• More hidden facts you don’t know about a Catholic Pope
Most ignorant Catholic fanatics would never believe that some of their Popes slept with women and fathered children. Some actually married wives, while others fathered bastards.
To ascend to the apex of papacy means you have to swear to the Catholic doctrine of clerical celibacy. Simply put, the doctrine is the practice where priests or bishops or popes remain unmarried so they could serve God well. It was in the 11th century that celibacy became compulsory due, partly to Gregorian reforms and, partly to following papal decrees.
Before that time Popes were allowed to married. However, after sex was considered a “mortal sin” several Catholic Popes had went ahead to sleep with women.
Below are some of such individuals.
1. Pope Julius II: Born Giuliano della Rovere in 5 December 1443, Pope Julius II reigned as the head of Catholic Church between 1503 and 1513. He fathered three illegitimate daughters.
2. Pope Paul III: Pope Paul III was born in 29 February 1468 and he died in 1549. His real name was Alessandro Farnese, and he reigned as Pope from 1534 to 1549. After he took the holy order, Pope Paul III took Silvia Ruffini as his mistress. They were never going to be married. But their illicit affairs had resulted in three sons and a daughter before they broke up in 1513. Pope Paul III later installed one of his illegitimate sons, Pier Luigi Farnese, the first duke of Parma.
3. Pius IV: Pius IV was born Giovanni Angelo Medici in Milan on 14 March 1499. He reigned as Pope between 1559 and 1965. He wasn’t married but he allegedly slept with a woman who gave him a son and two daughters.
4. Pope Gregory VIII: At his birth on 7 January 1502 he was named Ugo Boncompagni. He reigned as Catholic Pope between 1572 and 1585. He received ecclesiastical tonsure in 1539, and he had illicit affairs with Maddalena Fulchini which resulted in a son in 1548. Giacomo Boncompagni, the son, remained a bastard with Pope Gregory VIII when the Pope made him the Gonfalonier of the church. He later made Giacomo the governor of the Castel Sant’Angelo and Fermo.
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5. Pope Leo XII: He was born Annibale Francesco Clemente Melchiorre Girolamo Nicola della Genga on 2 August 1760. He reigned as Pope between 28 September 1823 and February 1829 when he died. He was alleged to be a highly sexually active man. For years he had slept with wife of a Swiss Guard soldier and had three children with her.