Vatican City, Jun 14, 2018 / 10:27 am (CNA/EWTN News).- After spending more than a decade in private collection in Atlanta, a copy of a 1493 letter written by Christopher Columbus about his experience in America has been returned to its rightful place in the Vatican library.
Columbus penned the letter to Spanish King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella in 1493 after returning from his voyage to America, describing what he saw during his travels.
The “Columbus Letter,” unofficially titled “Letter about the Recently Discovered Islands,” was then translated and manually printed into Latin, and several copies were distributed throughout Europe. Around 80 authentic copies still exist today.
One of the oldest copies of the 8-page letter, written in small, fine print, was given to the Vatican in 1921 as part of the “De Rossi Collection,” which consisted of rare books and manuscripts given to the Vatican at the request of bibliophile Giovanni Francesco Rossi upon his death in 1854.
At some point, though it is not known exactly when, the letter was stolen. It was not until 2011 that a rare book and manuscript expert became aware that the copy in the Vatican Library collection was a forgery after closely examining details in the stitching, chain lines and page size.
The expert then contacted the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Homeland Security Investigations about the possible theft.
Vatican officials were informed, and the forged letter was examined by more experts, including specialists from Princeton University, who confirmed that the letter was a fake.
The original copy of the Vatican’s letter was eventually traced back to David Parsons, an actuary from Atlanta, who had purchased it for $875,000 from a rare book dealer in New York City in 2004, unaware that it had been stolen from the Vatican.
In 2013 Parsons sent his letter to the expert who originally caught the forgery, and after closely examining it, the expert found it to be authentic.
It was confirmed in 2016 that the “Columbus Letter” Parsons owned had been sold to the New York book dealer he bought it from by notorious Italian book thief, Marino Massimo De Caro, who is currently serving a 7-year sentence in Italy for the theft of roughly 4,000 ancient books and manuscripts throughout Italy.
After further comparative analysis was done on both the original letter and the forgery, it was confirmed in April 2017 that Parsons’ letter had in fact been stolen from the Vatican Library, and that the theft had to have taken place sometime before 2004.
In August of that year, investigators contacted David Parsons’ widow, Mary Parsons, and presented her with evidence of the theft and forgery. She agreed to part with the letter, renouncing all rights, title and interest, so that it could be returned to its original home in the Vatican Library.
The letter formally exchanged hands June 14, when U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See Callista Gingrich presented it to Vatican Archivist and Librarian, Archbishop Jean-Louis Bruguès, O.P. and the Library’s Prefect, Bishop Cesare Pasini, inside the Vatican Library.
During the hand-off, Gingrich called the letter “a priceless piece of cultural history,” and said she was honored to return the letter to “its rightful owner.”
She noted that U.S. Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agents since 2007 have returned more than 11,000 artifacts and pieces of art from over 30 countries as part of an ongoing investigation into the illegal sale of stolen books and manuscripts.
To date, Gingrich said, HSI has repatriated both paintings and manuscripts to Austria, Italy, France, Germany and Poland, among others, and have recovered ancient artifacts from different regions, including Europe, South America, Asia and the Middle East.
In addition to the letter recovered from Parsons, HSI has recovered and returned two other Columbus Letters as part of their ongoing investigation into the sale of stolen books and manuscripts. The two additional Columbus Letters that were confiscated have been returned to the Riccardiana Library in Florence, and the Library of Catalonia in Barcelona.
As a gesture of gratitude to Mrs. Parsons for agreeing to part with her late husband’s treasured “Columbus Letter,” the U.S. Embassy earlier this week hand-delivered a personal note from Mrs. Parsons to the pope.
In remarks during the repatriation ceremony, Archbishop Bruguès voiced gratitude to all involved in recovering the letter, which he said is “a priceless artifact of cultural history which today has found its way back to its home.”
He said the library was “surprised” to find out their copy was a fake, and noted that while it is still unknown when the original letter was taken, the technique used in the forgery, called “stereotyping,” was a common during the late 19th and early 20th centuries and reproduces not only the visual characteristics of the original, but also the tactile characteristics.
“We are extremely grateful to be able to reinsert this volume in its rightful place in De Rossi’s collection,” he said, adding that the letter “will remain at the disposal of researchers who come from around the world to study the collections of the Vatican Library.”
