LEO XII, Pope. - Annibale Sermattei della Genga, b. at the Castle of Genga, near Spoleto, on 22 Aug. 1760, d. in Rome on 10 Feb. 1829. He studied at Osimo and Rome; ordained a priest in 1783, he was bishop of Tyre, nuncio at Lucerne and at Cologne, envoy in 1805 to the German Diet, then nuncio at Munich and in 1808 at Paris. He returned to this city to convey to Louis XVIII, restored to power, the congratulations of the Pontiff. A cardinal of the Order of Priests from 8 March 1816, he was bishop of Senigallia and, in
(phot. Alinari)
LEO XII, pope - The Pope standing in blessing. Monument by G. De Fabris (1836) - Basilica of St. Peter.
1820, vicar of Rome. He openly manifested his opposition to the policy of Consalvi, who had drawn upon himself the hostility of many cardinals kept by him far from power, who reproached him for the adoption of various administrative reforms introduced by the Revolution and the Empire with regard to ecclesiastics, nobles and cities, the conclusion of concordats held to be injurious to the rights of the Church, and the alleged weakness shown toward the powers and above all toward Austria.
On the death of Pius VII, Card. Albani, head of the Consalvian Party supported by Metternich, communicated the Austrian veto on the election of Card. Severoli. The Party of the «zealots», mostly Italians, nevertheless succeeded, on 28 Sept. 1823, in having another of its candidates, Card. della Genga, elected against the Consalvian Castiglioni. The latter replaced Consalvi with the old conservative Card. Della Somaglia but showed that he was not bound to any tendency: he sought advice from Consalvi himself and knew how to give a direction of his own to the life of the Church.
The program of his pontificate is announced in the encyclical Ubi Primum of May 1824: restoration of religion, struggle against the errors that threaten the faith, condemnation of the sects, of indifferentism in matters of religion, of the Bible societies. Despite the opposition of the States and of a part of the Curia itself, he proclaimed for 1825 the Jubilee, which was to provoke a general movement of return to the faith, such as to overwhelm every opposition and resistance on the part of sects and political powers, and which in fact turned out to be unexpectedly imposing. With the bull Quod Divina Sapientia he reformed studies under ecclesiastical control, thereby creating the appropriate Congregation of Studies; he then restored the Roman College to the Jesuits and entrusted to them the College of Nobles; with Quo graviora mala he again condemned the sects.
These, however, were not the only things that created worries for the Pontiff, who had to struggle against Gallicanism in France, Josephinism and Febronian tendencies in Austria and Germany, and against the Orthodox autocracy of the Tsar. There was also a conflict with Spain when the King, whose restoration had been celebrated and blessed by the Pope, wished to prevent him from providing for the spiritual needs of the ancient Spanish colonies, through an implicit recognition of their new political order. In 1828 he believed he had put an end, by an agreement, to the anticlerical policy of William I of the Netherlands, but the latter sought not to apply the convention with the support of the Belgian liberals. L. XII did not compromise himself in the conflict between the Gallicans and La Mennais, whom he considered guided more by the heart than by reason.
His action aimed at restoring order in the Papal State did not always achieve the desired end. The brigands of the Roman countryside were not subdued by Card. Pallotta or by Msgr. Benvenuti, who replaced him; nor did the condemnations of Targhini and Montanari and the sending to Romagna of Card. Rivarola and then of Msgr. Invernizzi serve to put an end to the conspiracies and insurrections. L. XII sought to restore the old regime, by removing laymen from public offices and by measures in the judicial field in favor of ecclesiastical tribunals and in the social field in favor of the nobility. On the other hand, he introduced many timely economies, reduced or abolished taxes and imposts, but did not succeed in preventing the worsening of the economic-financial situation due to the poverty of the country and also in part to the exodus of wealthy Israelites sometimes compromised from the political point of view.
L. XII kept himself somewhat aloof from his subjects and was not very popular because of the severe economies introduced, the suppression of certain institutions incapable of supporting themselves, the imposition of shutters on taverns, although the reduction of taxes and other timely and beneficial provisions deserved to be more greatly appreciated.
Many of the last measures of his pontificate are due to Card. Tommaso Bernetti, who replaced Della Somaglia and accentuated the anti-Austrian tone of papal policy.
Bibliography13 works
Fausto Fonzi