Saint Paul Giustiniani
Humaniste
vénitien (+ 1528)
En pleine Renaissance
italienne, cet humaniste vénitien, devenu moine au désert de Camaldoli,
s'efforça de raviver la flamme de son Ordre en fondant "la Compagnie des
ermites de saint Romuald" ou "Congrégation de Monte-Corona".
Dans le seul à seul avec Dieu, lui aussi élabora une doctrine équilibrée de
l'idéal érémitique.
SOURCE : https://nominis.cef.fr/contenus/saint/7429/Saint-Paul-Giustiniani.html
Prière du Bienheureux
Paul Giustiniani
Voici la
Prière « Mon Dieu, selon la mesure infinie de Ta grandeur et de Ta
bonté, relève-moi, et je ressusciterai » du Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani
(1476-1528), humaniste vénitien devenu moine-ermite bénédictin au désert de
Camaldoli qui réforma l’ordre des Camaldules et fonda la Compagnie des ermites
de saint Romuald ou Congrégation de Monte-Corona.
La Prière du Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani « Mon Dieu, selon la mesure
infinie de Ta grandeur et de Ta bonté, relève-moi, et je ressusciterai » :
« Si je regardais mes péchés, j'hésiterais à espérer en Dieu ; mais
si je considère Sa miséricorde, il n'y a pas de limite à mon espoir. En tombant
je me suis brisé, dispersé, souillé. Qui va me ramasser, me recueillir, me
purifier ? Qui va me rendre l'innocence et la tranquillité ? Mon âme,
espère dans le Seigneur, mets ta confiance en Lui : comme Il a promis, Il
relève ceux qui tombent. Je suis tombé, oui, mais Tu es mon Dieu et mon Roi.
Selon la mesure infinie de Ta grandeur et de Ta bonté, relève-moi, et je
ressusciterai. Ainsi soit-il. »
Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani (1476-1528)
SOURCE : https://site-catholique.fr/index.php?post/Priere-du-Bienheureux-Paul-Giustiniani-a-Dieu
Prière du Bienheureux
Paul Giustiniani
Voici une Prière sur la
bonne manière de prier « Comme le navire, qui fend la mer, ne laisse
derrière lui aucune trace du parcours qu’il a fait » du Bienheureux Paul
Giustiniani (1476-1528), humaniste vénitien devenu moine-ermite bénédictin au
désert de Camaldoli qui réforma l’ordre des Camaldules et fonda la Compagnie
des ermites de saint Romuald ou Congrégation de Monte-Corona.
La Prière du Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani « Comme le navire, qui fend
la mer, ne laisse derrière lui aucune trace du parcours qu’il a fait » :
« Comme le navire, qui fend la mer, ne laisse derrière lui aucune trace du
parcours qu’il a fait, ainsi notre âme, sous la conduite de l’Esprit divin, en
traversant l’immense mer et l’abîme des contemplations divines, ne devrait pas
voir, si elle se retournait, le chemin par où elle est passée, ni comment elle
est parvenue à tel point donné. Si tu avais pris tout cela en considération,
cher frère en Christ, tu n’aurais probablement pas demandé ni à moi ni à
d’autres que te fût suggérée une manière de prier ; mais tu te serais
plutôt complètement abandonné à l’Esprit divin, sans prétention de connaître ni
la voie ni comment Il Te guide. Souviens-toi alors que dans tes oraisons,
c’est-à-dire quand tu es en prière, la méthode la meilleure est celle de n’en
avoir aucune et que la forme la meilleure est de n’en avoir aucune. Puisque
l’oraison naît de cet Esprit qui est généreux en ses dons, surabondant et
divers, de même divers et variés et quasi infinis sont les modes et les formes
que prend la prière. Ainsi soit-il. »
Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani (1476-1528)
SOURCE : https://site-catholique.fr/index.php?post/Priere-du-Bienheureux-Paul-Giustiniani-sur-la-Priere
Prière du Bienheureux
Paul Giustiniani
Voici une Prière sur la
bonne manière de prier « Rien ne pourra me séparer de la charité de
Dieu qui est en Jésus-Christ » du Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani
(1476-1528), humaniste vénitien devenu moine-ermite bénédictin au désert de
Camaldoli qui réforma l’ordre des Camaldules et fonda la Compagnie des ermites
de saint Romuald ou Congrégation de Monte-Corona.
La Prière du Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani « Rien ne pourra me séparer
de la charité de Dieu qui est en Jésus-Christ » :
« Rien ne pourra me séparer de la charité de Dieu qui est en Jésus-Christ.
M’enlèveras-Tu, Seigneur, le très doux sentiment de T’aimer ainsi ? Je
pense que non, car c’est Toi qui veux que je T’aime ainsi. Tu m’éprouves
peut-être pour savoir - ou pour mieux dire, pour me faire savoir- si je T’aime
vraiment. Eh bien ! Seigneur, essaie et tente mon cœur, et vois s’il y a
en lui un autre amour que Toi, s’il T’aime autrement qu’en Toi et pour Toi
seul. Permets, Seigneur, que je Te parle ainsi, mais comment pourras-Tu faire
que je ne T’aime pas ? Si Tu me donnes la paix intérieure et extérieure,
je T’aimerai ; si Tu me donnes la guerre et la bataille, je
T’aimerai ; si Tu me consoles intérieurement et au-dehors, je
T’aimerai ; si Tu me laisses dans la tribulation, sans consolation, dans
l’angoisse, je crois que je T’aimerai encore. Si c’est Toi seul, Seigneur, et
non moi-même que j’aime - Toi, mon bien et mon unique Amour-, je ne me soucie
pas de ce qui peut m’arriver, pourvu que je fasse Ta volonté et que
s’accomplisse en moi et par moi tout Ton bon vouloir. Ainsi soit-il. »
Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani (1476-1528)
SOURCE : https://site-catholique.fr/index.php?post/Priere-du-Bienheureux-Paul-Giustiniani-sur-la-Charite
St Paul
Giustiniani (1476-1528)
Né dans l’opulente famille vénitienne des Giustiniani, le jeune Thomas fut formé à l’école des humanistes italiens les plus renommés de son temps. Il se retira sur l’île de Murano pour approfondir dans la sérénité sa propre recherche philosophique ; là, Thomas entra en contact avec les moines camaldules et sa vie subit un retournement soudain et radical. En 1510, il entra, avec deux amis vénitiens, dans l’ermitage des Camaldules où il prit le nom de Paul. Vite, il se mit à aspirer, avec l’un de ses deux amis, Pierre Quirini, à une profonde réforme de l’Église, jusqu’à écrire un pamphlet détaillé sur la question qu’il adressa au pape Léon X.
Mais le mécontentement de Giustiniani ne se limitait pas à la situation
d’ensemble de l’Église ; il garda, sa vie durant, la certitude que la vie
érémitique pouvait être le rappel, dans le silence et le mystère, de l’amour de
Dieu pour les hommes, une « prédication sans paroles ». Brûlant du désir de se
livrer totalement à une vie d’intimité avec Dieu, il abandonna l’environnement
des Camaldules et créa en 1520, près d’Ancône, la « Compagnie des Ermites de
Saint Romuald », aujourd’hui connus sous le nom d’ermites camaldules de Monte
Corona. Giustiniani sut, grâce à sa grande culture, maintenir l’unité entre une
austérité poussée presque à son paroxysme et une sensibilité spirituelle
remarquable.
SOURCE : http://www.peintre-icones.fr/PAGES/CALENDRIER/Juin/28.html
Church
and Abbey San Salvatore di Montecorona (also: Abbazia Camaldolese di San
Salvatore, Badia di Montecorona, San Salvatore di Monte Acuto), territory of
Umbertide, Umbria, Italy
Le monastère de Monte Corona (monastero dell'Assunta Coronata), ou à l'origine ermitage du Mont-Corona, puis abbaye du Saint-Sauveur, monastère catholique situé en Italie à Umbertide, dans l'archidiocèse de Pérouse, à 30 kilomètres d'Assise, en Ombrie.
Church
and Abbey San Salvatore di Montecorona (also: Abbazia Camaldolese di San
Salvatore, Badia di Montecorona, San Salvatore di Monte Acuto), territory of
Umbertide, Umbria, Italy
Le monastère de Monte Corona (monastero dell'Assunta Coronata), ou à l'origine ermitage du Mont-Corona, puis abbaye du Saint-Sauveur, monastère catholique situé en Italie à Umbertide, dans l'archidiocèse de Pérouse, à 30 kilomètres d'Assise, en Ombrie.
25 June (Camaldolese)
28 June on
some calendars
Profile
Born to the Venetian nobility,
the son of Francesco Giustiniani and Paola Malipiero. Studied theology and philosophy at
the University of Padua. Pilgrim to
the Holy Lands in 1507 which
left with a desire for the religious life. He joined the Camaldolese hermits in 1510 and
became a travelling reformer,
going from one hermitage to
another to help them returned to proper Camaldolese discipline
and teaching. Part of the general chapter of 1513 that
helped unify and regularize the conventual and hermitic sections
of the Camaldolese. Prior of
the hermitage in Camaldoli, Italy from 1516 to 1520. Ordained a priest in 1518.
While serving as prior, Blessed Paolo
obtained permission from Pope Leo X to
found a order of hermits devoted
to the original rule as written by Saint Romuald.
He founded the Society of Saint Romuald, also known as
the Camaldolese Hermits of Monte
Corona or Montecoronesi in 1520.
Founded the hermitage of
Monte Cucco in 1521,
and wrote the
constitutions of the new Order in 1522.
In 1524 the
four existing hermitages held
their first general chapter and chose Paolo as their Prior-General. Imprisoned briefly
in Macerata, Italy and
then in 1527 in Rome, Italy when
the city was
sacked by the mercenary Lutheran Lanzichenecchi; he was imprisoned and tortured with Saint Gaetano
da Thiene but escaped.
Born
25 June 1528 in
the hermitage of
San Silvestro de Monte Soratte, Rome, Italy of
natural causes
buried in
the nearby crypt of San Silvestro, his grave was
lost over the years when the hermits had
to abandon the site
Additional
Information
books
Our Sunday Visitor’s Encyclopedia of Saints
other
sites in english
llocs
web en català
sitios
en español
sites
en français
fonti
in italiano
Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani
MLA
Citation
“Blessed Paolo
Giustiniani“. CatholicSaints.Info. 7 January 2023. Web. 24 June 2024.
<https://catholicsaints.info/blessed-paolo-giustiniani/>
SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/blessed-paolo-giustiniani/
Saint of the Day – 28
June – Blessed Paolo Giustiniani ECMC (1476-1528)
Posted on June
28, 2020
Saint of the Day – 28
June – Blessed Paolo Giustiniani ECMC (1476-1528) – Priest, Monk and Founder of
the Congregation of the Camaldolese Hermits of Monte Corona, Reformer
– born as Tommaso Giustiniani on 14 June in Venice, Italy and died on
28 June 1528, aged 52 in Monte Soratte.
He was a member of the
noble Giustiniani family of Venice and was born there in 1476, the
son of Francesco Giustiniani and Paola Malipiero. He studied
theology, philosophy and law, at the University of Padua. when he
had completed his studies, in 1507, he made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and
upon his return he felt a call to follow the life of a the religious.
He joined the Order of
the Camàldula, the Camaldolese, in 1510. The superior of the
order, Pietro Delfino, asked him to assist in ending the irregularities that
existed in some communities of the order, caused by the autonomy of each house
and the lack of authority of the Prior General. Especially, the conventual
branch (of cenobitic life) had relaxed in the application of the rule.
In 1513, Pope Leo X, at the request of Giustiniani and Delfino, convened
a General Chapter of the Camaldolese that decided the creation of the united
congregation of the Sacred Hermitage and San Michele de Murano, with temporary
general Priors and with a balance between the Conventual and Hermit branches.
In 1516 he was elected
Prior of the Hermitage of Camaldoli until 1520 and in 1518 he was Ordained a
Priest. Desiring a more hermit-like type of life and faithful to
the primitive rule of the order, he obtained from Pope Leo X, permission to found
other communities, which would follow the original rule of St Romuald.
