Visiting ‘Peter in Chains’: French Pilgrimage to Rome, 1873–93

Abstract

Inscribed on the wall of the expiatory Basilica of Sacré Coeur, at Montmartre, the 1873 ‘national vow’ of France interprets the nation's recent misfortunes as divine chastisement of an errant and irreligious people. Since it was Napoleon III's withdrawal of French troops from Rome that had made it possible for the Italian forces to capture the papal city in September 1870, the ‘national vow’ reflects a strong sense of French responsibility for the pope's loss of his temporal power. The Catholic Right interpreted France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian war, and her subsequent loss of Alsace and Lorraine, as God's punishment on ‘the eldest daughter of the Church’ for her desertion of the Vicar of Christ, and the ‘national vow’ pledged prayer for the Roman pontiff's deliverance from his enemies. This study analyses the devotion of French Catholics to ‘the prisoner of the Vatican’ during the Third Republic through an exploration of some of the religious and political meanings of pilgrimage to visit ‘Peter in chains’. It also charts the process by which promotion in the Catholic press, rapid train transportation and cheaper package fares opened an era of mass pilgrimage to Rome and paved the way for a new popular papal style.

‘A Most Select Gathering’. Mexican National Pilgrimages to Rome during the Papacy of Leo XIII

“…The pilgrimages organised during the final years of the papacy of Pius IX were characterised by the small number of participants, their elite composition, and their Legitimist stamp. This was the case for the first national French pilgrimage in 1873 and the Spanish one of 1876 (Brennan 2000;Kertzer 2004;Seiler 2007;Horaist 1995;Hibbs-Lissourgues 1995;Ramón Solans 2018;Heid 2020).…”

“…The pilgrimage of 1887 was a great success and managed to bring 1400 workers, 110 factory owners, and 300 clergy to Rome. Two years later, in 1889, the pilgrimage reached 3000 workers and in 1891, three months after the publication of the Rerum Novarum, 20,000 French workers travelled to Rome in gratitude to Leo XIII for that document (Brennan 2000). In Spain, the Marquess of Comillas and Catholic industrialist, Claudio López Bru, promoted a workers' pilgrimage that brought 18,500 pilgrims to Rome in 1894 to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the priestly ordination of Leo XIII (Faes Díaz 2009).…”

“…From the mid-nineteenth century, the papacy's progressive loss of territories in the face of advancing Italian unification awoke a wave of empathy and solidarity with the papacy, which came to be expressed in forms of devotion to the pope as an alter christus (Horaist 1995;Zambarbieri 2005;Seiler 2007). The national pilgrimages had a strong political dimension, both in their defence of the papacy's temporal sovereignty as well as for their nature of protest against the participants' political regimes, such as the Royalist Catholics against the French Third Republic, the Legitimists against the Spanish Bourbon Restoration, or the German Catholics against the Kulturkampf (Brennan 2000;Dupont 2018;Heid 2020). As well as national pilgrimages, workers' pilgrimages were also organised which, financed by parishes and businesses, served to demonstrate the adhesion by the proletariat to Catholicism and thereby to fight socialism and anarchism.…”

“…As well as national pilgrimages, workers' pilgrimages were also organised which, financed by parishes and businesses, served to demonstrate the adhesion by the proletariat to Catholicism and thereby to fight socialism and anarchism. Researchers have particularly focussed on the French and Spanish pilgrimages (Brennan 2000;Faes Díaz 2009). In turn, the Holy See contributed to these types of national and worker pilgrimages with the celebration of ordinary and extraordinary jubilees which illustrated the global dimension of papal power (Ticchi 2005).…”

Pilgrimage and Religious Mobilization in Europe

“…From the mid-nineteenth century, the papacy's progressive loss of territories in the face of advancing Italian unification awoke a wave of empathy and solidarity with the papacy, which came to be expressed in forms of devotion to the pope as an alter christus (Horaist 1995;Zambarbieri 2005;Seiler 2007). The national pilgrimages had a strong political dimension, both in their defence of the papacy's temporal sovereignty as well as for their nature of protest against the participants' political regimes, such as the Royalist Catholics against the French Third Republic, the Legitimists against the Spanish Bourbon Restoration, or the German Catholics against the Kulturkampf (Brennan 2000;Dupont 2018;. As well as national pilgrimages, workers' pilgrimages were also organised which, financed by parishes and businesses, served to demonstrate the adhesion by the proletariat to Catholicism and thereby to fight socialism and anarchism.…”