GREGORY XIII, POPE. - Ugo Boncompagni, fourth son of Cristoforo, a Bolognese merchant, and of Angela Marescalchi, was born on January 1, 1502, in Bologna. There he received his doctorate and was a professor of law in the years 1531-39. Then, having gone to Rome in the service of Cardinal Parisio, he was ordained a priest at the age of about 40. Soon he was employed by Paul III in various judicial offices, and in 1546 was named abbreviator of the Council of Trent. Paul IV used the learned jurist in various diplomatic missions, and in 1558 named him bishop of Vieste, but nevertheless continued to employ him in the Curia. Toward the end of 1561 he was again sent by Pius IV to the Council of Trent as companion of the cardinal legate Simonetta, and, thanks to his canonistic expertise and his exceptional capacity for work, he rendered valuable services. When the Council ended he returned to Rome, and on March 12, 1565, he received the purple with the title of St. Sixtus. When Pius V died six months after the victory of Lepanto and nine years after the closing of the Council of Trent, the Sacred College, after a very brief conclave, on May 14, 1572, named as pope Cardinal Boncompagni, who assumed the name of G. XIII.
The new Pope, despite having turned 70, immediately showed exceptional energy and an inflexible will to continue the work of radical regeneration of the Church begun by Pius V. BORROMEO, EDOARDO, and following faithfully in all important questions in the footsteps of his great predecessor, G. XIII appears to us throughout the years of his pontificate as ceaselessly engaged in renewing the Catholic world through the integral and punctual implementation of the reform decrees of the Council of Trent. Under him Catholic Reform and Catholic restoration made immense strides, and, whereas previously the work of regeneration had been conducted only in Italy and Spain, it developed with swift and sure rhythm throughout all Christendom.
A most effective instrument for G. XIII was the Order of the Jesuits. The Society, only recently founded, expanded its activities in almost all European countries, in Brazil, in the Indies, in Japan, and, while carrying the Gospel to the most distant and inhospitable pagan lands, it helped and supported Catholics in the Protestant countries, and struggled to lead back to the faith princes and peoples who had gone astray. On a different plane, but with no less intensity, labored the Capuchins who, under the auspices of G. XIII, spread throughout central and western Europe.
The strenuous activity of G. XIII and his co-workers did not lead the Christian peoples of Europe back to religious unity, because the attempts to reunite Sweden and Russia with the Church came to nothing, the attempt to overthrow Queen Elizabeth of England failed, and in France the struggle between Catholics and Calvinists remained for the moment undecided. But it was also crowned by grandiose victories: thus in the Netherlands the Catholic cause regained the upper hand, Poland was definitively reconquered for the Church and Protestantism was uprooted there, in Germany, thanks also to the meritorious activity of the dukes of Bavaria and of distinguished German ecclesiastical princes, Protestantism was halted in its expansion and much of the lost ground was reconquered by the Church.
In the Latin nations the religious conditions were likewise the object of the vigilant care of G. XIII. Worthy of particular mention are the reform of the Carmelite nuns of Spain through the work of Teresa of Jesus, and the institution of the Congregation known as the Priests of the Oratory through the work of Philip Neri.
Under G. XIII the missions, which had already been largely favored by Pius V, received an impulse, and excellent results were obtained among the pagan peoples of America and in the far East. Here too the Jesuits acquired imperial titles of glory.
G. XIII also favored the sciences and the arts. Buildings of public utility and distinguished monuments arose in Rome, as well as churches and numerous colleges for the education of priests of the various nations, which proved of the greatest advantage for the formation of the clergy and consequently for Catholic Reform and Restoration as well as for the missions. In the scientific field the Pope concerned himself with a new edition of the texts of canon law, of the Roman Martyrology, and with the reform of the calendar: the latter a historical event of the greatest importance, to which the name of the Pontiff remains linked.
G. XIII died at the age of eighty-four on April 10, 1585, and his mortal remains were deposited in St. Peter's, in a tomb that only in 1723 was adorned with sculptures by Camillo Rusconi. His pontificate, even if it was not particularly fortunate as regards more properly political activity (the Pope strove with crusading zeal for the Christian powers to unite once again against the Turk, but did not succeed in his aim), and indeed unhappy with regard to the internal administration of the Papal State (the struggle against the bandits who infested the State proved fruitless), must be considered as one of the most glorious of the modern age for the conspicuous results achieved in the more strictly religious field, especially as concerns Catholic Restoration and Reform.
BIBL.: sources