Pope Leo X granted him the necessary permission and allowed him to found a
differentiated congregation, free from the jurisdiction of the Camaldolese
Prior General and with its own constitutions, called the Company of
Hermits of Saint Romuald, which would later be the Congregation of the
Camaldolese Hermits of Monte Corona. This Order would come to
considered as the most faithful expression of the original Charism of the Order
of St Romuald.
On his return from Rome
with permission, Giustiniani resigned as Prior and with a companion, Oliverio
da Cortona, went to seek the spiritual guidance of a Hermit who lived in Monte
Corona, near Perugia. Together with a Dominican, they went to live
alone in a place in the Apennines, Pascialupo, where they lived in a Chapel and
in 1521 founded the Hermitage of Monte Cucco.
Paolo was left alone with
the Camaldolese monk who had accompanied him, as the other companion did not
want to adopt the rule of St Romuald. The monks of Camaldoli asked
him to be closer to them and he soon moved to a Hermitage near Massaccio, where
he was joined by other monks of Camaldoli. These first Hermitages
were followed by those of Cupramontana, San Leonardo de Monte Volubrio (diocese
of Fermo) and San Benedetto de Monte Conero, near Ancona .
In 1522, Giustiniani
drafted the constitutions of the new congregation, which consisted of the
rigorous application of the original rule, modifying only the habit.
In 1523, the Order
recognised the congregation of Monte Corona as independent, remaining in the
Camaldolese family and in 1524 the first Chapter of the four hermitages of the
congregation took place, which elected the Founder as Prior General.
In 1527 he went to Rome for matters of order and was taken prisoner by
the soldiers of the army of Charles V who occupied the city. with Gaietà de
Thiene , also a prisoner, he was tortured but released. He returned
to Venice and then to Massaccio.
In 1528 he returned to
Rome and visited the Pope, obtaining confirmation of some privileges of the
Order. In Viterbo he contracted the plague. He went to
San Silvestro de Monte Soratte, near Rome, an ancient Benedictine Abbey that
had been given to the Hermits of Monte Corona. He died there on 28
June 1528.
He was succeeded as the
Prior General of the congregation by Agostino di Basciano.
He was buried in the
crypt of San Silvestro. His relics were lost during the
abandonment of the Hermitage and were only rediscovered in 1932.
Although he has never been formally Beatified, he had always been
considered a saint and was decribed as a “beati.” His cultus was
formally confirmed allowing special veneration in his order.
Blessed Paolo
Giustiniani’s Camaldolese Hermits of Monte Corona lives solely in Hermitages,
usually with a very small number of monks comprising the community.
There are three houses in Italy, two in Poland and one each in Spain, the
United States and Colombia, as well as a new foundation in Venezuela. Unlike
the other congregation, it is not a member of the larger Benedictine
Confederation.
Author: AnaStpaul
Passionate Catholic.
Being a Catholic is a way of life - a love affair "Religion must be like
the air we breathe..."- St John Bosco Prayer is what the world needs
combined with the example of our lives which testify to the Light of Christ.
This site, which is now using the Traditional Calendar, will mainly concentrate
on Daily Prayers, Novenas and the Memorials and Feast Days of our friends in
Heaven, the Saints who went before us and the great blessings the Church
provides in our Catholic Monthly Devotions. This Site is placed under the
Patronage of my many favourite Saints and especially, St Paul. "For the
Saints are sent to us by God as so many sermons. We do not use them, it is they
who move us and lead us, to where we had not expected to go.” Charles Cardinal
Journet (1891-1975) This site adheres to the Catholic Church and all her
teachings. PLEASE ADVISE ME OF ANY GLARING TYPOS etc - In June 2021 I lost 95%
sight in my left eye and sometimes miss errors. Thank you and I pray all those
who visit here will be abundantly blessed. Pax et bonum! VIEW ALL POSTS
SOURCE : https://anastpaul.com/2020/06/28/saint-of-the-day-28-june-blessed-paolo-giustiniani-ecmc-1476-1528/
Camaldolese
(CAMALDOLITES, CAMALDULENSIANS).
A joint order of hermits and
cenobites, founded by St. Romuald at the beginning of the eleventh century.
About 1012, after having founded or reformed nearly a hundred unconnected monasteries and
hermitages, St. Romuald arrived in the Diocese of Arezzo seeking
place for a new hermitage. It was here, according to the legend, that he was
met by a certain count called Maldolus. This man, after describing his vision
of monks in
white habits ascending a ladder to heaven (while he
had slept in one of his fields in the mountains), offered this spot to
the saint. The
field, which was held by Maldolus in fief of the Bishop of Arezzo, was readily
accepted by St. Romuald, who built there the famous hermitage afterwards known
as Campus Maldoli or Camaldoli. In the same year he
received from the count a villa at the foot of the mountains, about two miles
below Camaldoli, of which he made the monastery of Fonte
Buono. This latter house was intended to serve as infirmary, guest-house, and
bursary to the hermitage, in order that the hermits might not
be distracted by any worldly business.
Camaldoli and Fonte Buono
may be considered as the beginning of the Camaldolese Order; the former
foreshadowing the eremitical,
the latter the cenobitical, branches. It is true that this
opinion has been gravely contested. The Camaldolese writers are naturally
inclined to place the date of
the foundation of their order as early as possible, and their judgment is
further influenced by their views on the birth-date of St. Romuald. But they
differ considerably among themselves, their estimates varying from the year
940, chosen by Blessed Paolo Giustiniani, to the year 974, that commends itself
to Hastiville. They point out that St. Romuald founded many monasteries and
hermitages, and was many times surrounded by disciples before he came to
Camaldoli; and they argue that in founding Camaldoli he did not intend to begin
the order, but merely a new hermitage; that the order was called
the Romualdine until the later years of the eleventh century, and
then received the name Camaldolese, not from its origin at Camaldoli,
but from the fact that the Holy Hermitage had always retained its first fervour
and had been an exemplar to all other houses. It seems probable, however, that
St. Romuald before 1012 was rather a reformer of Benedictine houses
and a founder of isolated monasteries and
hermitages, than the originator of a new order. Indeed it is doubtful if he had
ever any intention of founding an order, in the modern sense, at all. But at
Camaldoli the Rule, which later appeared in modified form as the
"Constitutions of the Blessed Rudolph", is first heard of; at
Camaldoli the distinctive white habit first appears; at Camaldoli are first
found in combination the two cenobite and hermit branches
that are afterwards so marked a feature of the order. Strictly, perhaps, the
order did not come into existence till the Bull "Nulli
fidelium", of Alexander
II, in 1072. But, as all its distinctive features are first found together
at Camaldoli in 1012, it may not be unwarranted to asign the foundation of the
Camaldolese Order to that date.
The five Camaldolese
congregations
For six centuries the
order grew steadily as one body, recognizing the Holy Hermitage as its head.
But in process of time it became divided into five separate congregations,
viz.: (i) The Holy Hermitage, (ii) San Michele di Murano, (iii) Monte Corona,
(iv) The Congregation of Turin (San
Salvatore di Turino), (v) Notre-Dame de Consolation. The history of these
congregations had better be considered separately, after which something will
be said of the Camaldolese Nuns.
(i) The Congregation
of the Holy Hermitage
Little need be said here
of this great congregation, for throughout the centuries it has changed but
little, and its history is mostly to be found in its relations with the
congregations to which it gave birth. Before the separation of San Michele di
Murano, the Holy Hermitage had given four cardinals and
many bishops to
the church, and was famous throughout Europe for
the sanctity and
austerity of its members. Gratian, the great canonist; Guido d'Arezzo, the
founder of modern music; Lorenzo Monaco, the painter; Niccola
Malermi, the first translator of the Bible into Italian, are all
claimed as sons of this great congregation. To the present day, in spite
of persecution and
spoliation, the hermits of
Camaldoli and the cenobites of Fonte Buono remain examples of austerity and
monastic fervour.
(ii) The
Congregation of Murano
In the year 1212
the Venetian Republic,
anxious that a hermitage should be founded within its borders, sent a request
to this effect to Guido, Prior of Camaldoli. By him were sent Albert and
John, hermits,
and two lay brothers.
To these was made over the little church of San Michele, on an island (now
known as the Cemetery Island) between Venice and Murano,
where tradition asserts St. Romuald to have lived with Marinus. The church was
partly under the jurisdiction of
the Bishop of Castello, partly under
that of the Bishop of
Torcello. It was, however, at once released from the jurisdiction of
both and handed over to Albert as representing the Prior of Camaldoli. At first
a hermitage was started; but soon, on account of the rapid influx of novices, it was
found necessary to
adopt the cenobitical manner of life. The church was rebuilt and was consecrated by Cardinal Ugolino, and by
1227 the house is included by Gregory IX in his
enumeration of the monasteries subject
to Camaldoli. In 1243 another attempt to found a hermitage near Venice was made,
John and Gerard, hermits of
Camaldoli, being sent by Guido, the prior-general, to take possession of the
house and church of San Mattia in Murano, which had formerly been a nunnery and had
been given to Camaldoli by the Bishop of Torcello.
This hermitage prospered greatly, and, six years after its foundation, was
granted a much-mitigated form of the rule by Martin III, prior general of
Camaldoli. Within twenty years this hermitage already possessed a subject
house, and by the middle of the fourteenth century we find the Prior of San
Mattia making a visitation of his suffragan monasteries, and the
hermitage itself adopting the cenobitical life.
Meanwhile, about the end
of the thirteenth century, the Priory of San Michele had developed into
an abbey, and in
1407 its monks were
allowed to elect their own abbot, subject only to
the confirmation of the Prior of Camaoldoli. Two years later Paolo
Venerio, Abbot of
San Michele, was appointed by the pope one of the
visitors and reformers of monasteries in Venice. In 1434
Camaldoli asserted its authority, when Ambrogio Traversari, the prior general,
suddenly made a visitation of San Mattia di Murano and deposed the prior
for contumacy.
At the same time he exempted San Michele from the jurisdiction of the
vicar, and subjected it immediately to the prior-general. But in another ten
years came a further impulse towards independence, when Pope Eugenius IV suggested
that the Camaldolese abbeys should
form a congregation similar to that of Santa Giustina di Padova. The times,
however, were not opportune, and though a union of nine abbeys was
attempted in 1446 (called the Union of the Nine Places) it was soon abandoned,
and for twenty years the matter rested. But in 1462 Pius II granted to
Mariotti, prior general, and to his successors the right of appointing all
superiors under his jurisdiction ad
nutum. At once the question of separation became again important, and twelve
years later it was solved. The Abbeys of Santa Maria dei
Carreri, at Padua,
and of San Michele di Murano and the Priory of San Mattia di Murano formed a
new congregation. To escape the danger of commendam it was arranged
that the superiors of these houses should be elected for only three years at a
time, and a semblance of connexion with Camaldoli was maintained by requiring
confirmation of their election by the prior general. The new congregation was
confirmed by Sixtus
IV, and soon showed signs of vigour. In 1475 the two great abbeys of Sant'
Apollinaire and of San
Severo at Classe were united to it; and in 1487 Innocent VIII confirmed
and extended the privileges granted by his predecessor. By 1513, however, the
life tenure of office by the prior general was found to be inconvenient by
others as well as by the new congregation, and a general chapter of the whole
order was held at Florence. It was decided to form a new united congregation
"of the Holy Hermitage and of San Michele di Murano", with a prior
general elected annually (afterwards triennially), and alternately from
the hermits and
the "regular" cenobites. The "conventuals" were expressly
excluded from the generalship and were forbidded to take novices. This
congregation was confirmed and was granted extraordinary privileges by
the Bull "Etsi
a summo" of Leo
X. The reunion lasted, in spite of many disputes between the hermits and the
cenobites, for more than a century. In 1558 the conventuals were separated from
all privileges of the order, and eleven years later (1569) were finally
suppressed by Pius V.
In the same year the
congregation was much strengthened by the suppression of the hermit order of
Fonte Avellana, which, with all its possessions, was united to the Camaldolese
Order. Four years later, in 1573, the great Abbey of San Gregorio on the Cælian
Hill in Rome was
united to the congregation. The whole order was, at the beginning of the
seventeenth century, at the summit of its fortunes. In 1513 there had been
seventeen "groups of monasteries" and
four nunneries in
the order, and since then had been added Fonte Avellana with its dependencies,
the congregations of Monte Corona and of Turin, and several great
historic abbeys.
