There had been reading at table, especially from two books, Pope Gregory The Great's account of St. Scholastica in his Dialogues and my own The World Of Washington Irving.

The first case recorded of the partial exemption of an abbot from episcopal control is that of Faustus, abbot of Lerins, at the council of Arles, AD 456 ; but the exorbitant claims and exactions of bishops, to which this repugnance to episcopal control is to be traced, far more than to the arrogance of abbots, rendered it increasingly frequent, and, in the 6th century, the practice of exempting religious houses partly or altogether from episcopal control, and making them responsible to the pope alone, received an impulse from Pope Gregory the Great.

Pope Gregory I repeats the concept, articulated over a century earlier by Gregory of Nyssa that the saved suffer purification after death, in connection with which he wrote of " purgatorial flames ".

The same word in adjectival form ( purgatorius-a-um, cleansing ), which appears also in non-religious writing, was already used by Christians such as Augustine of Hippo and Pope Gregory I to refer to an after-death cleansing.

Alfred's first translation was of Pope Gregory the Great's Pastoral Care, which he prefaced with an introduction explaining why he thought it necessary to translate works such as this one from Latin into English.

This order is known from a bull of Pope Gregory XI addressed to the monks of the church of St Ambrose outside Milan.

In 1375 Pope Gregory XI gave them the Rule of St Augustine, with set of constitutions.

Therefore, Pope Gregory IX requested him to give up this practice.

On 20 August 1233, Andrew had a meeting with the legate of Pope Gregory IX in the woods of Bereg, and they made an agreement which ensured the privileges of the clergy.

Pope Gregory VII canonized Ælfheah in 1078, with a feast day of 19 April.

The Angles are the subject of a legend about Pope Gregory I, who happened to see a group of Angle children from Deira for sale as slaves in the Roman market.

He was one of the seven cardinals who, in May 1408, deserted Pope Gregory XII, and, with those following Antipope Benedict XIII from Avignon, convened the Council of Pisa, of which Cossa became the leader.

John XXIII was acknowledged as pope by France, England, Bohemia, Prussia, Portugal, parts of the Holy Roman Empire, and numerous Northern Italian city states, including Florence and Venice ; however, the Avignon Pope Benedict XIII was regarded as pope by the Kingdoms of Aragon, Castile, and Scotland and Gregory XII was still favored by Ladislaus of Naples, Carlo I Malatesta, the princes of Bavaria, Louis III, Elector Palatine, and parts of Germany and Poland.

During the third session, rival Pope Gregory XII authorized the council as well.

The first Archbishop of Canterbury was St Augustine ( not to be confused with St Augustine of Hippo ), who arrived in Kent in 597 AD, having been sent by Pope Gregory I on a mission to the English.

It seems that Pope Gregory, ignorant of recent developments in the former Roman province, including the spread of the Pelagian heresy, had intended the new archiepiscopal sees for England to be established in London and York.

Pope Gregory XVI rescinded this privilege and reserved to the Pope the right of creation of such knights ( Acta Pont.

Apart from a short poem attributed to Mark of Monte Cassino, the only ancient account of Benedict is found in the second volume of Pope Gregory I's four-book Dialogues, thought to have been written in 593.

In Gregory ’ s day, history was not recognized as an independent field of study ; it was a branch of grammar or rhetoric, and historia ( defined as ‘ story ’) summed up the approach of the learned when they wrote what was, at that time, considered ‘ history .’ Gregory ’ s Dialogues Book Two, then, an authentic medieval hagiography cast as a conversation between the Pope and his deacon Peter, is designed to teach spiritual lessons.

In the monastic library at Jarrow were a number of books by theologians, including works by Basil, Cassian, John Chrysostom, Isidore of Seville, Origen, Gregory of Nazianzus, Augustine of Hippo, Jerome, Pope Gregory I, Ambrose of Milan, Cassiodorus, and Cyprian.

Bede was the first to refer to Jerome, Augustine, Pope Gregory and Ambrose as the four Latin Fathers of the Church.

Pope: " Thus on a roe the well-breath'd beagle flies, And rends his hide fresh-bleeding with the dart " The Iliad of Homer ( 1715 – 20 ) Book XV: 697 – 8

He received some votes in the 1605 conclaves which elected Pope Leo XI, Pope Paul V, and in 1621 when Pope Gregory XV was elected, but only in the second conclave of 1605 was he papabile.

The canonization of Saint Udalric, Bishop of Augsburg, by Pope John XV in 999 is the first undoubted example of a papal canonization of a saint from outside Rome ( Some historians maintain that the first such canonization was that of Saint Swibert by Pope Leo III in 804 ).

With the revision of the Code of Canon Law promulgated in 1917 by Pope Benedict XV, only those who are already priests or bishops may be appointed cardinals.

