as Kurt Augustin Huber, “Johann Nepomuk Neumanns
Prager Studienzeit (1833–1835),” in: Katholische Kirche und Kultur in Böhmen: Ausgewählte
Abhandlungen, eds. Joachim Bahlcke and Rudolf Grulich, [Religions- und Kulturgeschichte
in Ostmittel- und Südosteuropa, 5] (Münster, 2005), 555–86.
7. See, for example, Emanuel Kovář, Ctihodný sluha boží Jan Nepom: Neumann, biskup
Filadelfijský v Americe (Brno, 1910), 28–31; John F. Magnier, Short life of the venerable servant
of God John Nepomucene Neumann, C. SS. R, Bishop of Philadelphia (St. Louis, 1897), 10–12;
Josef Alois Krebs, Lebensgeschichte des ehrw: Dieners Gottes Johann Nep. Neumann, aus der Kongregation des allerheilligsten Erlösers, Bischofs von Philadelphia (Winterberg, 1899), 7–8; James
J. Galvin, Blessed John Neumann, Bishop of Philadelphia (Baltimore, 1964), 11; Brother Flavius,
The House on Logan Square: A story of Blessed John Neumann (Indiana, 1967), 25–30; Elizabeth
Odell Sheehan, John Neumann: The Children´s Bishop (New York, 1965), 11; Jane F. Hindman, An Ordinary Saint John Neumann (New York, 1977), 8–15.
8. Ioannes Nepomecenus Neumann, “Kurze Lebensbeschreibung (Baltimore, 27. März
1852),” ed. Andreas Sampers, SHCSR, 11, no. 1 (1963), 83–104; Alfred C. Rush, trans. and
ed., The Autobiography of St. John Neumann, C.SS.R. (Boston, 1977) (hereinafter The Autobiography). Neumann’s autobiography was translated into Czech by the Czech Redemptorist
Rudolf Chytil (1910–2004). At the time of communist totalitarianism, it came out in samizdat together with specimens of selected letters by Neumann, and letters from his classmates
and family members. See Rudolf Chytil, Neumanniana (Nové Zámky, 1978), 7–27.
Thanks to the publication of Neumann’s autobiography in English, most authors already
describe Neumann’s path to the priesthood accurately.

520

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

Patrick J. Hayes, Neumann House, June 2023, photograph. Printed with permission
of the photographer.

after theological studies (1835–1839),9 testify that the path was not so
clear-cut.
In his spiritual journal, he confessed that during his studies in philosophy (1829–31), his affection for Johann Christoph Friedrich Schiller,
Johann Gottfried Herder, and other poets distracted him from the priestly
vocation.10 Only at the end of philosophical studies did he try to decide
between medicine, law and theology. He speaks of it this way:
When the time came, at the end of the philosophy course, for me to decide
either for theology, or law or medicine, I felt more of an attraction for the
9. William Nayden, ed and trans., “John Nepomucene Neumann’s Spiritual Journal,”
SHCSR, 25, no. 2 (1977), 321–418; SHCSR, 26, no. 1 (1978), 9–74; SHCSR, 26, no. 2
(1978), 291–352; SHCSR, 27, no. 1 (1979), 81–152. However, it should be emphasized that
the whole of Neumann’s Spiritual Journal was not published in this way, but only its French
part; the German part was not published in its entirety. Neumann’s Spiritual Journal is found
in the Redemptorist Archives of the Baltimore Province in Philadelphia (hereinafter RABP),
a copy in the AGHR Roma. This study will only refer to the Journal with the relevant enrollment date Neumann made in it.
10. Curley, Bishop John Neumann, 17; Journal, April 9, 1835.

RUDOLF SVOBODA

521

Neumann as a ten year old boy, c. 1821, daguerreotype. Photographer unknown.
Printed with permission of the Redemptorist Archives, Philadelphia.
latter. This was all the more so because out of eighty or ninety applicants
for theology, only twenty were to be accepted. For this, along with the
best scholastic transcript, recommendations were also required, and I
wanted to have nothing to do with them. In this uncertainty about the
choice of a profession, I came home in the autumn vacation of 1831 and
found that my father was not against letting me study medicine in
Prague, even though the expenses involved were great. My mother was
not too happy with this. Even though I pointed out to her that I did not
know anyone who would back my request for admission into the institute
for the study of theology (everyone studied there without paying tuition),
nevertheless she thought that I should give it a try. I then wrote a letter
of application and sent it to Budweis by a special messenger to the
bishop’s consistory and shortly after that I received the letter of acceptance into the Budweis Theological Seminary. From that moment on I
never gave another thought to medicine and I also practically gave up
completely the study of physics and astronomy on which I preferred to
spend time, and this without any great difficulty.11

This description of the circumstances that led Neumann to study theology and the priestly vocation is very convincing. On a more general level,
we can say that the family, and indeed priestly role models from Prachatice
11. The Autobiography, 26.

522

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

Painting of Prachatice, 1670, painting, stored in the Prachatice town museum.

and Budweis, played their part, as well as the kind spiritual formation from
the Piarist and Cistercian fathers, whom he met almost daily at the gymnasium and philosophical lyceum in the years 1823–31. He was also very well
prepared to study theology regarding knowledge and skills.12
The Decision to Go on a Mission
In determining the exact time when Neumann decided to go on a mission to the United States, one finds only moderately accurate information
in the Neumann literature: most authors limit themselves to a brief statement that this decision was made while studying theology; however, some
authors differ in both the precise timing and Neumann’s motives.13
12. Neumann’s study years and his spiritual formation are discussed in detail in the
already-mentioned study: Rudolf Svoboda, “John Nepomucene Neumann in Budweis 1823–
1833.”
13. The information already mentioned by Curley, Ferrante, Rush, and Sampers is
quite correct; most other authors are based on Neumann’s autobiography.
Relatively common—but inaccurate—is the association of Neumann’s decision for missions with the period of his study in Prague or even with the very period of the end of his theological studies. See De vita Ven. Joannis Nep. Neumann, Episcopi Philalelphiensis Comentatoriolum ex annalibus provinciae americanae desumptum, Ilchestriae (Ilchester, MD, 1911), 9–11;

RUDOLF SVOBODA

523

Patrick J. Hayes, České Budějovice—Neumann lodged here across from theologate, June
2023, photograph. Printed with permission of the photographer.

Neumann mentions the period of this decision and its circumstances
both in his letters and his autobiography. In a letter to his parents on
February 11, 1836, written shortly after his definitive departure from
home, he spoke of a goal for which, despite “. . . obstacles, I had been
preparing for three years: for the ease with which I acquired the necessary
knowledge for my future work and many other circumstances, I was convinced that it was the call of God who urged me to sacrifice myself for the
salvation of the ignorant, even though this thing seems difficult to me.”14
Tom Langan, John Neumann: harvester of souls (Huntington, 1976), 7–8; Sheehan, John Neumann: The Children’s Bishop, 32-33. Sometimes—again inaccurately—too many priests in
Neumann’s native diocese were cited as the main reason for Neumann’s decision to go on
missions, but this was—as will be shown below—one of the reasons why his priestly ordination was postponed at the end of his theological studies. See Magnier, Short life of the venerable
servant of God John Nepomucene Neumann, 14–15.
14. Ibidem, Letter from John Nepomucene Neumann to his parents, February 11, 1836.
The vast majority of Neumann’s letters have not been preserved in the originals, but in
copies made for the purpose of the canonization process. Unless otherwise stated, these copies
are found in RABP, St. John Neumann Collection, Neumann Letters, 1823–1860, Box 1 and
2; also in AGHR Roma, Neumanniana, Box 1; and last but not least in Státní oblastní archiv

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

It is therefore easy to count that the decision had to be made in the second
year of studying theology, i.e., in the school year 1832/33, when he was in
Budweis. He also confirms this in his autobiography (1852) and states that
in the second year of theological studies, he began to read the reports of the
Leopoldine Foundation,15 especially the letters of Frederic Baraga (1797–
1868) and other missionaries working in North America.16 Baraga was an
inspiring personality. Originally a Slovenian priest, he signed up for missions to the United States in 1830, where he began his service there in
1831. He sent letters to Europe, which Neumann then read.17
Further details were given by his classmates when they testified about
him, either in the 1870s for his nephew Berger’s forthcoming book or in
the following decade as part of the aforementioned diocesan process with
Neumann:
His classmate Jan Šavel testifies that Neumann and another classmate
Vojtěch Schmid decided to go on a mission to North America after being
Třeboň (National Regional Archive Třeboň, hereinafter referred to as SOA Třeboň), Biskupský archiv České Budějovice (Episcopal Archive České Budějovice, hereinafter referred to as
BA ČB) Procesní akta k blahořečení a svatořečení filadelfského biskupa J. N. Neumanna
[Procedural Acts on the Beatification and Blessing of J. N. Neumann, Bishop of Philadelphia], card. 947.
15. Leopoldinenstiftung für das Kaiserreich Österreich zur Unterstützung der amerikanischen Missionen (also Leopoldinen-Missionsverein or Leopoldinen-Stiftung, also Leopoldine Society or Leopoldine Foundation) was a missionary association that collected financial and material
support for the Catholic Church in North America. The association was founded by Emperor
Francis I in Vienna on May 13, 1829. The association was named after his recently deceased
daughter, Archduchess Leopoldina (1797–1826), who was also the Empress of Brazil. Since
1831, the association published written reports about its activities four times a year, under the
title Berichte der Leopoldinen-Stiftung im Kaiserthume Oesterreich, zur Unterstützung der
katholischen Missionen in Amerika.
The Leopoldine Foundation began operating in the Diocese of Budweis shortly after its
founding thanks to the priest Hermann Dichtl. It was Dichtl who was a great inspiration for
Neumann. See Kurt Augustin Huber, “Hermann Dichtl (1802–1877),” in: Katholische Kirche
und Kultur in Böhmen, 493–553.
16. The Autobiography, 27.
17. Baraga, like Neumann, eventually became a bishop. First, in 1853, he became the
titular bishop in Michigan; finally, in 1857, he became the first bishop of the diocese of Sault
Sainte Marie (Michigan), known since 1865 as Sault Sainte Marie-Marquette, today the diocese of Marquette.
Baraga was not the only missionary or supporter of missions who sent letters back to
Europe in the early 1830s. The Leopoldine Foundation published the letters in printed
reports. As well as Baraga, the letters were written by, for example, Simon Senderl, Franz X.
Haetscher, Francis P. Kenrick, and Friedrich Résé (Frederick Reese). Curley lists the letters
published between 1831 and 1832. See Curley, Bishop John Neuann, 22, 406–07.

RUDOLF SVOBODA

525

ordained priests while walking along the Vltava river.18 They informed a
few of their classmates of their intention but they did not want to join
them, even though they allegedly admired the plan. Another classmate,
Antonín Laad, also links this decision to Neumann’s intensive New Testament study, specifically 2 Corinthians, chapter 11. The New Testament
was part of the study in the second year of theology, i.e., in the school year
1832/33, which confirms the time of Neumann’s decision.19 Leonard
Žďárský talks about the fact that he started preparing for his mission by
studying languages and also by doing physical exercises.20 Another classmate, Karel Krbeček, also clearly links Neumann’s decision to studying at
Budweis and reading reports from the Leopoldine Foundation.21
At this time, he decided with Vojtěch Schmid to ask the bishop of Budweis Arnošt Konstantin Růžička (1816–45) to send them to study in Prague.
They hoped to learn French and English there. The bishop had the opportunity to send several of his seminarians to the Prague archbishop’s seminary,
which also meant continuing his theology studies at the university. In this case,
he complied with Neumann’s request so that with the next school year, he
could continue his studies in theology in Prague and prepare for his future mission.22 However, he did not send Vojtěch Schmid with him, but rather the
already mentioned Antonín Laad.23 Neumann spent the third and fourth years
of theological studies in Prague, where he began to write his spiritual journal,
clearly showing his persistent desire to become a priest and missionary.24
18. Testimony of Vojtěch Schmid from April 4, 1872, sent to Johann Berger. See
Curley, Bishop John Neumann, 23, 407; Svoboda, Jan Valerián Jirsík, 152–54, 174–75; The
Autobiography, 27.
19. Testimony of Antonín Laad from April 11, 1872, sent to Johann Berger. See Chytil,
Neumanniana, 139–40; Berger, Leben und Wirken, 42; Curley, Bishop John Neumann, 23.
20. Testimony of Leonard Žďárský from February 27, 1872, sent to Johann Berger. See
Chytil, Neumanniana, 146; Curley, Bishop John Neumann, 23 and 407.
21. Neumann’s classmate Karel Krbeček writes about it in two testimonies. The first
was sent to Berger in 1872 and is stored at the RABP in Philadelphia; see RABP, St. John
Neumann Collection, Berger Papers, Box 47. Curley describes it as “Krbecek Notizen.” See
Curley, Bishop John Neumann, 13 and 405. Krbeček gave further testimony on November 3,
1886 during an interrogation in the diocesan process leading to the canonization of Neumann. The content differs from the original testimony only in formulations or other
emphases. See SOA Třeboň, BA ČB, Procesní akta k blahořečení a svatořečení filadelfského
biskupa J. N. Neumanna, sign. I-A-1, card. 947.
22. The Autobiography, 27–28.
23. Antonín Laad writes that at that time, in the archbishop’s seminary in Prague, two
places became available for theologians of Budweis. Bishop Růžička sent Neumann and Laad
to Prague on the recommendation of the rector of the seminary, Jan Körner. See Chytil, Neumanniana, 141.
24. See Huber, “John N. Neumann’s Student Years in Prague, 1833–1835.”

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Portrait of Arnošt Konstantin Růžička, c. 1816–1845, painting. Painter unknown.
Currently stored in the gallery of Bishops of Budweis in the bishop’s residence.

Departure to the United States of America Without Higher
Ordinations, and the Dimissorial Letter of the Bishop of Budweis
In almost all the texts devoted to Neumann, there is a fairly simple
explanation of why he was ordained a priest after arriving in the United
States: there was an abundance of priests and priesthood candidates in
Neumann’s native Diocese of Budweis, so there was no place for him. The
illness of Bishop Růžička is also sometimes mentioned.25 A closer and
more comprehensive explanation is missing here. 26
25. The vast majority of authors visibly draw from Berger’s book and Neumann’s autobiography. However, both sources do not provide more information.
Only a few authors cite—incorrectly—Růžička’s illness as the only reason for Neumann’s non-ordination. See Flavius, The House on Logan Square, 7–8; Paschal Turbet, The
Little Bishop: Episodes in the Life of St. John Neumann, CSsR (Boston, 1977), 36–37; Sheehan,
John Neumann: The Children´s Bishop, 40; Josef Koláček, Der Heilige der Neuen Welt Johannes
Nepomuk Neumann (Stein am Rhein, 1979), 43; René Buggenhout, Trekker voor God, Mgr.
Jan Nepomuceen Neumann, Redemptorist, Vierde Bisschop van Filadelfia (Leuven, 1963), 17.
26. With references to Neumann’s Spiritual Journal and correspondence, Michael J.
Curley best describes this topic in his monograph on Neumann and Alfred C. Rush in a precisely executed note-taking apparatus on the English translation of Neumann’s autobiography. Augustin Reimann also describes the topic in some detail. See Augustin Reimann, Böhmerwaldsohn und Bischof von Philadelphia, Johann Nepomuk Neumann CssR 1811–1860
(Königstein, 1960; Czech samizdat version Syn Šumavy a biskup ve Filadelfii, O životě Jana
Nepomuka Neumanna), 22–26. However, none of these authors give an overall picture to us.

RUDOLF SVOBODA

527

Several questions could help clarify the whole matter: Why was he
admitted to study and formation when there was no place for him in his
native diocese? Why did Bishop Růžička send him to study in Prague
when Růžička would not be interested in his priestly ministry? Was his
situation quite specific, or did it also apply to other priesthood candidates who completed their theology studies in 1835? Was his ordination
only postponed, or should he not have been ordained at all? Was the
postponement of the ordination the immediate reason for his departure
overseas? Was it common at the time to go on missions—and not be a
priest?
The circumstances of Neumann’s departure from his native diocese
caught the attention of promotor fidei, the so-called devil’s advocate, Gustavo Persiani, when, in 1896, he examined documents from ordinary
diocesan processes with Neumann, which took place in Budweis and
Philadelphia in 1886–88. Among other things, he came across in his written documents that Neumann did not have a so-called litterae dimissoriae—
a dimissorial letter confirming that he met all the conditions for receiving
higher ordinations and that he was duly released from the diocese. He,
therefore, asked for clarification on this matter before the apostolic process
began.27 Therefore, we can ask another question: Why was he not properly
released by his bishop when he left the diocese?
An explanation of why Neumann and his classmates, who graduated
in theology in the 1834/35 school year, did not receive higher ordination
shortly after completing theology, as was common at the time, i.e., in June
or July 1835, is to be found in the connecting together of different causes:
in general, the specific relationship between the Catholic Church and the
state, i.e., the Habsburg monarchy or later Austrian Empire, and also some
specific circumstances concerning the Diocese of Budweis and its bishop,
Arnošt Konstantin Růžička.

27. See Nicola Ferrante, “La causa di beatificazione e canonizzazione di S. Giovanni
Nepomuceno Neumann, 1886–1976,” SHCSR, 24 (1976), 485–511. It was also published in
Studia Neumaniana: Sancto Joanni Nepomuceno Neumann in solemni canonizatione obsequii
fratrum munus, [Bibl. Hist., 6] (Roma, 1977), 348–74.
For an English version of the article, see Nicola Ferrante, “The Cause of Beatification
and Canonization of St. John Nepomucene Neuman, C.ss.R (1886–1976),” The Province
Story, A Redemptorist Historical Review, 3, no. 2 (1977), 33–66. See Philadelphien. seu Budicen.
Beatificationis et canonisationes Servi Dei Ioannis Nepomuceni Neumann e Congregatione Sanctissimi Redemptoris, Episcopipi Philadelphiensis. Animadversiones R. P. D. Promotois Fisedi Super
Dubio, Roma 1896, in: Philadelph. seu Budvice. Ser. Dei Joann. Nepom. Neumann. Positio Super
Introductione Causae, AGHR Roma, Neumanniana, Book SN1, pp. 1–71.

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

Confirmation of lower ordinations of February 11, 1836, signed by Arnošt Konstantin
Růžička, Bishop of Budweis, stored in the Redemptorist Archives of the Baltimore
Province, St. John Neumann Collection, Box 1, Early education. Printed with
permission of the Redemptorist Archives, Philadelphia.

Since the reign of Empress Maria Theresa (1740–80) and her sons
Joseph II (1780–90) and Leopold II (1790–92), there had been a
church-political system in the Habsburg monarchy called Josephinism,
after Joseph II. Within it, the Catholic Church, on the one hand, was in
a privileged position in the state, so in addition to the Church administration and pastoral care, it was also in charge of supervising trivial (i.e.,
elementary/primary) schools, which was a very broad and important
competence given compulsory schooling. At the same time, however,
the state used the Church in order to govern more effectively, and,
because of that, it did not hesitate to intervene directly in the internal
affairs of the Church. The state often exercised its influence, among
other things, on the education of priests and, last but not least, on individual priestly careers. Since the reign of Joseph II, priests who were not
financially secure received a salary from the state from the so-called
Religious Fund. It was a state-controlled fund that originated primarily
from the assets of Church institutions abolished during the reign of
Emperor Joseph II.
On the one hand, of course, it helped the Church because the livelihoods of the priests in this way were well ensured and they were no longer

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529

pauperized. On the other hand, in poorer dioceses, this caused considerable dependence on the state because the bishops had to prove to the state
authorities that the adepts of higher ordinations had the so-called titulus
mensae, that is, they were financially secure. If this was not the case, the
bishop had to apply for funding from the state Religious Fund.28 Such a
request could be rejected for various reasons. Although the bishop could
theoretically ordain a new priest, the financially-insecure priests would
then have to live “at the bishop’s expense,” and relations with the state
authorities could also deteriorate. Therefore, something like this was out of
the question. After all, episcopal nominations were also in the hands of the
state and, therefore, the emperor, so the bishops’ manifestations of “disloyalty” were rare.
The Diocese of Budweis, founded only in 1785, owned almost no
property. Not only all the priests but also the bishops, the members of the
cathedral chapter, and all the officials of the episcopal consistory received a
salary from the state.29 It was a relatively large number. To look more
closely, in 1834, the Diocese of Budweis numbered 841,329 people and
was almost homogeneously religious—with the exception of a few hundred
Jews and several dozen people professing the Lutheran and Calvinist
denominations, nearly the entire population was Catholic.30 They were
cared for by 876 priests, of whom 777 were secular and 99 were religious.
The diocese had a total of 424 places of official church administration.31 In
the first half of the nineteenth century, a sufficient number of priesthood

28. This financial security originally consisted of a commitment to secure financially a
cleric who was taken on by cities, nobility, corporations, monasteries, or private individuals.
29. On the establishment of the diocese and its financial provision, see Novotný, Svoboda, Martínková, Veber, and Ryantová, Die Diözese Budweis in den Jahren 1785–1850.
30. “Přehled duchovenstva království Českého roku 1834” [Overview of the Clergy of
the Kingdom of Bohemia in 1834], Časopis pro katolické duchovenstvo [Journal for Catholic
Clergy], 9, no. 1 (1836), 182; Svoboda, Arnošt Konstantin Růžička, 116.
31. See Catalogus Universi Cleri tum Saecularis tum Raegularis Episcopalis Dioeceseos
Bohemo-Budvicensis sub glorioso Regimine Reverendissimi ac Illustrissimi Domini Domini Ernesti
Constantini Ružicžka Dei Gratia Episcopi Bohemo-Budvicensis Musei Regni Bohemiae—Societatis Philharmonicae ad promovendam artem musicam quoad sacra, nec non Societatis ad promovendam industriam, et ad prospiciendum caecis de sustentatione Membri Activi. Anno MDCCCXXXV. Budvicii—Bohemorum. Typis viduae defuncti typographi Martini Zdarssa, dirigente
Joanne Seeger (Budweis, 1835).
The data given in this catalogue of the clergy correspond to the data in the Overview of
the Clergy of the Kingdom of Bohemia in 1834, issued by the provincial authorities. It states,
among other things, that all parishes and other places of Church administration are fully
occupied by priests. See “Přehled duchovenstva království Českého roku 1834,” 182; Svoboda,
Arnošt Konstantin Růžička, 116–17.

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

candidates were provided by a priestly seminary in Budweis, where 100 to
120 theologians studied for four years.32
The specific numbers of theology students and ordained priests in the
twenties and thirties were as follows:33

School Year

Number of
Theology Students
in Budweis

Year of
Priest
Ordination

Number of
Ordained Priests—
Secular/Orders

1820/1821
1821/1822
1822/1823
1823/1824
1824/1825
1825/1826
1826/1827
1827/1828
1828/1829
1829/1830
1830/1831
1831/1832
1832/1833
1833/1834
1834/1835
1835/1836
1836/1837
1837/1838
1838/1839
1839/1840

90
101
102
110
118
129
158
180
201
208
192
180
143
125
118
120
124
120
126
133

1821
1822
1823
1824
1825
1826
1827
1828
1829
1830
1831
1832
1833
1834
1835
1836
1837
1838
1839
1840

23/2
18/2
14/0
23/0
33/1
19/2
14/3
20/0
29/0
31/2
26/6
33/1
30/3
10/1
13/3
40/6
13/3
14/6
22/2
18/3

32. The situation of the episcopal priestly seminary in Budweis was very specific. The episcopal priestly seminary practically overlapped with the diocesan Institute of Theology, i.e., there
was an expected combination of formation and education. It was the same building where the
seminarians could live and study. The seminary with theological institute was founded by an
imperial decree of April 7, 1803. Studies began at the theological institute on November 4,
1804. From the beginning, however, only thirty young people lived in a one-storey seminary
building in today’s Kněžská Street, which also applied to the time studied by John Nepomucene
Neumann. There was no place for other seminarians, so although they had the status of a seminarian, they had their private accommodation around the city and attended seminars regularly.
Their formation was quite complicated. The thirty places mentioned above were reserved
mainly for poor students of the final two years. Neumann himself lived outside the seminary
building for the first two years of his studies. He can therefore be described as a “seminarian”
because he was admitted to a seminary that was housed in the same building as the Institute
of Theology. However, he could begin to prepare more freely for his missionary vocation precisely because he did not have to live in the seminary building.

RUDOLF SVOBODA

531

Data on the number of theology students and ordained priests do
not correlate absolutely. On the one hand, even theology graduates could
go to another diocese without higher ordination (as was the case with
Neumann). On the other hand, among the newly ordained candidates for
the priesthood, there could be a “late-finisher” from previous years or a
graduate of theology from elsewhere (again, this could be in Neumann’s
case because he was returning from studies in Prague). However, graduates of theological studies in Budweis still made up the vast majority of
future priests.
It should not be overlooked that from about the school year 1825/26
onwards, there was a substantial increase in the number of theology students for several years, as well as fluctuations in the number of ordained
priests. The reason was the order of the state entitled Court Study Commission of March 31, 1825, according to which all priesthood adepts with
effect from the following school year (i.e., 1825/26) had to be educated at
the theological school (institute or faculty) of their home diocese.34 This
order caused a large problem for the Diocese of Budweis because, until
then, many young men were going to seminaries in the surrounding dioceses. The most probable reason was the desire for better financial security
in the future, which they could not achieve in the poor Diocese of Budweis.
In any case, the regulation meant an immediate increase in the number of
students in all senior years (second, third and fourth) of theological studies
in Budweis and an increase in the number of applicants for theology (in
other words, admission to the seminary). It is not without interest that
twenty-five students were admitted for the school year 1824/25 and then a
The standardized system of studying theology at this time allowed the diocesan Institute
of Theology students to go easily to university to study theology—as happened in Neumann’s
case. Eventually, after completing basic theological studies, he could seek a doctorate. For
more details, see Svoboda, “John Nepomucene Neumann in Budweis 1823–1833. Study at
Gymnasium, Institute of Philosophy and Episcopal Priestly Seminary.”
33. For information on the numbers of theology students in each school year, see
Tomáš Veber, Českobudějovický biskupský kněžský seminář a diecézní teologických institut v letech
1803–1850 (master thesis, Faculty of Theology, University of South Bohemia, Budweis,
2003), annex 4; for the numbers of ordained priests, see SOA Třeboň, BA ČB, Matrika
biskupských prací—Matrica seu Liber functionum episcopalium, 1786–1852, Inv. No. 17, Book
17 (hereinafter Matrica, Book 17); SOA Třeboň, BA ČB, Matrika biskupských prací—Matrica
seu Liber functionum episcopalium (Matrica Functionum Episcopalium ab initio Episcopatus
Bohemo-Budvicensis Pro Archivii Reverendissimi Episcopalis Officii adornata), 1786–1852, Inv.
No. 18, Book 18 (hereinafter Matrica, Book 18); Svoboda, Arnošt Konstantin Růžička, 121–
22, 149.
34. See Miroslav Novotný et al., Dějiny vyššího školství a vzdělanosti na jihu Čech od
středověkých počátků do současnosti (Budweis, 2006), 115.

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

year later, for the school year 1825/26, there were forty-four students.35 At
the time when Neumann was to be ordained, i.e., at the end of the school
year 1834/35, the number of theologians at the Institute of Theology in
Budweis was declining by degree. This was due both to the incremental
departure of crowded years and to the tightening of the selection of candidates. We can therefore say that the numbers of theology students, i.e.,
seminarians, approximately ten years after the issuance of the above-mentioned state regulation, had stabilized again at approximately the level
before 1825. For the diocese, this meant returning to the optimal number
of theology students and newly ordained priests.
However, Neumann and his classmates were affected by all the above
circumstances: the excessive number of newly ordained priests in the Diocese of Budweis in recent years meant that all the priestly posts the state
was willing to fund were filled.36 Therefore, the diocese leadership decided
not to grant higher ordination to theologians who completed their studies
in the school year 1834/35 until further notice.
Neumann, finishing his studies in Prague, learned of his unexpected
situation at the beginning of the calendar year 1835—and, of course, this
threw him into considerable uncertainty.37 In a letter to his parents on May
16, 1835, he wrote:
35. Svoboda, Arnošt Konstantin Růžička, 149.
36. Of course, they could go to another diocese if they had a place in it, and the bishop
released them. However, the majority did not choose this path.
37. In the letters from the seminary to the parents of January 1 and April 3, it is clear
that there were doubts as to whether this would happen:
“In case we are not ordained, it is just possible that I should undertake a journey into
the kingdom [Bavaria—to visit uncle Philipp Janson] during the coming holiday, if only other
circumstances will permit it. At least it would be my wish to spend this time travelling; however, most likely nothing will come of it, as we heard lately that many stations in the diocese
of Budweis have become vacant. Around Easter I believe, we shall find out from the Rector
of Budweis [Seminary, John Körner], how matters stand with us; we are going to stay in
Prague only months more. This time, I hope, will pass rather quickly, because we have very
much to do, and we have scarcely enough to be able to do all that.”
“In your last letter, you wanted to know if I did know anything more certain about the
ordinations. We receive very dissimilar reports in different ways. Some, namely, believe that
we shall be ordained, others think not.
The Rector of Budweis has written us nothing at all about it, most likely, because they
have not yet settled in the Consistory. On account of this uncertainty, I also could not write
as yet to Munich and Obernburg [to invite relatives to ordination]. If the theologian, Zdiarsky, who most likely often comes to the Rev. Cathedral-provost, has written anything certain to Prachatice, I ask that you inform me with the next letter.”
See AGHR Roma, Neumanniana, Misc. Neumann Items, card 1; see also the testimony
of Antonín Laad from April 11, 1872, sent to Johann Berger, Chytil, Neumanniana, 140.

RUDOLF SVOBODA

533

Grade Report, Theology in Budweis and Prague, 1835, stored in the Redemptorist
Archives of the Baltimore Province, St. John Neumann Collection, Box 1, Early
education. Printed with permission of the Redemptorist Archives, Philadelphia.

In regards to the ordination, we hope to learn something definite soon,
because the Rector of Budweis, to whom we sent congratulations for
his Saint-day, will answer us very soon. As we heard, the Bishop of
Budweis is already well. In case we are ordained, we shall have our
examinations earlier, and come home also for some days. On the 13th
of this month, all those who were left over from last year were ordained,
and we cherish the most certain hope that we shall also be, as soon as
we come to Budweis.38
38. Letter of John Nepomucene Neumann to his parents, Prague, May 16, 1835 (this
cited letter was not preserved in its original, and its copies are stored in above mentioned
archives, see note 14 for archival information).

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

However, time passed, and the good news from Budweis did not
come.39 But he was still determined for his mission.40 He finished all the
exams in Prague, and in July he went home to Prachatice.41 There he also
told his mother and sisters about his intention to go on missions, and then
he also told his father.42
Probably in August or September, Neumann and Vojtěch Schmid
were briefed by their priestly mentor, Hermann Dichtl, cathedral vicar of
Budweis, that he had received good news from the director of the seminary
in Strasbourg, Andreas Räss, which could resolve their situation.43 Räss
announced that Bishop Francis Kenrick had empowered him to admit
German-speaking priests or students of theology to the Diocese of
Philadelphia. For Neumann and Schmid, this seemed like a good solution
to their situation: they could go on missions soon, even without ordination.
With Dichtl’s support, they approached the Leopoldine Foundation
for travel money. The foundation refused, arguing that the bishop of
Philadelphia, and not they, should apply for a financial contribution. With
another request, they turned to Bishop Růžička and the Budweis cathedral
chapter (in other words, to the episcopal consistory, because the canons
were part of the diocesan leadership), saying that they would like to leave
the diocese as soon as possible.44 However, they were clearly refused.45 The
rejection was most likely due to financial reasons. It did not mean a rejec39. We can read the uncertainty and worries in his Spiritual Journal: “It’s doubtlessly
because I am afraid it won’t really come to pass . . . the whole business of my ordination may
simply fall through!” (Journal, May 22, 1835); “I heard also today that our Bishop is not any
worse. Still my hopes for ordination are slim; my expectations regarding my own improvement are so weak I hardly even want to be a priest right now” (Journal, June 18, 1835); “Concerning our ordination, today we heard from Fr. Prinz that in the seminary at Budweis they
doubt that we shall be ordained. In the letter we received regarding minor orders nothing at
all was mentioned about it.” (Journal, June 28, 1835).
40. Journal, June 24 and 25, 1835.
41. The final canonical examinations for the priesthood were taken at the end of the
studies he completed in Prague, not in Budweis, as some authors write. He then left Prague
on July 8 and arrived in Prachatice on July 10. See Journal, July 7, 19 and 23, 1835. On the
contrary, inaccurate information can be found in The Autobiography, 28, where Neumann
claims to have arrived home at the end of August.
42. He told his mother and sisters of his decision on July 24 and his father on July 26,
1835. See Journal, July 25 and 29, 1835.
43. Neumann mentions in his Spiritual Journal that Hermann Dichtl visited France in
June and July. Along the way, he probably met Räss. See Journal, June 24, 1835.
44. Bishop Růžička was apparently acquainted with the intention of Neumann and
Schmid to go on missions. See Journal, August 8 and September 11, 1835.
45. Journal, November 4, 1835.

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535

tion of their intention as such. This is shown by the fact that the bishop, at
Dichtl’s request, permitted the organization of a collection among the
diocesan priests for both young missionaries. In the end, enough money
was collected for only one—and Neumann was chosen. It could not be a
complete rejection of Neumann’s plan by the diocesan leadership, as the
consistory sought his father’s written consent for his departure,46 and Neumann’s passport, which he received in mid-December 1835, was processed
through the episcopal consistory’s office.47 In the meantime, he was still
preparing to leave—he continued studying languages and thought about
what his departure would mean for his family.48
In his autobiography, Neumann writes that Růžička was so ill at the
time of his arrival from Prague to southern Bohemia in August 1835 that
it seemed that he would not be able to carry out ordinations for five to six
months.49 So far, it has not been possible to prove precisely when Bishop
Růžička was ill; however, references in the literature devoted to the history
of the Diocese of Budweis generally mention the years 1834–35 as the
years of Ružička´s illness. A partial answer can be found in the already
quoted Register of Episcopal Works (Matrica seu Liber functionum episcopalium). Here it is quite clear from the records that in 1834, Bishop Růžička
did not carry out any acts connected with blessing or consecration (e.g.,
bells, churches, altars, etc.) and did not do any subdeacon or deacon ordinations. He limited himself to a few priestly ordinations in the chapel of
his episcopal residence, which he usually did not do. Thus, it can be said
that he limited his episcopal activities at this time, perhaps because of illness.50 However, when the Austrian Emperor Ferdinand I and his wife
46. His father gave John written consent to go on a mission on August 9, 1835. He also
received a recommendation from the dean of Prachatice, Enders. See Journal, August 8, 21
and 29, 1835.
47. Journal, December 11 and 13, 1835.
48. Karel Krbeček—who was in the same situation as Neumann—testifies to this on
November 3, 1886 as follows:
“After the theological studies he had done, no ordination took place in Budweis that
year, and therefore not even a Servant of God was ordained here. This was because many
[priestly candidates], almost the whole of the previous year, did not find a placement or a job.
The bishop at the time said that it would be better to wait at home without ordination than
to be idle at home as priests. The Servant of God, however, was not idle at home but preparing to travel to America. I say all this from my own experience.” Krbeček also talks about
Neumann’s intention to go on missions before the ordination and to be ordained where there
is a lack of priests. See SOA Třeboň, BA ČB, Procesní akta k blahořečení a svatořečení
filadelfského biskupa J. N. Neumanna, sign. I-A-1, card. 947.
49. The Autobiography, 29.
50. See Matrica, Book 17 and 18; Svoboda, Arnošt Konstantin Růžička, 178.

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

Anna visited Budweis between September 2 and 5, 1835, Růžička was
already in such good physical condition—which Neumann himself speaks
of in his letter and diary—that he not only welcomed them personally but
also he brought them to his residence, where the imperial couple found
accommodation. After the visit, he travelled to Prague with them.51 It can
therefore be said with great certainty that it was not the bishop’s illness that
hindered Neumann’s ordination. There can be no doubt that Bishop
Růžička expected to consecrate Neumann and his classmates (whether they
had completed their studies in Prague or Budweis) sooner or later. After
all, Neumann’s classmates were ordained priests on March 25, 1836, when
Neumann was already travelling overseas.52
Regarding the circumstances of the departure itself, it must be said
that Neumann finally left home without saying goodbye on February 8,
1836. He arrived in Budweis, from where he wrote to his parents—but he
also visited the bishop and asked him to issue the necessary documents.
His visit to the episcopal consistory is evidenced by the confirmation of
lower ordinations of February 11, 1836, signed by Bishop Růžička and the
episcopal notary and secretary Johann Schreglich but also by a written certificate dated the same day of the completion of his theological studies, and
his good morals and piety. However, Bishop Růžička did not sign this certificate—it bears just the signature of Johann Geith, the provost of the
cathedral chapter and the chancellor of the consistory.53 Of course, NeuThe historiographers of the Diocese of Budweis, Franz Mardetschläger and Kurt
Augustin Huber, also write that the appointment of a coadjutor began to be seriously considered at this time. Cf. Franz Mardetschläger, Kurz gefasste Geschichte des Bistums und der Diöcese
Budweis zur Jubiläumsfeier ihres hundertjährigen Bestehens (Budweis, 1885) 24–25; Kurt
Augustin Huber, “Ein josephinischer Pfarrer,” Archiv für Kirchengeschichte von BöhmenMähren-Schlesien, 14 (1997), 93–109, here 98–99. However, this was not confirmed in either
the Czech or Austrian archives. See, for example, SOA Třeboň, BA ČB, Arnošt Konstantin
Růžička, Styk s vídeňským papežským nunciem a vídeňským arcibiskupem v náboženských a
církevních otázkách, 1732–1744, sign. II/2/b/5, card. 13. It was not until 1841 that in a personal
letter Růžička asked the bishop of Linz (a neighbouring diocese), Gregor Ziegler (1827-52),
to ordain to the priesthood nineteen alumni because of his illness. See Oberösterreichisches
Landesarchiv Linz, Diözesanarchiv Linz, Briefregister—Brief Nr. 1158 from July 15, 1841.
51. See Svoboda, Arnošt Konstantin Růžička, 174.
52. See the testimony of Antonín Laad, Chytil, Neumanniana, 144.
53. Confirmation that Neumann received the tonsure and four lower ordinations on
July 21, 1832, as well as confirmation of Neumann’s good manners and piety, can be found
in Neumann’s estate in Philadelphia. Both certificates are from February 11, 1836, and the
signatures and seals are authentic. See RABP, St. John Neumann Collection, Box 1, Early
education.
Records in the Journal of February 17 and March 2, 1836 indicate that he took all the
documents and recommendations with him for the bishop.

RUDOLF SVOBODA

537

Confirmation of Neumann’s good manners and piety from February 11, 1836, signed by
Johann Geith, the provost of the Budweis cathedral chapter and the chancellor of
the consistory, Redemptorist Archives of the Baltimore Province St. John
Neumann Collection, Box 1, Early education. Printed with permission of the
Redemptorist Archives, Philadelphia.

mann had to have other documents with him, especially the testimonials
from his studies. However, he did not receive the most important documents, the so-called dimissorial letters, i.e., documents in which the bishop
confirmed that Neumann had fulfilled all the conditions for receiving
higher ordinations and dismissed him as a cleric from his diocese in order
to serve in another diocese (so-called exeat).54 When Neumann visited the
bishop on February 12, he received only his blessing.55 He then left Budweis on February 15.56 Růžička’s reason why he did not issue dimissorial
54. Confirmation of fulfilment of all conditions for higher ordination and release from
the diocese could be found in a single document.
55. Letter of John Nepomucene Neumann to his parents, Budweis, February 11, 1836.
56. This date is evident from a letter from John Nepomucene Neumann to his parents
in Strasbourg, dated February 28, 1836. It states that on the day after his departure, on February 16, he arrived in Linz, which corresponds in time to the distance between the two cities.
On the contrary, in his autobiography from 1852, he mentions February 13 as the day of

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

letters to Neumann is unknown. However, he probably wanted a written
confirmation of admission to the new diocese first. Neumann had no such
confirmation.
So Neumann left without higher ordinations and a dimissorial letter,
but with the legitimate hope of being accepted by Bishop Kenrick into the
Diocese of Philadelphia. He travelled through Linz to Munich, where this
hope was dashed because he learned that Bishop Kenrick had revoked the
authorization given to Räss, so he would not accept him into his diocese.
When Neumann arrived in Strasbourg at the end of February, Räss confirmed this bad news—but at the same time promised to write to Bishop
Dubois in New York if he would accept Neumann into his diocese.57
Neumann’s ship sailed from Le Havre, France on April 20, 1836.58 He
saw New York on May 28. After the necessary quarantine days, he could
go to the mainland and visit Bishop Dubois on June 2.59 He received a
warm welcome, which he describes in a letter to the dean of Prachatice,
Enders, on June 27, 1836:
In an hour I was then at the Cathedral, next to the episcopal residence.
At my ringing a short copper-red servant came, who led me first to Rev.
Reffeiner, for whom Rev. Canon Räss in Strasbourg had given me some
books to take along. He was greatly delighted at my arrival and told me
that the former had written on my account to the Most Rev. Bishop and
already three weeks ago a letter had been sent to Europe, informing him
of my reception into the Diocese of New York.60

Reffeiner then introduced him to Bishop Dubois. Neumann showed
him his documents, and the bishop confirmed that he wanted to accept
him into his diocese and that he had to ordain him immediately:
When I represented to him, that it could not be done, as I had no written
dimissorials from his Excellency, even if I left with his knowledge and
consent—that I wished to be able to prepare myself for some months for
departure from Budweis, but he was probably wrong here—after all, many years had passed
since then. See The Autobiography, 30; Journal, February 17, 1836.
57. The Autobiography, 31; in a Journal entry dated March 31, 1836, he claims that Räss
had already written to Bishop Dubois.
58. Letter of John Nepomucene Neumann to his parents, Le Havre, April 11, 1836.
59. Alfred C. Rush gives a detailed time analysis of Neumann’s arrival. See The Autobiography, 96.
60. Letter of John Nepomucene Neumann to the Dean of Prachatice Philip Enders,
New York, July 27, 1836 (this cited letter was not preserved in its original, and its copies are
stored in above mentioned archives, see note 14 for archival information).

