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HISTORIES OF THE SACRED AND SECULAR
Jorge Dagnino
Histories of the Sacred and Secular, 1700–2000
Series Editor
David Nash
Department of History
Oxford Brookes University
Oxford, United Kingdom
Aims of the Series
This series reflects the awakened and expanding profile of the history of
religion within the academy in recent years. It intends publishing exciting
new and high quality work on the history of religion and belief since
1700 and will encourage the production of interdisciplinary proposals and
the use of innovative methodologies. The series will also welcome book
proposals on the history of Atheism, Secularism, Humanism and unbelief/
secularity and to encourage research agendas in this area alongside those
in religious belief. The series will be happy to reflect the work of new
scholars entering the field as well as the work of established scholars. The
series welcomes proposals covering subjects in Britain, Europe, the United
States and Oceana.
v
Contents
1 Introduction 1
vii
viii Contents
Bibliography225
Index245
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
and religious itinerary of the future pontiff, Paul VI. Many of these studies
have been characterised by a limited sense of a proper historical dimension
and have neglected other important aspects of the history of the FUCI,
such as its place within lay Catholic life in the 1920s and 1930s, and its
engagement with the principal intellectual trends of the time. It is these
shortcomings that this study sets out to address.3
Structure
Broadly speaking, this book is divided into three parts and an epilogue. It
follows a chronological structure that coincides with the three presiden-
cies that marked the history of the association during the period under
study. Thus, the first part extends from 1925 to 1933, when the FUCI
was led by Igino Righetti and Giovanni Battista Montini; the second
from 1933 to 1939 when the organisation was presided over by Giovanni
Ambrosetti; and, finally, the last part is devoted to the years 1939 to 1943
when the federation was under the rule of the young Aldo Moro and
Giulio Andreotti.
According to the prevailing interpretations, the FUCI of the 1925–33
period was characterised by an intellectual openness and the willingness
of the federation to enter into a fruitful dialogue with the modern world,
which eschewed the attitude of condemnations and anathemas that was
common to many Catholic circles of the time. Moreover, in the political
domain, the federation is commonly presented as having been immune to
the attractions of Fascism or, indeed, directly anti-Fascist. In contrast to
this predominant view, it is argued in the present study that the FUCI in
this era was characterised by a high degree of ambiguity and ambivalence
with regard to the modern world and modernity in general. Moreover, in
my analysis, a much more conservative Montini and FUCI emerge—an
association that was not devoid of a spirit of conquest and of a militant and
intransigent Catholicism, fuelled by a vision of an ideological and totalis-
ing Catholicism.
The first part ends with the examination of the relationship between
the Catholic student association and Fascism. Undoubtedly these were
troubled times for the FUCI, marked by the violent clashes that occurred
at the national congress of Macerata in 1926 and, above all, by the crisis
of 1931 in relations between the church and the Fascist regime over the
youth groups of Catholic Action. While the majority of the leaders of
the organisation had no Fascist sympathies, within the rank and file the
INTRODUCTION 3
who would become a frequent contributor to the FUCI press and works.11
During his pontificate, Paul VI would nominate Father Giulio Bevilacqua
as cardinal. At the Oratory he also became acquainted with Father Paolo
Caresana, who eventually became his personal confessor. Another impor-
tant experience in the biography of the young Giovanni Battista Montini
was his collaboration with the periodical La Fionda, edited by his friend
Andrea Trebeschi, who would die in a Nazi concentration camp in 1945.
Montini quickly rose to a position of leadership at the periodical, which
promoted a religiosity lived as a source of societal renewal after the tragedy
of the Great War—a conflict that the young fiondisti had supported with a
fervent spirit of patriotism.
