Catholic Anti-Modernism And the Modernity of Fascism

In December 1925 a small Catholic review based in Fiesole, named Fede e Ragione after the principles of neo-Thomism, did not hesitate to remind Mussolini of the superiority of the Church over the state −2 ‘superiorità della Chiesa sopra dello Stato’– as well as the duties of the latter toward Catholicism: ‘doveri dello Stato verso della Chiesa’. Successors of the “Party of Pius X” and representatives of the most intransigent trend within the Church, integralist Catholics of Fede e Ragione firmly opposed every aspect of modernity including the separation between the public sphere and religion, secularism, and the interference of the modern state. A confessional review founded in Florence in 1919, Fede e Ragione demonstrates that the Catholic endorsement of Mussolini’s regime turned out to be a convoluted, slow, and incomplete process. In the checkered history that led to the Lateran Pacts, much has been said in the scholarship about, on the one hand, the Holy See and the ecclesiastical hierarchy’s positions, and, on the other hand, the opposition coming from Christian democrat tendencies. The reservations expressed by the right-wing of Italian Catholicism have been instead overlooked by the historiography. To some extent, this lack of study could be related to the complex and not immediately decipherable relations of integralist Catholics to Fascism, as their positions were ambivalent and fluctuated: neither an open opposition nor an enthusiastic support for the regime. Much of this ambiguity has to do with integralist Catholics’ inflexible anti-modernist and theocentric views as they increasingly faced the secular modernity of the Fascist regime. This case contributes to a more nuanced investigation of the diversity of Catholic culture under Fascism encouraged by a recent scholarship that, in the wake of Renato Moro, further explores the variegated manifestations of Catholic nationalism and the impact of nationalization and mass politics upon Italian Catholicism. Although a

specific case study that still lacks an in-depth scholarly investigation, 5 this example formed part of a broader tendency that demonstrates that the merging between Fascism and right-wing Catholicism was nothing but inevitable and predictable. Rather than an ideological symbiosis, the support of integralist Catholics for Mussolini's regime resulted in large part from an opportunistic convergence that focused mainly on the most reactionary features of Fascism while downplaying its anti-clerical fringes. In accordance with its agrarian, sanfedista, and traditionalist positions, Fede e Ragione saw in Mussolini's regime an opportunity to curb modern forces in Italy and to crush 'common enemies' of both Fascism and the Catholic Church: socialists, Christian democrats, free-masons, Protestants, and Jews. 6 As the Fascist regime moved closer to a resolution on the Roman question, Fede e Ragione embraced clerical Fascism as an instrumental means of re-catholicizing Italy. 7

A Legacy of Integralist Catholicism and Anti-Modernist Activism
Founded in Florence in December 1919, and transferred to Fiesole in March 1922, Fede e Ragione was launched as a theological and cultural bi-weekly, a 'rivista cattolica di cultura e di critica'. Beyond this generic subtitle, the review aimed at implementing a precise anti-modernist platform. The review relied on the zeal of its readers to propagate integralist views and presented itself as a 'centro di raccolta di quanti cattolici, preti e laici, intendono di unirsi a noi per opporre una azione franca e coraggiosa alla invadenza dei principi nefasti del liberalismo, del naturalismo del laicismo, che minacciano di travolgere ogni nostra attività'. 8 Fede e Ragione's editors defined their Catholicism as integral, an activism entirely devoted to upholding the traditions of the Roman Catholic Church not only in religious matters but also in the secular realm: Noi siamo, in primo luogo, puramente ed integralmente cattolici in questo senso che noi riconosciamo il pieno diritto della dottrina, della disciplina e delle direttive della Chiesa non solo sull'individuo e nelle questioni strettamente religiose, ma sulla società ancora, ed al riguardo pure di qualunque quistione mista, o sia tale che anche indirettamente tocchi la Fede e la morale. In seguito di che, è chiaro, noi lotteremo per il principio di autorità, della tradizione e dell'ordine religioso-sociale nel senso cattolico di queste parole e nelle sue deduzioni logiche sotto la guida suprema della Sede Apostolica .... Saremo, per conseguenza, avversari dichiarati ed