A Tale from 'Lloyd's'

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXVI, Issue 24, 18 June 1908, Page 9

A Tale from 'Lloyd's'

An esteemed correspondent impounded- and forwarded to us a cutting from ' Lloyd's Weekly: ' which has been circulated in Christchurch. The cutting is., .headed ' Criminal Clerics ', with sundry sub-headings which one expects as a matter of course from such a source as 'Lloyd's ' when, 'dealing with such a theme. We q"uote hereunder, word for word, the principal item in the bill of £ criminal clerical '- sensations provided by c Lloyd's ' for' the delectation of -those -of its readers who are mentally gifted with the "indiscriminate appetite that Mother Nature is credited with having given to the farfamed goat of Harlem. ' Lloyd's ' pretty bit of NoPopery romance runneth thus :—: — /

' Punishment as merited as it is sever.c has overtaken Don Giovanni ' Riva, a licensed priest of the archdiocese of Turin, who, at Milan v Assizes, on Monday, was sentenced to sixteen years' imprisonment for hatoi--tual corruption of the inmates of the Consolata Convent Girls' Orphanage -in Milan, of which institution he' was father confessor. - - ' The trial, which has lasted a long • time, was heard with closed doors, but -the facts have been supplied to the press by the legal reporters. > . The jury found Don Riva guilty in all • cases, and denied- -that there were any extenuating circumstances. They acquitted another priest and the vice-directress, but seat the Mother Su-' perior, Suora Mafia Fumagalli; to prison for ten months for having striven to hush up the scandal by concealing the confesspr's crimes. • Fumagalli's institute at Turin was under the sanction of Cardinal Richelmy, Archbishop of Turin, to whom she had bequeathed everything, but Cardinal Ferrari, Archbishop- of ' Milan, had- declined to •' authorise the house* partly because the nuns' tlid'-u'dt observe the rule of enclosure, and partly because of the dirty state of" the building.'- - -• : -7 .' So much for the romance. Now for the reality. ■ "> * • * ■ It is difficult to write temperately of such . a blackguardly perversion of notorious facts as ' Lloyd's Weekly' has given to its readers. The Fumagalli scandals have been before the wprld for over .a year past ; the whole working of the fraudulent business has been turned inside out ; every journal in Italy and in England that has not been ' nid-nid-nodding ' is aware of the facts of the case ; and only.' a conscious perverter of ] truth could have been guilty of laying before the public the scandalous misrepresentations quoted above from ' Lloyd's '. Our readers have from time to time been kept abreast of the Fumagalli fraud, and those of alert attention and passable memory will readily recall the true position of affairs. We may, however, briefly recall the facts. ' Lloyd's ' romance tells its readers (1) that the Fumagalli woman was a nun (it calls her ' Suora .'—that is ' Sister ') ; (2) that she was the ' Superior ' of a • Convent Girls' Orphanage at Milan ' ; (3) that Fumagalli's institute at Turin was under the sanction of the Cardinal-Archbishop ; (4) that the Cardinal-Archbishop of Milan did not ' authorise ' the house, and for two reasons, one of which was that the ' nuns ' did not ' observe the rule of enclosure ' ; and (5) that ' a licensed priest of the archdiocese of Turin ' was ' father confessor ' of the « Suora ' Fumagalli's ' Convent Girls' Orphanage at Milan ' and was guilty of •' habitual corruption of the inmates '. mSo runneth ' Lloyd's ' envenomed romance. ' Thereader is now aske.d to mark how plain a tale will put it down. (1) The Fumagalli woman was never a nun. She was simply an -adventurer and impostor who —despite the repeated and public protests of the Car-dinal-ArcKbishop, ..and his strong appeals to the local authority— decked" herself out- in nun's attire, in order the better to further her money-raising objects. (2) Her ' institutes ' at Turin and Milan were not ' convents ' ; there were no ' nuns '_in them ; and the only females Associated.., with, the Fumagalli . impostor were —of the Fumagalli brand, and fit partners with her in ■ the scandals, which • the ecclesiastical authority had denounced long and earnestly before the Criminal law was put into motion against the den which 'Lloyd's' turns into a' convent. (3) Fumagalli's other ' institute ' in Turin, was- not approved by the .CardinalArchbishop, and the Story of her generous bequest to him is all a myth. (4) It "is true that the CardinalArchbishop of Milan did not ♦" authorise ' the Fumagalli den in his cathedral city. But it is not true that he refused ' partly because the nuns did not observe the rule of enclosure." He refused all along, and all along, urged the civil authorities to take -action, simply because he knew that the creature was an impostor and adventuress wholly unfitted to be entrusted with the care of children, and the alleged ' nuns \

were not nuns, but the dupes or accomplices of the' criminal who is now expiating her "deeds Jn" gaol. (5). Every Catholic schoolchild knows that a priest, who is merely '"licensed ' in the archdiocese of Turin is not thereWy empowered to be 'father' confessor' to an institute in Milan, or even to hear any confession what-, soever in Milan. To do so he must receive ' 'faculties' from the Cardinal-Archbishop of Milan. But (a) no ' licensed priest of the archdiocese of Turin ' had any connection whatever with the Fumagalli ' institute ', or ' any part in the scandals that arose in connection therewith, (b) There was n 0 ' father confessor ' whatsoever in ♦ connection with - that ' institute ' ; nor had any licensed ' priest either of the archdiocese of Milan, or of Turin, or of any .other diocese in Italy, . any connection, either official- or unofficial, with the place/ (c) The scandals that arose-and they were of the gravest kind-were- 'perpetrated, not by an?- ' father confessor '- but -by the Fumagalli impostor's male partners ' in the : business. And it is v to the credit of the -Church' that they were^under her ban long before the criminal lawwas set in motion against them, and that no practising - Catholic had any share in the concern. Two or three other ' fairy tales from a far-off land ' appear in the < Lloyd's ' cutting. They are of .a piece' with the Fumagalli tale, and all (or at least most of them) have already been exposed in our editorial- or news columns. • • ■ ' ~