CAMPELLO, ENRICO. – Religious agitator, born in Rome in 1831 of an ancient family from Spoleto, and died there in 1902. Having entered ecclesiastical life, he successively became a canon of S. Maria Maggiore and of S. Pietro. In 1881 he apostatized, and in the same year published his Confessione di Fede, which was practically almost identical with that of the Old Catholics: namely, that the hierarchy was indeed of divine institution, but that bishops and parish priests ought to be elected by the clergy and the laity; he acknowledged the Pope only as the «primus inter pares», denying him infallibility; the liturgy was to be celebrated in the vernacular; ecclesiastical celibacy was indeed acceptable to God, but the obligation of observing it for priests was unjust and tyrannical, and ought to be abolished, etc.
On these foundations he wished to establish the so-called «Italian Catholic Church». Aided by the Anglicans of the «Anglo-Continental Society», he founded in Rome the newspaper «Il labaro»,
which disappeared after a short time and was revived at S. Remo under the direction of Ugo Janni. In 1883, urged on by the Anglican minister Dr. Nevin, he inaugurated a chapel in Rome, on Via Genova, opened several schools, and was recognized as a priest of the «Church of God» by the Episcopalian bishop of Long Island in the United States. At this time several apostates joined him, such as G. B. Savarese, who was later reconciled with the Church, and Cicchitti-Suriani. In 1886, as matters were not proceeding well for the new church, C. traveled to London to consult with his Anglican friends; there it was decided that he should leave Rome and go to spread the new doctrines in the Valnerina, among whose inhabitants he worked for many years, especially at Castellilago, Arone, Ferentello, and in some other small villages, with a further incursion into S. Remo under the auspices of Ugo Janni. In 1902, at the age of 71, C. made his abjuration in the chapel of the Pontifical Pio Latino Americano College in Rome, and returned to the Church, in which, repentant of his errors, he died.