The Sacred Congregation known as that of the Propaganda Fide, is formed,
at present, like all the other Congregations of Rome, of a number of
Cardinals, Prelates and officials, presided over by a Cardinal Prefect.
They form a Corporate Body, and their duty is to conduct what we might
call the foreign department in the vast administration of the Vicar of
Christ.
At one period, at the very commencement, the Propaganda was conducted in
person by St. Peter and his successors. It remained during nearly the
whole of the first Pope’s lifetime his own principal occupation. He had
to convert both Jews and Gentiles before he had a Church of any great
extent to rule. He had, however, it must be confessed, a very excellent
“Prefect of the Propaganda” in St. Paul, who carried out the work the
Sacred Congregation now sees to, both by himself and his numerous
companions and disciples. St. Paul died a Bishop of no particular
locality—he was, so to speak, very like many of his successors and his
present one, Cardinal Simeoni, an _episcopus in partibus infidelium_. He
did great and lasting work, but on his death the successors of St. Peter
had to find out other means to carry on the evangelization of the world.
And they succeeded wonderfully from that day to this. We see them ruling
with admirable wisdom, sanctity, and authority the vast empire left them
mainly by the exertions of St. Peter and St. Paul; never forgetting the
peculiar labours of the one or the other. The evangelization of the
nations as well the government and teaching of the Church was never
omitted by any one of them. From their side, principally, went forth
those crowds of holy men who continued to prosecute the work of the
evangelization of the world, until from the extreme limits of this then
British Province, to the sands of the Great African Desert, and from
the Pillars of Hercules to the frontiers of Persia, the persecuting
Roman Empire had the followers of Christ in the army, in the navy, in
every department, and even in the Courts of the terrible, anti-Christian
Emperors themselves. They caused Christians to fill the towns, and spread
at last to the remotest villages of the Empire, and then to be found far
beyond its borders. And when the whole East and West, after ten terrific
struggles, at last embraced the Cross, the successors of St. Peter with
renewed zeal and increased resources attempted the evangelization of all
then known, barbarous nations.
I say increased resources, for even in these times of persecution the
Roman Pontiffs were not destitute of temporal means. The generous piety
of the faithful recognised their immense responsibility, and supplied
the means which heartless infidelity now strives to deprive them of. The
Roman Pontiff, even when compelled to lay hidden in the Catacombs, was
the father of the orphan, and of the widow, and of the poor. From the
crypts of the Catacombs, as well as, afterwards, from the portals of the
Vatican, he sent forth a never ceasing stream of apostolic men who at his
bidding, and with his blessing, and with his authority, went forth to the
very ends of the earth for the evangelization of the heathen, and the
consolation of the people of God.
On this point you will allow me to quote a passage from the writings
of a great French Prelate, Monsigneur Dupanloup, whom our present Holy
Father has characterised as “the glory and the consolation of France” in
his day. No one who recollects his history will doubt for a moment the
weight of his authority. He says:
“Mother and Mistress of all Churches, the Church of Rome was from that
time what she ought to be, viz., the richest, the most powerful, and
also the most generous in her gifts. The Faithful throughout the world
venerated her as the centre of Catholicity; and lavished their wealth
upon her, together with their obedience and their love. They did not wish
the head of their religion and the Vicar of JESUS CHRIST to be unequal
to the immense calls of his spiritual administration; they wished the
Pope to have sufficient to meet all the requirements of the universal
mission which had been confided to him, the enormous disbursements that
he was obliged to make for the welfare of so many people confided to
his care, and also for the nations which were still infidel, to whom it
was his duty to send the light of faith, by bishops, priests, deacons,
and apostolic missionaries. Hence the riches of the Roman Church from
the time of the persecutions; hence the considerable possessions which
she enjoyed a long time before Constantine; hence also the generous
liberalities which she lavished upon the world, as Eusebius tells us,
for the maintenance of a large number of the clergy, of widows and of
orphans, and of the poor as well as for the propagation of the faith,
and the foundation of Christianity in the most distant countries.
Eusebius cites Syria and Arabia, and our own histories add the Gauls
and the Spains to these countries. This was not all; it was necessary
that while buried still in the Catacombs, the Papacy should maintain
apostolic notaries to keep the acts of the martyrs, and to be ever ready
to reply to the questions for consultation almost daily addressed by all
the Churches, whilst at the same time, the Roman Church was sending
numbers of ships across the sea laden with alms. Such was even before
the peace of the Church, the temporal power with which the faith of
Christians surrounded the Apostolic See, and of which the charity of
the Popes made so noble a use for the welfare of nations. Monuments and
the most celebrated facts teach us that the Roman Church, in order to
supply so many wants, not only possessed vessels of gold and silver and
a great number of moveable goods, but also, considerable capital. The
Pagans sometimes respected, sometimes carried off, these possessions.
