Dates

• Existence: 1810 March 2 - 1903 July 20

Biography

Pope Leo XIII was born Gioacchino Vincenzo Raffaele Luigi Pecci, in Carpineto Romano, Italy in 1810. He studied at the Academia dei Nobili, and went on to receive his doctorate in theology and doctorates of civil and Canon Law in Rome in 1836. He was ordained as a Catholic priest on 31 December 1837. Pope Gregory XVI appointed Pecci as Papal legate, and he served the province of Benevento, then Spoleto, and finally Perugia. In 1843 he was appointed Apostolic Nuncio to Belgium and from 1846 to 1877, he served as Archbishop of Perugia. 1853, he was elevated to the College of Cardinals, as Cardinal-Priest of San Crisogono. He was elected Pope in 1878, and he announced that he would assume the name "Leo" in memory of Pope Leo XII due to his admiration for the late pope's interest in education and his conciliatory attitude toward foreign governments. Pope Leo XIII reasserted the scholastic doctrine that science and religion coexist, required the study of Thomas Aquinas, and refounded the Vatican Observatory. He also improved Vatican relations with Russia, Germany, France, and Britain. His 1891 encyclical Rerum novarum outlined the rights of workers to a fair wage, safe working conditions, and the formation of trade unions, while affirming the rights to property and free enterprise, opposing both socialism and laissez-faire capitalism. With that encyclical, he became popularly titled as the "Social Pope" and the "Pope of the Workers." He died in 1903.

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