But the disruptive tendencies in the order were fatal to its continued
prosperity. In 1616 the differences between the hermits and the
cenobites of the great Congregation of the Holy Hermitage and San Michele
resulted in their separation again into two congregations, and in spite of an
attempt at reunion in 1626 this separation was final. The Congregation of San
Michele di Murano had its own general, styled "the general of all the
Camaldolese monks and hermits". It
possessed at one time about thirty-five monasteries (including
Sant' Apollinaire at Ravenna,
San Michele and San Mattia at Murano, Santa Croce at Fonte Avellana, Santi
Angeli at Florence,
and San Gregorio at Rome),
as well as eight nunneries.
The houses subject to the congregation were divided into the four provinces
of Venice, Tuscany, Romagna, and
The Marches and Umbria, each with its "house of profession",
whose abbot was
the vicar of the province. At each of the quinquennial chapters, the four great
offices of the general, the two visitors, and the procurator general
were distributed in turn among the four provinces, so that each province every
twenty years had possessed all these dignities. Under this organization the
congregation attracted many devout and intelligent subjects, and its reputation
both for learning and for strictness was widespread. Romano Merighi
(1658-1737), one of the founders of the Accademia degli Arcadi; Guido Grandi
(1670-1742), historian of the order and famous mathematician, friend and
correspondent of Newton; the two brothers Collina; Angelo Calogerà (1699-1768),
the historian of letters; Claude Frommond (1705-65), physician and
chemist; Benedetto
Mittarelli (1708-77) and Anselmo Costadoni (1714-85), authors of the
"Annales Camaldulenses"; Mauro Sarti (1709-66), historian; Isidore
Bianchi (1733-1807) and Clemente Biagi (1740-1804), archæologists; Ambrogio
Soldani (1736-1808), naturalist—these are but a few of the illustrious names
that adorn the congregation. It has also produced four cardinals: Andrea
Giovannetti (1722-1800), for twenty-three years Archbishop of
Bologna; Placido Zuria (1769-1834), Vicar of Rome under
three popes;
Mauro Cappellari (1765-1846), who in 1831 was elected pope and assumed
the name of Gregory
XVI; and Ambrogio Bianchi, who was also general of the order till his death
in 1856. It was Mauro Cappellari to whom the Camaldolese Order is indebted for
its survival. The great catastrophe of the French Revolution resulted
in 1810 in the general suppression of religious orders
in Italy. Fonte
Avellana was spared in recognition of the scientific attainments of the
titular abbot,
Dom Albertino Bellenghi. But the Venetian houses
were involved in the general ruin. S. Mattia was deserted and ultimately
demolished. But Mauro Cappellari, who was at that time Abbot of S. Michele
di Murano, succeeded in retaining house and community, by clothing the latter
in the habits of secular
priests, and by turning the former into a college for noble
youths. The magnificent library was
confiscated, and, after its chief treasures had been placed in public libraries, the remaining
18,000 volumes were sold by public auction. In 1813, after the blockade
of Venice by
the Austrians, the Commune made a public cemetery of the island of San Michele,
thus destroying the vineyards of the abbey. In 1829 the same
body gave the monastery and
island into the custody of the Friars Minor Observant,
who still possess them. Meanwhile, in 1825, Cappellari had been created cardinal by Leo XII, and it was
owing to the strenuous opposition of the former and of Cardinal Zuria that
that pope relinquished
his intention to suppress the now enfeebled order. And when Cappellari mounted
the pontifical throne as Gregory XVI, he not only
materially assisted the finances of the order, but in every way furthered its
attempts to regain something of its former prosperity. At his death, in 1846,
it had recovered several of its historic houses and had hopes of regaining all.
But these hopes have not been realized.
(iii) The
Congregation of Monte Corona
If we except Camaldoli
itself, all the houses of the order may be said to have abandoned, by the end
of the fifteenth century, the eremetical mode of
life so dear to St. Romuald. The establishment of hermitages in the
neighbourhood of towns had rendered the solitary life of the hermit almost
impossible, and the munificent benefactions which at various times had been
made to the order had caused it to lose not a little of its primitive spirit
and to abandon many of its stricter observances. It was reserve to Paolo
Giustiniani, a member of the illustrious Venetian family of that
name, to restore to the order the observance of St. Romuald's ideal of a life
of silence and solitude. At an early age he left Venice, where he had
been born in 1476, to study philosophy and theology in the
famous schools of
Padua, and at the end of a brilliant career there he went on a pilgrimage to the
Holy Land. On his return to Italy he entered
religion at the age of thirty-four, becoming a hermit at
Camaldoli. His promotion to high offices in the order was rapid. Shortly after
his profession he was sent on an embassy to the court of Leo X to
obtain papal protection
against a certain abbot of
S. Felice at Florence,
who seems to have been lavishly spending the revenues of Camaldoli, and whom
the prior of
Camaldoli, general of the order, was unable himself to deal with. The result of
the embassy was a Bull from
the pope ordering
restitution to be made to Camaldoli and forbidding to the Abbot of S. Felice
any further interference. On Giustiniani's return from Rome, the general of the
order, Pietro Delphino, invited his co-operation in the difficult task of
suppressing the abuses which had grown up. All authority in the order, which by
right belonged to the prior of
Camaldoli, was now possessed by the superiors of the regulars and conventuals.
The discipline and observance of the former seem to have been strict, but the
case of the conventuals left a great deal to be desired. Their superiors were
perpetual, and apparently independent of one another. Recourse was had to Leo X, who, in 1513,
ordered a general chapter to assemble. The results of its deliberations have
been given above in the history of San Michele di Murano.
In 1516 Paolo Giustiniani
was elected Prior of Camaldoli, and on the expiration of the three years of
office, he again journeyed to Rome on business
concerning the order. After the lapse of another three years spent in seclusion
at Camaldoli, he was re-elected to the office of prior and once again
approached the court of Leo X, to obtain
permission from that pontiff to attempt an extension of the order. Leo, who
appears to have had a great respect for Giustiniani, not only encouraged him in
his project, but allowed the foundation of an entirely new congregation, exempt
from the jurisdiction of
the general and possessing its own peculiar constitutions. Returning from Rome to Camaldoli,
he read the Brief from
Leo to the assembled hermits and monks, and proceeded to
resign the office of prior. Accompanied by a single companion he travelled on
foot to Perugia to
seek advice and spiritual
direction from a solitary (of the Third Order of St.
Francis) who dwelt at Monte Calvo. With this latter and a member of the Order of St. Dominic, he
betook himself to a retreat in the Apennines—a dismal and solitary rock known
as Pascia Lupo. A ruined chapel appears to
have been the sole shelter for the three wanderers, and their right to possess
even this was disputed by the priest of the
neighbouring village so vigorously that it required papal authority to
settle the question. Paolo was soon forsaken by his Dominican and Franciscan companions,
who were aggrieved at the idea of adopting
St. Romuald's rule, he himself remaining at Pascia Lupo with the companion whom
he had brought from Camaldoli and two others who had joined him. He was not
destined, however, to remain long in this lonely spot, for, acceding to an
earnest request from the hermits of
Camaldoli to live near them, he came, with his original companion, to a place
near Massaccio, and was there joined by some of the religious from Camaldoli.
Such were the first beginnings fo the congregation founded by Paolo
Giustiniani. Soon it was increased by the addition of two famous monasteries, viz. that
of St. Leonard, situated on the summit of Monte Volubrio, in the Diocese of Fermo, and
that of St. Benedict, near Ancona. The former was
given to the order by its commendatory abbot,
Gabrielli, nephew of the Cardinal of Urbino. Massaccio was
given over entirely to the new congregation by Camaldoli in 1522. In the same
year Giustiniani drew up his constitutions. No important additions to previous
legislation seem to have been made. The rule of life was to be kept with the
greatest rigour, as in St. Romuald's time. The hermits' food was
rarely to consist of anything better than dry bread, and wine was very seldom
allowed. The form of the monastic habit was considerably altered: the tunic
and scapular were
so shortened as to come only a few inches below the knee, and in place of the
cowl the new hermits were
given a capuce with a hood attached to it, and a short cloak fastened with a
piece of wool at the throat.
There were now in all
four hermitages belonging to the congregation, and in January of the year 1524
the first general chapter was held in the monastery of St.
Benedict near Ancona.
In this chapter Paolo Giustiniani was elected general of the
congregation, priors were
chosen for the different monasteries, and the
constitutions were confirmed. In the same year Cardinal Giulio dei Medici, the
friend and helper of Giustiniani, succeeded to the papacy as Clement VII. Giustiniani
immediately repaired to Rome to obtain from
the new pontiff confirmation of the acts of Leo X and full
possession of the monasteries which
Gabrielli, holding in commendam, had given over to the congregation
when he joined it. Clement readily gave the necessary confirmation
and at the same time granted the congregation certain dispensations from
canon law.
This confirmation of
Gabrielli's gift did not imply that the monasteries would
remain in the possession of the congregation after Gabrielli's death.
Giustiniani, anxious that the gift should be made perpetual, once more set out
for Rome,
accompanied this time by Gabrielli. It was the month of May, 1527, the very
time at which the soldiers of the Emperor Charles V were
occupying Rome.
Giustiniani and his companion on their arrival were made prisoners, but, having
nothing in their possession, were released, and travelled first to Venice and then to
Massaccio. In 1528 Giustiniani went to Rome for the last
time. He saw Clement in the Castle of S. Angelo and obtained the confirmation
he had sought in the preceding year. Besides this he received confirmation of a
gift previously made by the Abbot of St. Paul's, of the monastery of San
Silvestro on Monte Soracte. On his way to this monastery, which was
about twenty miles distant from Rome, he was seized by
his last illness, and died at his newly acquired monastery on the
28th of June, 1528.
On the death of the
founder, a new general was chosen for the congregation in the person of Agostino
di Basciano, who died shortly after. His place was taken by Giustiniano di
Bergamo, formerly a Benedictine monk. He summoned a
general chapter to decide which of the then existing houses was to be
considered as the chief of the congregation. Many preferred Massaccio, as being
the first-founded, but precedence was finally given to the monastery of Monte
Corona.
In 1540, reunion was
effected between the Congregations of Monte Corona and Camaldoli, with
the prior of
Camaldoli as general. It was arranged that a general chapter was to be held
yearly at Camaldoli, at which the prior was to be chosen. This state of things
only lasted for a year; the congregations were again separated and remained so
till the year 1634, when they were again united by Pope Urban VIII. This
union lasted till 1667, when they were finally separated by a Bull of Clement IX.
(iv) The
Congregation of Turin
The Congregation of Turin owes its
foundation to Alessandro Ceva, a member of a noble Piedmontese family. Born in 1538, he
went to Rome in
1560 to study for the priesthood,
and there placed himself under the spiritual direction of St. Philip Neri. Eight
years later, with the saint's advice,
he determined to join the Camaldolese, and we find him becoming prior general
of the order in 1587. From 1589 to 1595 he was in perpetual dispute with the
order concerning the reformation of the Breviary ordered by
Popes Pius V and Clement VIII. In 1596 he
was sent to Turin as prior of the
Camaldolese monastery of
Puteo Strata, with authority to found hermitages of the order in Piedmont. Two years
later a terrible plague visited Turin, during which the
Camaldolese monks undertook
the care of the sick, which the secular clergy, whose
numbers had been terribly reduced by the pestilence, were scarcely able to
perform. Alessandro Ceva, in the midst of his ministrations in the afflicted
city, was called away to assume the priorship of the monastery of San
Vito at Milan,
and we find him writing from this place in 1599 to the Archbishop of Turin, begging him to
ask Charles Emmanuel, Duke of Savoy, to make a
solemn vow to God to found a
Camaldolese hermitage, that the plague might be arrested. The vow was made
publicly by the Duke of Savoy and the
people of Turin,
and the foundation of the new hermitage after much delay was laid in July,
1602, at a lonely spot between Turin and Peceto.
