From "Aeterni Patris" to the Crisis of Modernity (1879-1910)

After the Italian State took over the Collegio Romano building (1873) and its adjoining premises - the magnificent library, the scientific laboratory, the Kircher Museum, the astronomical observatory - and turned them into public institutions, the Institute was transferred to the premises of the Borromeo Palace in via del Seminario. It was thus restored to its original status. With a rescript of December 4, 1873, Pius IX allowed the Roman College to assume the title of Pontifical Gregorian University of the Roman College (“Pontificia Università Gregoriana del Collegio Romano”), suppressing the literary schools and limiting its academic activities to theological and philosophical studies. In 1878 the number of students was down to about 400 due to the punitive fees imposed by the Italian authorities.

However, before moving to the current premises in Piazza della Pilotta (1930), some very important developments were to take place. In particular, we shall refer to two events whose consequences had an impact on the Church. These are the restoration of Thomism and the condemnation of Modernism.

 

The developments of Neo-Thomism: from doctrinal unity to uniformity

During his rectorate [1824-29], Luigi Taparelli d’Azeglio made every effort to re-establish Thomism, but with very limited success. When he arrived in Rome (1847), the soon-to-be Cardinal Newman likewise expressed surprise at the lack of interest in the work and thought of Thomas Aquinas. In his contributions to La Civiltà Cattolica, Matteo Liberatore (1810-92)^[1],  took a leading role in promoting the rebirth of Thomistic thought. He furthered the teachings of St Thomas in Catholic schools at a time when idealism prevailed in seminaries and religious colleges.

Shortly after his election (February 20, 1878), Pope Leo XIII asked the Gregoriana to revive Thomistic studies. On November 28 he received the members of the faculty, led by the Rector, Ugo Molza, to whom he expressed his full confidence in the future of this institution, whose prestige was now widely recognised and which, at his behest, was to become the first Catholic institution that embraced neo-Thomism. The rebirth of Scholasticism continued and reached its climax during the pontificate with the Encyclical Letter Aeterni Patris (4 August 1979), whose preparation Father Liberatore had played an important part in.

The Pope appointed Joseph Kleutgen as director of studies, but this post was soon terminated for health reasons. He was replaced by Camillo Mazzella, who had moved to Rome from Jersey. He served as Professor of Dogmatic Theology from 1879 and as Prefect of Studies (1880-'86) until his appointment as Cardinal. In the brief Gravissime nos (December 30, 1892), Leo XIII publicly acknowledged the solicitude with which the Gregoriana had met the papal requests^[2].

 

 

The doctrinal philosophy of Aquinas adopted by the University meant that several professors at the Gregoriana had to give up their professorships to foreign lecturers. For the first time since the restoration of the Society (1814), the University’s teaching staff took on an international dimension. Juan J. Urráburu, summoned from Spain to replace the eclectic Professor Salvatore Tongiorgi as Dean of Philosophy, became a prolific writer and commentator on St. Thomas. Domenico Palmieri and Alessandro Care were replaced by orthodox Thomists. Louis Billot, summoned from the Jesuit scholasticate of Jersey by Leo XIII to promote Thomist studies in Rome, was an equally passionate Thomist. He arrived at the Gregoriana in 1885 and held the chair of dogmatic theology until 1910, a year before his appointment as cardinal. A leading figure in metaphysical theology, Billot dismissed other glossators of Aquinas when he found them in disagreement with what he believed to be the philosophy of St. Thomas, drawing on St. Augustine and Bossuet. His dogmatic texts (De Trinitate, De Verbo incarnato, De Eucharestia) were much appreciated by his students, including Eugenio Pacelli - the future Pope Pius XII - and Emmanuel Suhard, Cardinal Archbishop of Paris (1940 - ‘49). Palazzo Borromeo, where Jesuit Father Guido Mattiusi delivered the lectures of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas, played a significant role in the dissemination of Aquinas’ teachings.