irreconciliabili, tanto sul terreno religioso, quanto sul terreno politico-sociale, di ogni forma di liberalismo, come quello che nega di riconoscere i sovrani diritti di Dio, del Cristo e della Chiesa sulla vita degli individui e della società, da una parte, e, dall'altra, si rifiuta di rigettare il principio rivoluzionario e massonico del diritto pubblico dell'ateismo. Fede e Ragione embraced anti-modernism in every sense of the term, as uttered in the encyclical letters Quanta cura (with its Syllabus Errorum) of 1864 and Pascendi of 1907: not only the opposition to secular modernity as intended by Pius IX, but also the repression of modernism within the Church as conducted under Pius X. Thus, Fede e Ragione saw the modern world in apocalyptic terms as a cosmic struggle of the Church against all the forces of the anti-Church ('anti-Chiesa'), comprehensively defined as 'l'insieme dei suoi avversari sia esterni, vale a dire quelli che si dichiarano lealmente e francamente anticattolici e antireligiosi, e sia interni, ovvero i falsi amici della Chiesa e della religione'. 10 This fight implied for the integralists to curb all the opponents of the Church, enemies from without (socialists, atheists, free-masons, Jews) and from within (modernists, Christian democrats, and liberal Catholics). To this end, the editors of Fede e Ragione drew upon a military terminology that called readers to become soldiers of God and considered themselves new crusaders in 'una lotta nella quale tutto indistintamente siamo chiamati ad essere soldati contro i nemici di Dio e della società'. 11 In the Italian context, these integralist positions implied a fierce advocacy in defense of the rights of the Pope in the 'Roman Question', extensively understood as both a religious and a political issue. The review campaigned for the reinstatement of the pontiff's temporal power: 'Egli deve anche esteriormente apparire, quale è, il re, il principe della umanità cristiana'. 12 Therefore, all Catholic tendencies that were willing to compromise with the Italian state and its liberal political system were deprecated as traitors to the cause of the Holy See.
The trajectories of Fede e Ragione's editors provide a deeper understanding of the radical anti-modernism of this review. The two founders and main contributors of the review were Don Paolo De Töth   The anti-modernist vehemence of Fede e Ragione was also influenced by Umberto Benigni's close collaboration with Sassoli de Bianchi and De Töth. Himself a journalist in the early stages of his career, Msgr Benigni (1862-1934) was a key figure of the anti-modernist campaign under Pius X as the creator in 1909 of the infamous transnational secret network Sodalitium Pianum, also called Sapinière. 16 This espionage organization aimed to denounce suspects of modernism within the Church. Benigni and the Sodalitium Pianum fell in disgrace in 1914 with the pontificate of Benedict XV, although the organization was officially disbanded only in 1921. Deprived of pontifical support and after the revolutionary changes of the World War, Benigni reoriented his activism in a more political rightward direction. Fede e Ragione was one among the multifold counter-revolutionary activities of Benigni during that period; the local Tuscan review benefited from his transnational connections. From Rome, Benigni directed an office that was dedicated to the international correspondence of Fede e Ragione. He also provided the Fiesole editors with his own bulletins and frequently wrote antisemitic articles published in Fede e Ragione under the pen name of H. Brand. 17 Most of Fede e Ragione's editors were local Catholic activists, such as Piero Bargellini, Tito Casini, Nicola Lisi, lawyers Antonio Renier and Aldo Fortuna, Roberto Mäder, Guido Mattiussi, and Arturo Colletti. Some of them demonstrated broader connections with the Catholic cultural scene in Florence during the Fascist era. 18 Future Christian democrat mayor of Florence in 1965-1966, the young Bargellini (1897Bargellini ( -1980) also collaborated at the same time with Mino Maccari's Il Selvaggio, a mouthpiece of the Tuscan Strapaese, a provincial, rural, and anti-bourgeois trend. Bargellini also became closer to Giovanni Papini, author of the popular Storia di Cristo in 1921. Albeit critical of Fede e Ragione's polemical tone (calling Bargellini's friends 'i suoi itterici amici fiesolani'), Papini himself was among the subscribers of the review. 