Mozart, Freemasonry, and the Synodal Way

A recent, brief exhibit at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York City highlighted the life and work of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. J.P. Morgan, the famous financier, built his library on Madison Avenue in the 19th century as a place to house, preserve, and make available to scholars Morgan’s burgeoning collection of rare books and manuscripts, among them copies of musical scores in Mozart’s hand.

“Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Treasures from the Mozarteum Foundation of Salzburg” included some of those scores and, thanks to the Mozarteum, several of the great man’s musical instruments, numerous portraits of Mozart, his family, and his patrons, and many letters and other documents across the span of W.A. Mozart’s all-too-brief life (1756-1791).

And once again, it got me wondering about the Catholic Mozart’s affiliation/flirtation with Freemasonry. More about that diversion from the One True Faith shortly, but first: Mozart the Catholic.

Begin with the fact that he wrote five dozen Catholic liturgical compositions, the most famous of which is the last thing he wrote: his nearly hour-long, unfinished Requiem Mass. In my opinion, however, his most beautiful work is the four-minute eucharistic hymn, Ave verum corpus (“Hail true body”), a four-part SATB, meaning the music is arranged for four distinct vocal ranges: Soprano, Alto, Tenor, and Bass. It’s lovely with orchestra and large chorus or as an a cappella quartet. Here’s Leonard Bernstein conducting Ave verum corpus (and drawing, as he often did, nearly more attention to himself than to the music):

In childhood, the Mozart family – Wolfgang’s father (Leopold), mother (Anna Maria), sister (Maria Anna), and Wolfgang – were devoted Mass-goers. (Five other Mozart children died in infancy.) Wolfgang never really ceased being a faithful Christian.

So, why – at 28 – did the genius from a devoutly Catholic family decide to join Zur Wohltätigkeit (the “Beneficence”) Masonic lodge in Vienna? Well, why does Masonic imagery persist on America’s currency? To the second question, the answer may be as simple as: Ben Franklin, who was a Mason and a free thinker, and (as Mr. Jefferson might say – and did say about his Declaration) Masonic ideas were “in the air” 250 years ago.

In Vienna as in Philadelphia, liberty, fraternity, equality, and scientific inquiry were seemingly irresistible Enlightenment ideals, and there’s no doubt their basis was largely secular, often even anti-Catholic. But it’s also true that, for statesmen and artists, religious faith was rather more in their bones than simply in the air.

Mozart’s lodge was a social club with rituals and mysteries that parodied Roman Catholic rites. The Church had been the ground upon which the culture of the West was based. Some scholars speculate that Masonic Temples, secular in nature, were meant to be refuges from the Catholic/Protestant conflicts that had been roiling in Britain and in Europe since the 16th century (mostly settled by the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648, but still haunting regional conflicts through the religious affiliations of the combatants). The Lodge became a place where Protestants, Catholics, and men of no faith could gather in peace.

Of course, Mozart and his friends may also have attended Mass on Sunday. But composing, like writing, is a solitary profession, and Mozart may have found the lodge more relaxed and congenial than church.

Pope Clement XII had banned Catholics from becoming Freemasons in the 1738 bull, In Eminenti apostolatus, and the penalty for being a Mason was excommunication. None of the documents in the Morgan exhibit (nor any known to exist elsewhere) suggest Mozart read the bull and chose to ignore it.

A peculiar historical fact is that Zur Wohltätigkeit was a kind of reform-Catholic lodge based upon the teachings of the liberal Italian priest-theologian Ludovico Antonio Muratori (1672-1750). Muratori was solidly Catholic in most respects but eschewed popular piety and was particularly committed to the Catholic ideal of charity (another translation of Wohltätigkeit). But in his book, De Ingeniorum Moderatione, he also called into question papal authority.

And there was also in play at Zur Wohltätigkeit the influence of Johann Nikolaus von Hontheim (1701-1790), coadjutor bishop of Trier, Germany, who wrote under the pen name Justinus Febronius. His nationalist Catholic views were referred to as Febronianism. Von Hontheim wanted to diminish the power of the papacy and the Holy See. Call it “Reform Catholicism” or the “Catholic Enlightenment,” but these ideas – anti-clerical (especially anti-Vatican) and nationalist movements – were an integral part of Freemasonry in several Catholic countries.

Interesting, isn’t it, that we see this sort of thing welling up today in Germany? Muratori’s Aufklärungskatholizismus (Enlightenment Catholicism), as his German-speaking confreres called it (as only they can), would eventually be condemned. But at the time, Muratori’s emphasis on patristics was a welcome development, even as his insistence that temporal rulers and local bishops should be empowered to reform the Church without awaiting approval from Rome was unwelcome. Pius VI condemned this approach in Auctorem fidei (1794), itself a precursor of 19th- and 20th-century reassertions of Catholic orthodoxy and papal primacy.

Pius VI also fired a shot across the bow of Febronianism in Super soliditate petrae (1786), and yet the controversy of fluidity in doctrine and questioning of papal authority continued to simmer until the First Vatican Council answered the matter of papal authority in 1870’s Pastor aeternus, and Pius X shut down the entire liberal project in Pascendi Dominici gregis (1907).

Yet the celebration of individuality, nationalism, and modernity simply will not die. Some people reject wisdom because they didn’t think it up themselves. The Sacred Tradition and the Deposit of the Faith teach us that the Holy Spirit continuously guides the Church. But the careless evocations of the Spirit at the several synods on synodality were sacrilegious. Divine revelation, Scripture, and the lived tradition of the Church must guide us, and not what amounts to focus groups. We need no show of hands on the Ten Commandments.

So, Mozart certainly had his Enlightenment fling, but, Lord, have mercy, he ended where he belonged. Here’s the Kyrie from his Requiem (Mr. Bernstein with the baton again):

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