:" Also in another volume from the times of Pope John XV, Dagome, lord, and Ote, lady, and their sons Misico and Lambert ( I do not know of which nation those people are, but I think they are Sardinians, for those are ruled by four judges ) were supposed to give to Saint Peter one state in whole which is called Schinesghe, with all its lands in borders which run along the long sea, along Prussia to the place called Rus, thence to Kraków and from said Kraków to the River Oder, straight to a place called Alemure, and from said Alemure to the land of Milczanie, and from the borders of that people to the Oder and from that, going along the River Oder, ending at the earlier mentioned city of Schinesghe.

On 5 October 1920, Pope Benedict XV proclaimed Ephrem a Doctor of the Church.

* 1621 – Gregory XV becomes Pope, the last Pope elected by acclamation.

At an early age, he came to the attention of the papal nephew, Cardinal Scipione Borghese, and in 1621, at the age of only twenty three, he was knighted by Pope Gregory XV.

* 1920 – In Rome, Pope Benedict XV canonizes Joan of Arc.

In 1921, Pope Benedict XV appointed him as the Italian president of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith.

However, there was no Pope John XX, owing to confusion caused by medieval historians misreading the Liber Pontificalis to refer to another Pope John between John XIV and John XV.

Pacelli became the under-secretary in 1911, adjunct-secretary in 1912 ( a position he received under Pope Pius X and retained under Pope Benedict XV ), and secretary of the Department of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs in February 1914.

Pope Benedict XV appointed Pacelli as nuncio to Bavaria on 23 April 1917, consecrating him as titular Bishop of Sardis and immediately elevating him to archbishop in the Sistine Chapel on 13 May 1917.

During the war, the Pope followed a policy of public neutrality mirroring that of Pope Benedict XV during World War I.

The existence of a second Pope John XIV was widely accepted in the 13th century, hence the numbering of Popes John XV through XIX was regarded as being erroneous.

In particular, Pope Benedict XVI stated after his election that he was inspired by Pope Benedict XV, who led the Church through the chaos of World War I, and Saint Benedict of Nursia.

* Pope John XV

The Eastern Orthodox Church and Eastern Catholic Church celebrate his feast day on 9 June and also, together with Pope Athanasius I of Alexandria, on 18 January.

The dogmatic constitution states that the Pope has " full and supreme power of jurisdiction over the whole Church " ( chapter 3: 9 ); and that, when he " speaks ex cathedra, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church, he possesses, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer willed his Church to enjoy in defining doctrine concerning faith or morals " ( chapter 4: 9 ).

He was crowned Pope at Vienne on February 9, 1119.

It was the official papal chalice for many popes, and has been used by many others, most recently by Pope Benedict XVI, on July 9, 2006.

Mehmet Ali Ağca (; born January 9, 1958 ) is a Turkish assassin who murdered left-wing journalist Abdi İpekçi on February 1, 1979 and later shot and wounded Pope John Paul II on May 13, 1981, after escaping from a Turkish prison.

Later, the attempt of Alessandro ( died February 9, 1604 ) to obtain the title of Monterotondo was thwarted by Pope Gregory XIII.

The Venerable Pope Pius XII (; ), born Eugenio Marìa Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli ( 2 March 1876 – 9 October 1958 ), reigned as Pope, head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City State, from 2 March 1939 until his death in 1958.

In 1939, Pius XII turned the Vatican into a centre of aid which he organized from various parts of the world At the request of the Pope, an information office for prisoners of war and refugees operated in the Vatican under Giovanni Battista Montini, which in the years of its existence from 1939 until 1947 received almost 10 million ( 9, 891, 497 ) information requests and produced over 11 million ( 11, 293, 511 ) answers about missing persons.

Pope Adrian VI (, ), born Adriaan Florenszoon Boeyens ( 2 March 1459 – 14 September 1523 ), served as the 218th Pope of the Catholic Church from 9 January 1522 until his death on 14 September 1523, 1 year and 248 days later.

Pope Marcellus II ( 6 May 1501 – 1 May 1555 ), born Marcello Cervini degli Spannochi, was Pope from 9 April 1555 to 1 May 1555, succeeding Pope Julius III.

On 9 April 1555, on the evening of the fourth day of the papal conclave, Cervini was " adored " as Pope, despite efforts by cardinals loyal to the Emperor Charles V to block his election.

Pope Benedict VIII ( died 9 April 1024 ), born Theophylactus, was Pope from 1012 to 1024.

Pius IV ( 31 March 1499 – 9 December 1565 ), born Giovanni Angelo Medici, was Pope from 1559 to 1565.

Pope Clement IX ( 28 January 1600 – 9 December 1669 ), born Giulio Rospigliosi, was Pope from 1667 to 1669.

Clement X, on 24 November 1673, beatified nineteen Martyrs of Gorkum, taken prisoner at Gorcum, the Netherlands, and put to death in Brielle on 9 July 1572, in hatred of the Catholic faith, the primacy of the Pope, the Roman Church, and the Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist.