Biography
Born in Piacenza, he spent most of his ecclesiastical career in the north, in the Low Countries.
Gregory succeeded Pope Clement IV in 1271 after the papal chair had been vacant for three years due to divisions among the Cardinals. The College of Cardinals was equally split between French and Italian Cardinals who wanted a Pope from their country due to the ongoing political situation with Charles of Anjou, younger brother of King Louis IX of France, who had usurped the throne of Sicily by arms and perpetually intervened in the political affairs of the entire Italian peninsula. The deadlock was finally broken when the citizens of Viterbo, where the Cardinals were assembled, removed the roof from the building they were meeting in and locked them in, only allowing them bread and water. Three days later, the Cardinals elected Pope Gregory X. He was considered a strong choice because even though he was Italian, he had spent most of his career north of the Alps and thus had not been embroiled in recent Italian political controversies.
Gregory's election came as a complete surprise to him, partially because it happened while he was engaged in the Ninth Crusade at Acre with King Edward I of England in Palestine. Not wanting to leave his mission, his first action as Pope was to send out appeals for aid to the Crusaders, and at his final sermon at Acre just before leaving to sail for Italy, he famously remarked, "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning" (a quote from Psalm 137).
Sometime during his reign as Pope, Gregory wrote a letter against the charges of "blood libel" and persecution against the Jews.
On his arrival at Rome, his first act was to summon the council which met at the Second Council of Lyons in 1274 for the purpose of considering the East-West Schism, the condition of the Holy Land, and the abuses of the Roman Catholic Church. It was while returning from that council that he died at Arezzo on 10 January 1276. He is still buried inside the Cathedral Church. He is responsible for the papal bull which was subsequently incorporated into the code of canon law that regulated all conclaves for papal elections until the reforms of Pope Paul VI in the twentieth century.
He was succeeded by Pope Innocent V.
Read more about this topic: Pope Gregory X
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