The Pope and Mussolini (72 page)

CHAPTER 10: EATING AN ARTICHOKE

1.
ASV, ANI, pos. 22, fasc. 10, ff. 2r–3r, Borgongini a Mussolini, 12 settembre 1929.

2.
ASMAE, AISS, b. 2, Mussolini a Borgongini, 15 settembre 1929.

3.
While Mussolini claimed that September 20 proved to be a good thing for all, argued Borgongini, “all of the popes, from Pius IX to Pius XI, have always believed the opposite, and so have all Catholics.” ASMAE, AISS, b. 2, Borgongini a Mussolini, 18 settembre 1929.

4.
Cannistraro and Sullivan 1993, p. 328.

5.
E. Mussolini 1957, pp. 40–50, 103; De Felice 1974, pp. 19–20; De Felice 1981, p. 274n38; Morgan 1941, pp. 109–11, 138–39; Festorazzi 2010, pp. 80–81; Motti 2003, pp. 198–99; E. Mussolini 1957, p. 39.

6.
CC 1929 IV, pp. 548–52; “La solenne visita dei Sovrani d’Italia al Santo Padre,” OR, 6 dicembre 1929, p. 1. Cardinal Merry del Val was afraid that Borgongini—“who is capable of anything”—might bow to the government pressure and get the pope to reciprocate the royal visit, something the former secretary of state thought beneath the pope’s dignity. Tardini 1988, p. 450n32. The following week, marking the first anniversary of the Lateran Accords, OR recalled the event as the product of “the charity of a Father, the wisdom of a King, and the genius of a Statesman”; “XI Febbraio,” OR, 11 dicembre 1929, p. 1.

7.
E. Mussolini 1957, p. 135.

8.
Confalonieri 1957, p. 160; CC 1930 I, pp. 80–81. Although a number of cardinals had come to Rome for the final celebrations of the Holy Year, including two from the United States, none were told of the visit and so none got to witness it. NARA, M561, reel 1, John W. Garrett, U.S. embassy in Rome, to secretary of state, December 20, 1929; “475,000 Visit in Rome for Pope’s Jubilee,” CDT, December 19, 1929, p. 35.

9.
Baudrillart 2003, pp. 381–83 (6 décembre 1929), quoted in Durand 2010, p. 44.

10.
R. Mussolini 2006, p. 97.

11.
Moseley 1999, p. 5.

12.
E. Mussolini 1957, pp. 122–24.

13.
Thomas à Kempis’s Caracciolo 1982, pp. 102–5; Innocenti 1992, p. 14; Moseley 1999, pp. 4, 7, 11; Morgan 1941, p. 114.

14.
CC, 1930 II, p. 284. “This business of the pope’s gift to the newlyweds,” De Vecchi (1998, pp. 147–48) wrote in his diary that day, “is terrific for public opinion not only in Italy but throughout the world.” Later that year, just before Ciano and Edda left for China, where Ciano would take up a new diplomatic post, the pope gave them a private audience and presented them with leather-bound editions of Thomas à Kempis’s
Imitation of Christ
, bearing the pope’s autograph. “Son-in-law and Daughter of Il Duce Chat with the Pope,” CDT, September 9, 1930, p. 31.

15.
Moseley 1999, p. 15.

16.
DDI, series 7, vol. 9, n. 231, 26 agosto 1930. Borgongini’s draft of the letter, with corrections, is found in ASV, ANI, pos. 23, fasc. 2, ff. 165r–169r.

17.
The Duce ordered the destruction of historic palaces and churches, in the words of one historian, “as if they were a sterile lava flow that had descended on Rome rather than on Pompey in the days of its glory.” De Felice 1974, pp. 52–53; Insolera 1976, pp. 128, 132–33; Painter 2005, pp. 22–23.

18.
Navarra 2004, pp. 17, 44; De Felice 1968, pp. 55–56; Festorazzi 2010, p. 94; Cannistraro and Sullivan 1993, p. 298; ASV, ANI, pos. 22, fasc. 10, ff. 23r–34r, 4 settembre 1930.

