REISACH, KARL AUGUST von. - Cardinal, b. July 6, 1800 at Roth (diocese of Eichstätt), d. December 22, 1869 at the Redemptorists' house in Contamine (Savoy). Having earned a degree in jurisprudence, he entered the Collegio Germanico in Rome in 1824. He later became rector of the College of Propaganda.
Together with Fr. Perrone and others, R. was given the task of carefully examining the Hermesian doctrines, which Gregory XVI then condemned in September 1855 with the brief
Dum acerbissimus. Appointed bishop of Eichstätt in 1836, he founded there the diocesan ecclesiastical seminary and promoted popular missions there. Transferred to the archbishopric of Munich-Freising, after the crisis of 1848 he asked the civil authorities to annul every legislative provision contrary to the Concordat of 1817. This request of R., together with the whole Bavarian episcopate, and in particular the constancy displayed in securing for the Church the rights fixed in the Concordat, in the end became troublesome to King Maximilian II, who sought to have the archbishop transferred, regarding him as responsible for the difficulties that had arisen in relations between Church and State. The sovereign vainly attempted to persuade Archbishop Geissel to cede to R. the administration of the archbishopric of Cologne in exchange for that of Munich-Freising, addressing to the Pontiff the request that R. cease from the government of the archdiocese. Pius IX, not wishing to push the conflict further, granted the King's wish, created R. cardinal on December 17, 1855 and called him to be part of the pontifical Curia. Prefect of the Sacred Congregation of Studies, he was appointed in 1867 president of one of the preparatory commissions of the Vatican Council.
Bibliography4 works
Silvio Furlani