The church of this new hermitage was finished in 1606, and endowed by the Duke
of Savoy as
the chapel of
the Order of the Knights of the Annunciation (see MILITARY ORDERS),
of which order the hermits were
to be regarded as chaplains.
Little is known about
this congregation, which seems to have been reabsorbed into the congregation of
Monte Corona in the eighteenth century.
(v) The Congregation
of Notre-Dame de Consolation.
In the year 1626 there
entered the Congregation of Turin Boniface
d'Antoine, a French priest belonging to
the Diocese of Lyons.
Almost immediately he was sent to France by the
general of the congregation, to solicit from Louis XIII authorization for the
founding of Camaldolese hermitages in France. His first monastery was in
his native Diocese
of Lyons, near a town named Bothéon. It was dedicated to Our Lady of
Consolation and was founded and endowed by Balthassar de Gudaigne de Hostun,
Marquis do Baume, in 1631. His second foundation was at Mont Peuchant in Le
Forez, thanks to the help and munificence of the Archbishop of Lyons, Cardinal de
Marque Mont. The Archbishop of
Vienne, Pierre de Villars, was also friendly to the new order, authorizing the
foundation of the hermitage of Notre Dame de Grâce at Sapet: and testifying at
the same time to the sanctity and
austerity of d'Antoine. Another foundation in the Diocese of Lyons was
made in 1633, when Père Vital de Saint-Paul, an Oratorian, and his sister
presented the two churches of St.-Roch and Val-Jésus, situated in the parish of Chambre,
to d'Antoine. In the following year Louis XIII gave his formal consent by
letters patent to the establishment of the Camaldolese in his dominions, on the
condition that their general should always be French. He also prevailed upon
the reigning pontiff, Urban
VIII, to form the French Camaldolese
into a separate congregation, with the title of "Notre-Dame de
Consolation", which was effected by a Bull dated 8 October,
1634. They were to observe the constitutions of Monte Corona, to which
congregation they were affiliated. The new order seems to have been popular
in France. In
1642 Charles de Valois, almoner of the Duc d'Angoulême, founded a hermitage at
La Flotte, in Vendôme, and in 1659 the order was presented with another house
in Vendôme, at La Gavalerie, in the parish of Bessé. A
foundation was made in 1674 by the Comte de Guénégaud and his wife, Elizabeth
de Choiseul, on their estate at Rogat, in the parish of Congard,
in Brittany. In 1671 the new congregation took possession of the hermitage of
Mont-Valérien, near Paris,
whither they had been invited two years previously by a lay religious community.
This foundation, however, was abandoned two years later. In 1679 a Camaldolese
community was introduced into the old Benedictine abbey at Ile
Chauvet, in Lower Poitou. This abbey had been
held in commendam by
various persons,
some of whom had been laymen.
In 1654 Henri de Maupas, Abbot of St.-Denis
at Reims and
afterwards Bishop successively of Le Puy and Evreux,
became commendatory
abbot, and fifteen years later introduced the Camaldolese, with the consent
of the Bishop of Luçon, in whose diocese
the abbey was
situated. This was the only foundation of any importance made in France after the
death of Boniface d'Antoine in 1673. Henceforth the history of this
congregation is closely connected with the history of Jansenism. Throughout
the congregation there were many obstinate adherents of the new heresy, and in 1728 a
pamphlet, entitled "Le Témoignage", defending their position,
appeared in answer to the punitive measures taken against them by the General
Chapter of 1727. No amount of repression could remove all traces of this
persistent heresy,
and the whole Congregation was suppressed in 1770.
The first house
of Camaldolese Nuns, San Pietro di Luco in Mugello, near Florence, was founded by
Blessed Rudolph, in the year 1086. It is true that St.
Romuald himself had founded houses for nuns in 1006 and
1023; but there is no evidence that they followed the Camaldolese rule, and the
Camaldolese writers almost unanimously assign the beginning of the houses
for women to
Blessed Rudolph. By 1616, when the congregation of San Michele di Murano was
finally separated, there were eight houses subject to that congregation,
besides many others under the jurisdiction of
the bishops in
whose dioceses they
were situated. The nuns follow
the rule of Camaldoli. They wear a white habit, veil, scapular, and girdle, to
which the choir nuns add
a black veil. In choir the choir nuns wear a white
cowl, but the lay sisters a white cloak.
Rule and constitutions
St. Romuald has left no
written rule; the austere manner of life led by his hermits was
transmitted by oral tradition. His great ideal was to introduce into the West
the eremitical life
led by the Eastern monks and
the Fathers of the Desert. In the words of St. Peter Damian, his
endeavour was "to turn the whole world into a hermitage, and make all the
multitude of the people associates of the monastic order" (totum mundum in
eremum convertere, et monachico ordini omnem populi multitudinem sociare). He
introduced into Western
monasticism a system hitherto unknown, and attempted a blending of the
cenobitical life of the West with the eremitical life of
the East. The rule was of the utmost severity. The brethren lived each in their
separate cells, in the midst of which stood the oratory or chapel, where they met
for the Hours of the Divine
Office, the whole Psalter being
recited daily. There were two Lents during the
year, one in preparation for Christmas, the other
for Easter.
During both these periods every day of the week except Sunday was an abstinence
day, that is to say, really a fast of the most rigorous kind on bread and
water. During the remainder of the year this abstinence was to be kept on all
days except Thursdays and Sundays, when fruit and
vegetables might be eaten. The ideal of St. Romuald was one of absolute
asceticism, and there was little room in his system for the "nothing
harsh, nothing burdensome" (nihil asperum, nihil grave) which is so
striking a feature in the Rule of St. Benedict,
with its broad comprehensiveness and wise power of dispensation. This rule
of life remained unrelaxed at Camaldoli till the year 1080, when the fourth
prior, Blessed Rudolph I, gave the first written constitutions to the order.
Besides a mitigation of austerity, there had become necessary a
definite written code which everyone who joined would be bound to follow. The
abstinence on bread and water, which had hitherto been observed on all days
except Sundays during
the two Lents,
was now dispensed on Thursday as well, and also on the feasts of St.
Andrew, St. Gregory,
St. Benedict, the Annunciation, Palm Sunday, and Maundy Thursday. On
these days fish and wine were to be allowed. On feasts of twelve lessons, if
these were not days of abstinence, the hermits were
allowed to take their meals together in a common refectory. The observance of
silence which was continual under St. Romuald, was slightly relaxed in
Rudolph's constitutions. It was to be observed throughout both Lents and on all
abstinence days. At other times it was to be observed from Vespers till after
the conventual Mass. An important change in the character of the order was made
by Rudolph's extension of the cenobitical life. Fonte Buono, from being merely
an adjunct of Camaldoli, now became a separate monastery, and
henceforth the Camaldolese Order is distinguished by this twofold character. In
his legislation for
cenobites Rudolph built carefully on St. Benedict's Rule. The
interpretation which adhered closely to the letter and rigour of this rule,
without consideration of circumstances of time, place, and national
characteristics, was that which naturally appealed most strongly to the
monastic reformer, and it was this aspect of the rule, if anything,
intensified, which Rudolph chose for his monks, who were regarded
by their contemporaries, and have ever since been regarded, as forming one of
the many branches of the great Benedictine tree.
In 1085 and 1188 further constitutions were given, more mitigated than those
given in 1080; and as time went on the tendency was ever towards greater
relaxation. In 1249 and 1253 Blessed Martin III gave his constitutions, and
others again were promulgated in
1328. When the hermits of
Camaldoli were united with the monks of the Congregation
of San Michele di Murano, in 1513, special constitutions were drawn up, and
when the first union was made between the Congregations of Camaldoli and of
Monte Corona, in 1540, separate constitutions were given to the former.
With regard to the rule
observed at Camaldoli today, it may be said with truth to retain
some of the early rigour and austerity. Meat is never allowed except to the
sick, and the severe abstinence on bread and water has to be observed on every
Friday throughout the year. Meals are always taken in the seclusion of the
cell, except on the great feasts, and even then in silence. The two Lents are still
observed, and during these periods eggs, milk, butter, and cheese are strictly
forbidden. All the Hours of the Divine Office are
said in common in the hermitage church, a building which practically consists
of one long and spacious choir. The hermits rise all
the year round at half an hour after midnight for Matins, Lauds, and Meditation,
which last for an hour and a half. A rest is then allowed till sunrise, when
they betake themselves again to the church for the Office of Prime, and then
return to their separate oratories to
celebrate Mass.
A slight collation is then taken, and the time between that and Tierce is spent
in spiritual reading. Tierce is sung at nine, followed immediately by the
conventual Mass and Sext. The remainder of the morning till the Office of None,
at eleven, is passed daily in study and manual labour, each hermit having his
own little garden and workshop. Dinner is taken at half-past eleven and is
followed by recreation, during which the hermits are allowed
in summer to take a siesta. Vespers are sung at
sunset, and a slight collation is taken later on. The day is closed by Complin, Meditation, and
the Rosary.
Twice a week in winter, and three times a week in summer, talking is allowed
during recreation time, and walks may be taken through the woods surrounding
the hermitage. The monks at
Fonte Buono live a life somewhat similar, though, of course, without the
solitude of the hermits' life,
and a walk beyond the monastic
enclosure is allowed daily. Their hospice is now an hotel, and their
forests have been appropriated by the Government. Speaking generally, the
Camaldolese cenobites today may be said to follow the Benedictine rule in
its ordinary interpretation.
The habit of the
Camaldolese is now but little changed from that worn in the earliest days of
the order. A white tunic reaching to the ankles, with scapular, girdle, and
hood of the same colour. The cowl, worn only during the Divine Office, is also
white, and of the same shape as the ample cowl of the Benedictines. A cloak is
worn when walking abroad in cold weather, and the hermits also have
another very ample cloak in which the whole body can be wrapped when hurrying
to the midnight Office from their cells in severe weather.—Camaldoli, it should
be remembered, stands on a range of the Tuscan Apennines at
an altitude of 3680 feet above the sea.
An aspirant to the solitary
or to the cenobitical life at Camaldoli has to undergo a long and severe
probation. He is at first regarded as a guest for some days, and is then
summoned before the community, assembled in chapter, and formally received.
Placed immediately in the novitiate, he continues
to wear his secular dress for forty days, after which period he is clothed in
the novice's habit
and begins a novitiate of
two years. If he should persevere he is admitted to simple vows, which may,
if necessary, be
dispensed during the three following years. During these three years the young
religious does part of his ecclesiastical studies,
and then, unless his superiors think a longer period necessary, he is
admitted to solemn or final vows and to Holy orders. A lay brother's probation
is different. He remains one year in the novitiate, and then
becomes an "oblate" for seven years; another year's novitiate is then
gone through, at the end of which he is called conversus, and his
simple vows are
taken for three years. If all is satisfactory, at the end of this period he is
allowed to take solemn vows.
Present state of the
order
There are at the present
date (1907) three congregations in the Camaldolese order: the Congregation of
Cenobites, which possesses four monasteries, with about
fifty subjects; the Congregation of Hermits of Etruria,
which possesses two hermitages and three monasteries, with nearly
sixty subjects; the Congregation of Hermits of Monte
Corona, which possesses ten houses, with about one hundred and thirty subjects.
All these houses are in Italy, except the monastery of
Bielany in Poland,
belonging to the Congregation of Cenobites, and the hermitage of Nuova
Camaldoli, near Caxias in Brazil, belonging to the
Congregation of Hermits of
Etruria. This last was founded from Camaldoli in 1899, by Dom Ambrogio
Pierattelli and Dom Michele Evangelisti, and one lay brother, Ermindo
Dindelli. In 1900 these were joined by three more hermits and two
more lay brothers from
Camaldoli. Dom Ambrogio was elected prior in 1903, and the first Camaldolese
hermitage in the New
World shows many signs of rapid and fruitful growth.
There are also five
houses of nuns in
existence, with about 150 inmates. These are all in Italy.
