Pope St. Saint Gregory VII

by Jean Crete

ON MAY 25. we celebrate the ninth centenary of the death of the great Pope St. Gregory VII. We do not know exactly when he was born; the place was Sovana in Tuscany [central Italy]; his name was Hildebrand—a name of non-Italian origin and apparently having some reference to fire [it is probably of Lombard origin]. He made his studies at Rome. Confronting the general moral corruption of his day—as much on the part of the clergy as the laity—he had the same reaction as did St. Benedict in the sixth century. He decided to flee from the world and entered the Abbey of Cluny, which at that time was at the height of its glory. There he distinguished himself to such an extent that he was elected prior while still quite young. His reputation reached Rome. Pope Gregory VI called him to Rome to reform the Abbey of St. Paul's-Outside-the-Walls, which was suffering from a relaxation of its rule. Hildebrand re-established regular monastic discipline, and Gregory VI made him his counselor for Church affairs. Pope St. Leo IX, on his election to the papal throne in 1048, named Hildebrand a cardinal and archdeacon of the Roman Church. From then on Hildebrand was prominent in Church government. St. Peter Damian, who had so well counseled previous popes, recognized in Hildebrand the man raised up by God to continue his work.

The clergy of the time were suffering from two evils: simony, i.e., buying and selling Church offices; and nicolaism, i.e., concubinage. Hildebrand saw that the source of these evils was the interference of the secular princes in the selection of bishops and other ecclesiastical dignitaries. St. Leo IX held a series of councils—at Rome, at Pavia, at Mainz and at Reims—to condemn simony and nicolaism. He sent Hildebrand to the Council of Tours in 1054 to condemn the heresy of Berengarius, who denied the Real Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist. The same year, Michael Cerularius made the Greek schism permanent. The following year Leo IX died. Hildebrand helped elect as the new pope Gebhard of Eichstadt, who took the name Victor II, and supported him in his work in defense of the freedom of the Church. When Victor II died in 1057, Hildebrand helped to elect Frederick of Lorraine, who took the name Stephen IX but died the next year. A cabal then elected an anti-pope, John Mincius, who took the name Benedict X. St. Peter Damian and Hildebrand opposed him and helped to elect Gerard of Florence, who became Nicholas II and allied himself with Robert Guiscard, Count of Poilles and Calabria. At the Council of Rome in 1059, Nicholas II published the bull reserving to cardinals the election of the pope. At the death of Nicholas II, Hildebrand helped to elect Anselm of Lucca, who took the name Alexander II. King Henry IV of Germany tried to impose an anti-pope, Cadalous, who took the name Honorius II and tried in vain to seize Rome. The failure of the attempt persuaded Henry IV to abandon his anti-pope, and to recognize Alexander II. Alexander in his turn excommunicated Henry's counselors, and for the twelve years of his pontificate (1061-1073) worked tirelessly at the task of reform of the clergy with the help of the faithful Hildebrand.

Four times Hildebrand had been influential in getting a pope elected whom he judged best for the Church, yet himself avoiding the formidable responsibility of the supreme pontificate. But the day after Alexander II's death, the cry went up in Rome: "Hildebrand for pope!" The cardinals joined in the wish of the faithful and the Roman clergy and on April 22, 1073, Hildebrand was unanimously elected pope by acclamation. He took the name Gregory VII in memory of Gregory VI, who had called him to Rome.

The pontificate of St. Gregory VII was to be one long struggle for the freedom of the Church and the reform of the clergy. The monks helped him considerably in this task, for if the secular clergy was deeply corrupt, the monasteries were at that time at the height of their fervor. St. Hugh, who had been abbot of Cluny for twenty-five years when Gregory VII ascended the papal throne, was destined to remain at his post for another thirty-five years and founded monasteries in France, England, Germany, Italy and Spain. The congregation at Cluny was the army of the pope and the mainstay of the Church. It was during the pontificate of St. Gregory VII that the Grande Chartreuse was founded and also the Congregation of Vallombrosa. The Pope had excellent assistants, above all Hugh of Flavigny. But his most valuable helper was Mathilda, Countess of Tuscany; she gave the Church part of her estates; the lands thus donated by the Countess remained part of the papal domain until 1860. Her unshakable loyalty to St. Gregory VII contributed in large part to preventing the king of Germany from marching on Rome. At the Roman Council of 1074, Gregory passed the severest measures against evil-living clerics. These measures were well received in Spain and Italy but stirred up violent opposition in England and France—and especially in Germany. Far from backing down, Gregory called a new council in Rome in February 1075, and there declared absolutely forbidden the investiture of clerics by secular princes. The king of Germany, Henry IV, at first pretended to submit: to become emperor he had to be consecrated by the pope, something that had never been done by a legitimate pope. He had therefore no right to call himself emperor. Faced with the inflexible will of St. Gregory VII, he tried on December 25, 1075, to kidnap the pope. The attempt failed, and Gregory summoned Henry to Rome to furnish an explanation. Henry's response was to convene a council at Worms in January 1076 to declare the Pope deposed. St. Gregory VII then excommunicated Henry IV and released his subjects from their oath of allegiance to him.

