His pontificate was marked by the efforts of various heretics in Rome, among them the gnostics Valentinian, Cerdon, and Marcion, to sow their errors in the Church's center. The last-named, when excluded from communion by Saint Pius, founded the heretical group which bears his name. St. Justin and other Catholic teachers assisted the Pontiff in defending Christian doctrine and preserving it from corruption. After having governed the Church for fifteen years St. Pius I obtained the crown of martyrdom by the sword, in the year of Our Lord 150.
Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira
Biographical selection:
St. Pius I (140-155) was born in the city of Aquilea, He succeeded St. Hyginus (136-140) in the Apostolic See. He was friend of St. Polycarp of Smyrna and St. Justin the Apologist, who fought against the Gnostic heresy that was contaminating the Church. St. Pius I demanded the highest respect for the consecrated species of Bread and Wine in the Eucharist. He made a special decree prescribing that if a negligent priest would let even a drop of the Precious Blood fall on the ground he would have to make 40 days of penance. If the Precious Blood would be spilled on the Altar and not onto the ground, the penance would be between 3-9 days, depending upon the quantity spilled.
One of the places where St. Peter and St. Paul used to work, the palace of St. Pudentiana, was transformed by Pope Pius I into a church. After governing the Catholic Church for 15 years, St. Pius I suffered martyrdom under Marcus Aurelius.
Comments of Prof. Plinio:
One can see that St. Pius I was a Pope who carried out his functions during the period of the Roman persecutions. Thus he counts among those first Popes who were associated with the admirable work of the internal organization of the Church. This is a very important point that historians and scholars habitually overlook.
St Pius I
St. Pius I
During the persecutions, even when she was being stepped on and wounded, even when she was pouring out blood in all her parts, the Catholic Church continued to organize herself. After Constantine’s decree that gave liberty to the Church, she came out of the catacombs, and one could admire her full and perfect organization: she had a Hierarchy, an exact Church Law, all her structures had been made, her liturgy defined, and a wealth of doctrine established. This means that from the time that St. Peter and St. Paul arrived in Rome until the moment the Church left the catacombs, an enormous work of organization had been carried out.
The Catholic Church appeared as the first entity in History claiming a universal character. Until then, this idea was absurd. All the existent religions and other organizations were limited by borders of State. The Church claimed this universality naturally, wisely, and with good sense. She emerged from the catacombs already with her universal character and carried on naturally because everything was already prepared for that.
This means that even while she was suffering persecutions, she was not obsessed by them. At the same time, she was serenely constructing her magnificent structure. One might think that the development of the body of the Church would need to be made in peace and tranquility, that persecuted men could never do such a thing. But the opposite is true.
Throughout that period, those very men who were threatened, persecuted, at constant risk of being brought before the Roman tribunals and receiving their martyrdom, never ceased thinking, praying, and making the Church more perfect – here a point of doctrine was polished, there a part of the liturgy was improved, over there a new custom was being established. Considering this serenity and calm, one is reminded of the serenity and calm of the martyrs in the arena. That tranquility before death was present at the tragic moment when they were facing beasts and tortures. This was a consequence of a state of spirit fostered by the Catholic Church that kept them in a constant state of confidence and calm. This also explains why they were able to calmly and serenely construct, stone by stone, the extraordinary institution that they built.
The contemplative state also was born in the Church as another consequence of the persecutions. Many Catholics, fleeing the persecutions of the pagan Roman Empire, found refuge in the desert. There they began to dwell in isolation, living lives of prayer and sacrifice, which became the eremitic life of contemplation.
Here, then, one sees the admirable panorama of the life of the Church at that time: The great ever growing number of martyrs, the apostolate of the Church extending to all corners, her spirit of recollection giving rise to a flourishing contemplative state. It was an admirable growth and development.
Behind all those initiatives was the presence of the Holy Ghost. The Roman Catholic Church is more than a society of defined persons – the Pope, Bishops, Clergy, and faithful. This is the human element of the Church. But there is also that which is called the spirit of the Church. This spirit is the continuity in the Church of a determined mentality, a determined wisdom, a determined Faith, and a determined virtue, which exists not by a work of man, but by a supernatural factor: this is the action of the Holy Ghost. By means of this action, good Catholics everywhere in all centuries understood each other, knew each other, and supported each other. They had a single mentality, and when they died, others came and succeeded them with the same spirit.
