Theodulf Mertel

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Theodulf Mertel as cardinal
Cardinal Mertels coat of arms
Theodulf Mertel, contemporary painting, around 1860

Theodulf Mertel , also T (h) eodolfo Mertel (born February 9, 1806 in Allumiere , Italy; † July 11, 1899 there ), was a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church from 1858 until his death . The son of a Bavarian immigrant worked for the Holy See as a lawyer, minister of justice and interior as well as prime minister of the Papal States and crowned Pope Leo XIII. He was the last cardinal in church history to be elevated to the rank of cardinal as a layperson .

Life

Origin and career

The parents Theodulf Mertels, Isidor Mörtl and Mertel, baker from the Bavarian town of Eglfing , and Maria Franziska geb. Lunadei from Vorarlberg , had emigrated to Italy and had lived in Allumiere, a papal mining settlement in northern Lazio (70 km northwest of Rome), where alum stone was mined , since 1803 . Here the father worked as a state employee to take care of the miners in his baker's profession.

Theodulf was born there in 1806 as the first child of his parents. He attended the Capuchin school in Tolfa , then the Montefiascone seminary . Finally, he studied law at the Sapienza University in Rome, graduating in 1828 and earning a doctorate in ecclesiastical and civil law . He then worked as a lawyer in his home town of Allumiere.

Employee of the Roman Curia

Service under Gregory XVI.

Pope Gregory XVI In 1831 he was appointed to the service of the Roman Curia , where he held various legal offices. Among other things, Mertel headed an ecclesiastical congregation that took care of the legal affairs of those in need and defended them free of charge if necessary.

In 1843 he was promoted to president of the papal civil court and received the title of prelate , although he was not a member of the clergy .

Service under Pius IX.

In 1847 Pope Pius IX appointed him . as auditor of the Sacra Rota Court .

The revolutionary time of 1848 brought great political and constitutional upheavals for the Church and the Pope. Pius IX quickly came to appreciate the capable lawyer Mertel. As secretary of the Cardinals' Commission, he was entrusted with the elaboration of the new statutes (Basic Law) for the Papal States and overnight drafted a 69-article draft. The Pope accepted his text without any change. Mertel was now considered a legal authority in the Vatican.

Pius IX appointed him to the closest leadership of the Papal States in 1853; first as minister of justice, then as head of the interior department (interior minister).

In the consistory of March 15, 1858 Theodulf Mertel received - against his express will - from Pius IX. the cardinal's hat and shortly thereafter the appointment as cardinal deacon of the titular deaconry Sant'Eustachio . After the uprising, he refused to be ordained priest because of his modesty, but asked for ordination as a subdeacon in order to at least formally belong to the clergy. Finally, on May 16, 1858, the Pope himself ordained him as a deacon .

In 1863 the Pope appointed him President of the Supreme Council of the Papal States (Prime Minister).

Cardinal Mertel participated in the First Vatican Council in the function of a papal senator . In the debates about the infallibility dogma, he advised the juridically extremely precise formulation of the case and added: “It is not acceptable that everything that popes have done and said counts as dogma.” He affirmed the infallibility decision, but urged prudence : "One must be careful that zealots without distinctions and advocates of excessive conceptions do not cause bigger problems than the opponents."

Due to the political events and the occupation of the Papal States, the council ended prematurely on October 20, 1870. Even now Mertel was used again. He formulated the letter with which the Pope protested against the illegal dissolution of the Papal State. Mertel is also credited with supporting the wavering Pope Pius IX with like-minded people. convinced he shouldn't leave Rome. The pontiff later described him as the “best man of the 19th century” and appointed him executor of his will. In this capacity, Mertel also directed the nightly transfer of the body of Pius IX on July 13, 1881. from the Vatican to the Basilica of San Lorenzo Fuori le mura . This led to riots and an angry crowd tried to throw the coffin into the Tiber.

Service under Leo XIII.

In 1878 Theodulf Mertel took part in the conclave , which Joachim Pecci as Leo XIII. elected to the Pope. The son of a Bavarian baker finally crowned the new head of the church with a tiara in the Sistine Chapel, on behalf of the sick cardinal protodiac Prospero Caterini .

Even under Leo XIII. Mertel remained the main lawyer at the curia , entrusted with a large number of scientific and diplomatic tasks. With Giovanni Battista de Rossi he shared a lively interest in the new discoveries in the catacombs and he worked with him in the Archaeological Society of the Vatican until old age.

In 1881 he became cardinal deacon of Santa Maria in Via Lata , and in 1884 he was finally given the titular church of San Lorenzo in Damaso . In 1884 the pontiff appointed him Vice Chancellor of the Holy Roman Church.

Retirement, personal interests, and death

In 1889, at the age of 83, Mertel gradually withdrew into retirement.

As a cardinal, Mertel was very charitable and advocated the establishment of institutions for the deaf and dumb and the disabled. In his hometown Allumiere, where he was now staying more and more often, he made generous donations for the needy, financed the studies for poor candidates for the priesthood and brought a congregation of sisters to the town.

He was a passionate local historian and extensively researched the history of the area where he was born. He was also interested in geology and owned a rich mineral collection. In addition, he always kept in touch with his father's Bavarian homeland. He wrote Latin letters to the local priest Sauter von Eglfing and asked about his relatives. According to Martin Eckart from Huglfing , who wrote a treatise on Cardinal Mertel in 2000, the prelate supported the descendants of his aunt Margarethe in his Bavarian homeland and was annoyed that Pastor Sauter answered his Latin letters in German. Mertel was also friends with the Augustinian Abbot Johann Gregor Mendel .

Almost unable to walk and almost blind, Theodulf Mertel died on July 11, 1899; at the age of 93, the oldest member of the College of Cardinals . Even the New York Times reported in an obituary about the death of "the cardinal who was never ordained a priest". He found his final resting place in a tomb built for him next to the pilgrimage chapel “Mother of Grace” in Allumiere.

memory

The municipalities of Eglfing and Allumiere entered into a town partnership in 2000 because of their mutual Cardinal Theodulf Mertel. In Rome the "Via Teodolfo Mertel" and in Allumiere the "Piazza Teodolfo Mertel" are named after the prelate of German origin. In Eglfing, the Kardinal-Mertel-Weg leads to the partnership chapel, which was inaugurated in 2007.

literature

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predecessor Office successor
Prospero Cardinal Caterini Cardinal
Protodeacon 1881-1884 		Domenico Cardinal Consolini
Friedrich zu Schwarzenberg Cardinal Protopriest
1885-1899 		Mieczysław Halka Ledóchowski
personal data
SURNAME Mertel, Theodulf
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Mertel, Teodolfo; Mertel, Theodolfo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Jurist, papal minister, cardinal
DATE OF BIRTH February 9, 1806
PLACE OF BIRTH Allumiere
DATE OF DEATH July 11, 1899
Place of death Allumiere