PIO VII, POPE. - Barnaba Gregorio Chiaramonti, born on 14 August 1740 (not 1742) in Cesena to Count Scipione and Marchesa Giovanna Ghini. After completing his early studies at the Jesuit college in Ravenna, he entered the Benedictine Order. In 1775 he became Abbot of S. Callisto in Rome; in 1782 Bishop of Tivoli; in 1785 Bishop of Imola; and shortly thereafter, a cardinal. In the administration of the dioceses entrusted to him, Chiaramonti displayed those qualities of gentleness and mildness that would characterize his conduct even in the most difficult and tragic moments of his life.
After the death of Pius VI in Valence on 29 August 1799, the conclave for the election of a new Pontiff convened in Venice, where numerous cardinals had taken refuge under Austrian protection. The late Pontiff had stipulated that the future conclave should meet precisely where the majority of the cardinals were located. The conclave lasted from 10 December 1799 to 14 March 1800; its secretary and organizer was the young prelate Ercole Consalvi. The candidate preferred by the government of Vienna was Cardinal Mattei. In the early ballots, Cardinal Bellisomi, Bishop of Cesena—opposed by Austria—prevailed, followed by Cardinal Gerdil of Savoy (v.). In the end, the votes converged on Cardinal Chiaramonti, who, in homage to his predecessor, took the name Pius VII.
The election displeased Vienna, where the newly elected Pope was reputed to hold certain democratic sympathies; mention was made of a homily delivered in Imola in which he had affirmed that there was no antithesis between democracy and Christianity. After his coronation, which took place in S. Giorgio Maggiore on 21 March 1800, the imperial government invited him to Vienna to settle peacefully the question of the Legations. He firmly refused and, as soon as possible (6 June), left Venice, traveling by sea to Pesaro and from there entering Rome on 3 July. On 15 May, from Venice, his first encyclical had appeared: with simplicity and firmness, it proclaimed the Church’s right to follow its divine laws in full independence. Consalvi (v.) a cardinal and Secretary of State; between the two there was always complete harmony and understanding. The Peace of Lunéville (1801) restored the Papal States to their pre-Treaty of Tolentino condition.
Pius now faced the problem of religious restoration in France and the lands swept by the revolutionary storm. Soon after the Battle of Marengo (14 June 1800), the First Consul entrusted Cardinal Martiniana, Bishop of Vercelli, with communicating to the Pope his intention to establish an accord between the Church of Rome and the French Republic in a spirit of peace. Pius agreed and entrusted the negotiations in Paris to Monsignor Spina and the theologian Caselli, who met there with Abbé Bernier, representative of the First Consul. The First Consul, offering to restore religious peace in France, sought to exploit the support of the Church and clergy. Pius soon had to abandon plans to defend refractory bishops, preserve the patrimony of the French Church, and restore Catholicism as the official religion of the French state. The long and exhausting negotiations were broken off in June 1801. Pius sent Cardinal Consalvi to Paris, and the Concordat was signed on 15 July 1801. When the Pope saw the text, grave opposition arose among the cardinals, but Consalvi secured papal ratification of the agreement, and Pius signed the Concordat on 15 August, sending Cardinal Caprara to Paris with legatine authority for its implementation.
The First Consul, to placate the opposition of the old revolutionaries, then promulgated the Organic Articles, which subjected certain religious activities to state and police control in the spirit of old-style jurisdictionalism. To Pius there remained only to protest against these arbitrary measures in an allocution to the cardinals on 24 May 1802. On 18 April 1802, the Concordat was promulgated in Notre-Dame and the Te Deum sung solemnly. In reality, dissatisfaction was widespread, both among anti-revolutionaries and among the more intolerant revolutionaries. Pius was accused of having betrayed the Church. As a consequence of the Concordat, ecclesiastical principalities in Germany disappeared in 1805, and the property of religious institutions was confiscated.
With the proclamation of Napoleon Bonaparte as Emperor of the French, pressing invitations were made to Pius to attend the imperial coronation ceremony in Paris. The cardinals were opposed and echoed the sentiments of several Catholic governments. Pius, hoping that his personal sacrifice might bring benefit to the Church, departed on 2 November accompanied by seven cardinals and four bishops. The papal journey to France— the first since the Avignon period—elicited moving religious demonstrations from the populations along the route Florence–Turin–Mont Cenis–Lyon. On 25 November at Fontainebleau, Pius was received in the forest by the Emperor, dressed as a hunter during a hunting party: a rather coarse reception that did not impress the Pope favorably. The coronation ceremony took place in Notre-Dame on 2 December: Pius received from the Emperor the oath to maintain peace for the Church and the people; Napoleon himself took the crown from the altar and placed it on his head. The day before, Pius had succeeded in persuading Napoleon to contract a religious marriage with Josephine, which was done in secret. Napoleon sought to persuade the Pope to remain in France, either in Paris or Avignon. Pius resisted all insistence; he warned that if force were used to detain him, the Emperor would have only the monk Barnaba Chiaramonti in his hands, for he had left detailed instructions to that effect in Rome. Pope and Emperor parted coldly: from that moment, the tension that would soon lead to rupture began to grow. Pius returned to Rome on 16 May. During his stop in Florence, he succeeded in securing the submission of Scipione de’ Ricci (v.), the Jansenist Bishop of Pistoia.
