Christ's Faithful People
Christ's Faithful People
1254 - 1261 AD
There was consternation among the cardinals at Naples when Innocent IV passed away. The papal army had just been routed, and the cardinals yearned to set distance between themselves and the victorious Manfred. But the podesta of Naples locked up the cardinals and told them bluntly that they would stay locked up until they gave the Church a new pastor. On December 12, 1254, the second day of the conclave, the cardinals elected by compromise Rinaldo de' Conti. He accepted and chose to be called Alexander IV.
Rinaldo was the son of the count of Segni and the third pope of that family to reign in the thirteenth century. He rose swiftly in the ranks of the hierarchy and was made cardinal deacon by his uncle, Gregory IX, in 1227 and cardinal-bishop of Ostia in 1231. He received from his uncle not only honors but also a strong attachment to the Franciscans. When he learned that St. Clare was gravely ill, he went to Assisi to console her and heeded the saint's dying request to obtain from Innocent IV a confirmation of the Poor Clares' privilege of poverty.
As pope, Alexander was not the strong man that Innocent IV had been. It is true that he rejected the peace feelers put out by the victorious Manfred and re-excommunicated Frederick's son, but he was quite unable to make head against him. Down to Alexander's death Manfred maintained himself in Sicily. Alexander also had a hard time in Rome.
The senator Brancaleone of Bologna practically set the Pope's civil authority there at naught. In Germany too Alexander timidly intervened to support Richard of Cornwall against Alfonso of Castile in the futile struggle for the imperial crown. Neither ever became real emperor.
At Paris a great fight was brewing in the university. The secular masters hotly resented the invasion of the friars. Led by the Burgundian William of St. Amour, they furiously denounced both Dominicans and Franciscans. Small chance they had of being listened to with favor by Alexander! He loved the friars and backed them up strongly. Alexander IV did the university a great favor when he confirmed the right of men like Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas to teach in its lecture halls.
Alexander also repealed a decree of his predecessor which had revoked some of the privileges granted to the friars. He absolved Henry III of England from his oath to observe the famous Provisions of Oxford, because King Henry was his vassal and had no right to take such an oath without his approval, and also because Henry had been forced to take the oath.
Alexander IV showed himself less broadminded than Innocent IV in his dealings with the Greeks.
On the whole, Alexander was a good spiritual man but not at all as gifted with ability to govern as his kinsmen Innocent III and Gregory IX. Alexander IV died at Viterbo on May 25, 1261.
