SOMALIA

SOMALIA - Concrete bridge over the Uebi Scébeli at Mahaddei.

by Pavia. Hence in some documents the wording: “Clerici Regulares a Somasca sancti Maioli de Papia.”

Meanwhile, the orphanages of the Veneto had been joined by those of Lombardy, Liguria, Piedmont, Romagna, the Marches, and Tuscany; in Cremona and Milan the Fathers had taken up and embraced as their own the work of Christian Doctrine, thereby earning the popular title of “Fathers of the Works.” In 1566 St. Charles Borromeo entrusted to the Somaschi the parish of Somasca, recently established, and placed under their full direction a rural seminary there. Thus the Order broadened its initial scope. The success of this new direction met with full approval, so much so that Cardinal Madruzzi, Prince-Bishop of Trent, entrusted to them the seminary, followed by those of Venice, Alessandria, Rome, Lodi, Naples, Tortona, Treviso, Cremona, and Brescia. Then, when in 1595 Clement VIII called the Somaschi to govern the largest college in Rome, known as the Clementine College, for the education of noblemen destined for any career, the Order acquired its definitive character, which has remained unchanged in the centuries that followed: care of orphans, instruction of youth, and assistance to the secular clergy in parishes.

Later, other colleges were accepted: in Brescia, Salò, Bergamo, Venice (known as the Ducal Seminary), and four in Naples. This expansion of Somascan institutions throughout every region of Italy was accompanied by an increase in the so-called “professed houses,” that is, houses of religious formation. In 1627 the religious numbered 438, and in 1713, 450; the orphans were 300; the boarders and other pupils in the colleges numbered over 1,000. In 1616 the Congregation of Christian Doctrine in France, founded by the Venerable Servant of God César de Bus, requested to be aggregated to the Order of the Somaschi; Paul V granted this, though maintaining a certain distinction, so much so that the prepositus general bore the following long title: Prepositus General of the Clerics Regular of Somasca in Italy and of Christian Doctrine in France. In 1626, Urban VIII reconfirmed the union and also approved the Constitutions and rules common to both institutions. Thirty years later, however, the French Doctrinarians, desirous of regaining their former autonomous form—also because they were excluded from the generalship—requested and obtained from Innocent X permission to reconstitute themselves as a separate congregation. In 1661, Alexander VII prescribed the division of the Order into three provinces: the Lombard, comprising the Duchies of Milan, Savoy, Mantua, and Parma; the Venetian, within the Republic of Venice; and finally the Roman, which extended from Tuscany to all of southern Italy and included Liguria. Meanwhile, the Order had spread even further. In 1583, Cardinal Tolomeo Gallio entrusted to the Somaschi the college that still bears his name in Como, with the explicit purpose of serving as a bulwark against Lutheranism in the city. During the plague of 1630, about a third of the priests died, but a rapid recovery was noted after the terrible scourge, so much so that the golden age of the Order was almost immediately recorded. During this period, the Somaschi provided the Church with 22 bishops, including 4 cardinals; they held chairs in several universities, and when Clement XIV suppressed the Jesuits in 1773, the Somaschi replaced them in some of their institutions, for example, at the Nunziatella in Naples.

Also from this period were Fr. Jacopo Stellini, a philosopher who continued and documented Vico’s theories; Gian Antonio Santini, professor at the Sapienza, correspondent of Galileo and chosen by St. Joseph Calasanz to establish the first Scolopi; Gaspare Leonarducci, a poet of good repute and restorer of the cult of Dante; the theologian Agostino De Angelis, later Bishop of Umbriatico; and among the pupils, Benedict XIV, who completed all his studies with the Somaschi, first in Bologna and then at the Clementine College in Rome. Also belonging to the Somaschi was Fr. Giuseppe Maria Puiati, a famous Jansenist who, despite his great learning and irreproachable life, asked and obtained permission to leave the Order.

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SOMASCHI - The Sanctuary of St. Jerome and the Mother House - Somasca.

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(courtesy of the Somaschi Fathers, Rome) The Sanctuary of St. Jerome and the Mother House - Somasca.

In 1796, laicism launched its first attacks. The Republic of Venice forbade religious from attending General Chapters and ordered them to govern themselves separately; almost immediately, Austria did the same in Lombardy. Thus the Order was split into three branches, and in 1784 four provinces were created from the territories where it was still free, namely the Piedmontese, Ligurian, Roman, and Neapolitan. But in 1798 the King of Naples cut off even the latter. Though remaining united internally, the Order could not but suffer from the lack of governmental unity. Therefore, following the closure of other houses by the French in 1797, the entire Order had to be reduced to a single province; indeed, in 1810, at the time of the Napoleonic suppression, the Somaschi retained only the single house at Lugano.

When Pius VII restored the religious orders on 22 August 1814, the Somaschi were able to reconstitute themselves fairly easily in Piedmont, Liguria, and the Papal States, thanks chiefly to Fathers who, at the time of the suppression, had managed to remain in some houses as parish priests or private holders of colleges. Four years later, the novitiate at Somasca was reopened, and the Piedmontese, Genoese, and Roman provinces were reconstituted, followed later by the Venetian and Lombard, which were united into one. Of the previous religious houses, only the Gallio College in Como and the novitiate with the parish of Somasca were resumed. With the suppressions of 1866 and 1874, eighteen houses were lost, including the Clementine College, and 165 religious priests and 65 lay brothers were dispersed.

Various attempts to open houses abroad failed, and it was only in 1901 that it became possible to open a college in Bellinzona in the Canton of Ticino, and in 1921, responding to repeated requests from bishops, they established themselves in the Republic of El Salvador in Central America, and then in Honduras. In 1939, a commissariat was formed in Central America. At present, the Somaschi number 300; they care for about 700 orphans; the pupils in their schools number over 1,000; they have 26 houses in Italy, 1 in Switzerland, and 6 in Central America.