Sources
AUGUSTINUS
FORTUNIUS, Historia Camaldolensium (Venice, 1575, 1579);
BEAUNIER, Receuil historique des Archevêchés, Evêchés, Abbayes et
Prieurés de France (Ligurgé, 1906), introduction; Camaldoli ed i
Camaldolesi, brevi note di un sacerdote secolare ad un giovane (Rome,
1905); CARMICHAEL, In Tuscany (London, 1901), 245-264;
CAMPBELL, Guida storica illustrata di Camaldoli (Udine, 1906);
GRANDI, Dissertationes Camaldolenses (Lucca, 1707);
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Kirche (Paderborn, 1907), I, 401-408; HELYOT, Histoire des ordres
monastiques (Paris, 1718), V, 236-79; HERZOG AND
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Benedicti (Paris, 1707), IV, 1261-3, 275, 289, 339; MATTABELLI AND
COSTADONI, Annales Camaldulenses O. S. B. (9 vols., Venice, 1755-73);
MORONI, Diz. (Venice, 1840-58), V, 290, 308; XCI, 519-53, 561--62; S.
PETRUS DAMIANUS, Vita Sancti Romualdi (Florence, 1513);
RAZZI, Regola della vita eremitica data dal b. Romualdo (Florence,
1575); RAZZI, Vite dei santi e beati del ordine di
Camaldoli (Florence, 1600); THOMAS DE MINIS, Catalogue Sanctorum et
Beatorum totius ordinis Camaldulensis (Florence, 1605);
ZIEGELBAUER, Centifolium Camaldlulense (Venice, 1750); Regola di
S. Benedetto e Constitutioni della Congregazione degli Eremiti Camaldolesi di
Monte Corona (Rome, 1670); Regolamento giornaliero pei novici degli
Eremiti Camaldolesi di Monte Corona (Frascatri, 1906); Le Messager
des Fidèles, Revue Bénédictine (Maredsous, 1887), IV, 356-63; Revista
Storica Benedictina (Rome, 1906-7), I, 288-9, 470-5; II, 371-383, 600-4.
Butler, Richard Urban, and Leslie Toke. "Camaldolese." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 3. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908. <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03204d.htm>.
Transcription. This
article was transcribed for New Advent by WGKofron. With thanks to Fr.
John Hilkert and St. Mary's Church, Akron, Ohio.
Ecclesiastical
approbation. Nihil Obstat. November 1, 1908. Remy Lafort, S.T.D.,
Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.
Copyright © 2023 by Kevin Knight.
Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03204d.htm
GIUSTINIANI
A celebrated family,
which, according to Bernardo Giustiniani in his vita of his uncle St. Lawrence,
was driven from Constantinople by sedition and migrated to Istria and Venice.
The Venetian branch is found in Chioggia and Fermo. A Genoese branch spread to
Corsica, Naples, Sicily, and Lipara, as well as to Chios, an Aegean island
ruled by Genoa. The first member of whom there is record was Bl. Nicholas, a
Benedictine monk (d. c. 1180). He entered the monastery of San Niccolò del
Lido at Venice in 1153. When all the male members of his family perished in a
disaster at sea, he was dispensed from his monastic vows by Pope Alexander III.
He married Anna Michieli, daughter of the Doge of Venice, and fathered nine
children. He returned to the monastery before his death. Although he is honored
on November 21 in the Benedictine Order, there has been no formal
beatification.
Venetian Branch. Lawrence (see
lawrence justinian, st.), the most famous member of the family, an ascetical
and mystical writer, entered the canons regular of st. augustine in 1400 and
led a humble, mortified life, showing special love for the poor. From 1409 on,
he served in various administrative posts in his order and in the Church,
ultimately becoming superior general (1424–31), bishop of Castello (1433), and
finally patriarch of Venice (1451–56). Beatified in 1524 by clement vii,
Lawrence was canonized by alexander viii in 1690.
Leonardo, statesman
and poet; b. Venice, c. 1388; d. there, Nov. 10, 1446. Leonardo was
the brother of Lawrence. He became head of the Council of Ten (1443) and the
procurator of saint mark's. He is noted for having restored the canzonetta as
a popular lyric.
Bernardo, statesman
and historian; b. Venice, Jan. 6, 1408; d. there, March 10, 1489. He was the
son of Leonardo, and became ambassador to Louis
XI of France, paul ii, and sixtus iv, as well as a member of the
Council of Ten. He is known for his biography of his uncle St. Lawrence (Venice
1475) and for his history of Venice, the De origine urbis Venetiarum (Venice
1492).
Paolo, Bl., monk and
spiritual author, known also as Tommaso; b. Venice, June 15, 1476; d. Abbey of
St. Sylvester of Mt. Sorate, June 28, 1528. He studied philosophy and theology
at the University of Padua and then c. 1505 took up a solitary
existence at Murano near Venice. He was the founder of the Camaldolese Hermits
of Monte Corona and in 1513 succeeded Pietro delfino as general of the order.
Paolo is known also as the author of numerous ascetical works and the Regula
vitae eremiticae (Camaldoli 1519). His cult has not been officially
confirmed.
Innocenzio, scholar;
d. Aug. 10, 1563. He was a Camaldolese monk, a noted theologian and the author
of a vita of Bl. Paolo.
Nicolò Antonio, bishop;
b. 1712; d. 1796. A Benedictine, he was named to the See of Torcello in 1754,
Verona in 1759, and Padua in 1772. He also translated and edited the works of
St. athanasius and of St. Lawrence Giustiniani. Two Jesuit authors, Fá brice (1530–1604)
and Gerolamo (b. 1698), also are from this branch of the family.
Genoese Branch. Paolo
de Moneglia, curialist and diplomat; b. Genoa, 1444; d. Budapest, Hungary,
1502. A Dominican since 1463, he became provincial for Lombardy in 1485, master
of the Sacred Palace in 1490, and inquisitor general for Genoa in 1494 (see
inquisition). In 1499 he became bishop of Chios and was named legate for
Hungary by Pope alexander vi.
Agostino, bishop and
Orientalist; b. Genoa, c. 1470;d. at sea off Liguria, Italy, 1536. He
became a Dominican, was named bishop of Nebbio in Corsica in 1514 and
participated in the Fifth lateran council (1516–17). In 1517 he became the
first professor of Hebrew at the University of Paris. A friend of pico della
mirandola, erasmus, and Thomas more, Agostino was the first in Europe to
publish a polyglot bible (1516), and in it, commenting on Ps 18.5, he inserted
a brief notice on Christopher columbus. Quétif ascribes 15 works to his
authorship.
Vincenzo, a
classicist; d. 1599. He took up residence at Valencia, Aragon, and was the
author of Commentaria in universam logicam and editor of the works of
vincent ferrer. Decio (1580–1642), another Dominican, came from
Messana and was bishop of Aleria, Corsica, from 1612.
Benedetto, Jesuit
exegete; b. Genoa, March 16, 1551; d. Rome, Dec. 19, 1622. He served seven
years as rector of the Roman College and was appointed theologian of the Sacred
penitentiary in 1606. Twelve works are ascribed to his authorship, of which his
commentaries on the Epistles of St.
Paul (2 v. Rome 1612–13) and on the Catholic Epistles (Lyon 1621) are
best known.
Six other Giustiniani are
numbered among the Jesuit writers: Agostino (1551–90), Giorgio (1569–1644), Vincenzo (1593–1661), Pietro (1628–1707), Gerolamo (1656–1734)
and Ottaviano (1689–1768).
Giovanni, a military
commander; d. Chios, 1453. He brought a Genoese contingent to Constantinople in
1453 and played a leading part in the brave but unsuccessful defense of that
city against the Turkish attack.
Michele, (1612– c. 1680)
was vicar to his cousin Decio, Bishop of Aleria, and also a historian of
Italian affairs. Lorenzo (1761–1824 or 1825) was a distinguished
scholar who became librarian of the Biblioteca Nazionale (1805) and professor
of critical diplomatics at the University of Naples.
Members of the Hierarchy. There
were five cardinals from the Giustiniani family.
Vincenzo of Chios,
scholar; b. Chios, Aug. 28, 1519;d. Rome, Oct. 28, 1582. He was master general
of the Dominican Order from 1558 to 1571 and participated in the Council of
trent (1562–63). He was the legate of Pope
Pius V in Spain and was created a cardinal in 1570. He edited the
first complete edition of the works of St. thomas aquinas (17 v. Rome 1570).
Benedetto of Chios,
bishop of Porto; b. 1554; d.1621. He served under the popes from gregory xiii
to gregory xv and was noted for his zeal and charity to the poor of his
diocese.
Orazio of Chios,
scholar and curialist; b. Chios, Feb. 28, 1580; d. Rome, July 25, 1649. He was
an oratorian and became librarian of the Vatican (see vatican library) under
urban viii. He was made bishop of Montalto in 1640 and a cardinal in 1645. He
also served as consultor of the Congregation for the propagation of the faith
and of the Holy Office, as well as grand penitentiary.
Giacomo, curialist
and papal diplomat; b. Rome, Dec. 29, 1769; d. Rome, Feb. 24, 1843. He was
vice-legate at Ravenna in 1794, governor of Perugia in 1797, and vice-governor
of Rome until he was forced to withdraw before Napoleon's troops. Reinstalled
in Rome by pius vii, he was created archbishop of Tyre in 1817 and served as
nuncio to Spain until raised to the cardinalate in 1826 by leo xii. He was
among the candidates for the papacy after the death of pius viii but was
opposed by the Spanish government.
Allesandro, papal
diplomat; b. Genoa, Feb. 3, 1778;d. Genoa, Oct. 11, 1843. He was instrumental
in the negotiation of the Concordat of 1818 with the Kingdom of the Two
Sicilies and was in Naples during the revolution of 1820–21. He was created
archbishop of Petra in 1822, named nuncio to Naples the same year, reassigned
as nuncio to Lisbon in 1826, and raised to the cardinalate in 1832.
Two archbishops and four
bishops are listed among the Giustiniani of Chios. Leonardo (c. 1395–1459),
a Dominican, was vicar-general of the Congregation of Fratres Peregrinati until
appointed archbishop of Mytilene in 1444. He is widely known through the
account of the capture of Constantinople (Patrologia Graeca 159:923–944)
that he sent to Pope nicholas v. Antonio (1505–71) became archbishop
of Naxos in 1562, assisted at the Council
of Trent, and was later transferred to the See of Lipari. Timoteo (c. 1502–71),
a Dominican, was bishop of Aria in Crete (1550), of Chios (1564), and later of
Stromboli in Calabria. Angelo (1520–96), a famous Franciscan
preacher, was bishop of Geneva (1568) and assisted with the edition of the
Greek Fathers produced under Pope Gregory
XIII. Gerolamo (1554–1618) was made bishop of Chios in
1597. Pietro Mario, a Benedictine, was bishop of Sagona in Corsica
(1726) and of Ventimiglia (1741). He also composed a history of the Abbey of
monte cassino to the 10th century.
Bibliography: General. J. Kraus, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed. J. Hofer and K. Rahner (Freiburg 1957–65) 4:904–905. M. L. Fenoglio, Dizionario
ecclesiastico 2:209. Nicholas. A. M. Zimmerman, Kalendarium
Benedictinum: Die Heiligen und Seligen des Benediktinerorderns und seiner
Zweige 3:343. J. L. Baudot and L. Chaussin, Vies des saints et des
bienheureux selon l'ordre du calendrier avec l'historique des fêtes, ed. by the
Benedictines of Paris (Paris 1935–56) 11:703. Leonardo. M. T. Dazzi, Leonardo
Giustiniani, poeta popolare d'amore (Bari 1934). G. Billanovich,
"Alla scoperta di L. G.," Annali della R. Scuola normale superiore
di Pisa 8 (1939) 99–129. Bernardo. Enciclopedia ecclesiastica, ed. A. Bernareggi (Milan 1942) 4:156. Paolo. P. Lugano, ed., L'Italia
benedettina (Rome 1929) 273–279. A. des Mazis, Dictionnaire
d'histoire et de géographie ecclésiastiques 11:519–536. J. Leclercq,
"Le Bx. Paul Giustiniani et les ermites de son temps," Problemi
di vita religiosa in Italia nel cinquecento: Atti del convegno di storia della
chiesa in Italia (Bologna, 2–6 sett. 1958) (Padua 1960) 225–240; Un
Humaniste ermite: Le Bx. Paul Giustiniani, 1476–1528 (Rome 1951).
