Europe in 1999.
The Pope Casts his Lot in the New World. Complications in Europe
Rendered his Residence in Rome Undesirable. No Refuge in Europe
Available for his Holiness. Generous Offer of the Southern States
of the American Union. The Papal See transferred to Rio Janeiro
in 1945.
The relations of the United States of the Americas with Italy in 1999
were of a character that demand more than a passing notice, going
far to illustrate the political eminence that had been attained in
that year by the great American Republic.
In the year 1927, the long standing and severe tension that had
existed between the Papacy and the Italian government ever since
Napoleon III in 1870 withdrew his French garrison from the Holy City,
became greatly intensified and had reached an acute stage that proved
beyond human endurance.
The strained relations between the Vatican and the Quirinal had
reached a critical stage. The fierce struggle between Church and
State had attained a point of utmost tension. It became obvious,
even in that year, that the break and parting of the ways could not be
very distant. In 1927 the Popes of Rome had already been prisoners in
the palace of the Vatican for a period of over fifty years. Patience
in their case had ceased to be a virtue. Rome had long been a house
divided against itself and its rule under two kings could not always
endure. The delicate position of the Pope became a most unenviable
one. The insolence of the Roman rabble even found its way under
the glorious dome of St. Peter, where, on Palm Sunday, in the year
1923 Pope Pius X was insulted by a clique from the Roman slums. That
the Holy Pontiff, the spiritual ruler and sovereign of 328,000,000
Catholics, should experience insult in St. Peter's, his citadel of
strength and power, proved a scandal beyond belief.
Convinced that his temporal power was forever broken, Pope Leo
XIV in the year [The Pope Decides to Leave.] 1945 decided, after
consulting a Conclave of Cardinals, to abandon the city of Romulus
and Remus and to shake from his sandals the dust of ancient Rome. It
was at first thought that the College of Cardinals would check their
baggage and take the overland route to Avignon, in southern France,
an honor which many centuries before had already fallen to the lot
of that ancient municipality.
But it was otherwise decreed and great was the astonishment of the
world when its nerves were thoroughly startled by the startling news
that Pope Leo XIV had elected to remove the Papal See from Rome and
to establish it in the United States of the Americas. The world's
astonishment was akin to consternation when the news of this radical
change of base was first announced and it was learned that the Vatican
intended to cast its lot in the new world.
A proposition to transplant the Papal See from its ancient anchorage in
the Italian [It Startles One's Nerves.] peninsula into the new world
would have been scouted in 1899 with scorn and derision as the wild
phantasy of a babbling maniac. People living in 1899 might perhaps have
seriously entertained a proposition to remove the pyramids of Egypt
from their ancient foundations and transfer them to the sandlots of
San Francisco, to open up a Chinese laundry in the King's Chamber; a
proposition to dispatch an army of laborers with shovels to the crater
of Vesuvius and attempt to extinguish that volcano by shoveling in
sand, might, in 1899, have been regarded as a plausible undertaking;
the attempt of a delegation of Protestant ministers to personally
convert the Sultan of Turkey from Mohamedanism and induce him to attend
a camp-meeting, might have commended itself to all good citizens in
1899, but the startling proposition to remove the Papal Court from
ancient Rome to South America, appeared to all minds in 1899 as the
most improbable of all improbabilities, yet in 1945, (forty-six years
later,) the public mind was better prepared for this great change
and the removal of the Court of Rome in that year to Rio Janeiro was
entertained in better grace and in a more conciliatory spirit.
In 1945 the position of the Papacy in Rome was no longer endurable. The
[Rome Unsafe for the Pontiff.] sacred person of the Pontiff became
no longer safe within the precincts of the Eternal City. The Vatican
had been frequently violated by mobs from the banks of the Tiber and
the slums of Rome, over which the Italian government could effect
no control. The revered head of the church, like his Divine Master
while on earth, knew not where to lay his head.