19 Fede e Ragione had a rather tiny audience and was read mainly by priests and zealous lay Catholics. The number of subscribers never went beyond 2,000. The potential number of readers however could have been slightly higher as subscriptions were frequently collective. Additionally, Fede e Ragione was conceived as a tool for preaching: each reader received multiple copies to disseminate for propaganda purposes. Although the review was mainly read locally (Florence, Pisa, and Grosseto), the complaints of various bishops against Fede e Ragione's intrusions into their dioceses demonstrate a larger, national diffusion: in Latium, and to a greater extent in the North-East of Italy, especially in Veneto. Indeed, De Töth regularly traveled to Vicenza and Treviso where a group of dedicated aristocrats and clerics supported his integralist cause. Furthermore, Fede e Ragione had a broader impact within Italian Catholicism as its savage attacks against modernism, Christian democracy, and the Jesuits, fostered a wider range of replies, especially in Civiltà Cattolica. The director Father Enrico Rosa pointed out numerous times the disrespectful and offensive assaults from the Fiesole group, for instance against Father Giovanni Semeria. 20 In his letters to Papini, Bargellini proudly defended Fede e Ragione's scandalous tone ('noi di Fiesole siamo scandalosi; lo dicono tutti') as justified by a systematic tracking and uncovering of every alteration to the Catholic tradition: 'E qui faccio la difesa degli itterici di Fiesole, i quali sono in quello stato di cattiva salute perché sono in uno stato di continua indignazione per gli sciagurati e vergognosi metodi di lotta che si hanno nel campo cattolico'. 21 Still in 1929, the review denounced the infiltration of modernist ideas within the Church and Catholics who did not sufficiently fight modernism: Accennavamo nell'ultimo numero dell'anno testè passato alla illusione di coloro i quali non vogliono credere alla esistenza del modernismo e si scandalizzano se ne sentono parlare, anzi solo nominare. Ma bisogna pure avere il coraggio di guardare in faccia la realtà. E la realtà è che nel campo cattolico ci si trova, oggi, davanti ad uno sbandamento pauroso di principii e di idee: nel luogo delle ferme convinzioni domina il sentimentalismo; la vita cristiana si va naturalizzando un giorno più dell'altro, mentre la resistenza all'errore e al lassismo dei costumi va indebolendosi sempre di più. 22 Among the naturalist tendencies of Italian Catholic culture, Piero Bargellini decried the revival of Catholic theatre after the war and denounced the trend of 'spiritual theatre' on behalf the rigorous principles of French moralist Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet.
In Fede e Ragione, he vilipended the play Paolo di Tarso by Guido Manacorda who in turn replied to Bargellini in the Florence daily La Nazione. The bitter fight between both catholic writers lasted throughout 1927, provoking Papini's disapproval while Bargellini also cast scorn on the Compagnia di San Paolo, a community created in Milan in 1921, which promoted Catholic cultural action including theatre. 23

Catholic Interventism in the Aftermath of WWI and the Emergence of Fascism
Founded in the immediate aftermath of the Great War, Fede e Ragione interpreted the devastating world conflict as a divine punishment against modern society's rejection of God. Thus, the review argued that re-catholicizing Italian culture and politics and the restoration of the Holy See supremacy were the only legitimate solutions to the postwar unrest. Not surprisingly, Fede e Ragione applauded Pius XI's first encyclical letter Ubi Arcano (1922), which shared the same diagnosis of the war and promoted the dogma of the Social Reign of Christ the King. 24 However, this aspiration to a Christian reconquest over modern society was conceived only in 20  reactionary terms by integralist Catholics. Every adaptation or compromise with modern principles that found their legitimacy outside the Church tradition were reprobated as pure error, opportunism, and even threat to the truth of the faith. Thus, Fede e Ragione fustigated under the term 'aconfessionalism' various forms of Catholic action, especially Christian unionism, even when authorized by the ecclesiastical hierarchy. In the troubled postwar context in Italy, the Integralists of Fiesole automatically discredited any form of social Catholicism and Christian democracy in a reductive view: 'Bisogna combattere il semi-socialismo e modernismo sociale, professati, purtroppo!, da un numero non indifferente di cattolici ignoranti, ciechi e ostinati'. 25 Advocating for the creation of a genuine party of God ('partito di Dio'), Fede e Ragione constantly targeted the Partito Popolare Italiano (PPI), the first democratic Catholic party in Italy founded in 1919.
