Sarnelli, Maria Gennaro, Venerable

SARNELLI, Maria Gennaro, Venerable. - Preacher and ascetical writer, firstborn of the barons of Ciorani, b. in Naples on 12 Sept. 1702, d. there on 30 June 1744. Set to university studies, he became a lawyer. Later, having taken the ecclesiastical habit, he attended the College of the Chinese founded by M. Ripa. A priest in 1732, he joined the Neapolitan Apostolic Missions, and in 1733 entered at Scala the Congregation founded by St. Alphonsus M. de Liguori, of whom he was a tireless disciple. He lived almost always in Naples, devoting himself to the poor of the street, to the sick in hospitals, to the conversion of sinners.

A zealous social reformer, he carried out initiatives amid misunderstandings and sacrifices. He fought sentimentalism and formalism in the Christian life, educating the people in private and public meditation on the eternal truths. Continuing the moral reclamation begun by St. Francis de Geronimo, he fought, also on juridical grounds, against unbridled prostitution and brought about the intervention of King Charles of Bourbon, who in 1738 had the sinful women gathered into a separate quarter. He was then a pioneer of the Anti-Blasphemy League, mobilizing bishops and magistrates to root out insolent language. He accompanied the threefold campaign with preaching and books, of which the Mondo santificato (1738), the Mondo riformato (1739), the Cristiano santificato (1739), the Anima illuminata (1740), the Ecclesiastico santificato (1741), etc., still deserve to be read. The Anima desolata (1740) and the Discrezione degli spiriti (1741) have a mystical character. All his works are gathered in a collection of 14 volumes (Naples 1848-51), some of which were translated into other languages, such as Le glorie e grandezza della divina Madre (ibid. 1739). He is buried in Naples, in the church of S. Antonio a Tarsia. Pius X in 1906 proclaimed the heroicity of his virtues.

Celestino Testore

riche per illustrare... gli atti della Congr. delle Apostoliche Missioni, II, Naples 1768, pp. 343-46; R. Giovine, Vita del gran servo di Dio p. G. M. S., Naples 1858; F. Dumortier, Le venir. serv. de Dieu le p. J. M. S., Paris 1886 (Italian trans. Naples 1889); Neapolit. beatif. et canoniz. p. J. M. S. positio, Rome 1889; M. De Meulemeester, Bibliographie générale des écrivains rédemptoristes, II, Louvain 1935, pp. 373-77; III, ibid. 1939, p. 379.

Oreste Gregorio