In the 1549 Book of Common Prayer, part of the English Litany contained these charming words:
ShowtimeTV has begun its new series on The Borgias, the ancestors of the Corleones and the Sopranos, and their papal standard-bearer, Rodrigo, who became Alexander VI, father of Lucrezia and Cesare. Practically the epitome of religious nadir (!), The Catholic Encyclopedia writes of him, "So little have Catholic historians defended him that in the middle of the nineteenth century Cesare Cantù could write that Alexander VI was the only Pope who had never found an apologist." Wikipedia points out:
Compared to these folks, the sins of omission and cowardice of the current hierarchy seem almost
pathetically tame. Context. Context.
...from the tyrannye of the bishop of Rome and all his detestable enormities..
Good Lorde, deliver us.
The Pope as The AntiChrist
ShowtimeTV has begun its new series on The Borgias, the ancestors of the Corleones and the Sopranos, and their papal standard-bearer, Rodrigo, who became Alexander VI, father of Lucrezia and Cesare. Practically the epitome of religious nadir (!), The Catholic Encyclopedia writes of him, "So little have Catholic historians defended him that in the middle of the nineteenth century Cesare Cantù could write that Alexander VI was the only Pope who had never found an apologist." Wikipedia points out:
Such was Rodrigo's unpopularity that the priests of St. Peter's Basilica refused to accept the body for burial until forced to do so by papal staff. Only four prelates attended the Requiem Mass. Rodrigo's successor on the Throne of St. Peter, Francesco Todeschini-Piccolomini, who assumed the name of Pope Pius III (1503), forbade the saying of a Mass for the repose of Rodrigo Borgia's soul, saying, "It is blasphemous to pray for the damned". After a short stay, the body was removed from the crypts of St. Peter's and installed in a less well-known church...Twill be a mix, no doubt of both historical and fantasied enormities. Example, the background music for Pope Jeremy Irons Borgia's coronation in 1492 is Handel's Zadok the Priest, written for King George II's..in 1727.
Compared to these folks, the sins of omission and cowardice of the current hierarchy seem almost
pathetically tame. Context. Context.
1 comment:
Amazing that the Catholic Encyclopedia doesn't mention Machiavelli'e apologia for Pope Alexander VI — or his son Cesare.
I think he would have done better not to build up the Egyptianness in Christianity (the art, the grand architecture etc; the universities) and to have concentrated on law and government which he did admirably well. (Machiavelli points out that as soon as Alexander dies and can no longer advise his son Cesare, the son makes mistakes.)
The greatest art work was not this or that bit of "Renaissance" sculpture, cathedral ceiling, etc, but the nonlegitimate tableau "Death of Remirro d'Orco" cut (¿lengthwise?) which presumably was done as Alexander 6 advised, at least as described in Prince ch 7.
"The Pharaoh-city of this theoria left the people at once satisfy'd and stupefy'd" (and the soldiers dangerously eager for more "reduction" or creation of stuff to shalom or peace or Islam — in contrast to the work of Severus ch 19).
Ah, well, so Alexander led an "immoral" "personal" life. What right have Christianity's Egyptian hierophants to make an objection? He built up their grand style architecture in temples etc. They presumably are crypto-glad he was an unbeliever, rather than a believer such as Oliver Cromwell, who didn't bother with "Renaissance art" and renewal through "culture" etc.
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