Emboldened by the prestige conferred by the imperial coronation, Napoleon began to act arbitrarily toward the Church and the Papacy. Both in France and Italy, he issued measures even in religious matters, going so far as to demand the annulment of the marriage of his brother Jerome, contracted in America, and the rupture of relations with England and other governments opposed to the Empire. To papal resistance, Napoleon responded by militarily occupying Ancona. Pius protested, but after the victory at Austerlitz, Napoleon replied haughtily, declaring himself the firstborn son of the Church, as were the Carolingian and Capetian monarchs his predecessors; while the Papal States were a gift from the emperors, and the popes were to follow imperial policy.
When Napoleon made his brother Joseph King of Naples, Consalvi protested, invoking the Pope’s rights and his supreme sovereignty over the Kingdom. The Emperor responded by threatening to have the cardinal arrested and assigning the papal lands of Benevento and Pontecorvo as fiefs to Talleyrand and Bernadotte. Consalvi renewed his protests but was compelled to resign his office on 17 June 1806. The Pope entrusted the Secretariat of State to Cardinal Casoni, who soon retired and was succeeded by Doria and then Gabrielli, who continued the policy of resistance.
Napoleon then presented the Pope with an ultimatum: the right to appoint a third of the cardinals, the coronation of the King of Naples, adoption of the Napoleonic Code, recognition of the “liberties” of the Gallican Church and the Organic Articles, the appointment of an autonomous French patriarch, the abolition of clerical celibacy and of religious orders. The Pope’s refusal precipitated events: on 2 February 1808 General Miollis occupied Rome. Pius VII issued a fresh protest and declared the French general henceforth a prisoner. The French regime turned to open violence: cardinals were either expelled or arrested. After the arrest of the Secretary of State Gabrielli, the Pope replaced him with Pacca.
From Palermo the British offered Pius hospitality in Sicily and means of escape, but the Pope refused. An attempt to arrest Cardinal Pacca within the Quirinal Palace itself was thwarted by the Pope’s personal intervention. Meanwhile, on 2 April 1808 from Saint-Cloud, Napoleon issued a decree uniting the Marches with the Kingdom of Italy. On 17 May from Schönbrunn he suppressed the papal temporal power, declaring Rome an imperial city and assigning the Pope an annual income of two million francs.
Pius VII responded by ordering Pacca to publish a bull of excommunication against all who had ordered or perpetrated acts of violence against the Holy See (10 June 1809). On 20 June Napoleon wrote to Murat that the Pope was a madman who must be confined; Pacca and all the Pope’s most loyal supporters were to be arrested. The odious task was entrusted to General Radet, who on the night of 5 July scaled the Quirinal and entered the room where the Pope lay. He demanded in the Emperor’s name that Pius renounce his temporal dominion. Rising to his feet, the Pope replied: “I cannot, I ought not, I will not. I have sworn to God to preserve the Church’s States, and I shall never fail that oath.”
Radet then forced Pius VII and Cardinal Pacca into a carriage and set out with them. On 8 July the two prisoners reached Florence, whence they were immediately taken on to Genoa, Alessandria, and the Mont Cenis pass; by 21 July they were in Grenoble. Pacca was imprisoned at Fenestrelle. The Pope was conveyed to Valence, then to Avignon, and finally on 15 August to Savona, where imperial orders soon tightened the surveillance of the illustrious prisoner lodged in the episcopal palace. In outward show honours were paid him, but in reality he was held in strict confinement, his personal relations and correspondence closely monitored; gradually he was to be completely isolated.
The Emperor hoped to bend Pius to his will, convinced that he was dealing with an old man too weak to resist once placed beside shrewd and loyal counsellors.
In the affair of the divorce from Giuseppina in order to marry Maria Luisa of Austria, the Pope, the only competent authority in the matter, was ignored. Cardinals who, as a sign of disapproval, abstained from attending the solemn ceremony of the new marriage were stripped of their property and exiled with the prohibition of wearing the insignia of their dignity. When Napoleon ordered that the bishops he had appointed should take possession of their sees without regard for canonical institution, the Pope condemned the intruding bishops. To intensify the harshness of his imprisonment, his books were taken away from him and even the writing materials he needed. In November 1809 and March 1811, Napoleon convened two ecclesiastical councils in Paris to prepare for a council; in fact, this national council was summoned for June 1811. Meanwhile, a commission of bishops was sent to Savona to pressure the Pope: under threat of annulment of the Concordat, he was to confirm the bishops already appointed; for the future, if canonical institution by the Pope did not occur within three months of their appointment, it was to be given by the metropolitan bishop or the senior suffragan; the Pope was also to take an oath of fidelity to the Emperor and reside in Avignon.
