St. Gregory VII

St. Gregory VII (born c. 1025, near Sovana, Papal States—died May 25, 1085, Salerno, Principality of Salerno; canonized 1606; feast day, May 25) was one of the greatest popes of the medieval church, who lent his name to the 11th-century movement now known as the Gregorian Reform or Investiture Controversy. Gregory VII was the first pope to depose a crowned ruler, Emperor Henry IV (1056–1105/06). With this revolutionary act, Gregory translated his personal religious and mystical convictions regarding the role of the papacy into direct action in the world at large. He was canonized by Pope Paul V in 1606, but until 1728 his feast was limited to Sovana, his most likely place of birth, and Salerno, where the 900th anniversary of his death was celebrated in the presence of Pope John Paul II in 1985.

Early life

He was born Hildebrand in about 1025, probably in southern Tuscany, to an upper-middle-class family with possible connections to Rome. In one of the few personal recollections in his papal letters—preserved in the original register in the Archivio Segreto (“Secret Archives”) of the Vatican—he recalled growing up in the Roman church under the special protection of St. Peter, “Prince of the Apostles.” He attended the palace school at the Lateran with Roman nobles before continuing his education among the canons of San Giovanni a Porta Latina, a collegiate church next to the Lateran basilica and palace. One of his teachers there was Archbishop Lawrence (Laurentius) of Amalfi, who was famed for his knowledge of both Greek and Latin, and the head of the community was the archpriest John Gratian, the future Pope Gregory VI (1045–46). Hildebrand served as one of his chaplains (acolytes) and accompanied him into exile at Cologne (now in Germany) after the pope had been deposed for simony (paying money for ecclesiastical office) at the Council of Sutri in December 1046. (Gratian or, more likely, his supporters allegedly had used bribes to secure his election.) Hildebrand completed his studies at Cologne’s famous cathedral school and among its canons (clergy and priests associated with an archbishop or bishop) before returning to Rome in early 1049 after the death of Gregory VI, in the company of Bruno of Toul, the future Pope Leo IX (1049–54).

Traditionally, historians have assumed that Hildebrand was a monk. The only question seemed to be whether he became a monk in Rome or later, during his exile on a possible visit to the famous abbey of Cluny in Burgundy (region of present-day France). The latter theory, based on the writings of a younger contemporary and enthusiastic supporter, Bonizo of Sutri, has been shown to be completely untenable, as has the notion that the young Hildebrand became a monk in Rome at the monastery of St. Mary on the Aventine, where an uncle was supposedly abbot. This theory also rests on a single source, the hagiographic vita by Paul of Bernried, a later admirer of Gregory. Writing in the 1120s, a generation after Gregory’s death, Paul set out to edify his audience rather than to report facts, and the vita is riddled with very obvious errors. Gregory VII himself wrote that he was a canon at both the Lateran basilica and at Cologne. St. Mary’s is never mentioned by him. It seems unlikely that Hildebrand was a monk, and the distinction between canon and monk is significant because the reform undertaken by the regular canons was in the vanguard of the ecclesiastical revival that sought to restore the glory and austerity of the early Christian church as pictured by churchmen in the 11th century. These ideas deeply influenced Gregory’s worldview.

After Hildebrand’s return to Rome in 1049, although he had not yet reached the age of 30 required for the priesthood, he became a collaborator of Pope Leo IX, who ordained him subdeacon and named him rector (administrator) of the Benedictine abbey of San Paolo Fuori le Mura in 1050. Hildebrand revered Leo like a father, and Leo later distinguished his protégé by awarding him the unusual title of cardinal subdeacon, signifying Hildebrand’s closeness to the Holy See. Hildebrand served the papacy as legate in France (in 1054 at Tours and in 1056 at Chalon-sur-Saône), at the imperial court in Germany (1054/55 and 1057/58), and briefly in Italy at Milan (1057). Emperor Henry III held him in high esteem, and under Leo’s successor, Pope Victor II (1055–57), Hildebrand served in the papal chancery, as his signatures under papal privileges (grants of special favour) show. During the pontificates of Stephen IX (1057–58), Nicholas II (1059–61), and Alexander II (1061–73), Hildebrand developed into a leading figure at the papal court.

In the fall of 1058, Hildebrand was made archdeacon of the Roman church and was characterized by Peter Damian as an “unmovable column [support] of the apostolic see.” As archdeacon, he was a chief participant in the first papal coronation with a crown-mitre, which symbolized the papal claim to sovereignty over the church and the secular monarchies. The theory undergirding this aspect of the ceremony was that of the forged Donation of Constantine, an 8th-century document that figured prominently in the new canonical collections that were compiled at that time in Rome and elsewhere. The document claimed that Constantine granted to the pope spiritual authority over the church and temporal dominion over the Western Roman Empire. In his new position Hildebrand also actively furthered the papal alliance with the Normans of southern Italy and their principal leaders, including Robert Guiscard, who became a papal vassal. Hildebrand supported William the Conqueror’s invasion of England in 1066, and, because his obligations as archdeacon also included judicial and financial duties, he began to build up armed groups of papal supporters known as the militia of St. Peter (Latin: milites Petri). At the same time, he was most sympathetic toward the reform efforts of the Patarines, as one of the factions among the citizens of Milan was known. This group fought against simony and clerical marriage, two vices that reformers believed occurred frequently among the higher clergy of the city of Milan. Because the higher clergy of the city were closely related to the leading noble families governing Milan, the Patarines’ uprising took on social-revolutionary overtones as well. Hildebrand also took the side of the hermit-monks of Vallombrosa who had rioted against the bishop of Florence, whom they accused of simony.

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Important information concerning Hildebrand’s time as archdeacon is provided by a manuscript fragment that records, at least partially, some of the discussions in Rome at the time of the great Lateran Council of April/May 1059. Much of the text comprises an address to the assembly in which Hildebrand harshly criticized the Aachen Rule for Canons ratified under Emperor Louis the Pious (814–840) at the Aachen council of 816. He pointed out in particular that this rule permitted canons to own private property and was thus in conflict with the declarations of the ancient Church Fathers and popes. Hildebrand asserted that canons should lead strictly regulated lives in common, imitating Christ’s Apostles (vita apostolica), and renounce all personal property when admitted to a community of regular canons. In short, the living arrangements of canons were to be scarcely distinguishable from those of monks. Contemporary manuscripts of the Aachen Rule, primarily from Rome and the vicinity, are evidence of Hildebrand’s success at the council, for they omit the objectionable passages concerning private property and add texts from the Benedictine Rule for monks.