REGGIANINI, LUIGI. - Bishop, b. in Modena in July 1775, d. there in Jan. 1848.
As soon as he was a priest he promoted a Congregation of young ecclesiastics to provide catechetical instruction in the schools, and later a Pia Unione to assist the religious of both clergies during the turmoil of the French invasion and the Napoleonic government.
When the need for such assistance ceased, he directed the activity of the Unione toward preaching the Ignatian exercises for the benefit of the indigent. In 1818 he founded the Institute of the Daughters of Jesus for the instruction of poor girls, with particular attention to the deaf-mute, and he directed it for more than a decade. Another initiative of R. was the publication of a periodical entitled Memorie di morale, di religione e di letteratura, with which he proposed to combat liberal and anti-Christian thought, in defense of the rights of the Church and of pontifical authority. Spiritual director, then rector of the Seminary of Modena and confessor of the Este princes from 1814 until his death, in 1838 he was elected by Gregory XVI bishop of Modena, and he devoted the greatest care of his episcopal ministry to the formation of the young clergy and to charitable works, among which chiefly a home for retired priests, which, however, he could not see inaugurated before his death. The stipulation of the Concordat of 1841 between the Holy See and the Este government spurred him to implement the concordat agreements with tireless zeal: he saw to the institution of the Ecclesiastical Court and personally assumed the presidency of the Administrative Commission of ecclesiastical benefices and of the factory boards. He was a discreet and enlightened counselor to Duke Francis V, who was particularly attached to him, and for this reason he exercised a significant influence on the Modenese politics of his time. His passing aroused universal regret, and the funeral turned into a veritable apotheosis of the pious prelate.