Indian Sculpture c12.119

c12.119

the *Syllabus* of 1864, which condemned the modern world, and the definition of papal infallibility in 1870, which seemed to isolate the papacy from the modern world, were the logical conclusions of the policy of centralization. The papacy had become a monarchy, and the Church a centralized organization, in which the bishops were merely the agents of the Roman Curia. The *Risorgimento* had destroyed the temporal power, but it had made the Pope more powerful than he had ever been in the history of the Church. The loss of the Papal States was a blessing in disguise, for it freed the papacy from the burden of temporal government and allowed it to concentrate on its spiritual mission. The Pope was no longer a sovereign prince, but the spiritual leader of a worldwide Church. The *Risorgimento* had not destroyed the papacy; it had transformed it.