RUDOLF SVOBODA

539

the reception of the Holy Orders, he answered that he could and must
ordain me as soon as he returned from the visitation already scheduled,
which in spite of his age of 80 years he conducts every year without interruptions. As there is here no Religious Fund nor Benefices, I was
ordained Subdeacon on the 19th of this month, Deacon on the 24th, and
Priest on the 25th on the title of the American Mission.61

Bishop Dubois sent the said letter, announcing the admission of Neumann to his diocese to Canon Räss. Neumann’s autobiography mentions
that he even determined the place of his future priestly work.62 Räss forwarded a letter from Dubois to the episcopal consistory in Budweis, where
Bishop Růžička signed a letter of release on June 28, 1836, in which he also
agreed to Neumann’s ordination—and sent it to New York.63 However, as
we know, John Nepomucene Neumann had already been a priest for three
days by then.
When, in 1896, the bishop of Budweis Martin Josef Říha answered
questions from the promoter of faith with the participation of witnesses, he
was able to confirm that John Nepomucene Neumann had been duly
released by Bishop Růžička from his home diocese, referring to the specific
minutes of the episcopal consortium from June 1836.64 The devil’s advocate
had already been satisfied with this answer, and this question was never
asked again during the canonization process. 65

61. Ibid.
62. The Autobiography, 34.
63. The dimissorial letter itself has not been preserved. Evidence that it was sent can be
found in Vojtěch Schmid’s letter to Václav Neumann on July 20, 1836. Schmid hoped that
by mid-August, it could be in New York so that John Neumann could be ordained at the end
of August. See Letter from Vojtěch Schmid to Václav Neumann, July 20, 1836, Chytil, Neumanniana, 170.
64. See the document of June 5, 1892, signed by the bishop of Budweis Říha and witnesses. SOA Třeboň, BA ČB, Procesní akta k blahořečení a svatořečení filadelfského biskupa
J. N. Neumanna, fol. 379–84; the original of the letter sent to Rome can be found in AGHR
Roma, Neumanniana, S. Neumann—Miscelanea.
65. In a decree of Cardinal Cajetan Alois-Masella, the Prefect of the Congregation of
Rites, of December 15, 1896, announcing the settlement of doubts about the life and virtues
of John Nepomucene Neumann, the departure for the United States by Neumann is mentioned in this way: “. . . a proprio Episcopo Budvicensi rite dimissus. . . ,” i.e., that he was duly
released from his home diocese. See Decretum Philadelphien. seu Budvicen. Beatificatonis et canonizationis Ven. Servi Dei Ioannis Nepomuceni Neumann e Congregatione Sanctissimi Redemptoris Episcopi Philadelphiensis, AGHR Roma, Neumanniana, Book SN1. On the same day,
Pope Leo XIII issued the Decretum introducendae causae, officially launching the apostolic process with Neumann.

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QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTLY AND MISSIONARY VOCATION

Neumann’s words shed light on and justify Bishop Růžička’s decision
when he left the Diocese of Budweis.66 By no means can he be criticized
for refusing to release Neumann from his diocese for legal reasons in order
to be ordained elsewhere when he did not know where he was going. In
addition, the later revocation of Bishop Kenrick’s authorization given to
Räss to receive theologians and priests for his diocese also vindicates
Ružička’s circumspective decision. The exeat had no chance of arriving in
New York in time, i.e., before Neumann’s ordination. Neumann himself
had sailed across the sea for forty days, and it is also known from other testimonies that the delivery of a letter between Europe and the United States
took about a month and a half, sometimes two months, and could be lost
for various reasons.67 In any case, we can confirm that the release letter
existed, but it is impossible to confirm that it arrived in New York. Nevertheless, for Neumann, it no longer mattered.
Conclusion
The young John Nepomucene Neumann decided to start his journey
to the priesthood only during the holidays of 1831 when he stayed home
in Prachatice after graduating from the philosophical lyceum in Budweis.
He decided to become a missionary only during his second year of study of
theology in Budweis, and from that moment on he began to prepare for his
mission. The postponement of the higher ordinations of Neumann and his
classmates ending their theological studies in the school year 1834/35 was
directly caused by the excessive number of ordained priests in recent years.
However, this situation arose not only as a result of a specific state intervention in the education of future priests but also due to the financial
dependence of the poor Diocese of Budweis on the state Religious Fund.
Neumann eventually chose not to wait for priestly ordination in his native
diocese, but preferred instead to go on missions to the United States without receiving higher ordinations, without official release by the bishop
from the diocese, and in relative uncertainty about his future. However, his
decision can be considered a rather logical outcome of his vocation to missionary work.

66. Until recently, he had a very bad reputation as a Josephinist and a Febronian who
had poorly taken care of his diocese. This erroneous view was clearly refuted in the monograph
Svoboda, Arnošt Konstantin Růžička. This bishop was very kind, especially caring for priestly
vocations, the seminary, and the seminarians. See esp. 110, 138–50.
67. See Letter from Vojtěch Schmid to Václav Neumann, July 20, 1836, Chytil, Neumanniana, 170–71.

Indigenous Globalism: Confraternity and
Connectivity in Colonial Cuzco
FRANK LACOPO*
This article places colonial Cuzco’s Nombre de Jesús confraternity
within early modern global history. The Nombre de Jesús served as a
focal point for collaboration between Indigenous elites and Jesuit proselytizers in the old Inca capital. An ambiguous archive and forgeries
related to the confraternity have led to sensationalist narratives about
the confraternity. While compelling from the perspective of archival
and forgery studies, this discussion ultimately distracts from a more
thoroughly-grounded history of a mixed European and Indigenous
institution. This article draws on evidence outside the forgeries to show
how Indigenous mission history was globally connective and collaborative rather than European-dominated.
Keywords: Jesuits, Missions, Peru, Ethnohistory, Atlantic History
Introduction
In the Jesuit Order’s central archive in Rome is a two-volume manuscript chronicle of the Society’s history in Peru, dating to 1600.1 About
* Frank Lacopo is a Ph.D. Candidate at The Pennsylvania State University. His email
is fxl60@psu.edu.
1. The anonymous 1600 chronicle spans two volumes that are accessible in Rome at the
Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu [hereafter ARSI] in the Provincia Peruana series [hereafter “Peru”], Peru 25 and 26. The manuscripts have been studied and fully transcribed by
Francisco Mateos. For Mateos’ critical description and discussion of the volumes, see Francisco Mateos, ed., Historia General de la Compañía de Jesús en la Provincia del Perú: cronica
anonima de 1600 que trata del establecimiento y misiones de la Compañia de Jesus en los paises de
habla española en la America Meridional, 2 vols. (Madrid, 1944), I, 79–107. While historians
may never have a full understanding of the chronicle’s authorship, it was certainly written in
Peru and almost definitely had multiple authors. As Mateos suggests, Antonio de Vega may
have been involved in writing at least part of the chronicle’s Cuzco section, since Vega wrote
a more focused history of the Cuzco mission in the same year. It is possible that the 1600
anonymous chronicle is in part a condensation of many provincial histories written in Peru at
the end of the sixteenth century on the order of Superior General Claudio Acquaviva.
It should be noted that ARSI also holds a second copy of the chronicle in a different
hand, but with no significant scribal differences in the sections relevant to this article. The call

541

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INDIGENOUS GLOBALISM

halfway down the page numbered “20” begins a detailed description of “the
confraternity of the Nombre de Jesús, of the Indians,” which had been
established in Cuzco. By most measures, this was a typical sodality, the likes
of which existed across the early modern Catholic world.2 The confraternity
provided means of mutual aid and Christian burial for its members, organized events on feast days, and established a presence in one of the city’s
important churches. In the Jesuit church where the confraternity met and
for which they provided a significant amount of the decoration, the group
[had] their spiritual discussions every Wednesday and Friday of the year,
their memorials [for] holy weeks, [and] their communions [for] many
feast days. Here every day of earthly time [del mundo] the blind and poor
pray the Christian doctrine and sing, with other devout couplets and
motets. This is something that has caused and continues to cause much
admiration and edification. Others among them are skillful in music,
without having learned except by ear. And being sightless they take from
memory the responses and hymns to sing on feast days, and at the masses
that they celebrate here for their dead.3

Additionally, the confraternity organized and participated in processions
with priests to visit, console, and maintain the living spaces of the sick.4
But these were not the Nombre de Jesús’ only significant characteristics. The confraternity was also a cultural and religious mediator between

numbers for the second copies are ARSI, Peru 23–24. Comparison between the volumes
might raise new and important questions for manuscript studies and knowledge transmission,
but these matters lie outside the scope of this article.
2. See Christopher Black and Pamela Gravestock, eds., Early Modern Confraternities in
Europe and the Americas: International and Interdisciplinary Perspectives (Aldershot, UK, 2006),
on the global confraternity phenomenon.
3. ARSI, Peru 26, p. 21: Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la
provincia del Perú, II, 36. Since Mateos’ transcription is more accessible and preserves the original folio numbering, spelling, and abbreviations, this article cites from Mateos rather than the
manuscript throughout the article. Mateos made very few errors in his transcription. Any that
appear in a quoted passage are noted. “Aqui tienen sus pláticas sp[i]r[it]uales todos los miércoles y viernes de año, sus monumentos las semanas sanctas, sus comuniones muchas fiestas;
aquí todos los días del mundo rezan la doctrina xpna. y la cantan, con otras coplas deuotas y
motetes, los ciegos y pobres, cosa que ha causado y causa mucha admiración y edificación, y
algunos de ellos son diestros en la música, sin poder auer aprendido más que de oydas, y por
no tener ojos toman de memoria los responsos y himnos para cantar en sus fiestas, y en las
misas que dizen aquí por sus difuntos.” Author’s own translation. Mateos corrects “cielos,”
“heavens,” to “ciegos,” “the blind,” finding a likely scribal error. Mateos also retains “admiracion,” although the scribe seems to have crossed out this word in the manuscript.
4. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 37.

FRANK LACOPO

543

Cover and pages 20–21 from the anonymous chronicle (Peru, 1600), stored in
ARSI, Peru 26. © Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu

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INDIGENOUS GLOBALISM

Jesuits and Indigenous cuzqueños, and a means for expressing Indigenous
prestige on the public stage.5 The sodality hosted elections and served as a
vehicle for the expression of status through patronage of the arts:
The said confraternity has their cabildos and elections of their leader
prioste and mayordomos and aldermen. There are in [the church] two
chapels, the first belongs to the Yanakunas of the college, who are assistants and servants of whom we will speak when discussing temporal matters, and the other is of the same confraternity in which the father in
charge of the sodality says Mass every day to the Indians. It has a very
opulent image of Our Lady and a well-adorned sacristy and altar. Every
day there it is augmented because a rich and very virtuous Indian, one of
the first founders of the confraternity, Diego Cucho, wishes to endow it
sufficiently, and already has it for his internment.6
5. Throughout this article, I use the term “Indigenous” to refer to those descended from
the Andes’ pre-Spanish inhabitants, as this is both more illustrative and less pejorative than
the historical “Indio/a” or “Indian” in modern usage. I use the term “Indian” only when quoting directly from primary sources, as this preserves the sense that colonial people had when
writing and thinking about Indigenous people. As David Garrett points out, the city of Cuzco
and its surroundings are exceptional as the geographical home of the precolonial Inca elite,
who ruled the empire of Tawantinsuyu before the Spanish invasion. I have chosen the broader
term “Indigenous” to describe members of the Nombre de Jesús confraternity owing to the
dearth of information on specific individuals associated with the sodality. See Garrett, Shadows of Empire: The Indian Nobility of Cusco, 1750–1825 (Cambridge, 2005), 11, for a discussion on categorizing Indigenous people in colonial Cuzco.
6. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 35.
“Ylustra mucho nra. yglesia la cofradía del N[ombre] de Jesús, de los yndios que en ella está
fundada, y en la yglesia de los mesmos yndios de que ya queda hecha relación, donde los
cofrades de la dha. cofradía hazen sus cauildos y electiones de su prioste y mayordomos y
demás officiales o veintiquatros. [H]ay en ella dos capillas, la una es de los yanaconas deste
collegio, que es lo mismo que ayudantes y criados, de quien se hablará después quando se trate
de lo tenporal; la otra de la mesma cofradía en que se dize cada día missa a los yndios por el
P[adre] que tiene a su cargo dha. cofradía. Tiene una muy rica ymagen de N[uestra] S[eñora],
buen adorno de sacristía y altar, y cada día va en más augm[ento] porque la quiere dotar suficiente[mente] vn yndio rico y muy virtuoso, de los primeros fundadores de esta cofradía de
Jesús, llamado Diego Cucho, y la tiene ya para su entierro.” Author’s own translation. Diego
Cucho’s name was corrected from another name that began with a “P,” but the correction is
too heavy in the manuscript to make out the original. This passage in particular is highly suggestive that the 1600 chronicle’s section on the Nombre de Jesús is either drawn from or
helped to generate Vega’s history of the same year, as the relevant section in Vega’s history
opens almost identically: “Ilustra mucho nuestra iglesia la cofradía del Nombre de Jesús, que
en ella está fundada, en la iglesia de los indios, donde los cofradres tienen sus cabildos y elecciones de su prioste y mayordomos. . . .” See Antonio de Vega, “Historia o enarración de las
cosas sucedidas en este colegio del Cuzco destos Reynos del Perú desde su Fundación hasta
hoy Primero de Noviembre Día de Todos Santos año de 1600,” in: Historia del Colegio y Universidad de San Ignacio de Loyola de la Ciudad del Cuzco, ed. Ruben Vargas Ugarte (Lima,
1948), 42. The identification of the term “veintiquatros” with confraternal aldermen is not

FRANK LACOPO

545

The 1600 chronicle therefore provides a window into Indigenous interactions with the new colonial order and religion in Cuzco.
A straightforward study of the confraternity is valuable, but must
acknowledge the sodality’s complex historiographical position. In 1996, a
corpus of documents hitherto unknown or ignored by most of the academic community appeared. Known collectively as the “Naples Documents,” these sources seemed to rewrite basic understandings of the history
of the colonial Andes.7 The Nombre de Jesús became a somewhat unlikely
part of the ensuing controversies. One of the publications about the documents implicated the confraternity, and particularly its European Jesuit
allies, in an effort by the mestizo Jesuit Blas Valera to fake his death after
an English attack on Cádiz and to return to Peru to advocate for a new,
utopian, and Christian Inca Empire.8 If verified, this finding would heavily
revise basic knowledge about Latin American history.
As is the fate of many sensational discoveries, the crucial source within
the Naples Documents which locates the Nombre de Jesús within the
alleged Inca revivalist effort has been shown to be a forgery.9 This article is
an effort to move beyond sensationalist narratives and to center instead
what can be known about the important confraternity. By directing attention toward more reliable documents, a new comparative and connective
chapter on the global nature of Indigenous confraternities in the colonial
Americas emerges.10 Through examinations of sometimes-ambiguous but

immediately obvious to a modern reader, although it was a common usage. A short discussion
of this documentary problem is in Paul Charney, “A Sense of Belonging: Colonial Indian
Cofradīas and Ethnicity in the Valley of Lima, Peru,” The Americas, 54, no. 2 (1998), 385–86.
7. A study of the intrigue surrounding the Naples Documents is worth a monographlength study on its own, and this author has therefore chosen to forego extensive discussion
of them. For an accessible introduction to the documents’ meaning and significance, see Kenneth Andrien, “The Virtual and the Real: The Case of the Mysterious Documents from
Naples,” History Compass, 6, no. 5 (2008), 1304–06.
8. Laura Laurencich Minelli, “El manuscrito De las costumbres antiguas de los naturales
del Pirú: un enfoque nuevo sobre su historia y autoría,” Anuac, 3, no. 2 (2015), 3n3. For details
surrounding Valera’s accusation, imprisonment, and death, see Hyland, Jesuit and the Incas:
The Extraordinary Life of Padre Blas Valera, S.J. (Ann Arbor, 2003), 1-2.
9. Erika Valdivieso, “Dissecting a Forgery: Petronius, Dante, and the Incas,” American
Journal of Philology, 142, no. 3 (2021), 493–533.
10. In its use of the term “connective,” this paper generally follows Sanjay Subrahmanyam’s discussions of “connected history,” which simply insists that the early modern
world was characterized, in part, by a marked increase in interregional connectivity, human
movement, and flow of ideas across great geographical distances. As this article shows, some
of the most crucial chapters in the seemingly locally-oriented Nombre de Jesús’ history were

546

INDIGENOUS GLOBALISM

unforged sources, Indigenous-dependent missionary strategies, and the
Jesuits Diego de Torres Bollo and Blas Valera, this article demonstrates
that the Nombre de Jesús was a locus of complex collaboration between
Indigenous and non-Indigenous actors in Cuzco. The Nombre de Jesús fits
into the global history of missionary Catholicism, and is an especially illustrative example of how Indigenous actors could creatively resist colonial
repression as they modified European organizational and devotional forms
to serve their needs.
A Confraternity in Cuzco: Global Patterns and Local Strategies
Confraternities were voluntary associations whose principal purpose
was to provide “social assistance as insurance and assurance” to members.11
Despite the masculine inflection of the word “confraternity” (cognate with
Spanish cofradía, Italian confraternita, and Latin confraternitas, meaning
“brotherhood”), women and children could be members. Some institutions, including the Nombre de Jesús, were thoroughly mixed.12 When
functioning properly, most early modern confraternities made sure that
their members received adequate care if sick and proper burial upon death.
On both sides of the Atlantic, confraternities also extended positive incentives for joining, as they were major participants in public religious events
and processions. They therefore served as centers of social association and
as vehicles to enter important political networks.13 The 1600 chronicle estimates the confraternity’s membership at as many as five hundred, meaning
that the institution’s capacity to provide this wide variety of social resources
was significant.14
The Nombre de Jesús provides an example of how a European form of
lay social and religious organization and display spread across the Atlantic
connective. Essential reading in the broad discussion of connected history begins with Subrahmanyam, “Connected Histories: Notes towards a Reconfiguration of Early Modern Eurasia,” Modern Asian Studies, 31, no. 3 (1997), 735–62, here 737.
11. Laura Dierksmeyer, Charity for and by the Poor: Franciscan-Indigenous Confraternities in Mexico, 1527–1700 (Norman, OK, 2020), 35. During the period of Indigenous demographic crisis in the Andes in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, the resources
that the confraternity could provide would have been crucial to its Indigenous members. For
discussion of that topic, see Garrett, Shadows of Empire, 46–47.
12. Christopher F. Black, Italian Confraternities in the Sixteenth Century (Cambridge,
UK, 1989), 35–38; Dierksmeyer, Charity for and by the Poor, 113–16.
13. Black and Gravestock, eds., Early Modern Confraternities in Europe and the Americas,
passim.; Dierksmeyer, Charity for and by the Poor, 72; Nicholas Terpstra, Lay Confraternities
and Civic Religion in Renaissance Bologna (Cambridge, UK, 1999), 74.
14. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 37.

FRANK LACOPO

547

as part of broader colonial processes, and specifically how Jesuit strategies
for promoting charity and public piety could be transplanted from their
original European, and particularly Roman, context and could adapt to
colonial circumstances.15 The confraternity’s participation in Christian procession events is highly illustrative. During these processions, the anonymous chronicle reports that the confraternity members—men and
women—went dressed in their ancestral garb, processing with candles and
the “arms of the Nombre de Jesús.”16 Furthermore, the “prioste,” or leader
of processions, was to be a “principal Inca” (“Ynga principal”). He carried a
banner emblazoned with the emblems of the confraternity.17 In subtle and
sometimes not-subtle ways, Indigenous confrères appropriated the
Nombre de Jesús to express and maintain their status in Cuzco after colonization. The confraternity was a locus of complex negotiation between the
colonial state, the hierarchical Church, and Indigenous cuzqueños who
needed a place of prestige in the colonial order.
The spread of Jesuit confraternities and the Society itself in the 1560s
constituted part of what historians, including Juan Carlos Estenssoro
Fuchs, have identified as the “second evangelization” of the Andes.18 This

15. Some discussion exists in English on the ways in which the Roman model of Jesuit
confraternity spread in Italy, but more research is necessary into the spread of this devotional
and organizational form. For a good starting point, see Lance Lazar, Working in the Vineyard
of the Lord: Jesuit Confraternities in Early Modern Italy (Toronto, 2005), 125–52. An expansive
and longstanding literature exists on the establishment and variable functions of confraternities in Peru and colonial Latin America more generally. Classic introductions and case studies
include, but are certainly not limited to, Olinda Celestino and Albert Meyers, Las cofradías en
el Perú: región central (Frankfurt, 1981); Alicia Barzarte Martinez, Las cofradías de españoles en
la ciudad de México (1526–1860) (Mexico City, 1989); Tetsuya Amino, “Las lágrimas de
Nuestra Señora de Copacabana: Un milagro de la imagen de María y los Indios en diáspora
de Lima en 1591,” Journal of Department of Arts and Sciences of University of Tokyo, 22 (1990),
35–65. Dagmar Bechtloff, “La formación de una sociedad intercultural: las cofradías en el
Michoacán colonial,” Historia Mexicana, 43, no. 2 (1993), 251–63.
16. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 37.
17. Ibid. The description of these processions evokes a similar scene discussed in the
opening of Jose Carlos de la Puente Luna’s Andean Cosmopolitans: Seeking Justice and Reward
at the Spanish Royal Court (Austin, TX, 2018), 1. Here, Puente Luna recalls a 1610 Indigenous procession celebrating the canonization of Ignatius of Loyola. During the procession,
the participants “carried gentlemen of royal Inca descent in litters” to the principal Jesuit
church in the city. While Puente Luna does not identify the participants as members of the
Nombre de Jesús, it is not inconceivable that they had a presence in this procession, given
their Jesuit ties.
18. For a brief discission, see Juan Fernando Cobo Betancourt, “Colonialism in the
Periphery: Spanish Linguistic Policy in New Granada, c. 1574–1625,” Colonial Latin American Review, 23, no. 2 (2014), 127–28.

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stage of proselytization developed during the establishment of a stronger
monarchical state in Peru and campaigns to create new and largely artificial
Indigenous communities known as “reductions,” which aimed to Christianize and control colonized populations.19 This was also a period (starting
with, among other watersheds, the Cédula magna of 1574) when the colonial state began to implement aggressive policies to enforce the use of
“general languages,” typically pre-colonial imperial languages like Quechua
and Nahuatl, at the expense of other Indigenous languages.20 As missionaries existing on the boundaries between European and Indigenous cultures, the Jesuits acted as agents of these imperial projects. Indeed, Jesuits
themselves occasionally saw the great diversity of languages spoken in
Indigenous America as a diabolic trick to hinder evangelization.21 As a
confraternity in the heart of Quechua-speaking Cuzco, the Nombre de
Jesús benefitted rather than suffered from the implementation of general
language policies. The elites of Cuzco were, in this particular respect, in a
relatively advantageous position to maintain their status through a confraternity under new colonial pressures, and could even co-opt the confraternity for their own goals.22
As José Carlos de la Puente Luna has discussed, colonized Andean
people drew on a variety of strategies to prove their conversion and to certify their Christianization to colonial authorities.23 The appearance of early,
genuine, and total conversion to Catholicism was crucial for Indigenous
19. As Garrett notes, these reductions were not only often founded for the purpose of
language policy and Christianization, but were modeled, at least in theory, on Castilian
municipalities. Garrett, Shadow of Empire, 26.
20. For the relationship between “general languages,” Spanish colonialism, and broader
intellectual history in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, see esp. Juan Carlos
Estenssoro’s “Las vías indígenas de la occidentalización: Lenguas generales y lenguas maternas en el ámbito colonial Americano (1492–1650),” in: Langues indiennes et empire dans
l’Amérique du Sud coloniale, dirs. Juan Estenssoro and Cesar Itier, [Mélanges de la Casa de
Velázquez, Nouvelle série, 45 (1)], (Madrid, 2015), 15–36. The introduction of “general languages” in colonial Latin America has been the subject of a longstanding historiography, and
is still politically- and socially-charged inside and outside strictly academic conversations. See
Betancourt, “Colonialism in the Periphery,” 119, 124.
21. See, for example, Akira Saito, “‘Fighting Against a Hydra,’ Jesuit Language Policy
in Moxos,” in: Beyond Borders: A Global Perspective of Jesuit Mission History, eds. Shinzo Kawamura and Cyril Veliath (Tokyo, 2009), 350–63, here 352. See also Sabine MacCormack, On
the Wings of Time: Rome, The Incas, Spain, and Peru (Princeton, 2007), 174–75.
22. Although, as some have noted, the version of Quechua that eventually became
accepted as a “general language” may have been largely an artificial colonial construct, the
campaigns to promote the general language had to start with speakers of the language. For
references and discussion on this debate, see Betancourt, “Colonialism in the Periphery,” 138.
23. Puente Luna, Andean Cosmopolitans, 168.

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elites who sought to maintain their status as caciques in the Spanish
Empire. Inca and other Indigenous elites had to avoid the “stain of neophyte status” at all costs, since a “New Christian,” whether in Iberia or
across the Atlantic, was implicitly an imperfectly-integrated subject of the
king.24 In Cuzco, participation in a Jesuit confraternity would have functioned to demonstrate—if only publicly and officially—Indigenous elites’
Christianization. It is therefore unsurprising that the confraternity also
assisted in catechizing Indigenous people. Overall, the Nombre de Jesús
represents a discreet aspect of colonial Peruvian history that can be located
in local, regional, and global patterns.
Catechization, Adaptation, and Linguistic Politics in the
Nombre de Jesús’ World
Indigenous Peruvian elites found themselves in a precarious position
toward the end of the sixteenth century. Royal authorities demanded—at
least in theory—absolute adherence to Catholic doctrine beyond that
expected of a “New Christian” as a precondition for cacical authority and
elite subjecthood. Yet the Third Council of Lima allowed mestizo ordination only under very restrictive circumstances, making elite families’ direct
participation in Christian religion exceedingly difficult.25 Even after the
Spanish crown reversed the ruling in 1588, the Jesuit hierarchy remained
opposed to mestizo and Indigenous participation in the priesthood.26 The
Nombre de Jesús found alternative ways to participate in colonial religion,
proselytization, and public life.
In addition to satisfying material needs, the confraternity served as a
crucial point of intersection for Jesuit missionary activity and continuing
expression of Indigenous identity and ritual display. Processions were a
major element to Indigenous elites’ strategies of maintaining status in
Cuzco’s urban space. The anonymous chronicle of 1600 recounts that “in
[the confraternity’s] processions and feasts, they go with candles glowing
with the arms of the Nombre de Jesús, and the Indians go dressed in white
shirts, colored [y]acollas or mantas, some of scarlet and others of crimson

24. Puente Luna, Andean Cosmopolitans, 167.
25. For a useful discussion of the Third Lima Council’s objective to create a “stable missionary and pastoral regime,” see Alan Durston, Pastoral Quechua: The History of Christian
Translation in Colonial Peru, 1550–1650 (Notre Dame, IN, 2007), 28–29.
26. Durston, Pastoral Quechua, 88; Sabine Hyland, “Illegitimacy and Racial Hierarchy
in the Peruvian Priesthood: A Seventeenth-Century Dispute,” Catholic Historical Review, 84,
no. 3 (1998), 439.

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INDIGENOUS GLOBALISM

The Cuzco School, Marriage of Martin de Loyola to Princess Dona Beatriz and Don
Juan Borja to Lorenza (Ana María Lorenza de Loyola y Coya, daughter of Martin and
Beatriz), 1718, oil on canvas. Currently stored in the Museo Pedro de Osma.
Painting is in the public domain. The painting depicts the bride wearing a women’s
manta (lliclla), albeit one with Europeanized elements.

damask.”27 In the same processions, the women are described as wearing
llicllas and “yacsas,” the latter perhaps an alternative spelling of “aqsus,” an
Indigenous women’s dress that wraps around the wearer. These are all ref27. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 37.
“en sus processions y fiestas van con cirios encendidos con armas del N[ombre] [de] Jesús, y
ban vestidos los yndios con camisetas blancas y acollas o mantas coloradas vnos de grana y
otros de damasco carmesí; y las yndias con lliquillas y yacsas que son sus mantas y sayas o
vasquiñas de las mesmas colores. . . .” Author’s own translation. The scribe originally wrote
“las armas del niño Jesus,” but crossed out “niño” and corrected it to “nombre,” recycling the
“n” in the word. Another possible reading of “y acollas” is “and ancallos,” which refers to festive garb and is defined in Diego Holguín’s colonial dictionary as an “ancient” and “very precious” article of women’s clothing. While this reading makes sense grammatically, the gendered inflection of the passage makes it less likely. See Diego González Holguín, Vocabulario
dela lengua general de todo el Peru llamada lengua Qquichua, o del Inca (Lima, 1608), 17. For a
discussion of mantas, see Julia K. McHugh, “Cloth Making and Meaning in the Viceregal
Americas,” in: Painted Cloth: Fashion and Ritual in Colonial Latin America, ed. Rosario I.
Granados (Austin, TX, 2022), esp. 34–36. The author extends his deepest thanks to Kyle
Marini, Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Art History at The Pennsylvania State University, for helping him to sort out these specialized questions regarding Indigenous textiles
and clothing. It must also be noted that the distinction “scarlet” and “crimson” in the chronicle could be read as a juxtaposition between kermes and cochineal dye, although the source
does not provide enough context to reveal the author’s intent.

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erences to Indigenous clothing within the context of the confraternal procession. A manta, or “mantle,” is a square cape worn around the shoulders
and is commonly fastened at the front with a pin. Specific delineations
exist between women’s and men’s mantas, llicllas for women and yacollas
for men. In some of their forms, Indigenous women’s mantas are also used
to carry children. The Nombre de Jesús thus served as a vehicle for outward
and multi-gendered Indigenous participation in the most important public
rituals and festivities.
Particularly important was the feast of Corpus Christi. As Carolyn
Dean has discussed, Corpus Christi events in Cuzco were opportunities
when Indigenous elites “strategically occupied cultural interstices” not in
merely nostalgic ways, but in a manner that allowed them to construct
“new selves” in the colonial order.28 During Corpus Christi events, Indigenous cuzqueños performed submission to the colonizer’s religion and its
central tenet of transubstantiation, but also expressed their own identities
and insisted upon Indigenous culture’s relevant and ongoing presence in
community life.29 The Nombre de Jesús’ male and female members had a
central place in the city’s Corpus Christi festivities and, according to the
1600 chronicle, may have drawn as many as five hundred members to
Corpus Christi and other similar events.30 While these numbers are unreliable for precise demographic study, they convey a sense of the group that
understood itself as descendants of the Inca elite and were attracted to the
confraternity’s events.
Perhaps even more significant than the confraternity’s place in processions was their role in proselytization. The Nombre de Jesús’ efforts on this
front must be understood within the history of ordination. Peruvian Jesuit
rhetoric called for top-down proselytization of Indigenous people by
peninsular missionaries. Starting with campaigns aimed at purity within
the ranks in the 1560s and solidified at Third Lima Council of 1582–83,
Jesuit policy attempted to bar mestizos and Indigenous people from joining
the Society, disqualifying the very people whose linguistic and cultural
knowledge was crucial for the mission to Indigenous people.31

28. Carolyn Dean, Inka Bodies and the Body of Christ: Corpus Christi in Colonial Cuzco,
Peru (Durham, 1999), 3.
29. Dean, Inka Bodies and the Body of Christ, 2.
30. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 37.
31. Sabine Hyland, “Illegitimacy and Racial Hierarchy,” 431–54.

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INDIGENOUS GLOBALISM

Parish of San Sebastián (detail), in the Procession of Corpus Christi series, c. 1680,
oil on canvas. Artists unknown. Currently stored in Museo del Arzobispado,
Cuzco, Peru. Painting is in the public domain.

This knowledge gap formed a central part of the Jesuits’ theological
and political dialogue. Immediately after the Third Lima Council (1582–
83), which was called in part to establish a stable pastoral program for
Peru, José de Acosta argued that European missionaries needed to take
control of conversion in colonial lands.32 He called Jesuits to catechize on
their own terms, even if it involved learning the necessary languages with
minimal Indigenous assistance. Such a project could be centered in Lima,
Spain, and Rome rather than in the mission field, the latter corrupted by
paganism as it was. In his 1588 De procuranda Indorum salute, Acosta
asserted, “experience has shown that the greater part of [mestizos] prevent
32. For the objectives of the Third Lima Council, see Durston, Pastoral Quechua, 28.

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[sound missionization] with their corrupt customs that do not improve on
account of their skill in language.”33 Yet a single person with proficiency in
Indigenous languages was “more valuable than a hundred vulgar catechists,
for they can do more in a single sermon than many others can do in a hundred years.”34 Indigenous language was invaluable, but Indigenous people
who learned those languages as children were to be cut out of the missionary process.
Linguists and anthropologists have investigated colonial Catholicism’s
attempts to appropriate Indigenous languages. Alan Durston, for example,
documents the gradual absorption of Quechua into Peruvian catechetical
literatures. This brand of appropriation was largely a matter of removing
words, phrases, and modes of expression that obviously reflected specifically Indigenous religious worldviews. Usually, it was assumed that Latinate words and ideas could stand in as corrective replacements.35 As
Durston has revealed, Quechua (or at least the forms of Quechua that
developed for Spanish speakers and practicing Christians) transformed
into a semiotic system that could express Christian ideas by the end of the
sixteenth century. An Andean process of mutual understanding developed
much faster than the analogous transition that James Lockhart identified
in the Nahua heartland, where significant cross-linguistic comprehension
took more than a century to develop.36 Thus, the Nombre de Jesús fit into
its colonial world uneasily. Opportunities for collaboration and for resistance were clear.
Surviving sources provide specific information on how the Nombre de
Jesús participated in proselytization. The confraternity hosted “spiritual discussions every Wednesday and Friday of the year” which, as Sabine Hyland
suggests, were possibly overseen for a time by the mestizo Jesuit Valera
when he was based in Cuzco.37 In addition to the regular spiritual discus33. José de Acosta, De procuranda Indorum salute, in: Obras del P. Jose de Acosta de la
Compañía de Jesus (Madrid, 1954), 518. Acosta’s fears were not entirely baseless. Kenneth
Mills formulates the idea of Andean “self-Christianization” as a shorthand for the
autonomous Indigenous religious thinking and behavior that Peninsulars feared. Kenneth
Mills, Idolatry and its Enemies: Colonial Andean Religion and Extirpation, 1640–1750 (Princeton, 1997), 262–63. See also Charles, Allies at Odds, 100.
34. Acosta, De procuranda, 516.
35. Durston, Pastoral Quechua, 308–14.
36. James Lockhart, The Nahuas after the Conquest: A Social and Cultural History of the
Indians of Central Mexico, Sixteenth through Eighteenth Centuries (Stanford, CA, 1992), 441.
37. This suggestion is in Sabine Hyland, Gods of the Andes: An Early Jesuit Account of Inca
Religion and Andean Christianity (University Park, 2011), 21.

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sions, the Nombre de Jesús appears to have assisted by providing music and
perhaps ceremonial appointments while “foreign Indians” came to Cuzco to
receive catechization, some of them likely in Quechua. The confraternity
conducted this role as they participated in processions around the city to
visit the sick, assisted Jesuit priests in ministering to the infirm, and provided food to the imprisoned. As the chronicler reports, the confraternity
attended to various ministries and spiritual discussions and, in their work,
an “infinity of Indians go” with the confrères.38 Context clues imply that the
confrères provided linguistic assistance during these ministries.
Status-seeking indigenous confrères’ most obvious resource was their
proficiency in speaking Quechua or “runasimi,” the “words of the people.”
While proselytization in Quechua was key, it remained a fact that the language was difficult for adult European missionaries to acquire. By 1583,
only thirteen of 136 Jesuit “subjects,” or about ten percent, were listed
specifically as capable of ministering to “Indians” and at least presumably
having special language skills.39 More frequently, Jesuits could operate in
Latin and Spanish, and were therefore mostly effective at preaching to
Spanish-speakers.40 But Quechua was crucial for ministry to those who did
not understand Spanish. The catechetical and conversionary work in which
the confraternity participated was therefore important for the proselytization of native Quechua speakers as well as the promotion of Quechua as a
general language among the “foreign” Indigenous people who came from
outside of Cuzco to “confess and receive the Christian doctrine.”41 In this
respect, the Nombre de Jesús fit into broader trends, as Quechua became
38. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 37.
As Betancourt has already discussed in the context of New Granada, tracing the details of linguistic collaboration among peninsular missionaries and Indigenous people is often impossible to characterize precisely. Nevertheless, reading sources for implied collaboration is highly
productive. See Betancourt, “Colonialism in the Periphery,” 120.
39. Peru 4I-II, fols. 8r–14v, stored in Rome, ARSI. In her study of Jesuit missions in
Peru, Aliocha Maldavsky finds the same number. In her methodology, she selects only those
who are listed as ministering to “Indians.” It must be noted that there is one other Jesuit in
these records, a Joan Serrano, who is listed as having skill in “Lengua,” which could be a reference to Indigenous language proficiency. Although Serrano may not have had a formal
ministry in which he used his skills, he should be noted. See Maldavsky, Vocaciones inciertas.
misión y misioneros en la provincia Jesuita del Perú en los siglos XVI y XVII (Madrid and Lima,
2012), 217.
40. While David Garrett notes that the later colonial Inca nobility of Cuzco was one of
the most Hispanicized Indigenous groups in the Americas, the sixteenth century was a time
flux and less-complete Hispanicization even among Cuzco’s elite. See Garrett, Shadows of
Empire, 60.
41. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 36.

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as common, if not more common, in catechetical instruction than Spanish
around the start of the seventeenth century.42
While an expansive literature exists on Quechua catechetical texts and
Indigenous processions in the period 1550–1650, less research explores
Indigenous-sponsored institutions in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century
Cuzco that assisted missionization.43 Historians have long cited the Jesuits’
ability to forge alliances with local elites across the world as one of the keys
to their success. But Cuzco hosted more than a mere alliance. By collaborating with the Society of Jesus in its ministries in Cuzco, the Nombre de
Jesús participated in resistance, intentionally or not, against a colonial
ecclesiastical hierarchy that increasingly sought to marginalize Indigenous
participants. As is visible in Jesuit documents, an alliance between Indigenous people and their languages for proselytization became viable in Cuzco
can be traced to as early as 1576 or 1577. In this fleeting period, Valera was
present in the Cuzco mission and possibly served as the spiritual advisor of
the Nombre de Jesús.44
While no complete list of the confraternity’s lay members has been
forthcoming from the archives, evidence on Valera can act as a proxy for at
least some confrères’ views regarding proselytization and Indigenous language. On Quechua’s positionality in regard to Latin and Spanish, Valera
had clear opinions.45 Valera’s support for Quechua not only as a noble language equal to Latin, but as a general language, is cited in Inca Garcilaso
de la Vega’s work:
When they [non-native Quechua speakers] return to their lands with the
new and more noble language that they learned, they appear more noble,
more decorated, and more competent in their intellects . . . as is the Latin
language for us . . . and so the Puquinas, Collas, Urus, Yuncas, and other
rude and rough nations that speak even their own languages poorly seem
to throw off their roughness and rudeness when they learn the Language
of Cuzco, and their politics, courtesies, and wits aim to higher things. At

42. MacCormack, On the Wings of Time, 176.
43. Among the important works that touch on this topic are John Charles, Allies at
Odds: The Andean Church and Its Indigenous Agents, 1583–1671 (Albuquerque, 2010) and Maldavsky, Vocaciones inciertas.
44. Hyland, Gods of the Andes, 21.
45. Valera had had precursors in these beliefs. The peninsular Domingo de Santo
Tomás, author of a very important 1560 Quechua grammar and lexicon, made similar arguments for Quechua’s parity with Latin, even claiming that Quechua could be “regulated and
enclosed under the same rules as Latin.” Quoted in MacCormack, On the Wings of Time, 177.