Constantine ordered, says Eusebius, that restitution should be made to
the clergy of the _houses, the possessions, fields, gardens, and other
goods of which they had been unjustly deprived_. What a strange thing!
that Paganism should recognise that the Church had a right to property,
and yet this is in the present day contested by nations which call
themselves Christian.”[24]
With the resources here so eloquently indicated, the Popes, even in
the earliest ages, provided for the evangelization of the most distant
nations. Indeed, we scarcely meet with a single Pontificate, not
illustrated with this blessed characteristic of the Apostolic ministry—a
characteristic which became more marked as time rolled on. Just as the
Church had attained its first triumph, the Pope, who had most to do
with the conversion of Constantine, and with the splendid works of that
Monarch for religion, was consoled by the conversion of the Iberians
near the Black Sea, and of the Abyssinians beyond the distant, southern
confines of ancient Egypt. The Popes aided the terribly tried Christians
of Persia, under the long persecutions of Sapor and his successors, just
as Leo XIII. aids the persecuted Christians of China as I speak. We know
of the solicitude of St. Celestine in selecting and sending Palladius, a
dignitary of the Roman Curia, to convert the Irish and Picts. Then came
the mighty Mission of St. Patrick, received at Rome from the same Holy
Pontiff, and solemnly confirmed by his successor. Soon after, St. Leo
the Great sent St. Valentinus, to carry the glad tidings of Redemption
to those tribes once so formidable to Roman power, who inhabited the
forests bordering on the Danube and the Rhine. St. Severinus, authorized
by the same authority, was contemporaneously carrying the faith to
Pannonia and Norica. The Rhetians and the faithful Tyrolese received,
through the solicitude of Pope Leo, the grace of the faith, also from
St. Severinus. Besides those absolute and direct conversions, by saints
from the very side of the Roman Pontiff, every national conversion made,
was helped on, and had to be watched over, by his fatherly, evangelical
care. The conversion of Clovis and the Franks, and other barbarians;
the destruction of Arianism amidst the fierce tribes who embraced that
heresy, and brought it with them on their conquests; the care of the
Faith amongst the ever-fickle Catholics in the East; the ecclesiastical
formation of new realms, gained over by the Apostles despatched for
the purpose, constantly exercised the zeal of the Sovereign Pontiffs
in those days. Who does not know the love and care manifested by St.
Gregory the Great for the desolate Anglo-Saxon ancestors of the people
now inhabiting England, and so strangely in many instances forgetful,
or worse than forgetful, of the debt of gratitude they owe the Popes?
It was not so with the ancient Catholics of that land. The intercourse
between them and then far-off Rome, was greater than it is to-day, with
all our modern appliances for swift and easy travelling. But then, not
as now, it was love of God and not of travel, that brought the crowds of
Anglo-Saxon pilgrims to Rome. They loved to see Christ’s Vicar, to visit
the tombs of the Apostles and Martyrs, and to manifest the gratitude
of their nation at the Shrine of the real Apostle of England, Pope St.
Gregory the Great. The same Pontiff was as zealous and as successful in
converting all that remained of the Donatist heretics in Africa as in
evangelizing the people of Britain. The care of his successors for the
vast conversions wrought by the multitude of Irish missionary saints
amongst the Pagans during the early middle ages, and of missionary saints
like St. Boniface and St. Willibrord, who came from England, is just as
remarkable. The connection of the Popes with SS. Cyril and Methodius, the
Apostles of the Bulgarians, the Moravians, and the Bohemians, has been
recently brought very prominently before the world of our day, by our
present Holy Father who has just built a church to honour their memory,
over the remains of St. Cyril, one of the two, who died in Rome. Pope St.
Nicholas the Great and Pope John VIII. sent bishops, priests, and ample
assistance to the same evangelic labourers, who are the Apostles and
civilizers not only of the nations before-mentioned, but also of Moravia,
Silesia, Bosnia, Circassia, Russia, Dalmatia, Panoramia, Dacia, Carinthia
and several neighbouring nations. Under Pope Sylvester II. the great
warlike nation of the Hungarians became converted by the zeal of their
truly apostolic King, St. Stephen; and to this day the crown sent by the
Pope to that Monarch, is used in the coronation of the Kings of Hungary
(now the Emperors of Austria), who retain with just pride the privilege
to have the Cross borne before them, and to take the title of Apostolic
Majesty, both given by the Pope. With every conversion which afterwards
took place in the North of Europe or elsewhere, the Popes had the same
intimate connection, and their Apostolic zeal never flagged until a still
wider field than ever opened out for it by the discovery of America, and
the coming of that unfortunate torrent of heresy and schism from which
all our present religious misfortunes flow, and which is known under the
name of the Reformation.
