Born in Rocca di Papa (Rome) on January 28, 1844.
Died in Rome on January 1, 1913.
Lucio Basili took the Franciscan habit on May 19, 1859, made his first vows on May 20, 1860 and solemn vows on July 28, 1863. Ordained a priest on September 22, 1866, he taught philosophy and moral theology in his province and in the Holy Land. Returning to Italy in 1881, he was elected Provincial Definitor (1884-1887), Secretary General (1889-1896), Definitor General (1895-1897) and Attorney General (1898-1906). He was also extraordinary penitentiary of the Vatican basilica (since 1885), visitor general of the provinces of Tuscany and Ab¬bruzzo, apostolic visitor of the Doctrine Fathers, examiner of the Roman clergy, consultor of the Sacred Congregation of Bishops and Regulars (since 1896) and guardian and rector of the church of S. Lorenzo in Panisperna.
Father Pietro da Rocca di Papa is the author of the severe vote presented to the Congregation of Bishops and Regulars on July 20, 1905, on the request made by Don Guanella for the approval of his two religious institutes. Vote preceded by another, always negative, of 5 July 1904, on the question that arose between Don Guanella and his ordinary * Teodoro Valfrè di Bonzo regarding the faculty to confess one's nuns and patients. In his judgment regarding the request for approval, the friar underlined what he considered to be an indocility of the founder, who had not complied with the prescriptions received in 1901 to restrict "the boundless secondary purpose of his institute" (that is, the works of the apostolate) and to take care of the complete separation of the personnel of the two institutes. He concluded his vote by proposing that, "considering the sui generis nature of the two twin institutes" and the "great and almost insurmountable difficulty of reducing them in conformity with the ecclesiastical provisions", the congregations should remain forever "as pure and simple diocesan institutes". Subsequent history, above all thanks to the decisive help of the Redemptorist father *Claudio Benedetti, managed to overturn the vow and the predictions of the severe seraphic religious.
Sources:
COLOMBO ANGELETTI, Obituary of the Roman province of SS. Apostles Peter and Paul, Rome, 1969, p. 17.
"Acts of the Order of the Friars Minor", To the Clear Waters of Florence, From the Typography of the College of St. Bonaventure, 1913, p. 72.
"Schematism of the entire Order of Friars Minor", To S. Mariae Angelorum near Assisi, Ex Schola Typographica Umbra, 1909, p. 45.
Guanellian sources:
BRUNO CAPPARONI, The papal approval of the Guanellian congregations: difficulties and positive results (1898-1935), in The Constitutions and Regulations of Don Luigi Guanella. Historical and thematic approaches, edited by Alejandro M. Dieguez, Rome, Nuove Frontiere, 1998, pp. 127-128.
Photographs:
Not found yet.
AM Dieguez
Guanellian Encyclopaedia
© 2008 Guanellian Study Center – Rome