Editing Girolamo Savonarola (section)

=== 19th century ===
In the mid-nineteenth century, the "New Piagnoni" found inspiration in the friar's writings and sermons for the Italian national awakening known as the [[Risorgimento]]. By emphasising his political activism over his puritanism and cultural conservatism they restored Savonarola's voice for radical political change. The venerable pre-Reformation icon ceded to the fiery Renaissance reformer. This somewhat anachronistic image, fortified by much new scholarship, informed the major new biography by [[Pasquale Villari]], who regarded Savonarola's preaching against Medici despotism as the model for the Italian struggle for liberty and national unification.<ref>Pasquale Villari, ''The Life and Times of Girolamo Savonarola'' trans. by Linda Villari 2 vols (New York, 1890).</ref> In Germany, the Catholic theologian and church historian [[Joseph Schnitzer]] edited and published contemporary sources which illuminated Savonarola's career. In 1924 he crowned his vast research with a comprehensive study of Savonarola's life and times in which he presented the friar as the last best hope of the Catholic Church before the catastrophe of the Protestant Reformation.<ref>Joseph Schnitzer, ''Savonarola Ein Kulturbild aus der Zeit der Renaissance'' 2 vols (Munich, 1924); Italian translation ''Savonarola'' trans. Ernesto Rutili 2 vols (Milan, 1931). No English translation.</ref> In the [[Italian People's Party (1919)|Italian People's Party]] founded by Don [[Luigi Sturzo]] in 1919, Savonarola was revered as a champion of social justice, and after 1945 he was held up as a model of reformed Catholicism by leaders of the [[Christian Democracy (Italy)|Christian Democratic Party]]. From this milieu, in 1952 came the third of the major Savonarola biographies, the ''Vita di Girolamo Savonarola'' by Roberto Ridolfi.<ref>Roberto Ridolfi, ''Vita di Girolamo Savonarola'' 6th ed. with additional notes by Armando F. Verde O.P. (Florence, 1981.)</ref> For the next half century Ridolfi was the guardian of the friar's saintly memory as well as the dean of Savonarola research which he helped grow into a scholarly industry. Today, most of Savonarola's treatises and sermons and many of the contemporary sources (chronicles, diaries, government documents, and literary works) are available in critical editions. 

The present-day Church has considered his [[beatification]].<ref>Innocenzo Venchi, O.P. "Iniziative dell'Ordine Domenicano per promuovere la causa di beatificazione del Ven. fra Girolamo Savonarola O.P.," ''Studi Savonaroliani Verso il V centenario'' ed. Gian Carlo Garfagnini (Florence, 1996) pp. 93–97</ref>

The Polish National Catholic Church, a reform movement in Catholicism, named its Theological Seminary after Savonarola.<ref>{{cite web |url= https://www.savonarola.net |title= Savonarola Theological Seminary of the Polish National Catholic Church|publisher= Polish National Catholic Church |access-date= 6 April 2025}}</ref>