Further research and information on the English Reformation, English Catholic martyrs, and related topics by the author of SUPREMACY AND SURVIVAL: HOW CATHOLICS ENDURED THE ENGLISH REFORMATION
Although Matthew Bunson has left TCA as editor (now he's with National Catholic Register), I hope to maintain a good relationship with the new editor. Doctor Bunson had accepted this article for publication last year: "What Is a Papal Bull? Understanding differences in papal decrees and documents" and so it appears as a feature in the September/October issue. As usual with these articles, I do betray my interest in the English Reformation as in this list of papal bulls through the centuries:
Because these documents have been issued since the sixth century, there are hundreds of papal bulls in the archives of the Vatican Library. Many of the papal bulls from the medieval era, for example, proclaim that the Jewish people are not to be blamed for the death of Jesus and that they must be protected by civil authorities. Other epoch-making papal bulls include:
• Pope Clement VI’s 1342 bull declaring the Franciscan order as the custodian of the Holy Land sites in the name of the Catholic Church (which it still is today).
• Pope Pius IV’s Benedictus Deus, which ratified all the decrees of the Council of Trent in 1564.
• Pope St. Pius V’s Regnans in Excelsis (“Reigning on High”) in 1570, declaring Elizabeth I of England a heretic and releasing her subjects from loyalty to her reign.
• Pope Gregory XIII’s reform of the Julian calendar in 1582, establishing the Gregorian calendar, which many Protestant countries in Europe did not adopt since it was proclaimed by the pope.
• Several bulls concerning the Society of Jesus, approving it (Pope Paul III in 1540), suppressing it (Pope Clement XIV in 1773), re-establishing it (Pope Pius VII in 1814) and reaffirming its papal privileges (Pope Leo XIII in 1880).
• Pope Pius IX’s Universalis Ecclesiae, re-establishing the Catholic hierarchy in England (1850).
In 1914, today was a day of peace in Europe before war began--it was a Thursday--and the next day, the Austro-Hungarian Empire declared war on Serbia. On Saturday, July 29, Austria started bombing Belgrade, and Russia mobilized against Austria. The day after that, Austria and Russia started mobilizing against each other. On July 31, Germany issued an ultimatum to Russia and another one to France--step by step, day by day, the great powers of Europe moved closer and closer to waging war against one another.
The video above, from the Catholic News Services, emphasizes the efforts of Pope Benedict XV, elected in September of 1914 after the death of Pope Pius X, to negotiate peace at the beginning of the war--a Christmas truce in 1914--and a just peace at the end of the war. He was consistently ignored, as this EWTN page notes:
He was elected to succeed Pius X, probably because of his diplomatic experience. As father to all Catholics, Benedict XV favored neither side in the war. But his policy of neutrality was misinterpreted by both sides, each regarding him as siding with the other. He pressed for a Christmas truce in 1914 to ward off the “suicide of Europe,” but was ignored. In 1917, he tried to broker a peace plan, but his efforts were unsuccessful. He was able, however, to arrange the exchange of disabled prisoners through neutral countries, and to have the sick and wounded sent to neutral countries for treatment and recuperation. Through his intercession, deported Belgians were allowed to return home, and he donated money to relieve those suffering the effects of the war throughout Europe. After the war, in 1919, he asked for a Vatican role in the Paris Peace Conference, but was turned down. He pleaded with the victorious Allies to lift the blockade against Germany, because of the suffering it caused to women and children, and he took up a Church-wide collection to buy food. For human solidarity, he favored the founding of the League of Nations, though the Vatican itself was excluded from membership.
In his November 1, 1914 encyclical Ad Beatissimi Apostolorum (Appealing for Peace), he reached out to the Patriarchs, Primates, Archbishops, Bishops, and Other Local Ordinaries in Peace and Communion with the Apostolic See to remind themselves and their communities of their Christian brotherhood:
Our Lord Jesus Christ came down from Heaven for the very purpose of restoring amongst men the Kingdom of Peace, which the envy of the devil had destroyed, and it was His will that it should rest on no other foundation than that of brotherly love. These are His own oft-repeated words: "A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another (John 14:34); "This is my commandment that you love one another" (John 15:12); "These things I command you, that you love one another" (John 15:17); as though His one office and purpose was to bring men to mutual love. He used every kind of argument to bring about that effect. He bids us all look up to Heaven: "For one is your Father who is in Heaven" (Matt. 23:9); He teaches all men, without distinction of nationality or of language, or of ideas, to pray in the words: "Our Father, who are in Heaven" (Matt. 6:9); nay, more, He tells us that our Heavenly Father in distributing the blessings of nature makes no distinction of our deserts: "Who maketh His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and raineth upon the just and the unjust" (Matt. 5:45). He bids us be brothers one to another, and calls us His brethren: "All you are brethren" (Matt. 23:8); "that He might be the first-born amongst many brethren" (Rom. 7:29). In order the more to stimulate us to brotherly love, even towards those whom our natural pride despises, it is His will that we should recognize the dignity of His own very self in the meanest of men: "As long as you did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me" (Matt. 15:40}. At the close of His life did He not most earnestly beg of His Father, that as many as should believe in Him should all be one in the bond of charity? "As thou, Father, in Me, and I in Thee" (John 22:21). And finally, as He was hanging from the cross, He poured out His blood over us all, whence being as it were compacted and fitly joined together in one body, we should love one another, with a love like that which one member bears to another in the same body.