Today the faithful who understand and love this same institution, virtue, and tradition have this spirit and represent this continuity. You have certainly seen a fire burning at night, when the flames are more easily seen. Once in a while, a spark shoots out from the fire, flies high above it, and then falls again into the bosom of the burning wood. Those good Catholics of whom I spoke are like those sparks in the fire. Amid the present crisis of the Church, those sparks shine with the light of the Church, with the light that the Church had before the Council, and they fly up and they will return their light and their very existence to her after her restoration. I hope we make up part of these Catholics. Our joy is to be a part of the Catholic Church. Anything good in us comes from our belonging to her, which is a Temple of the Holy Ghost.
There is a certain analogy between the faithful of the time of St. Pius I and today’s faithful. Today’s good Catholics do not suffer a bloody persecution (in most parts of the world, but the 'peaceful' religion is spreading its errors all over). Instead they face a bloodless persecution and are maltreated in many ways. Our Lady helps them, and they continue on, stone by stone constructing their work in that same spirit, until that moment Our Lady will choose for her glorification, and the Reign of Mary will be established. Then future Catholics will see that even amid the worse torments in History, which is the present day crisis, the Church continued to live, to progress, to give good fruit, and, moreover, she continued to be herself.
These are the considerations on the feast of St. Pius that I can offer you.
Prof. Plinio Correa de Oliveira, deceased 1995.
Read a little about him:
The Saint of the Day features highlights from the lives of saints based on comments made by the late Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira. Following the example of St. John Bosco who used to make similar talks for the boys of his College, each evening it was Prof. Plinio’s custom to make a short commentary on the lives of the next day’s saint in a meeting for youth in order to encourage them in the practice of virtue and love for the Catholic Church. TIA thought that its readers could profit from these valuable commentaries.
The texts of both the biographical data and the comments come from personal notes taken by Atila S. Guimarães from 1964 to 1995. Given the fact that the source is a personal notebook, it is possible that at times the biographic notes transcribed here will not rigorously follow the original text read by Prof. Plinio. The commentaries have also been adapted and translated for TIA’s site. (TIA means 'Tradition in Action', a group founded by him in Brazil.
Plinio Corrêa de OliveiraCatholic thinker, writer, university professor, journalist and lecturer — all of these describe the life of Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira. However, such a description is somehow incomplete.
Indeed, he is a man who must be seen in light of the times in which he lived. Born in São Paulo, Brazil in 1908, the founder of the Brazilian TFP is a figure that stands tall in a tempestuous century where he emerged as a man of faith, thought and action.
If he is to be defined at all, Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira must first be understood as one who valued his Catholic Faith above all else. The Faith marked his entire life. He turned his back on a promising political career, and put himself at the service of the Church.
This central focus began from his infancy when his mother, Lucilia Corrêa de Oliveira, imparted to him a love of the Catholic Church. That early formation and later his Jesuit education was the foundation of a life of zealous Catholic action.
In 1928 he joined the Marian Congregations of São Paulo and soon became one of its main leaders and orators. In 1933 he helped organize the Catholic Electoral League and was elected to the nation’s Constitutional Convention. As the youngest congressman in Brazil’s history, he garnered the largest number of votes and served as a distinguished leader of the Catholic bloc.
The rest of his life is a long list of service to the Catholic cause. He held the chair of Modern and Contemporary History at the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo. He was also the first president of the São Paulo Archdiocesan Board of Catholic Action.
From 1935 to 1947 he served as director of the Catholic weekly Legionário, which attained prominence in the Brazilian Catholic press under his tutelage especially for its opposition to Nazism. In 1951 he began his direction of the monthly paper Catolicismo. From 1968 to 1990 he wrote a column for the Folha de S.Paulo, the city’s largest daily newspaper.
However, Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira was more than just a man of Faith and action. His profound analysis of history and world events gave rise to a pole of Catholic thought that opposed communism and Catholic leftism as it rocked Latin America and the world. (Liberation Theology)
An avowed Thomist, he was the author of 15 books and over 2,500 in-depth essays and articles. His works include: In Defense of Catholic Action, Revolution and Counter-Revolution, The Church and the Communist State: The Impossible Coexistence, Nobility and Analogous Traditional Elites in the Allocutions of Pius XII and many others.
Finally, Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira was truly a crusader of the twentieth century, a man who was the very embodiment of his thought. He founded the Brazilian Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property (TFP) in 1960 and served as president of its National Council until his death in 1995. His life example and his penetrating treatise Revolution and Counter-Revolution inspired the founding of autonomous TFPs and TFP Bureaus worldwide.
None of his works would be possible without an intense interior life. What impressed those who know Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira was his profound confidence in the Blessed Virgin who was the source of his courage and allowed him to carry on the struggle for Christian Civilization with the absolute certainty of the final victory of good over evil. He was the twentieth century crusader who firmly believed in the words of Our Lady at Fatima: “Finally My Immaculate Heart will triumph!”
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