by Fred Moleck
Pope St. Pius X, Reactionary
For the longest time in my church music career-ministry, I would bow my head in humble gratitude when someone would say the name Pius X.Since 1903, his name and his motuproprio (Benedict XVI did not invent the term) Tra le sollecitudini reshaped our understanding of sacred music both in practice and in the development of liturgical spirituality.
Imbedded in the document are concepts that generated the three bedrocks of Vatican II reform—full, active, and conscious participation in the liturgy that paved the way to the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy of Vatican II.
On September 8, the church marked 100 years since his reactionary encyclical Pascendi Dominici Gregis, the 1907 document that condemned what he saw was the “synthesis of all heresies”: M O D E R N I S M.
Pius X labeled anything that smacked of collegiality, critical analysis of Scripture, intellectual inquiry—anything that even hinted that there is more than one way to think and talk about church things.
In fact, one can see that Vatican II’s revolutionizing documents on the nature of the church, Scripture interpretation, and liturgical reform stand in direct opposition to Pius X and his predecessor, Pius IX, a.k.a. Pio Nono.
Pius X stunted creative inquiry and discussion on anything that strayed from the poured-in-concrete neo-scholasticism, which had no room for historical discoveries about the Bible, let alone renovated worship.
To insure its universal efficacy, Pius X mandated “all clergy, confessors, preachers, religious superiors, and professors in philosophical theological seminaries” to take the oath, which consisted of 1048 words—that’s a lot of stuff to be against.
Whew! Musicians escaped again.
To better understand the reactionary position St. Pope Pius X took, it is important to understand what was going on in Europe and the Americas in the 1800s.
The American Revolution was the first proving ground that non-royal humans can govern themselves. The human condition did not need “rule by divine right” in the maintenance of the human condition and regulating its behavior.
Nationalism was emerging rapidly in which ethnic identities, languages, history, literature, and political independence were major issues.
This fierce national identity took on major social upheavals in Italy in the movement to secularize the Papal States.
These little kingdoms were sovereign to themselves and were under the direct patronage of the pope.
All of the Italian Papal States were suppressed by the armies of the Risorgimento. The pope lost all property—save what is now known as Vatican City.
Pope Pius IX—Pio Nono—saw himself as a hostage. He and future popes were ticked off.
The resentment was deep and was given a voice with St. Pope Pius X and his campaign against modernism as he rode the crest of the unleashed tsunami.
It is a great act of God’s mercy that St. Pope Pius X is remembered as a benign embracing pontiff with snow-white hair extending his hand to children to illustrate how he made if possible for them to make their first communion.
His image grows radiant when church musicians talk and celebrate his motu proprio on sacred music. Let’s continue that celebration, but oathless, unabashedly modern, and always ready to sing God’s praise.
You can reach Fred Moleck via email at fmoleck@comcast.net