In the meantime, Giovanni Battista was developing a strong religious
vocation that reached its culmination when he was ordained to the priest-
hood in 1920. On this occasion, Luigi Sturzo sent him a telegram of con-
gratulations.12 After his ordination, Montini moved to Rome, where he
enrolled himself in the Faculty of Philosophy at the Pontifical Gregorian
University and, simultaneously, at the Faculty of Languages and Philosophy
at the University of La Sapienza, with the aim of enriching his humanis-
tic formation. Nevertheless, these academic endeavours, which were very
dear to the young Montini, were rapidly interrupted when the cardinal
Secretary of State, Pietro Gasparri, ordered him to join the Pontifical
Academy of Nobili Ecclesiastici—the institution where the diplomats of
the Vatican were formed. In May 1923 he was sent on a diplomatic mis-
sion to Warsaw, where he would stay for a period of six months. After his
return to Italy, in October 1924, he entered the Vatican’s State Secretariat,
where he would remain until he was designated archbishop of Milan thirty
years later. At the end of November 1923 he was nominated ecclesiastical
assistant of the Roman branch of the FUCI, and in 1925 he was elevated
to the rank of central ecclesiastical assistant of the organisation, a position
that he held until his departure in 1933.
Igino Righetti (1904–39)13 was a native of Rimini. He went to the liceo
Luigi Galvani of Bologna and from a very early age displayed an interest
and passion for social and political affairs. Initially, he was a follower of
the nationalistic youth movement. In 1921 he became secretary, in his
native Rimini, of the revitalised Popular University. In the period before
the Great War, the Popular University had been an institution inspired by
a socialist-democratic spirit and, during Righetti’s secretariat, it changed
to an organisation that, although not formally religious, was respectful of
religion. Righetti rapidly developed the qualities that were later to make
8 J. DAGNINO
him well known in his period as president of the FUCI, namely his abili-
ties as a cultural organiser and leader that allowed him to convince persons
much older than himself, and of diverse ideological views to collaborate in
the activities of the Popular University.
In the academic year 1922–23, he enrolled in the Faculty of Law at the
University of Bologna, though there is no evidence that he participated
in the activities of the local FUCI chapter during his stay in the city.14 In
January 1924 he relocated to the University of Rome to continue his law
studies. While living in the capital he continued his collaboration with his
native Rimini, this time as contributor to the Catholic periodical L’Ausa.
He also participated as secretary of the Diocesan Assembly of Catholic
Action at Rimini, of which he was for a brief period also president. While in
Rome, the young Igino Righetti became acquainted with Father Giovanni
Genocchi, who was actively involved in the life of the Roman branch of
the FUCI, and who convinced Righetti to join the FUCI at the beginning
of the academic year 1924–25, of which he would become the national
president after the national congress of September 1925 in Bologna.
Before dealing with the principal outcomes of this research, it might
be useful to provide some basic data regarding the FUCI. With regard
to the social background of the fucini, the overwhelming majority came
from the educated middle classes.15 Furthermore, many of the students
did not come from the structures of Catholic Action but were recruited
directly at the university level. Indeed, most of them had been educated in
state schools rather than in private and confessional ones, a feature which
distinguished the students from the other branches of the lay organisation.
