The Bad Popes: How Can I Be Catholic When Some Popes Were So Terrible?

I love the Catholic Church. I believe she is the Church founded by Jesus Christ. I believe in the Eucharist, the sacraments, apostolic succession, the communion of saints, Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the authority Christ gave to Peter and the apostles.

But I will be honest: the history of the “bad popes” bothers me.

It should bother us.

There have been popes who were saints, martyrs, reformers, theologians, missionaries, defenders of the poor, and courageous shepherds of souls. But there have also been popes who were worldly, corrupt, politically ruthless, immoral, negligent, or simply unworthy of the office they held. Some were not just “imperfect.” Some were scandalous.

As a Catholic, I do not think we help the Church by pretending otherwise.

The question is not, “Were there bad popes?” Yes, there were. The real question is: does the sinfulness of some popes disprove Catholicism?

I do not believe it does.

But I also do not believe Catholics should respond with denial, defensiveness, or blind loyalty to men who disgraced the office of Peter. The Catholic answer is not that every pope was holy. The Catholic answer is that Christ is holy, even when His ministers are not.

The Catholic Faith Is Not Built on the Personal Holiness of Every Pope

One of the biggest misunderstandings about Catholicism is the idea that Catholics believe the pope is perfect. We do not.

Catholics do not believe the pope is sinless. We do not believe every pope is automatically a saint. We do not believe every papal decision is wise. We do not believe every political opinion, administrative choice, appointment, personal action, or offhand comment of a pope is protected by the Holy Spirit.

Papal infallibility is much narrower than many critics realize. Vatican I taught that the pope is protected from error when, as supreme pastor and teacher of all Christians, he definitively defines a doctrine of faith or morals to be held by the whole Church. Vatican I also made clear that the Holy Spirit was not promised to Peter’s successors so they could invent new doctrine, but so they could guard and faithfully explain the apostolic deposit of faith.

That is very different from saying a pope cannot be corrupt, cowardly, foolish, immoral, political, vain, or personally sinful.

The Catechism says the visible bonds of unity in the Church include one faith received from the apostles, common worship and sacraments, and apostolic succession through Holy Orders. It also teaches that the Church of Christ “subsists in the Catholic Church,” governed by the successor of Peter and the bishops in communion with him, while also acknowledging that many elements of sanctification and truth exist outside her visible confines.

That means a Catholic does not have to defend evil. We defend the faith. We defend the sacraments. We defend the apostolic office. We defend Christ’s promise to His Church.

But we do not have to defend corruption.

The First “Bad Pope” Problem Was Peter Himself

This may sound shocking, but the problem of sinful Church leadership begins in the New Testament.

St. Peter was chosen by Christ. Jesus said to him, “You are Peter,” and gave him the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. Catholics see this as foundational for the office of Peter and the papacy.

But Peter was not personally flawless.

Peter confessed Jesus as the Christ, but he also misunderstood Christ’s mission. He denied Jesus three times. He needed mercy. He needed restoration. In John 21, Christ did not restore Peter by pretending Peter had never fallen. He restored him by commanding him to feed His sheep.

Even after Pentecost, Peter could still be wrong in conduct. St. Paul says he opposed Cephas, meaning Peter, “to his face” because Peter’s behavior toward Gentile Christians was wrong. That passage matters because it shows that recognizing Peter’s authority does not mean pretending Peter can never be criticized.

So from the very beginning, Catholicism has never depended on the idea that Church leaders are personally sinless. The office is real. The grace is real. The authority is real.

But the man can still be weak.

The Church Is a Visible Kingdom, Not an Invisible Idea

This is also why I cannot accept the idea that Jesus came merely to reform first-century Judaism, or to start some vague, invisible, spiritual association of individual believers with no visible authority, no visible structure, and no visible family.

I believe Jesus came as the Messiah of Israel. He came not to abolish God’s promises, but to fulfill them. He came to restore, fulfill, and universalize the Kingdom of David — not as a temporary political kingdom limited to one nation, but as the Kingdom of God, open to all nations, with Christ Himself as King.