Fede e Ragione distrusted the first sansepolcrista Fascism because of the anticlerical and revolutionary orientations of its foundation in March 1919. The initial Fascist intransigence on the Roman Question inevitably contrasted with the same type of intransigence on the Catholic side as Fede e Ragione asserted, still in June 1922, that Rome should not be the capital of the Italian state. 26 Additionally, Fascism, because of its neo-pagan nationalism and sacralization of politics, was looked upon with suspicion by integralist Catholics who instantaneously perceived in it a potential contender of Catholic hegemony in Italy. Despite their own nationalistic tendencies, the editors made clear that nationalism was acceptable only as a form of patriotism that respected religion: 'contro quel nazionalismo pagano, cui oggi il concetto di patria è ridotto, e che fa ottimo riscontro al sindacalismo areligioso ..., noi difenderemo il vero concetto e amore di patria'. representatives of Italian Jewish culture such as Rabbi Dante Lattes and the Federazione sionistica italiana. Fede e Ragione did so in accusing Lattes of implementing in Italy the alleged Jewish plot for world domination exposed in the notorious and fictitious The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. 44 Fede e Ragione had previously mentioned substantial parts of the Protocols already in May 1920, an early occurrence for the Italian context. 45 Furthermore, Benigni and De Töth were among the first Italian translators of the Protocols as they published entirely the antisemitic forgery in Fede e Ragione from March to December 1921. 46 The print run of the Protocols − 10,000 copies in March 1921 that ran out of print by June − was a significant breakthrough for a minor publication accustomed to a more modest diffusion.
The antisemitism of Fede e Ragione, and more broadly of integralist Catholics, relied on an apparent paradox: while antisemitism was a central polemical tool in their denunciation of modernity, integralist Catholics voiced a modern and secular version of antisemitism that went beyond the traditional repertoire of Christian anti-Jewish stereotypes. The Catholic review purposely appropriated modern motives of antisemitism that shaped a derogatory and racial definition of Jews. Fede e Ragione was nonetheless critical towards Nazism and ultra-nationalism because of the anti-Christian nature of their antisemitism. Thus, Fede e Ragione promoted a Latin version of antisemitism that claimed to dissociate itself from any pseudo-scientific racism. For instance in 1928, Fede e Ragione fulminated against the neo-pagan views of Julius Evola. Signed under the pseudonym of Minimus, the article was written by Piero Bargellini who saw in Evola's book Imperialismo pagano a manifestation of 'lo spirito di Satana'. 47 Fede e Ragione drew on a variety of topics to identify Jews with modern culture. Among them, the Catholic review recurrently criticized the film industry as a sector entirely controlled by Jews and symptomatic of a Jewish modern mentality: 'Che l'industria cinematografica sia totalmente nelle mani degli Ebrei, oramai nessuno più ne dubita'. 48 Stigmatizing this alleged Jewish world domination of the film industry − 'gli Ebrei, padroni assoluti dell'industria cinematografica di tutto il mondo' − the editors were even more outraged by the trend of biblical movies produced by Hollywood, such as Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925) and The King of Kings (1927). Regarding this latter movie, Fede e Ragione considered it a perversion of the New Testament that aimed to present episodes of the Passion from a Jewish point of view by placing the responsibility of Christ's death only on the Romans; henceforth the Jewish schemes in Hollywood were 'mossi anche da un segreto senso di rivincita, ossia di fare ingoiare ai goiym un Cristo di loro manifattura'. Looking at biblical film as a