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last they are made more capable and sufficient to receive the doctrine of
the Catholic Faith. . . .46

Even after the Jesuit Order mandated Valera’s departure from Cuzco in
1576, a decision which the Indigenous community in Cuzco protested, the
space that the confraternity made for Indigenous religious dialogue
remained intact at least until the 1600 chronicle’s composition.47
As Sabine Hyland and others have shown, the road toward the exclusion of Indigenous and mestizo people in Peruvian proselytization was
long and complicated. Although negative attitudes toward ethnic diversity
in the Peruvian Jesuit ranks made their way into policy in the first decades
of Jesuit presence in Peru, the Second Lima Council of 1567–68 and following provincial congregations, like the one in Cuzco in 1576, called for
the composition of texts in Quechua and Aymara. This policy development
shows how colonial authorities recognized the indispensability of Indigenous language and, whether or not authorities like Acosta would admit it,
the native speakers who assisted in ministry and catechesis.48 By 1603—
likely in response to an additional and more urgent call for grammars and
catechetical materials from the Third Council of Lima—the Italian Jesuit
Ludovico Bertonio had produced several such grammars.49 In one of his
small grammars published in Rome and likely intended for students to
46. Garcilaso de la Vega, Primera parte de los Commentarios Reales (Madrid, 1723), 225–
26. “. . . quando se buelven à tus Tierras, con el nuevo, y mas noble Lenguage que
aprendieron, parescen mas Nobles, mas adornados, y mas capaces en sus Entendimientos . . .
como à nosotros la Lengua Latina. . . . Y asi los Indios Puquinas, Collas, Vrus, Yuncas, y otras
Nasciones, que son rudos, y torpes, y por su rudeça, aun sus proprias Lenguas las hablan mal;
quando alcançan à saber la Lengua del Cozco, paresce que echan de sì la rudeça, y torpeça que
tenian, y que aspiran à cosas Politicas, y Cortesanas, y sus Ingenios pretenden subir à cosas
mas altas: finalmente se hacen mas capaces, y susicientes para recebir la Doctrina de la Fè
Catholica. . . .” Author’s own translation. Also quoted and translated in part from another
edition of de la Vega in Hyland, Gods of the Andes, 30.
47. Acosta described the protests to Superior General Mercurian in the February 15,
1577 annual letter. ARSI, Peru 12, fol. 26v. See also de Egaña and Fernandez, Monumenta
Peruana, II, 269–270. Hyland, The Jesuit and the Incas, 55 discusses this document.
48. de Egaña and Fernandez, Monumenta Peruana, II, 202. As Aliocha Maldavsky has
discussed, Álvarez de Paz, rector at Cuzco, was an opponent of Indigenous-language missionization. Thus, the Nombre de Jesús and others like them had powerful opponents in Cuzco.
For de Paz and his debate with the pro-Indigenous language Nicolás Mastrilli Durán, see
Maldavsky, Vocaciones inciertas, 261–67.
49. See, for example, Ludovico Bertonio, Arte grammatica muy copiosa dela lengua
Aymara (Rome, 1603), and idem., Arte breve dela lengua Aymara (Rome, 1603). As early as
1583, multilingual doctrinal material was already appearing in Lima. See Betancourt, “Colonialism in the Periphery,” 125.

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carry when they launched into their missions, Bertonio’s stated purpose
was not to help readers “apprehend perfectly the Aymara language,” but
rather to provide knowledge for rough-and-ready, working preaching and
catechization.50 Thus, after the Third Council of Lima, the Society of Jesus
and the broader European Church hierarchy had taken steps to take full
control of the missionization process. Yet they remained reliant on Indigenous speakers and other local allies.
Transcultural Jesuits in the Nombre de Jesús’ World:
Diego de Torres Bollo and Blas Valera
It is possible to profile some members and allies of the Nombre de Jesús
who brought Cuzco’s model to broader audiences. The first of these is the
well-known transatlantic figure Diego de Torres Bollo. Born near Villalpando, near Burgos, in 1551, Bollo can be found listed among Valera and
other important missionaries in the 1583 Jesuit catalogs. He is placed in the
relatively humble forty-seventh spot in that catalog. Later, he can be observed
rising in the ranks to become rector in Cuzco in the late 1580s, when the
Nombre de Jesús was active. By the mid-1590s he had moved on to be rector
in Quito and, ultimately, he helped to found the first missions in Paraguay.51
He is documented in Rome in 1603, where he approved the Roman
printing of Doctrina christiana y catecismo, a Spanish-Quechua catechism
approved by the Third Lima Council.52 While in Rome, Bollo served as a
procurator of the Jesuit Order.53 Torres Bollo’s role in translation during
his stint as procurator is highly feasible, as the antiquarian Pedro Lozano
attributes to him eloquent Quechua speaking ability.54 Indeed, Bollo
50. Bertonio, Arte breve dela lengua Aymara, 3–4. “Aunque esta arte breue no seruirà
[sic] de aprender perfectamente la lengua Aymara, pues su breuedad no da lugar de explicar
los precettos como fuera necessario. . . .” Author’s own translation.
51. See de Egaña and Fernandez, Monumenta Peruana IV, 513, for a reference to Bollo
in Cuzco; ARSI, Peru 4I-II, fol. 43r for Bollo’s entry in the 1595 Quito catalogs. For a general history of the missions in Paraguay, see Guillermo Wilde, “The Missions of Paraguay:
Rise, Expansion, and Fall,” in: A Companion to the Early Modern Catholic Global Missions, ed.
Ronnie Po-chia Hsia (Leiden, 2018), 73–101.
52. Durston, Pastoral Quechua, 103. Durston notes that Torres Bollo is not to be confused
with Diego de Torres Rubio, a linguist who also composed catechetical materials in Quechua.
53. On the developing field of study on Jesuit procurators, see José Gabriel MartínezSerna, “Procurators and the Making of the Jesuits’ Atlantic Network,” in: Soundings in
Atlantic History: Latent Structures and Intellectual Currents, 1500–1830, eds. Bernard Bailyn
and Patricia L. Denault (Cambridge, MA, 2009), 181–209.
54. Lozano, Historia de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Paraguay, 2 vols.
(Madrid, 1754), I, 587.

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showed little humility on this matter: he claimed to have learned Quechua
quickly in his Relatione Breve.55
When he arrived back in Europe after his mission, Bollo gained personal association with Superior General Claudio Acquaviva thanks to his
work on behalf of the Society of Jesus against encomenderos and their abuses
against Indigenous populations in Paraguay.56 For this work, Bollo
received accolades from the bishops of Cuzco, Propoyan, Quito, and Lima,
which were conveyed through a letter written by Joaquín de Aldana to
King Philip III.57 Bollo’s career as a transatlantic Indigenous ally climaxed
when he was in Europe overseeing the publication of the Third Lima
Council’s catechism. In the earliest years of the seventeenth century, he
was involved in securing the confraternity’s papal privileges from his position in Rome, an activity which is attested in the form of a papal bull.58 In
these activities, Bollo shows how an Indigenous confraternity could reach
across the world and leverage their influence against Spanish colonial
authorities working to marginalize non-European people in the mission.59
Bollo’s rise from regional colonial notable to favored personality in
Rome played a key role in his successful publication of his Italian-language
Relatione Breve. This source offers substantial insight into a peninsular
55. On this matter, see Franco Pierno, “À la lisière de l’«autre monde» Le Pérou dans
la Relatione breve de Diego de Torres Bollo (1603),” Renaissance and Reformation/Renaissance
et Réforme, 34, nos. 1–2 (2011), 61–96, here 69.
56. For details surrounding this controversy, whose repercussions reached across the
Atlantic and to Rome, see Giuseppe Piras, “P. Diego de Torres Bollo, il potere coloniale
spagnolo e la ‘salvación y liberdad de los indios,” Archivio per l’Antropologia e la Etnologia, 135
(2005), 83–94.
57. Piras, “P. Diego de Torres Bollo, il potere coloniale spagnolo e la ‘salvación y liberdad de los indios,” 85; de Egaña and Fernandez, Monumenta Peruana VII, 347.
58. The fruit of Bollo’s labor seems to have been a bilingual Latin-Quechua papal bull,
housed at the Vatican Apostolic Archive. For a short analysis and transcription of the Latin
version of the bull, see Maurizio Gnerre, “Una Bula Pontificia de 1603 en Quechua,” in: Sublevando el Virreinato, eds. Minelli and Numhauser, 339–50. There is no reason that this bull
could not have been created given Bollo’s location in Rome in 1603 and his relationship with
high-ranking churchmen, including Claudio Acquaviva. However, it must be noted that the
author’s efforts to locate the bull in the Vatican Archives were unsuccessful, and that Gnerre’s
publication on the bull appears in a collection edited by Minelli, an early proponent of the
Naples Documents. Whether or not the bull was translated into Quechua, the Latin (whose
presence is attested in sources before the Naples Documents controversy and which Gnerre
duly cites) remains a testament to the Nombre de Jesús’ visibility across the Atlantic.
59. For a broader discussion of those traveling from the Andes and the challenges they
faced gaining audiences in Europe owing to their frequent classification as inferior subjects or
unworthy interlocutors with authorities, see Puente Luna, Andean Cosmopolitans, 10–11.

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Jesuit’s experience with Indigenous institutions in Peru such as the Nombre
de Jesús, and has been recognized for decades both as one of the earliest narrative sources on the South American missions and as one of the first texts
within the Jesuit relation genre. Much has been written on this central text,
which levies an argument against Spanish abuses in South America and
even goes so far as to label the Spanish as “foreigners” on the continent.60
Bollo’s ideas about Indigenous people come out in his writing. But the
fine details of his interactions and relationships in Cuzco are murky compared to his later work in Europe. Recent scholarship draws oblique connections between the transatlantic figure of Bollo and the Nombre de
Jesús.61 This caution may not be attributable to meaningful omission as
much as documentary problems and naming similarities between the Society of Jesus, the name of the physical Jesuit church in Cuzco, and the confraternity.62 Despite the occasional lack of clarity, it is likely that Bollo
returned to Europe after associating with the confraternity, where he advocated for the Nombre de Jesús and the causes that it stood for before the
Jesuit hierarchy, the pope, and Europe’s reading population.
Bollo’s case involves research into the career of a well-documented
European Jesuit. Blas Valera’s relationship with the confraternity’s mission
is clearer. As Hyland has convincingly suggested, Valera became the spiritual advisor to the Indigenous members of the Nombre de Jesús confraternity almost immediately upon his arrival in Cuzco.63 This conclusion is
supported in the 1600 chronicle, which mentions Valera as one of several
Jesuits involved with the confraternity’s activities.64 In this role, the mestizo Jesuit adopted “radical” views, such as one holding that Christianity
and Andean religions held profound similarities, and that syncretism was
a more appropriate missionary approach than Andean religions’ replacement with Catholicism.65
60. Piras, “P. Diego de Torres Bollo, il potere coloniale spagnolo e la ‘salvación y liberdad de los indios,” 85. See esp. Pierno, “À la lisière de l’‘autre monde’” for broader recent work
on Torres Bollo’s Relatione Breve.
61. An exception is Piras, “P. Diego de Torres Bollo, il potere coloniale spagnolo e la
‘salvación y liberdad de los indios,” 91, n. 11, which finds correspondence linking the two. Of
the key documents cited here, see esp. de Egaña and Fernandez, Monumenta Peruana VII,
219–22, which claims to connect Bollo to some high-ranking Indigenous members of the
confraternity.
62. As Puente Luna shows, relations between colonial travelers and European authorities are especially ephemeral in the record. See Puente Luna, Andean Cosmopolitans, 10–11.
63. Hyland, Jesuit and the Incas, 54.
64. Mateos, ed., Historia general de la Compañia de Jesus en la provincia del Perú, II, 38.
65. Hyland, Jesuit and the Incas, 54.

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INDIGENOUS GLOBALISM

According to a visitation record held at ARSI containing a catalog of
“subjects that are in the college of Cuzco” from 1576, Valera was a reader
of Latin and ministered in Indigenous languages.66 In this same document,
Andrés López and Francisco de Medina are listed as peninsulars who
know Indigenous languages. Pedro Añasco is recorded as another mestizo
who knows Quechua, while Martín Piçarro is listed as a Quechua-proficient criollo.67 Out of sixteen “subjects” listed in this 1576 catalog, six had
some Indigenous language proficiency, and they are listed as responsible
for administering sacraments to Indigenous people and teaching languages, namely Spanish and Latin. Like Valera and Bollo, these missionaries were possibly associated with the Society of Jesus and the Nombre de
Jesús at the same time. The lack of a confraternity member list prevents a
firmer assertion on this matter. What is likely, though, is that Jesuits from
Iberia and others with parents from two continents came together in
Cuzco under Valera, the spiritual advisor of the Nombre de Jesús, in their
proselytizing mission.
Like much in the early years of missionary work and transatlantic contact in the Andes, hierarchy and relationships between colonizers, colonized, and religion were in flux. In Valera’s case and for his Indigenous
missionary charges, the old Inca linguistic hierarchy remained relevant.
Old languages persisted even as colonial authorities such as Acosta and
Francisco de Toledo attempted to replace Andean spirituality with European Catholicism. Pre-Spanish invasion hierarchies remained so relevant
that they served as the basis for Spanish efforts to create a general language
for Indigenous populations.68 From this perspective, the Nombre de Jesús
was a locus of resistance in its retention of catechetical roles, but a collaborator in its perpetuation of the “general” Indigenous language. The confraternity was a colonial institution which claimed legitimacy both from
Spanish ecclesiastical authority and from a not-so-distant past of Quechua
linguistic supremacy. Thus, the confraternity, its Jesuit supporters, and its
lay benefactors fit into the broader history of early Jesuit missionaries at the
intersection between Catholic colonizers and non-European populations.

66. ARSI, Fondo Gesuitico, shelfmark 1488/2/2, fol. 13v. Valera is mentioned as being
a “lecturer” in Latin, and immediately afterward mention is made of his superior linguistic
skills. For an accessible published version of the document, see de Egaña and Fernandez,
Monumenta Peruana, II, 140–41. This reference also appears in Hyland, Jesuit and the Incas,
54, where she also suggests names of possible Indigenous members of the confraternity.
67. de Egaña and Fernandez, Monumenta Peruana, II, 140–41.
68. Aliocha Maldavsky, “The Andes,” in: Companion to Early Modern Catholic Global
Missions, 41–72, here 58.

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Coda: Placing an Indigenous Confraternity in Global History
The Nombre de Jesús was part of the early Jesuit missionary infrastructure, which featured some basic characteristics.69 Regional variations
sprang from the idiosyncrasies of preexisting hierarchies and varying
demands of language acquisition.70 One of the Jesuits’ first ministries
involved the foundation and operation of Italian missionary institutions
known as case dei catecumeni (houses of the catechumens). The first of these
institutions was established in 1543 in a building adjacent to the church of
San Giovanni di Mercatello in Rome, and was administered by the confraternity of San Giuseppe dei Catecumeni.71 In the same years as the Jesuits’
first forays into Peru, the Jesuits appropriated Hebrew for sermons and catechetical instruction at this catechumen house. The travel narrative of the
English Catholic Gregory Martin gives testimony to two former Jews who
preached in the Roman casa every Saturday, sometimes in Hebrew, to
Jewish catechumens.72 At the Roman house were at least three other converts with speaking and writing knowledge of Hebrew, as well as possibly
some Arabic—a Dominican, a Jesuit, and “Reader of the Hebrew in Sapientia, that is the universitie.”73
A broader view of the early modern Jesuit missionary project further
contextualizes the picture in Peru. Matteo Ricci and Francis Xavier offer
examples of syncretic missionizing approaches.74 Indeed, Ricci not only
assimilated significant parts of Confucian thought into his conversionary

69. For a discussion of Roman Jesuit missionary institutions and the ways these institutions were copied across the world, see Thomas Lucas, Landmarking: City, Church, and
Jesuit Urban Strategy (Chicago, 1997).
70. The following analysis has a precursor in Hyland’s comparison of Peruvian Jesuit
practice with Matteo Ricci and Roberto di Nobili. Hyland, Gods of the Andes, 12–13.
71. Lazar, Working in the Vineyard of the Lord. For similar Italian houses, see E. Natalie
Rothman, Brokering Empire: Trans-Imperial Subjects between Venice and Istanbul (Ithaca, NY,
2011); Matteo Al-Kalak, Un’altra fede. Le Case dei Catecumeni nei Territori Estensi (1583–
1938) (Florence, 2013); Samuela Marconcini, Per amor del cielo: farsi christiani a Firenze tra
Seicento e Settecento (Florence, 2016).
72. Martin, Roma Sancta (Rome, 1969), 78. Martin’s original text was composed 1580–
1581 in Reims.
73. Martin, Roma Sancta, 78. For broader discussion of conversionary sermons in
Rome, see Emily Michelson, Catholic Spectacle and Rome’s Jews: Early Modern Conversion and
Resistance (Princeton and Oxford, 2022).
74. See Ronnie Po-chia Hsia, A Jesuit in the Forbidden City: Matteo Ricci 1552–1610
(Oxford, 2010) for the most up-to-date treatment of Ricci’s thought and career. For an older
but still useful exploration of Ricci’s syncretism, see Jonathan Spence, The Memory Palace of
Matteo Ricci (New York, 1983).

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INDIGENOUS GLOBALISM

treatise The True Meaning of the Lord in Heaven.75 He also adopted the
accoutrements and behavioral norms shared among the sages of the Ming
empire. Likewise, during the first major overseas Jesuit mission, Xavier
immediately recognized the need to meet skeptical non-Christians with
cultural markers that they could understand and in which they recognized
legitimacy. Xavier met an initial reaction of confusion and cold reception
in Yamaguchi, Japan, as his strange dress and language made him appear
as a Buddhist missionary from India, not an uncommon sight during
Japan’s Warring States period (1467–1615).76 Xavier and his companions
met with more luck when they adopted Portuguese emissaries’ dress and
language that, while still foreign, Japanese political and clerical elites could
recognize and understand.77 Regional language and customs were therefore
crucial to Jesuit proselytization across the early modern world. The
Nombre de Jesús fit into global patterns even as it functioned to reinforce
local and regional Indigenous elites’ continuing status.
At the same time, any attempt to use Ricci and Xavier as points of
comparison with the Peruvian experience must come with a heavy dose of
caution. The Jesuits in Peru and elsewhere in sixteenth- and seventeenthcentury Latin America had to navigate a strong colonial government that
knew and sometimes actively worked against Jesuit agendas formulated in
Rome. Additionally, the principle of limpieza de sangre was not a strong
force in the far-flung and predominantly Italian missions in Asia. Conversely, the Spanish state’s interests and limpieza de sangre ideology rested
heavily on Latin American ecclesiastical activities, including the Third
Lima Council’s decision to suspend mestizo ordination and to make pariah
the status of “neophyte” and “New Christian.”
Historians of colonial Latin America and the Atlantic World must
reconcile missionary disorganization on the local level with the ideals that
missionaries shared across the Atlantic. Jesuit and other Catholic attempts
to appropriate language across the Americas and elsewhere, while a broad
topic, is still only one facet of the enormous Catholic effort to proselytize
peoples and cultures across the early modern world. Cuzco’s lesson is
daunting: in each area where they laid foundations, Catholic missionaries
75. Ricci’s The True Meaning of the Lord in Heaven has been reproduced in Matteo Ricci
and the Catholic Mission to China, 1583–1610: A Short History with Documents, ed. Ronnie Pochia Hsia (Indianapolis, 2016), 99–100.
76. Neil S. Fujita, Japan’s Encounter with Christianity: The Catholic Mission in PreModern Japan (New York, 1991), 25.
77. C. R. Boxer, The Christian Century in Japan, 1549–1650 (Berkeley, 1951), 27.

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encountered unique sets of contingencies that challenged their efforts in
idiosyncratic ways, and which created unique documentary challenges.
While the presence of mestizo Jesuits and their use of language in the missionary process is all but certain, the level and nature of lay Indigenous participation in ministry remains mysterious, perhaps until more archival discoveries occur. In the meantime, historians of Catholicism will only
formulate realistic understandings of the early modern world by recognizing and grappling with the tensions between global missionary ideals and
local challenges to them.

Forum Review Essay

American Catholicism Transformed: From the Cold War Through the Council.
By Joseph P. Chinnici. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2021.
Pp. xvi, 461. $45.00. ISBN 978-0-19-757300-6).
INTRODUCTION
Joseph M. White (Independent Scholar, Bowie, MD)
In this landmark work, Joseph P. Chinnici examines the complex history of American Catholicism from 1945 to 1965 to explain its many
transformations. In three parts, (1) significant post-World War II developments in Church life are interpreted, thereby providing background for
(2) the detailed narrative of Americans’ participation and influence at Vatican Council II (1962–1965) and (3) the Epilogue: Spirit and Letter,
which addresses the Council’s long-term meaning. Adopting the approach
of his late historian friend, Christopher J. Kauffman, that “context is everything” for historical understanding, the author explored the abundant
sources related to the many issues examined. This exhaustive research is
revealed in 119 pages of sources listing 1,328 endnotes.
In Part I, “From the Cold War to Civil Rights,” four chapters (102
pages) address U.S. Catholics’ thought and action from World War II,
through the Cold War, to the appropriation of the Civil Rights movement
by the 1960s. During this period the World and Cold Wars unified
Catholics. The public Church in the U.S. in its presentation to a wider
world framed its identity by allegiance to the papal understanding of the
Church’s role in a global world and its own program of social reconstruction. On the international scene, Catholics supported the leadership of
Pope Pius XII and U.S. bishops in opposing totalitarian systems. The
“tight” relationship between law and morality reinforced a strong public
linkage between divine, natural, and positive law. These became the outward sign of a “truly moral order, the sacramental heart of the Church’s
mission of social reconstruction in society.” Moving from the Church’s
longstanding “ambivalence” about democracy, the Pope aimed for an
alliance with the western powers to oppose the Soviet Union’s system. The
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papal ideal promoted a stable social order protecting the family, its property and freedom, as society’s basic unit. Catholicism’s identity with the
Cold War pointed to the shared values and idealism ordering family life
along with treating war and nuclear arms. In their discourse, the U.S. bishops linked the Christian understanding of the person endowed with rights
and the nation’s founding documents. Moreover, Church leaders challenged a world increasingly turning from God, that is, secularism. In that
context, the Cold War convergence of religion and the American way of
life led to a religious revival marked by institutional growth. This trend
uniting doctrine and life, religion, and national identity, underlay renewal
movements. These often involved networking beyond national boundaries
so that national Catholic organizations of women, families, universities,
the lay apostolate, pastoral liturgy, workers, and others met at international
conventions to learn and share ideas on the Church’s role. The Liturgical
Movement advanced a better theological understanding of the Liturgy.
Unity did not always prevail as Catholic Right and Catholic Left movements emerged. The Civil Rights movement brought about Catholics’
engaging with Christians of other faith traditions to advance racial equality. These efforts modeled direct action and organizational activities for
Catholics.
Part II, on “The Second Vatican Council,” in five chapters (200 pages)
examines American participants’ record in this global event, beginning
with the preparatory phase, then the Council’s four annual fall sessions
(1962–1965), plus related activities between them. Drawing from public
and/or private views of participants, commentators, and historians, along
with texts of documents, the author greatly expands on previous interpretations of Americans’ record of participation.
In the Preparatory Phases, 1959–1962, the suggestions that the
world’s bishops were asked to submit for the Council to consider describe
what 85.4%, or 136 respondents among the U.S. bishops, were thinking.
Their responses reveal divisions marking the postwar Church. Next, the
theological commissions’ work of drafting schemata for the Council to consider yielded tensions between the Holy See’s new Ecumenical secretariat
and views of the Roman Curia’s older departments. Controversies also
marked Liturgical questions, the priesthood of the faithful, and other
issues that presaged challenges facing the Council.
Once the Council began in 1962, the narrative through four chapters
addresses the fascinating activities of the U.S. bishops and their theologians with frequent quotations from their public and private views. The

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U.S. bishops got a “political education,” having arrived as individuals and
then coming together for group action. Their role is treated on several
major issues: the Liturgy, “Two Sources” of tradition, the Church as the
People of God, Laity, episcopal collegiality and role of national conferences, Mary in the Church, Ecumenism, and common worship. For the
Americans, their role with leading theologian, John Courtney Murray, S.J.,
in producing the Declaration on Religious Freedom despite formidable opposition is described. The Declaration on the Relation of the Church to NonChristian Religions, Constitution on Divine Revelation is addressed along
with The Church in the Modern World and family and peace issues. The
Council thereby brought a new awareness to the riches of Judaism and the
presence of God in other religions, new understandings for how the
Church and the world interpenetrated each other, and perspectives on how
the people of God were ordered.
The Epilogue: Spirit and Letter (8 pages) on the Council’s reception
offers “orientations,” not conclusions. For the latter the author modestly
acknowledges more scholarship from “knowledgeable” people is required.
But five areas are proposed as needing examination to evaluate the history
of the Council’s reception: (1) levels of experience and commitment, (2)
importance of the U.S. Church for the universal Church, (3) new institutional structures, (4) the challenge of secularism, and (5) the intense
debates of Church issues emerging as part of the reception process. To cite
from the volume’s preface, the author had wisely proclaimed, Historia
Magistra Veritatis.
REVIEWS
R . S c o t t A p p l e b y (University of Notre Dame)
For those of us who came of age in the wake of Vatican II, Joseph
Chinnici’s exhaustively researched, theologically astute history of the conciliar sessions and the social, cultural, and political contexts in which they
unfolded, evokes the personal memory of a mix of emotions felt at the
time: wonder, curiosity, hope and, most of all, excitement. At least it did
in this reader, a boy at the time of the four sessions, dimly aware of the
details, but who, as a young adult growing up Catholic in a Protestant
majority town in the South, reaped the benefits of the Church’s new openness and contagious confidence. “The work of the Second Vatican Council
enters into the culture first on the level of experience, imagination and
affective commitment,” Chinnici notes (313), and so it was with me.
Indeed, the Council was the ecclesial context within which I decided to

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become a church historian. That choice led me, later in life, to interact with
lionhearted champions of ecumenism, religious freedom, and meaningful
lay participation in the life of the Church. I was delighted, for example, to
see the attention given in the narrative to the irrepressible Thomas Stransky, C.S.P. and the fervent but gentle Canadian theologian, Gregory
Baum, O.S.A.
American Catholicism Transformed conveys innumerable insights into
the evolution of the postwar, conciliar Church. Here I focus on the one I
found to be the interpretive key to the whole story, namely the centrality
of the ecumenical movement to the American contributions to Vatican II.
The presence of the “separated brethren” at the sessions made vivid for the
Council Fathers the puzzle facing American Catholics, who were a minority, however hefty, in the world’s emerging, majority Protestant democratic
superpower: how best to “relate” to the non-Catholic Christians with
whom millions of Catholics went to public school, lived and worked alongside, and, increasingly, married and raised a family.
Stransky’s recording, reporting, and advocacy (initially, as the
appointed assistant to Augustin Cardinal Bea, the leader of the highly
influential Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity [SPC]), amounts to
one sustained argument, with which historian Chinnici resoundingly
agrees: the emergence of a “global ecumenism” was a decisive “sign of the
times” which grounded, informed, and authorized, as it were, Vatican II’s
transformative deliberations and decrees on: religious freedom; the liturgy,
and the inclusive understanding of the Church as Sacrament,” the role of
the laity, and “the priesthood of the faithful”; Jewish-Catholic relations;
inter-religious dialogue; and, not least, “the Church in the world.”
Chinnici, who excels at unearthing the revealing quote, captures the
bold, inspired ambitions of the “progressive” ecumenists on the SPC by
citing the comments of Gustave Weigel, S.J., the American pioneer of ecumenism, to the Preparatory Commission. A proponent of dialogue with
Protestants, Weigel’s argument signaled a shift away from conversion as
the primary aim of engagement with “others.” Those who urge conversion,
Weigel points out, presuppose superiority, whereas “ecumenical action”
presupposes equality among the participants in the dialogue. (This is not,
he hastens to add, an “objective and ontological” equality, of course, but a
“subjective and psychological” one.) Dialogue of this kind, Weigel avers, is
“an exercise in genuine Christian virtue” whose purpose is manifold—“to
give testimony to the Gospel and give a reason for the faith you believe; to
exercise catholicity that Christians want to adhere to good things, [and] to

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build up the Church as the mystical body of Christ; to manifest charity to
the neighbor that is not feigned . . . to have good conversations and fellowship between churches, to hope that such closeness may be the union of all
in one” (quoted on 124–25).
When this approach triumphed in various ways at the Council, and
the general outlook eventually filtered down to the grassroots level, my
twelve-year-old self was pleased to inform my best friend in school that, as
a Presbyterian, he was no longer automatically doomed to burn in hell
when he died.
Chinnici’s largely sympathetic and at times celebratory account of the
Council sessions, decrees, and resulting fruits (including new, vital lay and
religious movement of dialogue, witness and evangelization through example) is not naïve; the author warns us, along the way, that persistent tensions and divisions in American society, sown in part during the Cold War
and mirrored within the hierarchy, will resurface, often with a vengeance,
after a decade or so of postconciliar ebullience. The path from those heady
days to John Paul II’s historic convening of world religious leaders at Assisi
in 1986, and Pope Francis’s theology of encounter, is marked, sadly, with
sidetracks, setbacks and a turning inward.
In the Epilogue, our guide tries to make sense of those divergences
and contradictions. He offers some useful conceptual frameworks—the
“system of the sacred” fostered in some quarters of American Catholicism,
whereby a kind of religious logic, grounded in the intertwined themes of
the Council, “would guide some people’s choices” (313); the process of
rapid globalization that would accelerate the conscious internationalization
of the Church via a series of synods, transnational networks and localglobal interactions; and, the Church’s decisive choice “to enter into a politics of history no longer tied to Christendom” (314).
Less successful is his attempt to account for the eventual near-abandonment of the “pastoral” mode adopted by the Council, in favor of a more
openly contentious brand of both ecclesial and secular politics—tied, in the
American case, to the cultural turmoil surrounding severely contested
issues such as the (failed) campaign for an Equal Rights Amendment
(ERA) for women and the (failed) campaign for women’s ordination. To
be fair, however, the divisions in church and society that marked the 1980s
and beyond, complicating the legacy of the Council, is not the proper subject of American Catholicism Transformed. But, one hopes, it will be the
subject of this gifted author’s next major project.

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William Dinges (The Catholic University of America, Emeritus)
Analysis of the meaning and intent of the Second Vatican Council,
not to mention its myriad consequences, remains an academic growth
industry. Consider Joseph Chinnici’s American Catholicism Transformed, a
masterful current contribution. The book is a meticulously-told, deep-bore
analysis of the historical shaping of the current “cleavages” of the Church
in America. The avalanche of footnotes, along with assumptions about a
reader’s acquaintance with pre-Vatican II Catholic culture, ecclesiology
and theology suggests it is not a read for the academic faint of heart. The
narrative is dense, the analysis penetrating, and the tale is one of interwoven and sometimes conflicting national and international interests—not
to mention the occasional episcopal intrigues within the Council itself.
The trophy element of American Catholicism Transformed is how Chinnici opens a new perspective on both Vatican II and Catholicism’s current
malaise. In the latter case, he links aspects of the council’s deliberations
with global post-WWII developments and with American Catholic contours at the time. So doing reveals how the tradition navigates change and
exposes root sources of its current polarization. Few if any scholars of postWWII Catholicism, Vatican II, and the postconciliar era have written as
insightfully within this “context is everything” framework, one that also
works as a sociology of knowledge scaffolding that brings attention to preconciliar “fault lines” that arose out of the growing ideal/real “gaps”
between official church teachings and human life experiences; lay and clerical relations; and Catholicism’s general “entanglement” with the American way of life. Chinnici’s meticulous study also offers rich insight for comparative analysis with what unfolded in the Protestant and Jewish
traditions in their equally conflicted engagement with modernity. The
“people of God” would do well to pay heed.
Although not a shortcoming, considering the comprehensive nature of
the author’s research on American Catholics published elsewhere, additional factors relevant to Catholicism’s contemporary “sorting” might warrant deeper attention than what is alluded to in the book. One is the
Second World War.
Chinnici’s time frame is “since” World War II. A closer look at the
impact of the war, itself, might be more heavily weighted. Mass mobilization, population dispersion (de-ghettoizing), and the national imperative for
war-time unity animating the government push for a “Tri-Faith” religious
consciousness, significantly impacted American Catholic life and culture.

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Other factors such as Catholic assimilation via rising levels of educational attainment, social mobility, affluence, and greater acceptance, also
warrant further attention—as does the impact on American Catholics of
postwar cultural shifts in the meaning and locale of “the sacred,” the psychological and spiritual prioritizing of “authenticity,” and the postwar impact on
religion of what Philip Rieff dubbed the “triumph of the therapeutic.”
Chinnici recognizes how the ideological fragmentation he has
tracked (“sort[ing]”) has blurred Catholic identity, notably in relation to
mainline Protestantism. American Catholicism Transformed tells how and
why this “mutation” evolved. The epilogue leaves open the question as to
where all this might go especially, as Chinnici notes, regarding the council where one of the problems now is not so much rejection of it, but
reading it “backward” in a manner divorced from the intentions of its
participants such that it can be picked apart to affirm one contemporary
position of another.
The root challenge highlighted in American Catholicism Transformed is
an old one: engaging and legitimating change while preserving the continuity of tradition. Chinnici points to a contemporary Church with a “fractured inheritance of pluriformity.” The inherent difficulties of identity
coherence (and effective evangelization?) in such a model, especially where
traditional authority structures have lost plausibility—have been further
compounded by the ongoing travails of the sexual abuse/hierarchical
malfeasance crisis, the covid tsunami, the internet/social media revolution,
the Church’s neuralgic liturgical wars, and tensions over Pope Francis’s
papacy. Nor does our rapidly secularizing culture, the accelerated opting
out of organized religion, and the transformation of religious orientations
into polarized political ones auger well.
Where goes “pluriformity,” considering the above? American Catholicism
Transformed is a capstone project of a brilliant scholar of the American
Catholic experience(s). Consider it required reading for anyone seriously
concerned with the interplay of religion and culture, the future of the Church
in America and, one might add, the current possibilities of synodality.
M a r k M a s s a , S . J . ( Boston College)
Joseph Chinnici has written an extraordinarily important work of revisionist scholarship. He has convincingly resituated the current wars raging
within the North American Catholic Church over the “meaning of Vatican
II” within debates and ecclesiological fissures that had emerged decades

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before that Council was even called, but which that Council abetted. And
he has accomplished this by pursuing rigorous, archive-based research in
personal letters, Vatican II “day books,” and even early drafts of ecclesial
documents that never made it to the light of day. Chinnici’s book is now
required reading for anyone seeking to understand the massive theological
and cultural transformations that have taken place within U.S. Catholicism
since the end of World War II.
Chinnici’s larger historiographic point is simple but profound: the
reception of Vatican II in the United States hardly occurred in a vacuum.
The fissures within the North American church pre-conditioned both the
interpretation and the implementation of the Council. Thus, to understand
the U.S. perception of what really happened at Vatican II, Chinnici argues
that one has to begin well before the first gathering of bishops in the great
nave of St. Peter’s in 1963. Considerably before that opening session, two
“sides” or parties had already staked out distinct social imaginaries that
would profoundly shape how conciliar documents would be received. Those
who were inclined to stress the similarities of ideology that existed between
the Catholic tradition as it emerged from the “long nineteenth century” and
the dominant strands of Cold War Catholicism would receive the Council
one way: for them, the Council helped inaugurate a revolutionary period of
secularization and the concomitant dissolution of a once united community.
On the other “side” stood those who understood that U.S. Catholicism had
already started making accommodations with the powerful forces of social,
cultural, and religious change in the post-war world: for them, the Council
inaugurated a period of freedom in which the American Catholic Church
could begin to carve out a long-overdue presence at the table of modernity.
“In either case, the key to understanding the historical process [of receiving
the Council] is seeing the landscape of ambivalence that marked the postWorld War II period” (5). For Chinnici, that landscape of ambivalence
defined the pre-Council American church in ways that predetermined the
conflicted reception of the Council’s “meaning.”
Read in that revisionist light, many of the divisions that emerged at
Vatican II—and to some extent defined the post-Vatican II American
church—were not “caused” by the Council or its documents. Those divisions date from what the author terms the “religious 1950s,” when an
awareness emerged within the Catholic community itself that the inherited
understandings of “the faith” entered a prolonged period of transition.
Thus, for the author, Vatican II hardly ushered in the “end of Christendom” or the secularization of a once-united immigrant ghetto mini-state
(as so many of the Council’s interpreters have argued); rather, the post-

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conciliar era marked a “concerted effort toward . . . moving religion out of
the contained categories of the Cold War into the new public categories of
a changing society. Patterns of development which were latent in the preconciliar era now entered the public speech of the [Catholic] community
to shape new institutional pathways and rituals of behavior” (28).
Chinnici thus situates the meaning of Vatican II in a much older
debate going on in the U.S. church: one of the earliest instances of that
debate was the dueling reviews of John Courtney Murray and Joseph
Fenton over Emmanuel Cardinal Suhard’s 1948 book Growth or Decline?
The Church Today. Suhard’s book, written just three years after the end of
World War II, raised the central question that came to dominate postconciliar debates in the United States: “Shall the Church remain rigid in
order to safeguard all, or shall she permeate all in order to win all?” (59).
Murray, already emerging as the most respected voice of what would
become the progressive wing of U.S. Catholic intellectuals, argued strenuously that the very rigidity of post-Tridentine Catholicism was a stance
that had to be abandoned for another model of Christ and culture. Fenton,
a professor of theology at the Catholic University of America and one of
the most visible voices of anti-modernist dogmatism, more than implied
that Suhard’s book reeked of heretical modernism, which he described as
the conglomeration of all errors.
In the heady days of receiving the Council’s documents which sponsored dramatic changes in how Catholics worshiped, organized local parish
communities, and understood the relation of the ordained to lay Catholics
“in the pews,” it seemed like the Council had unleashed massive forces of
theological and sociological change for the American Catholic community.
And it had. But those massive forces of change were not received in a
vacuum: fissures and cracks in what many (incorrectly) perceived to be the
united American Catholic identity had emerged well before the Council’s
documents arrived. The Council’s documents provided the churchapproved language for debating differences of style and substance that had
produced those fissures in the first place.This is a brilliant book, and students of American Catholic thought and practice need to read it.
L e s l i e W o o d c o c k T e n t l e r (The Catholic University of America)
Chinnici has written a remarkable book, both in terms of scholarly
depth and interpretive acuity. The opening section, which traces the evolution of American Catholicism from the imposed conformities of the deep
Cold War to the stirrings of dissent and renewal that emerged in the later

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1950s, is a model of subtle argumentation. “The religious 1950s are a
period of transition,” the author explains, with lay-led movements for
reform—some, like the Christian Family Movement, with an international
constituency—forming a crucial bridge to the post-conciliar world. It is
something of a truism among historians today that the roots of the Second
Vatican Council lie deep in the 1950s. But Chinnici shows us with
thoughtful specifics just what this means and how it worked. Those same
reform movements also bridged, or at least began to bridge, the gulf
between an eroding but still-extant Catholic subculture and a pluriform
American nation itself increasingly stirred by reformist energies. As Chinnici rightly argues, both ordinary Catholics and many of the Council
fathers were deeply affected by the various crusades for social justice that
emerged in the early 1960s, especially the civil rights movement.
Not every Catholic nor indeed every Council father responded to
those movements in the same way. The civil rights movement in particular
became a powerful source of Catholic conflict, especially around the issue
of open housing, as Chinnici duly notes. But more could be said on this
score, given the bitterness bred by the issue in numerous American cities.
(Perhaps the most indelibly “Catholic” image of period civil rights activism
was generated by a Catholic mob who hurled insults and even stones at
priests and sisters on an open housing march in Chicago’s Marquette Park
neighborhood in 1966.) More might usefully be said as well about the relative size and composition of the Catholic reform movements whose agendas foreshadowed any number of conciliar reforms. Only a small minority
of Catholics, after all, participated in such movements, and those who did
were apt to be both relatively affluent and well-educated. For the great
majority of American Catholics, especially but not exclusively the less educated, the Council’s reforms very likely appeared to come more or less out
of the blue. Not that the Council’s reforms were necessarily unwelcome;
the vernacular Mass, a signature reform, was indisputably popular. But
how many Catholics, one wonders, experienced those reforms as mandated
from above, not just by the distant Council fathers but also by an activist
laity notable for its articulateness, public poise, and facility with abstractions? Might the Church in such circumstances not become for some just
one more institution in which one’s voice was ignored and one’s view of the
world discounted or even reviled? How easy it might then be to simply
drift away from Catholicism, first in terms of regular practice and then—
very likely in the next generation—from any church connections at all.
The heart of Chinnici’s book is his detailed account of the American
bishops’ experience at the Second Vatican Council. Perhaps surprisingly,

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this is the stuff of exhilarating drama as men who arrived as discrete and
generally cautious individuals forged a new collective identity, repudiated
old leaders and elevated new ones, and were increasingly caught up in the
Council’s progressive tide. Men known for their reform commitments, such
as Detroit’s John Dearden and Chicago’s Albert Meyer, play major roles,
but so do individuals who loom less large in historical memory, like Manchester’s Ernest Primeau. (Primeau, a vigorous advocate of an enhanced lay
role in the Church, proposed to his Council confreres that each US diocese
establish a mechanism “by which the laity, especially the more educated
laity, could communicate with the bishops and pastors” [181]—a proposal
that speaks, if inadvertently, to the question raised above.) Chinnici’s narrative is sufficiently compelling to dispel the presentist concerns that most
readers, especially most Catholic readers, are apt to bring to a book on the
Council. Thus we encounter the Council in its full integrity as an historical
event—one characterized both by what Chinnici calls a “progressive
dynamism” and by a determination to maintain equilibrium between an
acknowledged need for reform and continuity with the Catholic past.
Ultimately, of course, the Council can hardly be separated from what
came next, as Chinnici obliquely acknowledges in his brief epilogue, where
he lays out “orientations” for analyzing the now almost sixty intervening
years of change rather than conclusions. But I, for one, would like more.
What can account for the speed of change in the immediate post-Council
years—the direction of change is more readily explicable—and especially
for the demoralization that so quickly afflicted priests and women religious
and had such deleterious impact on Catholic institutional life? His demurrals notwithstanding, Chinnici is among the most knowledgeable of historians when it comes to the period in question. In lieu of an expanded epilogue—probably impractical, as the book is already long—I would settle
happily for a second volume.
RESPONSE
Joseph P.Chinnici,O.F.M.(Franciscan School of Theology at the
University of San Diego, Emeritus)
Introduction
Gratitude extends in all directions for the summary and then reviews
of American Catholicism Transformed. For many years I have admired and
learned so much from the work of these fine scholars, so much so that it is
an honor to be included in their company and once again to profit from

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their comments. Each has picked up several different themes that I have
tried to elucidate in the work: Joseph White has well accomplished no
small feat in summarizing a rather long book; Scott Appleby, by means of
his own personal experience, relates the centrality of ecumenism to the
changing relationship between the Church and the “other”; William
Dinges brings his sociological expertise to the endeavor and considerably
expands the factors that influenced the transformation of American
Catholicism; Mark Massa takes a wide lens on the pre-conciliar era and
points to the intellectual debates that preceded the Council; Leslie Tentler
has identified some of the disparities and tensions embedded in the conciliar reform. She notes that “more could be said” in several areas, an expansion with which I agree. Notably enough, theology, history, sociology, and
experience meet in these comments. In addition, I am grateful for the
laudatory comments and careful reading of a difficult book. The comments
add substantially to the story. I thank you for your time and the effort put
into this review. Let me single out the following elements as making a contribution to our historiography of the period. Perhaps these areas will
address some of the questions posed by the reviewers.
The ambivalence of the pre-conciliar period
Massa speaks about the “landscape of ambivalence” and singles out the
telling example of the reception of Cardinal Suhard’s Growth or Decline?.
Dinges refers to the wide gap that opens up between the presentation of
the Church’s teaching and the experience of the people in the pre-conciliar
world; Tentler correctly identifies the forces of renewal and their relatively
smaller size compared to the larger Catholic populace, while Appleby
points to the “persistent tensions and divisions in American society.” In
identifying the ambivalent structure of 1950s American Catholicism, the
reviewers make a significant point.
This ambivalence is partially referred to in White’s summary, but the
duality, even pluralism, the book identifies as marking the post-war world
is central both to the immediate perception of the Council as “revolutionary” (See Dolan, Greeley, Ahlstrom, and others) and to the long-term
institutionalized splits that will emerge in the community after 1978. Picturing the 1950s Catholic populace as coherent and without public dissent—as if the immigrant Church paradigm were still alive—forms the
backdrop for those who entertain notions of the “secularization” of the
1960s. Although this view may provide an ideal for judging developments
during and after the Council, it will not carry the historical freight of reality. Disagreements and alternatives cut through the post-war world but

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were confined largely to the private sphere. An ideal public national
mosaic of obedience, hierarchy, doctrinal coherence, and devotional consistency held sway, even as more local and international expressions of
Catholic identity presaged change. Dinges has rightfully listed many of
the elements of this change inaugurated by the War. His suggestions
might have been a better place to start. I simply began with the first phase
of the Cold War.
As I tried to describe it, the era from 1945 to 1962, shaped by divergent responses to communism, saw distinct organizational and moral languages emerging in the fields of social engagement, sexuality, liturgical
practice, and the role of the laity in the Church (Massa, Tentler,
McGreevy, and O’Toole have indicated the same issue in numerous writings). The process of change before the Council could be described as two
tectonic plates, one larger, the other smaller, moving toward each other,
then publicly colliding in the immediate pre-conciliar era as the threat of
communism declined. As Massa astutely picks up, “the reception of Vatican II in the United States” did not occur in a vacuum. Seen in this fashion,
the Council gave institutional, linguistic, and practical expression to a new
religious landscape within American Catholic public life.
It seems to me that, imaged in this way, as a process rather than a finished product, the issue of the largeness or smallness of the movements
that Tentler raises become slightly less telling. Analyses of the stages of
social movements and historical theologians who have studied reform (e.g.
most notably Yves Congar, Jean Leclercq) indicate that change in the
Church, whether “progressive” or “conservative,” occurs when peripheral
configurations of ecclesial life move toward the power centers of a corporate life. The final catalyst for overall change is leadership and institutionalization. The book points this out with respect to the reforms of Specialized Catholic Action, the Lay Congresses, and the liturgical movement.
All of this is tied to the geo-political and theological stance of the papacy,
again shaped by divergent responses to totalitarianism, from Pius XII
through John XXIII, Paul VI, and John Paul II. The Council occurs during
the period of détente; the consolidation of reactions to its reforms in the
post-conciliar world surface with public power during the second phase of
the Cold War, 1978–1989. This is not a return to the Cold War Catholicism of the early 1950s, but there are similarities in emphases. Taken as a
whole, the book tries to argue for an appropriate periodization, particularly
with respect to the post-conciliar world. The Council’s interpretation
becomes historiographically defined by how one periodizes and then prejudges these pre- and post-conciliar developments.