The Popes of this period dealt with the duties brought upon them by one
and the other of these momentous events, as became their traditions and
their obligations. The vast fields opened up for Missionary zeal by the
discoveries of Columbus and Vasco di Gama were soon occupied by their
care. It was, after all, but a phase in the kind of evangelization which
their predecessors had carried on in one part or another of the world,
since the days of St. Peter and St. Paul.
More difficult far became the task of repairing the injury done to many
countries by the ravage occasioned by many reformers of many minds and
many degrees of hatred for Catholicity. Wars followed fast upon doctrinal
differences. The face of whole kingdoms changed. Radical political
changes grew apace. The work of the conversion of England, Scotland,
Prussia, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and several minor German States had
to be commenced over again, with the difference that heresy was a far
more redoubtable opponent than Paganism of any kind. It was a system
of various-phased negations constantly changing, never knowing its own
Christian belief, and satisfied only upon some points which it refused
to hold in common with the Church of God. Its systems, all made by men,
according to caprice, or logical necessity springing from error, differed
one from the other fully as much as all differed from the Catholic faith
of ages. The reasoning to be used against one sect would not suit against
another. On points of the most vital importance all held opposite views.
Some would have it that Christ was God, and others that He was not. Some
held for Grace and others for pure Pelagianism. Some admitted the Real
Presence, and others regarded that doctrine as idolatrous. One party held
out for more or less sacramental efficacy, and others denied it, in part
or entirely. So the babel went on, in nothing united save in hatred and
opposition to the one, stable, changeless truth of the old religion. In
Ireland, in France, in Germany, wars took place between fellow-countrymen
on points of doctrine. In England and other countries the party in
opposition to Catholicity found out, as they thought, not only that the
religion of their forefathers for generations was wrong, but they further
considered it to be their duty to deprive such of their fellow-citizens
as continued to hold the old Faith, of goods, of liberty, of civil
_status_, and even of life itself. Almost everywhere in Europe, confusion
and anger reigned in those sadly troubled times.
None experienced more difficulty in dealing with the perplexing
responsibilities arising from the Reformation than the Roman Pontiffs.
The business of the Holy See increased to an enormous extent. Several
new Congregations had to be formed by the action of the Council of Trent
alone. Every department of Church administration had to be remodelled.
New Orders arose providentially to meet the needs of the times. These
had to be guided and watched over. Contemporaneously with the religious
troubles in Europe, new fields for Missionary enterprise were opened up
in America, in Asia, in Africa, even in some of the Isles of the Pacific.
Mahometanism, instead of subsiding, began to grow more menacing.
England, Scotland, and most of the Northern Kingdoms of Europe ceased
to be Catholic. The fires of the sanctuary were completely quenched in
Denmark, Prussia, Sweden, Norway and several German Principalities.
Ireland sustained the full pressure of the power of England to force
her—though, thank God, in vain—to abjure the Faith. France was in a state
of civil war on account of religion. Switzerland was divided. Hungary,
Poland, and Bohemia wavered. The work of real Reformation in purely
Catholic countries; the repression of attempts at schism from without
and disorder from within; occupied the common Father of the Faithful
unceasingly. It was when the difficulties of his position increased to
such an extent, that it was morally impossible for him to attend any
longer, personally, to everything required for the purpose of spreading
the Faith, that he at last called in the assistance of a special
Congregation to assist him in a work which his predecessors had at all
periods of their previous history discharged by themselves alone.
Gregory XIII. filled the Chair of St. Peter at the period when the work
of the evangelization of the nations pressed heaviest. He may be said to
have employed himself solely in that work. For the wants of the Germans
and Hungarians he had, out of his own resources, founded and perpetually
endowed a magnificent College which still subsists in Rome. He formed
the English College for the resuscitation of the Faith in Britain; the
Polish College for the Poles; and for the vast missions then evangelized
by the zeal of the newly formed Society of Jesus, he built and endowed
the magnificent Roman College of the Gesu, wherein he placed no less than
three hundred cells for students and twenty auditories for instruction.
Out of this went the men whose eloquence resounded along the banks of the
Rhine, and whose holy lives, boundless zeal and great learning won back
millions in the German Fatherland to the Faith. Thence, too, went forth
the men who penetrated into the heart of the old civilization of China,
to the East and West Indies, and to the fastnesses and virgin forests of
the newly-discovered tribes of America. Gregory XIII. embraced in his
zeal the East as well as the West. He founded in Rome Colleges for the
Greeks, and for the Maronites of Mount Libanus. Nor did he forget, in his
care for far-off nations, the claims of his own See. The Jews of Ghetto
and the youth of Rome have to thank his great heart for permanent means
established for their care and education. He was the patron of physical
science as well as of sacred studies; and to him, to Gregory XIII., Hugo
Buoncompagno, the modern world is indebted for the reformation of the
Calendar on a basis more correct than that attempted before him by a man
more famous, but not so great in works of real utility, Julius Cæsar, the
first of the rulers of Imperial Rome.