Europe in 1945 had no refuge or shelter to offer to His
Holiness. Russia, the home of the Greek church, could offer him no
asylum, where one of his exalted rank might dwell in peace. Austria,
that steadfast and ever faithful son of the church, would gladly
have sheltered the Papal Court, assuring it permanent safety and
a splendor commensurate with its prestige, but, unfortunately for
Austria in 1945 that country was rent in twain, a shadow of its former
greatness. Hungary had long enjoyed her richly merited independence
and in that year had become a leading European power.
The eyes of the Papacy could not turn to Spain for succor in
1945. Spain in that year was reduced to a barren waste, having expiated
her crime of 1930, that of employing powerful fulminants from air-ships
to destroy two African cities. France in 1945 had no refuge to offer
the Pope. As a result of two unfortunate wars, she had passed into
the custody of Germany, occupying the position of a mere vassal.
Realizing the serious difficulties which environed the Papal See in
1945, the Catholic states of the southern tier of the United States
of the Americas, known as South America, made an urgent appeal that
the Court of Rome might be removed into their midst.
Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, Chile, Peru, Venezuela, Brazil, Uruguay,
Argentina, [The South to the Rescue.] Paraguay and Patagonia levied
contributions among the faithful and between them the munificient
sum of $500,000,000 was raised, to be placed at the disposal of the
Pope. Accompanying this gift offering was sent an earnest petition and
prayer that the Pope would consent to abide in the new world, where a
splendid reservation consisting of 17,000 square miles of choice lands
had been placed at his disposal in the neighborhood of Rio Janeiro.
In the petition of the South American States praying His Holiness
to acquiesce in this important project, it was pointed out that the
Pope would be domiciled upon the only continent which was catholic in
its entirety, with no creed to oppose, and, in removing the throne
of St. Peter to Rio Janeiro, the Pope would occupy the position of
a patriarch surrounded by his faithful children. The invisible, but
none the less galling fetters, that had enslaved the Pope since 1870,
making him virtually a prisoner in the Vatican, would be entirely
removed. In the State of Brazil he might rule a principality of no
mean proportions, far larger and immeasurably more wealthy than the
Papal kingdom of 1870 when Pius IX was yet King of Rome. The catholic
citizens of South America represented fully the many advantages of
removing the Papal Court from the old into the new world.
It will be recollected that in 1999 the total population of the
United States of the Americas amounted to 531,000,000. Of this vast
population at least 175,000,000 citizens residing in South America
were adherents of the church of Rome.
The liberal offer that came from the South American States received
the utmost [The Pope Accepts the Offer.] attention from the Papal
authorities. To withdraw from that ancient city seemed like the
uprooting of all traditions. The irreligious were prone to make merry
over the proposition, predicting with strange irreverence, that in
Rio Janeiro the Pope would feel like a cat in a strange garret. But
with such innuendoes we have nothing in common. Let history proceed
undisturbed in its course.
It required a heroic sacrifice to give up Rome, filled with the
most precious historic memories, a city in which lies enshrined the
dust of St. Peter's successors. This step meant the abandonment of
that magnificent cathedral, which in 1999 still formed an aureole
of glory about the Eternal City. But Rome in 1945 was no longer a
safe tabernacle for the Papacy. Its mobs were unbridled in their
license. The person of the Pontiff was no longer safe within the
walls of the Vatican. The Italian government proved to be an abettor,
if not an instigator, of these outrages.
With a dark, threatening cloud hovering over the throne of St. Peter
in Europe, and [All Headed for the West.] on the other hand, bright
skies and a most alluring and tempting prospect eagerly awaiting its
transferment to Rio de Janeiro, after long hesitation and endless
Conclaves, the Sacred College of Cardinals, (the Pope concurring,)
gave its official sanction in 1945 to the removal of the Papal See
to the Western Hemisphere, under the ægis of the great American
Constitution, the noblest document ever written by the fallible pen
of man, a charter which protects and defends all who are worthy and
they who seek its sheltering folds.