The angel Gabriel says this plainly at the Annunciation. Jesus would receive “the throne of David his father,” reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His Kingdom there would be no end. That is royal, Davidic, kingdom language. It is not merely private spirituality. It is not merely an invisible religious feeling. It is a Kingdom.

This is one reason Catholics see such importance in Matthew 16. Jesus gives Peter “the keys to the Kingdom of heaven.” In Isaiah 22, the key of the House of David is associated with authority in the royal household. Catholics therefore see a typological connection: Peter is not a replacement for Christ, but the visible steward of Christ the King’s household. The Pope is not the true King. Christ is. But the Pope serves as the visible steward, servant, and vicar of the King.

This also helps explain Catholic devotion to Mary. If Jesus is the Davidic King, then Mary is not just another believer. She is the Mother of the King. In the Davidic kingdom, the queen mother held a special place. Catholic belief that Mary is Queen does not take glory away from Christ; it flows from who Christ is. The Catechism teaches that Mary was exalted by the Lord as “Queen over all things,” and Revelation 12 presents the image of a crowned woman associated with the birth of the Messiah.

The bishops, too, are not merely religious managers or motivational speakers. They are successors of the apostles. The Catechism teaches that Christ governs His Church through Peter and the other apostles, who are present in their successors: the Pope and the college of bishops.

I know some Christians disagree with this Catholic reading. I want to be fair about that. Many Protestants sincerely believe the Church is fundamentally the invisible fellowship of all true believers. Catholics also believe that God knows His own and that grace can work beyond visible Catholic boundaries. But Catholicism insists that the Church is not invisible only. She is visible, sacramental, historical, institutional, familial, and apostolic.

Vatican II teaches that the Church is “constituted and organized in the world as a society,” and that this visible social structure serves the Spirit of Christ in building up the Body of Christ. It also teaches that the Roman Pontiff is the “perpetual and visible principle and foundation of unity” of both bishops and faithful, while each bishop is a visible principle of unity in his own particular church.

And this is where the scandal of bad popes becomes painful, but understandable.

If the Church is a visible Kingdom, a visible family, a visible Body, and a visible household, then she will have visible leaders. And because those leaders are men, they will sometimes be sinful men. Some will be weak. Some will be foolish. Some will be worldly. Some, tragically, will be corrupt.

A visible Church will have visible wounds.

But that does not disprove the Church. In a strange way, it proves exactly what Catholicism teaches about the Church on earth: she is holy because Christ is holy, but she is also made up of sinners who constantly need purification, repentance, and reform.

This is why anti-Catholic arguments often miss the point. They act as if Catholics believe our hope is in the Pope, or in bishops, or in priests, or in any man. We do not. We respect the offices Christ established. We believe authority matters. We believe apostolic succession matters. We believe the Pope and bishops have real responsibilities in the household of God.

But our hope is not in them.

Our hope is in Jesus Christ.

The Pope is not the head of the Church in the ultimate sense. Christ is. The bishops are not the source of grace. Christ is. Priests do not save us by their own power. Christ saves. The Church’s leaders matter because Christ chose to work through visible instruments, but those instruments remain human, fragile, and accountable to God.

So when I see bad popes in history, I do not have to pretend they were good. I can say they were bad. I can say they sinned. I can say they wounded the Church. But I do not have to conclude that Christ abandoned His Church.

A bad steward does not mean there is no King.

A corrupt servant does not mean there is no Master.

A sinful pope does not mean there is no Christ.

It means the Church, like Israel before her, is a divine mystery carried in human hands. And sometimes those hands are dirty.

So How Bad Were the Bad Popes?

Some were very bad.

Pope Stephen VI is remembered for one of the strangest and most disturbing episodes in Church history: the Cadaver Synod. In 897, the corpse of Pope Formosus was exhumed, placed on trial, stripped of papal vestments, mutilated, and thrown into the Tiber River. Later, the Church reversed the actions against Formosus and recognized the validity of his ordinations.

