Saint Leo III

Saint Leo III (born, Rome—died June 12, 816, canonized 1673; feast day June 12) was the pope from 795 to 816.

Leo was a cardinal when elected to succeed Pope Adrian I on December 26, 795; he was consecrated the next day. Unlike Adrian, who had tried to maintain independence in the growing estrangement between East and West by balancing the Byzantine emperor against Charlemagne, Leo immediately yielded to Charlemagne by recognizing him as patricius of the Romans. On April 25, 799, during a Roman procession, Leo was physically attacked by assailants incited by Adrian’s supporters, who accused him of misconduct and whose ultimate plan was to blind Leo and remove his tongue, thus disqualifying him for the papacy. He fled across the Alps to his protector, Charlemagne, at Paderborn. Exactly what was negotiated there is unknown, but Leo was safely escorted back to Rome in November by a commission that discredited the complaints against him and arrested and deported his accusers.

Confusion in Rome continued, however, and Charlemagne in the autumn of 800 went there “to restore the state of the church, which was greatly disturbed.” In the presence of Charlemagne, on December 23, Leo solemnly purged himself of the charges against him. Two days later, at a large gathering in St. Peter’s Basilica for the consecration of Charlemagne’s son (Louis I the Pious) as king, Leo suddenly crowned Charlemagne as emperor. By this act, Leo obliterated his earlier humiliation and established the legal precedent that only the pope could confer the imperial crown. More important, however, Leo made his position secure by becoming the immediate beneficiary of the coronation, itself an illegal and revolutionary proceeding. His motive to create a new Western empire alongside the Eastern one proved ineffectual, for the Byzantines regarded Charlemagne as a usurper. Leo’s act, which had clearly been prepared in advance, also carried wide connotations: it separated East and West, causing a rivalry persisting until the 13th century; by allying the papacy with the Western empire, it involved Charlemagne and his successors ever more deeply in the ecumenical pretensions of the papacy.

Although the relations between Pope and Emperor were relatively amiable, Charlemagne controlled imperial administration and ecclesiastical reform. Yet in 809, when approached by Charlemagne’s theologians, Leo confirmed the dogmatic correctness of the Filioque clause (the doctrine that the Holy Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son) introduced into the Nicene Creed; but, because that clause had always been rejected by the Eastern churches, Leo, in the interest of peace with the Greeks, urged that the creed should not be chanted in the public liturgy.

Upon Charlemagne’s death in 814, the hatred of the Roman nobility against Leo reasserted itself. He had some conspirators executed and submitted an account of his action to Louis, who had succeeded his father. Leo died soon afterward.