John XXIII in His Own Words (3): Devotion to Saint Pius X and Blessed Pius IX

Pope John on the sedia gestatoria

It seems ironic, to say the least, given the polarization that postconciliar developments have produced in the Church, with the Society of Saint Pius X as a kind of flashpoint, that one of the deepest and tenderest of Blessed John XXIII’s personal devotions was to none other than Giuseppe Sarto, whom he constantly recalls in his private notes and public discourses. Today it would be harder to imagine a saint further removed from “the spirit of Vatican II” than Pius X—and (although to a lesser degree) John XXIII himself, who sought to live, think, and pray in that saint’s footsteps. Some passages in John XXIII's Journal of a Soul bring out his tender and profound devotion to both Pius IX and Pius X, papal saints and heroes of traditionalism.

Of special note is the fact that Angelo Roncalli, on the day of his first Mass, was blessed personally by Pope Pius X, as we will see mentioned in two of the following diary entries.

[Prayer to St. Pius X]
         On the day of my first Mass your hands were laid on my head, the head of a newly ordained priest kneeling as you passed by in the Vatican.
           I have always treasured in my heart the memory of that gesture and of the gentle words of good wishes and blessings which accompanied it.
         Now fifty years have passed.  You are a citizen of the heavenly Jerusalem, you rejoice in the glory of the saints, and all Christians pray to you.
         The humble young priest of long ago has been placed in the Chair of St. Mark, where you, too, presided with such splendour of doctrine, virtue, and example.        O Holy Father Pius X, I put my trust in you.  I do not fear to die.  I do not refuse to work.  May your powerful arm assist me, so that all that is still left for me to do in my life may be to the edification, the blessing and the joy of these beloved children of Venice, your children and mine, with whom it is sweet to live but still more precious and joyful to sacrifice myself in an outpouring of lovingkindness and pastoral care.  [Prayer for the 50th anniversary of Roncalli's ordination as priest, August 1954, while Patriarch of Venice.]

It is interesting, in this passage, that John XXIII spontaneously thinks of Pius IX after outlining the virtues necessary for a saintly soul (and shepherd):

The maxim “Know thyself” suffices for my spiritual serenity and keeps me on the alert.  The secret of my success must lie there: in not “searching into things which are above my ability” and in being content to be “meek and humble of heart.”  Meekness and humbleness of heart give graciousness in receiving, speaking and dealing with people, and the patience to bear, to pity, to keep silent and to encourage.  Above all, one must always be ready for the Lord’s surprise moves, for although he treats his loved ones well, he generally likes to test them with all sorts of trials such as bodily infirmities, bitterness of soul and sometimes opposition so powerful as to transform and wear out the life of the servant of God, the life of the servant of the servants of God, making it a real martyrdom.  I always think of Pius IX of sacred and glorious memory and, by imitating him in his sufferings, I would like to be worthy to celebrate his canonization.  (Journal, p. 299, between 29 Nov. and 5 Dec. 1959)

Pope St. Pius X

And an outpouring of gratitude for his priestly ministry:

My heart is touched when I think of this anniversary of my ordination as a priest—10 August, 1904—in the church of Santa Maria in Monte Santo, Piazza del Popolo. … I remember it all, at a distance of fifty-seven years.  Ever since then I have felt ashamed of my worthlessness.  “My God, my mercy.” … After my first Mass over the tomb of St. Peter I felt the hands of the Holy Father Pius X laid on my head in a blessing full of good augury for me and for the priestly life I was just entering upon; and after more than half a century (fifty-seven years precisely) here are my own hands extended in a blessing for the Catholics, and not only the Catholics, of the whole world, in a gesture of universal fatherhood.  I am successor to this same Pius X who has been proclaimed a saint, and I am still living in the same priestly service as he, his predecessors and his successors, all placed like St. Peter at the head of the whole Church of Christ, one, holy, catholic and apostolic.  (Journal, p. 302; on 10 August 1961)

A New Series: Pope John XXIII in His Own Words

(1) Introduction

With renewed attention being paid to the Pope who summoned the Second Vatican Council and, on its very eve, promulgated the last editio typica of the traditional Roman Missal (1962), it seems important that we strive to understand this man better, lest we lazily accept the mainstream media’s depiction of him as the herald of the “contemporary church.” (See my article last week for several compelling reasons to think that this could be the Caricature of the Century.)