Pope John XII, who reigned in the tenth century, is often listed among the most immoral popes. The Catholic Encyclopedia describes him as a “coarse, immoral man” and says the Lateran was spoken of as a brothel under him. That is not an anti-Catholic source saying this. That is a Catholic source acknowledging a shameful reality.

Pope Benedict IX was another disgraceful figure. The Catholic Encyclopedia bluntly calls him “a disgrace to the Chair of Peter.” He came from a powerful Roman family, treated the papacy almost like a family possession, and was involved in one of the most chaotic periods in papal history.

Pope Alexander VI, Rodrigo Borgia, is perhaps the most infamous Renaissance pope. His name became associated with nepotism, political intrigue, and sexual immorality. Catholic sources acknowledge the scandals surrounding his children and his family favoritism, while historians also recognize that some stories about the Borgias were exaggerated by enemies and later legend.

Pope Leo X was not necessarily “evil” in the same dramatic way as some others, but his worldliness and financial mismanagement helped set the stage for the Protestant Reformation. The Catholic Encyclopedia says jubilees and indulgences were degraded almost entirely into financial transactions during his pontificate, and that Leo left the papacy deeply in debt.

Catholics can and should defend the doctrine of indulgences properly understood, but we should be honest that abuses surrounding indulgences caused real scandal. The Church herself later acted against financial abuses connected to indulgences; New Advent notes that St. Pius V canceled grants of indulgences involving fees or other financial transactions.

These stories are ugly. They should make Catholics uncomfortable. They make me uncomfortable.

But discomfort is not the same as disbelief.

The Catholic Defense Is Not to Defend the Indefensible

A Catholic should never say, “Those popes did nothing wrong.”

That is not apologetics. That is propaganda.

The better Catholic response is this: the sins of bad popes prove the reality of sin, not the falsehood of the Catholic faith.

Bad popes show us what happens when sacred office is treated as power instead of service. They show us what happens when politics, money, family ambition, lust, pride, and corruption enter the sanctuary. They show us why reform is necessary. They show us why the Church must always return to repentance.

The Catholic Church does not ask me to call evil good. In fact, Catholic morality requires the opposite. Sin is sin, even when committed by clergy. Scandal is scandal, even when caused by a pope.

I can defend the papacy without defending every pope.

I can defend apostolic succession without defending nepotism.

I can defend the Eucharist without defending corruption.

I can defend the Catholic faith without pretending every Catholic leader lived it well.

That distinction is everything.

Did Bad Popes Disprove Papal Infallibility?

No, because papal infallibility does not mean papal impeccability.

“Infallibility” means protection from error under specific conditions when the pope definitively teaches the universal Church on faith and morals. “Impeccability” would mean the inability to sin. Catholics do not believe popes are impeccable.

A pope can sin personally. A pope can govern badly. A pope can be a poor administrator. A pope can be politically reckless. A pope can appoint the wrong people. A pope can fail to discipline corruption. A pope can be arrogant, weak, worldly, or immoral.

None of that is the same thing as the Church solemnly binding all Catholics to heresy as part of the deposit of faith.

That is why the bad popes are a scandal, but not a disproof of Catholicism.

In some strange way, they may even point to something deeper. If the Church were merely a human institution, some of these men should have destroyed her. Yet the Mass survived. The sacraments survived. Scripture survived. The creeds survived. Apostolic succession survived. The saints kept coming. Reform kept happening. The Church was wounded, sometimes terribly, but not destroyed.

To me, that does not excuse the scandals. But it does suggest that the Church is held together by something greater than the personal virtue of her worst leaders.

Why Would God Allow Such Men to Become Pope?

This is the hardest question.

I do not know the full answer. No Catholic does.

But Scripture shows us again and again that God works through flawed people. David was chosen by God and still committed grave sins. Peter denied Christ. Judas was one of the Twelve. The apostles argued about greatness. Early Christian communities were filled with conflicts, scandals, and divisions.

God’s people have always needed purification.

