Pope Clement XIV

Pope Clement XIV (Latin: Clemens XIV ; 31 October

1705 22 September 1774), born Giovanni Vincenzo
Antonio Ganganelli, reigned from 19 May 1769 to his
death in 1774. At the time of his election, he was the only
Franciscan friar in the College of Cardinals. To date, he
is the last pope to take the pontical name of Clement
upon his election.

Pope Clement XIII elevated Ganganelli to the cardinalate on 24 September 1759 and appointed him as the
Cardinal-Priest of San Lorenzo in Panisperna. His elevation came at the insistence of Lorenzo Ricci who was the
Superior-General of the Society of Jesus.

Ganganelli opted to become the Cardinal-Priest of Ss.

XII Apostoli in 1762. In 1768 he was named the poHe is best known for his suppression of the Society of nens of the cause of beatication of Juan de Palafox y
Jesus.
Mendoza.[3]

1
1.1

1.3 Election to the papacy

Biography
Early life

Ganganelli was born in Santarcangelo di Romagna in

1705[2] as the second child of Lorenzo Ganganelli and
Angela Serana Maria Mazza. He received the sacrament
of baptism on 2 November 1705.
He initially studied at Verucchio but later received his education from the Society of Jesus at Rimini from 1717.
He also studied with the Piarists of Urbino. Ganganelli
entered the Order of Friars Minor Conventual on 15
May 1723 in Forli and he changed his name to Lorenzo
Francesco. He did his novitiate in Urbino where his
cousin Vincenzo was a friar. He was professed as a full
member of that order on 18 May 1724. He was sent to Cardinal Ganganelli
the convents of Pesaro, Fano and Recanati from 1724 to
1728 where he did his theological studies. He continued Main article: Papal conclave, 1769
his studies in Rome under Antonio Lucci and obtained
his doctorate in theology in 1731.[3]
1.3.1 Pressures

1.2

Priesthood and cardinalate

King Louis XV of Frances (171574) minister, the duc

de Choiseul, had former experience of Rome as the
French ambassador and was Europes most skilled diplomat. When one has a favour to ask of a Pope, he
wrote, and one is determined to obtain it, one must
ask for two. Choiseuls suggestion was advanced to the
other ambassadors and it was that they should press, in
addition to the Jesuit issue, territorial claims upon the
Patrimony of Peter, including the return of Avignon and
the Comtat Venaissin to France, the duchies of Benevento
and Pontecorvo to Spain, an extension of territory adjoining the Papal States to Naples, and an immediate and nal
settlement of the vexed question of Parma and Piacenza
that had occasioned a diplomatic rift between Austria and
Pope Clement XIII.

He was ordained around this time after he received his

doctorate and he taught philosophy and theology for almost a decade in Ascoli, Bologna and Milan. He later returned to Rome as the regent of the college that he studied in and was later elected as the Denitor General or
the order in 1741.[2] In the general chapters of his order
in 1753 and 1756, he declined the generalship of his order and some rumored it was due to his desire of a higher
oce.[3]
Ganganelli became a friend of Pope Benedict XIV who
in 1758 appointed him to investigate the issue of the traditional blood libel regarding the Jews, which Ganganelli
found to be untrue.[4]
1

1 BIOGRAPHY

The conclave had been sitting since 15 February 1769,

heavily inuenced by the political manoeuvres of the ambassadors of Catholic sovereigns who were opposed to
the Jesuits. Some of the pressure was subtle: for an unprecedented impromptu visit to the conclave by Emperor
Joseph II (176590) and his brother Leopold, the Grand
Duke of Tuscany ocially incognito, the seals were broken, the Austrians inspected the proceedings with great
interest and brought with them a festive banquet. During the previous ponticate, the Jesuits had been expelled from Portugal and from all the courts of the House
of Bourbon, which included France, Spain, Naples, and
Parma. Now the general suppression of the order was
urged by the faction called the court cardinals, who
were opposed by the diminished pro-Jesuit faction, the
Zelanti (zealous), who were generally opposed to the
encroaching secularism of the Enlightenment.[2]