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The Interpretation of the Council
Interestingly enough, Appleby describes my account of the Council
as “sympathetic and at times celebratory” while Tentler notes that the narrative “is sufficiently compelling to dispel the presentist concerns” that
many bring to its interpretation. I hope both are correct. It is true that as
a young seminarian at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, I welcomed the ecumenical and social changes that marked the 1960s. The
Council did capture my imagination and conviction. But the stimulus for
writing this book was not my love for conciliar teaching, but rather an
attempt to break through the interpretations which remove the Council
from its own history. It seems to me that commentators, episcopal leaders,
and various interest groups often search for a systematic consistency based
on unarticulated presuppositions. Attempts at equilibrium between tradition and reform have been mutilated by writers on both the left and the
right. Reform” or “rupture” now enter into our language as abstractions
from the process of history. As a Franciscan and historian I inherit a
vision of reform which is more dramatic than synthetic. In short, Catholicism is a community of faith composed of people living within a system
of contraries that refuse to become contradictories: freedom and obedience, the national and the international, the local and the universal, the
communal and the hierarchical, for examples. At one of the book sessions
a participant asked if American Catholicism Transformed was “a personal
interpretation.” Well, of course it is, but perhaps not as the participant
implied. The book has a rather large number of footnotes, as the summary
and reviewers note. It is these data that must be engaged—argue with the
notes, not the historian. Why? Simply because it is time we engaged the
data of history and give historians, of which the commentators here would
be superb examples, a place at the ecclesial table of synodality. History
studies how people interact in time. It dissolves the absolutes that govern
our ecclesial wars and have dominated our evaluations since the beginning
of the culture wars. I believe that part of the present problem in American
Catholicism is its escape from history and retreat into a virtual reality of
competing ideas.
Politics and the Pastoral
The reviewers all point in some way to the post-conciliar period.
Appleby ponders the question: Why was the pastoral mode of the Council
abandoned? Dinges ends his essay: “Whence goes ‘pluriformity’?” Massa
views the work in a revisionist light that helps address the fissures in today’s
Church. Tentler in her usual generous and gentle style would like another

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volume. They all seem to pick up something that occasioned the work. Its
initial research base was the archival papers of prominent leaders in the
national Church. The papers I examined were not so much personal as
institutional, i.e. they held significant reports and analyses from a variety of
organizations, theologians, lawyers, sisters, priests, laity, and Roman Curia
officials. I found there a long arc of internationality that had shaped American Catholicism since World War II. Archbishop Jean Jadot, Apostolic
Delegate to the United States, captured the heart of the change in the
stature of the Church in the United States as early as 1973:
They [the Pope and Roman Curia] are anxious to receive accurate infor-

mation about the United States because they are convinced of the importance of your country and of your communities in the present history of
the world and of the Church. Whatever happens here will, sooner or
later, have repercussions on other parts of the world. The influence of the
United States is not a myth. I refer not only to your economic and technical might with its political consequences. I am thinking primarily of the
American way of life, of the cultural patterns which you set and of the
public morality which is accepted by many of your fellow citizens.

Also present in the archives were the conflicts that marked various
ministries on either side of the culture divide: pressure groups arguing for
the ordination of women coupled with apocalyptic rejections of the same
by lay and clerical correspondents; failed attempts to establish a middle
road on the part of leaders; the changing membership of the American
hierarchy, the papacy, and the Roman Curia that influenced developments
in the 1980s, to name some examples. Much of the institutional discomfort
of the Church in the United States symbolically culminated in the “Seattle
case” (1978–1988); the different interpretations of the “Ratzinger Report”
(1984–85); and the meeting of the archbishops in Rome on March 8–11,
1989. Rippling in all directions, a flood of discord spawned divergent theological organizations, media presentations, visions of family life, arguments over sexual morality, and oppositional views of the role of women in
the Church, religious life, and the priesthood. At the center of the debate
within the Catholic community lay the interpretation and implementation
of the Council. As an historian, I asked myself the question: How did all
this develop and how did the Americans experience the actual conciliar
event? I tried to discover what one historian has called the “point of inception.” American Catholicism Transformed is partially structured to identify
the long history behind the public explosion of the 1980s. Initially, I had
envisioned two volumes, one covering the post-war world through the
Council, and the second covering the period from 1965 to 1989. I do
appreciate Tentler’s suggestion at the end of her remarks. A couple of

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essays have been written for Volume II; the rest remains in file cabinets.
Here let me call attention to just two particular issues that may shed some
light on the very fine openings identified by my colleagues:
The Politics of History
The Church internally and externally has always been shaped by the
“politics of history,” whether that be its accommodations to the Constantinian settlement, its alliances with absolute monarchies, the battles over
jurisdictionalism in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, or the reaction to the French Revolution. But it has never before in its history grappled with the politics of a participative government and a social arrangement of religious freedom within the context of Church-state separation.
The new crossover between the American political settlement and the
Body of Christ began to gather steam with the focus on human rights in
the Cold War era, the development of civil rights, and the move from the
immigrant Church to the ecclesial communities of the suburban world.
When the Council provided a new language for the faith (e.g. “the people
of God,” “active participation,” a “share in the priestly, prophetic and
kingly dimensions of Christ,” “collegiality”) and encouraged new structures
(e,g. national conferences, parish councils, diocesan and national pastoral
councils, international synods) political presuppositions, ecclesial language,
structures, and experience embraced. A “constitutive moment” and new
pathways of relationship immediately surfaced (for an analogous process,
see Paul Starr, The Creation of the Media). Organizations “for” and “against”
immediately began to surface. Not all of these movements across the spectrum can be examined here, but perhaps looking at a couple of examples
will help address Tentler’s question about the “speed of change.”
For example, Frances Bodeen, the founder of Parents for Orthodoxy in
Parochial Education (first newsletter November 1967) writes in her memoir:
The time came before the Ecumenical Council, when I beheld the infection spreading into the Catholic Church. I withdrew myself to the spiritual realm and gave myself over to working within the Church to help
salvage what we could. I continued to inform myself as to the “nature of
the beast,” namely Communism. It was then I began a serious study of
Fatima, for it seemed our only hope for a true peace. With the help of
others, we organized “cells” or study groups to combat the errors within
the Church.

Bodeen corresponded with James J. Kerley, Jr. of Cheverly, Maryland, a
member of the Catholic Family Foundation. She treasured his 1968

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speech “The Catholic Layman and the Great American Schism.” This
suburban housewife, opposed to open housing and sex education in
Catholic schools, later went national in alliance with the Wanderer. Their
vision was reinforced by Catholics United for the Faith, founded in September 1968. This well-networked and petition-driven initiative aligned
itself with significant departments of the Roman Curia. A movement
shaped by anti-communism and Cold War Catholicism had begun at the
grass roots, networked itself over time, entered into affinity relationships
with those in positional power, and took on the profile of interest group
advocacy within the Church.
An opposite example was culturally shaped by the new politics of civil
rights, participative governance, and community organization. One author
describes a general “movement” composed of a younger generation reacting
to the constraints of the 1950s, accompanied by an “almost mystical devotion to activism and a distrust of theory,” marked by an “underground-resistance psychology based on a polarized view of society.” The parallel
crossover of this type of “politics of history” into the Church can be seen in
several examples. Here I want to address the more perduring and influential
ones. In the Dearden archives, one correspondent has written to the President of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops on April 6, 1967. He
refers to the formation of the Association of Chicago Priests, set up in the
Summer–Fall of 1966. A similar process was taking place in Detroit,
Newark, Pittsburgh, North Dakota, and elsewhere. “Priests analogize that
they are persons to the spiritual, business, institutional, and juridical functions of the Church as persons are to the economic enterprises. . . .” In May
1968, the National Federation of Priests’ Councils was formed; three years
later, in preparation for the Synod of 1971 on Justice and the Priesthood,
the NFPC, no longer focused simply on local priestly affairs, advocated for
“shared responsibility” with the bishops,” “an official ministry for women,”
“administrative tribunals and due process at every level of the Church,” and
a change in the “present law of mandatory celibacy.”
All of this was happening while the Conference of Major Superiors of
Women developed “Vatican II and Religious Women,” a 1966–67 study
document that outlined the following as major themes: the “personal dignity of every individual; the biblical and liturgical sources of Christian life,
collegiality, openness to the world, ecumenical attitudes and actions.” In
1971, the Executive Board of the National Federation of Priests’ Councils
expressed “solidarity” with the sisters’ study paper. Seven years later, in
May 1978, the Leadership Conference of Women Religious published
“Patterns in Authority and Obedience.” Among the “new understandings”

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was the following: “A strong affirmation of the basic human right of
women to define themselves and to have access to the decisions that shape
their lives arising from the insights of liberation theologies, the Church’s
own statements on justice, and world-wide movements to assure the full
development and participation of women.” While it would be premature to
forge direct conscious links between these various cultural movements and
internal Church relations, the analogizing crossover merits consideration.
What is happening within five years of the Council is something that will
grow exponentially in the following decades: the bleeding over into ecclesial life of direct action, identity politics, and interest group advocacy.
Eventually, after 1978, with a change in the geo-politics of the papacy and
the full institutionalization of the various convictions, the careful middle
positions that the Council tried to make foundational will be hollowed out.
Full scale ecclesial “culture wars” begin.
The Demise of the Pastoral
Lastly, the “loss of the pastoral” to which Appleby refers cannot but be
effected by these developments. Divisions first occur along a spectrum,
moving from those privileging objective norms at one end to those privileging subjective experience on the other end. The Council’s position as
indicated in American Catholicism Transformed developed over time but
attempted to balance the equation by placing the objective and subjective
elements in the same relational field of interaction. The Council’s vision of
the “pastoral” in media held sway for the first period of conciliar reform
and with the first generation of conciliar reformers; resistance was there
but, other than in the media, represented a minor institutional dimension.
This struggle for the “pastoral” touched the community most directly on
the practical level. It represented an attempt at a new configuration of
Catholicism within American culture. The archives testify to extensive discussions in areas of birth control, catechetical changes, first communion/
first confession sequencing, communion in the hand, clerical celibacy,
abortion, sterilization, public disagreement from the positions of authority,
acceptance or rejection of the Equal Rights Amendment, ministry to gays,
general absolution, inclusive language, the recipe for altar breads, intercommunion, women in ministry, and priestly identity. Interest group politics begin to shape the conversations—the immediate and long lasting
crossover with American political life.
During the initial stages, the various positions began to make alliances
with favored organizations, take advantage of strategically placed people in
key secretarial positions and sensitive to particular pastoral positions, learn

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adroit use of media exposure, organize petitions of concerned “ecclesial citizens,” and utilize monied resources to shape institutional life. The second
stage witnessed significant signs of the more mature development of very
distinct organizational approaches to the post-conciliar Church. To some
extent this development was manifest at the Council in the positions of
John Dearden and John Wright. One clear example may be seen in the
establishment of the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars (1977) as an academic
body countering the older and more progressive Catholic Theological Society of America (1946). The presenting issue was human sexuality. The same
pattern is evident in the movement from the first Women’s Ordination
Conference (1975) to the second Conference (1978). The latter would be
followed by the formation of women’s advocacy organizations publicly
pushing for institutional change. These organizations reflected the elite professional class now disagreeing amongst themselves. Critical differences
reached a combustion point both when the second phase of the Cold War
emerged and positional authority in the Church began to change.
The development of positions on women in society and Church is
another key indicator of the explosive nature of the “pastoral” in a political
climate of religious pluralism and human rights. This can be seen in the
initial consideration by the episcopal committee examining the Equal
Rights Amendment (from 1972) and then its final rejection because of its
possible opening to abortion (1978). The ERA was an issue that would not
go away for another decade. Similarly, opposition to the legalization of
abortion took different tactical forms, some seeing it as a single legal issue,
others trying to discover how best to oppose it within a context of religious
freedom. The Leadership Conference of Women Religious published
Choose Life in 1977, but this was severely critiqued by the episcopal committee asked to examine the document’s compatibility with Church teaching. The differences within the community culminated in the 1984 controversy over the New York Times ad supporting free choice. As a second
example, the increasing tension and disappearance of a conciliar pastoral
approach can be illustrated by examining the discussions and reactions to
Archbishop Border’s Task Force on Women (1974–1976), Archbishop
Weakland’s 1981–82 Task Force on Women, and the very strident reaction to Weakland’s 1990 listening sessions on women’s experience of abortion. What is happening? Similar to the differing cultural forces in society
at large, the Council in the United States is being received on national and
local levels in a progressively contentious way. The “politics of history”
turned out to be a new and dramatic communal process embedded in the
society at large. Given the teaching of the Council and its opening to the
American proposition, how could Catholic teaching arrive at a coherent

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public stance respectful of the pastoral zone of moral decision making?
Reading various positions backwards from the present, using labels to dismiss opinions, violates the historicity of the participants. There were many
victims at all levels of the Church in the course of this polarization. One of
them was the Council itself.
Such is the situation on which American Catholicism Transformed tried
to shed some light. “Where goes pluriformity?” Dinges asks. Historians
have a difficult time prognosticating. But one historian of theology and
spirituality might speculate. The papacy of Francis attempts to bridge the
divides so well entrenched by this “politics of history.” Fixed disagreements are apparent in the reaction to Chapter VIII of Amoris Latitiae,
which calls for a “pastoral approach” to marriage and family life, and in
the acceptance/reluctance surrounding the listening process of synodality.
Currently, transgenderism is the flash point of discord. The patchwork
quilt of American Catholicism seems here to stay. Perhaps the Church as
a whole needs to return to the Council in a new way, listen to its participants, analyze the theological “signs of the times,” and through the hard
work of sub-commissions of bishops, theologians, priests, religious, and
laity, conversation with the “other,” and deliberations guided by the Holy
Spirit, respond from its internal resources to people’s quest for a Gospel
life of peace, justice, and mutual love. This is the hope that American
Catholicism Transformed attempted in its limited way to place before the
community. But historically speaking, the global reception of the Council
is only in its infancy.

Book Reviews
GENERAL
Intimate Strangers: A History of Jews and Catholics in the City of Rome. By Fredric
Brandfon. (Philadelphia and Lincoln: Jewish Publication Society, University
of Nebraska Press. 2023. Pp. xiii, 366. $36.95. ISBN: 978-0-8276-1557-1.)
Years ago, I used the term “tense intimacy” to describe the state of early
modern Roman Jewry. Thomas Cohen spoke of “intimate outsiders,” and the late
Lynn Gunzberg called them “Strangers at Home.” Now, Frederic Brandfon has
called them “Intimate Strangers.” The eclecticism should be obvious, alongside the
question: what else did Brandfon borrow. The answer is everything, but not well;
the book contains no original research. It truly pains me to write the following
review. I have written reviews filled with superlatives, others with criticisms, one
unmasking cynicism, and some pointing out ignorance, but never once where I feel
the author has jumped into deep water before learning to swim. This may be a
lesson that writing history is a discipline, a skill, and one bounded by unspoken, yet
firm rules.
Brandfon’s book surveys (select episodes in) the history of the Jews in Rome
from ancient times to, literally, our days. Admittedly, nobody has done this for
Rome itself. But to do so requires preparation. Let me begin with note 60 on page
301. There, Brandfon refers to document 486 in volume 1 of Stow’s Jews in Rome,
recording that, in 1540, Jewish lenders agreed to set aside an annual sum for the
poor. But then he says this may have been to blunt the force of the Monte di pietà.
What Jews went to the Monte di pietà? In the event, in Rome, the institution was
not authorized, let alone up and working until 1539. That is, however many books
and articles he refers to in the index, which are very many, Brandfon lacks knowledge of the institutions he intends to analyze; few Italian works are cited, and
recent Italian studies, especially those on modern Jewish Rome, go unmentioned.
There is some question whether Brandfon properly digests what he has read.
In the case of one Shem Tov Soporto, Brandfon says that the young man wanted
out of his marriage. Stow’s essay devoted to this case explains that the problem was
Shem Tov’s impotence and the way the Jewish authorities dealt with it. The documents contain no suggestion of seeking an annulment. There is more. Brandfon
cites Stow’s essay a few pages before discussing the episode, but only to discuss
Rome Jewry’s unique marriage rituals. In discussing Shem Tov directly, Brandfon
refers to the original documentation, never to Stow’s essay, even though Brandfon’s
explanation follows Stow up to the point of misrepresenting the resolution. One
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imagines Brandfon found the original documentation, too, from reading the essay.
This essay also contains a balanced discussion about whether young girls, often four
or five years old, who experienced vaginal bleeding were the victims of violence or
were simply being protected. Brandfon unreflectively calls it violence (pp. 129–31).
Stow’s Theater of Acculturation is the backbone of Brandfon’s chapter six. But
nowhere is this work cited in the chapter’s notes. The expositions, in any case, are
muddled. Brandfon correctly understands that Jews equated being ghettoized with
being “divorced,” receiving a bill of divorce, a get—and since when do divorced
wives count themselves as strangers—but he then confuses get with serraglio, the
term he says Jews mockingly use to refer to the ghetto (p. 105). However, this
term—or, more formally, claustrum—is found in papal texts, not Jewish ones, even
after “ghetto” crept in decades later. This blunder is matched by Brandfon’s characterization of the get given by neofiti as “streamlined,” an interpretation suggesting
a lack of knowledge about a get’s normal contents; the truth is that Roman Jews
introduced a mild change, in fact, not a novel one, that pulled the wool over papal
eyes. Brandfon also writes that Jews lived in the ghettarello. Spizzichino, the authority on the subject, says, correctly, that nobody did.
On many occasions, Brandfon argues as though the interpretations are his,
with references to the originators/authors only in the backnotes. I have brought
examples from my area of expertise, but difficulties are evident throughout. In addition, to build ancient Jewish history in Rome by comparisons of ancient texts—
without, as is the case, examining their treatment by secondary authors—is amiss.
Equally wrong is to give the same weight to secondary treatments from the early
twentieth century as to recent ones.
Treating the unique papal inaugural procession—during which Jews present a
Torah scroll to the pope, only to have the scroll rejected, sometimes violently—as
a matter of gift culture, with no investigation of the theological aspects that dominate here, substitutes imagination for reasoned historical conclusion. Canon law
and ius commune as factors are nearly absent throughout the book. There is also a
measure of thoughtlessness. In the final chapter surveying the remains of the
ghetto, without wondering what current Roman Jews think of its fortunes, he
speaks of the moving brass markers set in the sidewalks memorializing Holocaust
victims; and he reproduces photographically that of Antonio Roazzi (p. 269).
Roazzi would have been appropriate when discussing the massacre at the Fosse
Ardeatine—the victims were victims regardless of identity—but not in recalling the
Shoah. Roazzi, as is easily ascertained under “Fosse Ardeatine vittime,” was a
Catholic. Brandfon’s understanding of the doctrinal significance of Nostra aetate
and similar documents also lacks sophistication. I do not believe the charge of deicide was itself ever doctrine, as is said repeatedly.
The book’s title: Lynn Gunzberg’s “strangers” are the grotesque characters in
satiric plays, the giudiate ,and other untoward literary references. Brandfon uses
“strangers” globally. Yet how can people who, unlike other European Jews, cannot

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be qualified as immigrants, who have lived in Rome for more than two millennia,
prior to many, if not most, of its current inhabitants, be called “strangers?” Outsiders, possibly, in a limited sense. I prefer “tense intimacy.” Jews and Christians in
Rome share, and have shared. too much: language, foods, customs, other behavior;
rabbinic notaries in the sixteenth century, using Hebrew words, were really writing
in Italian, purposely imitating Capitoline Notaries, and saying so. It is this very
closeness without being identical that has caused frictions. Scholars will discard this
book; lay readers will be misled. I do not understand how the book was recommended for publication.
University of Haifa (Emeritus)

KENNETH STOW

Women in the Mission of the Church: Their Opportunities and Obstacles throughout
Christian History. By Leanne M. Dzubinski and Anneke H. Stasson. (Grand
Rapids, Michigan. Baker Academic. 2021. Pp. 213. $25. ISBN: 978-1-54096072-6.)
The inspiration behind this highly accessible and informative survey is a practical one, demonstrating to a lay audience that women have always been “crucial to
God’s work on earth” (p. ix). No feminist fad or modern heresy, female leadership
goes back centuries, as the authors explain, to the very beginning of the history of
Christianity and on into the present. The volume grew from the hands-on experience of one of the co-authors, Leanne Dzubinski, as she taught classes on women
in church leadership, first to students at Philadelphia Biblical University, and then
to female missionaries and executives in missionary organizations. When the need
for a book became apparent, she engaged a seasoned professional historian, Anneke
Stasson, who also had a keen interest in helping laywomen—and laypeople more
generally—reclaim the long history of women in church leadership.
The moderately-sized volume covers the gamut of Christian history, from the
time of Christ to the present, focusing primarily but not exclusively on highly visible women in highly visible roles. Two opening chapters deal with the early
church—patrons, missionaries, apostles, widows, and martyrs, as well as virgins,
scholars, desert mothers, and deacons. Part 2 takes on “late antiquity,” specifically
the work of nuns, beguines, and mystics, as well as empresses and queens. The third
and final section of the book focuses on American Christianity and the role of
African and Asian women in the spread of global Christianity. The emphasis is
again on leadership, particularly preaching, evangelizing, and founding new congregations. Perhaps because of the focus on spoken word and entrepreneurial success, the volume is focused primarily on Protestantism, and more the evangelical
variety than mainline Protestantism or Catholicism.
Throughout, the authors avoid a triumphal approach. While they celebrate the
achievements of unusual women—everyone from early Christian martyrs like
Thecla and Perpetua to more recent figures like Dora Yu and Abiodun Akinsowon—they make sure readers understand the obstacles as well as the opportuni-

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ties women have faced. More than once a step forward has resulted in two more
backward, a loss of control to male leadership or direct constraints due to outright
gender prejudice. The authors strive throughout to provide a nuanced and balanced
historical narrative.
In doing so, they are able to draw from a wide and sophisticated body of scholarship. The volume is a testimony to the flourishing of women’s history in the larger
framework of Christian history, and to the authors’ ability to summarize and select
telling examples of exemplary and influential women. This is not a new synthesis or
a book of cutting-edge scholarship on gender and Christianity—and it is not meant
to be. It is one of those rare volumes, written for laypeople without condescension
or cant, free of axes to grind or villains to be exposed and condemned. While far
from comprehensive, it is a clear and thoughtful introduction to a complicated and
all too often controversial subject. It ably introduces lay audiences to the gratifying
depth and breadth of all we have come to know about the many ways women have
shaped and directed Christian witness.
Melrose, Massachusetts

MARGARET BENDROTH

The Years of Jesuit Suppression, 1773–1814: Survival, Setbacks, and Transformation.
By Paul Shore. (Boston: Brill. 2020. Pp. 117. $94.00. ISBN: 9789004421080.)
Those who have researched the history of the Suppression of the Society of
Jesus will know just how difficult a task this has long been. The very process of Suppression brought with it the destruction of a mode of often meticulous recordkeeping both at the international level, through the archives of the Society at its
headquarters in Rome, and, more locally, in individual Jesuit province and institutional archives.
The documentary evidence to uncover and analyze what actually happened in
any particular province around the time of the Suppression and during its aftermath
is often scattered between what survives, often fragmentarily, among contemporary
Jesuit province or central records in Rome, or else has to be unearthed from other
sources, including those of the individual agencies in each country which implemented the actual suppression process.
Securing an overview of what happened internationally during the Suppression period has long proven to be an even more difficult task. Though the edition
and publication in 2001 by Charles E. O’Neill and Joaquín María Domínguez
Martín of the four-volume Diccionario histórico de la Compañía de Jesús: biográficotemático at last provided up-to-date accounts of the history and historiography of
the Suppression in individual Jesuit provinces, a succinct synoptic analysis of the
entire suppression process was still lacking.
That long-standing lacuna has now happily been filled by the admirable work
of Paul Shore here under review: sadly, however, it has proven to be among the last
of his writings prior to his sudden and untimely death on February 27, 2023.

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Despite its title, apparently restricting the scope of the study to the years of
the universal suppression of the Society of Jesus, from 1773 to 1814, Paul Shore’s
survey and analysis helpfully embrace the full scope of the suppression process,
beginning in Portugal and its empire in 1759, tracking the expulsions of the Jesuits
from France in 1762, and then from the Spanish empire, including Naples and
Parma, and also from Malta, in 1767.
Through careful analysis, drawing upon an immense international historiography
contained in the bibliography, the author not only looks back to the Suppression, but
also forward to the future, delineating in his Conclusion an exciting range of research
opportunities that await scholars. Taken together, this elegant study will long remain
both a useful research guide for the future and a worthy monument to one aspect of
Paul Shore’s scholarship and erudition across a vast field of Jesuit studies.
Venerable English College, Rome

MAURICE WHITEHEAD

The Bible and the Crisis of Modernism: Catholic Criticism in the Twentieth Century. By
Tomáš Petráček. Translated by David Livingstone and Addison Hart. (Notre
Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. 2022. Pp. vii, 421. $125.00. ISBN:
978-0-268-20289-7.)
The period of Roman Catholic Modernism (1890–1914) constituted a watershed in the development of Catholic reception of historical-critical method. Of the
six periods of that reception identified by Petráček, the two central ones coincide
with the modernist crisis. The first period, 1840–70, saw preoccupation with the
relation between the Bible and the natural sciences, while the 1880s were marked
by the perception of Catholic exegesis in relation to Protestant and rationalist exegesis, to the detriment of the first. These periods are passed over lightly in favor of
the attempts to address the challenges posed by historical-critical methods, a fifth
period of relative stagnation (1914–43), and a final period beginning with the
encyclical Divino afflante spiritu in 1943 and culminating with developments at the
time of Vatican Council II and after.
Accounts of the struggles over Catholic biblical scholarship over this time typically–and understandably–center on Francophone scholars and their interactions
with those who opposed using critical methods, while acknowledging contributions
by German and English scholars. A secondary aim of this study, and one of its
merits, is to expand horizons to include Czech contributors. In addition to tracking
the work of the more familiar figures of Marie-Joseph Lagrange, Alfred Loisy, and
Franz von Hummelauer, Petráček showcases the careers of Vincent Zapatel, Alois
Musil, Jan Nepomuk Hejčl, and Vojtěch Šanda, following them through and
beyond the modernist period. Attention to Czech responses continues with examining the significance and reception of Dei Verbum.
The larger aim of the book encompasses examination of “conservative response
and reasons for it” (p. 1). As a counterpart to practitioners of critical methods,
notable figures who were in opposition and their motives are explored. Another

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strength of this study is its attention to institutional sites of biblical interpretation:
the École Biblique in Jerusalem, the Pontifical Biblical Commission, and the Pontifical Biblical Institute. The survey of the decisions of the Biblical Commission,
their authority, and their e
“Intellectual” Modernism (it also had its social-political aspects) may be
resolved into major questions: a biblical question, an apologetic question, and a
dogmatic question. With regard to the first, the “biblical question” was centrally
one of inspiration and its corollary inerrancy. An important substantive thread that
appears in Petráček’s account, therefore, is discussion of influential theories of
inspiration as a way of further bringing out contrasts between historical critics and
their Scholastic opponents. Indeed, near the conclusion of the book Petráček states,
“Full acceptance of the historical critical method . . . was only made possible
because the Catholic Church changed its concept of inspiration” (p. 290).
As subsidiary aims Petráček nuances enduring stereotypes: intellectually gifted
biblical critics who faced intellectually limited Curialists, and modernists who were
lacking in faith contrasted with antimodernists possessed a living religious faith.
The book will expand the horizons of those whose primary interest resides in
the chapters on Modernism. In its tracing of the fortunes of Catholic exegesis and
exegetes into the years beyond the modernist crisis it informs us regarding the
motives that fueled opposition to historical criticism and induced stagnation in
Catholic scholarship. It not only follows the trajectory of familiar figures such as
Loisy and Lagrange, but also expands its circle to include lesser known scholars.
Perhaps its greatest contribution is that the author takes a story that has largely
been told in more piecemeal fashion, or in more summary ways, and explores it
with both range and depth.
The translation reads well and has been closely proofread. A few small caveats:
H. Delehaye’s name is misspelled on pp. 119 and 337n. (but correctly on p. 249).
While Jesuits are vowed religious, they are not appropriately designated as monks
(p. 169) or as “monastic” (p. 166).
University of Saint Thomas

CHARLES J. T. TALAR

Santa Sede e Cattolici nel Mondo Postbellico, 1918-1922: Raccolta di Studi nel Centenario della conclusione della Prima Guerra Mondiale. Edited by Marc Agostino.
(Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana. 2020. Pp. 677. E35.00. ISBN: 97888-266-0466-4.)
The pontificate of Benedict XV(1914–1922) was short—only seven years and
five months. Yet during it, the Pope, the Catholic Church, and the Catholic laity
faced unprecedented challenges. Virtually the whole period was one of widespread,
bloody violence in Europe and Ireland—the First World War itself and, after the
last shot had been fired in November, 1918, a succession of territorial conflicts
between warring national and ethnic groups, civil wars between established elites

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and communist/socialist revolutionaries, and other social upheavals. As Robert
Gerwarth has put it, the First World War “failed to end.”1
This collection of essays given at a conference in November, 2018, attempts to
analyze the responses of the papacy and Catholics to these challenges, all of which
deeply affected the Church. They ranged from those deriving from the collapse of the
Austro-Hungarian, German, and Russian empires, the Bolshevik threat to Europe
engendered by the Russian Revolution of October, 1917, and the problems thrown
up by the territorial dimension of the Versailles Peace Settlement of 1919. Though
international and national politics—in the latter case, devising a Catholic political
strategy with which to operate within newly democratic “successor states”—often
seem to have monopolized the energies of the “diplomat” pope and his Secretary of
State, Cardinal Pietro Gasparri—the collection also addresses more clearly ecclesiastical and spiritual matters that engaged the attention of the Holy See in the post-war
period, like the “new” missionary policy of Benedict and the prefect of Propaganda
Fide, Cardinal Willem Marinus Van Rossum, and the underlying strategy of the
beatifications and canonizations that took place during Benedict’s pontificate.
The essay of Professor Roberto Regoli, which analyzes the sessions of the
Congregation for Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs (Affari Ecclesiastici Straordinari), in which responses to some of the most serious challenges facing the Church
were deliberated, provides the key to the decision-making process overall. He
demonstrates that the cardinals of the Congregation adopted a pragmatic approach
to the post-war situation in which the Holy See found itself, and that they realized
that this situation even offered positive opportunities, particularly in the diplomatic
sphere where Benedict XV’s humanitarian and peace policies during the war had
greatly enhanced the international standing of the Holy See.
In the final essay, “Conclusioni,” Andras Fejerdy points out that scholars from
ten countries participated in the conference, but it is puzzling that none were from
Germany, the United Kingdom or the United States. In terms of content, some
omissions are also a trifle puzzling. While it would be impossible, even in a volume
of this size, to comprehensively cover the whole gamut of relevant subjects, why, for
instance, is there an essay on the establishment of diplomatic relations between Latvia
and Estonia and the Holy See but not on the neighboring Baltic state, Lithuania,
with which the papacy would have a troubled relationship throughout the 1920s?
Many of the subjects covered by individual essays have, of course, already been
dealt with elsewhere and inevitably, in some cases, in more detail. But these essays
almost always have something new to say and for that reason they add much to our
understanding of the policies of the Holy See in Benedict XV’s final years.
University of Cambridge

JOHN POLLARD

1. Robert Gerwarth, The Vanquished. Why the First World War failed to end, 1917–1923
(London: Penguin, 2017).

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Die Sorge der Päpste um den Frieden: Eine ethische Analyse der Botschaften zum Weltfriedenstag. By Patrick Körbs (Berlin/Münster: LIT Verlag. 2021. Pp. 522.
$65.43. ISBN: 978-3-643-14879-7.)
With a programmatic message, Paul VI founded the Catholic tradition of the
World Day of Peace on December 8, 1967. Since January 1, 1968, the Catholic
Church has been celebrating a Day of Peace at the beginning of the year. The programmatic leadership has been reserved for the popes. Every year, the popes published
a message for the Catholic World Day of Peace. Over half a century, a text corpus of
papal peace reflection has thus emerged that combines fundamental considerations
with current references. However, this text corpus does not play a prominent role in
scholarly reflection on the peace ethics of the popes. The dissertation presented at the
University of the Federal Armed Forces by Patrick Körbs, a priest of the Archdiocese
of Munich and since 2021 studying Canon Law at the Gregoriana and training for the
Diplomatic Service of the Holy See, analyzes the entire corpus up to 2021 in order to
change this. The plea for greater attention to the messages is justified.
Körbs is able to show, using a Korff-oriented analytical grid of individual,
social, and environmental ethics, how multilayered the popes develop their peaceethical impulses in the rather short, sometimes concise texts. From individual peace
education to issues of social justice and disarmament to respect for creation, the
popes take up contemporary issues and try to integrate them into the Christian
vision of a just peace.
Even if the doctrine of just war is not abandoned, the papal messages reflect the
hope for the possibility of a just world peace. John XXIII’s Pacem in Terris and the
optimism of the Second Vatican Council were foundational for this new orientation.
While Paul VI was still dominated by individual ethical issues, in the long
pontificate of John Paul II social ethical issues came to the fore, which for the first
time were also accompanied by environmental ethical approaches. John Paul II’s
pontificate also marked the supposed end of the East-West conflict and the advent
of a global world order. While Benedict XVI continued to develop this agenda to
a large extent, Francis further sharpened the social and environmental ethical
demands. Francis also took up the violence of globalization with his speech about
the Third World War, which is being waged on a small scale.
With a skeptical view of the Pax Americana, Körbs emphasizes that the popes
did not focus on the implementation of a global world order, nor did they pay
homage to an idealistic pacifism. The papal messages do not contain a comprehensive doctrine on how world peace could be established. They do, however, fulfill
their claim to point to the chance of peace in a concrete form in the respective
courses of time.
In his dissertation, Körbs thus does not follow the trend sometimes found in
Catholic peace ethics to equate appeals for peace with the hope for world peace or
even to demand such a view from the popes. On the contrary, he emphasizes the

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rather fragmentary and flexible character of the messages in a world of conflict.
Perhaps, however, the analysis of the papal messages could have been more critical.
From the perspective of a Christian realism, the popes have ventured sometimes far
in their messages of peace in the hope of a world peace that the world probably
cannot give.
University of Passau

MARIANO BARBATO

MEDIEVAL
Il patriarcato di Aquileia: Identità, liturgia e arte (secoli (V-XV). Edited by Zuleika
Murat and Paolo Vedovetto. (Rome. Viella. 2021. Pp. 432. €70,00. ISBN:
9788833138022.)
The patriarchate of Aquileia, an episcopal see allegedly founded by Saint Mark
the Evangelist, ranked among the most powerful metropolitans of the medieval
Catholic Church, encompassing the Italian provinces of Friuli, the Alto Adige, and
Veneto, Croatia, Slovenia, and Austria. Aligned with the German emperors,
Aquileia was the source of Venice’s ecclesiastical lineage but also its chief rival until
Venice seized control in 1465.
The editors of the present volume theorize cultural identity as entailing shared
linguistic, religious, and devotional values, communal customs, and origins. In the
case of Aquileia, the apostolic foundation justified its church’s metropolitan
authority and fostered distinctive liturgical rites and jurisdictional ties that unified
otherwise disparate ethnicities, languages, and customs under the patriarch’s rule.
As Andrea Tilatti’s historiographical essay shows, the focus on the greatness of the
medieval patriarchate was central to nationalist narratives in writings by scholars
within Friuli and the Veneto. Subsequent contributions underline the juridical and
political roles of the patriarchate. Although Mark’s Aquileian mission is first
recorded in the late eighth century, Giuseppe Cuscito ties this tradition to the
schism over the Three Chapters, which led Aquileia, the leading dissident opposed
to the papal position, to claim metropolitan authority over the Upper Adriatic
churches a century earlier. Emanuela Colombini shows how the Passiones of Istrian
saints share phraseology and narrative structures with Aquileian Passiones of Mark
and Hermagoras, Felix and Fortunatus, thereby reinforcing identity of the Istrian
diocese with Aquileia. Essays by Maria Clara Rossi and Silvia Musetti consider
how the patriarch of Aquileia’s jurisdiction over the canons of Verona exempted
them from episcopal authority, resulting in a physical and jurisdictional separation
of the canons from the bishop, as well as distinct ritual roles. Katja Piazza assesses
archival sources in Udine that provide the basis for understanding the division of
territories subject to the Aquileian patriarch within the German Empire.
A distinctive Aquileian religious identity is considered in three essays. Alessio
Peršič argues that one can detect an emphasis on certain symbolic elements in Early
Christian commentaries on liturgy from Aquileia and Pannonia, including a ritual

