Raptim Transit… A Gunslinger Pope (Pope Pius XI)

WDTPRS ^ | 11/20/2007 | Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

[Pyro7480]

This is marvelous. Biretta tip to FA o{]:¬)

The blog on L’espresso by Sandro Magister has a great item, which I offer in my translation:

In the curriculum of Pius XI there is a certificate for being a first-rate shot

In L’Osservatore Romano for 20 November, ... there stands out in the cultural page a bizarre headline: "the librarian with the pistol".

We are not dealing with just any librarian, but with Achille Ratti, who became Pope with the name Pius XI.

And the gun?

Here’s the explanation of this oddity. When he was prefect of the Ambrosian Library in Milan, Ratti kept a a revolver close at had "as a deterent to keep off possible miscreants with gunshots in the air, or the like."

Once promoted to the Vatican Library, he brought his gun with him. And when in 1918 Benedict XV sent him to Poland as an apostolic visitor, he sent to Warsaw via the diplomatic pouch, "a small revolver and ammunition".

As Pope, we don’t know. But it occurs that he could have been a quick-draw, based on the motto he chose for his episcopal coat-of arms: "Raptim transit" , "it goes by swiftly", a citation of Job 6:15.

[Pyro7480]

Pope Pius XI

[Pyro7480]

Catholic ping!

[Tax-chick]

He looks like Calvin Coolidge.

[NeoCaveman]

When the Pope packed heat.

[Tax-chick]

I like it. Maybe I’ll get his picture for the wall.

[AnAmericanMother]

???!!!???

[Tax-chick]

Pope Pius’s face is just a little rounder, but if you put the glasses and Pope clothes on President Coolidge, they’d certainly pass for first cousins :-).

[AnAmericanMother]

Maybe he could join St. Gabriel Possenti as the patron of handgunners . . .

[Pyro7480]

The thought did cross my mind. ;-)

[AnAmericanMother]

I dunno. Pope Pius looks like a Northern Italian, and Mr. Coolidge could be the Poster Child for old-line New England.

I guess they look sort of alike, maybe I'm looking at different visual cues!

[Kolokotronis]

When I was a kid, +PXI’s picture with a family blessing hung on the parlor wall of my best friend’s grandmother’s house. I always thought he was rather forbidding.

[Tax-chick]

To an accountant, he looks friendly and efficient.

[Running On Empty]

Yeah—but when it’s Teddy Roosevelt we think he looks, well—commanding and strong. :-)

[Pyro7480]

Forbidding? In what sense?

[Kolokotronis]

“Forbidding? In what sense?”

Hey, I was little and the nuns had told me unless I was subject to his successor, I was off to hell! Frankly, he scared me big time! :)

[Tax-chick]

More like Rick Schroeder in “The Lost Battalion” than Tom Berenger in “The Rough Riders.”