1922 | Religion
Religion
Pope Benedict XV dies of pneumonia at Rome January 22 at age 67 after a 7½-year reign in which he has codified Church law, persuaded Swiss officials to admit soldiers suffering from tuberculosis, instituted a missing persons bureau to reestablish contacts between soldiers and their families, and given away so much in alms that the Vatican has to borrow the wherewithal to bury him. Having tried to maintain neutrality during the Great War despite pro-Austrian sentiment in the College of Cardinals, Benedict XV has attempted in vain to mediate conflict, and he was excluded from the peace talks at Versailles in 1919. Benedict is succeeded by Milan's Achille Archbishop Ratti, 64, who will reign until 1939 as Pius XI. The century-old Society for the Propagation of the Faith moves its headquarters from France to Rome and is reorganized by the new pontiff, who makes it the chief fund-raising and distribution agency for all Roman Catholic missions.
The Society for the Advancement of Judaism is founded by Lithuanian-born New York rabbi-theologian Mordecai Menahem Kaplan, 41, who teaches at the Jewish Theological Seminary and whose group will advance the "Reconstructionist" idea that Judaism is an "evolving religious civilization" whose theological elements are no more important than its cultural aspects. Rabbi Kaplan introduces the bas (bat) mitzvah ceremony, and his daughter Judith becomes the first bas mitzvah. Used primarily in Conservative congregations, the rite will also be used to some extent in Orthodox synagogues and Reform temples, signifying an increase in young women's education and their broader role outside the home.
Onetime Pentacostal Church leader William J. Seymour dies of a heart attack at Los Angeles September 18 at age 52; liberal Protestant theologian Lyman Abbott at New York October 22 at age 86.