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washing of the feet at baptism, the emphasis on Christ’s descent into hell on Holy
Saturday, and the emphasis on the blood of Christ as a purificatory force in the
mission of the apostles. Sandro Puissi and Alessio Peršič further suggest that
Aquileian patristic sources informed the theology of Paolinus II, Patriarch of
Aquileia in the late eighth century. By contrast, Antonio Lovato’s analysis of the
order of extreme unction in Aquileian printed sources discounts the hypothesis of
a “patriarchal rite” distinct from the Roman rite.
Art’s role in shaping identity is highlighted in nine essays. Three explore
lesser-known aspects of the patriarchal basilica of Aquileia. Paolo Vedovetto summarizes evidence of carved reliefs from liturgical furnishings dating from the sixth
to eleventh centuries, offering reconstructions of the choir screen and ciboria, while
Maurizio Buora argues that eleventh-century liturgical furnishings under Poppo,
including the patriarchal throne, highlighted a rivalry with Venice and Grado.
Zuleika Murat demonstrates how the tombs and frescoes in the Della Torre chapel,
dedicated to the Milanese Saint Ambrose, reinforced the status of a ruling dynasty
that originated in Lombardy and dominated the patriarchal o
key social roles in the patriarchate between the 1270s and 1330s. Magdalena
Skobar and Sunčica Mustač argue that that sculpted reliefs of the enthroned Saint
Peter and orant Ecclesia, from Vodnjan near Pola, draw on Ottonian imperial
iconography to stress Church unity under the leadership of Aquileia. Four essays
discuss Udine Cathedral, as rebuilt under Patriarch Bertrand (1334-50) as his principal seat outside Aquileia. Sara Turk documents the fragmentary evidence of narrative and iconic frescoes in the choir chapels of Saint Nicholas and the Corpus
Christi, which she dates to the 1330s; Fabio Massaccesi draws on neglected drawings and documents to reconstruct the architecture, liturgical space, and fresco decoration by Vitale da Bologna under the patronage of Patriarch Bertrand;
Margherita Zibordi shows how the illuminated initials of the Gradual of Udine
Cathedral draw on Bolognese Trecento art and connects them with the workshop
of Vitale da Bologna. Davide Tramarin reconstructs the appearance of the convent
of Santa Chiara in Udine and demonstrates the patriarchate’s patronage of the
Franciscan order in Friuli.
As is often the case in such collections, the coverage of the broader topic is
uneven. Not all authors explicitly address a distinctive “Aquileian” identity, and
some even undercut the idea (e.g., Lovato, Zibordi); at the same time, crucial monuments of patriarchal authority—e.g., San Giusto,Trieste, and the crypt of
Aquileia Cathedral—are absent. The value of the collection is that it introduces
neglected examples and offers interpretations based on significant yet undervalued
or unknown documentary sources and archaeological finds, thus laying a foundation for a more comprehensive understanding of the Aquiliean patriarchate and its
culture.
University of Wisconsin-Madison

THOMAS DALE

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The Cartulary-Chronicle of St-Pierre of Bèze. Edited by Constance Brittain
Bouchard. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press. 2019. Pp. xii, 448. $103.00.
ISBN: 9781487506155.)
Constance Brittain Bouchard is well known for her path-breaking work on
medieval French monasteries and their estates. Over thirty years ago, her monograph Holy Entrepreneurs: Cistercians, Knights, and Economic Exchange in TwelfthCentury Burgundy (Cornell, 1991) helped transform our view of monks as economic
agents. The raw material for her study was monastic cartularies, which record the
minute details of transactions out of which economic and social history can be written. Now Bouchard has produced a very welcome edition of the cartulary chronicle
of St. Pierre of Bèze, a Benedictine house in Burgundy not far from the renowned
St. Bénigne of Dijon, which has previously been little known by historians. Thanks
to Bouchard, we have a rich new source that will help illuminate not just the history
of this monastery but the social life of its surrounding community.
In a succinct introduction, Bouchard describes the distinctive format of the
cartulary, which, as the title would suggest, incorporates significant passages of narrative history into a largely chronological series of documents. The bulk of the narrative concerns the foundation of Bèze in the seventh century and its refoundation
in the tenth after a series of vicissitudes visited upon the house by enemies both foreign and domestic. Bouchard expertly disentangles what is probably the compiler’s
self-serving guesswork (he gives the monastery an origin in 600, just a shade earlier
than the neighboring–and rival–monastery of Flavigny) from plausible reconstruction (she concludes that the monastery has a genuine mid-seventh-century origin).
Indeed, she rescues most of the earliest documents in the text from the charge of
outright forgery and argues instead that the twelfth-century chronicler was trying
sincerely to make sense of texts he did not fully understand himself.
The compiler did not compose most of the narrative passages de novo.
Rather, he borrowed liberally from the chronicle of St. Bénigne, which provides
a national perspective on events in what would later become France and Burgundy, as the “spine” of his account. This makes sense, since St. Bénigne and
Bèze were closely connected and had at one time even been ruled by the same
abbot, but Bouchard points out the places in which the compiler has deftly cut
and pasted in parts of the text that are relevant to his house alone; for example,
he omits portions of the chronicle in which the Dijon chronicler details gifts to
his own house but retains mentions of gifts to Bèze. These narrative passages are
particularly important in the early history of the abbey, but the narrative context
is also essential in some cases for understanding the documents the compiler provides. For example, he reproduces a passage that describes the reform of the
papacy under Henry III and the accession of Pope Leo IX, whose vigorous
defense of church rights extends to protecting St. Pierre of Bèze from having to
pay tithes to another church, on the grounds that no church dedicated to St.
Peter should be obligated to do so. The compiler thus deftly ties his house to the
main current of church reform.

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Previous editions of the text, all of which are based on a seventeenth-century
antiquarian work, had picked apart the chronicle and the cartulary, but Bouchard
follows the recent scholarly trend of representing the contents of a medieval manuscript as they were intended to be read by their author, namely, with narrative passages and documents deliberately intertwined. It is thus possible to follow exactly
how the compiler wished those documents to be understood in the context of the
history of his house. Bouchard concedes, though, “that this edition will be consulted primarily for the documents in it” (p. 17), so she helpfully numbers them. It
would have been an additional welcome step if she had differentiated the narrative
passages from the documents graphically; while it is usually easy to tell where the
compiler’s own contributions end and the documents (whether reproduced verbatim or summarized) begin, a visual reminder would be helpful.
The cartulary chronicle does indeed contain a treasure trove of material. Historians can exploit the many recorded instances of local people making agreements
with the monastery before departing for Jerusalem, in some cases, surely on crusade.
They can also learn much about the social relations among the people with whom
the abbey had dealings. This is very much the world of unruly lords that we see in
Thomas Bisson’s Crisis of the Twelfth Century (Princeton, 2008). For example, document 187, dated to May 31,1076, records an agreement that Fulk of Beaumont and
his son Geoffrey will “cease their violent activities at Noiron.” Document 311, dated
c. 1142, records the complicated case of an abusive provost who was persuaded to
step down, but whose heirs repeatedly pressed claims for his office until a final settlement was reached, doubtless after many resources had been expended on both
sides. This case provides a glimpse of the struggles that monasteries endured in
administering their estates via unreliable agents, so memorably described in Robert
Berkhofer’s Day of Reckoning (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004).
Bouchard is, unsurprisingly, a careful editor who has rectified many deficiencies
in the seventeenth-century edition. She has made available a rich new source for the
history of medieval Burgundy, and scholars for years to come will be in her debt.
The Catholic University of America

JENNIFER PAXTON

Embodying the Soul. Medicine and Religion in Carolingian Europe. By Meg Leja.
(Philadelphia. University of Pennsylvania Press. 2022. Pp. 378. $ 89.95.
ISBN: 9780812253894.)
A lot has been written in the past decades about Carolingian culture and religion. Through the works of Rosamond McKitterick, Jinty Nelson, Regine Le Jan,
and others, the study of the Carolingian period has been revitalized and the efforts
in the realms of politics, culture, and religion of the dynasty founded by Pippin’s
grab for power in 751 have received ample attention. The astounding book
reviewed here adds a whole new layer to Carolingian studies by concentrating on
ideas of the body and soul, looking specifically at the ways in which Carolingians
thought about these topics and bringing the field of the study of medicine into the
discussion. Early medieval medicine has long been regarded as a cultural backwater

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where no progress was made in thinking about health and in treatment of the body.
This book succeeds in a wonderful way to redress such outdated assessments that
were often informed by simplistic ideas of progress and scientific evolution.
The book consist of three main parts. The first discusses the intricate connections between body, soul, and self. In the period discussed there was not one overriding interpretation of these connections, but Leja reveals different ideas on these topics
by looking, for example, at theories about the connection between body, materiality,
and soul entertained by scholars such as Alcuin, his pupil Candidus, Gottschalck of
Orbais, and Ratramnus of Corbie. Where earlier scholars often assumed that Alcuin’s
De ratione animae was the last word on this topic, this study reveals a rich tapestry of
diverse perspectives and a lack of consensus. Advisory texts written for lay magnates
in the Carolingian period also reveal different attitudes. Whereas Paulinus of Aquilea
saw body and soul as antagonistic constituents and held that the body needed to be
controlled by the soul, Dhuoda stressed the close connection between the two and
favored cooperation between body and soul that would lead to salvation. Views on
the relation between bodily and spiritual health were also quite diverse. A sick body
could be a sign of spiritual health, especially in the case of ascetic ideals, but it could
also be a sign of sin, though more on a communal than on an individual level. In general, Leja observes a moderate stance with regard to asceticism and bodily afflictions:
obedience and fulfilling a role in society were more important than ascetic prowess as
the commentaries on the Rule of Benedict written by Smaragdus of St. Mihiel and
Hildemar of Civate (or Corbie) reveal.
In the second part of the book Leja discusses the respectability of the discipline
of medicine in the Carolingian age. That respectability was not self-evident because
the study of medicine and healing methods were tainted by connotations of paganism, superstition, and sorcery. Christian scribes and compilers of medical manuscripts
devised different ways to make medical texts acceptable for a Christian audience,
excising pagan elements from medical texts, replacing pagan invocations with Christian ones, or enriching the manuscript with Christian symbols. Should the body be
healed even when the affliction stems from sin? This pressing question demanded
careful consideration, but medical texts stated that one should make such an effort
because medicine was also a gift of God, and ultimately it was, of course, God who
restored physical and spiritual health. Medicine was not part of the educational program of the seven liberal arts, but in Carolingian times it became more and more
accepted as a scholarly endeavor. It is not very clear who the practitioners of medicine
were. They were certainly male, but could be lay, clerical, or monastic. Medical treatises emphasize the moral standing of the doctor. Whereas Christ and priests were
designated as doctors of the soul, practitioners of medicine were associated with
proper Christian behavior so as to assist the divine healer to the best of his abilities.
The third part of the book discusses the place of medicine within a wider spectrum of knowledge. In Carolingian manuscripts we find medical treatises often
accompanied with astronomical and prognostic texts. Augustine had censured such
ways of foretelling the future, but in the Carolingian era they were tolerated if exe-

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cuted by the proper persons for proper ends. So we find lunaria and an enumeration
of the Egyptian days alongside medical texts and alongside liturgical texts for the
sick and the dying. Yet there was also a clear acknowledgment of the fact that
although regularity of the heavenly bodies and their connection with the microcosmos of life on earth was God’s creation, he could also intervene directly in this world
whenever that was needed. As a parallel, humans could neglect ecclesiastical rules
whenever necessitas required it. The attention paid to astronomy was in a certain way
linked to humoral theories. These were important in another respect too, that of
food. It was understood that the consumption of particular kinds of food had an
effect on the humors of the body, and thus on its physical health, but also on the
moral state of health, not only of the individual but also on the level of the Christian
people. The collective fasts ordered by Charlemagne demonstrate such a connection.
This way of thinking fostered thinking about the Christian realm in terms of a body
that could become polluted, as became obvious during the reign of Louis the Pious
when fear of pollution and the need for penitential redress became so central.
From the brief summary of the contents of this book, it becomes clear that we
are dealing with a rich and rewarding study of a neglected topic in Carolingian and
early medieval history. The book deals with an impressive array of sources, from late
antique texts found in Carolingian manuscripts to the famous plan of the monastery
of St. Gall, to an analysis of individual manuscripts in all their details. Medical theories
are fruitfully related to other branches of knowledge available in Carolingian times and
connected to larger issues of Carolingian history. As such, Leja is able to show that
medicine was not a small niche that was only available to a few monks, as the denigrating term Mönchsmedizin implies, but that Carolingian elites acknowledged the
importance of medicine in a number of ways. It related not only to the body, but also
to the self, the soul, and the body politic as this admirable study convincingly argues.
Utrecht University

ROB MEENS

Das Alexandrinische Schisma: In Briefen und Ideenwelt des Arnulf von Lisieux und
Johannes von Salisbury. By Isabel Blumenroth. (Cologne. Böhlau. 2021. Pp.
847. €89.99. ISBN: 9783412522070.)
In early September, 1159, the conclave to elect a successor to Pope Hadrian
IV (1154–59) elevated two different candidates to the see of St. Peter. A numerical
majority of the cardinals appears to have settled on the late pope’s chancellor, the
canonist Rolando Bandinelli, who became Alexander III, but a smaller faction,
arguing that they nonetheless constituted the maior et sanior pars (greater and
sounder part) of the body, elevated Ottavio di Montecelli, who took the name
Victor IV. Both candidates were formally invested by their supporters and declared
to be the true pope. Each party immediately launched a fierce propaganda war to
delegitimize the opposing pope and secure the support of Europe’s ecclesiastical
and secular leaders. The so-called Alexandrine Schism roiled the Roman church for
nearly two decades (1159–77) but has often been framed as a struggle primarily
between Alexander and the German emperor Frederick Barbarossa (1151–90) over

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the place of the Roman church (and its pope) in Frederick’s ambitious vision of
German-Roman imperial renewal. Relatively less attention has been paid to how
the schism played out in other parts of Europe, however.1 Isabel Blumenroth aims
to close one of these lacunae with her monumental (nearly 800-page) study of
responses to the schism in the Anglo-Norman church and the kingdom of England, viewed principally through the letter collections of two great churchmen and
writers of the period, John of Salisbury and Arnulf of Lisieux.
Blumenroth brings both writers’ extensive engagement with the schism into
sharper focus while placing it within the context of the other major ecclesio-political crisis of their day, namely, the bitter feud between Henry II and Archbishop
Thomas Becket. Arnulf and John both supported Alexander, but at the same time
their positions were complicated, albeit in different ways, by the Becket controversy. Arnulf, for example, had led the charge that persuaded Henry II to formally
recognize Alexander as pope in 1161, but also took Henry’s side in the Becket
affair, much to the dismay of John of Salisbury. John, on the other hand, was a
staunch ally of both Alexander and Becket and came to see both conflicts as profoundly interrelated, going to the very heart of the principles of the liberty of the
Church and legitimate kingship he had elucidated in his Policraticus.
This is certainly the most significant, but by no means only, contribution the
book makes. In a detailed exegesis of dozens of letters and other writings from each
author, Blumenroth illuminates the extensive personal, political, and institutional
networks that shaped them–and which they in turn hoped to influence through
their correspondence. Methodologically, she is less interested in the letters as
sources for a historical reconstruction of specific events, than in what they reveal
about Arnulf’s and John’s Wahrnehmungs- und Deutungsmuster–the perceptual and
interpretive frameworks of their positions and arguments (pp. 33–36). Along the
way, Blumenroth builds upon the substantial body of scholarly literature on these
subjects, as well as on the two authors individually, while also offering a number of
important insights that connect aspects of their thought previously isolated behind
the thematic and disciplinary boundaries of earlier scholarship. This study will be
an essential resource to anyone working on the Alexandrine schism, the Becket
controversy, twelfth-century epistolary literature, or the political thought and ecclesiology of either John of Salisbury or Arnulf of Lisieux. For those without the time
to work through the denser and more detailed analytical sections of the book,
which also include extensive excerpts of (mostly untranslated) Latin from her
sources, Blumenroth provides an excellent twenty-eight-page precis at the end (pp.
747–72) summarizing the key arguments, accompanied by a register of the most
significant letters from each writer examined in the study.
Hamilton College

JOHN ELDEVIK

1. One of the few earlier studies to take a broader, transregional view of the schism,
with a focus on the Anglo-Norman sources, was the unpublished Oxford dissertation of Timothy Reuter, “The Papal Schism, the Empire and the West, 1159–69” (1975).

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Courting Sanctity: Holy Women and the Capetians. By Sean Field. (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press. 2019. Pp. 288. $43.95. ISBN: 978-1-501-73619-3.)
In Courting Sanctity, Sean Field sets out to demonstrate that “holy women
were central to the rise of the Capetian self-presentation as uniquely favored by
God” (p. 5). For most of the thirteenth century, the royal family’s support of the
new holy women, beguines and mystics, enhanced their reputation for sanctity. By
the later thirteenth century, Philip III and Philip IV distanced themselves from this
type of holy woman, who were drawn into court politics and then seen as part of
the forces of evil attacking the royal court. Field’s goal is to correct the established
narrative that focuses on the Capetian men–Louis IX’s piety, efforts to promote his
swift canonization, and Philip IV’s goal to centralize sacred power into his own
hands–and to draw attention to new models of French royal holiness during the
long thirteenth century. The book is organized in three chronological sections. The
first section focuses on the reign of Louis IX, particularly his sister Isabelle of
France and Douceline of Digne, godmother of Charles of Anjou. The second
section examines Elizabeth of Spaalbeek whose prophecies were a central element
of the conspiracies swirling within Philip III’s court in the 1270s. The third section
analyzes Philip IV and his treatment of Paupertas of Metz, Margueronne of
Belleville, and Marguerite Porete. These women were imprisoned, threatened, and
tortured so that “they could be forced to admit that they were nefarious agents of
the king’s enemies, satanically inspired poisoners, or sorceresses” (p. 11). Thus,
while women’s holiness promoted Capetian claims to divine favor in the 1250s and
1260s, by the early fourteenth century, these women were perceived as enemies of
the most Christian kings of France.
Field does a good job of discussing these holy women and their relationship
to the Capetian kings and their court. He clearly and succinctly explains the politics
of each reign and the roles that these women played in the court intrigues and
concerns. Field also contextualizes how the initial enthusiasm of some for the
thirteenth-century beguines and mystics was always a double-edged sword in the
pursuit of associating sanctity and divine favor with the royal family. The most
frustrating aspect of this book is that Field does not develop the connections
between the established male-dominated narrative of the Capetians as the “most
Christian kings” with the women of renowned piety. Chapter 4, “Writing Holy
Women, 1282–1285,” begins this process but loses the thread of the argument as
Field shifts his focus to the depiction of these women in the sources without tying
them explicitly into broader process of royal representation. So we see the
refashioning of the presentation of these women, but not how it contributed to the
project of portraying the Capetians as uniquely favored by God. Nor does he
demonstrate how the success of this portrayal of Capetian’s divine favor obviated
the need to cultivate saintly individuals. For example, Field begins his discussion of
Philip IV noting that he believed and royal chroniclers described him as ruling “in
the knowledge that he was God’s chosen agent . . . certain that his personal enemies
were God’s enemies” (p. 147). Field does not show how the earlier associations
with saintly women and the works of the 1280s helped to create this belief and

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characterization, although he implicitly shows that it is the key element of Philip’s
response to the perceived threat of these un-cloistered women’s prophecies.
Courting Sanctity offers a very good introduction to these six holy women and to
the scandals and challenges of the later Capetian kings. It offers a thoughtprovoking but ultimately unproven thesis about the role of these holy women in the
formation of the Capetians’ reputation as divinely favored above all others.
The Ohio State University

HEATHER J. TANNER

Remembering the Crusades and Crusading. Edited by Megan Cassidy-Welch. (New
York. Routledge. 2017. 266 pp. $56.95. ISBN: 9781138811157.)
Megan Cassidy-Welch has assembled an excellent and incredibly helpful set
of contributions on the ways in which the meaning of crusading was constructed
and reconstructed through historical memory. That the crusades informed the creation of family and, ultimately, national histories, has been central to crusades studies for two decades now, and several contributors to this volume have been instrumental in bringing this insight into the scholarly mainstream. Remembrance, as
these scholars have recently shown, was as essential as ecclesiastical prescription in
helping to define the crusades for contemporary Christians.
Following upon Cassidy-Welch’s introduction, six chapters on “Sources of
Memory” (Part II of the volume) survey the vehicles through which Christians
encountered crusading memory. According to M. Cecilia Gaposchkin, when the
liturgy celebrated the 1099 conquest of Jerusalem with invocation of the Psalms and
Isaiah, the city’s capture “was in a sense taken out of time and submerged through
Prophecy into Eschatology” (p. 42). A similar sensibility informed the composition
of the crusade sermons that provide the subject of Jessalynn Bird’s essay. An event
in historical time, when liturgically remembered, partakes of eternity. The next two
chapters in Part II similarly provide a bridge from the ideological and military
aspects of crusading to the quotidian experience of Latin Christians. Elizabeth
Lapina’s amply illustrated contribution on visual culture shows how crusading
informed the artistic representation of saintly intervention (again relating the crusades to a larger divine plan), while Anne Lester demonstrates that Christians recreated the sacral importance of crusading through the preservation of material
objects. Part II concludes with thoughtful studies of historiography and romance as
genres that both conveyed and re-negotiated the memory of the crusades.
Part III includes five essays on “Communities of Memory,” which for the purposes of this volume include monasteries, royal dynasties, various examples of the
Jewish diaspora, and families with cross-generational commitments to crusading.
Katherine Allen Smith demonstrates that the monastic memory of the crusades,
like everything else monastic, was a communal endeavor, constructed through
memories of returned crusaders, but always mediated by the exegesis of exemplary
wars in scripture. The medieval and modern memory of medieval kings, and indeed
the very notion of Capetian sacred kingship, also built on crusading exploits, as dis-

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cussed in a useful summary by James Naus and Vincent Ryan. For Jewish communities, on the other hand, invoking the memory of crusader violence, and papal protection from it, was a matter of collective safety. Rebecca Rist reads two Hebrew
texts—the Terrible Event of 1007, and Shelomo bar Shimshon’s chronicle of the
First Crusade—as part of a continuing negotiation over the pope’s role in safeguarding the Jews of Latin Christendom. In the final essay in this part of the book,
Nicholas L. Paul and Jochen G. Schenk revisit some of Paul’s earlier ideas about
the role of crusading in creating family memories, using an impressive theoretical
framework to explore kinship relations within crusading families. Family memories
inspired and even obliged further participation in the movement.
Part IV includes four excellent contributions to the burgeoning literature on
the enduring cultural resonance of the crusades in both medieval and modern contexts. Late medieval Byzantine chroniclers, despite the availability of early sources
like Anna Comnena’s Alexiad, reckoned primarily with the sack of Constantinople
in 1204—a reckoning that continues influence modern accounts of the relations
between eastern and western Christians (as neatly outlined Jonathan Harris’s contribution). Ana Rodríguez turns her attention to Iberia where, as scholars have long
argued, the memory of the crusades cannot be separated from the experience of the
so-called “Re-conquest.”
The final two essays of the volume directly confront the weaponization of crusading memory in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Alex Mallett traces the
evolution of Muslim views of crusading from the twelfth century through the age
of European imperialism and beyond, offering a useful corrective to recent claims
that the rhetoric of crusading in the modern Islamic world was largely a recent
invention. The final essay, by C. S. Jensen, offers a refreshingly original discussion
of how the experience of the “northern crusades” informed Baltic liberation movements of the nineteenth century, as well as those that arose in the aftermath of the
Second World War and of the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
The essays are well suited to a scholarly audience looking for succinct summaries of each contribution’s general topic, and the essays in Part II are especially
helpful in summarizing some of the most important developments in recent crusading scholarship. In addition, the wonderfully detailed bibliographies will provide an ideal starting point for additional work on crusading memory.
Whitman College

JOHN COTTS

Intellectual Dynamism of the High Middle Ages. Edited by Clare Monagle. (Amsterdam. Amsterdam University Press. 2021. Pp. 344. €118.99. ISBN:
9789048537174.)
This collection of essays contains studies on subjects that fall within the
research interests of its dedicatee, Constant J. Mews. The fifteen contributions have
been grouped chronologically within four sections (“Twelfth-century Learning,”

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“Sanctity and Material Culture,” “Theological Transmissions: Intellectual Culture
after 1200,” and “Gender, Power, and Virtue in Early Modernity”). While these
groupings may initially appear simply expedient, they offer the reader useful access
points to the collection, and encourage one to seek links between the contributions,
however varied their topics and periods.
A number of common themes emerge as guiding threads throughout the collection, as illustrated by the following selected contributions. One such theme is an
emphasis on the embeddedness of texts within the social and intellectual contexts–
“communities of learning”—that produced them. The studies of Juanita Feros Ruys
(examining Abelard’s concept of empathy and its Stoic and Christian forebears)
and Marcia Colish (on the influence of John Cassian on Bernard of Clairvaux’s theology of free will) both remind the reader of the complexity of the textual corpora
inherited by medieval scholars. John Crossley, in turn, points to the radical potential that calculations based on newly introduced Hindu-Arabic numerals held for
scholars, evaluating how the medieval encyclopaedist Jacobus capably expanded on
Boethian musical theory in his Speculum musicae. Meanwhile, Janice Pinder’s contribution, which offers a close reading of French and Latin texts of Guiard of
Laon’s Eucharist sermon, examines the influence of the movement to establish the
feast of Corpus Christi on the composition of the French version, ably situating it
within vernacular devotional traditions.
Another theme is the character of scholarly life. Earl Jeffrey Richards considers the spatial context within which Jean de Meun wrote the Roman de la Rose, considering how the circulation of ideas within the tight geographic space of the Latin
Quarter in Paris may have influenced Jean’s tongue-in-cheek references to relics as
testicles in the famous debate between Raison and Amant. Sylvain Piron examines
various texts from fourteenth-century Italy concerning the propriety of marriage of
scholars and provides a number of lively vignettes of medieval family life. Meanwhile, Riccardo Saccenti reconstructs theological studies in Paris in the 1240s
through the manuscript evidence of two commentaries on the Sentences, pointing
to the textual fluidity of reportationes in comparison to published version of sermons
and demonstrating how they can reveal details about the structure and training of
masters at the University.
Finally, the collection brings to the fore sensory aspects of medieval and early
modern sources. Carol Williams closely analyzes the structure of the musical setting of Abelard’s planctus 6, in order to convey the auditory experience of listening
to it and its ultimate emotional impact. Karen Bollermann and Cary Nederman,
meanwhile, investigate the transmission and reception of stories concerning the
hair garments worn for mortification by Thomas Becket, including skin-crawling
descriptions from biographies of the saint which describe how these itchy garments
were riddled with lice. In the final contribution to the collection, Tracy Adams
describes how royal mistresses were integrated into theatrical tableaux and pageants
within the performative space of the sixteenth-century French court, with their
(controlled) visibility underscoring their powerful role.

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As the preceding summary of selected contributions suggests, this volume
does justice to the heterogeneity of interests of its dedicatee, Constant Mews. Clare
Monagle comments in her thoughtful introduction that “it takes meaningful communities to produce meaningful scholarship.” This well-produced volume is certainly an able manifestation of the quality and character of the scholarly community
that has been inspired by Mews’s intellectual energy and wide-ranging research.
Leiden Univesity

IRENE O’DALY

The Great Western Schism, 1378–1417: Performing Legitimacy, Performing Unity. By
Joëlle Rollo-Koster (Cambridge, U.K. Cambridge University Press, 2022. Pp.
420. $125.00. ISBN: 978 1107168947.)
Anyone who undertakes to read this long and demanding book will need to
be determined. Its difficulty arises first from the fact that Rollo-Koster is a native
French woman who sometimes has not entirely mastered the English language or
else does not employ it smoothly. Thus she writes “the pope’s evasion precipitated
the end of the Subtraction,” when I think she means his flight; that “the crisis
processed,” when I think she means proceeded. She tells of how Gregory XI “concretized” a move, and of how Urban VI was declared illegitimate by “vice of procedure.” When she refers to “somewhat mitigated agency” (p. 7), I do not understand
how agency can be “mitigated.” Nor do I understand how one can “perform” legitimacy or unity.
Clumsy sociological and anthropological jargon abound: “the languaging [. . .]
about the crisis” (p. 6); “modes of transactional communication” (p. 35); “conceptualization and performance of papacy” (p. 69). One example out of many of the
challenges that the author poses is: “a certain Nardo (spicer), one of the banderesi,
was closely enmeshed with Prignano” (p. 33). (My Italian dictionary defines
“nardo” as “nard” or “spikenard”, so I became no wiser; “bandereso” is not in my
Italian dictionary; “spicer” is not in my English dictionary; and for “enmeshed” I
suppose the author means allied”.) We also have “pacify rancor” (p. 5) and
“Clement’s camerlengos controlled assignations” (p. 36).
Rollo-Koster eschews the goal of writing institutional history. (In this regard
we already have the clear, lively, and jargon-free accounts of the Great Schism by
Howard Kaminsky.) Instead she wants to view the Schism “through the prism of
social drama.” The stages of this drama are “Breach,” “Crisis,” “Redressive Action,”
and “Reintegration.” She finds that social and cultural anthropology will best
inform her work (p. 10), regarding which she is guided primarily by the writings of
the social anthropologist Victor Turner. Rollo-Koster offers some lively and imaginative sections, as, for example, “Music and the Virgin” and “The Apocalypse Tapestry of Angers” (which she aptly calls “a wool masterpiece”). But in sum I found
that this book was, well, “languaging” instead of communicating lucidly.
Northwestern University

ROBERT E. LERNER

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Peter de Rivo on Chronology and the Calendar. Edited by Matthew S. Champion,
Serena Masolini, and C. Philipp E. Nothaft. [De Wulf-Mansion Centre.
Series I, 57.1.] (Leuven. Leuven University Press. 2020. Pp. cxxxvi, 154. 1
Figure. €85.00. ISBN: 978 94 6270 244 8).
Peter de Rivo (in the vernacular, Pieter vander Beke, born in the early 1420s)
is well known to scholars of late medieval philosophy. As a charismatic professor in
turn of rhetoric, philosophy, and theology in Leuven from 1443 until his death in
1499, Peter first rose to wider prominence in 1465 by provoking a controversy concerning future contingents that caused the involvement of the theological faculties
of Paris and Cologne as well as the Roman Curia and ended with Peter first being
condemned by Rome in 1474 and then, after having attempted to reargue his position, being forced to sign a new retraction in 1476. Nonetheless, in the following
year he was re-elected as rector of the University of Leuven and continued his
career at the university. He remained a major figure in the community for another
two decades, but, as far as we know, he never taught any courses on astronomy or
related subjects. Thus, the two texts edited in the volume under review were the
result of private interest rather than any professional obligation, reflecting rather
the interests of a lively, curious mind.
The first and by far the larger of the texts is the dialogue De temporibus
Christi, completed in 1471, in which Peter tried to fix the dates of Christ’s birth,
death, and resurrection. The second, the Reformacio kalendarii Romani, Peter
wrote in 1488. In between, he engaged in a controversy on the chronology of
Christ’s life with the famous Paul of Middelburg, himself an alumnus of Leuven.
The result of the controversy were two works that, unlike the two texts edited in
the book under review, found their way into print and were the only writings of
Peter on chronology that had any circulation beyond the area around Leuven. The
first was the Opus responsivum, written in 1488 and printed the following year. The
second was the Tercius tractatus (the Opus responsivum was divided into two parts)
written and printed in 1492 in response to Paul of Middleburg’s refutation of the
Opus responsivum.
Peter’s Dyalogus de temporibus Christi and Reformacio kalendarii Romani both
survive in codici unici; the former in Columbia University’s Rare Book and Manuscript Library in a miscellaneous manuscript of different hands (Peter’s Dyalogus
carries a scribal colophon dated 1471), the latter in Cambridge University Library,
bound with the printed editions of Peter’s two works against Paul of Middelburg.
Of the three editors, Serena Masolini was responsible for the biographical and codicological parts of the volume. Matthew Champion contributed a chapter on the
wider cultural and geographical context of Peter’s chronological and other writings.
Philipp Nothaft did the heavy lifting, analyzing in three chapters Peter’s chronological writings and his controversy with Paul of Middelburg.
Establishing the correct date for the celebration of Easter has been an issue for
Christians since patristic times, and even though in the sixth century Dionysius

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Exiguus had fixed the date of the Incarnation as 1 AD, the chronology of Christ’s
life and death became a bone of contention in the Middle Ages. Harmonizing the
Jewish nineteen-year lunar cyle with the Julian solar calendar, with the inconsistent
chronological indications of the Gospels, and with the exigencies of various Church
traditions, called forth a variety of solutions from the eleventh to the sixteenth century. Painfully apparent to all was the growing divergence between the date of the
true solar spring equinox and its supposed date in the Julian calendar, upon which
the date of Easter in any given year depended, as the former retrograded back from
the latter approximately one day every 134 years. Peter’s solution was to make a
series of ingenious assumptions and work back from them. The first of these
assumptions concerned how and when the Julian calendar was instituted, for which
Peter relied especially on Macrobius’ description in his Saturnalia of the reform of
the calendar that Julius Caesar carried out with the help of his secretary M. Flavianus in 46/45 BC. Servius’s mention in his G eorgics commentary of a solar eclipse
on March 14 in the year of Caesar’s assassination also played a role in Peter’s calculations. A second major assumption was that the rules of the Jewish lunar calendar on postponing Passover in the time of Jesus’s crucifixion were not identical to
those in the time of the Council of Nicaea in the fourth century, when the rules for
the observing the date of Easter were established. With the help of the Carmelite
Oliver Godelof, who supplied him with computational data, Peter developed a
sophisticated astronomical-historical argument proving that truly, just as Church
tradition holds, Christ died on Friday, March 25, 15 Nisan in the Jewish calendar,
in the year 34 AD, in his thirty-fourth year, having been born in the forty-first year
of Caesar Augustus’ reign.
Peter’s arguments exercised no influence on the debate leading up to the Gregorian Reform of 1582 since, as been said, the two works edited in this volume
remained unknown. But these works, as well as his controversy with Paul of Middelburg, stand as witnesses to Peter’s far-ranging mind and the intellectual culture
of Europe at the end of the fifteenth century. We may note in closing that one part
of Peter’s reform of the calendar was to drop ten days from the calendar in March,
1501. The Gregorian calendar came to the same solution, dropping the ten days,
however, in October, 1582.
My only criticism of this splendid, informative volume is that despite its overt
purpose of making available in a critical edition two works of Peter de Rivo, the
Latin texts are paradoxically set in a smaller and therefore less easy to read font than
the rest of the volume.
The University at Albany, State University of New York

JOHN MONFASANI

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EARLY MODERN EUROPEAN
L’Inquisizione romana a Imola. Processi, Vols. I–II: (1551–1592). Edited by Giacomo Mariani, con prefazione di Adriano Prosperi e postfazione di Mons.
Alejandro Cifres. (Imola: Il Nuovo Diario Messaggero. 2021. Pp. 650.
€47.00. ISBN: 978-88-32256-30-7.)
The Roman Inquisition was among the institutions that most influenced the
religious, social, and cultural history of early modern Italy. Since the second half of
the twentieth century, historians have increasingly devoted their attention to the
ecclesiastical court, but this book represents a considerable novelty compared to the
historiographical framework. Mariani offers the complete and preciously annotated
edition of the first two volumes in which the trials of the Imola Inquisition are collected. This edition constitutes a fundamental work that will mark this field of
research, as stated also by Adriano Prosperi (pp. 9–11) and Alejandro Cifres (p. 617).
No similar editions are available according to the sources of the papal Holy Office:
the documents consulted and rearranged (with a great effort) by the author allow us
to follow (despite some temporal gaps) the activity of the tribunal between 1551 and
1592, an essential period for the institution, which in those years evolved from a court
of doctrinal orthodoxy to an institution stably in charge of protecting morality. It is
hoped that the later volumes of this collection will also be published, to follow the
Imola Inquisition as it evolved (or not) in historical and intellectual perspective.
Mariani did meticulous research for the notes and introductions in each
volume and for each trial. The reader can appreciate a historical narrative dense
with people and places, learning about events that very often go beyond the inquisitorial inquiries. Following the same individuals between different trials and crossreferencing, this information with that reported by Mariani in the bibliography,
gives us a more accurate insight into the lives of those men and women, of all ages,
social classes, and intellectual interests. The trials analyzed confirm the already
studied progressive decrease (after 1570s) of cases of formal heresy and the increase
of those for heretical propositions, blasphemy, anticlericalism, or clergy indiscipline. The sampler proposed is of a truly unique richness and variety: a barber who
reveals to his customers what he confessed in the Holy Office (p. 201); an anticlerical soldier who did not baptize his five children (p. 375); an overly diligent man
abusing the inquisitorial authority (p. 415); a pilgrim from Lyon in possession of
the German version of Erasmus’ “Adagia” (p. 469); secular guards denounced along
with those they were supposed to arrest for eating capons after Saturday vespers (p.
549). A colorful context emerges, where various forms of religious dissent persisted
for a long time against the homologation wished by the Inquisition. Moreover,
Mariani’s work testifies to the various strategies adopted by many people to escape
the ecclesiastical tribunal, but also to take advantage of any possible benefits offered
by the court, such as revenge (p. 450). Others, however, did not let their affections
soften them, especially if they were members of the powerful brotherhoods linked
to the Inquisition (the companies of the Holy Cross), going so far as to denounce
their husbands or sons (p. 595).

