Saint Paul of the Cross

In 1715, Paul, learning that a large army was being raised in Venice to repel the Turks who were ravaging Hungary, went to Crema as a volunteer; but God made him know that He was calling him to other battles, and he returned to his homeland, where he resumed with new ardor his exercises of piety and his usual labors. Shortly after his return to Castellazzo, one of his uncles, who was a priest, made him the heir to all his property on the condition that he would marry a young girl who was pious, modest, rich, and well-bred, in order to restore to his family the rank from which it had fallen. But Paul had already resolved in his heart to have only God as his inheritance and as the object of his affections; he gave proof of a very rare disinterestedness by renouncing the rich inheritance that was offered to him. For a long time already, God had been causing to be born and to grow in his soul the desire to lead a solitary life, to gather companions to work for the salvation of souls, to dedicate himself to His worship, and above all to excite the faithful to a tender devotion toward Jesus crucified. In 1720, returning one day from the Capuchin church, a clear and precise vision manifested to him the will of heaven. He saw a black tunic on which was drawn a heart with a white cross and the holy name of Jesus in white letters as well; he understood that such was to be the clothing of the disciples of the congregation of which he was to be the founder. Paul hastened to open his heart to the Bishop of Alexandria, and this wise prelate approved his plans and clothed him, on November 22, 1720, with the h oly habit that the Pass religieux Passionnistes Religious order founded by Paul of the Cross, characterized by a fourth vow of devotion to the Passion. ionist religious have worn ever since.

On the advice of his bishop, Paul retired to a humble dwelling near the parish church of Saint-Charles in Castellazzo. His only food was the bread given to him as alms; he granted himself only a few hours of sleep, and lay on vine branches. A tunic of coarse sackcloth formed his entire clothing; he always walked with his head uncovered; in all seasons his feet were bare. He rose in the middle of the night to pray, and until morning communed with his God in the most intimate union. He would then go to hear and serve Mass, receive the Holy Eucharist, and give advice and consolation to the many faithful who resorted to him as to a man in whom the Spirit of the Lord dwelt. He soon occupied himself with establishing the Rule of the new institute, and wrote it with such ease and promptness that he seemed to be writing under the dictation of someone. Paul then submitted it to the judgment of his bishop; but the humble pastor, not daring to trust his own judgment, submitted it to that of other pious and learned religious who all recognized in it the finger of God. They joined the holy Bishop of Alexandria in urging Paul to go to Rome to solicit from the Hol Rome Birthplace of Maximian. y See the approval of his Congregation and of the Rules that God had revealed to him. From then on he left his homeland and went to Rome to execute the designs of heaven. A slave to obedience, Paul, fearing to oppose the will of God, hastened to execute the project that the decisions of His ministers had assured him was its expression; he therefore set out in the month of September of the year 1721; but as happens to works that God inspires, this one encountered only contradictions. The refusal that was opposed to his request forced him to return to his homeland without his efforts having obtained any success.

Paul did not lose heart, however; some time later (1723), he again undertook the journey to Rome, accompanied by one of his brothers; but this time the matter took a much more favorable turn. After staying for some time in the Holy City, they were both ordained to the priesthood (June 7, 1727), and then employed in Rome itself for some time in works of charity toward their neighbor; it was then that they obtained permission to retire to Mount Argentaro, near the town of Orbitello; it was there, and in a small hermitage, that the two brothers, who were eager for mortification, first lived. But having subsequently obtained permission to gather companions, and their number increasing day by day, the servant of God immediately set his hand to the construction of the first monastery of the nascent congregation, which he placed on the same Mount Argentaro; it was taken possession of on September 14, 1737, with great solemnity. The servant of God, having happily obtained this first result of his efforts and solicitations, directed all his efforts toward obtaining from the Holy See the confirmation and approval of the Rules of the Society, so that they might be observed more exactly in another solitude, which would be better suited to the spirit of the Institute and the Rule. It was only after long and persevering efforts and several journeys undertaken for this purpose that Paul received from the Lord this consolation and the object of his most ardent desires. After having had these rules examined with maturity and having indicated the modifications to be made to some articles, Benedict XIV, of immortal memory, by a rescript of Ma y 15, 1741 Benoît XIV Pope who beatified Jerome Emiliani. , approved them with joy, and in the year 1746 he had the brief of this approval issued.