19.
R. Mussolini 1974, p. 97.

20.
“You are perfectly correct from a logical point of view,” Mussolini told the nuncio, referring to his argument that with Conciliation it made sense to drop the contested holiday. “But I am not entirely wrong from the viewpoint of
opportunità
.”

21.
“No, you are a believer,” replied the nuncio, “and the Lord is clearly helping Your Excellency.” See Borgongini’s lengthy account of the meeting in his letter to the new secretary of state, Eugenio Pacelli. ASV, ANI, pos. 22, fasc. 10, ff. 23r–34r, 4 settembre 1930.

22.
ASV, ANI, pos. 23, fasc. 10, ff. 53r–62r, Borgongini a Pacelli, 15 settembre 1930.

23.
Both meetings between Borgongini and Mussolini are described in ASV, ANI, pos. 23, fasc. 2, ff. 204r–213r, Borgongini a Eugenio Pacelli, segretario di stato, 15 settembre 1930.

24.
A number of historians maintain that Mussolini was constructing a civil religion in Italy. The Fascists themselves used that term: in 1930, one of the men closest to Mussolini described Fascism as “a civil and political religion … the religion of Italy.” By the late 1920s, Augusto Turati, head of the Fascist Party, was devising a system of ritual and myth modeled on the Catholic Church. He called on all Italians to believe in the Duce and Fascism without question, “as one believes in the divinity.” After the Lateran Accords, Turati published a Fascist catechism; one of its primary items of faith was “the subordination of everyone to the Head’s will.” Mussolini, like the pope, was said to be infallible in matters of faith, and his judgment, like the pope’s, was not to be questioned. The “man of Providence” knew what was best for his flock. Gentile 1995, pp. 144–45; Gentile 1993, pp. 124, 293–94.

25.
Mack Smith 1982, p. 168. In February 1933 the head of the PNF, Achille Starace, announced that henceforth all official government acts would contain the name DUCE only in capital letters. Falasca-Zamponi 1997, p. 61.

26.
Gentile 1995, pp. 144–45; Gentile 1993, pp. 124, 293–94. A reporter for Mussolini’s newspaper,
Il Popolo d’Italia
, stationed in China, passed on a special request. The Catholic missionaries in Wei Chou wanted a photograph of the Duce, hoping especially to get one he himself had signed. The journalist explained, “These are people who are facing unheard of difficulties and dangers, but are raising the voice of Italy by speaking to the Chinese of Mussolini as a God.” Later, upon receiving a signed photograph, the deeply appreciative head of the mission expressed his thanks for “our Duce, whom God has chosen to guide the great destiny of our Fatherland.” Franzinelli and Marino, 2003, p.
xii
.

27.
MacKinnon 1927, p. 81.

28.
Ibid., p. xv.

29.
Navarra 2004, p. 65.

CHAPTER 11: THE RETURN OF THE NATIVE SON

1.
A British envoy, looking back on these years, would later express surprise that the much more experienced Gasparri had adapted so well to the pope’s “autocratic ways.” C. Wingfield,
Annual Report 1934
, January 12, 1935, R 402/402/22, in Hachey 1972, p. 286, section 133.

2.
Ottaviani 1969, pp. 502–3.

3.
Rhodes 1974, p. 40.

4.
Morgan 1944, p. 137. The famous phrase—also found on the masthead of
L’Osservatore romano
, derives from Matthew 16:18, where Jesus says “and upon this rock I will build my church. And the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

5.
ACS, MI, DAGRA, b. 113, 8 novembre 1926; ACS, MCPG, b. 155. These reports should be read with some caution, for the “noted Vatican informer” clearly had it in for Gasparri. According to a December 1927 secret police report, Gasparri also distrusted Tacchi Venturi, whom he accused of playing a double game, sharing confidential Vatican information with the Duce; ACS, MI, DAGR, b. 1320. At the time of the commotion over the presumed assassination attempt against Tacchi Venturi, Gasparri had tried to turn the pope against him by suggesting that the episode had been concocted by the Jesuit for some obscure purpose. ACS, MI, DAGR, b. 1320, 5 settembre 1928. Further evidence of Gasparri’s efforts to displace Tacchi Venturi comes from a police report to Mussolini in 1928, informing him of Gasparri’s opposition to the Jesuit’s involvement in the negotiations over the Roman question; ACS, CR, “Appunto,” undated report on Principe Pignatelli. The police informant also reported that Monsignors Caccia and De Samper, the pope’s master of ceremonies and his majordomo, blamed Gasparri for their failure to be named cardinals and were poisoning the pontiff against him.

