Word: reigning
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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State of the Church. Other Popes have risen to the challenge of the 20th century, notably Leo XIII, who gave the church and the world his great encyclical on labor. But in the 19 years of Eugenio Pacelli's reign, the nature of the papacy has changed dramatically, partly because few men who have worn the triple crown have been so keenly and so tirelessly aware of the agonies of their...
...Pacelli's childhood the world outside the Vatican seethed with anticlericalism and glowed with humanist confidence in the ever onwardness and upwardness of history. Today the papacy and the Catholic Church are immensely stronger. Part of the story is told in numbers: during Pius XII's reign, Catholics throughout the world grew from 388,402,610 to 496,512,000 despite attrition in Iron Curtain countries. The church's strengthened spiritual posture was marked by the fact that under Pius 33 saints were canonized,*more than under any other Pope in this century. Its political success...
...Cunctator. Pius XII was the only Pope to have visited America (in 1936 when he was Vatican Secretary of State), and his pontificate was notable for its strengthened ties with the U.S. Five U.S. cardinals were named during his reign (James Cardinal Mclntyre, Edward Cardinal Mooney, Francis Cardinal Spellman, the late Samuel Cardinal Stritch, the late John Cardinal Glennon). Two close personal friends of Pius XII were Americans-Cardinal Spellman and Boston Tycoon Joseph P. Kennedy, onetime Ambassador to the Court of St. James...
...Compromise candidate. In case of a deadlock, the conclave may decide on an aged cardinal whose reign might be brief, postponing a decision (of the Italian cardinals, only three are under 70, of the whole college only...
...Italian v. non-Italian Pope. Under Pius XII's reign, for the first time in 500 years, non-Italian cardinals have come to outnumber the Italians, 37 to 18, but it is still considered probable that the next Pope will be Italian. The last non-Italian Pope was a Dutchman, Adrian...