CrucisPope Pius VI
Pope Pius VI was born Giovanni Angelo Braschi on 25 December 1717 at Cesena in Italy and was elected pope in 1775. His long pontificate of nearly a quarter century was overwhelmed by the upheavals that shook the old order of Europe, above all the French Revolution, which turned against the Church with ferocity, confiscating its property, subjecting the clergy to the state, and unleashing a wave of persecution.
Pius condemned the Revolution's attempt to subordinate the Church through the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, and he watched with grief as the faith was assailed in France and beyond. When the armies of revolutionary France invaded Italy, they seized the Papal States and proclaimed a Roman Republic, and in 1798 the aged pope was taken prisoner and carried off into France. Worn by illness and hardship, he died a captive at Valence on 29 August 1799, and it seemed to many that the papacy itself might not survive him, yet the Church endured and elected his successor.
Selected quotes
“Hold fast to the truth though the world turns against you; the storms of an age pass away, but the word of God abides forever.”
“Forgive those who persecute you, for vengeance belongs to God alone, and the martyr's crown is woven from charity, not from hatred.”
“Patience under injustice is a sermon louder than any word; the calm endurance of the faithful confounds the malice of the powerful.”