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Were yours truly the ghost writer for Pope Francis, a framing that I might propose would include the following themes (ranked as shown). It’s not only that an updating might be needed, but also that Laudato Si was a bit rough because it was admittedly accelerated to coincide with the politics of the Paris Climate Accord.
1. A restored DISTINCTION between the, yes, interrelated “human ecology” (e.g., the family) and the “natural ecology,” more than is provided by the conflated “integral ecology” (only the merged family of man?). Example, the moral equivalence between aborting our own children, the de facto triaging of ecological vulnerable human populations, and the abortion of the planet as our common home (our global amniotic sac).
2. The Catholic Social Teaching as the application of universal MORAL VIRTUES rather than as any ideology (the negation of all ideology!): prudential judgment (caution despite and even because of scientific uncertainty), courage (political), temperance (both personal and cultural), and fortitude.
3.An eye to the Church’s direct responsibility as the dark side of progressive modernity unfolds, by recalling a broad definition of “the preferential option for THE POOR”: “This option is not limited to material poverty, since it is well known that there are many other forms of poverty, especially in modern society—not only economic, but cultural and spiritual poverty as well” (Centesimus Annus, 1993, n. 57).
4. More HONEY less VINEGAR: More credit/encouragement to those kinds of programs well underway, or only partially, to preserve what is being lost or fix what is out of balance: conservation (whether Teddy Roosevelt’s national part initiative, or the transnational/public-private Nature Conservancy), environmental impact analyses (in the U.S. since 1969), or sometimes the corporate triple-bottom line (profit, loss, social/environmental factors).
5. A more developed message on the inseparability of the CST PRINCIPLES of Solidarity/ Subsidiarity (see again Centesimus Annus on human initiative/ethical markets, nn. 32, 44). Acknowledgment of knotty problems—details within the domain of those responsible for the common good (Vatican II)—in navigating uneven economic burdens and disjointed “politics” between the developed nations and India, and Marxist regimes.
#4 “…Teddy Roosevelt’s national parks [not “part”] initiative…” now totaling 52 million acres or 80 thousand square miles (0.08 million). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_national_parks_of_the_United_States From the internet, the Nature Conservancy operates in over seventy countries and the goal for 2030 is to have preserved 650 million hectares or 2.5 million square miles, a land area twice the size of India.
By comparison, the total land surface area of the earth is 197 million square miles, of which about one-third is devoted to agriculture and about another one-fifth to urbanization.
Was Francis of Assisi a borderline idolater? Or were the writings, fairytale ditties like the sermon to the fishes, the converted maneater wolf of Gubbio, the poem Brother Sun Sister Moon the pious inventions of adherents?
There are only two examples of alleged documents written by Saint Francis, one, to Leo of Assisi praising God. This first letter was a parchment, hand written on both sides. The other was a letter written to Bro Leo on his scruples regarding the Gospels.
Francis’ writings were redacted by his first followers. Francis insisted they be copied exactly as written. There’s reliable evidence they were not. Words were changed to ‘polish’ the image of the saint. Other letters, one to Elizabeth of Hungary, were lost (Franciscan Tradition: Francis of Assisi: Early Documents – The Saint. Armstrong, Regis, O.F.M. Cap.|Hellmann, J.A. Wayne, O.F.M. Conv.|Short, William, O.F.M.|Francis of Assisi, Saint, 1181-1226).
My purpose is not to denigrate the beloved saint, or to criticize Pope Francis for quoting him, although I do have misgivings following Pachamamma in the Sanctuary of St Peter’s, and the emphasis on the environment to the negligence of more concrete moral issues.
My purpose is to expose the real possibility of a more manly Francis, one who seriously followed Christ, prepared to reject the world, suffer the darkness of Mankind’s sins on Mount Alverna and receive the stigmata. Leaving us a legacy more consistent with that of saint Paul the Apostle, and Christ. Not however to totally diminish the possibility of his affinity with nature, rather to realistically temper it
Fr. Peter: Please do your research and read about the now exposed (and personally admitted) “Pachamama” drama as having been staged by Taylor Marshall of which he monetized a lot. Please stop spreading this smear campaign against Pope Francis.
Theodore Misiak set the standard for social as well as ecological justice in ‘The fruits of environmentalism and of social justice’. “We cannot have social justice without virtuous people”. For the environment and human ecology the standard is similar, We invariably cannot have just human ecology without virtuous people. That was brought home to me when flyfishing on pristine Canadice Lake NY. Smallest of the Finger Lakes Canadice is a watershed for Rochester.