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It is thanks to these works that scholars will look with renewed interest at different sources such as the inquisitorial trials, documents too often appreciated only
based on whether or not they testify the presence of the Protestant Reformation in
Italy. The trials remain a valuable source even for the following decades and centuries when, once the harshest phase of the Counter-Reformation had passed, the
everyday life of early modern Italy seems to emerge with greater clarity.
Polish Academy of Science, Warsaw

DENNJ SOLERA

British and Irish Religious Orders in Europe, 1560–1800: Conventuals, Mendicants,
and Monastics in Motion. Edited by Cormac Begadon and James E. Kelly.
(Durham: Durham University IMEMS Press. 2022. Pp. xii, 288. $115.00.
ISBN: 9781914967009).
This volume, the product of a conference held not long before we were all
forced into enclosure, avowedly promotes a shift in the center of gravity of early
modern Catholic scholarship, away from the Elizabethan period and the Jesuit Mission. Resisting the magnetic appeal of Edmund Campion, Mary Queen of Scots,
and the Spanish Armada, we are invited to consider the lives, witness, and dynamics
of other religious orders scattered from Ireland to Erfurt. The expansion of recent
Jesuit-centred scholarship is given its due, but the focus here is on the Benedictines,
Franciscans, Dominicans, and Carmelites. Irish, Scots, and English are given equal
attention, and most of the action takes place in the seventeenth century.
All this is as it should be. The reader is warned, however, that the collection
does not aspire to comprehensiveness. It is a miscellany of specialist studies to
which the editors have given some thematic structuring. The strength of the volume
is that it introduces a number of leading figures who deserve to be better known:
Luke (Francis) Wadding (1588–1657), an Irish Franciscan who founded St.
Isidore, the Irish college in Rome; Mary Percy (c.1570–1642) and Mary Knatchbull (1610–1696), abbesses of Benedictine convents in Brussels and Ghent;
Nicholas Anthony O’Kenny, a maverick Irish Dominican in Paris; Charles
Walmesley (1722–97), author of a sensational (and reactionary) General History of
the Christian Church (1771); and Ildephonse Kennedy (1722–1804), secretary of the
Bavarian Academy of Sciences. It is a pity that so few portraits are reproduced,
apart from the cover image of Walmesley and two frescos from St. Isidore. Maps
would have been welcome, too, showing the location and distribution of the various
religious houses mentioned in the text.
Ironically, the Jesuits remain a lurking presence, if only by contrast. Augustine
Baker (1575–1641) adopted a distinctive, Benedictine approach to mission, keeping a balance between monastic and missionary deployment so as to maintain the
centrality of the contemplative life. The frescos at St. Isidore, Rome, commissioned
by Luke Wadding, celebrated the settled Catholic identity of Ireland and the
legend that Duns Scotus, O.F.M., came from County Down, whereas the martyr
frescos at the (Jesuit) English College in Rome spurred seminarians to combative

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missionary endeavor. In the seventeenth century, the relationship between the Irish
episcopacy and the regular orders was generally harmonious, unlike the embattled
state of the Jesuits in England following the archpriest controversy at the turn of
the century.
Thanks to recent archival development, the contributors provide wellresearched glimpses of monastic and conventual life, many of which register the
displacement of Catholic energies: mystical experience in unexpected spaces, survival through tough and enduring leadership, a lively Irish presence in Paris, attachment to homeland identity, devotion to the Stuarts. In the eighteenth century,
engagement with continental movements increased: monastery gardens reflected
new trends in landscaping, and the Enlightenment elicited diverse responses. By
extending the chronological scope of the volume well beyond the early modern
period, Kelly and Begadon have demonstrated that British and Irish Catholic history is on the move.
University of the Free State
Bloemfontein, South Africa

VICTOR HOULISTON

Giannettino Doria: Cardinale della Corona Spagnola (1573-1642). By Fabrizio
D’Avenia. (Roma: Viella. 2021. Pp. 352. €32. ISBN: 9788833138091.)
Cardinals of the Post-Tridentine era have recently received a good deal of
attention for their political, religious, and cultural achievements that contributed to
the resurgence of the Roman Catholic Church in the seventeenth century. This
body of literature is best exemplified by the collection of essays in Brill’s Companion
to the Early Modern Cardinal (2020), edited by Mary Hollingsworth, Miles Pattenden, and Arnold Witte. Fabrizio D’Avenia adds to the growing studies of early
modern cardinals with this biography of Giannettino Doria, a Genoese cardinal
and archbishop of Palermo. Grounded in a stunning mastery of archival materials
from the Vatican, Rome, Genoa, Palermo, and Madrid, D’Avenia emphasizes
Doria’s many roles: cardinal protector of the Spanish crown, promoter of his
family’s aggrandizement, and dutiful pastor to his diocese in Sicily.
The first three chapters of D’Avenia’s biography outlines Doria’s background
as a scion of the powerful Doria family of Genoa, his formal education in Spain,
and his promotion as cardinal with the support of Philip II. As faithful ally of the
Spanish kings, Doria would later serve as the cardinal protector of Spain and, several times in his life, as the interim Viceroy of Sicily. Of particular interest is the
attention D’Avenia gives to the influence of Doria’s mother, Zenobia Del Corretto,
over his education and religious upbringing. The next four chapters not only cover
the vicissitudes of his career of as pro-Spanish cardinal, but also his role as archbishop of Palermo. Here, D’Avenia places Doria in the context of the post-Tridentine church’s institutional and pastoral history. In these chapters Doria is seen as
taking his responsibilities to his parishioners seriously, whether organizing efforts
against the plague of the early 1620s or his promotion of the Cult of Saint Rosalia,

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a local saint from the twelfth century whose body was discovered in 1624. In chapter six, D’Avenia details the jurisdictional battles Doria fought with the far-reaching arm of the Spanish Inquisition in Sicily. Despite his commitment to Spain,
Doria worked tirelessly for the spiritual needs of his diocese and in the defense of
his episcopal authority.
The last two chapters chronicle Doria’s navigation of growing tensions
between Genoa and Spain in the 1630s, his death in 1642, and his neglected legacy.
During this time the close relationship that Doria’s family had with the Spanish
were severely strained, demonstrating the political and diplomatic effects of the
Thirty Years’ War on his career For D’Avenia, Doria was a political and religious
mediator between the often divergent interests of the papacy and the Spanish
crown as well as those of his native Genoa. Doria inhabited several worlds as a
nobleman, cardinal, archbishop, and partisan of Spain, and had to navigate these
different worlds with care.
With this study, D’Avenia provides much more than a biography of an important power broker of the early modern church—in writing the life of Doria he tells
the greater story of geopolitical relations between three great powers of the
Mediterranean and the institutional history of the post-Tridentine Church. His
study should interest scholars of political and church history and acknowledges the
important role that cardinals played in early modern politics.
Utah Valley University

JOHN M. HUNT

Instruktionen und Ordnungen der Stiftsherrschaft Klosterneuburg: Quellen zur Verwaltung sowie zur Land- und Forstwirtschaft einer geistlichen Grundherrschaft in der
Frühen Neuzeit. Edited by Josef Löffler. (Vienna: Böhlau, 2021. Pp. 873.
€120. ISBN: 9783205213031).
Josef Löffler’s edition of the instructions and regulations for the officials of
Stift Klosterneuburg found in 28 boxes in the archive of the prominent Austrian
monastery of Augustinian canons begins with a comprehensive examination of late
medieval monastic structure and economy. This necessarily includes an introduction to the many officials of the monastery, their titles, and their competencies. He
uses the titles to trace the developments and changes of the monastery’s economic
structures through the centuries, giving an overview of the role played by the
monastery within Austrian society as well as its integration into government
through its close relationship to the ruling House of Habsburg. This complex relationship is illustrated by the section concerning the election of the highest position
in the monastery, the provost. The election required the confirmation of the
emperor, something which was not a foregone conclusion. The second superior also
receives special attention, as does the “Oberkellerer”, the official who functioned as
the bursar. Löffler provides organigrams to help the reader follow the developments
and order the names correctly, and to demonstrate not simply the changing monastic economy, but the integral role of the monastery within the changing Habsburg

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imperial structure. These introductory comments are followed by the description of
the sources and documents used as well as the rules governing the edition. The documents themselves are presented chronologically according to office, for example,
the “Hofmeisteramt” or the “Oberkammer,” in descending order of importance.
The last chapter focuses on the “Kanzleiordnung” in the eighteenth century, as the
monasteries served a notarial function in the imperial structure. Löffler furnishes
extensive indices, including historical measures and a glossary of terms.
Löffler’s edition is a tour de force and a major contribution to various fields of
history, including legal, economic, and monastic history. The documents transcribed
and presented give insight into the inner workings of the monastery, the functions
carried out by its officials, as well as the approach of individual provosts to the various offices. It also reveals the breadth and complexity of monastic economy over a
long period. The interdependence of the ecclesiastical and civil world is illustrated in
writings which had daily application in a “real world” setting. For example, the
“Spittelmeister,” responsible for the monastery hospice, was originally a canon of the
monastery. Already in 1551, the office is held by a layman, probably married; later
still a woman. It is the accessibility of such details in the documents which makes
Löffler’s edition compelling reading. Because they depict concrete historical situations dealing with every aspect of everyday economic life of Stift Klosterneuburg,
they are by nature interdisciplinary documents. The chapter on the “Küchenamt”
reveals not merely kitchen expenses and instructions, but also culinary details.
The sheer size of the undertaking in this edition is both its strength and its
weakness. It is a massive work, daunting in its scope. It can leave the reader bewildered by the sheer number of different titles and offices, especially as they changed
through time. Because the concentration is on instructions and ordinances, it
touches on the religious elements of the Stift only in passing, giving a lopsided view
of the monastery’s inner life.
Stift Klosterneuburg

CLEMENS TIMOTHY GALBAN, CAN. REG.

Ein Fürstenleben zwischen Alltag und Aufruhr: Die französische Korrespondenz (1772–
1801) des letzten Salzburger Fürsterbischofs Hieronymus Colloredo mit seinem
Bruder Gundaker. By Elisabeth Lobenwein. (Vienna: Böhlau Verlag. 2022.
Pp. 1200. €150,00. ISBN: 9783205214625.)
One of the continuing debates about the late Holy Roman Empire concerns
the viability of its ecclesiastical territories. At the time, some decried them as
anachronisms and looked forward to their dissolution, and this contemporary criticism still informs the scholarly debate. Was there such a thing as an enlightened
prince-bishopric? Was the dissolution of the sixty-nine territories of the imperial
church in 1804 the inevitable consequence of their obsolescence? Elisabeth Lobenwein’s excellent edition of the letters from the last prince-archbishop of Salzburg,
Hieronymus Count Colloredo, to his elder brother Gundaker illuminate the government of Salzburg and the fate of the territory in the period 1789–1804.

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Colloredo was in many ways typical of the empire’s leading German Catholic
prelates. He was the fifth of eighteen children of a member of the Austrian high
nobility, who served as Imperial Vice-Chancellor 1745–88 and was created a prince
in 1763. He took his ecclesiastical vocation seriously and was ambitious from the
outset to achieve high office. His election at Salzburg in 1772 owed much to the contacts of his family in the empire, in Vienna, and in Rome, though his defeat of strong
and favoured ‘local’ candidates left a legacy of popular ambivalence toward him.
The years from 1772 to 1789 were characterized by ambitious and wide-ranging reforms including improved poor relief, a pension system, better medical services and the introduction of inoculation, improvement of the education system
according to the principles of Johann Ignaz Felbiger, and a more liberal censorship
regime which limited the oversight of the consistory. Significant changes were also
made in financial management, taxation, and economic policy. In 1782 Colloredo
announced the abolition of twenty of the ninety-five regular feast days and his
intention to limit the extravagance of church ceremonies. This earned him plaudits
among commentators outside Salzburg but generated resentment at home. Some
noted that the archbishop did not exercise similar restraint in his hunting or entertainment at court.
At the same time, Colloredo was constantly preoccupied with fending o
Bavarian and Austrian moves to limit the extent of his archbishopric. This was
much larger than the territory that he ruled as prince and extended into lands ruled
by the Wittelsbachs and Habsburgs.
Everything changed in 1789. Anticipated revolutionary unrest failed to materialize, though the archbishop’s removal of valuables to Vienna and, increasingly,
the costs arising from troop movements through Salzburg territory and troop billeting generated growing discontent and resistance. The focus of the letters of these
years was rather di
1794 generated the idea that German secular princes who lost land to France
should be compensated by the grant of the lands in the remaining empire held by
the ecclesiastical territories, the Imperial Cities, and the Imperial Knights and
Counts. Gundaker von Colloredo had inherited his father’s position as Imperial
Vice-Chancellor in 1789, but he could do nothing to help his brother. In 1797
Austria recognised the French annexation of the left bank of the Rhine and
accepted the principle that the secular rulers should be compensated with the lands
of their ecclesiastical counterparts. The principality of Salzburg formally ceased to
exist in 1804. Colloredo had already fled to Vienna in 1801 and abdicated in 1803.
He died there, still archbishop of Salzburg but no longer a prince, in 1812.
As these letters so clearly show, he could have done nothing to avert this outcome. Even an enlightened, reforming prince-archbishop was powerless in the face
of the disaster triggered by the French wars, which ultimately destroyed the empire
itself in 1806.
Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge

JOACHIM WHALEY

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Gibbon’s Christianity: Religion, Reason, and the Fall of Rome. By Hugh Liebert (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2022. Pp. viii, 204. $104.95.
ISBN: 9780271092355).
All religions are interested in those who have lost faith. They may be deemed
heretics, pagans, ripe for proselytism, or simply part of the outside; but as intellectual and cultural challenges and perspectives, these individuals have significance.
And so, more particularly, if they comment on, indeed criticise, the religions in
question. Historians as commentators are of particular note for religions that have
an historical justification, pedigree and purpose, notably Christianity and Islam.
And so for Edward Gibbon who sought to understand and explain both. To this
historian, these religions were of world-historical importance, and notably so for
their role, he argued, in the fall of first the Western (476) and then the Eastern
(1453) Roman Empires.
This important book by Liebert addresses Christianity, more particular
Catholicism, but it is important to note that Gibbon’s engagement with religion
was far from limited. Indeed, he wrote:
“The Arabs or Saracens, who spread their conquests from India to Spain, had
languished in poverty and contempt till Mahomet breathed into those savage
bodies that soul of enthusiasm.”

Liebert, Professor of American Politics at West Point, rejects the idea of Gibbon
as anti-Christian and, instead, moves beyond his quips about some aspects of practice. We see Gibbon as able to contextualise Christianity in terms of the pagan
inheritance of Rome, and also understanding that this continuity made Christianity
different from Islam. Indeed, there is a fundamental difference in Gibbon’s work
between Christianity which transforms the Roman world from within and Islam
which assaults it as one of what is presented as a series of “barbarian assaults.” As
in his treatment of the “Caledonians,” Gibbon can present a positive view of “barbarians” as displaying a primitive virtue of innate heroism, but he is more sympathetic to the Christian world that is assaulted by Islam.
More generally, Gibbon’s history was an exemplary tale with an Enlightenment moral, as the customary diatribes against excess and corruption were given
depth, direction, complexity and contentiousness by Gibbon’s critique of the
impact of monotheism and specifically Christianity. This enabled him to give more
breadth to his discussion of Antiquity than other writers and to consider empires
of the mind, offering, as a result, an ideological dimension of and to power.
Liebert repeatedly emphasises Gibbon’s ability to hold several ideas in his
head and prose at once, and asks the reader to do likewise. Thus, for Gibbon, bishops are lovers of power but also able to lead and achieve. Popes are praised but also
criticised for an interest n territorial aggrandisement that aided Islamic expansion.
Liebert also underlines the extent to which the triumph of Christianity was as

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indispensable to the genesis of modern politics as the polite paganism of the Antonine Emperors of Rome. Moreover, Catholicism provided a suprapolitical unity
that was important to European culture. An important work that packs a lot in, but
is expensive. Deserves attention.
University of Exeter

JEREMY MARTIN BLACK

LATE MODERN EUROPEAN
Pajzs és kard. Bangha Béla élete és eszmeisége [Shield and Sword: The Life and Idealism
of Béla Bangha]. By Tibor Klestenitz. [Hungaria Æterna.] (Budpest: Századvég Könyvkiadó. 2020. Pp. 432. HUF 2.790. ISBN: 978-6-155-16463-7.)
Tibor Klestenitz’S’s monograph1 on Béla Bangha (1880–1940), a Jesuit priest who
had a significant impact on Hungarian Christian society and Catholic public life,
and who was one of the prominent personalities of last century’s Hungarian
Catholicism, examines both his personality and idealism. The volume outlines
church, press, and intellectual history based on sources related to Bangha. Striving
to be as realistic as possible, readers can learn about the opinions of the preacher
and publicist on various social and political issues. His way of thinking shows both
constants and changes. For his book, Klestenitz conducted research on press history, examining both the Hungarian and the foreign press.
The title of the volume, “Shield and Sword” [Pajzs és kard], refers to the
column written by Bangha in the pages of Magyar Kultúra [Hungarian Culture]
and alludes to the priest’s self-perception. As the author of the column, Bangha
discussed current social issues and sought to convince the intelligentsia that the
Church can provide answers to contemporary problems. In the introduction, the
author reviews the literature that has been published so far about Bangha’s life and
work, with particular attention to the significance of Zoltán Nyisztor’s book, which
was subjective in nature. Klestenitz examines this book objectively later in the
volume. The historian strives to create a more realistic image of Bangha, in contrast
to previous work.
The author outlines the chronological life path of Bangha. He joined the Society of Jesus at the young age of fifteen in 1895. The first part, titled “In peacetime
(1880–1914)” [A békeidőkben (1880–1914)] refers to the era of Emperor Francis
Joseph I, during which Bangha grew up and which greatly influenced his worldview. His family background was particularly important, especially his father István
Bangha, who was a lawyer committed to the interests of the Hungarian nation and
engaged in political and civic activities in which his faith always played an impor-

1. The review was prepared at the Doctoral School of Historical Sciences at Pázmány
Péter Catholic University with the support of the ELKH-PPKE-PTE Vilmos Fraknói Vatican Historical Research Group.

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tant role. He urged Catholics to voice their arguments and show that they are an
integral part of Hungarian society. István Bangha was also involved in the establishment of the Catholic Circle in Nyitra (now Nitra, in Slovakia).
If Bangha was physically weak, he was mentally sharp, and his attraction to
the press was already evident in his student years. Klestenitz provides a description
of his studies, including his time in the novitiate and at university, and also provides
insights into the development of his personality. Bangha’s oratorical skills were also
evident at an early age. In 1910, he arrived in Budapest and worked there with
short interruptions until his death. His organizational skills were also evident as he
sought to organize the distribution of the Catholic press with the goal of developing the Church press. He continued the style of conference speeches popularized
by Bishop Ottokár Prohászka, recognizing that delivering lectures could effectively
win over the male intelligentsia for the cause of defending the faith. Bangha was
committed to establishing a modern Hungarian press that could provide a clear
Catholic response to the challenges of the time. This commitment was reflected in
the founding of the scientific and public affairs journal Magyar Kultúra in 1913,
which he edited until his death.
The next part is titled “Turbulent Times: The Great War, Revolutions, Counterrevolution, and ‘Roman Exile’ (1914–1926)” [Felfordult világ: nagy háború, forradalmak, ellenforradalom, ‹‹római száműzetés›› (1914–1926)]. This section begins
with Bangha’s third probation in Great Britain and closes with his activities in
Rome. His first assignment abroad was cut short due to the outbreak of World War
I. The section portrays Bangha’s views on the war and his efforts to provide for the
spiritual needs of soldiers fighting on the front lines. During the political turmoil
that followed the Great War, Bangha was pushed into the background, and he had
to leave the country during the Hungarian Soviet Republic. After the restoration of
the monarchy, he represented his legitimist convictions.
Klestenitz provides an account of Bangha’s role in the establishment and leadership of the Central Press Company Ltd. He analyzes the orientation of the Ltd.
newspapers and the role of the Catholic press, as well as its relationship with the
archbishops of Esztergom. His superiors decided to send him to Rome in 1923. He
was the organizer of the International Secretariat of Congregations of Mary and
involved in the founding of the International Catholic Press Union.
In “The Last Era (1926–1940)” [Az utolsó korszak (1926–1940)], a central
role is given to passages dealing with Protestants and, understandably, the Jewish
community. Throughout the book, there is a recurring theme of Bangha’s views on
Jews. At the end of his life, he advocated Christian unity. Of course, his vision of
the actual unity of Christianity should be interpreted from the perspective prevalent
before the Second Vatican Council. His understanding of ecumenism in today’s
sense cannot be equated with Bangha’s views.
Despite his leukemia (since 1935), Bangha remained active in various projects
and events until his death. He edited the Katolikus Lexikon [Catholic Lexicon] and

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was main organizer of the International Eucharistic Congress in Budapest in 1938,
for which he wrote the hymn Győzelemről énekeljen [Sing of Triumph]. This same
was used at the world event in 2021. Bangha also played a role in organizing Hungarian Actio Catholica, becoming the vice-president of the movement, which was
established in Hungary in 1932.
The book is able to present a more nuanced and comprehensive portrayal of
Bangha. It shows why Bangha was the “apostle of the press” in Hungary. The book
is well-structured and provides valuable insights into Bangha’s life, work, and
views.
ELKH-PPKE-PTE Vilmos Fraknói Vatican Historical
Research Group

GYÖRGY SÁGI

The Persistence of the Sacred: German Catholic Pilgrimage, 1832–1937. By Skye
Doney. [German and European Studies.] (Toronto: University of Toronto
Press. 2022. Pp. xxii, 345. $85.00. ISBN: 978-1-4875-4310-5.)
Skye Doney’s book is a study of two major pilgrimages in western Germany
during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: the septennial pilgrimage to
the relics of the Aachen Cathedral and, especially, the pilgrimages to the Holy
Coat of Trier, occurring at irregular intervals. Based on extensive unpublished
material in ecclesiastical archives, the contemporary periodical press, the many
pamphlets, fliers, memorial images, medallions and other ephemeral forms of commemoration, and a thorough evaluation of the anthropological and historical literature on popular religious practice, the book contrasts official and expressly stated
opinions of the church hierarchy and more bourgeois and educated Catholics on
the one hand, and the not explicitly articulated aspirations of the hundreds of thousands or even millions of less educated and lower-middle or lower-class pilgrims on
the other. The upshot is an eminently readable and very fruitful study, whose main
premises might require some additional consideration.
Doney outlines the development of a more bureaucratic organization of the
pilgrimages—complete with pre-registration, entry tickets, assigned viewing times,
and even medical questionnaires to fill out, in order to evaluate claims of miraculous
healing. Proposals for pilgrimage songs or for memorial images and medallions
required approval of the cathedral chapter, whose canons applied strict esthetic criteria. Coterminous with this organizational process was the growth of a more
empirical attitude toward the sacred. Positivist historical investigation would
demonstrate the authenticity of the relics; pilgrims’ claims of being cured of disease
would no longer be accepted at face value but would require medical confirmation.
The author is critical of this whole line of intellectual development, seeing it as a
concession to Protestant and rationalist critics of Catholic piety and the sexist
imposition of the evaluation of male clergy and physicians on the claims of miraculous healing by female pilgrims—although he does show that there was a male
minority of claimants to the miraculous as well.

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Doney contrasts these changing opinions with the attitudes of the pilgrims,
who yearned for the physical presence of the sacred in their lives. They aspired to
touch the relics, to touch objects which had touched the relics, or, at the very least
to take home a picture or medallion with an image of a relic. He argues that these
attitudes persisted, largely unchanging, spontaneously expressed, and unprepared,
over the entire period his book covers.
This idea of a naïve, spontaneous, and unchanging popular piety is the weakest
point of the book, largely because the author does not investigate any potential
influences on it. He has nothing to say about the impact of ecclesiastically sponsored devotions—the two great nineteenth century ones, to the Virgin and to the
Sacred Heart, and the early twentieth century Christ the King devotions. (One of
the o
Christ the King devotions.) Widely publicized experiences of other pilgrimage
sites, especially Lourdes, are missing from his argument, although his study of
potential pilgrims’ correspondence with the pilgrimage organizers contains many
mentions of Lourdes. Changes in the prevalence of disease, attitudes toward illness,
or in the practice of medicine, as well as the increasing familiarity of Germans with
medical treatment and the medical profession, as a result of the growth of the social
insurance system, do not enter his discussions of claims to miraculous healing.
Without any consideration of these developments, the assertion of an autonomous,
persisting popular piety, in contrast to a changing clerically sponsored one, remains
unproven.
University of Missouri

JONATHAN SPERBER

Katholische Milieubildung im Oberschlesischen Industriegebiet. [Formation of the
Catholic milieu in the Upper Silesian Industrial Region] By Andreas Gayda.
(Münster: Aschendorff Verlag, 2021. Pp. 612. €58. ISBN: 9783402101865.)
In 1872, Catholics of Beuthen (today’s Bytom, Poland) desperately needed an
additional church. 600 year-old St. Mary’s served so many communicants–
22,427—that just getting in and out, reported a local official, was “life-threatening.” (p. 234) That danger was worse on Sundays, when 30–50,000 newcomers,
employed in Upper Silesia’s mines and steel mills, surged into town, pushing inside
before local parishioners arrived. After urgent fund-raising, work on a second
church was beginning—when Berlin intervened. Parish plans called for a neoGothic structure; the Crown’s architectural counselor demanded Romanesque. The
parish stood its ground: their building would be Gothic. Berlin remained adamant.
Faced with the prospect of the state’s taking over the church’s funds to administer
itself, the parish stopped work on this unquestionably urgent project.
What was going on? In the imagination of Prussian officialdom, Romanesque,
the architectural style common among churches of the empire’s Protestant majority, signaled “German,” hence loyalty to the state, while Gothic meant “French,”
hence Catholic—hence divided loyalties. Beuthen’s standoff reflected a fault line

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that ran through every aspect of life in the German Empire (1871–1914), exacerbated by Bismarck’s efforts to subordinate the Catholic Church to the state—
efforts his liberal allies arrogantly dubbed a Battle for Culture (Kulturkampf). That
battle would rage for two decades, with enduring consequences, and nowhere more
bitterly than in Prussia’s southeastern corner, Upper Silesia. Here the Church, its
bishop declared in 1873, was “persecuted, hated, robbed, and slandered,” urged on
by a press that “never tires [. . .].” (p. 130)
The “Catholic milieu,” whose formation in Upper Silesia is the subject of
Andreas Gayda’s impressive study, refers not (as I had supposed) to a “universe” of
confraternities, sodalities, workers’ associations, and clubs—the “Vereinskosmos”
Josef Mooser found so characteristic of Catholic Germany’s northwest. For Gayda,
“milieu” denotes not organizations, but solidarity, expressing a cohesive collective
identity. In a region overwhelmingly Catholic, such an identity might seem automatic. But cohesion was hardly a given, as breakneck industrialization was pouring
a tsunami of impoverished immigrants into the region’s mines, mills, and its four
urban agglomerations: Beuthen/Bytom, Gleiwitz/Gliwice, Kattowitz/Katowice,
and Königshütte/Chorzów. Catholic, these people certainly were, but strangers to
each other. And they didn’t have long to get acquainted. Thanks to the sulphur and
nitrates that industry was releasing into their water, air, and soil, life expectancy was
forty-three years: a challenging environment to organize.
The Kulturkampf kept them aware of their Catholic identity, but it was the
privileges of “Old Catholics”—burghers who had left the “Roman” church over
papal infallibility in hopes of founding a German “national” church—that “catalyzed” it. (p. 362) For example: in 1873 the mayor of Gleiwitz highhandedly
bestowed a Catholic church on these influential apostates, declaring them “the
actual co-religionists” (p. 442) of the building’s donor (in 1409!)—without consulting the city council, much less Gleiwitz’s Catholic majority. Their pastor—having
believed that he and the mayor were friends—suffered a nervous breakdown, leaving his successor to ward off a violent response from outraged Catholics at the
occupation by apostates of their sacred space.
Religious conflicts were compounded by “nationality” ones, especially after
Berlin’s demand, in this Polish-speaking region, that German be made the language
of instruction. Parents wanted their children to learn German, the route to upward
mobility, but insisted that religious instruction be taught in their mother tongue.
Instead, the poor six-year-olds (often having arrived with no breakfast and late
from doing chores) “learned”—in classes of 120–200 children—by rote the catechism in German and to parrot it back. A Zentrum MP quoted a teacher: “Every
day I face a room full of little idiots, staring at me with open eyes and open mouths
[. . .], but understanding me as little as I understand them.” When a child answered
questions poorly, the exhausted educator would “help it along with a stick. Who
counts the blue welts on the backs of schoolchildren?” the deputy asked; “And why
are the poor children getting so many blows? Because of the German language—
as if they had wronged it.” (p. 190)

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But a cohesive collective Catholic identity was also fostered by working
together. To enhance Deutsch Piekar and St. Annaberg, Upper Silesia’s two pilgrimage sites, miners donated their skills and labor; craftsmen and builders, their
materials—fixing paths and adding chapels, without pay. Railway personnel
harassed the pilgrims, not allowing time for everyone to disembark and relegating
those who succeeded to cattle cars on their trip home. On flimsy pretexts, district
officials forbade pilgrimages and imposed fines. As the pilgrims were too poor to
pay, the authorities got mine-owners to deduct them from the men’s wages.
Priests are the heroes of Gayda’s poignant story, and Ch. 5 offers moving portraits of all nine pastors. Intelligent, efficient, bi-lingual (Bishop Förster required
certification in Polish for every priest who aspired to a pastoral position), often
charismatic and always courageous—yet powerless against (mostly non-Catholic)
mine-owners and city fathers—they labored to the breaking point at the impossible
task of providing pastoral care for so many impoverished parishioners. The latter
were grateful; the graves of two of them still appear cared for; one with fresh flowers.
This “lightly revised” dissertation is the work of thirty years—during which its
author was employed full-time as an educator in a German Gymnasium. It is based
on prodigious research in parish, diocesan, and Polish state archives; on the press,
parliamentary debates, and published document collections; on correspondence,
address books, prayer books, hymnals—and sixty-one pages of secondary literature
in three languages. Gayda’s investigation puts paid to a truism born of the secularization thesis and classic modernization theory: that industrialization goes hand in
hand with religious decline. If that truism has been battered somewhat by historians in recent years, it remains commonplace in many general accounts of “modernity.” Yet in Upper Silesia, one of the most industrialized regions in Europe, religious life, by every measure, was thriving.
University of California–emerita

MARGARET LAVINIA ANDERSON

Political Exile in the Global Twentieth Century: Catholic Christian Democrats in Europe
and the Americas. Edited by Wolfram Kaiser and Piotr H. Kosicki. (Leuven:
Leuven University Press. 2021. Pp. 320. €69.50. ISBN: 9789462703070.)
This deeply researched volume explores the phenomenon of progressive
Catholic political exiles who fled fascist or authoritarian regimes in Europe and
South America between 1918 and 1989 and sought shelter abroad in Britain,
Western Europe, and the United States. The eleven chapters explore four geographical zones from which exiles fled; part one considers two well-known antifascist Catholic exiles from Mussolini’s Italy (Luigi Sturzo) and occupied France
(Jacques Maritain) who sought refuge in the Atlantic democracies until the end of
World War II; part two examines Spanish, Basque, and Catalan exiles who left
Spain following Franco’s victory in the Spanish Civil War; part three follows exiles
from Poland, Lithuania, and Hungary who left East-Central Europe to escape
Communist repression between 1944 and the end of the Cold War; part four

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expands the geographical scope of the volume to include the Americas, with two
chapters on Christian Democratic exiles from Chile following the establishment of
Pinochet’s military dictatorship. The authors explore who these Christian Democrats were and why they went into exile, how the exiles interacted with their host
countries, how they organized themselves politically while abroad, and what impact
their plans for postwar or post-dictatorship democratic transitions ultimately had.
Editors Wolfram Kaiser and Piotr H. Kosicki, both authors of extensive
research on Christian Democracy as well as Catholic political thought, group these
Catholic exiles under the political-ideological categorization of “Christian democrats.” This umbrella term underscores the exiles’ shared opposition to fascism and
authoritarianism of both the far right and far left, despite considerable differences
among these figures on how, exactly, to reconcile Catholicism with democracy.
Some, like Maritain, even rejected the appellation of “Christian democrat,” despite
his well-acknowledged influence within the movement. Nevertheless, a strength of
the volume is in teasing out the transnational exchanges and networks in which
Christian Democratic ideas evolved; for example, the experience of exile in the
1940s facilitated greater appreciation for the British and American political models
among continental Christian Democrats, while Chilean Christian Democrats cultivated renewed ties with Chilean socialists as a result of their shared exile in western Europe, contacts which in turn aided Chile’s democratic transition.
The exiles shared an uncomfortable position on the left-wing margins of the
Catholic Church, out-of-step with the majority of Catholics in their home countries and even, at times, the Vatican. This was especially the case for Catholic exiles
from western Europe and the Iberian Peninsula, who fled clerical, fascist, or
authoritarian regimes that had the tacit or explicit backing of the Vatican and popular support from most Catholics. They were, thus, doubly marginalized. A final,
somewhat depressing commonality binds these men together: with a couple of
exceptions, their political labors on behalf of their native countries resulted in few
tangible gains. Socially isolated in their host countries and cut off from influence at
home, the exiles found themselves sidelined when they tried to enact their plans.
In most cases, dissidents who either joined the local resistance or went into internal
exile enjoyed much greater influence in democratic reconstructions; in other cases,
younger generations simply supplanted the exiles with their own political agenda.
This is in many ways a story of failure, of men (alas, women feature only marginally
in these accounts, despite their crucial support of exiles’ work and livelihoods as discussed in the opening chapters) whose very decision for exile undermined their
ability to fight for the political dreams they sacrificed much to defend. Yet they
were nevertheless part of the global shift toward democracy and, especially, the
broader transformation of the Catholic Church into an institution tolerant of, if
not always favorable towards, democracy, secular politics, and socio-cultural
change. More might have been said on the ways that the work of these exiles, however marginal, intersected with these transformative developments.
University of Groningen

RACHEL M. JOHNSTON-WHITE

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Soldiers of God in a Secular World: Catholic Theology and Twentieth-Century French
Politics. By Sarah Shortall. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 2021. Pp.
352. $49.95. ISBN: 9780674980105.)
Sarah Shortall’s outstanding book argues that “the separation of Church and
state had a productive rather than a destructive effect on Catholic theology,
inspiring new approaches to the problem of political theology and opening up
new avenues for Catholic engagement in public life” (p. 2). Her main protagonists—the Dominican friars Marie-Dominique Chenu and Yves Congar and the
Jesuit fathers Henri de Lubac, Gaston Fessard, Yves de Montcheuil, and Pierre
Chaillet—shared a desire to make theology speak compellingly to temporal realties. At times, they disagreed about what constituted the way forward in this
project, sometimes strongly and often based on a tension between Dominican
and Jesuit approaches. Still, Shortall shows, they ultimately enabled the musty
old discipline of theology to count for something in the modern secular public
square, in France and well beyond it. In doing so, these theologians would exercise an outsized influence.
As her argument suggests, the twentieth-century renewal in Catholic theology
that these men helped to birth was rooted in an irony: anticlerical laws closed down
French Catholic seminaries, which sent Shortall’s young protagonists into sheltered
enclaves on the British island of Jersey and in rural Belgium where they reflected
on the political situation of France from a remove. Shortall explores how, dreaming
of home, they searched for creative ways of speaking about the challenges of everyday life without appearing to be political. Another irony, this one more well known:
They helped to make theology speak a contemporary language substantially by
engaging in historical research and by “returning to the sources” of ancient theologians whose vision had been long since eclipsed. By the 1930s and 1940s, as fascism
overtook Western Europe, it became clear that this work prepared them to nurture
a subtle “spiritual resistance,” honing a language and approach that would allow
them to speak to the political situation while evading censorship and sharpening a
Catholic political position that was both anti-fascist and anti-liberal—at once
opposed to the dynamic of the nationalist state/totalitarian collectivism and that of
the capitalist system/liberal individualism.
Shortall shrewdly illuminates a paradox at the heart of their theological contribution: that it was by “remaining detached from politics proper and bearing witness to its eternal mission that the Church could engage most effectively in temporal affairs” (p. 107). In time, this insight would be wide-ranging in its influence,
finding fresh articulations in the theological-political vision of the Second Vatican
Council and in the later work of liberation theologians, led by Gustavo Guttierrez,
and the Radical Orthodoxy movement, led by John Milbank. In the light of a
recent upsurge of contemporary interest in Catholic integralism and in the confessional state (see legal scholars Patrick Deneen and Adrian Vermeuel) against which
these nouveaux theologians positioned themselves a century ago, the story of these
men is particularly worthy of revisiting now.

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Shortall’s accomplishment in telling this important story, so carefully considered and so deeply grounded in the archives, is simply remarkable.
JAMES P. MCCARTIN

Fordham University

AMERICAN
The Shattered Cross: French Catholic Missionaries on the Mississippi River, 1 6 9 8 –
1 7 2 5 .By Linda Carol Jones. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.
2020. Pp. xiv, 297. $50.00 ISBN: 978-0-8071-7356-5.)
In The Shattered Cross author Linda Carol Jones shines a light on the missionary work of the Séminaire de Québec in the Mississippi River Valley at the beginning of the eighteenth century. Between 1698 and 1725 five seminary priests
embarked on missions among the people of the Taensas, Tamarois, Tunica,
Natchez and Quapaw nations. These missions resulted in little in the way of conversion to Christianity. While conversions were few Jones argues that some of the
priests managed to find a degree of cultural understanding, approaching a middle
ground, with their Indigenous hosts. The Shattered Cross is a well written and
important addition to our understanding of Christian missions in New France.
Jones’ primary source materials are archives located in France, Canada, and
Italy, with a focus on the archives of the Séminaire de Québec. These include private letters between the priests and their leadership, supply lists, discussions of
administrative matters and frank depictions of the conditions of the missions that
together provide unique insight into the motivations of the priests and the challenges they faced as they descended the Mississippi. The missions were not well
planned or adequately funded. Fathers Antoine Davion, François de Montigny,
Jean-François Buisson de Saint-Cosme, Nicolas Foucault and Marc Bergier struggled with logistical difficulties, isolation, a climate for which they were not
equipped, and their inability to speak the languages of their Indigenous interlocutors. In the case of the Tamarois they were also in direct competition with the
Jesuits. Fathers Foucault and Saint-Cosme were killed in the field, Father de Montigny left for France after twelve months, and Bergier succumbed to disease in a few
short years. Father Davion alone remained along the Mississippi for 25 years before
returning to France.
While Jones uses the archives to excellent effect in the retelling of the main
events of these missions the book is not able to paint as full a picture of the Indigenous peoples the missionaries lived among. As she notes, “we know very little about
the interactions that took place between Seminary missionaries and Native peoples
along the Mississippi during the early part of the eighteenth century” (p. 228). Jones
relies on the work of historians, anthropologists and other secondary sources to
frame the cultural contexts in which the priests found themselves. This is a large
task. Jones also draws on Richard White’s The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires and
Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1 6 5 0 –1 8 1 5 (Cambridge: Cambridge University

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Press, 1991) with its concept of the middle ground to characterize the accommodations she suggests occurred between some of the priests and their Indigenous hosts.
This is where the book is least convincing. White used the middle ground to characterize what happens when “diverse peoples adjust their differences through what
amounts to a process of creative, and often expedient, misunderstandings” (White,
p. xii). Not all accommodations to the ‘customs of the country’ amount to a middle
ground. That aside, Jones’s emphasis on the transformative potential of attempts to
bridge cultural differences in contact zones is an important theme throughout her
analysis of these missions and enhances the contribution of this book.
University of British Columbia

CAROLE BLACKBURN

Justifying Revolution: The American Clergy’s Argument for Political Resistance, 1 7 5 0 1 7 7 6 . By Gary L. Steward. (New York: Oxford University Press. 2021. Pp.
221. $74.00. ISBN: 9780197565353 [hardback].)
With this book Gary Steward joins Barry Shain, Daniel Dreisbach, Mark
David Hall, and other historians who contend that the colonial American clergy
came to oppose British “tyranny” primarily for reasons rooted in long-standing
Protestant political theology based primarily on careful exegesis of Romans chapter
13 (the “higher powers” are indeed “ordained of God,” but they sacrifice their right
to rule and should be resisted when they become “a terror to good works”). Against
them stand historians beginning with Bernard Bailyn and including John Wilsey,
James Byrd, Gregg Frazier, myself, and others who acknowledge some influence
from those older Protestant sources but view the colonial clergy’s justification for
revolution arising mostly from the Whig, anti-Tory, anti-High Church, Dissenting ideology sparked in the 1680s by resistance to the Catholic James II and then
expanding in the first half of the eighteenth century as British “country” voices
railed in apocalyptic terms against what they viewed as the corrupt, conspiratorial,
and power-mad “court” then dominating English political life. To this debate,
Steward makes a genuine contribution with very wide reading in sermons by
colonists, along with English Dissenting clergy, to show that Protestant themes of
resistance to unjust rulers going back to the era of Calvin and Luther remained
prominent in eighteenth-century clerical political assessments. The weakness of
this approach, however, is a studied disregard of evidence, which is abundant, qualifying his argument.
The first chapter of the book is its weakest. It concerns Jonathan Mayhew, the
theologically liberal Boston clergyman who in January, 1749/50, preached a celebratory sermon to commemorate the hundredth anniversary of the execution of
King Charles I. Mayhew, whom Bailyn had singled out as the clearest early colonial
exponent of radical Whig ideology (Pamphlets of the American Revolution [1965],
The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution [1968]), did in fact repeat a standard Protestant interpretation of Romans 13. But he also filled his sermon with
themes, vocabulary, and assumptions that had become standard in English opposition literature, including an obsession with “the slavish doctrine of passive obedi-

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ence and non-resistance,” examples of tyranny taken from classical Roman history,
an axiomatic link between “civil and ecclesiastical tyranny,” and the contrast endlessly reiterated by “country” spokesmen between “Liberty, the BIBLE and
Common Sense, in opposition to Tyranny, Priest-Craft and Non-Sense.”1 Steward
acknowledges that in this sermon Mayhew was channeling much from the theologically latitudinarian Bishop Benjamin Hoadly, who earlier in the century had
become famous for describing English Tories and High-Church Anglicans as
crypto-Papist enablers of the “court’s” corrupt managers. More significantly, Steward does not address the link that Jonathan C. D. Clark has thoroughly documented between Unitarian-leaning ministers like Hoadly and Mayhew and their
commitment to a modern view of politics focused on rights, personal liberty, the
fear of conspiracy: “The more unnecessary the doctrine of atonement, the more it
could be presumed that man was inherently benevolent; it followed that he was corrupted, or enslaved, only by outside forces (that is, by other people).”2 In other
words, Mayhew is far from a good example to show that classically Protestant views
dominated the colonial clergy’s resistance to British “tyranny.”
The rest of the book is stronger. Steward shows insightfully that much colonial
clerical opposition to Parliament’s Stamp Tax (1765) simply reiterated earlier clerical opposition to the short-lived Dominion of New England (1686–89), when
radical Whig ideology had not yet taken root. He makes the plausible suggestion
that colonials read John Locke as extending rather than replacing traditional
Reformed perspectives on government. He is also persuasive in pointing out that
colonial clerical appeals to the right of self-defense enjoyed a long heritage in
Protestant thought, though he weakens this argument when he supports it by publications like one from John Allen of Rhode Island. It included Allen’s comical use
of two obscure passages from the Old Testament (Micah 7:3, 2 Chronicles 28:18–
22) for a radical Whig defense of “the liberties of the people” against “the arbitrary
power of the wicked king.”3
Steward also offers a careful account of the arguments used in John Witherspoon’s noteworthy sermon, The Dominion of Providence over the Passions of Men,
that he preached in Princeton shortly before leaving for Philadelphia to sign the
Declaration of Independence. The account is especially helpful in detailing Witherspoon’s objections to the Deism that peeped through Tom Paine’s celebrated call
to arms, Common Sense, published in early 1776. It also makes good use of Gideon
Mailer’s revisionary John Witherspoon’s American Revolution (2017) that details the
substantial core of traditional Protestant theology in the sermon, though it would
have been good for Steward to follow Mailer as he quotes the latter to conclude that

1. Jonathan Mayhew, A Discourse Concerning Unlimited Submission and Non-Resistance
to the Higher Powers (Boston, 1750), pp. [v], 13, 53, [vi].
2. Jonathan C. D. Clark, The Language of Liberty, 1660–1832 (Cambridge, 1994), 38–39.
3. John Allen, An Oration on the Beauties of Liberty (1773), in: Political Sermons of the
Founding Era, 1730-1805, ed. Ellis Sandoz (Indianapolis, 1990), 315.