Innocenzio. J. François, Bibliothèque générale des écrivains de
l'Ordre de Saint Benoît, 4 v. (Bouillon 1777–78; repr. Louvain 1961)
1:550. Nicolo Antonio. Enciclopedia ecclesiastica, op. cit. 4:156–157.
Fabrice and Gerolamo. C. Sommervogel et al., Bibliothèque de la compagnie
de Jésus (Brussels-Paris 1890–1932) 3:1491–94. Paolo de Moneglia. J. Quétif
and J. Échard, Scriptores ordinis Praedicatorum (Paris 1719–23)
2.1: 3–4. Agostino. ibid. 2.1:96–100. R. A. Vigna, I vescovi
domenicani liguri ovvero in Liguria (Genoa 1887) 216–244. Benedetto. Bibliothèque
de la Compagnie de Jésus op. cit. 3:1489–91. P. Bernard, A. Vacant et al,
ed. Dictionnaire de théologie catholique (Paris 1903–50) 6.2:1381.
Other Jesuits. Bibliothèque de la Compagnie de Jésus op. cit. 3:1491–94.
Giovanni. S. Runciman, The Fall of Constantinople, 1453 (New
York 1965), passim. Michele and Lorenzo. N. Cortese, Eruditi
e giornali letterari nella Napoli del settecento (Naples 1922) 36–59. Enciclopedia
ecclesiastica, op. cit. 4:156. Vincenzo of Chios. J. Quétif and J. Échard, Scriptores
ordinis Praedicatorum (Paris 1719–23) 2.1:164–165. Orazio. É. d' Alençon, A. Vacant et al, ed. Dictionnaire de théologie catholique (Paris 1903–50)
6.2:1381–82. Giacomo. A. Eisler, Das Veto der katholischen Staaten bei der
Papstwahl (Vienna 1907) 240–242. J. Becker, Relaciones diplomáticas
entre España y la Santa Sede durante el siglo XIX (Madrid 1908), passim. J. M. March, La exclusiva dada por España contra el cardinale Giustiniani (1932).
Alessandro. W. Maturi, Il Concordato del 1818 tra la Santa Sede e le due
Sicilie (Florence 1929), passim. J. H. Brady, Rome and the
Neapolitan Revolution of 1820–21 (New
York 1937), passim. G. M. Monti, "Stato e Chiesa
durante la rivoluzione napoletana del 1820–21," in Studi storici, v.1
of Chiesa e Stato, 2 v. (Milan 1939) 335–405. Leonardo. S. Runciman, op. cit., passim. R. Loenertz, La Société des Frères
Pérégrinants (Rome 1937–) 1:66–70. Angelo. L. Wadding, Scriptores
Ordinis Minorum (Lyons 1625–54) 23:275–278. G. Matteucci, Due
illustri minoriti del sec. XVI (Venice 1949). Pietro-Mario. J. François, op.
cit. 1: 550–551.
[M. G. McNeil]
New Catholic Encyclopedia
SOURCE : https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/giustiniani
Church
and Abbey San Salvatore di Montecorona (also: Abbazia Camaldolese di San
Salvatore, Badia di Montecorona, San Salvatore di Monte Acuto), territory of
Umbertide, Umbria, Italy
Beato Paolo
Giustiniani Eremita camaldolese
Festa: 25 giugno
Venezia, 15 Giugno 1476 –
Monte Soratte, Roma, 25 giugno 1528
Era figlio della nobile
famiglia Giustiniani di Venezia. Vi nacque il 15 Giugno 1476. Dopo essere
diventato superiore maggiore nell'eremo di Camaldoli fino al 1520, ottenne da
Leone X il permesso di fondare un nuovo istituto eremitico, il quale da
principio fu chiamato la "Compagnia di San Romualdo".Più tardi ebbe
il nome canonico di "Congregazione degli eremiti camaldolesi di Monte
Corona" anche detti più brevemente "Montecoronesi". Tra gli
eremi cui dette vita, dopo quello di Monte Cucco, che fu il primo eremo ad
accoglierlo, vanno ricordati tra gli altri quello delle grotte di Cupramontana
e quello di San Silvestro sul Monte Soratte. A Macerata fu imprigionato per
amore e difesa degli eremiti. Trovandosi a Roma nel 1527, cadde prigioniero dei
Lanzichenecchi, in quel terribile sacco. Fu torturato insieme a San Gaetano da
Thiene, ma ne scampò riacquistando la libertà. Nella primavera del 1528
contrasse la peste a Viterbo. Non perfettamente guarito si rimise in viaggio
alla volta di Roma per ricevere in donazione l'eremo del Monte Soratte. Ma
proprio in quell'eremo morì di peste ancora giovane di 52 anni, il 25 Giugno
1528.
Il 28 giugno del 1528 si spegne sul monte Soratte Paolo Giustiniani, monaco e fondatore degli eremiti camaldolesi di Monte Corona.
Nato nel 1476 nella ricca famiglia veneziana dei Giustiniani, il giovane Tommaso fu formato alla scuola dei più grandi umanisti italiani del tempo. Ritiratosi sull'isola di Murano per approfondire nella quiete la propria ricerca filosofica, Tommaso venne a contatto con i monaci camaldolesi e la sua vita subì una svolta repentina e radicale. Entrato nel 1510 assieme a due compagni veneziani nell'eremo di Camaldoli, Tommaso assunse il nuovo nome di Paolo, e cominciò presto con uno di loro, l'amico Pietro Quirini, a invocare una profonda riforma della chiesa, fino a scrivere un dettagliato Libello sull'argomento, indirizzato a papa Leone X.
Ma lo scontento di Giustiniani non si limitò alla situazione globale della chiesa; egli serbò per tutta la vita la convinzione che la vita eremitica potesse costituire una silenziosa e misteriosa memoria dell'amore di Dio per gli uomini, una «predicazione senza parole». Desideroso di dedicarsi totalmente all'intimità con Dio, egli abbandonò l'ambiente camaldolese e diede vita nel 1520 nei pressi di Ancona alla «compagnia degli eremiti di san Romualdo», oggi noti con il nome di eremiti camaldolesi di Monte Corona.
Giustiniani seppe tenere unite grazie alla sua grande cultura un'austerità
quasi parossistica e una notevole finezza spirituale. I suoi insegnamenti sulla
vita spirituale ci sono giunti attraverso una preziosa serie di opere capaci di
parlare, a dispetto della loro netta impronta eremitica, a ogni cristiano in
cerca del radicalismo evangelico.
Come la nave, che solca il mare, dietro a sé non lascia traccia alcuna del
percorso fatto, così la nostra anima, condotta dallo Spirito divino,
attraversando l'immenso mare e l'abisso delle contemplazioni divine, non
dovrebbe vedere, se si volta indietro, per quale strada sia passata, né come a
quel dato punto sia giunta.
Se tu avessi considerato tutto questo, carissimo fratello in Cristo, probabilmente non avresti domandato né a me né ad altri che ti fosse suggerito un modo di pregare; ma ti saresti completamente abbandonato, invece, allo Spirito divino, senza pretendere di conoscere né la via, né come ti guida.
Allora tieni a mente che nelle tue orazioni, quando cioè sei in preghiera, il
metodo migliore è quello di non avere nessun metodo e che la forma migliore è
quella di non avere alcuna forma. Poiché l'orazione nasce da quello Spirito che
nei suoi doni è generoso, abbondante e vario, così vari e diversi e quasi
infiniti sono i modi e le forme che essa ha.
(Paolo Giustiniani, Trattato sulla preghiera)
Fonte : www.monasterodibose.it
SOURCE : https://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/94177
GIUSTINIANI, Paolo
Dizionario Biografico
degli Italiani - Volume 57 (2001)
Stefano Tabacchi
Nacque a Venezia il 15
giugno 1476, ultimo figlio di Francesco e Paola Malipiero, nobili veneziani,
che gli diedero il nome di Tommaso. La sua giovinezza resta in gran parte
sconosciuta a causa dell'assenza di documentazione. Infatti, nel 1507 il G.
distrusse tutti i suoi scritti giovanili, e gli spunti autobiografici che si
trovano nelle sue opere più tarde tendono a leggere le vicende passate in
funzione dell'approdo alla vita eremitica, con una consapevole selezione di
temi e una scarsa attenzione per la cronologia.
Rimasto orfano di padre
in giovane età, il G. fu educato a Venezia sotto la guida della madre. Nel 1493
si trasferì a Padova, per frequentare i corsi universitari di filosofia e
teologia, e vi rimase fino al 1504-05. Anche su questo periodo, che si intuisce
decisivo ai fini della sua formazione, non disponiamo di molte notizie. Certo è
che a Padova egli approfondì la conoscenza dei testi greci e latini e strinse
legami di fervida amicizia con diversi coetanei, come Nicolò Tiepolo e Vincenzo
Quirini (Querini), anch'essi membri di importanti famiglie veneziane e
appassionati di cultura classica. Progressivamente, però, maturava nel G. un
desiderio di vita ritirata e un forte interesse per la dimensione religiosa,
che lo condusse ad approfondire i testi scritturali e patristici,
esplicitamente contrapposti alla teologia scolastica. A quanto scrisse, in
questo passaggio dalla filosofia alla riflessione religiosa sarebbe stata
determinante una lunga malattia di cui soffrì nel 1504.
Alla fine del 1505 tornò
a Venezia. Desideroso di solitudine, si ritirò in una casetta che possedeva sull'isola
di Murano, e intensificò le sue riflessioni religiose. Nell'estate 1506 compose
così le Cogitationes quotidianae de amore Dei, un interessante diario
spirituale che dimostra solide letture bibliche e teologiche e tende a
ricollocare la cultura filosofica in una sfera decisamente inferiore alla
contemplazione religiosa. Il ritiro a Murano non fu però sufficiente a offrire
al G. la serenità di spirito cui aspirava. Deciso a dedicarsi esclusivamente
allo studio delle lettere sacre, nel 1507 fece voto di castità e partì per la
Terrasanta, con il progetto di ritirarsi nel convento francescano di Betlemme,
ma senza prendere gli ordini. Il soggiorno a Betlemme fu molto più breve del
previsto: all'inizio del 1508 era di nuovo a Venezia, ancora incerto sulla via
da seguire.
A Venezia il G. riprese i
contatti con i vecchi amici: Vincenzo Quirini, Gaspare Contarini, G.B. Cipelli,
detto Egnazio, Sebastiano Zorzi, Nicolò Tiepolo, Paolo Canal, Trifon Gabriel e
altri. Questo gruppo di giovani patrizi, conosciuto anche come "circolo di
Murano", si caratterizzava per una forte sensibilità per il tema della
salvezza individuale e trovava nella preghiera e nella meditazione un rifugio
dai drammatici eventi politici contemporanei. Nell'ambito del gruppo, il G.
assunse un ruolo di guida spirituale, esercitando una forte influenza sui più
affezionati amici, come Contarini, Egnazio e Quirini. Tuttavia, in questa fase
della sua evoluzione spirituale egli non aveva ancora elaborato una concreta
proposta culturale e religiosa e anche per questo motivo sembrano poco fondate
le analisi che tendono ad attribuire al circolo di Murano una coesione che in
realtà non ebbe.
Nel 1508-09 il G. era
ormai deciso a ritirarsi in qualche luogo pio con gli amici che lo avessero
voluto accompagnare, ma era poco propenso a prendere gli ordini sacri, che
considerava carichi di obblighi eccessivi. In questa fase, il ritiro dalla vita
attiva si configurava come un'esperienza di studio e preghiera, ancora
fortemente condizionata dall'ideale umanistico del saggio stoico. D'altro
canto, il G. nutriva un interesse ormai esclusivo per gli studi sacri, che si
espresse in un ampio commentario al Genesi, rimasto manoscritto e
incompiuto.
Nel 1509 il G., Egnazio e
Quirini avviarono trattative per essere accettati come oblati nell'abbazia
benedettina di Praglia, ma senza successo. L'anno successivo presero allora
contatto con i camaldolesi di S. Michele di Murano, il monastero dove si era
rinchiuso, per morirvi, Paolo Canal, uno dei più cari amici del Giustiniani. Il
generale dei camaldolesi, Pietro Dolfin, e il vicario generale, Paolo
Orlandini, si dimostrarono subito ben disposti e fu stabilito che il G. si
sarebbe recato nell'eremo di Camaldoli, per valutare la possibilità di
ritirarvisi; restava comunque inteso che i tre amici non avrebbero preso gli
ordini e avrebbero vissuto in stretta comunione.
