Cardinal Pietro Gasparri

Cardinal Pietro Gasparri is the secretary of state of the Holy See and a central participant in a secret meeting with Benito Mussolini in Rome in April 1923. The encounter marks a practical turn in the government’s relations with the Church: private negotiations and public concessions proceed alongside Mussolini’s campaign against Don Luigi Sturzo and the political autonomy of Italian Catholics.

Identity and Political Setting

The book presents Gasparri principally through his ecclesiastical office and his role in negotiations with the Fascist government. In the scene at Count Santucci’s palazzo, he arrives by a separate entrance from Mussolini. Their contrasting public identities frame the meeting: Gasparri has served God throughout his life, while Mussolini had been known for anticlericalism and attacks on religion. The contrast is not resolved by a public debate; both men enter and leave separately, without disclosing what passed between them.

The Secret Meeting

The conversation takes place in private at Palazzo Guglielmi. Santucci, the Catholic senator who owns the palazzo, is not present, and the narrative emphasizes that the meeting is to remain confidential. Its duration is notable, but its contents are withheld. The clearest immediate indication of its tone comes afterward: crossing Piazza della Pigna, Gasparri says he is satisfied with his conversation with Mussolini. The text establishes his satisfaction, but gives no transcript from which to infer the details of their agreement.

Negotiation and Concessions

The meeting belongs to a broader, months-long effort by the prime minister to reach a reconciliation with the Church. At the same time, the government grants the Vatican a series of concessions presented as technical measures: equalization of school taxes, the return of the crucifix to classrooms, compulsory religious instruction, ecclesiastical authority to choose teachers, and exemption of seminary assets from a special tax. The account places Gasparri’s meeting within this political exchange without attributing each measure to a specific request or decision by him.

The concessions also serve Mussolini’s contest with the Italian Popular Party. He wants to remove its founder, Don Luigi Sturzo, from political influence, and the narrative explicitly presents accommodation with the Church as a means of overcoming the party’s opposition. This makes the encounter more than a meeting between ecclesiastical and government officials: it sits at the junction of religious policy and the struggle over who may speak politically for Catholic Italians.

Narrative Role

Gasparri’s brief appearance crystallizes a broader contrast in the book between public political language and private bargaining. Fascist speeches elsewhere proclaim national unity, state power, and a mass movement reborn; here, behind separate entrances and closed doors, the government pursues a discreet accommodation with the Church. Gasparri is not shown as a public advocate in this episode, and the undisclosed conversation leaves his precise terms unknown. What the scene does establish is that he emerges satisfied while negotiations continue and government policy shifts toward the Vatican.