Adrian V

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I have read in several places that Pope Adrian V (1276) was never ordained a priest. Is that possible? If so, how?
 
Yep, gimme sources.

It’s garbage anyway. Look here.

He was a Cardinal which means that he was a priest.

He was Pope for just over a month.
 
I was actually told by a seminarian, who is a Deacon, that any Catholic male can become pope. Not just a Priest or Bishop.
 
victus said:
I was actually told by a seminarian, who is a Deacon, that any Catholic male can become pope. Not just a Priest or Bishop.
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I think that is also true, but it doesn’t apply in this case. 🙂
 
victus said:
I was actually told by a seminarian, who is a Deacon, that any Catholic male can become pope. Not just a Priest or Bishop.
Click to expand...
That’s true in theory. But if a lay Catholic would be elected as Pope he would have to be Ordained.
 
Sorry that I messed up the last reply. I am new at this.

One source is The North British Review, December 1866, p. 166. You can read this on-line in Google books. De Rosa also mentions it in Vicars of Christ on p. 49. See also the * New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia* books.google.com/books?id=8UpvrnKq-m8C&pg=PA54&dq=%22priest%22+%22Adrian+V%22 vol. 1, p. 54. If you Google “Adrian V” and “priest,” you will find plenty of other (mostly Protestant) sources.

Why would anyone think that this was all garbage? I find the details of papal history fascinating.

One certainly does NOT need to be a priest in order to become a cardinal. Until the last few centuries most cardinals were only deacons. Two cardinals were only eight years old when they received their red hats!

Many men were not priests at the time that they were elected or appointed pope. I could easily name a dozen. The normal process was for them to go through several days of ceremonies until they reached the rank of pope. This trend started in the tenth century. I may be wrong, but I think that John XI was the first who was consecrated without going through the “interstices,” the prescribed waiting periods between ranks. Ironically, this was one of the rules that Pope Nicholas I accused Patriarch Photius of violating about 80 years earlier.

I am not saying that any other popes were not priests, but it appears that this one may have somehow received the tiara and the pallium without being ordained. I suspect that those around him thought that he was too weak for the ceremonies, but somehow he was able to issue papal decrees without them. I have yet to find any material that described what actually happened in the weeks between Adrian’s election and his untimely death.
 
Wave said:
I have read in several places that Pope Adrian V (1276) was never ordained a priest. Is that possible? If so, how?
Click to expand...
Actually, Wave, I looked into it and I think you might be right. At least it’s possible. I haven’t really done any big research but according to few sites I checked (including Wikipedia) he was a Cardinal Deacon when he was elected to papacy. Until 1918 it was actually entirely possible to be a Cardinal with Holy Orders. Since he died 5 weeks after his election he was not ordained.

So yes, I guess Adrian V was never a Bishop of Rome and thus **technically **was never a Pope. They still include him because he was elected.
 
Wave said:
I have read in several places that Pope Adrian V (1276) was never ordained a priest. Is that possible? If so, how?
Click to expand...

That’s right.​

He was elected in 1276 - which like 1978 was a year of three Popes - & when elected he was still a layman. He died a month later, before there was time for him to receive priestly ordination. There was not at that time any canonical requirement for a cardinal to be a cleric: Cardinal Antonelli, who was Pius IX’s Secretary of State, was a layman when he died in 1876.

Another thing to remember is that, although since Vatican II the Roman Rite has had the three orders of:
  • bishops
  • priests
  • deacons
    this was not the case previously - there used to be seven orders, rather than three: which is why there are subdeacons (for instance) among those Catholics who serve at the pre-conciliar form of the Mass, & no subdeacons for the rest of us. The seven orders were reduced to three in 1972; four were of purely ecclesiastical origin, whereas the three listed above are held to be of Divine institution.
The relevance of this to Adrian V is that between the reception of one order & another there had (& has) to be a decent interval; one could not go from being a layman to being a bishop all in a day or two. (The ordination of the layman Ambrose of Milan in 374 as a bishop was very unusual.) So a layman elected Pope would have to take time in being advanced from one order to another; the Pope-elect died before he had time to be ordained to the priesthood.

I hope that explains things 🙂
 
Gottle_of_Geer said:

That’s right.​

He was elected in 1276 - which like 1978 was a year of three Popes.

…

So a layman elected Pope would have to take time in being advanced from one order to another; the Pope-elect died before he had time to be ordained to the priesthood.
Click to expand...
Actually there were four popes in 1276: Gregory X, Innocent V, Adrian V, and John XXI, and Pope John only made it to 1277.

As I mentioned, the interstices were indeed respected in Rome at least through the time of Pope Nicholas I, who excommunicated Patriarch Photius I in 863 for failing to recognize them (along with about a dozen other charges). However, things must have changed dramatically shortly thereafter. Pope John XIX reportedly became a priest, bishop, and pope in one day in 1024. As late as 1513 Pope Leo X needed only five days for the same ceremonies. Since Adrian V is almost exactly halfway between these two popes, I doubt that the interstices explain his failure to undergo the ceremonies.

The priest who formerly was called Pope Stephen III was elected to the papacy in 752, but he never was made a bishop. He died three days after his election. So, being elected is not a sufficient criterion for making the list.

Adrian V is, to my knowledge, the only person who is still considered a pope who never went through ANY ceremonies. He is known for repealing the bull on conclaves issued by Pope Gregory X. How he could do this without being consecrated as Bishop of Rome is still mysterious to me.
 
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Actually, until the last 40 years or so, there were laymen in the College of Cardinals.
 
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