Profaning the Sacred: The Unorthodox Financial Activities of Catholic Clerics During the Napoleonic Period, 1796–1814

Abstract

This article reveals for the first time how Catholic clerics survived financially during the Napoleonic period in Italy (1796–1814). Despite the very rich, 200-year historiography on one of the Church's most critical periods, there is almost nothing on how religious clerics coped at this time. Their institutions had been despoiled by the French, often in collaboration with locals, negating traditional forms of clerical income, such as alms or rental income from non-ecclesiastical properties. This caused clerics to search out unorthodox – at times, non-canonical – ways of eking out a living, either for themselves, their religious communities or both, as such distinctions were often blurred. Masses were monetized and traded; ecclesiastical paraphernalia composed of precious metals were smelted and commodified, and relics were sold for profit. The uncovering of these controversial acts by men who in normal times were upstanding reveals the desperation of the times and provides insight into the rich discussion on determining the degrees of separation (and overlap) between the sacred and profane.