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9. Giovanni Perrone, S.J.
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Giovanni Perrone, S.J. ‒ AVery RomanTheologian 23 A native of Chieri, nearTurin, Giovanni Perrone studied in the major seminary of Turin and earned his doctorate in theology there.1 He joined the Society of Jesus soon after it was restored in by PiusVII, and when Leo XII returned the Collegio Romano (today the Gregorian University ) to the society in he was assigned to its faculty. On November , , he was given the chair of dogmatic theology, and spent the remainder of his life there, except for a term as rector of the Jesuit school in Ferrara (– ) and three years of exile in distant Wales after revolutionary forces took over the city of Rome in . He was briefly rector of the Collegio Romano and for many years prefect of studies (dean): from till he died in . Perrone’s great influence in nineteenth-century ecclesiology is widely recognized. It was an influence exercised in two ways: first, through his teaching in Rome and his major textbook in dogmatic theology, and second, through .The one readily accessible account of the life of Giovanni Perrone remains the DTC article by C. Boyer: DTC, .:–. Salvatore Casagrandi offers an account of Perrone’s life and work in De claris sodalibus provinciae Turonensis Societatis Jesu commentarii (Turin: Jacobus Arneodus Eques, ), –. his extra-academic work in Rome, as consultor of several curial congregations, and as participant in the preparation of both the definition of the Immaculate Conception2 andVatican I’s dogmatic constitution on the Church. Perrone’s principal statement of his ecclesiology appears in his Praelectiones theologicae, which he first published beginning in .This nine-volume work went through some thirty -four editions, and its two-volume compendium went through forty-seven editions. Most of these “editions” were really reprintings rather than new editions in the present-day sense, but he also did a considerable amount of revising in them over the years. In the faculty of the revived Roman College,Roger Aubert observes,“one name dominates all the others, Giovanni Perrone.”3 In addition to the growing number of students whom he taught personally, his teaching spread across the Catholic world through the adoption in many seminaries of the Praelectiones. Gustave Thils calls him “the oracle of dogmatic theology” who “formed several generations of theologians,”4 and also notes Perrone’s influence at Vatican I.5 Both Roland Minnerath and Klaus Schatz, in his major recent history of Vatican I, mention Perrone’s significant role as a peritus for the Deputatio de Fide, the drafting committee of the council’s documents.6 (The drafting committee at Vatican I was called the Deputation on Faith, while its counterpart at Vatican II was called the Theological Commission .) Giovanni Perrone, S.J. . Perrone’s role in the definition of the Immaculate Conception is briefly mentioned in Roger Aubert, Le pontificat de Pie IX, vol. of Augustin Fliche andVictor Martin, eds., Histoire de l’Eglise (Paris: Bloud et Gay, ), –. . Roger Aubert,“La géographie ecclésiologique au XIXe siècle,” in Maurice Nédoncelle et al., L’ecclésiologie au XIXe siècle (Paris: Cerf, ), . Pages – deal with Perrone. . GustaveThils, La primauté pontificale: La doctrine deVatican I, les voies d’une révision (Gembloux: Duculot, ), . . GustaveThils, L’infaillibilité pontifical: Source, conditions, limites (Gembloux: Duculot , ), . . Klaus Schatz, S.J., Vatikanum I, – (Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh, –), :, , –, and :, , . Roland Minnerath, in Le pape: Evêque universel ou premier des évêques? (Paris: Beauchesne, ), has an interesting chapter on “L’intention des consulteurs deVatican I,” –, which gives information on Perrone’s role in particular, –. [18.221.53.5] Project MUSE (2024-04-26 17:00 GMT) Besides the Praelectiones theologicae, which in its nine volumes covers the principal areas of theology, Perrone wrote several other significant works. One was a book on matrimony, another was a book on the divinity of Christ, and one dealt with the Immaculate Conception of Mary.7 He also wrote one criticizing the theology of Georg Hermes,8 and two books on Protestantism. John Henry Newman in , not long after his conversion to Catholicism, asked Perrone’s comments on an essay that he entitled, “On the Development of Catholic Dogma” (written in Latin). He was very pleased with the detailed notes with which Perrone replied. James Gaffney says,“Perrone read the work sympathetically and perceptively and criticized it with amiable candor.”9 He developed a “warm esteem for Newman” from this time and defended him in Rome.10 Perrone himself was highly esteemed by Pius IX, who is said to have...