dangerous modern vector of religious error, integralist Catholics were especially concerned by the popular success of this new mass media, even in the countryside of Tuscany: Folle, come mai era avvenuto, dalla mattina alla sera, si videro riversarsi nei teatri e cinematografi per assistere alla riproduzione della vita, passione e morte del Signore: i templi, nei quali la Chiesa pregava, con le pie donne, accanto alla Croce di Gesù, erano vuoti: i cinematografi, invece, erano gremiti; e la cosa durò, in tal guisa, per oltre un paio di settimane, tanto da far pensare ad un vero fenomeno di suggestione collettiva. 44  Agli attenti osservatori apparve subito la mano secreta, che guidava il movimento; ma come far entrare nella testa di tanta gente che Il Re dei Re non era che un'impresa giudaica, creata apposta per allontanare il pecorume dei goiym dalla vera meditazione della croce di Gesù e sfruttarne le tasche, con il pretesto di una rappresentazione sacra e religiosa? I giorni sacrosanti e tremendi della Passione non devono venire profanati da divertimenti, che non fanno che ripetere il ludibrio e lo scherno, di cui i Giudei rabbiosi copersero il Salvatore. 49 Thus, in the mindset of integralist Catholics, film was considered only a malignant distraction from religion and not a potential propaganda tool. Unlike Mussolini's regime, which massively invested in this new popular media, Fede e Ragione urged good Catholics to boycott movie theaters: Noi non crediamo affatto necessario il cinematografo per l'educazione cattolica. I beni, che si prospettano dall'uso del cinematografo, non compensano i pericoli e gli inconvenienti, che esso presenta. ... L'unico mezzo per neutralizzare i danni del cinematografo è l'opporvisi, il boicottaggio; il far conoscere come il cinematografo è l'industria massima, in mano del giudeo, per la corruzione della cristianità. 50 Far from being a peripheral topic, this denunciation of the film industry is of specific interest regarding integralist Catholics' relation to Fascist modernity. Indeed Fede e Ragione explicitly deplored the lack of Fascist censorship against the so-called Jewish film industry, and against mass culture more broadly.

Modern and anti-Modern Fascism on the Path to the Conciliation
Within the frame of an increasing consensus for Mussolini's regime on the eve of the Lateran agreements, Fede e Ragione frequently urged the regime to take an even more anti-modernist and reactionary turn. For instance, the integralists advocated for rural policies and the creation of agrarian schools that could train 'buoni contadini'. Following a debate launched by Il Selvaggio, Fede e Ragione argued with paternalistic tones that: Se il contadino sapesse quanto è nobile il suo mestiere e conoscesse meglio le meraviglie e i tesori della terra, ch'egli macchinalmente lavora con l'occhio soltanto al profitto personale (la mentalità del contadino assai raramente vede più in là della propria persona), che ne può ricavare. ... I diletti, che la campagna produce e dei quali la vita semplice e libera dei campi è sorgente, non hanno confronto con i piaceri falsi delle città, fatti di miasma, materiati di immondezza e di disonestà. 51 In doing so, Fede e Ragione vilified urban life and the growth of modern cities as places of corrupted customs and de-catholicization. The Catholic review deplored that such immoral features of modernity were increasingly contaminating the countryside through the importation of movie theatres, ballrooms, and female fashion: O che ci vorrebbe tanto a rimandare a casa tutte quelle maestrine, che vanno a portare per le nostre campagne il malo esempio della moda schifosa, lasciva e libertina moderna? E forse che sarebbe impossibile a un Podestà di buon senso di impedire, nel proprio paese, l'impianto di un cinematografo immorale o l'apertura di una sala da ballo? Ma forse la cosa è divenuta difficile od impossibile perchè adesso anche le sale da ballo sono messe all'ombra del tricolore e del Littorio. Thus Fede e Ragione blamed the low ranks of Fascist authorities for being too permissive with modern customs and even for participating in this modern life style that integralists condemned as immoral and corruptive. The review called for a more severe Fascist censorship on the popular press that had to take example from the Index Librorum Prohibitorum of the Holy Office. 