Luigi Mozzi (26 May 1746 at

Bergamo Bergamo ( , ; ) is a city in the Alps, alpine Lombardy region of northern Italy, approximately northeast of Milan, and about from the alpine lakes Lake Como, Como and Lake Iseo, Iseo and 70 km (43 mi) from Lake Garda, Garda and Lake ...

– 24 June 1813 near

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

) was an Italian

Jesuit The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

controversialist.

Life

He entered the

Society of Jesus The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rome. It was founded in 1540 ...

in 1763, and on its suppression was received into the

Diocese of Bergamo The Diocese of Bergamo (; ; ) is a Latin diocese of the Catholic Church in Italy, and is a suffragan of the Archdiocese of Milan.archpriest The ecclesiastical title of archpriest or archpresbyter belongs to certain priests with supervisory duties over a number of parishes. The term is most often used in Eastern Orthodoxy and the Eastern Catholic Churches and may be somewhat analogo ...

and examiner of candidates for the priesthood. The zeal with which he opposed the progress of

Jansenism Jansenism was a 17th- and 18th-century Christian theology, theological movement within Roman Catholicism, primarily active in Kingdom of France, France, which arose as an attempt to reconcile the theological concepts of Free will in theology, f ...

in Italy gained him a reputation, and

Pope Pius VI Pope Pius VI (; born Count Angelo Onofrio Melchiorre Natale Giovanni Antonio called Giovanni Angelo or Giannangelo Braschi, 25 December 171729 August 1799) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 15 February 1775 to hi ...

called him to Rome, where he became an Apostolic missionary. He was elected a member of the

Accademia degli Arcadi The Accademia degli Arcadi or Accademia dell'Arcadia, "Academy of Arcadia" or "Academy of the Arcadians", is an Italian literary academy founded in Rome in 1690. The full Italian official name was Pontificia Accademia degli Arcadi. History Found ...

. In 1804 he rejoined the Society, which had been restored in

Naples Naples ( ; ; ) is the Regions of Italy, regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 908,082 within the city's administrative limits as of 2025, while its Metropolitan City of N ...

. He retired to the residence of Marquis Scotti near Milan, where he died.

Works

Among his important writings are: * (1781) * (Ferrara, 1785) * (Venice, 1787) * (Foligno, 1792), all against Jansenism; * (Venice, 1779), a defence of

Molinism Molinism, named after 16th-century Spanish Jesuit theologian Luis de Molina, is the thesis that God has middle knowledge (or ''scientia media''): the knowledge of counterfactuals, particularly counterfactuals regarding human action. It seeks to ...

. He translated from the English

Anthony Ulrich, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel Anthony, also spelled Antony, is a masculine given name derived from the '' Antonii'', a ''gens'' ( Roman family name) to which Mark Antony (''Marcus Antonius'') belonged. According to Plutarch, the Antonii gens were Heracleidae, being descendant ...

's "Fifty Reasons for preferring the Roman Catholic Religion" (Bassano, 1789); and from the French, (Assisi, 1791).

References

Hugo von Hurter The von Hurter family belonged to the Swiss nobility; in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries three of them were known for their conversions to Roman Catholicism, their ecclesiastical careers in Austria and their theological writings. Friedric ...

,'' Nomenclator'', III, 540 *''Vita del P.L. Mozzi'' (Novara, 1823). {{DEFAULTSORT:Mozzi, Luigi 1746 births 1813 deaths 18th-century Italian Jesuits Clergy from Bergamo