All'inizio di luglio 1510
il G. raggiunse Camaldoli e vi si trattenne fino al principio di agosto. Il
viaggio a Camaldoli modificò completamente il suo progetto iniziale e lo
convinse ad abbracciare la vita eremitica. Così, dopo un nuovo, breve soggiorno
a Venezia, il G. vestì l'abito camaldolese con il nome di Paolo nel giorno di
Natale del 1510. Nella sua corrispondenza egli attribuì la decisione a un grave
incidente verificatosi nel corso del viaggio, che aveva messo a rischio la sua
vita e aveva assunto il valore di una "illuminazione". Non si trattò
tuttavia di una decisione precipitosa, ma dell'esito ultimo di un travaglio
interiore iniziato da parecchi anni. Né si può trascurare l'influenza che
esercitò sul G. la conoscenza diretta dell'eremo di Camaldoli, che lo
impressionò per la serenità e la semplicità di vita.
Divenuto novizio
camaldolese, il G. cercò di indurre gli amici, e particolarmente Egnazio e
Quirini, a imitare la sua scelta, iniziando un fitto carteggio, che è uno dei
documenti più interessanti della sua spiritualità. Nelle sue lettere il G.
descrive con spontaneità i suoi sentimenti nella nuova condizione di vita e
teorizza la superiorità della vita religiosa e la sostanziale inutilità della
cultura classica ai fini della salvezza, riprendendo in maniera originale il
dibattito sugli stati di vita.
Le sue argomentazioni non
riuscirono a convincere Egnazio, che rimase in una posizione di incertezza, né
Contarini, che negò l'esistenza di una condizione di vita privilegiata
all'interno del cristianesimo, ma ebbero una forte influenza su Sebastiano
Zorzi e su Quirini, che nell'autunno del 1511 si recarono all'eremo. La scelta
di Quirini e l'attività di proselitismo svolta dal G. suscitarono perplessità
in alcuni degli amici veneziani, che valutavano come un vero e proprio
tradimento l'abbandono di Venezia proprio nel momento in cui era attaccata
dalle truppe della Lega di Cambrai. In particolare, Contarini cercò di
dissuadere Quirini, difendendo la legittimità della vita nel secolo e
insistendo sui pericoli che comportava la scelta eremitica. Il G. reagì con una
dura lettera a Contarini e Tiepolo, nella quale ribadì i fondamenti dottrinali
della scelta eremitica e li tacciò di manifesta eresia. Dopo che Quirini e
Zorzi presero l'abito camaldolese (22 febbr. 1512), la frattura fu in qualche
modo ricomposta e i rapporti del G. con Contarini tornarono cordiali. Rimase
però un dissenso di fondo sul significato della vita eremitica e sulle vie per
raggiungere la salvezza individuale.
L'8 ag. 1512 il G. fece
la sua professione solenne, insieme con Quirini e Zorzi, e divenne rapidamente
un punto di riferimento per gli altri eremiti. La situazione dell'eremo di Camaldoli,
in effetti, non era così rosea come era sembrato al G. nei primi mesi del suo
soggiorno. L'incerto governo di Pietro Dolfin sembrava incapace di garantire la
riunificazione dei diversi rami dell'Ordine e lasciava del tutto insoddisfatti
gli eremiti di Camaldoli, che lo consideravano supino ai voleri di discutibili
consiglieri. Il malcontento degli eremiti trovò in Quirini e nel G. degli
autorevoli portavoce, capaci di elaborare una proposta complessiva di riforma.
Fulcro di tale proposta era l'unione di Camaldoli con il monastero di S.
Michele di Murano, cui facevano riferimento altri monasteri camaldolesi, e,
soprattutto, l'allontanamento del generale dal governo dell'eremo, che avrebbe
dovuto essere assegnato a un priore, eletto ogni tre anni. Questi
provvedimenti, poi, sarebbero stati codificati in una riforma delle
costituzioni dell'eremo.
Dolfin si piegò di
malavoglia a convocare un capitolo generale, che si tenne a Firenze nell'aprile
del 1513. Le conclusioni del capitolo, recepite nella bolla Etsi a summo
rerum Conditore (4 luglio 1513), prevedevano il depotenziamento della
figura del generale in favore delle cariche elettive, l'unione delle
Congregazioni di S. Michele e Camaldoli e l'introduzione di altre riforme
proposte dal Giustiniani. L'opposizione di Dolfin fu facilmente superata,
grazie all'appoggio di Giuliano de' Medici e del neoeletto papa Leone X, ma il
vecchio generale cercò di rimettere in discussione le conclusioni del capitolo,
rivolgendosi direttamente al pontefice. Perciò, nel maggio 1513 i camaldolesi
inviarono a Roma il G. e il Quirini.
Il viaggio a Roma offrì
ai due religiosi l'opportunità di presentare al papa, nel luglio 1513, una
proposta complessiva di riforma della Chiesa, il cosiddetto Libellus ad
Leonem X, testo di importanza capitale per la storia religiosa del Cinquecento,
che può essere adeguatamente compreso solo tenendo presente le speranze
entusiastiche che salutarono l'elezione al papato di Leone X.
Nel Libellus è infatti ben evidente l'attesa di una nuova età apostolica,
in cui sarebbe stato possibile riformare la vita religiosa dei popoli
cristiani, riunire le Chiese orientali al cristianesimo occidentale e
convertire ebrei e musulmani. Queste attese millenaristiche, peraltro, non
toglievano nulla alla concretezza delle proposte di riforma, che prefiguravano
alcune linee guida del cattolicesimo postridentino.
Il discorso di Quirini e
del G. si articolava in sei parti, tra cui la più interessante è senza dubbio
la quinta, dedicata alla riforma della vita religiosa del clero e del laicato.
Le osservazioni sul clero insistevano molto sull'ignoranza e sulla bassa
qualità morale dei religiosi e contenevano proposte di riforma radicali: una
riorganizzazione degli studi ecclesiastici, che avrebbe dovuto ridurre il ruolo
della cultura classica e della scolastica a vantaggio dello studio dei testi
patristici; l'uso del volgare nella liturgia e la traduzione dei testi sacri;
l'istituzione di una censura preventiva sui testi religiosi; l'unificazione dei
regolari in poche famiglie religiose; una rigida vigilanza del pontefice sulla
scelta dei vescovi. Le proposte relative al laicato si caratterizzavano invece
per un'accentuazione degli aspetti repressivi, che peraltro affioravano un po'
in tutto il Libellus. In particolare si auspicava una severa azione di
contrasto di pratiche come il gioco, la prostituzione, l'uso dei cosmetici e,
soprattutto, l'astrologia.
Una corretta valutazione
di questo testo è difficile. I numerosi studi che lo hanno analizzato hanno di
volta in volta enfatizzato aspetti diversi, dal tema dell'evangelizzazione dei
popoli non cristiani alla critica della vita licenziosa del clero. Tuttavia
l'elemento più interessante, e potenzialmente più ricco di sviluppi, è l'idea
che le riforme si sarebbero dovute sviluppare non tanto attraverso un movimento
dal basso, quanto piuttosto grazie all'azione del pontefice. Una tesi che, pur
non criticandole apertamente, liquidava le ancora diffuse tesi conciliariste e
già prefigurava il ruolo che il Papato avrebbe assunto con il concilio di
Trento.
Il Libellus influenzò
alcuni decreti del quinto concilio Lateranense, ma non riuscì a imprimere una
svolta alla politica religiosa di Leone X. Tuttavia, il pontefice dimostrò
molta stima per i due camaldolesi e particolarmente per il Quirini, che nel
1514 tornò a Roma e assunse un ruolo di qualche rilievo
nell'entourage papale. Nell'estate del 1514 si parlava insistentemente di
un suo possibile cardinalato e il G. intervenne più volte sull'amico per
invitarlo a resistere alla proposta, per quanto possibile. Ma improvvisamente
Quirini si ammalò e, il 23 sett. 1514, spirò tra le braccia del G., prontamente
accorso a Roma.
La morte di Quirini non
rappresentò solo un grave colpo personale, ma privò il G. di un interlocutore
intelligente, capace di temperare le sue rigidità e più abile a muoversi sugli
scenari politico-diplomatici e a mantenere aperto il dialogo con le alte
gerarchie. Negli anni successivi alla morte dell'amico, il G. continuò comunque
a impegnarsi con straordinario attivismo per la riforma, interessandosi sia
all'Ordine camaldolese, sia alle grandi problematiche religiose contemporanee.
Particolarmente importante fu il suo intervento al sinodo fiorentino del 1516,
convocato per dare attuazione ai disposti del concilio Lateranense. In
quest'occasione il G. operò perché si giungesse a una condanna di G. Savonarola
e del profetismo savonaroliano, che considerava un ostacolo alla riforma della
Chiesa per via istituzionale, ma non riscosse molto successo. Lo stesso
Contarini, richiesto di un parere in merito, difese la sostanziale legittimità
delle posizioni savonaroliane.
Di non minore rilievo fu
l'azione svolta dal G. all'interno dell'Ordine camaldolese. Già prima di
diventare sacerdote, nel 1515, il G. era ormai riconosciuto dai confratelli
come un'autorevole guida spirituale; assunse diverse cariche istituzionali:
presiedette i capitoli del 1514, del 1515 e del 1516, allorquando fu eletto
maggiore, una carica triennale che gli fu rinnovata nel 1520. Nel 1516,
inoltre, portò a termine la ricompilazione delle Regulae Camaldulenses,
che furono approvate e stampate nel 1520. Le nuove Regulae si
fondavano sulle antiche tradizioni dell'Ordine, ma erano fortemente segnate
dall'impronta del G., soprattutto nell'accentuazione del ruolo dell'eremitismo
rispetto alla vita cenobitica. Contemporaneamente, il G. componeva numerosi
scritti religiosi, talora semplici meditazioni, talora veri e propri trattati,
e manteneva un fitto commercio epistolare con numerosi amici e conoscenti, ai
quali magnificava la superiorità della vita eremitica. Grazie al suo indubbio
carisma, egli riuscì a convincere diversi religiosi, soprattutto benedettini, a
passare tra i camaldolesi, anche se ciò produsse qualche frizione con gli
Ordini di provenienza.
L'azione del G. raccolse
notevoli consensi, ma suscitò anche forti opposizioni, che trovavano un
appoggio autorevole nel vecchio generale, Dolfin, ormai definitivamente
estromesso dal governo dell'Ordine. Desideroso di porre termine ai conflitti e
di intensificare la sua attività di proselitismo, il G. cominciò a meditare la
possibilità di abbandonare l'eremo. Già il 7 febbr. 1515 aveva ottenuto, grazie
all'intercessione di Pietro Bembo, un breve papale che concedeva a lui e ad
alcuni monaci di poter viaggiare, predicare ed erigere monasteri, ma non se ne
servì fino al 1520, quando la morte dell'amico Paolo Orlandini (1519) e le
tensioni interne all'Ordine lo indussero a rompere gli indugi. Il 14 sett. 1520
radunò il capitolo di Camaldoli e depose la carica di maggiore; qualche giorno
dopo abbandonò l'eremo insieme a un converso. Il progetto iniziale era
probabilmente quello di recarsi nelle Indie, ma, giunto sul monte Corona, nei
paraggi di Umbertide, un terziario francescano di nome Tommaso lo convinse a
desistere e si unì a lui. In seguito, il G. trovò altri seguaci, soprattutto
religiosi e romiti selvatici, ma anche un personaggio di qualche rilievo come
il ricco canonico Galeazzo Gabrielli, che mise le proprie sostanze a sua
disposizione. Furono così fondati i primi eremi, quello di Pascilupo,
nell'Eugubino, e quello delle Grotte di Massaccio, nei pressi di Jesi, un
antico monastero camaldolese che fu ceduto al G. nel 1522.
