We’re kicking off the third season of our spinoff podcast with something timely: the story of a new pope.
Only this pope was different from the ones we know in this time, seeing as how he exhumed his predecessor’s remains and put them on trial for heresy.
This was Pope Stephen VI, who reigned all the way back in 896.
Back then, popes often came from, and were chosen by, prominent families in Italian cities.
But because these families and their supporters spent lots of time and money feuding over politics, the popes they chose were weak, or corrupt, or both.
Few of them lasted long in the job and quite a few met with untimely, violent ends.
Stephen was part of one of these family-led factions; he succeeded Pope Formosus, who was part of a rival group.
Often times, leaders who disagree with the last administration just change course and adopt different policies.
But some people just really want to prove they’re better at the job than the last guy.
Which is why Stephen ordered up a heresy trial now known as the Cadaver Synod.
The church disinterred the physical remains of a dead pope, dressed them up in formal robes and put them on the throne, where the dead pope’s successor prosecuted the decaying body.
You will not be surprised to hear that the late pope did not mount a defense; he did have a deacon to serve as his official defender, but that guy reportedly didn’t jump at the chance to contradict his boss.
Though it’s said an earthquake struck in the middle of the trial, as if an almighty power was casting judgment on those trying to cast judgment.
Not that this stopped them: the very one-sided trial found Pope Formosus guilty of being a heretic and a usurper.
All of his acts as pope were declared null and void, Stephen VI’s people cut off the three fingers the dead pope had used to carry out some of those acts, and then they threw the rest of his body in the Tiber River, long used as a final resting place for all sorts of ne’er do wells and unmentionables.
But the pope who’d put his dead rival on trial ended up faring just as badly: after just over a year in power, Stephen VI’s rivals threw him in jail and strangled him, and later popes condemned his sham trial and undid some of his papal acts.
They even reburied what was left of Formosus at St. Peter’s Basilica.
Another story of the recently departed in the world of the living: back in 2012, a Swedish woman was on a plane to Tanzania when another passenger died, and the only open spot to put the body was the seat next to hers.
She handled the situation better than I would’ve, saying, “Of course it was unpleasant, but I am not a person who makes a fuss.”
The Cadaver Synod: Putting a Dead Pope on Trial (JSTOR)
“I Am Not A Person Who Makes A Fuss,” Says Woman Who Sat Next To Dead Guy On 10-Hour Flight (BradyCarlson.com)
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Image via Wikicommons
