Feast 30 May | Beatified 18 April 1909 | |
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Venerated in Roman Catholic Church
Anglican Communion Canonized 16 May 1920, St. Peter's Basilica by Pope Benedict XV Patronage France; martyrs; captives; military personnel; people ridiculed for their piety; prisoners; soldiers, women who have served in the WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service); and Women's Army Corps Died 30 May 1431, Rouen, France | ||
Saint Joan of Arc (French: Jeanne d'Arc) (often known as "The Maid of Orléans") is a recognized saint of the Roman Catholic Church. Although she was excommunicated and burnt at the stake for heresy by pro-English clergy in 1431, central Church officials would later nullify her excommunication, declaring her a martyr unjustly executed for a secular vendetta. Her legend would grow from there, leading to her beatification in 1909 and her canonization in 1920
Contents
Death and 15th century
As with other saints who were excommunicated or investigated by ecclesiastic courts, such as Athanasius, Teresa of Ávila, and John of the Cross, Joan was put on trial by an Inquisitorial court. In her case, the court was influenced by the English, which occupied northern France, leading to her execution in the marketplace of Rouen. When the French retook Rouen in 1449, a series of investigations were launched. Her now-widowed mother Isabelle Romée and Joan's brothers Jéan and Pierre, who were with Joan at the Siege of Orleans, petitioned Pope Nicholas V to reopen her case. The formal appeal was conducted in 1455 by Jean Bréhal, Inquisitor-General of France, under the aegis of Pope Callixtus III. Isabelle addressed the opening session of the appellate trial at Notre Dame with an impassioned plea to clear her daughter's name. Joan was exonerated on July 7, 1456, with Bréhal's summary of case evidence describing her as a martyr who had been executed by a court which itself had violated Church law.In 1457, Callixtus excommunicated the now-deceased Bishop Pierre Cauchon for his persecution and condemnation of Joan.
The city of Orléans had commemorated her death each year beginning in 1432, and from 1435 onward performed a religious play centered on the lifting of the siege. The play represented her as a divinely-sent savior guided by angels. In 1452, during one of the postwar investigations into her execution, Cardinal d'Estouteville declared that this play would merit qualification as a pilgrimage site by which attendees could gain an indulgence.
Not long after the appeal, Pope Pius II wrote an approving piece about her in his memoirs.
16th century
Joan was utilized as a symbol of the Catholic League, a group organized to fight against Protestant groups during the Wars of Religion in the 16th century. In 1964, the University of Pittsburgh Press published a translation of a 16th century manuscript of Joan's life. Its anonymous author wrote that he compiled the work "By order of the King, Louis XII of that name".
18th and 19th centuries
While Nicolas Lenglet Du Fresnoy and Clément Charles François de Laverdy wrote the first full-length biographies (Edmond Richer wrote a biography of Joan in 1639, but it was not published until 1912 ), ironically, it was the English who unintentionally sparked a movement which would lead to her canonization. Harvard University English literature professor Herschel Baker noted in his introduction to Henry VI for The Riverside Shakespeare (1974; p. 587) how appalled William Warburton was by the depiction of Joan in Henry VI, Part 1, and that Edmond Malone sought in "Dissertation on the Three Parts of Henry VI" (1787) to prove Shakespeare had no hand in its authorship. Charles Lamb chided Samuel Taylor Coleridge for reducing Joan to "a pot girl" in the first drafts of The Destiny of Nations, which was initially part of Robert Southey's Joan of Arc. She was the subject of an essay by Lord Mahon for the March 1842 The Quarterly Review, and an 1847 essay by Thomas De Quincey for Tait's. In 1890, the Joan of Arc Church in Farnham was dedicated to her.
As Joan increasingly found her way into popular culture, the French Navy dedicated the first of four vessels to her, a 52-gun frigate, in 1820; a 42-gun frigate (1852), an ironclad corvette warship (1867), and an armored cruiser (1899) followed. Philippe-Alexandre Le Brun de Charmettes's biography (1817), and Jules Quicherat's account of her trial and rehabilitation (1841-1849) seemed to have inspired widespread canonization efforts. In 1869, after Bishop Félix Dupanloup gave his yearly lecture on Joan to commemorate her lifting the Siege of Orleans, twelve bishops wrote to Pope Pius IX to ask that she be canonized, but the Franco-Prussian War postponed further action. In 1874, depositions began to be collected, which were received by Cardinal Luigi Bilio in 1876 (the same year as Henri-Alexandre Wallon's biography). Bilio asked Dupanloup for more information, but Dupanloup died before he could respond. Dupanloup's successor, Bishop Pierre-Hector Coullié, directed an inquest to authenticate her acts, and testimony from her trial and rehabilitation. On January 27, 1894, based on the report submitted to the Curia by Cardinal Aloisi Masella, it voted to recommend to Pope Leo XIII that he sign the Commissio Introductionis Causæ Servæ Dei Joannæ d'Arc, authored by Cardinal Lucido Parocchi, which Leo did immediately.
20th century to present
Joan was declared venerable by Pope Pius X on January 6, 1904. The decree of beatification was read on December 18, 1908. The ceremony itself was held on April 18, 1909, presided by Cardinal Sebastiano Martinelli and Cardinal Mariano Rampolla. Bishop Stanislas Touchet performed the Mass. Cardinal Serafino Vannutelli, Cardinal Pierre Andrieu, Cardinal Louis Luçon, Cardinal Coullié, then-Monsignor Rafael Merry del Val, Cardinal Girolamo Gotti, Cardinal José Vives, Bishop John Farrelly, Bishop Thomas Kennedy, Monsignor Robert Seton, Count Giulio Porro-Lambertenghi (grandson of Luigi Porro Lambertenghi) with tribunes from The Knights of Malta, The Duke of Alençon and his son The Duke of Vendôme, then-Archbishop William Henry O'Connell, and The Duke of Norfolk attended. Pius, whose sisters attended the ceremony, venerated the relics that afternoon, flanked by 70 French Prelates.
Her beatification approximately coincided with the French invention of the Janvier transfer engraving machine (also called a die engraving pantograph), which facilitates the creation of minted coins and commemorative medallions. This invention, together with the already well-established French sculptural tradition, added another element to Joan's beatification: a series of well-made religious art medals featuring scenes from her life.
In the subsequent fighting during World War I, French troops carried her image into battle with them. During one battle, they interpreted a German searchlight image projected onto low-lying clouds as an appearance by Joan, which bolstered their morale greatly. [see: The Maid of Orléans: The Story of Joan of Arc Told to American Soldiers by Charles Saroléa, Georges Crès & Cie (1918)]
Her canonization was held on May 16, 1920. Over 60,000 people attended the ceremony, including 140 descendants of Joan's family. Dignitaries included: Vendome, Lambertenghi with The Knights of Malta, now-Bishop O'Connell, Gabriel Hanotaux, Princess Zinaida Yusupova, Princess Irina Alexandrovna, Prince Feodor Alexandrovich, The Duke of Braganza, The Count de Salis-Soglio, Rafael Valentín Errázuriz, Diego von Bergen, Bishop John Carroll, Archbishop Edward Hanna, Bishop Daniel Gorman, Bishop Paul Nussbaum, the entire student body of The American College of Rome, and now-Cardinal Merry del Val, who greeted Pope Benedict XV as Benedict entered St. Peter's Basilica to preside over the rites. One-hundred thousand people celebrated at Westminster Cathedral, and at French churches throughout London.
In an essay for the May 18, 1920 Le Matin, now-former President of France Raymond Poincaré wrote that Joan's canonization "fulfills the last part of her mission in bringing together forever in the sacredness of her memory" one-time mortal enemies England and France. He concluded: "In her spirit, let us remain united for the good of Mankind".
Popularity
Joan of Arc's feast day is 30 May. Although reforms in 1968 moved many medieval European saints' days off the general calendar in order to make room for more non-Europeans, her feast day is still celebrated on many local and regional Church calendars, especially in France. Many Catholic churches around the globe have been named after her in the decades since her canonization.
She has become especially popular among Traditional Catholics, particularly in France - both because of her obvious connection to this country as well as the fact that the Traditional Catholic movement is strongest there. This branch of Catholicism, which has refused to accept the changes made by the Second Vatican Council, has compared the 1988 excommunication of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre (one of the founders of the Traditional Catholic movement) to Joan of Arc's excommunication by a corrupt pro-English bishop in 1431. Traditional Catholic parishes sometimes perform plays in Joan of Arc's honor.