Born in
Arona, Fossati studied at the
seminary in
Novara before being
ordained to the
priesthood on 27 November 1898. He was
private secretary to
Edoardo Pulciano, the
Bishop of Novara, later the
Archbishop of Genoa, from 1901 to 1911, the year when Fossati entered the
Oblates of Saints Gaudentius and Charles of Novara, a
society of apostolic life of priests of the diocese. Fossati then did
pastoral work in Novara until 1914. After serving as a military
chaplain during
World War I, he was made
superior of his Society in
Varallo Sesia in 1919. On 24 March 1924, Fossati was appointed
Bishop of Nuoro by
Pope Pius XI. He received his
episcopal consecration on the following 27 April from Archbishop
Giuseppe Gamba, and was then
Apostolic Administrator of
Ogliastra from 1925 to 1927. Fossati was later named
Archbishop of Sassari on 2 October 1929, and
archbishop of Turin on 11 December 1930. Pope Pius created him
Cardinal-Priest of
San Marcello al Corso in the
consistory of 13 March 1933. Fossati was one of the
cardinal electors who participated in the
1939 papal conclave (at which he was considered
papabile) which selected
Pope Pius XII, and again
voted in the
1958 conclave, resulting in the election of
Pope John XXIII. During
World War II, the Cardinal was an outspoken
opponent of Fascism, and asked that Catholics take
Jewish refugees and Gypsies into their homes. Fossati convinced the
German Army to avoid
Turin, thus sparing the city from devastation, in its 1945
retreat. Sister
Giuseppina De Muro, who has been named
Righteous Among the Nations by Israel's holocaust remembrance group,
Yad Vashem, wrote to him of the horrors at Le Nuove prison in Turin, and Father
Ruggero Cipolla followed with a letter of his own, corroborating her claims. Sister De Muro eventually saved over 500 Jewish people from being shipped to Nazi concentration camps, although Cardinal Fossati's actual role in the success of the efforts, if any, is unknown. From 1962 to 1965, he attended the
Second Vatican Council, and then served as an
elector at the
conclave of 1963, which selected
Pope Paul VI. Cardinal Fossati died from pneumonia in Turin, at age 88. He was initially buried at the chapel in the Seminary of
Rivoli, but his remains were transferred to the
Santuario della Consolata in 1977. ==See also==