POPE JOHN XXIII, (1881–1963), Pope from 1958. Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli was the third of thirteen children born to a peasant family at Sotto il Monte near Bergamo. From the seminary at Bergamo he won a scholarship to the San Apollinare college in Rome, where he was ordained priest in 1904. At this time he began the spiritual diary which he kept throughout his life (pub. in 1964; Eng. tr., The Journal of a Soul, 1965). He was secretary to Count Giacomo Radini-Tedeschi from the time of the latter’s appointment as Bp. of Bergamo in 1905 until his death in 1914. In his spare time he engaged in study of the history of the diocese and in 1909 embarked on his main scholarly work, Gli atti della visita apostolica di S. Carlo Borromeo a Bergamo (1575), (5 vols., 1936–58). His research in the Ambrosian Library brought him into touch with A. Ratti (later Pope Pius XI).

During the First World War he served as a hospital orderly and then as an army chaplain. In 1921 he was summoned to Rome as director of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith in Italy; under him the Society was reorganized and brought by Pius XI under the Congregation of the Propaganda. In 1925 Roncalli was consecrated titular Bp. of Areopolis and sent as Vicar Apostolic to Bulgaria. In 1934 he was translated to the titular see of Mesembria and appointed Apostolic Delegate to Turkey and Greece. During his time in the Balkans he established good relations with the Orthodox, visiting the Oecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople in 1939. In the Second World War he organized relief supplies to German–occupied Greece, as well as assisting Jews in Istanbul. At the end of 1944, after the German retreat from France, he was sent as Papal Nuncio to Paris. Here he dealt tactfully with the problem of the numerous French bishops accused of having collaborated with the Vichy regime; in the face of delays he pressed for the speedy return of German prisoners-of-war (meanwhile arranging study for the ordinands among them); and he won some concessions from the French goverment over the financing of Church schools. He showed sympathy with the motives (if not all the actions) of the worker priests (who were restricted after his departure). In 1953 he was created a cardinal. When he left France, he expected to have to work in the Curia, but on the death of the Patr. of Venice later in 1953, Roncalli succeeded him, glad to be returning to pastoral work.

In 1958, on the death of Pius XII, he was elected Pope at the age of 77. He caused surprise by taking the name of John, long discredited because of the antipope John XXIII. Among his first acts was the creation on 15 Dec. 1958 of 23 new cardinals, including G. B. Montini (later Pope Paul VI), and the number of cardinals soon exceeded the level of 70 laid down by Sixtus V. In 1959 he proposed to the cardinals three undertakings: a diocesan synod for Rome, an oecumenical council for the Church, and a revision of the code of canon law. The synod was held in Rome in 1960 and dealt with local problems of Rome. The council, soon to be known as the Second Vatican Council, is the most important event of his pontificate. He attributed the calling of it to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and gave it the task of renewing (aggiornamento) the religious life of the Church; it was to express the substance of its faith in new language and bring up to date its discipline and organization, with the ultimate goal of the unity of all Christians. To realize his ecumenical aim he set up the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity in 1960 and invited to the Council observers from other Churches. He opened and closed the first session of the Council, once intervening to give encouragement to those in favour of change. (For details of the legislation and significance of the Council, see vatican council, second). Other reforms of his pontificate included permission for the use of the vernacular in the Byzantine liturgy of the Melchites (5 April 1960), approval of a new code of rubrics for the Missal and Breviary (25 July 1960), the insertion of the name of St Joseph in the Canon of the Mass (13 Nov. 1962), and the creation of a pontifical commission to revise the code of canon law (28 Mar. 1963). He renewed the social teaching of the Church in ‘Mater and Magistra’ (1961) and in ‘Pacem in Terris’ (1963) he encouraged the end of colonialism and improvements in the position of women, as well as pleading for abandonment of the arms race. In the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 he publicly urged caution on the leaders of the United States and the Soviet Union. In 1960 he welcomed G. F. Fisher, the first Abp. of Canterbury to be received at the Vatican since the Reformation, and in 1961 the RC Church was for the first time represented at an assembly of the World Council of Churches. Throughout his pontificate there was a feeling that there was a desire in the RC Church to soften the obstacles to reunion with other Christian bodies, while he also sought to improve relations with Judaism by removing from the Good Friday liturgy the passages which caused most offence. He was mourned by those within and beyond the RC Church, was beatified by John Paul II in 2000, and canonized by Pope Francis in 2013..

The official acts of his pontificate are pr. in AAS Acta also ed. D. Bertetto, SDB (Bibliotheca Theologica Salesiana, 2nd ser.; Zurich, 1964). John XXIII’s Souvenirs d’un nonce: Cahiers de France (1944–1953) ed. L. Capovilla (Rome, 1963; Eng. tr., 1966); Il giornale dell’anima e altri scritti di pietà ed. id. (ibid., 1964; Eng. tr., 1965); Lettere ai familiari ed. id. (ibid., 1968; Eng. tr., 1970). Quindici letture also ed. id. (3rd edn., 1970), with detailed chronology of his life and other material in appendices. Correspondence with the future Pope Paul VI, 1925–1962, ed. id. (Brescia, 1982). His Life of Radini–Tedeschi, orig. pub. at Bergamo in 1916, was tr. into Eng. from 3rd edn., Rome, 1963, in 1970. The many studies include those of E. E. Y. Hales (London, 1965), M. Trevor (ibid., 1967), P. Hebblethwaite (ibid., 1984; rev. edn., 1994), and G. Alberigo (Bologna, 2000). F. Della Salda, Obbedienza e Pace: Il vescovo A. G. Roncalli tra Sofia e Roma 1925–1934 (Genoa, 1989); V. Branca and S. Rosso–Mazzinghi (eds.), Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli dal Patriarcato di Venezia alla Cattedra di San Pietro (Florence, 1984); M. Manzo, Papa Giovanni vescovo a Roma [1991]. F. Traniello in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, 55 (2000), pp. 627–39, s.v. ‘Giovanni XXIII’; R. Trisco in NCE (2nd edn.), 7 (2002), pp. 932–8, s.v.

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