Reading, many years ago, his spiritual diaries, published as Journal of a Soul, innoculated me against the now-common portrait of John XXIII as a proto-modernist. I highly recommend this eye-opener of a book. The reader will discover in John XXIII a thoroughly traditional Catholic—one who would be vastly more at home today in a Fraternity of Saint Peter parish or an Institute of Christ the King chapel than in the overwhelming majority of postconciliar Catholic parishes. Indeed, inasmuch as Journal of a Soul conveys a coherent Catholic worldview and sensibility regarding life, culture, and religion, a unified vision that has largely perished, it seems to me fair to say that Blessed John XXIII would not have recognized, and would strongly repudiate, much of what has been done over the past half-century in the name of the Council he convoked.

I will also wager that few if any progressives, liberals, or modernists will be citing from this book (or, for that matter, from John XXIII’s papal encyclicals, much less his Apostolic Constitution Veterum Sapientia) in all the chatter surrounding the April canonizations. After all, it is so much better for their cause to quote obiter dicta, informal remarks, balcony speeches, and other casual expressions of the mind of John XXIII, while generally ignoring his interior understanding of what he was doing and his formal pronounce¬ments that he knew bore great weight as expressions of the Magisterium. It will therefore fall to sites like New Liturgical Movement to perform a search and rescue operation for Papa Roncalli.

My plan is to publish weekly installments during April of texts I have gathered over a number of years, but I would like to ask NLM readers also to send me any passages from John XXIII that particularly appeal(ed) to them in their intellectual journey or spiritual life. If all goes well, it should be a wonderful opportunity to get to know aspects of this saintly pontiff and of his teaching that are at risk of being ignored.

As a teaser, let me offer two passages.

The first, courtesy of Rorate, surely merits a more widespread diffusion. Here is how Pope John XXIII spoke on January 25, 1959, when he first publicly announced that there would be an Ecumenical Council. Based on the past 50 years, one might have guessed that the announcement would sound a cheery note of rapprochement with modernity together with a desire to adapt (read: water down) Catholic practice and doctrine to suit the people of our time, much as Cardinal Kasper and his allies are advocating right now, in the name of “mercy,” a soft-pedaling of the Commandments and the Gospel. But that’s not quite what John XXIII had to say back in 1959 in his allocution to the Cardinals at Saint Paul Outside the Walls:

All of this—we mean, this [modern] progress—while distracting from the pursuit of higher gifts, weakens the energies of the spirit, leads to the softening of the structure, of the discipline, and of the good ancient order, to great detriment of that which constituted the strength of the resistance of the Church and of her sons to errors, which, in reality, always in the history of Christianity, led to fatal and pernicious divisions, to spiritual and moral decay, to the ruin of nations.
        This assessment awakens in the heart of the humble priest, whom the manifest choice of Divine Providence led, though most unworthy, to this highness of the Supreme Pontificate, it awakens, we say, a resolution influenced by the memory of some ancient forms of doctrinal affirmation and of wise orientations of ecclesiastical discipline which, in the history of the Church, at times of renewal, brought forth fruits of extraordinary efficacy, for the clarity of thought, for the compactness of religious unity, for the livelier fire of Christian fervor, which we continue to recognize, also in reference to the welfare of life down here, as an abundant wealth “de rore caeli et de pinguedine terrae” (Gen. XXVII, 28).
        Venerable Brothers and our dear children! We pronounce before you, certainly trembling somewhat out of emotion, but also with humble resolve of purpose, the name and the proposal of the double celebration: of a Diocesan Synod for the City [of Rome], and that of an Ecumenical Council for the universal Church.  

Here the Pope referred to himself as “the humble priest” who seeks “clarity of thought, compactness of religious unity, and the livelier fire of Christian fervor”—and it is not hard to see, in an entry in Pope John’s diary almost three years later, the very same genuine humility, clarity, and fervor:

It gives me joy to keep faithful to my religious practices: Holy Mass, the Divine Office, the whole rosary, with meditation on the mysteries, constant preoccupation with God and with spiritual things.
        In order that what I say may be not superficial but full of substance, I wish to become more familiar with the writings of the great Popes of old. In recent months I have felt very much at home with St. Leo the Great and with Innocent III. It is a pity that so few ecclesiastics study these writers, who abound in theological and pastoral doctrine. I shall never tire of drawing from these sources, so rich in sacred learning and sublime and delightful poetry. (Journal of a Soul, 319, between 26 Nov. and 2 Dec. 1961)

It is not surprising that we see Pope John’s encyclicals shot through with brilliant quotations from the Popes of the past, the Fathers and Doctors of the Church: they were the authors he read and loved and promoted. It is not surprising he strongly mandated the study of Latin and the dignity and splendor of the liturgy. This was his spirituality; this was his faith; this was the Tradition he cherished. It was left to others after him to transmogrify, repudiate, or even proscribe the very things Papa Roncalli himself thrived upon.

