STUDY DAY DEDICATED TO ST. PIUS X

Vatican City, 9 June 2014 (VIS) – The Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences has organised a study day dedicated to St. Pius X (1914-2014) to be held on 12 June , the centenary of his death. The theme of the day is “St. Pius X, a reforming pope facing the challenges of the new century”, and it was presented this morning in the Holy See Press Office by Fr. Bernard Ardura O. Praem., president of the aforementioned Committee and by Professor Alejandro Mario Dieguez of the Vatican Secret Archive.

“During this day”, said Fr. Ardura, “we intend to highlight the principles and pastoral directions of St. Pius X who, throughout all his ministry, was essentially a pastor of souls. … All his efforts in the ecclesial and social fields were dictated by a pastoral realism, oriented towards the renewal of the Christian life of people and communities”.

Diguez commented that the event “will offer an overview of new historical information on this intense and crucial pontificate. … This has been possible thanks to the publication of archive sources (with four volumes edited by the Vatican Archive), of profound and systematic research (not only on modernism but also on apostolic visits, codification and the reform of the curia), and study conferences (six over the last twenty-five years). It has therefore been possible to recover the historical Pius X and not that of myth, the Pius X of ecclesiastical governance and reform, and not that of popular piety, recomposing the complex and fascinating personality of this pontiff”.