The work of what may be called the Foreign Missions increased to such
overwhelming proportions through the enlightened Christian zeal of this
great Pope, that he found himself compelled to call in the assistance of
a few Cardinals, and to commit to their vigilance the duty of watching
over the Propagation of the Faith. These Cardinals could be scarcely
called a Congregation. They were more a kind of committee of vigilance to
keep the Pope posted in what should be effected by the centre of unity
for the evangelization of the world. But the idea had its origin in the
necessity which forced the Pontiff to call them together at all, and it
soon produced its fruit. The successors of Gregory were forced to advert
to it from the impossibility of dealing with every case; and at last
Gregory XV., of the famous Bolognese family, of the Ludovisi, determined
to found a real, formal, Sacred Congregation, for the work which we may
call the Foreign Office of the Church. He not only established it, but
conferred the most ample powers upon it, and gave it large means to
commence that beneficent action, which was soon everywhere felt in the
immense regions over which it exercised the paternal solicitude of the
Vicar of Christ.
Gregory XV. founded the Sacred Congregation of the Propaganda by a
Bull bearing date July 22nd, 1622. In this he clearly made known, that
his intention was to establish a department of Church administration
and action which should assiduously attend to the important duty,
hitherto discharged by his predecessors alone, without special organized
assistance, of extending the Faith in countries where it did not exist,
and of restoring it in places where it may have been lost or injured. The
duty of the Congregation was, according to the words of this Bull, “to
study diligently, that those sheep miserably wandering away should again
return to the Fold of Christ, and acknowledge the Lord and the Shepherd
of the Flock, to devise the best means by which, through the influence
of Divine grace, they may cease to wander through the endless pasturages
of infidelity and heresy, drinking the deadly waters of pestilence, and
be placed in the pasturage of true faith and salutary doctrine, and be
brought to the fountains of the water of life.”
The _Appunti_ or Memoranda published by the Sacred Congregation recently,
in reference to the definite sentence of the Italian Masonic Court
of Appeal, to which it applied for relief against the action of the
Government, state:—
“For this end, he (Gregory XV.) wished to depute in his name a
Congregation of Cardinals, who unitedly should exercise the greater
portion of the Apostolic Ministry, that most noble office, which, up to
that time, his predecessors had discharged by themselves and without the
ministry of others.”
The _Appunti_, afterwards, quote other passages of the Bull of Gregory
XV., who thus continues:—
“For even although by the pastoral vigilance, assistance, study, and
exertions of the Roman Pontiffs, our predecessors, of happy memory, it
was provided that so many harvests should not be in want of labourers
in the past, and our successors can also do the same, we have thought
it well to commit to the special solicitude of a certain number of our
venerable brethren, Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, this particular
business, as by the tenor of these presents we do commit and do give
over to them. Desiring that, congregated together, and using also the
assistance of certain prelates of the Roman Court, religious men, and a
secretary (as we ourselves have desired, and named them for the first
time), they should consult together, and watch over so great a matter
together with us, and in the best possible manner that it can be done,
attend to a work so holy and so exceedingly pleasing to the Divine
Majesty. For the more convenient discharge of which duty let them hold
congregations every month—once before us, and twice at least in the house
of the senior Cardinal amongst themselves—and there learn and treat
of all and every affair appertaining to the Propagation of the Faith
throughout the world. Let them refer the graver affairs which they shall
have treated in the above-mentioned house to Us, but other matters let
them decide and despatch by themselves, according to their own prudence.
Let them superintend all missions for preaching and teaching the Gospel
and the Catholic doctrine, and constitute and change the necessary
Ministers. For We, by Apostolic authority, concede and impart, by the
tenor of these presents, full, free, and ample faculty, authority, and
power of doing, carrying on, treating, acting, and executing both the
above-named, as well as all and every other matter, even if such should
be a matter which requires a specific and express mention.”
“But, in order that a business of such moment, in which great expenses
are necessarily contracted by the happy commutation of temporal with
spiritual things, may not be retarded by any impediment, and may proceed
more easily and speedily, beyond that which we have already ordered
to be supplied from our private means, and that which is given by the
liberality of the pious faithful, and that aid which for the future we
confide, will not be wanting, as the affair is our own and that of this
Holy See, we contribute to this work certain revenues for ever from our
Apostolic resources.”