Remembering the Real John XXIII

As we turn the corner into April 2014, when Pope Francis will canonize both John XXIII and John Paul II on Low Sunday/Divine Mercy Sunday, it behooves us to ask whether we have adequately grasped the spiritual profile of each one of the beati in question. With John Paul II still fresh in our memories, perhaps the question does not apply so much to him, but we may surely wonder how well the faithful actually know John XXIII and his teaching, more than fifty years after his death.

For some decades, there has been in the Church a curious phenomenon that one might call “the conciliar caricature,” part of which is a tendency to speak as if Angelo Roncalli (1881–1963) came from outer space to bring deliverance and freshness to an antiquated Church that was serving out the stale bread of yesteryear. On the contrary, Pope John XXIII, elected supreme pontiff on October 28, 1958, was in many ways utterly traditional—arguably more so than his more philosophically adventurous and intellectually wide-ranging predecessor Pius XII. One need only read Blessed John’s beautiful diary, later published as Journal of a Soul and still in print, to discover the simple, hardy, and thoroughly traditional Catholic piety that nourished this man in the entire journey of his life.

To his dying day John was convinced that the Church was possessed of a greater vitality than ever; that this vitality demanded of her a tremendous missionary effort for the leavening and transformation of the world; and that the Second Vatican Council he convened was going to bring about a deepened commitment to the religious life, a more forceful presentation of doctrinal truth, a more inspiring appeal to live the demands of the Gospel (see the Bull of Convocation of the Council, Humanae Salutis of December 25, 1961, and the address to the opening of the Council, Gaudet Mater Ecclesia of October 11, 1962). He was convinced, in short, that he was setting in motion the greatest missionary thrust since the age of the Apostles.

That he would have been sorely distressed by the aftermath is unquestionable. A pope who, in the face of many demands for vernacularization, issued the apostolic constitution Veterum Sapientia (February 22, 1962) unequivocally reaffirming the centrality and permanence of the Latin language in the Church’s life and liturgy, or who in an apostolic letter shared with the world his consuming devotion to the Precious Blood of Jesus (June 30, 1960), was not the kind of man who was ready to throw out tradition.

Probably the best way to appreciate how profound a lover of Jesus Christ and His Church was “good Pope John” is to read again his now largely forgotten encyclicals, several of which are truly outstanding for their rhetorical power, comprehensive approach, and sound pastoral wisdom. There were eight in toto, beginning with Ad Petri Cathedram (June 29, 1959), subtitled “On Truth, Unity, and Peace in a Spirit of Charity,” and ending with Pacem in Terris (April 11, 1963), over which the ailing pope labored tirelessly, so great was his desire to see it promulgated before his death. Here I wish to draw attention to five of the eight.

A pope’s inaugural encyclical is always important (recall John Paul II’s Redemptor Hominis or Benedict XVI’s Deus Caritas Est). It says much about the way its author perceives his pastoral office and his role in the Church at that time. Pope John XXIII’s words near the start of Ad Petri Cathedram sound like an anticipation of Vatican II: “The Catholic Church is forever young and is indeed a standard raised before the nations. From her come a pervading light and a gentle love which reach all men” (n. 2). He announces his main plans: to summon an ecumenical council and a Roman synod; to revise the Code of Canon Law and to “issue a Code of Canon Law for the Church of the Oriental Rite” (n. 3).

John XXIII immediately states his fundamental conviction, so contrary to the rampant relativism already characteristic of his time: “All the evils which poison men and nations and trouble so many hearts have a single cause and a single source: ignorance of the truth—and at times even more than ignorance, a contempt for truth and a reckless rejection of it. Thus arise all manner of errors, which enter the recesses of men’s hearts and the bloodstream of human society as would a plague. These errors turn everything upside down: they menace individuals and society itself” (n. 6).

Yet, the pope goes on to say, God has made it possible for man to know truth, both by the light of his reason and by the light of faith. If we do not embrace the truth God grants us to know, we are rejecting the highest good and losing our sanity. If we reject the Gospel, we reject “the very foundations of truth, goodness, and civilization” (n. 8). These are sobering words, a wake-up call for a drowsy world.