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“a certain degree of ambiguity” still attends the question of Witherspoon’s theological orthodoxy in relation to his political views (quoted p. 182, n. 67).
In a chapter on English Dissenters who opposed Parliament during the Revolution, Steward cites James Bradley’s excellent Religion, Revolution, and English
Dissenters (1990) to confirm that some of the many Dissenting English clergy who
opposed Parliament were theological conservatives who relied on classical Protestant reasoning, but not that Bradley identifies other English Dissenters as theological liberals whose opposition drew heavily from the playbook of the radical Whigs.
In sum, Justifying Revolution administers a healthy corrective to historians like
myself who have been too willing to ignore the classical Protestant roots of clerical
resistance to Parliament. It would have been an even stronger book if Steward had
recognized that a corrective is not a replacement.
University of Notre Dame (Emeritus)

MARK A. NOLL

John Moore: Catholic Pastoral Leadership During Florida’s First Boom, 1877–1901. By
Michael J. McNally. (St. Augustine, FL: Diocese of St. Augustine, 2020. Pp.
xx, 456. $29.99. ISBN: 9781647646424).
Michael McNally has set himself a difficult task here in describing the life and
work of Florida bishop John Moore whose “priests called him ‘Silent John’”
(p.350). Irish immigrant Moore was indeed discrete and left no journal nor diary,
nor much correspondence to help us understand him and his contribution to the
Catholic Church in Florida. Nonetheless, McNally has made a valiant effort to dig
out any and all extant letters from Moore to various correspondents and many
where others discussed Moore. We get a decent picture then of the life of a cleric
who spent his religious career in a “mission” area of the United States.
Born in County Westmeath, Ireland, in 1835, the young John Moore arrived
in Charleston, South Carolina, with his family in 1848, toward the end of the Great
Irish Famine. He must have shown some intellectual and spiritual talent as by aged
fifteen he was enrolled in the local Catholic seminary. When the seminary closed for
financial reasons, the bishop sent him to Europe to complete his studies, and later
his priestly formation. He achieved his Doctor of Divinity from the Urban College
in Rome and was ordained a priest for the diocese in April 1860. His first assignment back home was to work at the Cathedral in Charleston, but almost immediately the city was plunged into the Civil War. We are fortunate in the fact that as a
graduate of the Urban College “Moore was obliged to write an annual letter to the
Congregation of the Propagation for the Faith, explaining his [current] ministry” (p.
35). These letters provide great insight into the difficulties of serving a church in a
city under siege, while also recovering from an (unrelated) major December, 1861,
fire which destroyed a number of Catholic institutions including the Cathedral. The
absence of Moore’s bishop, Patrick N. Lynch, on a Confederate diplomatic mission
from late 1864 to the war’s end only exacerbated matters. By February, 1865, Moore
had gained his first pastorate, leading his home parish of St. Patrick’s, a predomi-

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nantly Irish church in the city. Bishop Lynch eventually made it back in late 1865
but then spent of a lot of his time on begging missions in the North, looking for
funds to rebuild his war-devastated diocese. Moore resented these absences because
Lynch lost focus on running his diocese properly. Uncharacteristically for “Silent
John,” he shared these concerns with close confidantes.
It was with his old Rome connections that he could be the most candid.
Despite his dislike of Lynch’s modus operandi, Lynch made him vicar general of
the diocese. This leadership experience, and his links to the Urban College, landed
him the episcopacy at St. Augustine, Florida, in 1877. Responsible for the whole
state as it was undergoing massive economic and demographic changes gave the
new bishop some serious challenges. He did an admirable job under the circumstances, recruiting numerous congregations of religious to cater to the spiritual and
educational needs of his widespread and growing flock. As an almost native white
southerner, he was not a progressive on racial matters, but he paid significant attention to the needs of African American Catholics. When he died in 1901, Moore
left the diocese in a stronger position than he had found it. Rome always remained
attractive to him, however, and he made a number of journeys there on behalf of
the broader American church and, on occasion, friends. As a close comrade of Fr.
Edward McGlynn, who he knew from his Urban College days, Moore became
embroiled in the controversy over McGlynn’s public espousal of Henry George and
the “Single Tax.” Moore took McGlynn’s side against the bishop who had suspended the outspoken priest for his political prominence. The Florida bishop used
his influence in Rome to help end the controversy. McNally is right in his view that
Moore’s quiet diplomacy could be quite effective.
The difficulty in understanding fully Moore’s effectiveness in Florida or Rome,
however, is that this book needed more serious editing. Published privately through
the diocese of St. Augustine, its haphazard organization leads to lots of repetition and
long tangential asides. Though Moore was friends with Henry Flagler, for example,
there is an overly long description of the developer’s career. The mix of present and
past tenses when describing historic correspondence can also be confusing. This lack
of a strong editorial hand before publication is a pity, as McNally has done some
excellent research here. His extensive notes and bibliography thus give scholars an
opportunity to follow the trail of this interesting bishop, a Roman-trained cleric who
had a Catholic experience far removed from the Eternal City he loved.
Northumbria University

DAVID T. GLEESON

Faith and Science at Notre Dame: John Zahm, Evolution, and the Catholic Church. By
John P. Slattery. (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. 2019. Pp. xv,
292. $27.00. ISBN: 9780268106096.)
The storied and somewhat tragic career of Ohio-born John A. Zahm (1851–
1921) began with his acceptance of Father Edward Sorin’s invitation, in 1867, to
study for the priesthood at the fledgling University of Notre Dame in South Bend,

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Indiana, where he was ordained and promoted to professor of chemistry and
physics eight years later. Intellectually gifted and ambitious, Zahm helped build
two new Catholic institutions on the American scene: Notre Dame (est. 1842) and
the Congregation of Holy Cross (founded in France in 1837). After a fire gutted
the university’s buildings in 1879, Zahm raised the funds to build a new science
museum and the first electric power plant for the campus. Not long thereafter, he
began a study of acoustics and musical harmonics in relationship to physics, eventually published as the book Sound and Music (1892), which established his national
reputation as a scientist with popular appeal.
In 1883 Zahm offered his first public remarks on what was to become his
major scholarly preoccupation for the next fifteen years, namely, the advance of
modern science in the light of faith. A series of public lectures and publications in
the early 1890s, culminating in his masterwork, Evolution and Dogma (1896),
argued that evolution, including that of the human body, was scientifically sound
and, properly understood, posed no threat to Catholic teaching. The general theory
of evolution, the intentionally audacious Zahm insisted, was a “nobler” conceptualization of God’s creative act than the traditional doctrine of special creation (the
immediate and simultaneous creation of each distinct species in its current form),
which he discounted as a theory based on assumptions unsupported by empirical
evidence. This assertion alone would have been sufficient to agitate Zahm’s ecclesial
detractors in the United States and Europe—those theologians and metaphysicians, especially among the Jesuits, who had embraced Pope Pius IX’s condemnations of modernity and Pope Leo XIII”s elevation of a certain reading of St.
Thomas Aquinas (i.e., “Neo-Scholasticism”). But Zahm’s further claim, that St.
Augustine and St. Thomas himself, properly understood, held positions congenial
to “theistic evolution,” sent them into a red-hot rage.
Zahm’s alliance with the so-called Americanists did not help his cause in the
Vatican, which viewed Americanism as a “liberal” movement dedicated to loosening the bonds between the Church and the modern democratic state and promoting so-called American virtues such as individualism and freedom in matters of
religion. In September, 1898, the Vatican’s Sacred Congregation of the Index of
Prohibited Books included Evolution and Dogma on a list of texts to be placed on
the Index, but did not publish the decree against Zahm, providing him the opportunity to submit to the ruling and withdraw the book (in its English, Italian, and
French editions) from publication. Henceforth, Zahm would not publish on the
topic of evolution. For the remaining twenty-three years of his life, he spent his
time traveling the world and authoring books on science and the natural world
(including one on women in science).
This story is recounted clearly and compellingly by John P. Slattery (not to be
confused with Zahm’s contemporary, John R. Slattery, the Americanist priest and
supporter of theistic evolution), whose book is really about its subtitle: John Zahm,
Evolution, and the Catholic Church. Slattery, drawing on his own archival investigations and translations of key texts, and on recent secondary studies based on mate-

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rial from the Archives of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith opened
by then-Cardinal Ratzinger in 1998, makes two important contributions to the
story of Zahm and, more broadly, the conflict between Catholicism and modern
science in the late nineteenth century. First, Slattery focuses more than previous
historians on the reasoning of Zahm’s accusers before the Congregation of the
Index—which statements found in Evolution and Dogma they found most objectionable, and why. In doing so he provides brief but illuminating profiles of the
major Neo-Scholastics who had it in for Zahm, especially the Swiss theologian
Otto Zardetti, whose time in the United States as professor at St. Francis Seminary
in Milwaukee and, later, as first bishop of St. Cloud, Minnesota imbued him with
a love for America and a disdain for Americanism. Slattery, in an appendix, provides a revealing translation of Zardetti’s scalding letter to the Congregation condemning Zahm.
Second, Slattery emphasizes the pervasive anti-modernism that nurtured late
nineteenth-century Neo-Scholasticism (read: late nineteenth-century Catholic
orthodoxy). Pius IX’s notorious Syllabus of Errors (also given a new translation in
an appendix) set the stage for the feverish assault on any form of science not framed
and governed by traditional Catholic metaphysics. Tellingly, Slattery rightly concludes, Zahm was defeated not because he was a mediocre scientist, but because he
was a mediocre theologian. “Zahm the empirical scientist increasing saw the probability of the evolutionary hypothesis, while Zahm the theologian consistently
argued for the consonance of evolution and faith,” he writes. “But Zahm the theologian could not and did not fully account for the problematic theological and
philosophical ideas that followed his evolutionary study to Rome. In the end, while
Zahm the scientist could have stood toe-to-toe with any cleric in the Vatican,
Zahm the theologian was no match for the depth and power of the Neo-Scholastic
minds at the end of the nineteenth century” (p. 161).
University of Notre Dame

R. SCOTT APPLEBY

A Religious History of the American GI in World War II. By Guenter Kurt Piehler.
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. 2021. Pp. xv, 393. $65.00. ISBN:
9781496226839.)
Until recent years, the religious dimensions of World War II have often been
absent from standard histories and presentations of the war as well as in academic
literature. Though each of the military services produced histories of their respective chaplaincy endeavor during the war, it was not until the 1990s and beyond that
academic studies on religion and the war emerged. This has been especially true
with respect to the American GI. Using a host of primary and secondary sources,
G. Kurt Piehler’s volume adds to the rich literature of recent years.
The religious demographics of the American GI in World War II were as
diverse as the American population. Roman Catholicism, Protestantism, and
Judaism were the three prominent faith traditions in the United States and within

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each of those traditions there was diversity of belief. Fifteen million women and
men served in the military and with religion as a core value for many of them, there
were enormous efforts made to meet their religious needs.
Viewing the religious lives of those in uniform and the policies espoused by
the government to encourage religion in the ranks, Piehler presents an informative
and readable history that emphasizes the story of the promotion of the nation as a
“tri-faith” nation within the military and the ramifications of it in furthering civil
religion and religious pluralism. Religious values and rhetoric were used by the government to inspire those fighting as well as those on the home front and Piehler
presents the actions clearly.
Thousands of Roman Catholic priests, Protestant clergy, and rabbis were
recruited as part of the mobilization efforts and their service in the U.S. Army and
U.S. Navy changed and broadened the chaplaincy services though there was more
religious diversity in the Army than the Navy.
Comprised of twelve chapters and a conclusion, enhanced with photographs,
thorough notes, and a good bibliography and index, Piehler offers readers a volume
that enhances historical discussion of religion in the military and uniquely presents
religion with respect to civilian leadership of the military from President Roosevelt
down through the government bureaucracy.
Especially noteworthy for this reviewer is his chapter “The Question of Race
and Religion,” in which he provides extensive information on segregation and religion in the U.S. armed forces. Conscription made the armed forces one of the most
diverse institutions in the nation but with enormous challenges including racism
and segregation. Similarly, his chapter “Patriarchy and the Religious Life of Military Women” provides information rarely seen in studies of religion in the military
during the war. Excellent overviews of ministry to the wounded (Chapter 13) and
the dead (Chapter 14), including enemy combatants show the many facets of providing religious care in the midst and aftermath of combat and trauma.
Although the war ended in the European Theater of Operations in May,
1945, and in the Pacific Theater of Operations in August, 1945, troops remained
in both theaters. Piehler’s Chapter 15, “Religion and Reconciliation with Enemies,” discusses unique and different religious challenges faced by those serving and
ministering in post-war Europe and post-war Asia.
Piehlier’s volume is a welcome addition to the literature and readers will find
much in it to consider with respect to religious pluralism in America from World
War II onward to the present. It is an insightful and helpful work that is well worth
reading.
U.S. Naval War College

TIMOTHY J. DEMY

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Undocumented Saints: The Politics of Migrating Devotions. By William A. CalvoQuirós (New York: Oxford University Press, 2022. Pp. xix, 368. $35. ISBN:
9780197630235).
Undocumented Saints: The Politics of Migrating Devotions by William CalvoQuirós is a thought-provoking book that explores the religious experiences of
undocumented migrants and their impact on Catholic devotion in the United
States. Calvo-Quirós draws on a variety of sources, including interviews, ethnographic observations, and archival research to provide a rich and nuanced analysis
of the ways in which migration and religion intersect in the lives of undocumented
migrants.
The book commences by situating the experiences of undocumented migrants
within the broader context of the U.S. immigration complex and the Catholic
Church’s response to it. Calvo-Quirós argues that the Church’s support for immigrants has often been limited to a narrow set of issues, such as access to education
and healthcare, while neglecting the spiritual needs of migrants. In response, he
proposes a new approach that centers on the devotional practices of undocumented
migrants themselves.
The crux of the book is a series of case studies that illustrate the diversity of
Catholic-derived vernacular devotion among undocumented migrants. CalvoQuirós focuses on a range of practices, including the veneration of vernacular saints
and one Catholic saint, the celebration of feast days, and the creation of homemade
altars. He shows how these practices not only provide a source of comfort and community for migrants but also challenge traditional understandings of Catholicism
and its relationship to power. One of the strengths of the book is its focus on the
voices of undocumented migrants themselves. Calvo-Quirós includes numerous
quotes and anecdotes from his interviews with migrants, which help to humanize
and give voice to a group that is often treated as a political or economic problem
rather than as individuals with their own hopes, fears, and spiritual beliefs. By
doing so, he sheds light on the complex ways in which migration, religion, and
identity intersect in the lives of undocumented migrants.
Another strength of the book is its interdisciplinary approach. Calvo-Quirós
draws on insights from anthropology, sociology, and religious studies to provide a
comprehensive analysis of his subject matter. He also engages with a variety of theoretical frameworks, including postcolonial theory and feminist theory, to challenge
traditional understandings of Catholicism and to illuminate the ways in which
power operates within religious communities. One area where the book could have
been strengthened is in its treatment of the role of the Church in relation to undocumented migrants. While Calvo-Quirós is critical of the Church’s limited response
to the needs of migrants, he does not fully flesh out the reasons for this. For example, he briefly mentions the political pressures faced by the Church in the United
States, but he could have gone into more detail about the ways in which the
Church’s relationship to power shapes its response to social issues.

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Overall, Undocumented Saints is an insightful and engaging book that illuminates previously neglected aspects of the religious lives of undocumented migrants.
It makes a valuable contribution to the fields of religious studies, migration studies,
and anthropology, and it will be of interest to scholars and students working in
these areas. The book is also accessible to a broader audience, and its focus on the
experiences of migrants themselves makes it a compelling read for anyone interested in the intersection of religion, migration, and identity in the United States.
Virginia Commonwealth University

R. ANDREW CHESNUT

LATIN AMERICAN
La disputa del pasado: España, México y la Leyenda Negra. Edited by By Emilio
Lamo de Espinosa. (Madrid: Turner Publicaciones. 2021. Pp. 248. €21.90
ISBN: 978-84-18428-43-2.)
La disputa del pasado: España, México y la Leyenda Negra considers the enduring impact of the Black Legend, a negative characterization of Spain, the Spanish
Catholic Church, and the Spanish conquest of Latin America that was first promulgated by non-Spanish historians and survives—both in the Anglophone world
and in Latin America—to the present day. This is partially the fault of professional
historians, the authors argue, for
“we have not known how to transmit new interpretations of the Conquest to
a broader public, and, in consequence, society has not overcome the nationalistic, simplistic, Manichean, and victimized vision forged in the middle
decades of the last century” (p. 56).

The book also grapples with the broader task of confronting past atrocities, encouraging readers to confront the sins of the past directly, without either idealizing history or resorting to cancel culture, political correctness, or presentism.
La disputa del pasado is edited by Emilio Lamo de Espinosa, a Spanish sociologist, and contains essays by Spanish and Mexican scholars. The book is divided
into two sections, entitled “La realidad. De la Conquista al Virreinato y a América
Latina,” and “. . . y su representación. ¿Una renacida leyenda negra?” In the first
part, Martín F. Ríos Soloma presents a historiographical evaluation of Spanish
and English studies of the conquest, describing how Revolutionary nationalism in
twentieth-century Mexico shaped historical narratives about the Conquest. Next,
Tomás Pérez Vejo examines the colonial period, asserting that New Spain should
perhaps not even be considered a colony, proposing instead that historians conceive of the cities of Mexico, Lima, or Manila as metropoles of a multinuclear
empire. In the third essay, Lamo de Espinosa argues that during the colonial
period, Latin American territory served as a bridge between the Pacific and the
Atlantic economies and culture, and asserts that the region might play this role
again today.

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The second part of the book, which I will review in somewhat greater detail
here, opens with an essay by Luis Francisco Martínez Morales, who challenges
hegemonic perceptions by U.S.-based scholars who focus on the atrocities of the
past without also acknowledging other aspects of Latin American history. He cites
Hungarian colonial scholar Pál Kelemen, who stated that: “it should be realized
that literary, humanistic, and scientific life of a high order existed in the SpanishAmerican colonies. This was a living, thinking continent, cognizant of European
thought but by no means always provincially dependent on it” (p. 133).
José Maria Ortega Sánchez also takes on Anglo-Saxon views on the Hispanic
world. His essay, one of the most polemical in the collection and a must-read,
begins with a critique of Marie Arana’s books Bolívar:American Liberator and
Silver,Sword and Stone:The Story of Latin America in Three Extraordinary Lives. For
Ortega Sánchez, these texts provide a clear example of the promotion of the Black
Legend of the Spanish Conquest within the U.S, since they reaffirm Anti-Spanish
and Hispanic prejudice and reflect the views of the majority of academic and nonacademic Anglo-Saxon readers. Subsequently, Ortega Sánchez discusses other
forms of media that, he argues, reinforce the Black Legend; in particular, John
Leguizamo’s Netflix movie Latin History for Morons, which may be the most widely
viewed history class about Latin America within and outside the U.S.
María Elvira Roca Barea’s essay, which closes the second section, analyzes the
complex topic of historical memory along the U.S.-Mexico frontier, particularly in
California. Roca Barea questions the damnatio memoriae of the Hispanic past in
California, and urges a reevaluation of mainstream history of the state to better
include its Spanish colonial past. To do so, she argues, could help Californians of
Mexican origin to understand that they are not foreigners in their native land.
The book concludes with an epilogue by the renowned Mexican historian
Guadalupe Jiménez Codinach, who argues that the Black Legend is still widespread in historical research as well as in popular opinion, particularly in the United
States and England. Ignorance of the history of Latin America in the United
States, she posits, is related to the way U.S. citizens designate their homeland as
‘America’ and maintain the other peoples of the Americas in a kind of limbo. For
U.S. readers in particular, this epilogue is fundamentally important, particularly as
they adjust to the demographic realities of Latin American immigration to the
United States.
This book is a provocative intervention that both describes and challenges
ongoing Black Legend narratives in scholarship, public discourse, and the media.
La disputa del pasado will therefore be of great interest not only to scholars of Latin
America, Mexico, and the United States, but also to graduate and undergraduate
students on both sides of the border.
Prepa Ibero

YVES BERNARDO ROGER SOLIS NICOT

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Bedlam in the New World: A Mexican Madhouse in the Age of Enlightenment. By
Christina Ramos. (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press.
2022. Pp. 266. $34.95. ISBN: 978-1-469-66657-0.)
Bedlam in the New World shows how much we can learn from an institutional
study. Examining Mexico City’s Hospital de San Hipólito from its foundation by
a penitent conquistador in 1567 through its heyday in the late eighteenth century,
Christina Ramos gives us much more than a history of a mental hospital. By placing it in a larger context, she sheds light on such issues as the nature of the Spanish
Enlightenment, the medicalization of insanity, and the role of the Church in promoting modern science. In addition, fascinating vignettes of several disturbed individuals expand our understanding of daily life in the colony.
The book draws on a variety of sources. Building on Cristina Sacristán’s pioneering works about the treatment of the mentally ill and deviant during the colonial period, Ramos adds the focus on San Hipólito. She supplements its records
with files from religious and secular courts that detail the judges’ deliberations
about whether individuals should be punished as criminals or heretics, confined
because of mental illness, or exonerated. These judicial cases—with their rich testimony by patients, their families and friends, legal experts, clergymen and, increasingly, doctors—form the crux of the book. Perhaps because of the limitations of the
hospital records (which do not appear to include inmate population counts, for
example) Ramos concentrates more on the process of determining eligibility for
internment than on the inner workings of the institution. She centers her analysis
on the late eighteenth century, when the documentation is most abundant.
Ramos shows that New Spain did not experience the Great Confinement
posited by Michel Foucault for seventeenth and eighteenth century Europe, where
asylums separated masses of undesirable people from mainstream society and disciplined its deviant members. San Hipólito remained small despite serving the
entire viceroyalty and it experienced several extended periods of decline. After initially taking in a broad array of paupers it specialized in housing demented men,
especially the locos furiosos who were deemed a danger to society. The institution
oscillated between benevolence and coercion. Staffed by male nurses who were
members of the Order of San Hipólito, it never lost its emphasis on traditional
Christian charity and spiritual healing. Far from holding a representative group of
Mexicans, it largely catered to inmates of Spanish descent who were considered
most worthy of assistance.
A major contribution of the book is to challenge the widespread narrative that
pits a secular Enlightenment against a retrograde Church and locates the birth of
psychiatry in France or England. Ramos confirms that the Hispanic world experienced what some scholars have termed a Catholic Enlightenment where religious
figures, instead of opposing science, were at the forefront of introducing new ideas.
Although it is a stretch to call San Hipólito a “laboratory” of knowledge production
(p. 12) simply because authorities occasionally asked nurses to report on patients’

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progress, Ramos is persuasive in proposing an alternative history of psychiatry that
places colonial Mexico and enlightened churchmen at the center, rather than the
margins, of this process.
This study also challenges the Black Legend view of the Inquisition by showing how it participated in modernizing trends and helped advance the medical
understanding of madness. Yet Ramos avoids painting too rosy a picture. While
inquisitors took great care to determine whether individuals were in their right
mind and often treated mad criminals with surprising leniency, the long investigations could drive sane people mad, since they were often imprisoned for months
and had their goods confiscated. And as an arm of the state, the Inquisition
increasingly censored texts and prosecuted people for questioning traditional
authority. This is one example where Ramos judiciously notes that the developments she traces were often contradictory.
Bedlam in the New World has the added virtue of being beautifully written,
albeit sometimes repetitive. It will be welcomed by scholars interested in colonial
Latin America and also in the history of science and Catholicism more generally.
Brandeis University

SILVIA ARROM

Catholic Women and Mexican Politics, 1750–1940. By Margaret Chowning. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. 2023. Pp. xiii, 362. $45.00. ISBN: 9780-691-17724-3.)
At the height of Mexico’s church-state conflict, President Plutarco Elías
Calles (1924–28) once tried to emasculate his opponents by dismissing the
Catholic Church as a “henhouse” rife with “women and elderly persons.” Dr. Margaret Chowning’s new book turns this caricature on its head and demonstrates that
such attempts to “diminish the church by feminizing it” (p. 12) actually speak to
women’s achievement of real power by virtue of their membership in lay associations known as cofradías, or confraternities.
These laywomen’s groups functioned as vehicles for public outreach, community building, and cooperation with male clergy. They enabled women to mobilize
at the parish level and organize formidable national campaigns despite regional
variations and laywomen’s class and racial differences. In times of war and peace—
and for nearly two centuries before obtaining the right to vote—Mexican Catholic
women exerted themselves in the public sphere by exercising a considerable, if not
unparalleled amount of influence within the Church. Laywomen acted socially and
politically, working “behind the scenes” (p. 1) so that the Church could survive the
passage of two aggressively secular Constitutions (1857 and 1917), and a handful
of violent conflicts pitting Mexico’s Catholic hierarchy against liberal reformers
and anticlerical revolutionaries.
These are the guiding premises of Chowning’s monograph, which delivers a
comprehensive history of laywomen’s mobilization during Mexico’s tumultuous

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nineteenth century. Chowning’s emphasis on women’s political activism ushers in
a new turn in Catholic Mexican historiography, which has, at times, over-centered
the early twentieth century as the focal point of the nation’s church-state conflict
and perhaps fallen short of questioning the veracity of official Church documents
to the point of (a) dismissing laywomen as apolitical and (b) drawing hard distinctions between more partisan (read masculine) politics and women’s cultural, religious, and social projects.
Instead, Chowning frames Mexico’s church-state conflict as a series of “culture wars” spanning back to the Enlightenment. Furthermore, Catholic Women
offers an important critique of scholars’ tendency to prioritize male politics, and
thereby to reinforce laywomen’s dual erasure from historical narratives of both
Mexican Catholic and political history. In these instances, women’s activism is not
only deemed apolitical on account of its religiosity, but also omitted from the story
because of laywomen’s limited access to the partisan arena.
Starting with the first chapter, the author’s interventions are bolstered by her
use of new primary sources. Whereas scholars had previously relied on legal documents to reinforce perceptions of male-dominated confraternities, Chowning uses
administrative records to uncover the presence of female majorities across class and
regional lines. Chapter 2 then examines confraternities’ spiritual and economic
crises during and after Mexico’s War of Independence. Chowning challenges gendered perceptions of “feminized religion” and historicizes laywomen’s growing
majorities in the face of declining membership totals. She argues that, amid the
perceived rise of secularism and so-called impiety, the prospect of socializing children into local Catholic communities drew women closer to cofradías. At the same
time, masculine understandings of republicanism relegated women to the private
sphere—a “derogatory” imagined space they came to share with the Church, and
which liberals deemed incompatible with secular modernity (p. 55).
The rest of the book examines how laywomen’s petition campaigns influenced
Mexican politics directly. The author argues that changes in women’s relationship
to the Church had a real effect on their engagement with national politics. The
book’s structure reflects this two-fold argument: chapters 3, 5, and 7 explore
women’s relations with the clergy; while chapters 4, 6, and 8 document laywomen’s
foray into politics, their dismissal by liberal elites, and conservative men’s anxieties
over their politicization.
Notably, Chowning reveals that, in response to the Mexican Congress’s
implementation of anti-religious legislation between the 1850s and 1870s, laywomen’s petition campaigns encouraged women to think for themselves and
express their political opinions “against the will of their husbands and fathers” (p.
121). At the same time, the author demonstrates that cofradías were integral to
processes of Romanization, and that women comprised the backbone of parishlevel modernization efforts despite the Church’s emphasis on masculine priest-centered leadership. Finally, the book ends with an epilogue that briefly outlines the

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trajectory of laywomen’s twentieth-century activism. Chowning argues that
cofradías were foundational to the establishment of more recent national organizations and remained central to Catholic women’s political mobilization.
Overall, Chowning’s pathbreaking study offers a comprehensive portrait of
living institutions shaped by women’s grassroots activism and everyday decisionmaking. It will appeal to specialists in the field and scholars of gender and religion
in Catholic Europe and the Americas.
Baylor University

RICARDO ÁLVAREZ-PIMENTEL

Abandoning Their Beloved Land: The Politics of Bracero Migration in Mexico. By
Alberto García. (Oakland: University of California Press. 2023. Pp. 243.
$29.95. ISBN: 978-0-520-39023-2.)
Despite layers of international and domestic power, the bracero program—a
series of bilateral agreements that brought temporary workers from Mexico to the
United States between 1942 and 1964—was actually deeply shaped by local municipal politics. With this argument, historian Alberto García brings readers greater
understanding of mid-century Mexico and foundational aspects of power, labor,
and migration in that era. Abandoning Their Beloved Land reveals how municipal
officials—influenced by local political opposition and religious conflict—played the
most important role in distributing bracero work cards.
Logically organized, García’s book begins with an overview of the initial federal
control of departures. He shows how the relationship between governors and presidents influenced braceros’ experiences, and how the bracero program, in turn, influenced the interactions between governors and presidents. The relationship became
increasingly complicated after federal authorities botched early distributions of
bracero permissions and departures out of Mexico City and had to rely on states.
In chapter 2, readers learn how state governors distributed bracero work permissions based on flexible considerations of municipal politics, unions, legislative
districts, areas of natural disaster, or other contingent categories. Governors passed
out work cards to wider constituencies, but municipal leaders selected individuals
for participation. This made the process subject to profiteering, favoritism, and
patron/client relationships.
García pauses his telescoping approach in chapters 3 and 4 to explain the
regional issues that drove bracero permission demand. Chapter 3 explores how religious and political tensions resulted in conflict over land—at first with former Cristeros and later with Sinarquistas—often with the losers of those conflicts requesting
bracero cards. Chapter 4 examines how agrarian reform and land redistribution
failed to deal with issues of poor land quality, competing land claims, and population growth on ejidal land. These failures created opportunities for the Catholicleaning PAN, clergy, and Sinarquistas (right-wing Catholic activists)—at times

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operating together—to generate public protests and political challenges. Together,
these chapters explain why the Greater Bajio area of Aguascalientes, Guanajuato,
Jalisco, Michoacan, and Zacatecas generated such a high percentage of braceros.
Chapter 5 moves to the municipal level, and gets into specific stories about how
cards were passed out. The author demonstrates that the systems for work permission
distribution were varied. Politicians gave out cards to diffuse opposition, mend fences
with political rivals, or solidify their influence with rural workers. For example, some
local leaders used permissions to get troublesome Sinarquistas out of the community,
while others used the permissions as rewards to mollify Sinarquistas. The chapter
briefly touches on how undocumented or false documentation migration grew out of
the fraud involved in the local permission process. García also delves into financial
issues beyond bracero remittances, examining how the sale of bracero cards financed
rural infrastructure in the absence of state and federal support.
The author has constructed a streamlined, clearly communicated work that
supplements the scholarship of Mireya Loza, Deborah Cohen, and Jorge Durand.
In its ability to explain how the Mexican state functioned on the ground, the work
is also a fine companion to Paul Gillingham’s examinations of mid-century power.
Abandoning Our Beloved Land is not a radical shift in what we know about braceros,
but it is a necessary work to understand the Mexican political context and the
importance of local stories.
Specialists and graduate students of Mexican politics, labor, and migration, as
well as scholars who examine braceros in the United States should read this work.
Because some insider knowledge of Mexican national history does make the text
more effective, the book will work well in undergraduate courses that offer supportive context before student engagement.
Central Washington University

JASON DORMADY

A Christian Revolution: Dialogues on Social Justice and Democracy Between Europe and
the Americas (1945–1965). Edited by Marta Busani and Paolo Valvo. (Rome:
Edizioni Studium. 2023. Pp. 292. ISBN: 978-88-382-5327-0.)
A Christian Revolution describes how Catholic intellectuals in Europe, the
United States, and Latin America sought to develop new ways to engage with politics and the state between the immediate post-war period until Vatican II.
In the wake of the definitive collapse of totalitarian Nazi and fascist regimes in
Europe, it seemed clear to many Catholics that this was a pivotal moment to regroup,
to rethink, and, perhaps, to create something new. Most urgently, Catholics sought
to develop a response to the rising appeal of socialism, communism, and Marxism.
Yet most of the protagonists of this book believed that Communism was spreading
for a reason—generally, because of fundamental injustices and inequalities that were
driving people towards it. At the same time, they argued that capitalism seemed not

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to do enough to respond to these injustices and inequalities, or for that matter, to
human dignity itself. The Catholic response, then, should be to first understand these
ideologies on the left, and then to propose an alternative—a Christian Revolution,
inspired by Catholic Social Teaching and by Pius XII’s concept of the “third way”—
that would transform the world through Christianity.
A Christian Revolution, then, offers a kaleidoscopic view of the many different “revolutions” or “third ways” proposed by influential Catholics during this
period. In chapter 1, Maria Bocci describes how intellectuals at the seemingly conservative Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore sought to reintroduce Christian
principles to the corporate state. Simon Unger-Alvi, in chapter 2, describes how,
in Germany, Catholic leaders hoped to revive the vitality of the Catholic Church
by developing Christian trade unions. In chapter 3, Susanna De Stradis tells the
somewhat surprising story of the Catholic Corporative Project in Cold War
America, in which Catholic sociologists found an audience at least temporarily
open to serious conversations about corporativism. In chapter 4, Rafael Escobedo
Romero looks at the uncomfortable relationship between US Catholics and
Franco’s Spain, describing how American Catholics had to try to reconcile their
admiration for the Catholic state with their beliefs in freedom and liberty, religious freedom and church-state separation.
In chapter 5, Lorena García Mourelle examines the French movement Economy and Humanism in South America, a strain of Christian humanist thought that
put the human being at the center of economic development. Yves Solís Nicot then
examines, in chapter 6, the fascinating work of Alberto Siri, a neo-Thomist
philosopher in El Salvador who tied to develop a third way for Latin America
through his writing.
In Chapter 7, Paolo Valvo looks into the case of the magazine “Latinoamerica,” published in Mexico and then transferred to Cuba until April 1959, describing
how the magazine’s Jesuit editors tried to generate a pan-Latin American readership and vision, becoming a showcase for ideas about the social question. Marta
Busani, in Chapter 8, examines the history of the Juventude Estudantil Católica
and Juventude Universitária Católica, two groups that grew out of Catholic Action
movements of earlier decades, but increasingly radicalized in the 1960s after the
Cuban Revolution.
The final two chapters of the book take us to Mexico. In Chapter 9, Laura
Alarcón Menchaca. narrates the story of Efraín González Morfín, a Catholic intellectual and politician who opposed the dominant PRI party. Finally, in Chapter 10,
Tania Hernández Vicencio discusses Cuernavaca bishop Sergio Mendez Arceo and
his contributions to Vatican II.
As this compelling book progresses chronologically, we can see hints of deepening ideological divides to come, particularly in Latin America with its deep and
abiding inequality that facilitated the rise of liberation theology. Yet, by examining

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the various ideas developed and promoted by Catholics in Europe, Latin America,
and the United States, A Christian Revolution showcases a surprising—and at
times, inspiring—period of open-mindedness and dialogue within and between
Catholic intellectuals and communities.
The Catholic University of America

JULIA G. YOUNG

Martyrs of Hope: Seven U.S. Missioners in Central America. By Donna Whitson Brett
and Edward T. Brett. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books. 2018. Pp. xxvi, 336.
$25.00 ISBN: 978-1-626-98293-2.)
In their preface for Martyrs of Hope: Seven U.S. Missioners in Central America,
Donna Whitson Brett and Edward T. Brett state that when writing this book, their
original intention was to “revise and update” their 1988 volume Murdered in Central
America: The Stories of Eleven Missionaries, a foundational text for understanding the
intricate and tragic overlap of Catholic activism, Central America’s civil wars, and
U.S. foreign policy during the 1980s. As Brett and Brett note, in the years since the
publication of Murdered in Central America, Guatemala and El Salvador’s civil
wars—and the Cold War itself—ended, the Catholic Church elected its first Latin
American pope, and a wealth of primary sources and new scholarship emerged. As
a result, Martyrs of Hope instead offers readers a new, more comprehensive understanding of its titular martyrs, their lives, work, and deaths along detailed analyses
of postwar political and socioeconomic conditions in both countries.
Two aspects of Martyrs of Hope are especially notable. First, the book’s impressive wealth of diary passages, personal letters, and recorded interviews is one of its
greatest strengths. These sources, many of them unavailable during the writing of
Murdered in Central America, offer readers a greater understanding of this book’s
titular subjects—Blessed Father Stanley Rother, Brother James Miller, Sisters
Maura Clarke, Ita Ford, Dorothy Kazel, and Carol Piette, and lay missioner Jean
Donovan—as people and martyrs in equal measure. Rother’s correspondence from
Guatemala in 1980 and 1981, for example, provides a vivid snapshot of the unfathomable violence that plagued the country and killed Rother in 1981. Relatedly, a
May 1980 letter from Piette to her friend Becky Quinn lamented El Salvador’s
brutal reality, noting that she heard “shots in the night” while reading one of
Quinn’s letters and, in a moment of tragic prescience, wrote “If you knew how the
soldiers search us and treat us you’d worry.” (Piette drowned just three months
later, while Salvadoran soldiers raped and murdered Clarke, Ford, Kazel, and
Donovan in December of that year.) In both cases, these letters offer glimpse of
ordinary life amid Central America’s extraordinary violence during the early 1980s.
Second, Martyrs of Hope utilizes Congressional testimonies, United Nations
reports, and contemporaneous press accounts, among other sources, to analyze major
historical moments and prevailing political and socioeconomic moments in postwar
Guatemala and El Salvador beginning in the 1990s. These include Guatemalan presidents Jorge Serrano and Otto Pérez Molina’s exits from office in disgrace (Serrano

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639

launched a failed coup in 1993 and Pérez Molina was convicted of corruption charges
in 2015) as well as the failures that both the far-right ARENA and far-left FMLN
parties encountered while governing postwar El Salvador. Additionally, Brett and
Brett analyze the burdensome toll that transnational drug cartels, organized crime
syndicates, and street gangs have taken on both countries over the last thirty years.
Ultimately, Brett and Brett’s original assertion is correct. Martyrs of Hope is
much more than a revised, updated edition of Murdered in Central America. It artfully interweaves comprehensive assessments of the Guatemalan and Salvadoran
civil wars and their complex legacies with richly detailed biographical sketches that
help personalize the book’s subjects. It is essential reading for scholars of Catholic
activism, Central American history, and U.S. policy approaches toward the region
during some of its bloodiest years.
MICHAEL J. CANGEMI

Bowling Green State University

ASIAN
G lobal Entanglements of a Man Who Never Traveled: A Seventeenth-Century Chinese
Christian and His Conflicted Worlds. By Dominic Sachsenmaier. (New York:
Columbia University Press. 2018. Pp. 280. $26.00. ISBN: 9780231187534.)
Until recently, the history of Christianity in China in the early modern period
followed the principal narrative lines laid down by missionaries in their own writings. Missionary sources, rather than external or even Chinese ones, provided the
framework for understanding proselytizing methods and for evaluating their success. It has been only in the past few decades that scholars have begun to integrate
Chinese language sources into studies of missionary-era Christianity, trying to
respond to the looming question: what understanding did early modern Chinese
Christians have of their adopted (or later inherited) religion? Answers to that question skew in favor of Christians from elite social strata, a natural outcome of the
missionary strategy to promote the “Teaching of Heaven” in educated social strata
via the printed word. Over the past two decades, scholars have increasingly tried to
integrate such Chinese voices into accounts of the missionary church, greatly
enhancing our understanding of the reception of Christianity from those who
became—or resisted—proselytization. Dominic Sachsenmaier’s new study of Zhu
Zongyuan (c. 1616–c. 1660), a high-status Christian from the port city of Ningbo,
is an excellent example of the promise of this recent trend.
The Global Entanglements of a Man who Never Traveled attempts a world history in reverse. It examines the varied contexts that marked the life of an individual
who remained in his specific cultural, linguistic, intellectual, and political milieu,
yet who nevertheless was affected by global currents of intellectual and commercial
exchange. Rather than focusing on the work of world-travelers, this study considers
how the processes set in motion during what may be called the “first era of globalization” were understood by those on the receiving end, in this case of a religious