He discussed the various evils of the day (besides the war) and how they contributed to the unrest that led to the war, including atheism, greed, racial hatred, contempt of laws and authority, etc. He urges the bishops and the patriarchs and bishops to be unified, charitable to each other, and to pray:
It remains for Us, Venerable Brethren, since in God's hands are the wills of princes and of those who are able to put an end to the suffering and destruction of which We have spoken, to raise Our voice in supplication to God, and in the name of the whole human race, to cry out: "Grant, O Lord, peace, in our day." May He who said of himself: "I am the Lord . . . I make peace" (Isaias 41:6-7) appeased by our prayers, quickly still the storm in which civil society and religious society are being tossed; and may the Blessed Virgin, who brought forth "the Prince of Peace," be propitious towards us; and may she take under her maternal care and protection Our own humble person, Our Pontificate, the Church and the souls of all men, redeemed by the divine blood of her Son.
Pope Leo XIII died on July 20, 1903. He was born Gioacchino Vincenzo Raffaele Luigi on March 2, 1810 and elected as the Vicar of Christ on February 20, 1878. As this article from the Catholic Encyclopedia describes his papacy, he had great impact on the Catholic Church in England and left an important legacy for the universal Catholic Church with his many (12!) encyclicals on the Rosary, his ground-breaking social encyclical, Rerum Novarum, and other Catholic devotions, like the Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel:
Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle; be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him, we humbly pray: and do thou, O Prince of the heavenly host, by the power of God, thrust into hell Satan and all the evil spirits who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls. Amen.
Sancte Michael Archangele, defende nos in proelio; contra nequitiam et insidias diaboli esto praesidium. Imperet illi Deus, supplices deprecamur: tuque, Princeps militiae Caelestis, satanam aliosque spiritus malignos, qui ad perditionem animarum pervagantur in mundo, divina virtute in infernum detrude. Amen.
As to his influence on the British Empire and Ireland, the Catholic Encyclopedia article notes:
Among the acts of Leo XIII that affected in a particular way the English-speaking world may be mentioned: for England, the elevation of John Henry Newman to the cardinalate (1879), the "Romanos Pontifices" of 1881 concerning the relations of the hierarchy and the regular clergy, the beatification (1886) of fifty English martyrs, the celebration of the thirteenth centenary of St. Gregory the Great, Apostle of England (1891), the Encyclicals "Ad Anglos" of 1895, on the return to Catholic unity, and the "Apostolicæ Curæ" of 1896, on the non-validity of the Anglican orders. He restored the Scotch hierarchy in 1878, and in 1898 addressed to the Scotch a very touching letter. In English India Pope Leo established the hierarchy in 1886, and regulated there long-standing conflicts with the Portugese authorities. In 1903 King Edward VII paid him a visit at the Vatican. The Irish Church experienced his pastoral solicitude on many occasions. His letter to Archbishop McCabe of Dublin (1881), the elevation of the same prelate to the cardinalate in 1882, the calling of the Irish bishops to Rome in 1885, the decree of the Holy Office (13 April, 1888) on the plan of campaign and boycotting, and the subsequent Encyclical of 24 June, 1888, to the Irish hierarchy represent in part his fatherly concern for the Irish people, however diverse the feelings they aroused at the height of the land agitation.
When Pope Leo XIII made Father John Henry Newman a Cardinal Deacon of the Church, he knew it was a controversial move--he called Newman "my cardinal" and said, "My cardinal! it was not easy, it was not easy. They said he was too liberal, but I had determined to honour the Church in honouring Newman. I always had a cult for him. I am proud that I was able to honour such a man."
May Pope Leo XIII, Gioacchino Vincenzo Raffaele Luigi, rest in the peace of Christ. Image credit from wikipedia commons.
