Pope Benedict IX: very young, often enthroned

Theophyl­ac­t­us of Tusculum (c1020–c1056) became the youngest pope ever as Pope Benedict IX. The date of his birth was uncer­t­ain but his first papacy definitely started in 1032. Benedict was great-grandson of Marozia, a powerful Roman polit­ician who ?was mist­ress of Pope Sergius III. Via Mar­ozia, Sergius possibly sired Pope John IX. Several of Mar­ozia's descendants became popes, and Ben­edict's immediate predecessors were his loved unc­les Popes Bened­ict VIII and John XIX.  His father was Holy Roman Emperor Alberic. This was arguably the most power­ful Italian family, enabling the family to control the papacy for a century! 

                                          

Pope Benedict IX, c1030 

Hulton Archive

The Catholic Encyclopaedia said Benedict was c20 years old when he became pontiff. But the closest source to the pope himself was the monk-historian Rod­ulfus Glaber (985-1047). He was a critic of Benedict, but still he was one of the few contemp­or­ary sources available. He said the pope was 12 in 1032, the time of his accession! As did med­ieval scholar F Donald Logan, who wrote about Benedict IX in A History of the Church in the Middle Ages.

In terms of theology and activities of the Church, he was entirely orthodox. But Benedict was accused of sodomy, best­ial­ity and homo­sexuality; he was said to have held orgies inside Lat­eran Palace. Clois­tered monk St Peter Dam­ian was horrified and wrote a treat­ise ag­ain­st all sex, especially homosex­ual­ity. Damian’s Book of Gom­orrah said it had been ramp­ant within the Catholic Church for centuries.

Benedict was also accused by Bishop Benno of Piacenza of many ad­ul­t­eries and murders. As did Pope Victor III in his Book of Dial­og­ues. But Benedict came up with one sin that no one before or since has repl­icated: selling the papacy!

The first trouble came in 1036 when political oppon­ents tried to murder Bene­dict in St Peter's Basilica Rome during mass. But Ger­man Emp­eror Conrad II restored him to power before long, and Benedict stay­ed in Rome until 1045. In those years, he continued to steal and murd­er; fed up with him, the people of Rome again drove him out.

When Ben­edict was ousted, his enemies replaced him with the Bishop of Sabina, Pope Sylvester III. But it took only 2 months for Bened­ict IX to re-invade Rome with force, depose Sylvester and re­turn to pow­er again. Amaz­ing­ly Bened­ict allowed Sylvester to return safely to his old diocese, but Sylvester was later declared an anti-pope.

Benedict IX enjoyed his second papacy for c2 months, and then abdic­ated because his godfather arch­priest John Gratian gave him heaps of money. Bened­ict IX had really wanted to marry his cousin and decided he would finan­ce his new life by selling his pontificate to Gratian.

Benedict's tomb in the monastery, died at 35.
All That's Interesting

Grat­ian was a better choice for pope than his god­son. After sealing the deal, Gratian became Pope Greg­ory VI in May 1045. This deal annoyed Syl­vester III who imm­ediately sought to reinstate his own papacy. Gregory had bank­rupt­ed the church in buying out Benedict, so he couldn’t fight off a new claimant. His papacy lasted about as long as Sylv­ester's, but this time it took longer for Benedict to return to power.

Rome’s clergy broke into 3 factions, each supporting 1 claimant (Pope Gregory, Benedict, ex-Pope Sy­l­vester). So Henry III King of Germany & Burgundy invaded Rome and intervened. He met the candid­ates outside Rome in Dec 1046. King Henry wanted to resolve the crisis, so that the legit­im­ate new pope could quickly crown him as the Holy Roman Emperor.

But the Emperor had Sutri Council dismiss all 3 of them. Syl­vester tried to fight for his claim so he was sentenced to life imprisonment. Pope Gregory admitted he was in above his skill-level and resign­ed. Even though Benedict was assured of the support of the libert­ine fact­ion, the young man didn’t show up for the pro­c­eedings and was deposed. So King Henry's selected Bishop Sugier of Bam­berg to become Pope Clement II at Christmas 1046. In return Clement quickly crowned King Henry III as Holy Roman Emperor.

Pope Clement II died mysteriously in Oct 1047, af­ter serving only 11 months as Pope. So Benedict seized the Lateran Palace in Nov 1047, and again installed him­self on the papal throne. But Benedict was driven away by Henry III's German troops in July 1048 who installed Pope Damasus II (July-Aug 1048) instead. Damasus died a month later from ?malaria.

Even after one of the shortest pap­ac­ies in history, Benedict IX did NOT go for a fourth papal term. Emperor Henry III returned to Rome and made Leo IX pope (1049-54), the man who ruled for 6 years and brought stability to the pap­acy. Leo finally put an end to Bened­ict's aspir­at­ions! Benedict retired to a monastery near Rome where he repented and soon died, at only c36 years old.

Emperor Henry III at the Synod of Sutri, 
rejecting all three contenders for pope. 
Hulton Archive 

Conclusion 
What a story! Benedict’s father got the Papal chair for him in Oct 1032. Benedict had three terms as pope: 1] from his election to his expul­sion for Sylvester III (Oct 1032–Sept 1044); 2] from his return to his sel­ling the papacy to Gregory VI (Apr–May 1045); and 3] from his return post-Clement II to Damasus II (Nov 1047–July 1048)'s start. He ruled during a tumultuous church era with 7 diff­erent, rapid papacies, the only man to have been Pope more than once.

Note the close subordination of pope to German emperor. In fact the ful­filment of the emperor’s supreme duty was to watch over the welfare of the ch­urch; the emperor was the representative of St Peter on earth. Thus the 962-1046 era saw the empire at its zenith and the papacy much weaker.

Thank you to Luciano Anastasi for The Tale of Benedict IX: A Papacy for Sale.