The majority of Germans sided with the Pope. In October 1076, the Diet of Tribur decided that the king should submit to judgment at Augsburg. The Pope set out for Augsburg. Henry, seeing himself lost, reached Italy with a small party. On hearing this news, Gregory withdrew to the castle of Canossa in Emilia, owned by the Countess Mathilda. Henry IV appeared there to beg for pardon. Although he was convinced that the king was insincere, Gregory after three days agreed to receive and absolve him. As Gregory had foreseen, Henry immediately resumed his scheming. In March 1077, the Assembly of Forcheim deposed Henry IV and elected Rudolph of Swabia king of Germany, a choice ratified by the Pope. Henry engaged Rudolph in battle and defeated him. Gregory continued to support Rudolph. At a council in Brixen in 1080, Henry declared Gregory deposed and an anti-pope, Guibert, elected, who took the name Clement II. It took Henry three years to bring his anti-pope to Rome—in the teeth of the German nobles and the Italians backed by Countess Mathilda. Finally in 1083 Henry IV took Rome and had himself crowned emperor by the anti-pope. St. Gregory VII, in the stronghold of Castel Sant'Angelo, endured a months-long siege. In 1084 he was released by Robert Guiscard, whom he accompanied out of the city.

Gregory then took up residence at Monte Cassino. In May 1085 he went to Salerno to consecrate the Basilica of St. Matthew. There he was taken ill and murmured, "I have loved justice and hated iniquity; therefore I die in exile." "Holy Father," replied a bishop, "you cannot die in exile, as you have received all nations as your inheritance in the name of Christ and the Apostles." St. Gregory asked the cardinals to elect as popes after him Desiderius of Monte Cassino, Odo of Ostia and Rainerius. He then died a holy death on May 25, 1085, and was buried in the Basilica of Salerno.

It is a fact unparalleled in Church history that the three cardinals named by Gregory all became pope, one after the other. Desiderius of Monte Cassino, after a long resistance, became Victor III in 1086 and ruled for a little more than a year. Odo of Ostia became Urban II in 1087 and is famous as the pope who preached the First Crusade; he also energetically pursued the reform policies initiated by St. Gregory VII. Henry IV succeeded again in capturing Rome; his son Henry VI persuaded him to renounce his power, but proved to be as evil as his father. In 1099, Rainerius became pope under the name Paschal II. After much traveling, he was imprisoned by Henry V and forced to consecrate him. Freed in 1112, Paschal retracted the actions wrung from him by Henry V. He died in 1118. His successor Gelasius II signed the Concordat of Worms with Henry V in 1122, by which the emperor granted to the pope the right to invest bishops with their spiritual powers by ring and crozier; the pope recognized in the emperor the right to invest bishops with the temporal goods attached to their bishoprics [lands and revenues from them].

This is exactly what St. Gregory VII had wanted. The memory of this very great pope was held in veneration by the faithful and was abominated by the legalists who worked progressively for the secularization of the State. Gregory VII was therefore not canonized in the usual way. His name was put into the martyrology in 1584 by Gregory XIII, who recognized the immemorial veneration paid to him [at his tomb] in Salerno. On November 20, 1610, Paul V extended this veneration to the Benedictine Order and to those dioceses which asked for it. Finally, by a bull of September 25, 1728, Benedict XIII extended the feast of St. Gregory VII to the universal Church: this is what is called "equipollent" canonization—done without the customary process.

In our age, when the Church suffers more than ever from the servility of bishops toward political powers, even the most lowly, we shall invoke St. Gregory VII for the defense of the Church; for—as St. Anselm said, "God loves nothing so much in this world as the freedom of His Church."