The remainder of the encyclical has the same tone. The sheer vehemence of style is reminiscent of Leo XIII, who is frequently cited with warm approval. John XXIII speaks of men who have “wandered pathetically far from the teaching of Christ” (n. 10), of the truth-attacker who “engages in an altogether despicable business’ (n. 11), of the movies and television programs that lead people into “loose morality and ignoble behavior, to treacherous error and perilous vice” (n. 14). He says we must fight with “weapons of truth” against these “weapons of evil” (n. 15) and error. The first error he castigates is the idea that “one religion is just as good as another” (n. 17). Not long after, he is critiquing the cult of progress and technology (n. 19) and underlining the duty of politicians to embrace the cause of truth if they wish to see any true peace and prosperity in their communities (nn. 21–22).

The entire document sounds the note of rallying around the See of Peter for the fearless proclamation of the Faith. What is perhaps most surprising, in light of the “Roncalli myth,” is the uncompromising apologetic in which John XXIII engages on behalf of the unity and unicity of the Church, refuting Protestant and other errors and pleading with separated Christians to reunite themselves to the Church founded by Jesus Christ. No milquetoast minister he: the duty of every non-Catholic to convert and join the one true Church is emphasized again and again (see nn. 59–91).

Sacerdotii Nostri Primordia (August 1, 1959), following hot on the heels of the inaugural encyclical, reveals the deepest yearning of John XXIII’s heart—building up the sanctity of the clergy, enkindling their zeal. He quotes St. Pius X: “Nothing is more needed to promote the kingdom of Jesus Christ in the world than the holiness of churchmen.” The encyclical is a beautiful recounting of the life and virtues of St. John Vianney on the occasion of the centennary of his death, interwoven with reflections and exhortations concerning the priesthood. While addressed, as custom dictated, to the bishops, it is clear that the pope had in mind each and every one of his priestly sons, whom he beckons to the heights of perfection, as well as young men discerning a vocation. This wonderful meditation on priestly life should be obligatory reading for the ordained or those aspiring to ordination.

The two mighty social encyclicals Mater et Magistra (May 15, 1961) and Pacem in Terris (April 11, 1963) would require little comment, if there had not been in the past forty years a serious neglect of the full scope and depth of Catholic social teaching—a neglect manifested by a narrow and superficial conception of the subjects it concerns, not to mention a Judas-like willingness to set aside major elements of this teaching whenever it becomes inconvenient or uncomfortable. In continuity with Leo XIII, a pope he dearly loved, Pope John XXIII recognized that the ultimate root of many economic injustices was a skewed understanding and perverted practice of politics. That is, the only viable solution to the “social problem” was the reconstitution of governments according to Catholic wisdom.

Even if some particular descriptions or proposals in these two encyclicals seem dated to us in 2014—hardly surprising given the mutability of human affairs—their sound principles, systematic analysis, and biting critiques remain perfectly relevant to our day and age, and well deserving of our study. This pair of encyclicals simply must not be left unread by any Catholic who is concerned about doing his part to promote justice and peace.

Then there is Aeterna Dei Sapientia (November 11, 1961), the encyclical with which John XXIII commemorated the fifteenth centenary of Pope St. Leo the Great’s death in 461. After recounting St. Leo’s doctrine and holiness, Pope John XXIII turns again, as he did in his first encyclical, to the subject of Church unity, and gives us a brief and compelling treatise on the true Church of Jesus Christ and the ineradicable, irreducible role the papacy plays therein. The Pope then states his hopes for the approaching Council: “We are fully confident that this solemn assembly of the Catholic hierarchy will not only reinforce that unity in faith, worship, and discipline which is a distinguishing mark of Christ’s true Church, but will also attract the gaze of the great majority of Christians of every denomination, and induce them to gather around ‘the great Pastor of the sheep’ who entrusted His flock to the unfailing guardianship of Peter and his successors” (n. 62).

A pattern has thus emerged: in spite of his failings—of which no pope, or no Christian whatsoever, can be completely free in this life—John XXIII ought to be remembered above all for his fearless and articulate defense of all that is distinctively Catholic, as well as for his persuasive and positive way of presenting it. We would do well to return to these sources of sound doctrine; we might even promote the encyclicals mentioned above as readings in parish groups or among friends. It would be a small but effective step towards appropriating the legacy of a pope whose real teaching and real sanctity have been largely forgotten.

[A different version of this article appeared in the May-June 2007 issue of Lay Witness.]