Pope John IX
Encyclopedia
Early life
Little is known about John IX before he became Pope. Born in TivoliTivoli, Italy
Tivoli , the classical Tibur, is an ancient Italian town in Lazio, about 30 km east-north-east of Rome, at the falls of the Aniene river where it issues from the Sabine hills...
in an unknown year, he was ordained as a Benedictine priest by Pope Formosus
Pope Formosus
Pope Formosus was Pope of the Catholic Church from 891 to 896. His brief reign as Pope was troubled, and his remains were exhumed and put on trial in the notorious Cadaver Synod.-Biography:...
. With the support of the powerful House of Spoleto he was elected Pontiff in early 898 following the sudden death of Pope Theodore II
Pope Theodore II
Pope Theodore II was ordained as a priest by Pope Stephen V; also his brother Theotius was a bishop. He was pope for twenty days during December 897 before he died. He reinstated the clerics who had been forced from office by Pope Stephen VI, recognizing the validity of the ordinations of Pope...
.
As Pope
With a view to diminish the violence of faction in Rome, John held several synods in Rome and elsewhere in 898. They not only confirmed the judgment of Pope Theodore IIPope Theodore II
Pope Theodore II was ordained as a priest by Pope Stephen V; also his brother Theotius was a bishop. He was pope for twenty days during December 897 before he died. He reinstated the clerics who had been forced from office by Pope Stephen VI, recognizing the validity of the ordinations of Pope...
in granting Christian burial
Christian burial
A Christian burial is the burial of a deceased person with specifically Christian ecclesiastical rites; typically, in consecrated ground. Until recent times Christians generally objected to cremation, and practised inhumation almost exclusively, but this opposition has weakened, and now vanished...
to Pope Formosus
Pope Formosus
Pope Formosus was Pope of the Catholic Church from 891 to 896. His brief reign as Pope was troubled, and his remains were exhumed and put on trial in the notorious Cadaver Synod.-Biography:...
, but also at a council held at Ravenna
Ravenna
Ravenna is the capital city of the Province of Ravenna in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy and the second largest comune in Italy by land area, although, at , it is little more than half the size of the largest comune, Rome...
decreed that the records of the synod held by Pope Stephen VI
Pope Stephen VI
Pope Stephen VI was Pope from May 22, 896 to August 897.He had been made bishop of Anagni by Pope Formosus. The circumstances of his election are unclear, but he was sponsored by one of the powerful Roman families, the house of Spoleto, that contested the papacy at the time.Stephen is chiefly...
which had condemned him should be burned. Re-ordinations were forbidden, and those of the clergy who had been degraded by Stephen were restored to the ranks from which he had deposed them.
To keep their independence, which was threatened by the Germans, the Slavs of Moravia appealed to John to let them have a hierarchy of their own. Ignoring the complaints of the German hierarchy, John sanctioned the consecration of a metropolitan
Metropolitan bishop
In Christian churches with episcopal polity, the rank of metropolitan bishop, or simply metropolitan, pertains to the diocesan bishop or archbishop of a metropolis; that is, the chief city of a historical Roman province, ecclesiastical province, or regional capital.Before the establishment of...
and three bishops for the Church of the Moravians.
Finding that it was advisable to cement the ties between the empire and the papacy, John IX gave unhesitating support to Lambert in preference to Arnulf
Arnulf of Carinthia
Arnulf of Carinthia was the Carolingian King of East Francia from 887, the disputed King of Italy from 894 and the disputed Holy Roman Emperor from February 22, 896 until his death.-Birth and Illegitimacy:...
during the Synod of Rome, and also induced the council to determine that henceforth the consecration of the Popes should take place only in the presence of the imperial legates. The sudden death of Lambert shattered the hopes which this alliance seemed to promise.
John IX died in the year 900 and was succeeded by Pope Benedict IV
Pope Benedict IV
Pope Benedict IV was Pope from 900 to 903. He was the son of Mammalus, a native of Rome. The tenth-century historian Frodoard, who nicknamed him the Great, commended his noble birth and public generosity...
(900–903).