Benedict XIV, in his brief, had provisionally appointed Paul as General of the Congregation until the meeting of the Chapter; this dignity weighed upon the humility of the Saint, who did not delay in summoning all his companions to his retreat on Mount Argentaro. The assembly was small in number, but the virtue and holiness of its members made up for the lack of quantity. There was little deliberation regarding the choice of a leader; Paul's disciples regarded him as a saint and a father, and despite his reluctance, they wished to have him as their superior for his entire life. In order to maintain him in this office, they had to ask the Holy See three times to grant a derogation from their Rule, which permitted only one re-election. The holy old man did not cease to weep and groan, begging to be delivered from the burden of authority, but his sons knew his merits too well, as well as the spiritual and temporal advantages of his administration; they remained unshakeable. The cares of governing his flock, the efforts and struggles to found and develop his institute, amidst persecutions and obstacles, never diverted Paul from his apostolic ministry. As soon as the Holy See, confirming the decrees of God, had ordered him to announce Jesus Crucified to men, he gave himself entirely to preaching. He let no opportunity to preach the word of God escape him. Missions and spiritual exercises made his tireless zeal admired; these were his battlefields where he fought without rest to destroy the roots of vice in souls and plant in their place the seed of all virtues. For fifty years, he devoted his life to converting sinners, sanctifying repentant hearts, and perfecting righteous souls.

In several circumstances, the Lord surrounded our Saint with visible protection. One day, while he was crossing Mount Argentaro, he felt himself fainting; fatigue had so exhausted his strength that he was seized by violent convulsions and had to throw himself to the ground. Believing then that he was reaching his final day, full of tender confidence in his God, he cried out: "Lord, I would not wish to die in this place without receiving the assistance of my religious brothers." He had not finished this prayer when an invisible arm lifted him from the ground; when he opened his eyes, he saw two angels who transported him, in an instant, to the place of his retreat. Sustained by the hand of God, he walked upon the waters of impetuous rivers; at the sight of him, brigands shed their savage ferocity; and it was in vain that criminal hands attempted to poison him.

Although the statutes of the congregation had been approved by a brief of Benedict XIV, they had not yet received canonical institution. Clement XIV, to wh Clément XIV Pope who granted canonical institution and the house of Saints John and Paul. om the Saint had often predicted the tiara, granted him this signal favor. Raised to the chair of Saint Peter, this pontiff always maintained a tender affection for Paul; at the humble request of the religious, he deigned to charge two prelates with examining the constitutions, and, their opinion having been favorable, he approved them again on November 15, 1769, in a brief beginning with the words: *Salvatoris nostri*; the following day, he published the bull *Supremi Apostolatus*, which confirmed the new Institute, bestowed praises upon it, and erected it as a Congregation of clerics, subject to simple vows; at the same time, the Holy Father took pleasure in enriching it with privileges and signal graces. The Saint, enclosed within the walls of his hospice, hid his joy in the depths of this pious asylum, thanking heaven and praying for the Sovereign Pontiff, when the designs of God and an order from the Pope called him one last time into the apostolic arena, to preach Jesus crucified to the Roman people. In vain he strove to cover with a modest veil the virtues and favors with which God filled him; his renown was so great and so popular that the largest churches could not contain the multitude that flocked to his voice. When, at the age of eighty, he preached at Santa Maria in Trastevere, the crowd that filled the basilica and the square of that name overflowed into all the surrounding streets.