By the end of the century, the total number of enrolled students had risen from 415 in 1880 to over a thousand. The student population represented some twenty different nationalities, as well as almost all the religious congregations and seminaries in Rome. After the upheavals of the early 19th century, the Gregoriana was once again an international university in the heart of Catholic Christianity. In the last decade of the century, philosophy was taught by Michele De Maria (Prefect of Studies), Pio De Mandato and Vincenzo Remer, whose Summa Philosophiae was one of the most acclaimed texts. Emilio De Augustinis and Felice Pignataro taught at the Faculty of Theology. A rigorous Thomism, devoid of external influences but nevertheless exhaustive, was imparted to students of different nationalities so as to provide them with the necessary training to face the currents of modern philosophy.

 

The Jesuits confronted with Catholic Modernism

When the anti-liberal intransigence was redirected by Leo XIII (1893), in the framework of a project for the integral restoration of the Society, supported by the proposal of Thomism as a guiding philosophical doctrine, the developments in social doctrine and the impetus given to historical and scientific studies favoured initiatives that challenged certain principles, such as the principle of the irreconcilability between the Catholic Church and the advances of the modern age, solemnly proclaimed in the Syllabus.

Modernism was born at the very time when Leo XIII’s policy of freedom was reviving ecclesiastical studies. In fact, it was more than a movement, it was an approach to the Magisterium. Its main proponents were Alfred Loisy and George Tyrrell. Loisy, a teacher at the Institut Catholique in Paris until 1893, disagreed with the unchanging truth of the New Testament revelation. In L’Evangile et l’Église (1902; The Gospel and the Church) he put forward a theory that undermined the entire dogmatic foundation of the faith. He argued that the whole doctrine, including the message of Christ, was conditioned and limited by the times, i.e., there was no distinction between development and change. Tyrrell, a Jesuit and professor at the Stonyhurst Scholasticate, argued in an anonymous article published in the Italian newspaper ‘Corriere della sera’ that the truths of the faith must be expressed anew by every generation in every age.

 

 

At the Gregoriana, Billot was the chief opponent of modernism, which he challenged in De immutabilitate traditionis, offering new clarifications on tradition, the remote and proximate rule of faith, theological methodology and dogmatic advance. Some expressions of the anti-modernist oath (September 1, 1910) coincide with those adopted by Billot in the second edition of the aforementioned text (1907). Oddly enough, in the course of the controversial process initiated in Rome, Loisy found a supporter in Father Enrico Gismondi, Professor of Oriental Languages at the Gregoriana (1888-1912) and Consultor to the Pontifical Biblical Commission and the Index.

The election of Pius X (4 August 1903) marked a decisive turning point in the process of censorship of Loisy’s works in Rome, including five texts that had already been placed on the Index in late 1903.

Pope Pius X initiated a process that culminated in the decree of the Holy Office, Lamentabili, and the encyclical Pascendi (September 8, 1907). In the former, the Pope rejected the arguments in favour of the practical value of dogmas and the idea that the ecclesia discerns, as well as the assertion that revelation was not completed with the Apostles. In Pascendi, it is not only the ideas of Billot that are recognisable, but also many excerpts from his works. At the same time, he reaffirmed scholastic philosophy as the foundation of all priestly formation^[3].

Pius X enjoyed the support of Father Mattiussi, whom he appointed to replace Billot at the Gregoriana (1911). One of Pope Sarto’s last documents was Quanta semper cura of 29 June 1914. Reiterating the dispositions formulated in Sacrorum antistitum (1910) against the spreading doctrines of modernism, materialism, monism and pantheism, he recommended the study of Thomist philosophy in Catholic schools and seminaries, which Father Mattiussi had reduced to twenty-four theses promulgated by the Congregation for Seminaries (March 7, 1916). The doctrinal unity of the Church and of the Gregoriana was effective in a world permeated by anti-Christian ideologies, but the strict adherence to Thomism – which had become uniformity – unquestionably slowed down the progress of Catholic theology.