Sarpi’s life and works bring to light a reality which has been typically ignored. Most historical accounts lead us to believe that the Roman Catholic Church, initially overtaken by Protestant assaults, came to successfully reorganize and reform itself in the Council of Trent. The truth is somewhat different.

Paolo Sarpi is not a familiar name in American discussions of the Protestant Reformation but was well known in 16th-century Europe. As was often the case, particularly in firmly Roman Catholic countries like Italy, placing a precise label on Sarpi’s theological beliefs is difficult and counter-productive. His life, however, offers an excellent vantage point for an overview of the Church of Rome after the Council of Trent (1545-1563).

Sarpi and the Venetian Interdict

Born in Venice on August 14, 1552 Sarpi became an Augustinian monk at 13. His intellectual abilities were immediately evident. At age 15, he was already debating the powers of the pope and church councils. At 20, he was appointed court theologian by Duke Guglielmo Gonzaga of Mantua. After earning a doctorate at the University of Padua and a temporary position as Procurator General of his Augustinian order, he moved back to Venice, where he would have continued a quiet life of a scholar if a momentous controversy hadn’t shaken the city.

In 1605, the Venetian authorities arrested two clergymen who had been accused of common crimes: Scipione Saraceno for abuse of his niece and Marcantonio Brandolin for homicide and damage of property. They were not sensational cases. Crimes committed by clergy were common and well documented. Most of the time, they were managed by the church, quietly and undercover.

Most Italian rulers accepted this arrangement, which was not reciprocated (the church felt free to perform arrests in any Italian state, upon suspicion of heresy, with or without the rulers’ agreement). The Republic of Venice had been a lone dissenting voice. Consequently, it had become a place of refuge for Protestant sympathizers and a prolific center of publication of controversial books.

To Pope Paul V, the arrest of Saraceno and Brandolin was the last straw in a long history of what the church considered Venetian interferences in its government. He threatened to excommunicate the whole city of Venice and its territories if the two clergymen were not delivered to church authorities.

Paolo Sarpi, who was at that time the official theologian for the Republic of Venice, encouraged its ruler, Doge Leonardo Donà, to stand his ground. Equally determined, Paul V kept his word, forbidding the clergy to perform any religious service in the doge’s territories. His injunction fell on deaf ears, because the clergy sided with the state, except for the Jesuits, who had become the fiercest defenders of Rome. The conflict turned into an international matter, with England on the side of Venice and Spain and Austria on the side of the pope.

Finally, a year later, the French authorities brought the two factions to a compromise: the two clergymen were delivered to France, who in turn delivered them to the church. It was a victory for Rome, while Venice formally stood by its convictions.

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