That does not mean God approves of evil. It means God can remain faithful even when His people are not.

The bad popes are not proof that sin does not matter. They are proof that sin matters very much. Their sins wounded souls. Their scandals damaged the credibility of the Church. They gave ammunition to enemies of Catholicism and caused confusion among the faithful.

But the sins of men do not erase the promises of Christ.

Jesus did not promise that every shepherd would be holy. He promised that the gates of hell would not prevail against His Church.

A Catholic Can Be Loyal Without Being Blind

This is where I think Catholics need balance.

Some Catholics are so embarrassed by Church history that they begin to doubt everything. Others are so defensive that they refuse to admit anything bad happened. I do not think either approach is right.

A mature Catholic should be able to say:

Yes, there were bad popes.

Yes, some of them were very bad.

Yes, their sins caused scandal.

Yes, Catholics should be honest about that.

No, their sins do not disprove the Eucharist.

No, their sins do not erase apostolic succession.

No, their sins do not invalidate the sacraments.

No, their sins do not make Jesus Christ untrue.

No, I do not have to leave the Church because some men were unworthy of leading her.

That is not blind loyalty. That is faith with open eyes.

How Can I Be Catholic If So Many Popes Were Horrible?

I can be Catholic because my faith is not in the personal holiness of every pope.

My faith is in Jesus Christ.

I am Catholic because of the Eucharist. I am Catholic because of the sacraments. I am Catholic because of the apostolic faith handed down through the centuries. I am Catholic because I believe Christ gave real authority to His Church. I am Catholic because the Church, despite the sins of her members, still gives us Christ.

I remain Catholic not because every pope was worthy of the office, but because I believe Christ established a visible Church, a visible household, and a visible Kingdom — and because Christ, not the Pope, is the true King and final Head of that Church.

The bad popes humble me. They remind me not to idolize Church leaders. They remind me that Catholics must never confuse the Kingdom of God with clerical politics. They remind me that the Church must always be purified, always repentant, always returning to Christ.

They also remind me that I am a sinner too.

It is easy to look at the bad popes and feel disgust. Sometimes we should feel disgust. But I also have to ask myself: have I always lived the Gospel perfectly? Have I never been selfish, proud, lustful, cowardly, angry, dishonest, or worldly? The difference is that my sins are not recorded in history books. Their sins were.

That does not excuse them. It only reminds me why every Catholic, from the pope to the newest convert, needs mercy.

The Church Is Holy Because Christ Is Holy

The Catholic Church is not holy because every Catholic is holy.

The Church is holy because Christ is holy.

The Church is holy because her soul is the Holy Spirit. She is holy because her sacraments give grace. She is holy because her doctrine comes from Christ and the apostles. She is holy because saints continue to rise from her even in dark times.

But her members are sinners. Her clergy are sinners. Her bishops are sinners. Her popes are sinners.

Some popes became saints.

Some became scandals.

Christ remains Christ.

That is why I can stay Catholic. Not because every pope was good, but because Jesus is good. Not because every shepherd was faithful, but because the Good Shepherd is faithful. Not because the Church’s human history is spotless, but because grace is stronger than sin.

A bad pope can disgrace the Chair of Peter.

He cannot erase the promise of Christ.

A corrupt pope can wound the Church.

He cannot make the Eucharist cease to be Christ.

A sinful pope can cause scandal.

He cannot destroy the Gospel.

So yes, the bad popes were real. Some were horrible. Catholics should admit that honestly.

But I am still Catholic because my faith is not built on the perfection of men.

It is built on Jesus Christ, who chose Peter knowing Peter would fall, restored him after his denial, and still told him:

Feed my sheep.

A Short Catechism-Style Answer

Q: How can you be Catholic knowing some popes were so bad?

A: I am not Catholic because every pope was holy. I am Catholic because Christ is holy, and because I believe He founded a visible Church with real authority, real sacraments, and real apostolic succession.

Bad popes can disgrace the office of Peter, but they cannot destroy the promise of Christ.