After prolonged resistance, Pius VII finally yielded, accepting in preliminary negotiations the proposal that the Concordat should include a clause whereby the Pope had to give canonical investiture within six months, after which the metropolitans would provide II. As soon as the draft of the document was drawn up, the Pope regretted it, but it had already been sent to Paris. The national council sat from 17 June 1811 to 5 August. The decree envisaged, which the Emperor’s representatives wrested from the bishops, was brought to Savona by a new delegation of pro-Imperial cardinals and bishops. Overwhelmed by the insistence of those who spoke of the needs of the Church, after a long dispute (3–20 September 1811) the Pope yielded with the reservation that the metropolitan should act by virtue of a formal delegation from the Pope.
Napoleon flew into a rage upon reading the papal brief and, from Dresden on the eve of the Russian campaign, ordered the governor of Turin, Prince Borghese, to transfer Pius VII in complete secrecy to the castle of Fontainebleau. Departing from Savona on 10 June, though ill, Pius arrived at the Mont Cenis hospice on 12 June; nearly at the point of death, he received the last rites from the monks. Recovering and forced to continue, he reached Fontainebleau on 20 June. Cardinals and pro-Imperial bishops were at his side to press him to yield to the master’s will.
After the catastrophic Russian campaign, at the end of December 1812, Napoleon returned to France and sought to make a conciliatory gesture to impress public opinion, but Pius rejected the proposals advanced by the bishop of Nantes, Du Voisin, and other bishops. On the evening of 18 January 1813, Napoleon, again in hunting attire, paid a sudden visit to the Pope. In the days that followed, Pope and Emperor held long discussions; on 25 January 1813 they reached an agreement that was to form the preliminaries of a new concordat. The Pope accepted the decisions of the Paris council and, as a concession, obtained the release of Cardinal Pacca and several others, the restoration of the suburbicarian sees, and the right to fill ten sees. Napoleon hastened to publish an act that was to remain secret for the advantage of his policy.
Cardinals Consalvi and Pacca, upon arriving near the Pope, made him aware of the error he had committed; on 26 March Pius wrote to Napoleon retracting what he had consented to and declared in a letter to the cardinals that no canonical institution given by metropolitans was valid. The Pope remained in France until February 1814, when, overwhelmed by defeat, Napoleon ordered that Pius be brought back to Savona and on 10 March that he be set at liberty. Pius entered Rome on 24 May, but in the spring of 1815, when Gioacchino Murat began his ill-fated enterprise, the Pope fled to Genoa, only to return to Rome by 7 June 1815.
After 1815 he had to confront once more the problems of the reconstruction of the Papal States and ecclesiastical restoration. To Cardinal Consalvi belongs the credit for having succeeded, through negotiations conducted in London and Vienna, in obtaining that the Congress establish the restitution of all the Pope’s territories, rejecting Austrian claims to the Legations. Only Avignon remained with France; a small strip of Ferrarese territory on the left bank of the Po was ceded to Austrian Venetia; Benevento and Pontecorvo were likewise restored by the Kingdom of Naples. Partially restored was the pre-revolutionary papal legislation, and the administration was reorganized on new foundations more suited to the times. Cardinal Consalvi saved the Pope from serious responsibilities by showing him the necessity of putting a seal on the past and renewing the state administration.
The motu proprio of 6 July 1816 abolished feudal rights, reorganized the courts, and unified provincial and municipal administrations along Napoleonic lines. The reform of ecclesiastical tribunals and the publication of new codes were also announced. In domestic policy, Consalvi adopted a broad tolerance toward advocates of liberal ideas, resisting Austrian pressures that would have imposed control over the Papal State. In Rome, Pius accorded the greatest hospitality to the mother and relatives of Napoleon, including Cardinal Fesch.
With the bull Sollicitudo omnium of 7 August 1814, Pius restored the Society of Jesus, suppressed by Clement XIV. To regulate ecclesiastical relations according to new exigencies, concordats were concluded around 1817–18 with the monarchies of Spain, Sardinia, France, Naples, Bavaria, and Prussia. A notable revival is also seen in the missionary field. He restored the Congregation of Propaganda Fide to functioning on new bases, and through the Pope’s solicitations the work of religious assistance and penetration in the Middle and Far East was reorganized. Thought was given to addressing the difficulties created in Latin America by the rebellion against Spanish rule, while the best hopes began to be realized in North America.
Pius died on 20 August 1823 following a fall in his own study in which he fractured his femur. He died without learning of the destruction of the basilica of Saint Paul, which had been gutted by a serious fire a few days earlier. He was buried in Saint Peter’s; Cardinal Consalvi commissioned the Danish sculptor Thorvaldsen to create a grand funerary monument: “Wisdom and Strength stand guard over the tomb.” — See plate CIII.