The Pope's Last Crusade (20 page)

The speech reflected the tone and language he had assembled for the pope's encyclical, yet no one at the dinner had a hint that this was part of the Vatican's most important statement ever on anti-Semitism.

The pope woke up at his normal hour on the morning of Friday, November 25, feeling as well rested as he had in recent days. He ate breakfast and walked out of his private apartments toward the elevator to begin his workday. But then he suddenly faltered, and before his aides could react, he lost his balance and fainted to the floor. Two Vatican physicians, Aminta Milani, the chief of the Vatican health service, and Filippo Rocchi, the junior member of the medical staff, raced to the pope. Attendants carried him to his bed. Milani administered oxygen and an injection of camphor oil, which had been used for decades as a stimulant in such cases.

For hours, the pope did not regain consciousness. The pope's heart had been damaged in the attack he suffered in late 1936, and those surrounding him were gravely worried. The priests and cardinals had been told he could not survive a second attack. Word spread around Rome that the pope was near death. Lorenzo Lauri, the first of the cardinals to appear, administered the sacrament of Last Rights when Milani described the gravity of the situation.

Pius's heartbeat was irregular and Milani continued to administer oxygen. Cardinal Pacelli soon arrived and sent word to church officials around the world that the pope was ill and to expect the worst. He ordered all but the doctors and closest aides to stay away from the papal bedroom. People gathered at the Vatican as word spread. The mood was black and somber. Prayers were issued worldwide.

The pope's heart rate was alternately weak and fibrillating; he did not move. After a while, just as Milani was giving up hope, the pope's heartbeat grew stronger again and the fibrillation stopped. By late morning, the doctor reported that pope was improving. Around 3
P.M.
, Pius opened his eyes, smiled, and appeared well. He asked for something to drink, and Milani called for some hot broth. The pope's sister, Donna Camilla Ratti, and his nephew, Count Franco Ratti, who had raced down from Milan on first word of the pope's illness, were soon allowed to enter Pius's bedroom to sit with him. By the end of the day, the pope was weary, but the scare was over.

An official Vatican communiqué reported the pope had suffered an attack of cardiac asthma, a symptom of what would later be called congestive heart failure, but had improved significantly in the course of the day. “It is a question now of knowing whether a true improvement occurred,” the communiqué said, “or whether the improvement was merely the effect of the remedies administered to sustain the Pontiff's heart.”

The pope was fully alert by the next morning. Although he understood the severity of what had happened, he went back to work and tried to minimize the danger. “Do not think of me,” he said. “Too many others are suffering today. May God help them all and bring peace to them all.”

Meanwhile, the pope summoned a trusted friend from Milan, Dr. Domenico Cesa-Bianchi, who was chairman of the medical institute at the University of Milan. Cesa-Bianchi had assembled a team of doctors at the Milan Institute, most of them anti-Fascists who were working quietly against Mussolini. Among them was the thirty-five-year-old Jewish heart specialist, Massimo Calabresi, who had been imprisoned by the Italian regime as a student. Calabresi had just finished a text on advances in cardiology and received a nationwide prize for the best medical book of the year. The pope wanted the best medical care available as he fought for time.

Within days, papal audiences and speeches resumed. “The Pope must be a Pope, he must not stay in bed,” Pius said. On Sunday morning, November 27, the pope surprised everyone by speaking to four hundred Hungarian pilgrims. One said the pope appeared “very pale but he appeared the master of his strength and unhesitating in his motions.”

“Since that date,” added a U.S. embassy official reported to Washington, “the Pope has not deviated from his normal schedule.”

The pope had averted death once more, but his collapse added to the perception that these might be his final days. Through December it was understood that private audiences would be shortened. His secretaries insisted that the pope take longer breaks and rest frequently. Some of the time, at least, he complied.

Achille Ratti, the future Pope Pius XI, circa 1880. Ratti was from a mountain village in northern Italy near Milan. He was ordained a priest at age twenty-two in 1879. As he advanced in the Catholic Church, he also became known as a world-class mountain climber. His exploits included the ascent of 15,203-foot Monte Rosa, the second highest peak in the Alps, on a pass never attempted before.
(Courtesy of Georgetown University Library.)

John LaFarge, at about twenty years of age. He graduated in 1901 from Harvard University, where he studied music theory and played the piano, while focusing his studies on poetry, literature, and the classics.

LaFarge in Holland, early 1900s. LaFarge entered a seminary in Innsbruck, Austria, in 1901, after Theodore Roosevelt, a family friend, helped convince LaFarge's father to accept the idea that his son wanted to be a priest.
(Courtesy of Georgetown University Library.)

LaFarge, circa 1915, in St. Mary's County, Maryland. After becoming a Jesuit, he was assigned to work in predominantly African-American parishes in rural Maryland, where he became an advocate of vocational training, education, and equal opportunity.
(Courtesy of Georgetown University Library.)

Achille Ratti, early 1900s. Ratti served as a teacher, as a scholar with three doctorates, as a librarian first at the four-centuries-old Ambrosian Library in Milan, and finally as head of the Vatican Library in Rome.

LaFarge, circa 1920, St. Mary's County. LaFarge lived in southern Maryland from 1911 to 1926. He worked on the creation of regional Catholic interracial councils and thought such councils should fight for an end to prejudice. He was transferred to New York in 1926 as associate editor of the Jesuit magazine
America. (Courtesy of Georgetown University Library.)

Pope Pius XI and his secretary, Monsignor Carlo Confalonieri, in the Vatican gardens, 1922. Achille Ratti was elected pope in February 1922. He had been elevated to the rank of cardinal and archbishop of Milan less than a year earlier. Previously he had been Pope Benedict XV's diplomatic representative in Poland after the end of World War I.