His incessant fatigues brought on an illness that the doctors declared incurable and mortal. While his desolate disciples trembled at the thought of losing their beloved father at any moment, he sighed only for the hour when he would go to be united with his God, and, while practicing the most heroic virtues, he settled his affairs and those of his congregation. Clement XIV learned of his illness; the thought of being separated from the friend he loved so much caused him deep pain, and he asked for a miracle from the holy virtue of obedience. Two religious having come to implore his blessing for the dying man, the Pope charged them to transmit these precise words to Paul: "Tell him that I do not want him to die now, I give him a reprieve, let him obey." When he received this order, the servant of God burst into tears, protesting to the divine Crucified One that he wished to obey his vicar. From that day on, his recovery continued to make progress, and he lived for several more years.

Satisfied with the humble and narrow retreat he occupied near the Lateran Palace, our Saint did not think of seeking another dwelling; but his benefactor, the Sovereign Pontiff Clement XIV, was concerned with finding one for him, and his vigilant tenderness finally discovered a place that corresponded both to his munificence and to the needs of his Congregation. On December 9, 1773, the Passionists, led by their venerable father, took solemn possession of the house and church of Saints John and Paul on the Caelia Saint-Jean et de Saint-Paul Motherhouse of the Passionists on the Caelian Hill. n Hill. The prodigious austerities of Paul, long and serious illnesses, joined to the fatigues of his apostolate, and the struggles he had to sustain to establish his Congregation, had left him with numerous infirmities that made his life a continual martyrdom. Every day his strength weakened; he could no longer walk, and, at the end of the month of June in the year 1775, he was forced to keep to his bed. He nevertheless neglected none of the exercises that his piety toward Mary had inspired in him; in order not to be deprived of the treasures of grace contained in the holy sacrifice, as he could no longer celebrate it himself, he wished at least to assist at it. For this purpose, he had chosen a priest whose strong and distinct voice allowed him to follow the prayers of the Mass, and who, every morning, came to say it in a small chapel contiguous to his room. Every day, for some time, he nourished himself with the Eucharistic bread. However, the doctor whose care he was receiving noticed that his strength was diminishing rapidly; he advised having him receive Communion as Viaticum; and, on August 30, in the presence of all the religious, sad and recollected, the most holy Sacrament was brought to him. United with his God, the Saint awaited the hour of deliverance with resignation, and nothing in his attitude betrayed the numerous revelations he had had regarding the moment of his passing. On October 8, the day consecrated to the divine maternity of the Virgin, desiring to honor the Mother of Mercy and at the same time to take new strength to pass from life to eternity, he wished to receive the sacrament of Extreme Unction. During the ceremony, he remained plunged in deep recollection; with hands joined and eyes filled with sweet tears, he responded with an accent of loving piety to the words of the priest. Finally, on October 18, after a sweet vision in which the divine Redeemer and his holy Mother had appeared to him, his blessed soul flew toward the heavens.

## CULT AND RELICS. — CO NGREGATION OF THE PASSIONISTS. CONGRÉGATION DES PASSIONNISTES Religious order founded by Paul of the Cross, characterized by a fourth vow of devotion to the Passion.

Scarcely had the Saint been laid in the tomb when the faithful invoked him as a blessed one of heaven; the infirm were touched with his relics and images, and these pious practices were attributed the power to obtain from the Lord the desired healings. The wonders and graces that God was pleased to grant through his intercession were numerous. His Holiness Pope Pius IX, after having Pie IX Pope who canonized Josaphat in 1867. approved two of the miracles of the great servant of God, declared, by a brief of October 1, 1852, that one could proceed to his beatification, the solemnity of which took place on May 1, 1853. Later, new and striking miracles determined the same Pontiff to place him among the Saints on June 29, 1867. A decree of January 14, 1868, made his office mandatory for April 28, the day on which his feast was fixed.