53 Conversely, with its demographic policy, the regime met the expectations of integralist Catholics who promoted the model of a Christian family: Il problema demografico è sempre all'ordine del giorno. Se n'è occupato, emanando nuove disposizioni in favore delle famiglie numerose, ancora l'ultimo Consiglio dei Ministri della passata settimana, e codesta preoccupazione è segno della sensibilità morale degli uomini, che hanno in mano, oggi, le sorti del popolo italiano, sopra tutto dell'on. Mussolini, a cui si deve il merito primo e principale della campagna contro il maltusianismo e ogni altra pratica diretta a diminuire le nascite. ... Il problema demografico non può risolversi che tornando, puramente, semplicemente, totalitariamente, alla concezione cristiana della vita, la quale il materialismo ha distrutto nella coscienza degli individui. 54 But while this article congratulated Mussolini, it also blamed Fascist journals like Il Popolo di Roma and Il Corriere Padano for publishing tabloid-like news and licentious stories that implied sex, adultery, and prostitution: 'Lupanare e famiglia sono termini antitetici, contrarii come il si e il no, oriente ed occidente'.
With the signature of the Lateran Pacts on February 11, 1929, Fede e Ragione highly praised the Fascist regime for becoming a model for all Christian Europe and for working for a true 'resurrection' (risurrezione) of Italy. 55 The Conciliation fostered a significant inflexion of tone in Fede e Ragione as the review for the first time enthusiastically embraced the rhetoric of the Fascist regime that elevated Mussolini to the status of providential man: Uomo nuovo, chiamato e sollevato dal Signore per la salvezza d'Italia nel momento forse più scuro della sua storia, Mussolini, intravedendo nel suo profondo la causa dei mali, che opprimevano la patria nostra, si sforzò subito di richiamarla alle sue origini. ... di qui il suo studio per moralizzare la vita pubblica .... E l'Italia, scossa dalla voce dell'Uomo, che la chiamava si rialzò ed obbedì. 56 On Sunday March 24, Fede e Ragione urged its readers to support the regime by voting yes at the plebiscite to 'elect' deputies that would ratify the Lateran agreements, a position shared by most Catholic journals in Italy: Il plebiscito dei cattolici italiani non potrà mancare, non mancherà all'Uomo, che il papa ha salutato l'Uomo della Provvidenza: mancare a questo plebiscito sarebbe una ingratitudine e una colpa, della quale i cattolici, che saranno sempre i primi fra i migliori cittadini, non si macchieranno. Votare per il Regime significa, infatti, oggi, votare per un'Italia sempre più cristiana, sempre più cattolica. 57 Church and the Italian state: 'questo felicissimo evento, che per me è stato sempre il sogno ed il desiderio più vivo di tutta la mia vita, oggi, grazie a dio, è un fatto compiuto'. 58 However, as tensions about the practical implementation of the agreements quickly emerged, integralist Catholics expressed a certain disenchantment. Fede e Ragione deplored Mussolini's discourse at the Chamber of Deputies on May 13, which reasserted Gentile's views that the Fascist state was inherently 'ethical'. 59 Fede e Ragione did not hesitate to stress the 'error' of Mussolini when he quoted in his speech Paolo Orano's thesis arguing that Christianity became universal and Catholic only and exclusively in Rome: 'Avendo l'on. Mussolini ripetuto -e pur troppo aggravandolol'errore dell'on. Orano ... il farfallone dell'On. Orano che il cristianesimo, solo in grazia di Roma, divenne cattolicismo'. 