Another interesting feature of the Catholic university students was that
proportionately few of its members enrolled themselves at the Catholic
University of Milan of Father Agostino Gemelli.16
The FUCI was present throughout Italy, but its principal strongholds
were in Lombardy, Venetia, Emilia Romagna, Campania, Puglia, and
Sicily. In 1928, the FUCI had 48 branches in the north, 23 in central Italy,
and 15 in the south. These numbers had risen by 1942–43 to 64 groups
in the north, 43 in central Italy, and 66 in the south. In the academic year
1928–29, the federation was composed of 2370 members, a figure which
rose in the years 1946–47 to 7055, in line with the overall growth of uni-
versity students on the peninsula. During the 1930s, the all-male branch
of the FUCI was able to recruit around 5 % of the whole Italian univer-
sity population, while the female branches of the association were able to
enlist 10 % of all young women who attended higher education.17 As such,
INTRODUCTION 9
Notes
1. Histories of the Italian Catholic Action and more broadly of Italian
Catholicism in the modern era abound. See, for example, D.I. Kertzer, The
Pope and Mussolini. The Secret History of Pius XI and the Rise of Fascism in
Europe (Oxford, 2014); J. Pollard, The Papacy in the Age of Totalitarianism,
1914–1958 (Oxford, 2014); L. Ceci, Il Vaticano e l’Italia di Mussolini
(Rome and Bari, 2013); J. Pollard, ‘Pius XI’s Promotion of the Italian
Model of Catholic Action in the World-Wide Church’, Journal of
Ecclesiastical History, 63/4 (2012), 758–84; idem, Catholicism in Modern
Italy. Religion, Society and Politics since 1861 (London and New York,
2008); F. Traniello, Religione cattolica e Stato nazionale. Dal Risorgimento
al secondo dopoguerra (Bologna, 2007); A. Acerbi (ed.), La Chiesa e
l’Italia. Per una storia dei loro rapporti negli ultimi due secoli (Milan,
2003); G. Verucci, La Chiesa cattolica in Italia dall’Unità a oggi
1861–1998 (Rome and Bari, 1999); E. Preziosi, Obbedienti in piedi. La
vicenda dell’Azione Cattolica in Italia (Turin, 1996); M. Casella, L’Azione
cattolica nell’Italia contemporanea (1919–1969) (Rome, 1992);
M. Guasco, Dal Modernismo al Vaticano II. Percorsi di una cultura religi-
osa (Milan, 1991); G. Penco, Storia della Chiesa in Italia nell’età contem-
poranea 1919–1945 (Milan, 1985); A. C. Jemolo, Chiesa e Stato in Italia.
Dalla unificazione agli anni settanta (Turin, 1977); P. Scoppola, La Chiesa
e il fascismo. Documenti e interpretazioni (Bari, 1971) and D. A. Binchy,
Church and State in Fascist Italy (Oxford, 1941).
2. Aldo Moro, Giulio Andreotti, Paolo Emilio Taviani, Guido Gonella,
Giovanni Leone, Emilio Colombo, Mariano Rumor, Amintore Fanfani,
Mario Scelba, to name but just a few, were all active members of the FUCI.
3. For studies of the FUCI see T. Torresi, L’altra giovinezza. Gli universitari
cattolici dal 1935 al 1940 (Assissi, 2010); M. C. Giuntella, La FUCI tra
modernismo, partito popolare e fascismo (Rome, 2000); FUCI. Coscienza
universitaria, fatica del pensare, intelligenza della fede. Una ricerca lunga
100 anni (Milan, 1996); R.J. Wolff, Between Pope and Duce. Catholic
Students in Fascist Italy (New York, 1990); R. Moro, La formazione della
classe dirigente cattolica (1929–1937) (Bologna, 1979); and G. Fanello
Marcucci, Storia della FUCI (Rome, 1971).
4. R. Moro, La formazione della classe dirigente cattolica, 91.
5. While both Azione fucina and Studium essentially dealt with the same top-
ics in their pages, Studium, being a monthly journal could do so in more
depth and in a more scholarly fashion than could the weekly Azione fucina.
See A. Majo, La Stampa Cattolica in Italia. Storia e documentazione
(Casale Monferrato, 1992), 180–82.
INTRODUCTION 11
6. For the history of the FUCI previous to 1925 see, for example, R. J. Wolff,
Between Pope and Duce, 1–11, and G. Fanello Marcucci, Storia della FUCI,
17–115.
7. M. Casella, L’azione cattolica, 68–71.
8. For these incidents see, for example, M.C. Giuntella, La FUCI, 135–37;
R. Moro, La formazione della classe dirigente cattolica, 63–5 and G. Fanello
Marcucci, Storia della FUCI, 113–16.