His body rests in the church of his monastery, under the altar table dedicated to Saint Vincent de Paul. He is dressed in the habit of his Order and seems to be sleeping, awaiting the awakening of the glorious resurrection. At the time of the Vatican Council, a chapel was arranged between the church of Saints John and Paul and the Passionist convent, which was to be dedicated to Saint Paul of the Cross and receive his relics. One notices there two monolithic columns of oriental alabaster of the highest value. It is a gift from Pius IX, who wished by this royal donation to recognize the merit of humility and penance. One sees, in the convent, the rooms that the Blessed occupied during his life. Everything there is simple, everything there preaches the love of the cross. The Saint's prayer books, his priestly vestments, his hair shirt, the iron chain with which he girded his loins, and his discipline, whose branches are metal blades, are preserved there. Under the floor of the convent where Saint Paul of the Cross practiced his austerities, a cavern is shown where the pagan emperors fed the beasts that were to devour the Christians in the circus.

But the honors rendered to his ashes have not alone perpetuated his memory; he has left the Christian world an imperishable monument in the flourishing Congregation that has gathered the legacy of his virtues.

After the death of the holy founder, the Congregation did not cease to grow, and like a tree, to extend its many branches far and wide. Houses were founded in the March of Ancona, in Umbria, in the Kingdom of Naples; in more recent times, in the Duchy of Savoy, and later in Tuscany and the States of Genoa. Today, there are Passionist religious in England, Belgium, and France in the diocese of Arras. The Congregation has three novitiates: one in Italy, one in Belgium, and the third in England. In each of the houses, the religious are very numerous; most apply themselves to the study of philosophy and theology; they devote six years to this, two to philosophy, three to theology, and one to sacred eloquence and the study of Holy Scripture and the Holy Fathers. Through these rigorous studies, they render themselves capable of attaining the goal of their Institute.

It is now time to set forth the utility of this Congregation of Passionists and the services it renders to society and the Church. It is beyond doubt that Saint Paul of the Cross, in instituting this Congregation with such pains and fatigues, did not have in view only the salvation of those who would wish to become members of this society, but that he proposed above all the sanctification of souls, since, at the beginning of the rules in general and at the head of each rule in particular, he reminds his religious that the end of this Congregation is not only to save one's own soul, but also that of one's neighbor; this is why the life of the Passionists is at once active and contemplative. The members who compose it show in all their acts this apostolic life to which they strive to form themselves each day.

As for the duties that the first part, that is to say the contemplative life, imposes on the religious of the Congregation of the Passion, it suffices to read their rules to know them, and, to speak of only one point, we will content ourselves with saying that the Passionists are bound to the exact observance of the three vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience; they make, moreover, a fourth vow that distinguishes them from other religious, that of making every effort to excite in the hearts of the faithful the memory of the death of Our Lord Jesus Christ; and although this fourth vow is not solemn, since the founder believed he should submit to the desire of the Holy See, which approved the institute with simple vows; this is why its observance is not rigorously demanded. The Passionist religious make one hour of meditation in the morning, one hour in the evening, and a half-hour during the night; after the recitation of the divine office, silence continues; the avoidance of the noise and dissipation of the world is the virtue proper to the Passionists, and it is for this reason that the holy founder wanted the monasteries to be, as much as possible, built in solitudes, so that the religious, separated from the agitations of the century, might enjoy more easily the first part of their vocation, and that, after having given themselves to the fatigues of the holy ministry for the sanctification of souls, they might have the advantage of retiring into solitude, of recollecting themselves, of fortifying themselves, and of rendering themselves more capable of then giving themselves to the functions of the active life. Finally, to summarize, we will say that the life of a Passionist is a life consecrated to rigorous poverty and severe solitude, which disposes them perfectly to fulfill all the duties of the contemplative life, which is one of the goals of the institute. Let us say a few words about the other part of the life of the Passionist religious.

