Catholic World News News Feature

The Slap of Anagni October 01, 2003

Alberto Carosa

The picturesque city of Anagni, Italy, a one-time papal summer residence not too distant from the renowned Monte Cassino abbey, is roughly an hour’s drive from Rome. Once the seat of pagan temples and sanctuaries in the days of the Roman empire, by the 5th century it had become an important diocese of the Christian world. In the 9th century the city’s first cathedral was built on the ruins of the temple dedicated to the goddess Cerere. During the 10th and the 11th centuries Anagni developed strong ties with the papal court. The popes of that era began to consider the old capital city of the Ernici region a safer and healthier spot to live, as compared to Rome, which was struck by frequent epidemic diseases. Anagni continued to be among the favorite residences of pontiffs over the next few centuries. Because of its illustrious residents, the city was the site of many significant historical events, particularly those involving the struggle between papacy and empire. In 1122, Pope Callistus II promulgated the bull of the Concordat of Worms from Anagni; in 1176, after the Battle of Legnano, Pope Alexander III received the imperial legates with whom he elaborated the Pactum Anagninum (Anagni’s Agreement), the basis for the peace that was achieved in Venice in 1177. A CENTURY IN THE LIMELIGHT The 13th century brought a golden age for the city. In the course of one century, Anagni gave four popes to the Church. The first to ascend to the papal throne was Lotarius Conti, who as Innocent III (1198-1216) was one of the outstanding personalities of his century, together with Frederick II, whose coronation as Emperor of Germany he favored, and Saint Francis of Assisi. (It was Pope Innocent III who approved the first rule of the Franciscan order.) Pope Innocent III is also noteworthy for having codified the Church’s doctrine on the relation between the spiritual and temporal spheres. He explained—at a time when such issues were hotly contested—that the Church has potestas directa (direct power) regarding religious issues, but only potestas indirecta (indirect power) over earthly matters. Pope Innocent III died in 1216, leaving the Church at the historical peak of her power. His efforts were taken up by Pope Gregory IX (Ugolino Conti, 1227-1241), who belonged to the powerful family of Conti di Anagni. This new pontiff, too, was quickly caught up in the struggle between spiritual and temporal leaders. On September 29, 1227, in Anagni’s cathedral, he excommunicated Emperor Frederick II who had abandoned the Crusade that the Emperor himself had proclaimed. The evocative ceremony took place by the lights of the torches, first shaken, then thrown on the ground, and finally blown out by the prelates. In September 1230, after the reconciliation, Pope Gregory IX received Frederick of Swabia in Anagni. During his pontificate, Pope Alexander IV (1254-1261), Gregory’s relative and Anagni’s third pope, had to face the raging theological dispute raised by the hostility of the University of Paris toward the mendicant orders. The leader of this dispute, the author of a vitriolic pamphlet attacking the Dominicans, was Guillaume de Saint-Amour, whose text was burned in front of the Cathedral, the sentence having been passed in Anagni in September 1256. But the name of Anagni is especially known because of events that took place during the pontificate of Boniface VIII, the fourth Bishop of Rome who was a native of the city, a member of the powerful Caetani family. His election, which occurred after the abdication of Celestine V, had been opposed by French cardinals and by the powerful Colonna family. And so it was that at Anagni, on the night of September 7-8, 1303, Pope Boniface VIII was captured and outraged with a slap on to his face by Sciarra Colonna. Colonna had come to Anagni along with William of Nogaret, an adviser to the King of France, and a gang of armed men. Their plan was to abduct the Pope, then arrange for him to be deposed by a council. But when the local populace learned about that notorious “slap of Anagni,” they rose up against the would-be kidnappers, foiling their plans, and freed the captive Pope. THE QUEST FOR POWER But why had Philip IV of France—“Philip the Fair”—sought to capture the Pope? During 2003, the city of Anagni is hosting a series of events to commemorate the pontificate of Boniface VIII, leading up to an October 11 ceremony marking the 700th anniversary of his death. The city’s mayor, Franco Fiorito, observes that Boniface was a major figure in Church history for several reasons: