The Origins of Radical Catholicism XX: La Vie du Pére Hecker and papal condemnation

There were other things happening at the same time as the Americanist crisis and the Apostolic Letter, Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae of Leo XIII condemning what he saw as “Americanism.”  Again, remember that what rang the alarm bell was the Book La Vie du Pére Hecker which was a translation of Walter Elliott CSP’s biography of the founder of the Paulists, Issac Hecker.  Some claim that if Vatican Officials had read the original work in English all would have been well—that the “heresy” existed only in the minds of those who had read the French translation which was biased towards certain issues current in the French Church. 

A French priest, the Abbé Charles Maignen who was an ardent opponent of French Republicanism even after Leo XIII had given his approval to the Third Republic, wrote a critique of La Vie du Pére Hecker, entitled:  Le Pére Hecker,est-il un saint? In order to appreciate what happened next one needs to refer to French Politics in the last quarter of the nineteenth century.  I had dealt with this in two earlier blogs (April 1 and 2, 2011).  While the majority of French voters wanted to restore the monarchy, they were divided on which branch of Bourbon family should be restored—one representing a restoration of pre-revolutionary Absolute Monarchy, the other of the Constitutionalist Monarchy of 1848.  Their inability to agree led to the formation of what was to be a temporary republic—it lasted seventy years.  The die-hard conservatives—to which party Maignen belonged—were absolutely opposed to the Republic and were appalled that Leo XIII had not only given his approval to it but had a policy of ralliement, calling the French to not only accept the republic but actively participate in it.  Maignen saw the influence of the United States and its republic behind this Vatican move away from monarchism.  Cardinal Richard of Paris, supporting the Republic and Leo’s stance towards it, refused to give Maignen’s book the imprimatur.  Richard was not supportive of Klein and his endorsement of Americanist principles in La Vie du Pére Hecker, but he was concerned that Maignen’s book had attacked not only papally approved Republicanism but liberal members of the American hierarchy, notably Gibbons, Ireland, and Keane. 

Maignen did not let the Cardinal’s refusal of the imprimatur stop him.  He managed to arrange to have Alberto Lepidi, OP, the Pope’s official theologian grant the imprimatur.  This created the impression that Leo had himself given permission for the book to be printed.  Cardinal Rampolla, the Secretary of State, denied that the Pope had even known of Lepidi’s imprimatur, much less authorized it.  Salvatore Brandi, SJ, editor of La Civilità Cattolica (a semi-official Vatican newspaper) and rabid foe of Gibbons and the liberals, claimed that the pope had explicitly authorized it.  It was the typical Vatican Curial Keystone Cops drill, then as now, when no one knows who is in charge and everyone is claiming authority while no one will take responsibility.  Part of the complexity was Maignen had the help of Georges Périès, a canon law professor who had been dismissed from the faculty at Catholic University and who had an implacable personal hatred for Gibbons and Ireland, in arranging for Lepidi to grant the imprimatur.  Ireland, never one to back down from a brawl, claimed that he, Gibbons, and the others whom Maignen had attacked were the loyalists and reminded Rampolla that  Maignen was the one who opposed Leo’s policies towards the French Republic.  Archbishop Messmer of Milwaukee—a foe of Ireland’s over the school and German language issues—arrived in Rome for his ad liminia and told the pope that Ireland and some other American bishops did indeed hold the heterodox positions Maignen had attributed to them.  There was so much personal animosity, both among the American bishops and between the Americans and the Europeans that the bottom-line truth is hard to discover.  But there was a lot at stake in this fight and in the end the liberals—that is to say, the Americanists—would lose the battle.  That battle. There would be more.  And speaking of battles, we still need to look at the Spanish American War and how that affected the Vatican and Testem Benevolentiae.  Also keep Maignen and the French Monarchists in mind as they will surface again with Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and the Restorationists after Vatican II.  The war never ends, the battles go on even today!
the image today are some of the French Crown Jewels

The Origins of Radical Catholicism XVIII: American Fuel on a French Fire, part 2

The proverbial spit hit the fan in 1897 when the Abbé Felix Klein published (at the urging of the Count de Chambrol, the leader of France’s néo-chrétien movement) a French translation of an American book, The Life of Father Hecker by Father Walter Elliott of the Congregation of Saint Paul the Apostle, commonly known as the Paulists.  The Paulists are a congregation of priests founded by Issac Thomas Hecker.  Hecker was born and raised Protestant in New York City and he converted to Catholicism at age 25.  He entered the Redemptorist Order—at that time a predominately German society that had established itself in the United States to serve the German immigrant communities and to evangelize Protestants in an effort to convert them to Catholicism.  Among the early American Redemptorists, indeed the superior of the Redemptorists in America when Hecker was ordained, was Czech-born Saint John Neumann.   Neumann is a saint, but Hecker and other American Redemptorists found their congregation’s methods too “old school,” that is European, and so they withdrew (not without some underhanded opposition) and with the permission of the Holy See established a new congregation, The Missionary Society of Saint Paul the Apostle. 

