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Giuseppe Siri

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His Eminence

Giuseppe Siri
Cardinal, Archbishop of Genoa
Cardinal Siri in the 1970s
ArchdioceseGenoa
SeeGenoa
Appointed14 May 1946
Installed29 May 1946
Term ended6 July 1987
PredecessorPietro Boetto
SuccessorGiovanni Canestri
Other post(s)Cardinal-Priest of Santa Maria della Vittoria (1953–89)
Previous post(s)
Orders
Ordination22 September 1928
by Carlo Dalmazio Minoretti
Consecration7 May 1944
by Pietro Boetto
Created cardinal12 January 1953
by Pope Pius XII
RankCardinal-priest
Personal details
Born
Giuseppe Siri

(1906-05-20)20 May 1906
Genoa, Kingdom of Italy
Died2 May 1989(1989-05-02) (aged 82)
Genoa, Italy
NationalityItalian
DenominationRoman Catholic
Alma materPontifical Gregorian University
MottoNon Nobis Domine (Not to Us, Lord)
— Psalm 115:1
Coat of armsGiuseppe Siri's coat of arms

Giuseppe Siri (20 May 1906 – 2 May 1989) was an Italian cardinal of the Catholic Church who served as Archbishop of Genoa from 1946 to 1987, and was elevated to the rank of cardinal in 1953. A protege of Pope Pius XII, he took part in the Second Vatican Council, and was at one point considered a papabile.

Early life and ministry

Siri (first on the right, back row) in 1930

Siri was born in Genoa to Nicolò and Giulia (née Bellavista) Siri. He entered the minor seminary of Genoa on 16 October 1916, and attended the major seminary from 1917 to 1926. Siri then studied at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, and was ordained to the priesthood by Archbishop Carlo Minoretti on 22 September 1928. Finishing his studies at the Gregorian, he earned his doctorate in theology summa cum laude and also did pastoral work in Rome until autumn 1929.

Upon returning to Genoa, Siri served as a chaplain until he became a professor of dogmatic theology at the major seminary in 1930, also teaching fundamental theology for a year. In addition to his academic duties, Siri was a preacher, public speaker, and professor of religion at the classical lyceums named to Andrea Doria and Giuseppe Mazzini from 1931 to 1936. He was named prosynodal examiner in the archdiocesan curia in 1936 and rector of Collegio Teologico S. Tommaso d'Aquino in 1937.

Episcopal career

Pope Pius XII bestows the red biretta upon Siri in 1953.
Siri in 1960

On 14 March 1944, Siri was appointed Auxiliary Bishop of Genoa and Titular Bishop of Livias by Pope Pius XII. He received his episcopal consecration on the following 7 May from Cardinal Pietro Boetto at the St. Lawrence Cathedral. He became vicar general for the archdiocese on 8 September 1944. During his tenure as an auxiliary, he was a member of the Italian resistance movement in World War II. He negotiated with the Nazi forces surrounding Genoa and met secretly with partisan leaders, eventually arranging a Nazi surrender that avoided further bombardment of the city.

Following the death of Cardinal Boetto, Siri was named Archbishop of Genoa on 14 May 1946, and installed on 29 May of that year. Pius XII made him Cardinal-Priest of Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome, in the consistory of 12 January 1953. At the time of his elevation, he was the youngest member of the College of Cardinals. He became known as the "minestrone cardinal" for his relief work in soup kitchens.

Siri during the Second Vatican Council

Pope John XXIII named Siri the first president of the Italian Episcopal Conference on 12 October 1959. He remained in that post until 1965. He was noted for his staunchly conservative views. At the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), he sat on its Board of Presidency but was anxious that the Council's progress in renewing the Catholic Church could be happening too quickly.[1] Alongside Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and Cardinals Alfredo Ottaviani and Thomas Cooray, he was part of the association of traditionalist Council fathers named Coetus Internationalis Patrum but Siri commented, "I would describe myself as an independent, a man who walks alone and is not a member of any group."[2] He was opposed to collegiality,[3] as well as innovation.[4]

Siri, who had voted in the papal conclaves of 1958 and 1963, was also one of the cardinal electors in the August and October 1978 conclaves. He was a strong candidate for the papacy, or papabile, in all four conclaves, in which his support lay mostly with curialists and other conservative cardinals.[4] Media reports suggested that Siri in fact topped the first count of votes in the August 1978 conclave before losing to Albino Luciani, who became Pope John Paul I.[5][6] Following John Paul I's death, Siri was the leading conservative candidate in opposition to Cardinal Giovanni Benelli, the Archbishop of Florence and leading liberal candidate. Vaticanologists suggested that the eventual winner, Cardinal Wojtyła, who became Pope John Paul II, was chosen as a compromise candidate between the two. Shortly afterwards, Siri implied that he disapproved of Wojtyła's election.[3]

In a biography of Siri, Nicla Buonasorte [d] reports that Siri was a friend of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre but disapproved of his reported schismatic activities. Even until the last minute, Siri begged him ("on his knees") not to break with the Holy See. In the end, Siri resigned himself to the inevitability of his friend's excommunication. Buonasorte commented: "In all probability, it is due to Siri that Lefebvre had no significant following in Italy."[7]

Siri's tomb in the Genoa Cathedral

Siri reached age 80 in 1986 and thus lost the right to participate in future conclaves; he was the last remaining cardinal elector who had been elevated by Pope Pius XII. Siri resigned from his post in Genoa on 6 July 1987, after 41 years of service. He died in Villa Campostano, Genoa, at age 82, and was buried at San Lorenzo metropolitan cathedral in Genoa.

