Saint Charles Borromeo: Son of the Church and a true reformer

When Saint Charles Borromeo was born in 1538, Protestant teachings had already swept all over Europe. Wars had erupted between Catholics and Protestants in Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Ireland, Denmark, Norway, and the Netherlands over the past two decades. When King Henry VIII began a new and bitter persecution against Catholics and Pope Paul III finally published an official excommunication against him, Charles was just a two-month-old baby.

To respond to Protestant claims, Pope Paul III also decided to convene a council. But his cardinals, more wars, and financial difficulties prevented the council from opening until the year 1545. The Council of Trent operated in fits and starts; it was discontinued in 1549, reopened in 1551, and postponed in 1552.

During these years, Charles grew up as the second son in a powerful Italian family and received an excellent education. Even as a teenager, he seemed to have the natural gifts of a leader. He was pious, reserved, and had a friendly temperament, preferring to spend more time praying than playing. He was probably teased by other students about a slight speech impediment, which he overcame in time. He was responsible and diligent even as a young man, and after his father died, he was the natural choice to take control of the Borromeo family finances. Despite that heavy responsibility, Charles managed to earn a doctorate in canon and civil law.

He was twenty-one years old when his uncle was elected pope. Following an unfortunate but longstanding tradition, popes commonly appointed a nephew or two to important positions—what we now call nepotism—and Pope Pius IV had always liked Charles. The new pope showered the young man with titles and offices. The fact that he was not a priest did not keep him from being made a cardinal and archbishop of Milan.

Unlike many other cardinal-nephews in the history of the Church, Charles wanted to use his position to build up the Body of Christ, not for his own pleasure and profit. As secretary of state, he found ways to ensure justice for the poor and established an academy in Rome. Most importantly, when his uncle decided to reconvene the Council of Trent, Charles devoted himself wholeheartedly to reviving that stalled project.

In retrospect, it is difficult for us to understand why popes and Church leaders ignored Protestant leaders’ arguments for so long. Didn’t they see that some of the Protestant claims about corruption and abuses were valid? That even those claims that were wrong deserved a coherent response? That by failing to act, they were only making it more likely that ordinary Catholics would leave the Church?

No, most of them didn’t seem to understand any of that. But Cardinal Charles Borromeo did, and he committed everything he had—his charming and amiable nature, his family and political connections, his natural intelligence, his tireless energy—to hold together all the competing interests and personalities participating in the council. Witnesses later claimed that it was only because of Charles’s leadership that the Council of Trent was finally brought to a successful conclusion. The council produced decrees that not only condemned specific Protestant teachings but also confronted the need for reform within the Church. Tridentine documents outlawed notorious abuses, clarified Church teaching on controversial subjects, and addressed the need for liturgical reform.

But documents are just documents. Real people—particularly bishops—were needed to implement all these changes.

Charles’s older brother died before the Council ended. Everyone expected Charles to walk away from his high-profile position, take over as head of the powerful Borromeo family, marry a wealthy young heiress, and have children. That’s what most young men would have done. But instead, Charles did the opposite. In fact, he must have been planning to set aside the family fortune all along but was just waiting for the right opportunity.

After renouncing his right to inherit, he was ordained a priest and bishop, and he immediately tried to live in his archdiocese rather than Rome.

One of the most common abuses of power in the Church at the time was the scandalous practice of men accepting the office of bishop merely to use the position as a source of income. Many never even set foot in their dioceses. Although Charles repeatedly begged the pope to allow him to go to Milan and implement the decrees of the Council of Trent, Pius IV repeatedly refused. The pope needed his influential, hardworking nephew in Rome. Finally, he did permit Charles to go to Milan in 1565.

But Pius IV died early in the next year, and the cardinals convened in Rome to elect a new pope. Although Cardinal Michael Ghislieri was not Charles’ first choice and had not been on the best of terms with Pope Pius IV, Charles wanted a good man to be pope. He gave his support to Ghislieri, who was elected, took the name of Pius V, and eventually became a great pope and canonized saint.

Pope Pius V also agreed to allow Charles to return to Milan, and Charles began to implement the changes that he had worked so hard to ensure were present in the decrees of the Council of Trent. Seeking to live more like a shepherd and less like a secular prince, he simplified his household and gave the extra money and goods to the poor. Now that he could see what was really going on in his archdiocese (or not), he could make changes in the personnel and practices of his archdiocesan administration.

He also cleaned house in the priests and religious communities in Milan. Far too many of his priests had concubines, didn’t know how to celebrate the sacraments (particularly Confession), dressed as laymen, and even carried weapons. Naturally, if many of the Milanese priests did not think sacramental Confession was important, why would the laity think otherwise? Ordinary Catholics did not know basic prayers or teachings of the Church and showed little or no respect for churches or their priests.

By establishing and regulating seminaries, Charles raised the standards for priestly life, and by publishing diocesan-wide regulations for religious, he did the same for religious communities. He gave both groups time to improve their behavior, but then he took action against individuals who refused to obey him.

That’s one of the reasons that a member of a religious community tried to assassinate him. Although one could concede that sixteenth-century guns were not as efficient as they are today, it is certainly puzzling that the bullet hit Charles hard enough to leave a bruise but didn’t even penetrate his vestments.

Charles was a private man, but it gradually became known throughout Milan that their bishop lived a simple life and practiced personal mortifications. He cared for the needs of the poor and always seemed to be trying to find new ways to draw his flock back to the sacraments and pious practices. Many in the laity followed his example and began to practice and learn about their faith.

When Charles went on a visitation of villages outside the city—where priests were scarce, and followers of heresies were numerous—he personally led his entourage through snow and up the sides of mountains. In big cities and small villages, crowds of people would show up to hear him preach. This was not because he was a brilliant theologian but because he preached from the heart about Jesus Christ and spoke in practical terms about how to live a virtuous life.

Then a plague broke out, and the rich and powerful ran away from Milan. Charles, however, stayed. He personally cared for the sick and begged his priests to do the same, even though his own health was never very good. All too soon, Charles contracted a serious illness and died at the young age of forty-six.

That one man could accomplish so much in such a short time may seem superhuman to us. But the Catholics of Milan knew that it simply meant that Charles was a saint.

Charles’ friends and contemporaries—except for those he punished or who thought having wild parties during Lent was perfectly reasonable—wrote glowingly about his prayerfulness, humility, selflessness, leadership, intelligence, and personal character. Charles almost single-handedly corralled cardinals toward the successful completion of the Council of Trent and then demonstrated the wisdom of the council’s documents by implementing them himself in a major Italian city. Without Charles Borromeo, would the Counter-Reformation have even happened?

Fortunately, we do not live in such an unhappy alternate universe. Instead, we can draw at least two important conclusions from the life of Saint Charles Borromeo.

First, we can thank God that He inspired a talented, rich kid to turn away from all the empty promises of secular success, accept His call to the priesthood, and give his life to Jesus Christ. And second, no matter how violent, chaotic, or hostile our culture may be toward the Church of Christ, the peace of Christ can still bring healing and reform.

Even today, God is at work in the hearts of humble, faithful men and women, giving them the grace to miraculously turn hearts and souls back to Jesus Christ. The real question for each of us is whether we are too busy to try to change the course of history in our own day—or whether we are willing to learn from the holy example of Saint Charles Borromeo.