Shocked when I learned that the Lake had to be dredged, drained for retrieval of barrels of deadly waste materials dumped years prior when regulations for waste disposal were insufficient. Although dumping in lakes was forbidden, industrial subcontractors weren’t concerned about poisoning people in Rochester. Cutting costs was more important.
Our planet, God’s beautiful gift, his assigning us as stewards hasn’t gone well. We can regulate with severe penalties but if there’s opportunity industrialists will likely exploit it. Our faith has wider repercussions than frequently realized. Laudato si’ 2 if well thought out can contribute to an environmental moral conscience.
Yes, Fr. Peter, we need to rescue St. Francis from this pontificate. The great repentant lover of Christ crucified is portrayed as a sixties hippy environmentalist frolicking in a bird bath. St. Francis loved all creation because he loved the Creator.
Have you read his last will and Testament? It is very beautiful. See page 65 the Franciscan Omnibus of Sources. The writings of St. Francis begin on page 44. https://archive.org/details/OmnibusOfSources/page/n825/mode/2up
I just watched and heard it narrated by the Franciscan Media Center India on YouTube. The narration and filming was excellent. The text appears an authentic representation of the saint.
Francis initially focuses on his love of priesthood, although we know out of his remarkable humility he remained a lay brother. He also left the Rule for the Order of Franciscans, which had to be modified because of its severity. There’s a collected ‘Works of the Seraphic Father St Francis of Assisi’. It doesn’t provide a publisher except that it was produced by the Order based on an 1848 Cologne Germany translation. It has the imprimatur of the Bishop of Birmingham England. It seems authentic.
Check out his writings in the Omnibus I linked. The Saint’s writings can’t be more than 100 pages. Try praying aloud his Praises and Prayers.
For the record, St. Francis was Ordained a Deacon to preach. For instance, he preached Christmas Mass at Greccio where he made the first crèche. St. Francis had such a reverence for the Eucharist he carried a broom around when he preached to clean the Churches in each town! He was constantly memorizing Scripture for prayer and share it through preaching. All of his writings are imbued with Scripture. God’s peace.
The earth, the air, the land and the water are not an inheritance from our fore fathers but on loan from our children. So we have to handover to them at least as it was handed over to us – Mahatma Gandhi
Spot on Dr. C. Gandhi has more to do with this pontificate than St. Francis.
“We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.”
Words also attributed to Chief Seattle (1786-1866), Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), and even the later Wendell Berry (1934-) and others. Of interest to some, Chief Seattle converted to Catholicism as a seasoned adult in 1848 (under the name Noah), and Oscar Wilde converted only very near his death; while Berry identifies as the “ultimate Protestant”.https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2014/08/19/the-ultimate-protestant-wendell-berry-same-sex-marriage-and-the-new-state-religion/
The saying is sometimes linked to Chief Seattle’s famous speech of 1854 (https://www.historylink.org/File/1427). The words do not appear there, but some of which reads this way about the indigenous peoples’ bond to nature:
“Your dead cease to love you and the homes of their nativity as soon as they pass the portals of the tomb. They wander far off beyond the stars, are soon forgotten, and never return. Our dead never forget the beautiful world that gave them being. They still love its winding rivers, its great mountains and its sequestered vales, and they ever yearn in tenderest affection over the lonely hearted living and often return to visit and comfort them.”
Like her father, Chief Seattle’s eldest daughter, Kikisoblu (c.1820-1896, renamed Princess Angeline) was also baptized and remained a Catholic until her own death, and is buried in a Seattle’s Lake View Cemetery.
And we don’t need to be lectured about it from people whose motivation is to use the issue as a rationalizing cover to make support for mass murder of inconvenient life seem like a benevolent service to the planet.
History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.
He long ago ran out of things to say. It’s now gotten to the point where he is issuing sequels to his own lousy originals. Christians are being murdered and persecuted in Nigeria, Pakistan, Nicaragua, Vietnam and many other countries (including, increasingly, Western “democracies”). Yet, this pope can’t write a letter to encourage the faithful who are under siege and condemn the evil regimes that are committing these crimes. To do so, of course, he would have to attack his allies and partners, like the CCP. So instead, he returns to repeat his pseudo-scientific claims about “climate change” and make equally bogus theological declarations about our moral obligation to submit to the Green Agenda.