9. There is a veritable publishing industry around the figure of Giovanni
Battista Montini-Paul VI, albeit of a very uneven scholarly value. See, for
example, F. De Giorgi, Mons. Montini. Chiesa cattolica e scontri di civiltà
nella prima metà del Novecento (Bologna, 2012); G. Adornato, Paolo
VI. Il coraggio della modernità (Milan, 2008); M. Mantovani and M. Toso
(eds.), Paolo VI. Fede, cultura, università (Rome, 2003); E. de la Hera, La
noche transfigurada. Biografía de Pablo VI (Madrid, 2002); A. Acerbi,
Paolo VI. Il papa che baciò la terra (Milan, 1997); J.L. González-Balado,
Vida de Pablo VI (Madrid, 1995); C. Cremona, Paolo VI (Milan, 1994);
P. Hebblethwaite, Paul VI. The First Modern Pope (New York, 1993);
Educazione, Intellettuali e Società in G.B. Montini-Paolo VI (Brescia,
1992); and Paul VI et la modernité dans l’Église (Rome, 1984).
10. On Giorgio Montini see A. Fappani, Giorgio Montini. Cronache di una
testimonianza (Rome, 1974).
11. On Father Giulio Bevilacqua see, for example, L’impegno religioso e civile di
p. Giulio Bevilacqua (Brescia, 1983) and A. Fappani, Padre Giulio
Bevilacqua prete e cardinale sugli avamposti (Verona, 1975).
12. G. Adornato, Paolo VI, 20.
13. On Igino Righetti, see G. Benzi and N. Valentini (eds.), Igino Righetti.
Una giovinezza pensante (1904–1939) (Rome, 2006); N. Antonetti, La
FUCI di Montini e di Righetti. Lettere di Igino Righetti ad Angela Gotelli
(1928–1933) (Rome, 1979); I. Righetti, Itinerari (Rome, 1959); and
A. Baroni, Igino Righetti (Rome, 1948).
14. A. Baroni, Igino Righetti, 24.
15. I have retrieved the following data from R. Moro, La formazione della
classe dirigente cattolica, 26ff.
16. Agostino Gemelli (1878–1959) was a tremendously powerful figure in
Fascist Italy. He converted to Catholicism in 1903, followed by his entry
into the Franciscan Order. He was ordained in 1908. In 1909 he founded
the Rivista di filosofia neoscolastica, followed in 1914 by the maiden issue of
Vita e Pensiero. He participated actively during the First World War as med-
ical captain and distinguished himself in the consecration of Italian soldiers
to the Sacred Heart. After the end of the conflict he saw the importance of
a Christianity-inspired political party. In 1919 he put forward an argument
that the PPI should be a confessional political organisation—a contention
12 J. DAGNINO
that was rejected. In 1921 he fulfilled one of his most cherished dreams
with the foundation of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan.
Additionally, Father Gemelli supported many of the stances of Mussolini’s
government. On Gemelli, see, for example, M. Bocci, Agostino Gemelli,
Rettore e Francescano. Chiesa, Regime, Democrazia (Brescia, 2003).
17. R. Moro, La formazione della classe dirigente cattolica, 27.
PART 1
and that the world was nothing more than a ‘great wheel’ that had lost
its sense of mystery, enchantment, and beauty. He was deeply convinced
that ‘technology has petrified life and upset the scale of human values’.23
The crisis had been further deepened by the ever-growing presence of
anti-intellectual and irrationalistic tendencies present in contemporary
society. Gonella presented the modern world as a place over-populated
by men enslaved by the power of material interests and the allure of the
senses. Moreover, these men and women of the twentieth century were
frequently obsessed with utilitarian concerns like the ‘demon of business
and gain’, which had led to the divinisation of the practical over the specu-
lative life.24 This in turn had guided twentieth-century humanity, in the
social, literary, philosophical, political, and artistic realms, among others,
to a feverish and compulsive desire to start everything anew, breaking any
kind of link with previous traditions, in a hopeless effort to inaugurate a
utopian new world. Gonella had no doubts in speaking of the ‘pathologi-
cal character of this very modern mentality’.25
Guido Gonella was one of the Catholic intellectuals who developed a
systematic and logically coherent line of criticism of the modern world.