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message. Crucially for Sachsenmaier’s story, Zhu Zongyuan wrote major works on
Christian themes aimed at other Chinese readers. These two books and a handful
of other fragments comprise the admittedly restricted corpus of his writings, but
they are sufficient for Sachsenmaier to demonstrate its protagonist’s links to and
appreciation of the wider world. The book’s five chapters address different contexts
of Zhu’s biography and writings, situating him within Chinese philosophical and
social traditions, as well as missionary networks, mercantile flows, and the political
struggles of the Ming-Qing dynastic transition.
Sachsenmaier’s book fits into a debate over the nature of Chinese Christianity
in the seventeenth century. In 1982, Jacques Gernet responded to decades of promission studies with the polemical assertion in his Chine et Christianisme that the
Jesuits’ high-status converts could not have been truly Christians owing to the gulf
in philosophical understanding between Confucian and Aristotelian traditions.
Nicolas Standaert parried in 1988 with his study of one such figure, Yang Tingyun,
subtitling his work Confucian and Christian in Late Ming China. Erik Zürcher’s late
work, especially his 2007 study and translation called Koudou Richao: Li Jiubiao’s
Diary of Oral Admonitions, gave further evidence of how thoroughly Chinese Christians understood the religious teachings that had been transmitted to them by
European missionaries. Dominic Sachsenmaier builds on these foundations, arguing for the depth of Zhu Zongyuan’s religious commitment, while also demonstrating how this particular Christian author framed his apologetics in line with
Confucian philosophy and Chinese cultural norms. Discarding the tired notions of
Chinese xenophobia and insularity, Sachsenmaier shows that this otherwise stationary figure was an active participant in receiving, processing, and accepting
information borne from long-distant sources.
The business of global history is a difficult one, as those of us who have tried
our hand at world-spanning microhistories or biography will readily confess. It is
difficult to master all sides of stories such as Zhu’s; the identification of the various
contexts of lives such as his should be accounted as a benefit to present and future
scholars. Sachsenmaier’s treatment of the Chinese contexts of Zhu’s life are the
most richly textured and insightful sections of this book. There is no question of the
mastery of this presentation of the social, intellectual, and political setting of coastal
Zhejiang province in the mid-seventeenth century. The discussion of the European
side of this story, unfortunately, lacks the same precision. Readers familiar with the
history of the Jesuits, Roman Catholicism, or Christianity in China will chafe at
the repeated invocation of the unquestioned (or successfully transmitted) mandates
of “the Catholic Church” or of a unitary “accomodation method.” The political,
economic, and religious rivalries of the various European empires in Asia are
treated in similar monolithic fashion, despite Sachsenmaier’s extensive bibliography on those subjects. The primarily lessons of Global Entanglements will be best
received, it is hoped, by scholars of China, whose field has grown increasingly
receptive to such globe-spanning perspectives.
Michigan State University

LIAM MATTHEW BROCKEY

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641

Developing Mission: Photography, Filmmaking, and American Missionaries in Modern
China. By Joseph W. Ho. (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. 2022. Pp.
x, 304. $29.95 paper [includes a free public access visual repository hosted by
the University of Michigan Library: https://dx.doi.org/10.7302/1259; selections accentuate Protestant images but no Catholic images]. ISBN: 978
1501761850, hardcover $125.00, ebook $19.95.)
The importance of cameras in the hands of American missionaries to China
during the first half of the twentieth century refocuses understanding on how their
efforts to proselytize increasingly utilized visual technology. Dr. Ho asserts:
“Almost no histories of American missionary activity in China (and other places in
East Asia during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries) examine the role of widespread photographic practices in missionary and Chinese experience” (p. 10).
Dr. Ho anchors each chapter of Developing Mission by providing a strong narrative on missionary history. At the same time, he expands on this foundation by
writing about how his archival research in China and in the United States was
graced by personal encounters with those who saved past photographs and movie
films as if they were sacred relics. This pedagogical approach is enhanced by his
excellent writing on religious themes as well as camera technology. This book will
be welcomed by professors for the classroom, graduates and undergraduates to
expand their interdisciplinary inquiry, and all academic and public libraries that
wish to bolster their cross-cultural and general science collection.
The following excerpts from each chapter reveal the quality of this book. Chapter 1, “New Lives, New Optics: Missionary Modernity and Visual Practices in Interwar Republican China,” includes: “The photographer would have appeared to be
bowing to the subject of his or her image, simultaneously presenting a nonthreatening physical profile and avoiding direct gaze. These viewfinders and the worldviews
of missionaries behind them combined to create specifically modern visualizations
of China” (pp. 35–36). Dr. Ho, in this instance, understands the camera as possible
symbol that became common in negotiating cross-cultural relationships.
Chapter 2, “Converting Visions: Photographic Mediations of Catholic
Identity in West Hunan, 1921–1929,” concentrates on articles penned by American Passionists and published in Sign Magazine to describe their mission. Sign
editors “had the power to reinterpret and reshape visual material sent from
China, for better or worse in ways that the missionaries could not. . . . When it
came to the Sign, the missionaries could not fully control their transnational
media identity” (p. 86). As curator of the Passionist China Collection, I witnessed how Dr. Ho’s respect for the archive had a direct impact on his incisive
analysis. This led me to assign this chapter to my undergraduate Modern China
class with positive results.
Chapter 3, “The Movie Camera and the Mission: Vernacular Filmmaking as
China-US Bridge, 1931–1936,” explains cameras as historical artifacts. When used

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by Jesse Mae Henke it served to highlight “how women served as interlocutors and
image-makers in ways that challenged maleness of filmmaking culture” (p. 109).
Dr. Ho handles multiple interdisciplinary themes skillfully.
Chapter 4, “Chaos in Three Frames: Fragmented Imaging and the SinoJapanese War, 1937–1945,” revealed how: “As witnesses to war, some missionaries
became documentarians in the eyes of an international mass public, catapulted to
circuits of global visual transmission not envisioned before the conflict” (p. 143).
Consequently, when China was ravaged by war, Dr. Ho suggests missionaries used
cameras with creativity, reverence and compassion. Fast forward to the contemporary era, and this chapter might serve as a precursor to understand the legacy as to
why some governments, unfortunately, might sometimes be suspicious of religious
actors’ relationship with and use of diverse media platforms.
Chapter 5, “Memento Mori: Loss, Nostalgia, and the Future in Postwar Missionary Visuality,” stresses the cinematic projects undertaken by Protestant missionary Harold Henke as well as American Jesuits William Klement and Bernard
J. Hubbard—the “Glacier Priest.” Dr. Ho suggests that their efforts still teach us.
“The films and photographs, products of experiences from a now ended period,
remained as visual-material traces of possibilities and losses just as meaningful for
their makers as they were for their subjects.” Arguably, this was a seminal moment:
as missionaries were “leaving” China, the China many had encountered “was leaving them” (p. 227).
Epilogue: “Latent Images.” In China, American missionaries with cameras
revealed “transnational confluences between global Christian missions, Chinese
Christianity, and national histories, US power and cultural influences in East Asia,
and modern visual practices” (p. 230).
Joseph W. Ho’s personal archival research, presentation of scholarship, and
lucid analysis contributes to his making Developing Mission enjoyable, relevant, and
challenging. The book will likely become an invaluable standard source for a wide
range of audiences’ who wish background as to how American Protestant and
Catholic missionaries helped create, shape, and engage in fluid international crosscultural visual representations with China that will long endure.
The Ricci Institute for Chinese-Western
Cultural History
B oston College

ROBERT E. CARBONNEAU, C.P.

Notes and Comments
ASSOCIATION NEWS
On Saturday evening, July 29, 2023, Msgr. Robert Frederick Trisco suddenly
died. He had faithfully and expertly served the Association for almost a half-century as its Executive Secretary (1961–2006, 2007–09) and its Treasurer (1983–
2006, 2007–09). In recognition of his service, the Association conferred on him its
Centennial Award at its meeting in his native Chicago in 2019. For more information on his remarkable life, please see his autobiographical essay at the beginning
of this issue. May the good Lord richly reward this faithful servant and grant him
joy forever in His presence

CAUSE OF SAINTS
On May 20, 2023, Pope Francis recognized the heroic virtue of Brazil’s
“Surfer Angel” Guido Schäffer (1974–2009), giving him the status of “venerable”
in a decree issued by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints. As a medical
doctor and delayed vocation to the seminary, Schäffer dedicated himself to working
with the poor and gathered around him others who helped in this ministry. He
died suddenly from an accident while surfing. For more information on this
remarkable man, see the article of Courtney Mares https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/254385/a-surfing-saint-pope-francis-recognizes-theheroic-virtue-of-guido-schaffer.
At a June 15, 2023, meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’
(USCCB) Committee on Canonical Affairs and Church Governance, the bishops
present by a voice vote affirmed their support for the advancement of the cause of
beatification and canonization on the diocesan level of five French-born priests who
died days apart caring for the sick during a yellow fever epidemic in Louisiana in
1873. The priests were Fathers Jean Pierre (1831–73), Jean Marie Biler (1839–73),
François Le Vézouët (1833–73), Isidore Quémerais (1847–73), and Louis Marie
Gergaud (1832–73), referred to by the local population as the “Shreveport Martyrs.”
On May 20, 2023, the simple wooden coffin containing the unembalmed
body of Sister Wilhelmina Lancaster, OSB (1924–2019), the African-American
foundress of the Benedictine Sisters of Mary, Queen of the Apostles, was exhumed
from her earthen grave in Gower, Missouri. Her corpse was found to be incorrupted. It was then moved to the chapel of the sisters’ monastery, encased in glass,
and placed near the altar of St. Joseph. It has become the object of veneration of
hundreds of pilgrims. While an intact, incorrupt body is often seen as a sign of a
holy life, church authorities have not ruled on the case of Sr. Wilhelmina nor has
a process been begun for her eventual canonization.
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NOTES AND COMMENTS

CONFERENCES
On June 26, 2023, a roundtable discussion was held at the École Française de
Rome at its Piazza Navona 62 address in Rome and online on the theme “Una
storia millenaria nel mondo digitale: Gli studi sul papato e la curia romana e le Digital Humanites.” About thirty historians and archivists from various European
countries, Mexico, the United States, and Israel discussed how digitization has
affected the study of papal history. For more information on the conference, please
contact Benedetta Albani (Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal
Theory, Frankfurt), albani@lhlt.mpg.de or Dr. Laura Pettinaroli (École Française
de Rome, Roma), dirmod@efrome.it.
On October 18–21, 2023, the Gesellschaft zur Herausgabe des Corpus
Catholicorum, together with the Verein für Reformationsgeschichte, will sponsor
an international symposium with the title “Religion und Ökonomie in der Frühen
Neuzeit” in Augsburg. For details on the speakers and the themes of their talks, see
www.corpus-catholicorum.de.
On October 26–27, 2023, a conference on “The Apostolic Ministry: History,
Theology, and Ecumenism” will take place in New Haven, CT, that will explore
the historical and theological significance of apostolicity in the contemporary
church, as well as its relevance for modern ecumenism. Papers on a wide range of
topics, including historical studies, systematics, church history, canon law, and ecumenism are welcomed. The deadline for submissions was Friday July 14, 2023. For
more information on the conference, see: https://sites.google.com/yale.edu/apostolicministry2023, or contact Dr. Matthew Reese (Yale & Johns Hopkins Universities) US: +1 (240) 463-7338, matthew.reese@yale.edu.
On April 18–19, 2024, an international conference will be held at the Pontifical Gregorian University on the theme of “Vatican Diplomacy and the Shaping of
the West (1939–1958).” Taking advantage of the opening of the Vatican Archives
for the pontificate of Pius XII who advocated for the adoption of Christian values,
the conference organizers encourage scholars to explore its documents relative to
the following topics: the fostering of Euro-Atlantic relations; relations with States
and Christian communities in the Eastern bloc; the facilitation of the development
of a unified European bloc; the role of the Holy See in multilateral diplomacy; the
Holy See’s policy towards Latin American countries, between the pushes for continental integration and the dynamics of the Cold War; the Holy See’s relations
with Francoist Spain and the Portuguese Estado Novo; the role played by Vatican
diplomacy in facilitating the processes of decolonization, particularly in the African
continent; its presence in the tensions that characterized the Middle East and the
emergence of the State of Israel; the role envisaged for the Mediterranean Sea as a
fundamental crossroads for the political-religious dynamics and international tensions that characterize the global context in this period; and papal diplomacy and
missions: priorities, directives for action, bilateral agreements. The deadline for
submitting proposals (abstract of a maximun of 2000 characters, short CV, and list

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645

of publications) to occidentespiusxii@gmail.com was July 31, 2023. Successful proposers will be notified on October 15, 2023. Travel and accommodation expenses
will be borne by the participants. The presentations may be either in English,
Italian, French, or Spanish. More articulated articles based upon the presentations
will be published at a later date.

FELLOWSHIPS/WORKSHOPS
The Center for Research on Global Catholicism (CRGC) at Saint Louis University supports scholarship at the nexus of Catholicism and culture, providing
robust programming that promotes interdisciplinary research, collaboration, and
methodological innovation. It studies how Catholicism migrated across time and
space to become a global religion, entangled with imperial ambitions, in excess of
official intentions, mobilized by material objects, affective relationships, politics,
theologies, epidemics, and more. It seeks to support scholars working in the field
of global Catholicism by facilitating connections between local archives of women
religious and research scholars and providing resources, community, and opportunities for collaboration. For more information on the Center, please contact its
executive director, Dr. Mary Dunn, at mary.dunn@slu.edu.
The Leibniz Institute of European History (IEG) will award eight to ten fellowships for doctoral students in European history, the history of religion, and
other historical disciplines from the early modern period to contemporary history.
It is particularly interested in projects that involve a comparative or cross-border
approach, that deal with European history in its relation to the wider world, or with
topics of intellectual and religious history. Fellowship winners will work for six to
twelve months at the Institute in Mainz. For information on how to apply, please
contact Ms. Joke Kabbert: fellowship@ieg-mainz.de.
On October 25–27, 2023 at the Sangalli Institute in Florence a workshop will
be dedicated to the following topic: “Empires and Religions: how religious factors
has innervated, justified, and contributed to rises and falls (1450–1850).” Young
Italian and foreign researchers (PhD students and postdocs) will have the possibility of receiving ten 250-euro worth mini scholarships. The deadline for applying
was July 20, 2023. For more information, visit: https://www.istitutosangalli.it/wpcontent/uploads/2023/05/Call-atelier-2023_eng.pdf, or contact Dr. Sonia Ariani
at segreteria@istitutosangalli.it.
The German Historical Institute of Paris has announced the placing online of
Gallia Pontificia, a publication of the Max Weber Foundation. The series provides
critical editions of the pontifical acts and registers regarding the French church up
to the beginning of the pontificate of Innocent III (1198–1216). As a first installment, the papal registers for the archbishopric of Reims were placed online consisting of 1162 texts in all. They make available the complete documentation regarding
the relations between the papal curia and one of the most important French archdioceses of the Middle Ages.

Obituaries

The Reverend Ian Ker
(1942–2022)
Father Ian Ker died on November 5, 2022. He was a priest of the Archdiocese
of Birmingham. For thirty years, he was parish priest of the Church of SS. Thomas
More and John Fisher at Burford, near Oxford and a member of the Faculty of
Theology in the University.
Ker is, of course, best known for his magisterial biography of John Henry
Newman (John Henry Newman: A Biography [Oxford, 1998]) and many other
works on Newman, as well as a very well received biography of Gilbert K. Chesterton (G.K. Chesterton: A Biography [Oxford, 2012]) and a wonderful book of literary
criticism, The Catholic Revival in English Literature, 1854–1861: Newman, Hopkins,
Belloc, Chesterton, Greene, Waugh (Notre Dame, 2003). He was a promoter of
Newman’s cause, and instrumental in Newman’s eventual canonization, having
issued a call during an interview on EWTN for “ordinary Catholics” to pray for
Newman’s intercession, which two listeners did with the result of miraculous cures.
Ker was born in an Indian hill station to a member of the Indian Civil Service
and his wife in the last days of the British Raj but returned in 1947 at age five to a
cold and dreary post-war Britain after Indian Independence. His family was conventionally Anglican, but not devout, and although he reported being fascinated by
occasional forays into Catholic churches, in his youth he thought of Catholics as
“disloyal quasi-foreigners.” He attended Shrewsbury and then Balliol College,
Oxford, where he read classics and philosophy. It was at Oxford that he converted
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647

to Catholicism, influenced, as he claimed, by Clive S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity (and
eventually wrote his own response to Lewis, Mere Catholicism [Steubenville, Ohio,
2006]). He then moved to Cambridge to study English literature, but his doctoral
thesis on religious dimensions in the writing of George Eliot was rejected by his
agnostic dissertation adviser, so he left without a degree.
Despite not having his advanced degree, Ker was able to get a position teaching classics and English literature at the University of York and it was during his
time there that he made the decision to study for the priesthood. He tried a vocation at Newman’s own Oratory in Birmingham, which did not work out, and completed his theological studies at the English College in Rome. It was also at this
time that he conceived his interest in Newman, accepting an invitation to edit The
Idea of a University and began a long association with the great Newman scholar
and editor of his letters and diaries, Fr. Charles Stephen Dessain.
Ker was offered a chair teaching philosophy and theology at the University of
St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, a situation that he surprisingly enjoyed, until
he returned to England to care for his aged parents. After a brief stint as Catholic
chaplain at Oxford, he took up his parish responsibilities in Burford, where he
shepherded a diverse flock ranging from Oxford dons to local farmers, and
renowned scholar and wit though he was, had the reputation of a caring and compassionate priest. At the same time, he continued to work with theology students
at Oxford.
Ker was a literary critic rather than a historian. His biography of Newman is
more a close reading and analysis of Newman’s texts, with extensive quotation, than
it was setting Newman in historical context. Indeed, when he encountered the
work of a historian who did try to put Newman, especially the young Newman on
his way to conversion (Frank M. Turner in his John Henry Newman: The Challenge
to Evangelical Religion [New Haven, 2002]) in historical perspective, and not
always in the most positive light, Ker responded with one of the more savage
reviews that one could find of one scholar’s work by another (Times Literary Supplement, January 3, 2003).
Ker was something of a traditionalist in his ecclesiology, and would refer to a
liberal bishop as “that wretched man” and mark the retirement of such with a celebratory dinner with friends (and looked forward to doing the same for Pope Francis!). Toward the end of his life, he became associated with the Neo-Catechumenate, probably as much to annoy a local bishop who banned them than for any
other reasons.
Boston College School of Theology and Ministry

JEFFERY P. VON ARX, S.J.

648

OBITUARIES

Jay P. Dolan
(1936– 2023)
Jay P. Dolan, professor emeritus of history at the University of Notre Dame,
died on May 7, 2023. The field of American Catholic history has lost one of its
giants. In the preface to The American Catholic Experience, Dolan noted that each
generation of historians asks new questions of the past. Jay’s questions developed
out of his experience of the Second Vatican Council on the Catholic side and his
scholarly encounter with the new social history. In Dolan’s telling, the stars of the
story were not bishops and clergy, but the “people of God,” the ordinary Catholics
who sat in the pews. He wrote about how they transplanted a European church to
American soil—and in the process changed the story of U.S. immigration, politics,
education and social reform.
Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, on March 17, 1936, Dolan graduated from
Fairfield Preparatory School and earned his bachelor’s degree from St. John’s Seminary. He was sent to Rome, where he was ordained a priest in 1961 and received
a licentiate in sacred theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in 1962. In
1966 Dolan enrolled as a doctoral student at the University of Chicago Divinity
School, studying under the renowned scholar of religion, Martin E. Marty. He
earned a Ph.D. in history in 1970 and taught theology at the University of San
Francisco before joining Notre Dame’s faculty as an assistant professor of history
in 1971. He left the priesthood and soon married historian Patricia McNeal. In
1975, Dolan launched the American Catholic Studies Newsletter, and persuaded
the University of Notre Dame to establish a Center for the Study of American
Catholicism. In 1977 he was named the Center’s inaugural director, equipped—as
he often liked to reminisce—with an annual operating budget of $500 a year.
Through the Center, which was renamed in honor of Charles and Margaret Hall
Cushwa in 1981, Dolan hosted conferences and lectures, sponsored travel and
research grants and postdoctoral fellowships, and guided a number of scholarly

OBITUARIES

649

projects. Dolan stepped down as Cushwa’s director in 1993 and retired from Notre
Dame’s faculty in 2003.
Dolan was the author or editor of sixteen books, including The Immigrant
Church: New York Irish and German Catholics, 1815-1865 (Johns Hopkins, 1975),
winner of the John Gilmary Shea Prize in 1976; Catholic Revivalism: The American
Experience, 1830-1900 (Notre Dame, 1978); The American Catholic Experience: A
History from Colonial Times to the Present (Doubleday, 1985); and The Irish Americans: A History (Bloomsbury, 2008). He edited a two-volume project, The American
Catholic Parish: A History from 1850 to the Present (Paulist, 1987) and three-volumes
on the history of Hispanic Catholics.
As prolific as he was, Jay never lost sight of the hard work and patience that
good scholarship required. I still have an email he sent me in the late 1990s, at a
point when I was struggling to write my dissertation. He shared that he, too, was
disheartened with the pace of progress on his latest book, but that he had an insight
while heating up some soup on the stove for lunch. Writing was a lot like making
soup, he said. We all get impatient and often wanted to rush things. But there were
times when it was important to let your ideas simmer, just like soup, to improve the
quality and flavor. Like many of Jay’s lessons, this metaphor has stayed with me for
twenty-five years.
The most renowned scholars are not always the most dedicated teachers—but
Jay was both. As a doctoral student in the mid-1990s, I served as his teaching assistant for his epic course, “The Irish American Experience.” Jay could capture an
audience of undergraduates like no other, imparting knowledge, always with an
Irish joke or two at the ready. By then he was long past the point where he could
have rested easily on his pedagogical laurels, but he never stopped trying to be a
better teacher. In the summer of ’94, for example, I helped him transfer his course
content to an online prototype of contemporary learning management systems. His
deep care for generations of students and their learning manifested itself in this and
in countless other ways.
Jay’s influence as the founding director of Cushwa Center is incalculable.
Making it possible for other scholars to do better work—by building networks,
convening conversations, funding research, and initiating projects—requires a certain kind of generosity that Jay possessed in abundance. Scott Appleby, Tim
Matovina, and I were privileged to stand on his massive shoulders.
Dolan was an avid golfer and an enthusiastic community volunteer, donating
his time to the Center for the Homeless in South Bend, Indiana, and to several
organizations in Vero Beach, Florida. He is survived by two sons, Patrick J. Dolan
(Ingrid) of Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Mark M. Dolan (Jaque) of Salem, Oregon,
and two grandchildren. His wife Patricia McNeal preceded him in death in 2018.
University of Notre Dame

KATHLEEN SPROWS CUMMINGS

Periodical Literature

GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS
Laicato e sinodalidade. Uma aproximação histórica: do nascimento da Igreja aos
concílios do Renascimento. Antonio José de Almeida. Revista Eclesiástica
Brasileira, 82 (May, 2022), 460–85.
Dialogue and Agreement Models in the Modern Ecumenical Movement (19101983): Minimal, Comparative, and Convergence Ecumenisms. Daniel Jara.
Teología y Vida, 63 (4, 2022), 539–59.
Paolo VI pellegrino al Congresso Eucaristico Nazionale a Udine (16 settembre
1972). Loris Della Pietra. Istituto Paolo VI, notiziario n. 84 (2022), 29–41.

ANCIENT
Forme di bullismo in ambiente monastico del IV secolo secondo l’Historia Lausiaca
di Palladio. Antonino Isola. Augustinianum, 62 (Dec., 2022), 423–34.
Gregor von Nyssa als geistiger Nachfolger des Basilius von Caesarea. Prägung und
Einfluss des Basilius im Leben und in der Theologie des Nysseners. Nikolai
Kiel. Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche, 120 (Mar., 2023), 27–53.
Basil the Great and Amphilochius of Iconium. Friendship, devotion and pastoral
strategy in 4th century Cappadocia. Ciprian Ioan Streza. Studia Monastica, 64
(2, 2022), 317–34.
The Baptismal Formula: a Search for Origins. Alistair C. Stewart. Ecclesia Orans,
39 (2, 2022), 391–414.
San Agustín, actor y testigo de la cultura popular pagana. Mitografía romana y
literatura profana en las obras del obispo de Hipona. Julio César Calvo
Herraiz. La Ciudad de Dios, 235, (May, 2022), 301–54.
A Via e a Pátria: Jesus Cristo na conversão de Santo Agostinho. Isidro Pereira
Lamelas, OFM. La Ciudad de Dios, 235, (May, 2022), 355–70.
From “Mors Pro Summo Munere Desideretur” to “Occidere se Ipsum”: An Overall
Approach to Augustine on Suicide. Oriol Ponsatí-Murlà. Augustinian Studies,
54 (1, 2023), 57–76.
Une allocution d’Augustin pour la fête de Cyprien: s. Denis 15 (313B). François
Dolbeau. Augustinian Studies, 54 (1, 2023), 1–22.

650

PERIODICAL LITERATURE

651

Taking Augustine at his Word: Re-evaluating the Testimony of De gestis Pelagii.
Andrew Chronister. Augustinian Studies, 53 (2, 2023), 153–84.
Words and Genealogies: Augustine on Race, Language, Ethnicity. Hans
Feichtinger. Augustiniana, 72 (2, 2022), 217–47.
La gula en el monacato primitivo griego (hasta Juan Clímaco). Fernando Rivas
Rebaque. Studia Monastica, 64 (2, 2022), 335–63.
Between Desert and Agora. Monks, Philosophers, and Holiness in Late Antiquity.
Daniel Lemeni. Studia Monastica, 64 (2, 2022), 365–82.
Wider den Ekel. Lebensdienliche Impulse aus der Benediktsregel auf dem
Hintergrund der biblisch-monastischen Tradition. Manuela Scheiba. Studia
Monastica, 64 (2, 2022), 427–54.
Les laïcs dans l’Église Ancienne: Quelques jalons. Daniel Vigne. Bulletin de
Littérature Ecclésiastique,123 (July, 2022), 53–70.
El Concilio III de Toledo: Aspectos litúrgicos. The Third Council of Toledo:
Liturgical Aspects. Juan Manuel Sierra López. Isidorianum,31 (2, 2022), 159–
182.
Grégoire le Grand (590-604): Petite Théologie Monastique. Marc Doucet, OSB.
Bulletin de Littérature Ecclésiastique,123 (July, 2022), 71–92.
La carità del papa. Gregorio Magno tra storia e agiografia. Carlo dell’Osso.
Augustinianum,62 (Dec., 2022), 463–75.

MEDIEVAL
Sing unto the Lord a New Song: Rewriting the “Vita Melanii” in EleventhCentury Rennes. James Drysdale Miller. Francia,49 (2022), 53–75.
L’Abbaye de Saint Savin et les eaux de Cauterets Annexe: Archives de l’abbaye de
Saint-Savin. Jean-François Le Nail. Thermalism et religion, 134 (Jan., 2022),
31–55.
Figurer l’hérésie simoniaque et la fornication cléricale. Le programme grégorien de
la Porte des Comtes à Toulouse. Raphaél Guersuraga. Cahiers de Civilisation
Médiévale X e –XII e siècle, 65 (July, 2022), 221–58.
De la difficulté à discerner la vrai du faux: enquête sur les premiers privilèges
pontificaux d’exemption de l’abbaye de Marmoutier (1087–1145). Jean-Hevré
Foulon. Journal des Savants (Jul., 2022), 197–253.
Fra Milano e Cluny: appunti intorno a un libello agiografico-liturgico. Laura
Albiero. Aevum, 96 (May, 2022), 287–321.
The role of patristic and medieval sources in the revival of the canons regular
communities in the 11th–12th centuries. Szabolcs Anzelm Szuromi,
O.Praem. Folia theologica et canonica, 10 (32/24, 2021), 49–58.

652

PERIODICAL LITERATURE

Un réemploi de Flavius Josèphe par Foucher de Chartres: l’or arraché aux cadavres.
Tomasz Pełech. Cahiers de Civilisation Médiévale Xe–XII e siècle,65 (July,
2022), 259–74.
The De privilegio chorepiscoporum (J3 †1118) and Pseudo-Isidore’s Attack on the
Chorepiscopate. Eric Knibbs. Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters,
78 (2, 2022), 475–52.
Der Parisinus latinus 4280 (saec. XII): Eine kanonistische Handschrift aus der Zeit
der Kirchenreform. Till Stüber. Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des
Mittelalters, 78 (1, 2022), 75–126.
Non milites, sed monachi? Der Kreuzzugsgedanke im Werk Ottos von Freising.
Mikuláš Netík. Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters, 78 (1, 2022),
127–51.
Stato delle Province francescane al tempo di frate Elia (1221–1227 / 1232–1239).
Il caso della “Provincia di Romagna” nelle fonti agiografiche antoniane.
Arnaldo Sancricca. Il Santo, 62 (1, 2022), 35–76.
Frati minori e documentazione pontificia: le lettere papali conservate a Padova (da
Gregorio IX ad Alessandro IV). Emanuele Fontana. Aevum, 96 (May, 2022),
357–98.
Un documento pontificio de Gregorio IX, de 1227, para la protección de la Orden
de Predicadores en el Archivo General de Arzobispado de Sevilla. Ma Isabel
González Ferrín. (Isidorianum, 31 (2, 2022), 183–215.
Une prédication quadragésimale d’Aldobrandino de Toscanella à l’origine d’un
traité pseudo-bonaventurien. François Wallerich. Mélanges de l’Ecole française
de Rome, 134 (1, 2022), 105–26.
Die “Oberrheinische Chronik,” das Chronicon pontificum et imperatorum Martins
von Troppau und die spätmittelalterliche Weltchronistik. Andreas Bihrer.
Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters, 78 (1, 2022), 197–217.
Antoniter in den ältest-überlieferten päpstlichen Supplikenregistern 1342–1366.
Karl Borchardt. Francia, 49 (2022), 95–162.
Originalausfertigungen von Meister und Konvent der Johanniter aus dem Archiv
des böhmischen Großpriorats 1364 bis 1535. Karl Borchardt. Deutsches Archiv
für Erforschung des Mittelalters, 78 (2, 2022), 543–608.
“Et zostrabo tecum”. Lo scontro tra Bernardino da Siena e Amedeo Landi. Note
sull’edizione dei processi milanesi. Pietro Delcorno. Il Santo, 62 (2–3, 2022),
325-58.
Tra prassi umanistica e autocoscienza osservante: Frate Apollonio Bianchi (†
1450). Pietro Delcorno and Marco Falcone. Mélanges de l’Ecole française de
Rome, 134 (1, 2022), 127–63.

PERIODICAL LITERATURE

653

El monasterio de Santa María de la defensión y su presencia en el mundo urbano
jerezano a través de sus propiedades inmobiliarias. Silvia María Pérez
González and Juan Carlos Arboleda Goldaracena. Studia Monastica,64 (2,
2022), 403–25.
Des navires castillans au secours de l’Italie. Deux lettres de Diego Rodríguez de
Almela à propos de la croisade d’Otrante (1481). Daniel Baloup. Le Moyen
Age,128, 2 (2022), 449–65.

SIXTEENTH CENTURY
Der Heilige Stuhl und die unierte griechische-katholische Kirche in Polen-Litauen
im 16.–18. Jahrhundert. Ausgewählte Aspekte. Stanisław Nabywaniec.
Ostkirchliche Studien, 71 (1, 2022), 147–66.
Pratiche e strumenti di gestione documentale nella cancelleria della Veneranda
Arca di S. Antonio: i “Libri iurium” dei secoli XVI–XVII. Giorgetta
Bonfiglio-Dosio. Il Santo, 62 (1, 2022), 77–127.
Presentation and Discussion of a Reformation-Era, Catholic, Vernacular
Baptismal Rite in Germany in Manuscript Cgm 9509 (part one). Luke A.
Donahue. Ecclesia Orans, 39 (2, 2022), 277–306.
Santa Teresa y los Agustinos-as. II. Domingo Natal Álvarez, OSA. La Ciudad de
Dios, 235, (May, 2022), 439–79.
Paolo Veronese e gli angeli della visione. Francesco Saracino. Gregorianum, 104 (2,
2023), 407–31.
The Economic Reform of Female Monasticism in the Papal States of Clement
VIII: Ideas, Actions, and Impacts. Isabel Harvey. Church History, 91 (Dec.,
2022), 729–52.

SEVENTEENTH AND EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES
Demonic Assault, Providence, and the Search for Salvation in Early Modern
Reformed English Protestant Theology. Brendan C. Walsh. Church History,
91 (Dec., 2022), 753–79.
Le pale settecentesche per il tornacoro della basilica del Santo. Niccolò Dalla
Costa. Il Santo, 62 (1, 2022), 129–50.
The Sacred Images, Patronages and Rituals of Obando Church, Bulacan,
Philippines: A Historical Investigation. Feorillo Petronillo Demeterio III and
Noella Ma-i Orozco. Philippiniana Sacra, 58 (May, 2023), 323–58.
Voyage to Luxembourg, 1687: The Curé’s People and the King. Carolyn Chappell
Louugee. Journal of Modern History, 95 (June, 2023), 269–307.

654

PERIODICAL LITERATURE

Christmastide Oration in the 1781 Monastic Missal of Saint-Vanne. Cuthbert
Johnson and Anthony Ward. Ephemerides Liturgicae, 137 (Jan.–Mar., 2023),
35–86.
Appropriating Processional Standards as Symbols of Authority: Inter-ethnic
Power Play in the Early 19th-Century Processions of the Historic Cathedral
City of Vigan, the Philippines. Romeo B. Galang, Jr. Philippiniana Sacra, 58
(May, 2023), 267–93.
Sfumature francescane nell’esperienza spirituale di Vincent Van Gogh (1853–
1890). Un mistico? Giovanni Spagnolo. Laurentianum, 63 (3, 2022), 447–
473.
Presencia de los agustinos en el Monasterio del Escorial: contexto civil español,
antecedentes históricos y primer decenio inédito (1885–1895). José Rodríguez
Díez, OSA. La Ciudad de Dios, 235, (May, 2022), 481–520.
Giotto o non Giotto: gli esordi del dibattito critico e attributivo sulle pitture murali
giottesche nella Sala Capitolare del complesso di S.Antonio a Padova. Il
Santo, 62 (2–3, 2022), 231–63.
El franciscano Gabino Martín Montoro: misionero y humanista. M.a Luz
Mangado Alonso. Scriptorium Victoriense, 67 (Jan., 2020), 217–29.
Il “trittico” con i santi francescani eseguito da Efrem Maria da Kcynia per il
Collegio degli Scrittori in Assisi (ora nel Museo Francescano di Roma).
Aleksander Horowski. Il Santo, 62 (2–3, 2022), 303–23.
En el 50 aniversario de la Asamblea conjunta de Obispos y Sacerdotes (1971).
Memoria de un testigo. Saturnino Gamarra-Mayor. Scriptorium Victoriense, 67
(Jan., 2020), 153–80.
Das Oberammergauer Passionsspiel 2022. Vom Hort des Antisemitismus zum
Vorkämpfer gegen Antisemitismus. Wolfgang Reinbold. Zeitschrift für
Theologie und Kirche, 120 (Mar., 2023), 124–54.

AMERICAN
Hidden in Plain Sight: John Cotton’s Middle Way and the Making of the
Cambridge Platform of Church Discipline. Michael P. Winship. Church
History, 91 (Dec., 2022), 780–802.
“An Oppressive Insensibility”: Disestablishment, Clerical Infirmity, and the
Origins of the Manual Labor Movement. Christopher J. Stokum. Church
History, 91 (Dec., 2022), 803–23.
Catholic Paternalism and Slavery’s Capitalism: Bishop John England’s Defense of
Domestic Slavery and the Interstate Slave Trade. David Roach. The Journal of
Southern History, 89 (May, 2023), 205–36.

PERIODICAL LITERATURE

655

150th Anniversary Celebration of the Founding of the Evangelical Lutheran
Synodical Conference. Mark Braun. Concordia Historical Institute Quarterly,
96 (Spring, 2023), 29–36.
Puritans, Padres, and Pentecostals: Perspectival and Pedagogical Shifts in
Americana Church History. Daniel Ramírez. Church History, 91 (Dec., 2022),
864–84.
“We Are Taking a Stand”—The 1973 Missouri Synod Convention. Ken Schurb.
Concordia Historical Institute Quarterly, 96 (Summer, 2023), 11–37.

LATIN AMERICAN
Igreja e política em Minas Gerais no século XIX. A participação de Dom Antônio
Ferreira Viçoso na “Questão Religiosa.” Amarildo José de Melo. Revista
Eclesiástica Brasileira, 82 (May, 2022), 349–76.
A Igreja católica e as questões sociais e políticas no Brasil (1950–1960). Buscando
novos sentidos à pastoral. Volney José Berkenbrock, Rodrigo Portella, and
Nilmar de Sousa Carvalho. Revista Eclesiástica Brasileira, 82 (May, 2022),
334–48.
Los sínodos diocesanos en la historia posconciliar de la Iglesia en Chile.
Antecedentes generales. Tibaldo Zolezzi and Sandra Arenas. Teología y Vida,
63 (2, 2022), 207–41.
“Querida Amazonia” e “Fratelli Tutti”: sobre o neoliberalismo. Jonas Matheus
Sousa Da Silva. Laurentianum, 64 (1–2, 2023), 183–93.

Other Books Received
Attridge, Michael, Darrian Dias, O.P., Matthew Eaton, Nicholas Olkovich. The
Promise of Renewal: Dominicans and Vatican II. [Dominican Series.] (Adelaide,
AFT Theology, 2017. Pp. xviii, 394. $29.95, paperback.)
Bucciantini, Massimo, ed. The Science and Myth of Galileo between the Seventeenth
and Nineteenth Centuries in Europe. [Biblioteca di Galilæana, 10.] (Florence,
IT: Leo S. Olschki Editore, 2021. Pp. x, 506. € 49,40.) Among thirty articles,
mostly in Italian or English, collected in this volume are “Galileo ‘ortodosso’:
la ricezione del metodo sperimentale nel ‘La Civiltà Cattolica’ (1850–1903),”
by Luigi Ingaliso (pp. 253–67), and “La massoneria e il mito di Galileo fra
Otto e Novecento,” by Fulvio Conti (pp. 393–407).
Bünz, Enno, Werner Greiling, and Uwe Schirmer. Thüringische Klöster und Stifte in
vor- undfrühreformatorischer Zeit. [Quellen und Forschungen zu Thüringen im
Zeitalter der Reformation, 6.] (Cologne: Böhlau, 2017. Pp. 462. € 60,00.)
Canepari, Andrea, ed. The Italian Legacy in the Dominican Republic: History,
Architecture, Economics, Society. (Philadelphia, PA: Saint Joseph’s University
Press. 2021. Pp. 538. $50.00, cloth.)
Delehanty, Jack. Making Moral Citizens: How Faith-Based Organizers Use Vocation
for Public Action. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2023. Pp
xii, 209. $24.95, paperback.)
Emmerson, Richard K. Apocalypse Illumination: The Visual Exegesis of Revelation in
Medieval Illustrated Manuscript. (University Park: The Pennsylvania State
University Press. Pp. 2018. Pp. xvi, 270. $74.95, cloth.)
d’Espalungue d’Arros, Édouard. Benoît XVI: l’héritage. Regards croisés sur un
pontificat. [Questions de Religions] (Paris: Editions Feuilles, 2020. Pp. 141.
€ 9.00, paperback.)
Griggs, Daniel, Tom Licence, and Marjory Lange. Aelred of Rievaulx: The
Liturgical Sermons: The Reading-Cluny Collection, 1 of 2, Sermons 85–133.
(Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press. 2021. Pp. 432. $49.95, paperback.)
Griggs, Daniel, and Tom Licence, trans. Aelred of Rievaulx: The Liturgical Sermons:
The Reading-Cluny Collection, 2 of 2 Sermons, 134–182. (Collegeville, MN:
Liturgical Press. 2022. Pp. 504, $49.95, paperback.)
Janzen, Rebecca. Unholy Trinity: State, Church, and Film in Mexico. (Albany, NY:
State University of New York Press. 2021. Pp. xii, 174. $31.95, paperback.)
Klapczynski, Gregor. Via triumphalis—Via dolorosa. (Freiburg: Herder, 2022. Pp.
160. € 10,30, paperback. 27 full-page, full-color illustrations.)
656

OTHER BOOKS RECEIVED

657

Paravay, Pierrette, and Daniel Le Blévec, dirs. Les carates de Chartreuse: Collection
des toiles du monastère de la Grande Chartreuse (XVII e–XIX e sièles). (Grenoble:
Éditions Glénat Couvent Sainte-Cécile. 2022. Pp. 288. € 45,00.)
Pensado, Jaime M. Love and Despair: How Catholic Activism Shaped Politics and the
Counterculture in Modern Mexico. (Oakland: University of California Press,
2023. Pp. xvi, 358. $34.95, paperback.)
Romero, Robert Chao. Brown Church: Five Centuries of Latina/o Social Justice,
Theology, and Identity. (Westmont, IL: Intervarsity Press. 2020. Pp. x, 238.
$30.00, paperback.)
Stuart, Joseph T., and Barbara A. Stuart. The Church and the Age of Reformations
(1350–1650). [Reclaiming Catholic History, 5.] (Notre Dame, IN: Ave Maria
Press, 2022. Pp. xxix, 164. $17.95, paperback.)
Walters, J. Edwards, ed. Eastern Christianity: A Reader. (Grand Rapids, MI:
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2021. Pp. xvi, 424. $55.00,
hardcover.) Readings in Syriac, Armenian, Georgian, Arabic, Coptic, and
Ethiopic.
Yarrow, Simon. The Saints: a short history. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016.
Pp. xii, 176. £10.99.)