In questa febbrile
attività di proselitismo il G. dovette talora scontrarsi con l'opposizione delle
autorità di governo locali. Nel 1522 il legato della Marca lo fece addirittura
rinchiudere nel monastero di S. Francesco di Macerata, accogliendo le denunce
di alcuni eremiti irregolari. Ma complessivamente si trattò di un periodo
particolarmente fortunato per il G., finalmente privo di responsabilità di
governo e libero di dedicarsi a quella che considerava la sua vera missione: la
diffusione dell'ideale eremitico camaldolese. In questa fase egli non pensava
infatti alla fondazione di una nuova congregazione, ma mirava piuttosto a
ricondurre al rigore della disciplina di s. Romualdo le varie forme di
eremitismo sparse per l'Italia. Così, nel 1523 il G. ottenne dal vicario
generale della Congregazione camaldolese il riconoscimento ufficiale e l'erezione
della nuova Compagnia degli eremiti di S. Romualdo, di cui fu riconosciuto
superiore indipendente. L'anno successivo, il capitolo della Compagnia, che
contava ormai una trentina di membri, approvò una regola, stesa dal G. e basata
sostanzialmente sulle Regulae del 1520. Progressivamente, però, la
rigorosa osservanza della vita eremitica propugnata dal G. e dai suoi seguaci
condusse a un'aperta rottura con la Congregazione camaldolese, che fu sancita
ufficialmente nel capitolo di Classe del 1525. Tuttavia, anche negli anni
successivi, il G. mantenne i contatti con Camaldoli e vi si recò più volte per
difendere le posizioni degli eremiti contro i cenobiti.
Nel frattempo, la
Compagnia romualdina continuava ad ampliarsi e nel 1526 il G. poté
tranquillamente abbandonare la carica di maggiore, pur mantenendo un ruolo
molto importante tanto sul piano spirituale quanto nell'organizzazione pratica
delle nuove fondazioni. Egli era ormai diventato un punto di riferimento per i
settori più attivi e innovatori del clero italiano. Sin dal 1523 aveva avviato
uno scambio epistolare con Gaetano Thiene, che gli esponeva con fiducia i
principî-guida del suo apostolato. Inoltre, il G. esercitò una forte influenza
sui fondatori dell'Ordine dei cappuccini e li protesse dalle persecuzioni di
cui erano fatti oggetto.
Gli anni della fondazione
della Compagnia non segnarono un arresto dell'attività letteraria del
Giustiniani. Risalgono anzi a questo periodo le sue opere più interessanti,
tutte scritte in volgare: il Secretum meum mihi (1524-26) e
il Trattato di ubidienza di don Paolo Giustiniano con una pistola del
medesimo a M. Marcantonio Flaminio (composta nel 1526 e pubblicata a
Venezia, S. de Sabio, nel 1535).
Il Secretum analizza
i vari aspetti del sentimento d'amore, da quello carnale a quello spirituale, e
rappresenta un'opera di grande originalità, per la saldatura tra la tradizione
mistica medievale e la filosofia neoplatonica. Al pari delle altre opere del G.
si tratta di una meditazione molto personale, caratterizzata da una scrittura
frammentata, che riutilizza in maniera originale diversi codici culturali.
La Lettera al Flaminio riprende uno dei temi favoriti della
riflessione del G., l'inutilità della cultura classica e profana ai fini della
salvezza. In questo testo, peraltro, la polemica antiumanistica e l'esaltazione
della vita eremitica si sostanziavano in argomentazioni complesse e raffinate,
che utilizzavano largamente la letteratura filosofica e teologica antica e
medievale.
Nel maggio 1527 il G.
dovette recarsi a Roma, per risolvere una vertenza relativa all'abbazia di S.
Salvatore a Montacuto. Si trovava da pochi giorni in città, ospite di Gian
Pietro Carafa e Gaetano Thiene, quando le truppe imperiali la presero d'assalto
e la misero a sacco. Anche il G. fu catturato e malmenato, ma dopo pochi giorni
era libero e poté fare ritorno all'eremo delle Grotte. All'inizio del 1528 lo
lasciò di nuovo per recarsi a Orvieto da papa Clemente VII, al quale richiese
la conferma dell'acquisizione di alcuni eremi. Nell'estate dello stesso anno si
recò sul monte Soratte insieme con il confratello Giacomo da Gubbio, per
visitare l'eremo di S. Silvestro, che gli era stato ceduto da Giovanni Matteo
Giberti.
Quando vi giunse, il G.
era già molto ammalato e lì spirò, il 28 giugno 1528.
Personalità complessa e
tormentata, il G. occupa un posto centrale nella vita religiosa italiana del
Cinquecento, non solo per la sua originale proposta di restaurazione
dell'ideale eremitico, inteso come testimonianza di amore per Dio e rifiuto del
mondo, ma anche per l'influenza che esercitò su alcuni dei più importanti
esponenti della Riforma cattolica, come Gasparo Contarini, Gian Pietro Carafa e
Gaetano Thiene.
Sin dai primi decenni
successivi alla sua morte all'interno dell'Ordine camaldolese fu attribuito al
G. il titolo di beato. Con un decreto dell'11 genn. 1681 la congregazione dei
Riti ordinò però di ritirare le immagini del G. con l'aureola e il titolo.
Tradizionalmente, il G. è rappresentato in abito eremitico, con una barba
fluente. Un esempio interessante di questa iconografia è una statua seicentesca
nella chiesa della Salute a Venezia.
Opere. Le opere del G.
sono per la maggior parte manoscritte. Opere pubblicate: Trattato di
ubedentia di don Paolo Giustiniano, con una epistola a m. Marc'Antonio
Flaminio, Venezia, S. de Sabio, 1535; G.B. Mittarelli - A.
Costadoni, Annales Camaldulenses, IX, Venetiis 1773, coll. 447-719 (parte
dell'epistolario e il Libellus); Secretum meum mihi, o Dell'amor di
Dio ragionamenti sei, a cura di A. Stolz, Frascati 1941; Trattati, lettere
e frammenti, a cura di E. Massa, Roma 1961-67; Regola della vita
eremitica, a cura di A. Visentin, Seregno 1996. Alcune opere minori sono state
pubblicate in Vita cristiana, XIV (1942), pp. 117-144; XXI (1952), pp. 63-83,
149-156. L'originale del Libellus è da considerarsi perduto. Una
traduzione italiana è stata pubblicata, sulla base di un manoscritto
settecentesco: P. Giustiniani - P. Quirini, Lettera al papa, a cura di G.
Bianchini, Modena 1995.
Fonti e Bibl.: Attualmente i manoscritti del G. sono conservati presso il Sacro Eremo Tuscolano di Frascati e non sono consultabili. La maggior parte del fondo è stata inventariata in P. Giustiniani, Trattati, lettere e frammenti, I, I manoscritti originali custoditi nell'eremo di Frascati, a cura di E. Massa, Roma 1961; ma si veda anche P.O. Kristeller, Iter Italicum, Cumulative Index to volumes I-VI, s.v.; Le lettere di s. Gaetano da Thiene, a cura di F. Andreu, Città del Vaticano 1954, ad indicem; A. Fiori, Vita del beato P. G., Roma, 1724; P. Paschini, S. Gaetano da Thiene, Gianpietro Carafa e le origini dei chierici regolari teatini, Roma 1926, passim; J. Schnitzer, Peter Delphin, ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Kirchenreform, München 1926, passim; J. Leclercq, Un humaniste ermite. Le bx Paul Giustiniani (1476-1528), Roma 1951 (a tutt'oggi il migliore profilo biografico); H. Jedin, Contarini und Camaldoli, Roma 1953 (anche in Arch. italiano per la storia della pietà, II, 1959); J. Leclercq, Le jugement du bx Paul Giustiniani sur st Pierre Damien, in Riv. di storia della Chiesa in Italia, XI (1957), pp. 423-426; Id., Le bx Paul Giustiniani et les ermites de son temps, in Problemi di vita religiosa in Italia nel Cinquecento, Padova 1960, pp. 225-240; S. Tramontin, Un programma di riforma della Chiesa per il concilio Lateranense V: il Libellus ad Leonem X dei veneziani P. G. e Pietro Quirini, in Venezia e i concili, Venezia 1962, pp. 67-93; G. Musolino - A. Niero - S. Tramontin, Santi e beati veneziani, Venezia 1963, pp. 267-276; I. Cervelli, Storiografia e problemi intorno alla vita religiosa e spirituale a Venezia nella prima metà del '500, in Studi veneziani, VIII (1966), pp. 447-476; F. Gilbert, Cristianesimo, umanesimo e la bolla "Apostolici regiminis" del 1513, in Riv. stor. italiana, LXXIX (1967), pp. 976-990; E. Massa, Le prime meditazioni del "secretum" di P. G., in Filosofia e cultura in Umbria tra Medioevo e Rinascimento, Gubbio 1967, pp. 301-366; F. Gilbert, Contarini on Savonarola: an unknown document of 1516, in Archiv für Reformationgeschichte, LIX (1969), pp. 145-149; J.B. Ross, Gasparo Contarini and his friends, in Studies in the Renaissance, XVII (1970), pp. 192-232; O. Zorzi Pugliese, Girolamo Benivieni: umanista e riformatore (dalla corrispondenza inedita), in La Bibliofilia, LXXII (1970), pp. 253-288; H. Jedin, Chiesa della fede, Chiesa della storia, Brescia 1972, ad indicem; G. Alberigo, Vita attiva e vita contemplativa in un'esperienza cristiana del XVI secolo, in Studi veneziani, XVI (1974), pp. 117-225; J. Leclercq, Il richiamo del deserto. La dottrina del beato P. G., Roma 1977; A. Pastore, Marcantonio Flaminio, Milano 1981, pp. 46-50; L. Fortini, Un trattato cinquecentesco sull'amore mistico: il "Secretum meum mihi" di P. G., in Riv. di storia e letteratura religiosa, XXII (1986), pp. 241-255; A. Visentin, P. G. eremita, Padova 1987; G. Fragnito, Gasparo Contarini. Un magistrato veneziano al servizio della Cristianità, Firenze 1988, ad indicem; E. Massa, P. G. e Gasparo Contarini: la vocazione al bivio del neoplatonismo e della teologia biblica, in Benedictina, XXV (1988), pp. 429-474; Id., L'eremo, la Bibbia e il Medioevo in umanisti veneti del primo Cinquecento, Napoli 1992, passim; E. G. Gleason, Gasparo Contarini. Venice, Rome and Reform, Berkeley-Los Angeles 1993, ad indicem; N.H. Minnich, The Catholic reformation: council, churchmen, controversies, Aldershot 1993, ad indicem; Id., The fifth Lateran council (1512-1517), ibid. 1993, ad indicem; L. Polizzotto, The elect nation. The Savonarolian movement in Florence, 1494-1545, Oxford 1994, ad indicem; C. Vasoli, Il tentativo di condanna del Savonarola come eretico e scismatico al sinodo fiorentino del '16-'17 ed al V concilio Lateranense, in Savonarole. Enjeux, débats, questions, a cura di A. Fontes - J.-L. Fournel - M. Plaisance, Paris 1997, pp. 243-261; J. Leclercq, G. P., in Dictionnaire de spiritualité, VI, Paris 1966, coll. 414-418; E. Massa, G. P., in Bibliotheca sanctorum, VII, Roma 1966, coll. 2-9; Diz. degli istituti di perfezione, III, coll. 1190-1192; IV, coll. 1367-1369.
© Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana fondata
da Giovanni Treccani - Riproduzione riservata
SOURCE : https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/paolo-giustinian_(Dizionario-Biografico)/
Jean Leclercq. Seul avec
Dieu : la vie érémitique d'après la doctrine du bienheureux Paul Giustiniani. Fenixx
Réédition Numérique (Plon). Tradition
monastique. Date de publication : 1955-01-01 : https://excerpts.numilog.com/books/9791041014910.pdf
Masai François, « Dom Jean Leclercq, Un humaniste ermite : le Bienheureux Paul Giustiniani (1476- 1528) [compte-rendu] », Scriptorium Année 1953 7-1 p. 168 : https://www.persee.fr/doc/scrip_0036-9772_1953_num_7_1_2480_t1_0168_0000_2
