Although the Council of Pisa had deposed Popes Gregory and Benedict and had elected Pope Alexander to end the great schism in the Church, there was still much before the council to do. There was the desperate question of Church reform if the council were to satisfy the hopes of Christendom, from Scandinavia to Greece, from England to Warsaw. While the council sat, most of Europe had discussed little else but the. reform of the Church but, until that reform actually happened, the multitudinous Church outside was ruled by a minuscule handful of the Church within the cardinals and the curia, without whom nothing could be done which had to be done.
The reform for which the Christian world had clamoured for over a century, for which the prelates and priests of the Church in every country but Italy had wanted for perhaps even longer, was many-sided. It involved the elimination of images and pictures from the churches, and an end to the solemnization of new festivals and of the building of yet more sacred edifices. Reform demanded an end to the canonization of saints and the prohibition of all work on feast days. Reform called for an end to simony not only within the papacy, the college and the Curia, but by parish priests who milked their poor parishioners. This Churchly vice had, put many of the faithful under ban of excommunication because they were unable to pay for justice. Corpses lay in the field ‘unhouseled, unannealed, no reckoning made because relatives could not pay priests for a Christian burial. However, despite the continuing demand for Church reform, the Council of Pisa felt that, by electing a new pope, they had done the one-thing which was absolutely needful.
Catastrophically, the great schism in the Church had not been terminated by the signing of conciliar decrees. Although the council had deposed two popes and had elected one pope, it had not proclaimed in writing to all the nations and to the people that the schism was over.
This thunderbolt crashed down upon the Church and upon Christendom. To the horror of the world, it soon became clear that merely one more pope had been added to the pope at Perpignan and to the pope who had fled Rome and now lived under the protection of Carlo Malatesta at Rimini. Incredible to Christendom, it was slowly and agonizingly understood that, although most of the prelates of Christendom had laboured mightily over their intentions,, all they had succeeded in doing was to bring one more pope into a world which was already overcrowded with popes.
All three papacies held their individual obediences in a deathgrip while, relentlessly, they collected their dues and tithes, their spoilias and servitias from the triply split parishes of the, world. Although the latest pope, Alexander V, was obeyed by the greatest part of Christendom, Benedict XIII had the obediences of Spain, Scotland, Sardinia, Corsica and Armagnac. The city-state of Rimini, parts of Germany, and the northern kingdoms were faithful to Gregory XII.
The twentieth; session of the Council of Pisa opened on 1 July, under the presidency of Alexander V. This was marked by greatly increased solemnity. Cardinal de Thury again celebrated high mass. The pope pronounced the benediction. Those parts of the service which had formerly been taken by a cardinal bishop were now performed by His Holiness. The Orate and the Erigite Vos, instead of being proclaimed by a simple chaplain or deacon; were now pronounced by a cardinal-deacon, and the pope was assisted by cardinals of that rank, including Baldassare Cossa, in white dalmatics and mitres. After the litany, Alexander himself read the remaining prayers and intoned the Veni Creator Spiritus. A, lofty seat, had been placed for him in front; of the, high altar and facing him were the Patriarchs of Alexander, Antioch and Jerusalem.
After the office had been concluded, the Cardinal of Chalant, assisted by three bishops, ascended the pulpit and published the decree which told that the pope had been unanimously elected by all the cardinals. A prayer for the welfare of the new pontiff and of the Holy Church was then put up, and the pope preached a sermon on the text Fiet unum ovile unus pastor, signifying that there would be one fold and, one shepherd, which was more than slightly in error.
At the, pope's order, Cardinal Cossa rose and read newly formed decrees which ratified all the business that the cardinals had done from 3 May. The two colleges of cardinals, those formerly of Benedict; and those formerly of Gregory, were amalgamated into a single college. Deposed, the two popes had no ecclesiastical supporters because, as popes, they no longer existed. The next decree related to
the reformation of the Church in its head and its members. The pope requested that different nations appoint men of probity, age and capacity to consult with him and his cardinals in the matter.
Sunday 7 July 1409, was fixed for Alexander's coronation: The newest of the three sitting popes assisted by cardinals and prelates in their long pluviales and white mitres, celebrated mass, then emerged from the western door of the cathedral of Pisa to the high throne which had been erected on the steps facing the baptistery. The epistles and the gospel were read in Hebrew, Greek and Latin. The triple crown was set upon Alexander's head by the Cardinal of Saluces. Then the, patriarchs, archbishops; bishops and mitred abbots mounted their steeds caparisoned in white cloths and, trappings. Last of all came, the pope on a white mule, wearing full pontificals, with the tiara on his head. The mule was led by Cardinal Cossa.
The procession rode solemnly through the streets of Pisa. The two rival pope's were burned in effigy. The Jews; as was traditional, met the pope as he rode and petitioned for a confirmation of their privileges. They presented him with a book of their law, which he was required to throw backwards over his shoulder, saying that he had a better law as his guide. Arriving at his palace, the pope dismounted and the Captain of Pisa took the mule and its trappings as his perquisite.
On the last day of the council, on the, authority of God, St Peter and St Paul; and on his own authority, Alexander bestowed plenary absolution upon all who had attended the council, and on the
servants who had been with them, and this was to avail up to the hours of their deaths.
28
Three months after the accession of Pope Alexander V, after he had established his own curia out of nothing, had implemented the arms of the Church – organizing department after department where there had been no apparatus whatever before – Cossa sent me to Milan with a message to Catherine Visconti, asking her to entrust to me her choice of a meeting place in three months' time.
He had much work to do before he could meet her to settle anything. On 1 October, he led the pope's armies and allied troops under the command of the Duke of Anjou and entered Rome, where he took possession of the Vatican after driving Ladislas south, back to Naples. It had been six years since Cossa was in Rome. Those years had formed him into the greatest cardinal of Urbanist obedience. He had originated and engineered the Council of Pisa, had secured the election of, a holy man to the papacy, and was himself the power behind the papal throne.
Cossa's accomplishment in recreating in Bologna all the machinery formerly at Rome had been a vast executive achievement. To begin with, although delegations of city magistrates and leading citizens came to him with rich gifts to plead that he persuade the pope to return the papacy to Rome, and although he knew Alexander was much inclined to that, Cossa was against it. He listened to the committees gravely, and accepted their gifts with sensitive regard for their motives, but he had no intention of permitting Alexander to go to Rome to stand at the mouths of Ladislas's cannon. Also, he had much in mind the many commercial enterprises which he, the marchesa and Cosimo di Medici controlled in Bologna which were enhanced, b, the presence of the papacy and the curia. It became necessary for him to remind Alexander of his promise, on election, to work for the recovery of the papal states. Bologna was Cossa's fief, so it would have to do for the old man as well. Without further murmur, Alexander settled luxuriously into Bologna with his immense retinue of female servants, holy, happy and unhorrified.