Pius

Pius, name of 12 popes. Saint Pius V (Michele Ghislieri; 1504–72), an Italian, was elected in 1566. With some severity he restored a degree of discipline and morality to the papacy in the face of the Protestant challenge and organized the Spanish-Venetian expedition that defeated the Turks at Lepanto in 1571. Pius VII (Gregorio Luigi Barnaba Chiaramonti; 1740–1823), an Italian, was elected in 1800. Under an 1801 concordat French troops were withdrawn, but the Papal States were later annexed by Napoleon I, whom Pius had consecrated emperor in 1804. Pius IX (Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti; 1792–1878), an Italian, began the longest papal reign, in 1846, with liberal reforms but became an extreme reactionary in both politics and dogma after the revolution of 1848. The Immaculate Conception became an article of dogma (1854), and papal infallibility was proclaimed in 1870 by the 1st Vatican Council. In 1871 the new kingdom of Italy passed the Law of Guaranties, defining relations between the state and the papacy, but Pius refused to accept the position. Saint Pius X (Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto; 1835–1914), an Italian, was elected in 1903. He condemned modernism in the church. Pius XI (Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti; 1857–1939), an Italian, was elected in 1922. He concluded the Lateran Treaty (1929) with the Italian state and issued encyclicals condemning communism, fascism, and racism. Pius XII (Eugenio Pacelli; 1876–1958), a Roman, was elected in 1939. He was an active diplomat in a difficult period and undertook a considerable amount of humanitarian work during World War II, although he was criticized for refusing to condemn Nazi policy toward the Jews. His encyclical Mediator Dei led to changes in the Masses.