Fallen order : intrigue, heresy, and scandal in the Rome of Galileo and Caravaggio / Karen Liebreich.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Liebreich, Karen.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Piarists--History--17th century.

Piarists.

Child sexual abuse by clergy--Europe--History--17th century.

Child sexual abuse by clergy.

History.

Europe.

Physical Description:

xxxii, 336 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of illustrations : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

Edition:

First American edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Grove Press, 2004.

Summary:

For hundreds of years the Piarist Order of priests has been known for its history of important contributions to education, science, and culture. Throughout Italy, Spain, and central Europe, the order's schools evolved from shelters created to educate poor children into exclusive private academies. Thousands of children were educated at Piarist schools, including Mozart, Goya, Schubert, Victor Hugo, Johann Mendel, and a host of astronomers, kings, emperors, presidents, even a pope. Yet in 1646, the Piarist Order was abruptly abolished by Pope Innocent X, an unprecedented step not seen since the Knights Templar were suppressed for heresy in the fourteenth century. Fallen Order is the stunning story of how the sexual abuse of children, practiced by some of the leading priests in the order, led to the Piarists' collapse. Karen Liebreich spent several years researching in the order's archives and in the Vatican Secret Archive, and discovered how the founder of the Piarist Order, Father Jose de Calasanz (later honored as the patron saint of Catholic schools) knew of the scandal and tried to keep it a secret. Cardinals and bishops actively participated in the cover-up in an effort to protect the reputation of an important cleric with influential family connections. The complicity of abuse went as far as the pontiff himself, when Pope Innocent X appointed a man known to be a prolific child abuser in charge of an order dedicated to the education of children. Although the Piarist Order was suppressed when the scandal eventually became public, it was later revived and is still in existence today, its turbulent past ignored. A brilliant portrait of seventeenth-century Rome, and the politics, personal rivalries, and Byzantine workings of the Vatican and the Catholic Church, Fallen Order is an explosive account of a history of cover-ups, deception, and shuttling known abuser priests from school to school that is frighteningly similar to the Catholic Church's response to child abuse in the priesthood today.

Contents:

Preface: 'Of great seriousness and commitment' xxi

1 'A patchwork city of strangers' 1

2 'Little beasts or untrained animals' 15

3 'If I had 10,000 priests now' 28

4 'A touch on his breeches' 47

5 'Be very careful in your dealings with the pupils' 56

6 'The worst vice' 63

7 'Prayer and penitence have been cast aside' 81

8 'This is really going to be a troublesome affair' 95

9 'How can the Holy Spirit be in such a house?' 112

10 'See that this business does not become public' 121

11 'Touching the shameless parts is not a sin' 134

12 'Just a case of brotherly persecution' 141

13 'Galileo is the most important man in the world' 152

14 'A sublime nothingness' 158

15 'You are prisoners of the Inquisition' 165

16 'A brief is to be prepared. But secretly' 175

17 'Do you know anything scandalous about your superiors?' 183

18 'Unworthy of such a position' 206

19 'Messing around with boys' 215

20 'We are in a most confused silence' 233

21 'I only with that the knowledge that we have today had been available to use earlier' 256.

Notes:

"First published in Great Britain in 2004 by Atlantic Books"--T.p. verso.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 307-317) and index.

ISBN:

0802117848

OCLC:

55510483