closest to him, and as the Annual Register for 1774 stated,

he was over 70 and had been in ill health for some time.
1.4.1 Suppression of the Jesuits
Main article: Suppression of the Society of Jesus
The Jesuits had been expelled from Brazil (1754),
Portugal (1759), France (1764), Spain and its colonies
(1767) and Parma (1768). Though he had to face strong
pressure on the part of the ambassadors of the Bourbon
courts Clement XIII always refused to yield to their demands to have the Society of Jesus suppressed. His successor Clement XIV tried to placate the enemies of the
Jesuits by treating them harshly: he refused to meet the
Superior General, Lorenzo Ricci, ordered them not to receive novices, etc.

Cardinal Ganganelli was elected pope on 19 May 1769

largely due to support of the Bourbon courts which had
expected that he would suppress the Society of Jesus. He
took the pontical name of Clement XIV. Ganganelli
rst received episcopal consecration in the Vatican on 28
May 1769 by Cardinal Federico Marcello Lante and was
crowned as pope on 4 June 1769 by the cardinal protodeacon Alessandro Albani.

The pressure kept building up to the point that Catholic

countries were threatening to break away from the
Church. Clement XIV ultimately yielded in the name
of peace of the Church and to avoid a secession in Europe and suppressed the Society of Jesus by the brief
Dominus ac Redemptor of the 21 July 1773.[5] However, in non-Catholic nations, particularly in Prussia and
Russia, where papal authority was not recognized, the order was ignored. It was a result of a series of political
moves rather than a theological controversy.[6]

1.4

1.4.2 Clement XIV and Mozart

1.3.2

Election

Ponticate

Clement XIVs policies were calculated from the outset to

smooth the breaches with the Catholic Crowns that had
developed during the previous ponticate. The dispute
between the temporal and the spiritual Catholic authorities was perceived as a threat by Church authority, and
Clement XIV worked towards reconciliation among the
European sovereigns. The arguing and ghting among the
monarchs seemed poised to lead Europe towards heavy
international competition.
By yielding the Papal claims to Parma, Clement XIV obtained the restitution of Avignon and Benevento and in
general he succeeded in placing the relations of the spiritual and the temporal authorities on a friendlier footing. The ponti went on to suppress the Jesuits, writing the decree to this eect in November 1772 and signing it on 21 July 1773. This measure, to late 19thcentury Catholics, had covered Clement XIVs memory
with infamy in his church, and was also quite controversial, with the Catholic Encyclopedia supporting Clement
XIVs suppression of the Jesuits as abundantly justied.
His work was hardly accomplished, before Clement XIV,
whose usual constitution was quite vigorous, fell into a
languishing sickness, generally attributed to poison. No
conclusive evidence of poisoning was ever produced. The
claims that the Pope was poisoned were denied by those Tomb of Pope Clement XIV.

