POPE PIUS XI

Pahiatua Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 14065, 11 February 1939, Page 5

POPE PIUS XI

SECOND EDITION

ENERGETIC AND CAPABLE RULER SEVERE LOSS TO THE WORLD. (Specially written for the “Herald).” With the passing of Pope Pius XI yesterday the world lost a world leader and a great worker in the cause of peace and humanity. Mourned by a flock ol 400.000,000 souls, this great teacher died on the eve of the anniversary of his Coronation as Pojie in 1922, in his 81st year. Ambrose Damien Achille Ratti was a man of the people, being the son of a respected manufacturer at Desio near Milan, where he was born on May 31, 1857. As a young man he was a noted mountaineer, and performed many feats of courage and endurance—a. training that was to stand him in good stead during the arduous years of his pontificate. As a student he was remarkably brilliant, gaining in succession" three Doctorates in Canon Law, Philosophy and Theology, with 100 per cent, in every examination. After being ordained as a priest on 20th December, 1879, he was appointed professor at a seminary for priests at Milan and soon afterwards was assistant librarian and then prefect of the Ambrosian Library at Milan, and in 1914 he occupied the responsible position of vice-prefect of the Vatican Library, raising to prefect in 1918. His writings during this period include reports to a number of learned societies in Europe and works on history, biography, arcchaeology and hagiography. He took a keen interest in the Arts and in Science. much of which he carried into effect later when as Pope he founded or organised educational and cultural institutions. In 1919 he was consecrated Archbishop of Lepanto, and in the same year was sent as Papal Nuncio to Poland—a position that called for the greatest tact and diplomacy owing to the delicate position in that newly independent country. In 1921 he was ordained Cardinal and Archbishop of Milan, and on February fit-h of the following year, on the death _of Benedict XV Cardinal Ratti, was elected Pope, taking the name of Pius XI, being c-rowned on 12th February. The outstanding characteristic of Pope Pius was the courage which he brought to *bear oil the problems that beset the world throughout the pontificate, and he stood up to the dictators. both Mussolini and Hitler, as no man has ever done. This same courage was well exemplified early in his career, when in 1919 in Warsaw i during the Bolshevik advance, when most of the diplomatic corps left for safety. Pius XI was a great worker for peace. When he was elected he found Europe still bleeding from the wounds of the great, war. and his work was first to remedy some of the terrible conditions then existing. His first encyclical, published in 1922, was on the troubles left by the war, and an outline of their causes and remedies. He has also dealt largely with social problems. with the Christian education of youth. Christian marriage and the soc al order. Perhaps his greatest achievement was his contribution to the settlement of the long-standing dispute between the Italian State and the Vatican. to 1860 th« Popes were tlk- iemporj tion of central Italy—the Papal states. These wi re lost to tn K :igdom of Italy in 18G0, and in Rome itself was removed from the temporal rule of the Vatican. During liis pontificate, an agreement and concordat was made with the Ita i&n State, the Treaty of the Vatican being made on 11th February. 1929. • \, ctly 10 years ago. By this treaty, the Vatican, St. Peter’s ( and the Vatican gardens, an area of about a square mile were made an independent state, this being sutfici- . lit to m. nof the temporal rule of Italy. With the passing of Pius XI the world has lost an energetic and capable ruler of the spiritual world, and one who made toe aelfar« of I inanity his concern both in spiritual and temporal matters. His pontificate was lived in troubled times, and he bore the burden •»: r« sponsibility with courage and fortitude to the end.