Carlo Odescalchi (5 March 1785 – 17 August 1841) was an Italian prince and priest, Archbishop of Ferrara, cardinal of the Catholic Church and Vicar General of the Diocese of Rome. For years a close collaborator of popes Pius VII and Gregory XVI, in 1838 he renounced his titles in order to become a Jesuit.
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Early life
A great-great-great-grandnephew of Benedetto Odescalchi, who reigned as Pope Innocent XI from 1676 until 1689, Carlo was born in Rome, the second son of the noble Baldassare Odescalchi, 3rd Prince of the Holy Roman Empire Odescalchi and 3rd Duke of Bracciano, Syrmia in the Kingdom of Slavonia and Ceri, and his wife Valeria Caterina Giustiniani of the Princes of Bassano, who also belonged to a family of nobles.
Carlo was first educated at home by his father, but from 1798 to 1800 studied in a seminary in Hungary, where the family lived for a time in exile after fleeing from the invading armies of the French First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte. He had received the clerical tonsure in 1797 and was eventually ordained to the priesthood on 31 December 1808, celebrating his first Mass on the next day, 1 January. Having completed higher studies in Italy, in 1809 he was awarded a doctorate in utroque iure (both canon and civil law). After becoming acquainted with Joseph Pignatelli and subsequent to Pope Pius VII's restoration of the Society of Jesus, he planned on entering the Society and was given preliminary acceptance but gave up the attempt due to the resistance of his sister Vittoria, who desperately sought to live near her brother. Pius VII himself agreed with Vittoria and promised Carlo that he could enter at a more appropriate time, but after Vittoria's marriage three years later, Pius decided to keep Carlo and appointed him papal auditor.