The active life that the holy founder of the Congregation of the Most Holy Cross and Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ prescribed to his children consisted in working, as much as their strength permitted, for the sanctification of souls; this is why all the priests of the Congregation who were judged capable of devoting themselves to the sacred ministry were to give themselves to missions, to give spiritual exercises to the clergy, to seminarians, to monasteries, to boarding schools, and to all persons living in community. To fulfill this part of their vocation, these religious gave spiritual exercises without interruption to all persons who wished to recollect themselves and make a retreat for their spiritual advancement. To correspond to this special part of their vocation, the evangelical preachers of the Congregation of the Passion strive to imprint in the memory and in the heart of the faithful the memory of the Most Holy Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, which is the object of the fourth vow. They teach the practical method for meditating upon it, and for drawing from his crucifix those treasures of science and wisdom that it contains. Those who do not give themselves to preaching fulfill the duties of the active life in the sacred tribunal of penance, and receive every day of the year the multitude of penitents who frequent their churches. The zeal of these apostolic men has not been limited by the borders of Italy, France, England, or Belgium; it has extended even to the infidels. The Congregation of the Propaganda has for many years entrusted the missions of Bulgaria and Wallachia to the Passionists; it maintains a bishop and eight missionaries and keeps this number always complete.

Although the religious of the Congregation of the Most Holy Cross and Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ are not bound by solemn vows, they are not for that reason free; for, on the very day of their profession, they make a vow of perseverance in the Congregation; consequently, unless there is a real and grave motive, approved by the superior general, the Passionists cannot leave the Congregation, nor can the Congregation exclude them from its bosom.

The habit of the Passionists consists of a tunic of black cloth and a cloak of the same coarse fabric; the robe and the cloak are similar to those worn by the regular clerks, except that the fabric is more common. They wear, moreover, on their habit, on the left side of the chest and suspended from the neck, a heart embroidered in white surmounted by a white cross: to distinguish the lay brothers from the priests, the latter wear them on the tunic and on the cloak, while the others wear them only on the tunic. This robe is tightened with a black leather belt. Among other austerities, they have for their use only shirts of coarse wool, in winter as in summer; they can have only sandals for footwear; they wear on their heads a poor hat; they habitually fast three days of the week in addition to Advent and Lent; they sleep on straw fully dressed, and they cannot remove their clothes to go to bed except in the case of grave illness; they rise at night to sing Matins, and recite moreover in choir, and at the time fixed by the rubrics, each part of the canonized office. The love of perfection, especially of recollection and prayer, makes them seek solitude; hence it comes that their houses, which bear the name of retreat, are established in remote places.

Saint Paul of the Cross founded, before his death, a monastery of Passionist nuns. Their life is in every way similar to that of the religious, except that the Rule admits some small differences in things that are not suitable to their sex. The city of Cornetto had the favor of being chosen to receive this monastery of Passionist daughters. The Rule prescribes that they apply themselves, as much as possible, to announcing to all Jesus and Jesus crucified. When it is not given to them to contribute to this oth erwise, Cornetto Site of the foundation of the Passionist nuns' monastery. they must address fervent prayers to the Lord to obtain the efficacy of the word of those who go to evangelize the peoples, and in particular the religious of the Most Holy Cross and Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. The Passionist nuns wear the same costume as the religious; they sing the offices at the same hours, and devote the same time to meditation at the same hours of the day and night; in a word, the Passionist nuns live by the same spirit and are in all things conformable to the religious of the same Congregation.

The Passionists possess today more than thirty houses, of which eleven are in the Roman State, two on Mount Argentaro, and one near Aquila, etc. To observe poverty more strictly, they have no income, live only on alms, and possess absolutely nothing, except in common. The retreat house of Saints John and Paul, which they have in Rome, is situated in the very place where these two Saints suffered martyrdom for Jesus Christ. The Passionists enjoy in Rome, as in all of Italy, the highest esteem. They have a great reputation for regularity. Their house is in Rome, in the judgment of Gregory XVI and Pius IX, currently reigning, one of the convents of the holy city where the most fervor reigns. The most ardent wish of these religious is to see England return to the Catholic religion. They pray much to this end with great confidence of being heard; they even have in this regard a prediction of their venerable founder, who announced to them the return of England to unity. They are directing their efforts at this moment toward this goal.

We have used, to compose this biography, the *Lives of the Saints canonized in Rome*, in 1867, and the *Dictionary of Religious Orders*, by Hélyot. — Cf. *Life of Fr. Paul of the Cross*, by Father Vincent Maria Strambi, Passionist; and another, more extensive, published in 1821, by a Father of the same Order.