Skip to main content

Connection #9 - Pope Paschal II to Henry V



Succeeded Urban II, and reigned from 13 Aug., 1099, till he died at Rome, 21 Jan., 1118. Born in central Italy, he was received at an early age as a monk in Cluny. In his twentieth year he was sent on business of the monastery to Rome, and was retained at the papal court by Gregory VII, and made Cardinal-Priest of St. Clement's church. It was in this church that the conclave met after the death of Pope Urban, and Cardinal Rainerius was the unanimous choice of the sacred college. He protested vigorously against his election, maintaining, with some justice, that his monastic training had not fitted him to deal with the weighty problems which confronted the papacy in that troublous age. His protestations were disregarded by his colleagues, and he was consecrated the following day in St. Peter's. Once pope, he betrayed no further hesitation and wielded the sceptre with a firm and prudent grasp. The main lines of his policy had been laid by the master minds of Gregory and Urban, in whose footsteps he faithfully followed, while the unusual length of his pontificate, joined to a great amiability of character, made his reign an important factor in the development of the medievalpapal dominion. Urban II had lived to witness the complete success of his wonderful movement for the liberation of the Holy Land and the defence of Christendom. He had died a fortnight after Jerusalem fell into the hands of the crusaders.

If it were ever unpresumptuous to trace the retributive justice of God in the destiny of one man, it might be acknowledged in the humiliation of Pope Paschal II. by the Emperor Henry V. The Pope, by his continual sanction, if not by direct advice, had trained the young Emperor in his inordinate ambition and his unscrupulous avidity for power. He had not rebuked his shameless perfidy or his revolting cruelty ; he had absolved him from thrice-sworn oaths; he had released him from the great irrepealable obligations of nature and the divine law. A rebel against his sovereign and his father was not likely, against his own interests or passions, to be a dutiful son or subject of his mother the Church, or of his spiritual superiors. If Paschal suffered the result of his own lessons, if he was driven from his capital, exposed to personal sufferings so great and menacing as to compel him to submit to the hardest terms which the Emperor chose to dictate, he had not much right to compassion. Paschal is almost the only later Pope who was reduced to the degrading necessity of being disclaimed by the clergy, of being forced to retract his own impeccable decrees, of being taunted in his own day with heresy, and abandoned as a feeble traitor to the rights of the Church by the dexterous and unscrupulous apologists of almost every act of the Papal See.

History of Latin christianity: Including that of the popes to the ..., Volume 3By Henry Hart Milman

When Henry V advanced with an army into Italy in order to be crowned, the Pope agreed to a compact (February 1111), by the terms of which the Church should surrender all the possessions and royalties it had received of the empire and kingdom of Italy since the days of Charlemagne (768–814), while Henry V on his side should renounce lay investiture. Preparations were made for the coronation on 12 February 1111, but the Romans rose in revolt against him, and the German king retired taking the Pope and curia with him.

Wikipedia

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Depression

your thoughts – clemmed, treacle slow, laden with seams of pit shaft dark – tread an endless groove, blinkered as a pit prop pony moithered by light your mind – dimmed, dunnock shy, cradled with songs of wind swept moors – dreams a fearless path clinkered as a wind squall diamond mantled with night your self – numbed, fossil still, layered with seals of sun starved gold – furls a nubless cloth crinkled as a sun coaxed rock rose ambered in time. by Helen Overell

Ley Lines #1

The concept of "ley lines" is generally thought of in relation to Alfred Watkins, but the stimulus and background for the concept is attributed to the English astronomer Norman Lockyer . [3] [4] [5] On 30 June 1921, Watkins visited Blackwardine in Herefordshire , and went riding a horse near some hills in the vicinity of Bredwardine , when he noted that many of the footpaths there seemed to connect one hilltop to another in a straight line. [6] He was studying a map when he noticed places in alignment. "The whole thing came to me in a flash", he later told his son. [7] It has been suggested that Watkin's experience stemmed from faint memories of an account in September 1870 by William Henry Black given to the British Archaeological Association in Hereford titled Boundaries and Landmarks , in which he speculated that "Monuments exist marking grand geometrical lines which cover the whole of Western Europe". [8] Watkins believed that, in ancie

Extinct Promotion

My story "Connect" was published last year in the anthology "Extinct Doesn't Mean Forever," edited by the formidable Phoenix Sullivan. On Tuesday, January 31, you can download the entire anthology Extinct Doesn't Mean Forever free from the Kindle store.  On both Tuesday and Wednesday, you can download each of the 18 single stories for free, including my story, Connect . By any reasonable measure we are dead. Unity -- slow, cold and broken -- is leaving me behind. It’s a slowly boiling mass of speckled gray now. I’m walking away from it, building, understanding, memorizing as I go. And to do these things, to tie them together, I use my memories. Of being alive, of dying, of being dead. Other authors in the anthology are participating in this promotion: Chrystalla Thoma: "The Angel Genome"  Peter Dudley: "Distractions" Shona Snowden: "Blood Fruit"  Scott Thomas Smith: "In Ring" Jo Antareau: "My Own