he proclaimed the first Jubilee Year in 1300, and established in Rome the university (La Sapienza) which was to become the largest in Europe. But “the Anagni slap” remains the single most memorable episode of his papacy, and that event in particular was remembered at a conference of historians, held in Anagni on the 700th anniversary of the event in September. Giovanni Diurni, a historian at Rome’s Tor Vergata University, pointed out that the episode must be seen against the background of a rising confrontation between the papacy and the French throne, which was probably the most powerful European kingdom of that time. The clash involved the division of power between the spiritual and temporal domains, with the former being embodied by the Church and the second by the French state, which at that time took the form of a Christian empire. In his papal bulls, Pope Boniface III followed in the footsteps of his predecessor Innocent III, maintaining the distinction between the two powers, each with its own clear-cut sphere of competence. King Philip IV, however, sought a different sort of division of powers, in which the king would have uncontested authority over his Christian empire and its subjects—including the Pope, who would be a salaried employee of the throne. Although Pope Boniface and King Philip had been allies earlier in their respective reigns, by the beginning of the 14th century the contrast between their views had become so harsh that the Pope withdrew the privilege of French kings to levy taxes on the French clergy, and denounced Philip in the famous bull Unam Sanctam. But King Philip pressed his own case. He summoned the nobles into assembly and read a forged papal bull, which in provocative tones stated that the king must be totally dependent on the pope. Boniface forcefully denied any connection with that document, but it did serve the king’s cause, rallying support for Philip’s claims against the papacy. As he mounted a campaign to oust the Pope, King Philip formed an alliance with the Colonna family. Two cardinals from that family said that Boniface III was an illegitimate pope, arguing that the abdication of his predecessor, Celestine V (the only pontiff ever to voluntarily resign) was invalid. Unnerved by what could be considered the first smear campaign in the history of public relations, Pope Boniface died shortly after the Anagni outrage. After the death of Pope Boniface, the splendor of Anagni waned. The subsequent transfer of the papal court to Avignon began a long period of decline for the city. HISTORY’S LESSONS Another speaker at the September conference of historians in Anagni, Roberto de Mattei, observed that Boniface VIII is among the most vilified popes in history. Yet today, with the benefit of hindsight, we can see him as a defender of the traditional Catholic teaching on Church-state relations—teachings that have been frequently confirmed by his successors up to Pope John Paul II. As Pope Boniface and his successors have taught, a total separation between spiritual and temporal authority can easily produce relativism, triggering an unbridled quest for secular power that has produced some of the worst dictatorial regimes in history—as the 20th century bears witness. On the other hand, the lack of any distinction between the spiritual and temporal realms can lead to a complete absorption of civil society into religion—a phenomenon now painfully visible in the world of Islam. De Mattei spoke also of the symbolic dimension of “the Anagni slap.” Five centuries earlier, the spiritual and temporal leaders of Christian Europe had shown themselves in complete accord, with the crowning of Charlemagne by the Pope as first emperor of the Holy Roman Empire on Christmas Eve in 800 AD. Five centuries later, the personal assault on a Roman Pontiff showed that the accord was broken, and an era was ended. “These were two symbolic and opposing events,” de Mattei said. “In much the same way as the crowning of Charlemagne ushered in medieval Christianity, the slap of Anagni marked its end.” Among the contemporaries of Pope Boniface, there were a perceptive few who realized the implications of the famous slap, recognizing that the offense was aimed not at the Pope as a person, but against his office. Among them was Dante Alighieri, the most famous Italian poet of all times. Although he was harshly critical of Boniface III, and consigned him to damnation in his Inferno, Dante was also outraged by the imprisonment of the Pope; he portrayed it, in his Purgatorio (XX, 86- 90), as a slap at Christ himself. [AUTHOR ID} Albert Carosa is a free-lance writer based in Rome.