LANTERI, PIO BRUNONE. — Founder of the Oblates of Mary the Virgin, born in Cuneo on 12 May 1759, died at Pinerolo on 5 August 1830.
At the beginning of 1782 he went to Vienna with Fr. N. A. Diessbach (v.), of whom he was a favorite disciple and active collaborator, in order to prepare for the latter’s visit by Pius VI; that same year, on 25 May, he was ordained a priest, and on 13 July he obtained a degree in theology from the University of Turin. He consistently refused any office or benefice in order to devote himself exclusively to the apostolate, which he exercised in the confessional (he was a much sought-after spiritual director), in preaching the Spiritual Exercises according to the Ignatian method, in the societies: Aa (v.), Amicizia cristiana (v.), FRATERNITÀ SACERDOTALE (v.) CATTOLICITÀ (v.), and finally in the Congregation of the Oblates of Mary the Virgin (v.), of which he had been Superior General since 1817 and which he definitively reconstituted with papal approval in 1825. During the imprisonment of Pius VII at Savona, he was among the most active organizers of the secret assistance provided to the Pontiff; this activity earned him confinement by the Napoleonic police to his country house at Bardassano (1811–14). After the Restoration he returned to Turin, where he sought to reactivate his former apostolic works: it was during this period that he Convitto ecclesiastico (v.), which was later established by the theologian L. Guala (v.). L.’s contribution to the renewal of the formation of the clergy in Piedmont was of the highest importance; in this regard he employed two highly effective means: the Spiritual Exercises according to the method of St. Ignatius and the dissemination of the ascetical and, above all, moral works of St. Alphonsus, of whom he was, in his time, his most ardent supporter in Piedmont. His cause of beatification is in progress.
Works. — L. committed only a few writings to print; most of his works are preserved in manuscript in the general archive of the Congregation of the Oblates of Mary the Virgin. Several of his apologetic writings, or writings concerning particular dogmatic or moral subjects (for example, the organic articles of 1802, the imperial catechism, the four Gallican articles, the conciliabulum of 1811, the so-called Concordat of Fontainebleau, the treatise De gratia by the Jansenist Salina, etc.), were circulated in manuscript copies in order to avoid police harassment. Because of his temperament, which was influenced by the grave political and religious situation in Piedmont at the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, L. consistently preferred anonymity. The following anonymous works are attributed to him: Réflexions sur la sainteté et doctrine du bienh. Liguori (Lyons–Paris 1823, translated into Italian, Reggio 1825, and reprinted several times with modifications); Réponse à la question si la doctrine du bienh. Liguori est toute sûre et approuvée par le St-Siège (Lyons 1824); Esercizi spirituali di s. Ignazio di Lojola col direttorio pel buon uso de' suddetti Esercizi ed alcune notizie intorno ad essi (Turin 1829); to these must be added the posthumous edition of the Medulla libelli Exercitiorum s. Ignatii, published in an appendix to the Direttorio degli Oblati di Maria Vergine, Turin 1854, pp. 189–218).