3
Pope Clement XIV and the customs of the Catholic The Catholic Encyclopedia (or the 1876 Encyclopdia
Church in Rome are described in letters of Wolfgang Britannica) says that:
Amadeus Mozart and of his father Leopold Mozart, written from Rome in April and May 1770 during their tour
[N]o Pope has better merited the title of
of Italy. Leopold found the upper clergy oensively
a virtuous man, or has given a more perfect
haughty, but was received, with his son, by the pope,
example of integrity, unselshness, and averwhere Wolfgang demonstrated an amazing feat of musision to nepotism. Notwithstanding his monascal memory. The papal chapel was famous for performtic education, he proved himself a statesman, a
ing a Miserere mei, Deus by the 17th-century composer
scholar, an amateur of physical science, and an
Gregorio Allegri, whose music was not to be copied outaccomplished man of the world. As Pope Leo
side of the chapel on pain of excommunication. The 14X (151321) indicates the manner in which
year-old Wolfgang was able to transcribe the composition
the Papacy might have been reconciled with
in its entirety after a single hearing. Clement made young
the Renaissance had the Reformation never
Mozart a knight of the Order of the Golden Spur.[7]
taken place, so Ganganelli exemplies the type
of Pope which the modern world might have
learned to accept if the movement towards free
1.4.3 Activities
thought could, as Voltaire wished, have been
conned to the aristocracy of intellect. In both
Clement XIV elevated sixteen new cardinals into the carcases the requisite condition was unattainable;
dinalate in twelve consistories.
neither in the 16th nor in the 18th century has
The pope held no canonizations in his ponticate but he
it been practicable to set bounds to the spirit of
beatied a number of individuals.
inquiry otherwise than by re and sword, and
Ganganellis successors have been driven into
assuming a position analogous to that of Popes
4 June 1769: Francis Caracciolo
Paul IV (155559) and Pius V (156672) in
16 September 1769: Juliana Puricelli, Bernard of
the age of the Reformation. The estrangement
Baden & Catherine of Pallanza
between the secular and the spiritual authority which Ganganelli strove to avert is now ir 1771: Thomas Bellacci
reparable, and his ponticate remains an ex 14 December 1771: Martyrs of Otranto
ceptional episode in the general history of the
Papacy, and a proof how little the logical se 8 June 1772: Paul Burali dArezzo
quence of events can be modied by the virtues
and abilities of an individual.
29 August 1772: John del Bastone
1773: Pope Benedict XI (formal beatication after Jacques Cretineau-Joly, however, wrote a critical history
Pope Clement XII conrmed the cultus)
of the Popes administration.
1774: Beatrix of Este the Younger
1.4.4

Death and burial

The last months of his life were embittered by his failures

and he seemed always to be in sorrow because of this.
On 10 September 1774, he was bedridden and received
Extreme Unction on 21 September 1774. It is said that St.
Alphonse Liguori assisted Clement XlV in his last hours
by the gift of bi-location.
Clement XIV died on 22 September 1774, execrated by
the Ultramontane party but widely mourned by his subjects for his popular administration of the Papal States.
When his body was opened for the autopsy, the doctors
ascribed his death to scorbutic and hemorrhoidal dispositions of long standing that were aggravated by excessive
labour and the habit of provoking articial perspiration
even in the greatest heat. His Neoclassical style tomb was
designed and sculpted by Antonio Canova, and it is found
in the church of Santi Apostoli in Rome. To this day, he
is best remembered for his suppression of the Jesuits.

2 See also
Suppression of the Society of Jesus
Cardinals created by Clement XIV

3 Notes
[1] Pope Clement XIV (1769-1774)". GCatholic. Retrieved
2 April 2014.
[2] Wilhelm, Joseph. Pope Clement XIV. The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 4. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908. 5 Jan. 2015
[3] Ganganelli, O.F.M. Conv., Lorenzo (1705-1774)". Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church. Retrieved 22 February
2015.
[4] Ganganelli, Lorenzo. The Ritual Murder Libel and the
Jew, (Cecil Roth ed.), The Woburn Press, 1934

[5] The Suppression of the Jesuits by Pope Clement XIV, The

Catholic American Quarterly Review, Vol. XIII, 1888.
[6] Roehner, Bertrand M. (1997). Jesuits and the State:
A Comparative Study of their Expulsions (15901990)".
Religion 27 (2): 165182. doi:10.1006/reli.1996.0048.
[7] Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Mozarts Letters, Mozarts
Life: Selected Letters, transl. Robert Spaethling, (W. W.
Norton & Company Inc., 2000), 17.

References
Initial text from the 9th edition (1876) of the
Encyclopdia Britannica
Valrie Pirie, 1965. The Triple Crown: An Account
of the Papal Conclaves from the Fifteenth Century to
Modern Times Spring Books, London

External links
Beach, Chandler B., ed. (1914). "Clement XIV".
The New Students Reference Work. Chicago: F. E.
Compton and Co.

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