Conclave speculation

Main article: Siri thesis

Siri was considered a strong candidate in the 1958 papal conclave held to elect a successor to replace Pius XII.[8] On the evening of 26 October, the first day of the conclave, apparent white smoke was seen coming from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel, a traditional signal to the crowds in the square outside that a pope has been elected.[9] No announcement was made, and after about half an hour the smoke turned black, indicating that there was no result. Vatican Radio corrected its report.[8]

Sometime in the late 1980s, an American traditionalist Catholic named Gary Giuffre began to expound the belief that Siri was the true pope, and that he was held captive in a monastery in Rome.[8] According to Giuffre and his followers, the white smoke that was seen on 26 October 1958 meant that a pope had been elected, and that pope was Siri, who was forced to reject the papacy because of threats from outside the conclave. Roncalli, who they claimed was a Freemason, was elected instead as Pope John XXIII.[8] It was also claimed that this occurred during the 1963 papal conclave that elected Giovanni Battista Montini as Pope Paul VI.[8]

Siri himself never made these claims, and accepted the authority of all popes in his lifetime. He was appointed president of the Italian Episcopal Conference by Pope John XXIII in 1959, and remained in the post under Pope Paul VI until 1964.[10] He was a candidate for pope in the August 1978 papal conclave that followed the death of Paul VI, where he is thought to have led in the early ballot; the conclave eventually elected Albino Luciani as Pope John Paul I,[5] and again two months later in the October 1978 papal conclave, where he is also thought to have come within a few votes of election before the eventual election of Cardinal Wojtyła as Pope John Paul II.[11] Siri never made any reference to what became known as the "Siri thesis", and there was no mention of it in his New York Times obituary,[2] in the biography written by Raimondo Spiazzi,[12] or in a speech given by Giulio Andreotti on the centenary of Siri's birth in 2006.[13]

References

  1. ^ O'Riordan, S, The Third Session, The Furrow, Volume 15, No. 10 (October 1964), p. 621, accessed on 6 October 2024
  2. ^ a b "Giuseppe Cardinal Siri Of Genoa Is Dead at 82". The New York Times. AP. 3 May 1989. Retrieved 23 April 2017.
  3. ^ a b "A 'Foreign' Pope". Time. 30 October 1978. Archived from the original on 30 September 2007.
  4. ^ a b "The Princes of the Church". Time. 30 March 1962. Archived from the original on 21 October 2008.
  5. ^ a b Allen, John L. Jr. (2005). "How a pope is elected". National Catholic Reporter. Retrieved 23 April 2017.
  6. ^ "How Pope John Paul I Won". Time. 11 September 1978. Archived from the original on 17 April 2008.
  7. ^ Carioti, Antonio (13 December 2006). "Siri, il cardinale dell'Ostpolitik segreta". Corriere della Sera (in Italian). p. 43. Archived from the original on 22 October 2008. fu amico fraterno di monsignor Marcel Lefebvre, ma disapprovò le sue iniziative scismatiche e lo scongiurò fino all'ultimo («in ginocchio», gli scrisse) di non staccarsi da Roma. Infine ammise che non c' erano alternative alla scomunica del vescovo dissidente. «A Siri – osserva la sua biografa – si deve, con tutta probabilità, la mancanza di un seguito significativo di Lefebvre in Italia».
  8. ^ a b c d e Cuneo, Michael W. (1999). The Smoke of Satan: Conservative and Traditionalist Dissent in Contemporary American Catholicism. JHU Press. pp. 84–5. ISBN 0-8018-6265-5. Retrieved 22 April 2017.
  9. ^ The Tablet. 1 November 1958. Quoted in Williams, Paul (2009). The Vatican Exposed: Money, Murder, and the Mafia. p. 239.
  10. ^ Cardinale, Gianni (2007). "The Italian Episcopal Conference and its Presidents". 30 Days. No. 2. Retrieved 23 April 2017.
  11. ^ Pham, John-Peter (2004). Heirs of the Fisherman: Behind the Scenes of Papal Death and Succession. Oxford University Press. p. 131. ISBN 0-19-534635-1. Retrieved 24 April 2017.
  12. ^ Spiazzi 1990.
  13. ^ Andreotti, Giulio (2006). "Defender of Tradition and of workers' rights". 30 Days. No. 4. Retrieved 26 April 2017.

Bibliography

  • Spiazzi, Raimondo, ed. (1990). Il cardinale Giuseppe Siri, arcivescovo di Genova dal 1946 al 1987: la vita, l'insegnamento, l'eredità spirituale, le memorie (in Italian). Bologna: Studio domenicano. ISBN 88-7094-018-7.
  • Buonasorte, Nicla (2006). Siri: tradizione e Novecento (in Italian). Bologna: Il Mulino. ISBN 88-15-11350-9.
  • Siri, Giuseppe (1980). Getsemani: Riflessioni sul movimento teologico contemporaneo (in Italian). Rome: Fraternità della SS. Vergine Maria. ICCU IT\ICCU\TO0\0554891.
  • Lai, Benny (1993). Il Papa non eletto: Giuseppe Siri, cardinale di Santa Romana Chiesa (in Italian). Rome: Laterza. ISBN 88-420-4267-6.
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Catholic Church titles
Preceded by Archbishop of Genoa
14 May 1946 – 6 July 1987 		Succeeded by
Preceded by President of the Italian Episcopal Conference
1959–1965 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Cardinal Protopriest
18 September 1982 – 2 May 1989 		Succeeded by
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