6.
The letter is published in Martini 1960b, pp. 129–30.

7.
ACS, MI, FP “Pietro Gasparri,” Città del Vaticano, 8 ottobre 1929. Recently, with Borgongini’s appointment as nuncio to Italy, Pizzardo had been named to replace him as secretary of the Congregation of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs.

8.
De Vecchi 1983, p. 144. When the Portuguese ambassador to the Vatican came to see him in October, Gasparri confided that he had offered his resignation, but the pope had not yet accepted it. He added that Mussolini had become a “fearful nightmare” for the pope, who, angered at pressures on Catholic Action youth groups, called him a “persecutor of young Catholics.” ACS, MI, FP “Pietro Gasparri,” Città del Vaticano, 23 ottobre 1929.

9.
As early as November 1928,
The New York Times
was already reporting not only the rumor that Gasparri would be replaced but also that he would be replaced by Eugenio Pacelli. “Say Nuncio Will Be Raised,” NYT, November 19, 1928, p. 2.

10.
Informatore n. 35, Rome, 2 ottobre 1929, in Fiorentino 1999, p. 238.

11.
Coco 2009, pp. 176–77. The pope may have considered another factor in his decision as well: rumor had it that Cerretti, while in Paris, had often been seen in the company of women.

12.
ACS, MI, FP “Cerretti,” informatore n. 35, Roma, 14 dicembre 1929.

13.
It was not going to be easy, the ambassador concluded, to find a person of his quality to replace him in Berlin. ASMAE, AISS, b. 4, n. 6361, Berlino, 10 dicembre 1929.

14.
Coppa 2011, pp. 20–21; O’Shea 2011, p. 81.

15.
Coppa 2011, p. 1; O’Shea 2011, pp. 74–80.

16.
Wolf (2010, p. 36) finds strong evidence that in these years Pacelli was linked to Umberto Benigni’s notorious network of informants but was savvy enough to avoid becoming “discredited by too open an association with Benigni and his ‘secret service.’ ”

17.
Coppa 2011, p. 30.

18.
Noel 2008, pp. 38–39.

19.
Wolf 2010, p. 74. Among the unorthodox practices in the German Church that Pacelli worked to stamp out was allowing women to sing in church choirs during High Mass; ibid., p. 61.

20.
Ibid., pp. 75–79.

21.
Ventresca 2013, p. 55. In September 1929 Monsignor Spellman visited Berlin; Eugenio Pacelli met him at the train station and hosted him during his stay. The American priest was impressed with his charm. “Seven out of ten people,” Spellman wrote to his mother on September 8, “consider him the most likely next Holy Father.” This prescience was especially impressive as the fifty-two-year-old Pacelli was not yet a cardinal. Gannon 1962, pp. 66–67.

22.
Papin 1977, p. 42.

23.
Charles-Roux 1947, pp. 74–77.

24.
Ibid., p. 77.

25.
Papin 1977, pp. 42–43.

26.
McCormick 1957, p. 75.

27.
Pacelli asked Pascalina to do her best to duplicate the congenial living quarters he had grown accustomed to in Germany. When he heard that the German bishops, in honor of his appointment as secretary of state, were planning to give him a new pectoral cross, he let them know that he would prefer German furniture. Pascalina then arranged for the furniture to be selected and sent from Germany. On the new secretary of state’s desk, visitors could see a little silver plaque containing the names of all the German bishops who had paid for it; Schad 2008, pp. 53, 62–65.