Giovanni Battista Montini was, perhaps, the other member of the FUCI
to conduct a systematic denunciation of the errors of contemporary
civilisation, although, as has been seen, he occasionally demonstrated a
degree of openness to modern society. Like Gonella and the anti-modern
Maritain, he located the origins of the disquiet of the modern world and
modernity in Luther—the ‘anti-teacher’, in Rousseau—the theorist of the
contemporary democratic regimes and ‘theoretician of the revolution’,
and finally in the subjectivism of Descartes. He bitterly commented on
how in the secular and rationalistic modernity ‘free enquiry, universal suf-
frage and systematic doubt’ had become dogmas that no one dared to
question,26 endangering the sole source of truth that was the Catholic
Church. Montini went on to distinguish between healthy and unhealthy
criticism. The former was an invaluable tool in every intellectual discipline,
while the latter constituted a ‘corruption’. Indeed, in criticism, the eccle-
siastical assistant saw the core of the modern world, a means transformed
into an end in itself, a ‘toxin’ that contaminated the men and women of
his time.27 Criticism for criticism’s sake had cut man off from the universal
truths that had to be rescued if the contemporary world were to be res-
cued from its ongoing predicament. But, in place of universal truths and
hierarchies of values, modern society exhibited a pitiful spectacle where
men and women wandered aimlessly and frenetically, giving free rein to
THE FUCI AND THE CONQUEST OF THE MODERN WORLD: 1925–1933 21
831
Stammering,
571
781
781
782
498
Vertiginosus, the,
426
Treatment of,
428
Stigmatization,
348-351
350
388
673
,
675
in thermic fever,
397
600
743
in tubercular meningitis,
727
641
,
643
646
in chorea,
455
1157
978
in labio-glosso-laryngeal paralysis,
1175
in paralysis agitans,
438
in spinal hyperæmia,
805
in writers' cramp,
538
Myelitis, acute,
822
823
727
728
Melancholia with,
158
Stuttering,
569
571
Suicidal insanity,
146
191
278
716
Sunstroke (see
Thermic Fever
).
headache from,
390
404
764
Superficial neuralgia,
1211
766
of spinal hyperæmia,
802
1233
800
of facial neuralgia,
1234
1067
657
658
280
1157
1263
headache,
404
neuralgias,
1220
Symmetrical gangrene,
1257
795
of acute alcoholism,
587
et seq.
776
782
of acute myelitis,
816
717
750
pachymeningitis,
747
868
of angina pectoris,
1238
of apoplexy,
733
of athetosis,
459
994
995
of Bell's palsy,
1203
of capillary embolism,
981
of catalepsy,
320
of cerebral anæmia,
782
of cerebral hyperæmia,
768
712
of cerebral softening,
981
989
of cerebral syphilis,
1003
of chorea,
445
of chronic alcoholism,
598-633
721
of chronic hydrocephalus,
741
of chronic lead-poisoning,
682
752
749
870
of concussion of the brain,
908
915
704
of spinal membranes,
747
716
of delirium tremens,
627
888
of disease of cervical sympathetic,
1264
874
of ecstasy,
342
of epilepsy,
477
of external pachymeningitis,
704
871
of gastralgia,
1238
178
707
of headache,
402
of heat-exhaustion,
387
of hebephrenia,
172
944-946
of hypochondriasis,
154
of hemiplegia,
954
99
of hysteria,
229
of hystero-epilepsy,
293
1114
791
of injuries to nerves,
1183
1185
1186
of insanity,
120
of insomnia,
379-382
1233
of internal pachymeningitis,
706
of intracranial hemorrhage and apoplexy,
733
of labio-glosso-laryngeal paralysis,
1170
of melancholia,
155
156
of migraine,
407
1230
of moral insanity,
143-146
of multiple neuritis,