Abstract

The Enciclopedia cattolica, whose 12 volumes were published between 1949 and 1954, constitutes probably the most ambitious publishing venture undertaken by Italian Catholicism in the aftermath of World War II. Directly financed by the Vatican, warmly encouraged by Pius XII himself and realized thanks to the collaboration of the Society of Jesus and the Sansoni publishing house, this work was intended to offer an up-to-date and thoroughly orthodox overview of modern knowledge, not only religious, but also profane, standing as a point of reference for post-war Italian culture, in open competition with Treccani’s Enciclopedia italiana, and thus contributing to the re-Christianization of Italian society. Making use of largely unexplored documentation, this essay aims to reconstruct the editorial history of the Enciclopedia cattolica, the motives and objectives of the various actors involved, primarily the Jesuits of «La Civiltà Cattolica», and the dynamics, not infrequently conflicting, that marked its realization. It will also provide some hypotheses to explain the substantial failure of this encyclopedia and of the cultural and religious project it embodies.