Manacorda, Emiliano

MANACORDA, EMILIANO. - Bishop, b. at Penangro in Monferrato on 6 Aug. 1833, d. at Fossano on 29 July 1909. Ordained priest in 1859, he moved to the ecclesiastical boarding school of Turin directed by Cafasso and in 1867 to Rome, where he earned a doctorate in theology and canon law. He held various offices in the Roman Curia, until he was elected bishop of Fossano in 1871.

He had the sanctuary of Cussanio built, carried out two pastoral visitations, held a diocesan synod and a regional Catholic congress, oversaw the honors paid to the b. Giovanni Giovenale Ancina and to the b. Oddino Barotti, established the minor seminary and a Salesian college. He wrote more than two hundred pastoral letters and compiled various collective letters on behalf of the Piedmontese episcopate. In addition to numerous pamphlets of a social character, among which Pensieri del socialismo (Fossano 1901) should be noted, he wrote Il Pontificato romano e l'incivilimento cristiano attraverso XIX secoli (Rome 1904); the first part of a Specimen iuris et disciplinae ecclesiasticae, and Diciannove secoli di civiltà cristiana (Fossano 1897).