60 More generally, Fede e Ragione abhorred any form of neo-pagan folklore in Fascist propaganda and the political instrumentalization of the myth of the romanità that did not rely substantially on Christianity. In April 1929, Piero Bargellini warned that the Natale di Roma, a Fascist festivity that celebrated the birth of Rome, should have a clear Christian purpose. Bargellini dissociated the first birth of Rome, pagan and violent, from the second one, Christian and spiritual: Poichè un misto di profano e divino non è mai giustificabile, bisogna pensare bene oggi a quale Natale si voglia alludere. Si vuole ricordare il primo, il natale della morte, o il secondo, quello della vita? Si vuole Roma eterna e si vuole Roma transitoria? ... Per noi, e non son cose nuove, il primo Natale di Roma è un fatto provvidenziale, che ha la sua conferma, la sua illustrazione, e la sua esaltazione soltanto nella seconda nascita. 61 Bargellini made clear that true Catholics should resist the neo-pagan trends of Fascism, 'miscugli di sacro e di profano, ibridismi di pagano e di cristiano per ambizione retorica o per accondiscendenza mondana.' A similar tension between integralist Catholicism and secular nationalism appeared in articles dealing with modern Italian history and in particular relating to the anticlerical tendencies of the Risorgimento. Reproving the private life of Giuseppe Mazzini, the Catholic editors argued that the recent alliance between the Holy See and the Fascist regime legitimized a critical revision of Italian nationalism: Oggi che l'Italia ha ripreso il posto che la volontà di Dio le assegnava in perpetuo il posto che le compete, di nazione cattolica prescelta; ... oggi che lo Stato Italiano si è riconciliato con Dio, col Papa e con la Chiesa, non sarà lecito a noi dissentire, e profondamente, da Giuseppe Mazzini? ... Noi facciamo opera di chiarezza e di onestà. Gli uomini più eminenti e rappresentativi del Fascismo hanno detto e ripetuto più volte che pur troppo nel passato per molti l'idea patriottica si nutrì d'odio contro la Chiesa Cattolica ed il Romano Pontificato; ma che ora non ha d'essere più così. 62 The Lateran agreements occupied most of the foreground of Fede e Ragione throughout 1929. While celebrating the Conciliation as a decisive step toward the recatholicization of Italy, the review also expressed concerns about the respect of the Church's spiritual and temporal rights facing the increasing totalitarian ambitions of Fascism. This discontent was actually shared by integralist voices within the Holy See, such as Cardinals Merry del Val and Boggiani who remained skeptical toward the concessions granted during the Lateran negotiations. 63 In its very last issue on December 31, 1929, Fede e Ragione complained against the Fascist journals that tried to discredit the Concordat as a 'clericalizzazione dell'Italia'. 64

Epilogue: the Silencing of Integralist Catholics after the Lateran Agreements
Among the hypothesis discussed in the scholarship to explain the interruption of Fede e Ragione, some have argued that the review was considered anti-Fascist and as such was suppressed by the regime. 65 Yet, archival evidence shows that even though Fascist officials were aware that Fede e Ragione's considerations on Fascism were in part motivated by opportunism, they did not see it as an anti-Fascist threat. In  67 In December 1929, Gasparri sent a final warning to Sassoli de Bianchi after Fede e Ragione calumniated the Volontaires du Pape, a French organization of lay Catholics founded by Christian democrat Francisque Gay. Once again, Fede e Ragione attacked organizations of the Catholic action that were fully approved by the Pope. 68 The last issue of Fede e Ragione appeared on December 31, 1929, celebrating Pius XI and without any anticipation of the cessation of the review.