Alphabetical list of Popes

The Popes, in chronological order

AD 400-500

40. St Innocent I. b. Rome; elected 22 Dec, 401; d. 12 March, 417. Son of Anastasius, "a man of great ability and commanding character...he laid down the law on a range of disciplinary and liturgical matters"(ODP). "It has been decreed by a divine, not a human authority that whatever action has been taken in any of the provinces, however distant or remote, it should not be brought to a conclusion befoe it comes to the knowledge of this See, so that every decision may be affirmed by our authority". He successfully petitioned to end  gladiatorial contests (ISPR). Backed John Chrysostom and protested unsuccessfully to the eastern emperor about him being deposed as Bishop of Constantinople. Innocent excommunicated the Irish monk Pelagius (who had denied the concept of 'original sin') and another priest "until they recover from the snares of the devil by whom they are held prisoner by heir own choice". After Innocent unsuccessfully pleaded with Emperor Honorius in Ravenna, he saw Rome invaded by its Arian-Christian neighbors--Goths, Vandals, Lombards. The Western church called them "bar-bar"  (ie. barbarian) and watched them sack Rome. The pope returned two years later.

41. St Zosimus. b. Greece; elected 18 March, 417; d. 26 Dec, 418. Banned public drinking by the clergy and made rules about their garb in church (LP) Beguiled by letters from and a meeting with Pelagius and his colleague Caelestius, he rehabilitated them only to about-face after opposition from the African church. His term was "marked by a high view of papal authority linked to tactlessness and personality clashes in which he seems to have been usually wrong" (BS) "The factions which erupted after his death suggest that his rule was divisive as well as misguided" (ODP)

42. Boniface I. b. Rome; elected 28 Dec, 418; d. 4 Sept 422. Harassed by dissenters in Constantinope and still battling followers of the controversial Irish monk Pelagius, his consecration was delayed because of opposition by 'anti-pope' Eulalius whose supporters had him ordained in the Lateran palace by the bishop of Ostia the same day as Boniface was ordained by his  supporters. The emperor  recognized Eulalius but asked both claimants to leave town pending arbitration. Defying this, Eulalius was expelled by imperial decree, after being deposed at a synod attended by 52 bishops (LP). Boniface wrote to the bishops at Thessaly emphasizing Rome's supremacy, adding "and whoever separates himself from it becomes an exile from the Christian religion, since he ceases to belong to its fellowship".

anti-pope  Eulalius  (418-9)

43. St Celestine I. b. Rome; elected 10 Sept, 422; d. 27 July 432. Despatched St Patrick to convert Ireland. Had to counter Nestorius, patriarch of Constantinople, who maintained that Jesus Christ was not one person but two persons joined together, one human and one divine.  Partly because of their resentment about the growing power of Constantinople, Celestine's  representatives supported Bishop Cyril of Alexandria at the  Council of Ephesus (431) which condemned this heresy. The pope's injunction was to "cut out this festering sore by which.....the whole body of the Church is being corrupted". After Nestorian's followers staged their own council, Emperor Theodosius arrested both Nestorian and Cyril but later released the latter. The pope also had to contend with  the remnants of Pelagianism and  those still supporting the hardline views of anti-pope Novatian from a century before. Celestine, who adopted the title pater patruum  (bishop of all bishops) , decreed that laymen could not be appointed to high church office.

44. St. Sixtus III. b Rome;  elected 31 July, 432; d. 19 Aug, 440. Working with emperor Theodosius II he was able to reconcile the opposing Ephesus factions, Cyril of Alexandria and John of Antioch, a Nestorius supporter. DSH says Nestorians "did as other heretics have done and so wrapped up their doctrine in verbiage as to make it uncertain what they really meant to teach". With funds from the imperial family he rebuilt and repaired much of the destruction wrought by the Visigoths earlier in the century and founded Rome's first monastery. Sixtus became involved in a territorial dispute with Proclus, bishop of Constantinople, over whose domain included a portion of the Balkans. Built S. Maria Maggiore.

