Pope Leo IX
Bishop of Toul (1026–49) | |
|---|---|
| Sainthood | |
| Feast day | 19 April |
| Venerated in | Catholic Church |
| Canonized | 1082 by Pope Gregory VII |
| Other popes named Leo | |
Pope Leo IX (21 June 1002 – 19 April 1054), born Bruno von Egisheim-Dagsburg, was the head of the
Leo IX favoured traditional morality in his reformation of the Catholic Church. One of his first public acts was to hold the
Early life
Bruno was born to Count
In 1017 Bruno became a
Bruno was a deacon in 1026 when Conrad set out for Italy to make his authority respected in that portion of his dominions, and as Herimann, Bishop of Toul, was too old to lead his contingent into the peninsula, he entrusted the command of it to Bruno. While he was thus in the midst of arms, Bishop Herimann died and Bruno was at once elected to succeed him. Conrad, who destined him for higher things, was loath to allow him to accept that insignificant see. But Bruno induced the emperor to permit him to take the see. Consecrated in 1027, Bruno administered the Diocese of Toul for over twenty years, during a time of stress and trouble.
Bruno became widely known as an earnest and reforming ecclesiastic by the zeal he showed in spreading the rule of the
Papacy
On the death of Pope Damasus II in 1048, Bruno was selected as his successor by an assembly at Worms in December. Both the emperor and the Roman delegates concurred. However, Bruno apparently favoured a canonical election and stipulated as a condition of his acceptance that he should first proceed to Rome and be freely elected by the voice of the clergy and people of Rome. Setting out shortly after Christmas, he met with abbot Hugh of Cluny at Besançon, where he was joined by the young monk Hildebrand, who afterwards became Pope Gregory VII; arriving in pilgrim garb at Rome in the following February, he was received with much cordiality, and at his consecration assumed the name Leo IX.[8]
Theology
Leo IX favoured celibacy for the clergy in his reformation of the Catholic Church. One of his first public acts was to hold the well-known Easter synod of 1049, at which celibacy of the clergy (down to the rank of subdeacon) was required anew. Also, the Easter synod was where the pope at least succeeded in making clear his own convictions against every kind of simony. The greater part of the year that followed was occupied by one of those progresses through Italy, Germany and France which form a marked feature in Leo IX's pontificate. After presiding over a synod at Pavia, he joined Henry III in Saxony and accompanied him to Cologne and Aachen. He also summoned a meeting of the higher clergy in Reims in which several important reforming decrees were passed. At Mainz he held a council at which the Italian and French as well as the German clergy were represented, and ambassadors of the Byzantine emperor were present. Here too, simony and the marriage of the clergy were the principal matters dealt with.[citation needed]
After his return to Rome, Leo held another
Relations with Constantinople
Patriarch Michael I Cerularius of Constantinople, through Leo of Ohrid, Archbishop of Bulgaria, wrote to the pope denouncing the use of unleavened bread and fasting days in the Latin Church. Leo IX sent a letter to Michael I in 1054, citing a large portion of the Donation of Constantine, believing it was genuine.[10]
Leo assured Michael that the donation was completely genuine, not a fable, so only the apostolic successor to Peter possessed that primacy and was the rightful head of all the Church. Before his death, Leo IX had sent a legatine mission under Cardinal Humbert of Silva Candida to Constantinople to negotiate with Patriarch Michael Cerularius in response to his actions concerning the Church in Constantinople.[11] Humbert quickly disposed of negotiations by delivering a bull excommunicating the Patriarch.[7] This act, although legally invalid due to the pope's death at the time, was answered by the patriarch's own bull of excommunication against Humbert and his associates and is popularly considered the official split between the Eastern and Western Churches. Afterwards, he closed down the Latin churches of Constantinople, stopped remembrance for the pope in the diptychs, and wrote letters to the other patriarchs against the pope. The patriarch of Antioch, Peter III, rejected most of Michael's accusations against Rome and urged him to compromise.[12] Despite this, the break began the Great East–West Schism.
Conflict with the Normans
In constant fear of attack from the
Selected works
- IX, Pope Saint Leo (15 August 2023). The Battle of the Virtues and Vices: Defending the Interior Castle of the Soul. TAN Books. ISBN 978-1505131741.
References
- ^ Coulombe, Charles A., Vicars of Christ: A History of the Popes, (Citadel Press, 2003), 204.
- ^ Butler, Alban, Butler's Lives of the Saints, (Liturgical Press, 2003), 176.
- ^ Robinson 2004, p. 99.
- ^ Ian Robinson, The papal reform of the eleventh century: Lives of Pope Leo IX and Pope Gregory VII (Manchester University Press, 2004), 99.
- ^ Barrow 2008, p. 56.
- ^ a b Mann, Horace. "Pope St. Leo IX." The Catholic Encyclopedia Vol. 9. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1910. 12 May 2019
This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
- ^ a b James R. Ginther, Humbert of Silva Candida, The Westminster Handbook to Medieval Theology (Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 89–91.
- ^ "Leo IX (Bruno von Egisheim und Dagsburg), Pope | Saints Resource". saintsresource.com. Retrieved 2020-07-07.
- ^ Lower 2014, p. 614.
- ^ Migne's Patrologia Latina, Vol. 143 (cxliii), Col. 744–769. Also Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum Nova Amplissima Collectio, Vol. 19 (xix) Col. 635–656.
- ^ Brett Edward Whalen, Dominion of God: Christendom and Apocalypse in the Middle Ages (Harvard University Press, 2009), p. 24.
- ^ Patriarch Peter of Antioch: Letter to Patriarch Michael Kerularios
- ^ Robert Bartlett, The Normans of the South, BBC TV
- ^ Theotokis 2014, p. 133.
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Leo (popes)/Leo IX". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
- . Catholic Encyclopedia. 1913.
Sources
- Barrow, Julia (2008). "Grades of Ordination and Clerical Careers, c. 900-c. 1200". In Lewis, C. P. (ed.). Anglo-Norman Studies XXX: Proceedings of the Battle Conference 2007. The Boydell Press. pp. 41–61.
- Lower, Michael (2014). "The Papacy and Christian Mercenaries of Thirteenth-Century North Africa". Speculum. 89 (3 July). The University of Chicago Press: 601–631. S2CID 154773840.
- Robinson, I.S., ed. (2004). The Papal Reform of the Eleventh Century: Lives of Pope Leo IX and Pope Gregory VII. Manchester University Press.
- Theotokis, Georgios (2014). Norman Campaigns in the Balkans, 1081–1108. The Boydell Press.
Further reading
- Migne's Patrologia Latina, Vol. 143 (cxliii), Leo IX Epistolae Et Decreta .pdf – 1.9 Mb. See Col. 744B-769D (pp. 76–89) for Leo IX's letter.
- Mansi's, Sacrorum Conciliorum Nova Amplissima Collection, Vol. 19 (xix) .pdf – 66 Mb. See Col. 635–656.
- Acta et scripta quae de controversiis ecclesiae Graecae et Latinae, by Dr. Cornelius Will, 1861. This book has the text of the letters relevant to the Great Schism of 1054. The Greek and Latin texts of the Schism was studied by Michele Giuseppe D'Agostino, Il Primato della Sede di Roma in Leone IX (1049–1054). Studio dei testi nella controversia greco-romana nel periodo gregoriano, Cinisello Balsamo 2008.
External links
Media related to Leo IX at Wikimedia Commons
Works by or about Leo IX at Wikisource
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