The issues that drove them to establish this new society were several, but two of them are particularly worth noting.  The first is that they had a significantly different approach to Protestantism than the Redemptorists (of the time) and other European Catholics.  Instead of seeing Protestants as being in blind error and heresy, they believed that the various denominations and sects that directly or indirectly dated back to the Reformation had in fact preserved much Catholic Truth and were Catholicism to be presented to Protestant audiences as a fulfilment of what they already believed and treasured many Protestants would become Catholics.  Indeed, the (comparatively) vast numbers of Protestants—Anglican/Episcopalians in particular—who had become Catholics during the Oxford Movement and Romantic Revival of the nineteenth century bore this out. Many of these converts saw themselves recovering their own ancient heritage rather than renouncing heresies.  Unfortunately this positivist approach did not correspond to the Roman view of Reformation history.  An Italian priest, the Canon Salvatore di Bartolo had written The Criterions of Catholic Truth making just this point that Catholicism and Protestantism shared much common tradition and faith.  DiBartolo’s book was condemned by the Holy Office of Roman Inquisition in 1891.   At the time of Hecker and the Paulists, however, Rome was not giving what was happening in America much consideration.  Di Bartolo and his ideas had to be condemned; Hecker and his ideas—well America and its Catholicism were more of a phantasm for the Roman Curia than a nation, a culture, and a Church to be taken seriously. That would soon change however and Rome would sound the fire alarm about American style Catholicism. 

 The second point was, strictly speaking, not a matter of doctrine but of discipline—though with doctrinal overtones (as we shall see).  Hecker and his fellow Paulists did not choose to have their congregation take the traditional vows of religion.   Their society was more interested in its mission than its structure: structure was to serve mission.  But the Church was not prepared for this innovation.  Again, Hecker and his followers were in America and little of what happened in America preoccupied the Roman officials (o for those golden halcyon days  to return!) but should those ideas come to Europe...  Well, then they would have to be stamped out.

Well, those ideas did come to Europe and it rang the Vatican fire-bell for the American Church.    In 1897 a French translation of Elliott’s Life of Father Hecker was published and the French translation proved to be every bit more popular than the original had been in America.  Part of this was the French edition  was, like the upcoming liturgical revisions, not an honest translation.  No translation ever is.  Tradure est tradere.  To translate is to betray.  Klein and his buddies were of the French Liberal tradition that supported the Third French Republic and Republicanism in particular.  They believed that the Church should adapt itself to the modern world and La Vie du Pére Hecker was a medium for their message.  Here we have a rapprochement with Protestantism and the incipient ecumenicalism that implies; we see that religious vows are passé, the mission of the Church demands an activism—the contemplative life and virtues are out of step.  We have Republicanism and the idealization of the Democratic.  And we have Roman officials having apoplectic seizures all over the corridors of the Apostolic Palace.  

Americans are no good at languages.  (Those who speak three languages are tri-lingual; two languages are bi-lingual; one Language, American.)  The Italians, on the other hand, are marvellous at every language but one—English.  Most Italians are polyglots—they might speak Chinese, Arabic, and Swahili, but few ever get English.  (This is in part the problem with this new liturgical translation that is coming out for our use this autumn.  Most of the Roman officials lack the ability to know what a faithful English translation is and confuse literalism for accuracy.  Dio mio!)  The Hecker biography drew no attention until it was published in a language the Curia could read—Klein’s French edition.  But that French edition was not a faithful translation of the English original—it was deliberately skewed to support the bias of the French liberals.  Yet there is nothing like a good fire drill and the Klein translation had everybody from the pope on down the lowliest housemaid-nun running up the scala santa through the Vatican corridors and down the scala regia screaming fuoco! fuoco!  (yes, I know the scala santa is not in the Vatican but over near San Giovanni in Laterano, but let’s just pretend for the sake of the imagery.)   Of course the idea wasn’t to put out a fire but to start one—for burning the Americans at the stake. 
The image today is Father Hecker, founder of the Paulists, the Missionary Society of Saint Paul the Apostle, 
There probably won"t be an entry tommorow.  Lent is a time that i seem to be up to my neck in lectures and workshops--but i will do my best to have an entry for you on Monday    Buona Dominica a tutti.