45. St Leo I. b. Tuscia; elected 29 Sept 440; d. 10 Sept 461. Had served as a deacon to both previous popes, and had been chosen by the emperor as his envoy in settling a civil dispute in Gaul. To the troublesome earlier schisms, most of which stemmed from differing interpretations of Christianity by Eastern sects, were added Manicheans, Priscillianists and Eutychians all with their own version of the true faith. Leo particularly rejected the appeal of the monk Eutyches who had been deposed by his bishop for preaching the monophysite doctrine which, stressing the divine nature of Christ, held that it transformed human nature in such  a fashion that the whole became divine yet with some human characteristics. Leo's response to these heresies, his Tomos  or Dogmatic Letter,  which precisely defined Catholic beliefs, was endorsed  by 406 bishops at the AD 451 Council of Chalcedon (LP). It had been rejected  two years earlier at the  Council of Ephesus summoned by the emperor Theodosius to whom nevertheless Leo had written: "We rejoice that there is in you not only a royal but also a priestly mind".
   In 452, the pope personally persuaded Attila the Hun to leave Italy; three years later, however, he was unsuccessful in resisting Genseric's Vandals who sacked the city.  Leo, who ordered virgins to be veiled, was the first pope to be buried at St Peter's. "Rome!...You priestly and royal city!" Leo had written. " You have become the capital of the world by being Peter's See...Your empire of peace is greater than the old Roman military empire".
Bas relief by Alessandro Algardi, St Peter's; depicted in a window in England's Wells Cathedral.  

46. St Hilarus. b. Cagliari; elected 19 Nov 461; d. 29 Feb, 468. Attended the 449 council at Ephesus on behalf of Pope Leo (who had termed  it "the Robber Synod" after it had rejected his Tomos ). From this raucous council, organised by emperor Theodosius II to back the monk Eutyches--who had been deposed by the Constantinople patriarch Flavian-- Hilarus "escaped with difficulty" (BS) At a  synod held in Rome he forbade popes and bishops from nominating their successors. Restocked many Roman churches (LP) after their looting by the Vandals.

47. St Simplicius. b. Blaera; elected 3 March 468; d. 10 March, 483. He protested the power grab by Constantinople's patriarch Acacius to equate his See with that of Rome. Simplicius supported the Eastern Catholics against the heretics who were pushing monophysitism, the Eutychian doctrine that Jesus had only one nature, his manhood being wholly absorbed in his divinity. Endorsed by the "robber synod" in Ephesus, the subsequent condemnation of Eutychianism in 451 at Chalcedon had been widely rejected in the Near East (PDS), it having received the backing of Byzantine emperors. One casualty was Alexandria's patriarch Proterius, murdered by monophysite supporters (LP) Collapse of the Western Empire led to  the founding of the Churches of Armenia, Syria and Egypt (Copts) during his pontificate (IPSR).

48. St Felix III. b. Rome; elected 13 March, 483; d. 1 March, 492.   Son of a priest, he was a widower with two children when he became pope. In a letter to Emperor Zeno, he wrote: "Supreme power has been entrusted to you over world concerns but it is your duty to leave ecclesiastical matters in the hands of those whom God has appointed to control them. You must leave the church free to follow her own laws". Felix deposed bishop Peter of Antioch and excommunicated  Constantinople's patriarch Acacius over a decree which more or less set aside Leo's Tomus: this Acacian schism between East and West continued  for three more decades. The pope had to battle against monophysitism and Eutychianism, varying interpretations of whether Jesus had two natures or one. ODP judged Felix  (grandfather of Gregory the Great) to be "authoritarian and harsh, he kept alive (this schism) by his intransigence"

49. St Gelasius I. b. Rome of African origin; elected 1 March 492; d. 21 Sept, 496. Kept alive the East-West schism in books he wrote denouncing Eutyches,  Nestorius and the Greeks "among whom there is no doubt many heresies abound". He authored a 28-chapter decretal about church administration and discipline, decreeing that promotion must be by seniority and that parish boundaries must not be changed lest "instability increases and universal confusion is created everywhere".After delivering the city from the threat of famine, the pope denounced the Lupercalians who wanted to revive an ancient fertility festival, sneering at the pagan gods "whose worship you refuse to abandon. Why did they not give you tranquil seas so that the ships might reach here with grain in winter and the city suffer less from want?" (LP).
   In a letter to Emperor Anastasius, Gelasius wrote: "Two jurisdictions divide the government of the world: the sacred authority of the popes and the imperial power". The clerics, he maintained, were more important, "in so far as they will answer for the kings of men themselves at the divine judgment". He was "a vigorous pontiff"  says BS, and held in "extraordinary reverence" by his contemporaries (ODP) but not the author of the Sacramentary that bears his name.

50. Anastasius II. b. Rome; elected 24 Nov, 496; d. 19 Nov, 498.  He was the first pope to assume title Pontifex Maximus (ISPR). His  letter to his namesake, Emperor Anastasius was part of his attempt to restore church unity although he was maligned by his opponents because of his "conciliatory attitude towards the Acacian schism" (BS) and his sympathy towards the Acacians  prompted Dante to feature him in his Inferno..LP says that "struck by a blow from the divine thunderbolt, Anastasius perished" with his critics "quick to claim that his death was the result of divine judgement:" (ODP)