AHC: Have a Pope Burned at the Stake

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From 1100AD - 1700AD have one of the Roman Catholic Pope's be burned at the stake as a Heretic.

Not being an expert on the subject, I'd guess maybe an avingnon pope could but again I'm unsure.
 
If the Papal Schism gets really heated I could see this. Or maybe a war between a King and the Pope gets escalated and the King coerces the cardinals into convicting the Pope as a heretic and has him burned on the stake.
 
The most direct way to bring this about is to have the pope in question actually be a heretic. Urban VI seems to have become seriously deranged over time and his rule had degenerated to a reign of terror by the end. He's a prime candidate to come up with some insane theological theory that could provoke the populace to lynch him.

Another possibility: have Innocent III take the field in person against the Albigensians and get captured. It's not impossible -- several of his predecessors had led papal troops, and he had considered leading the Fourth Crusade in person. The kings of France had burned Albigensians as heretics pursuant to Innocent's authority. Innocent's captors would love to get their revenge, and they did consider him a heretic.
 
Damn, I was thinking about the Cadaver Synod too. Maybe Pope Julius II decides to do a Cadaver Synod Revamped and put Rodrigo Borgia's skeleton on trial for whatever decadencies and idolatries they can think of and top it off with a good ol' fashion stake-burning event?
 
Damn, I was thinking about the Cadaver Synod too. Maybe Pope Julius II decides to do a Cadaver Synod Revamped and put Rodrigo Borgia's skeleton on trial for whatever decadencies and idolatries they can think of and top it off with a good ol' fashion stake-burning event?

Trust me, if the Papacy learned anything from the Cadaver Synod, it was "Let's not do this again, mmmm?" The Synod was followed by a decades long struggle between the Synod's detractors (which was most people), and its supporters, which saw the results overturned, reaffirmed, and overturned again.

And also, Popes murdered. Sometimes by their future successors.
 
If some variant of the Great Schism involved 2 churches with diverging theology and practice (which we DIDN'T have iOTL), where e.g. one Pope starts allowing mass in the vernacular, translations of bibles, etc. (as one possibility), then you could certainly have one of those two burned for heresy if he were caught by the other side.
 
If some variant of the Great Schism involved 2 churches with diverging theology and practice (which we DIDN'T have iOTL), where e.g. one Pope starts allowing mass in the vernacular, translations of bibles, etc. (as one possibility), then you could certainly have one of those two burned for heresy if he were caught by the other side.

Was the Avignon Schism ever close to having something like this happen?
 
Trust me, if the Papacy learned anything from the Cadaver Synod, it was "Let's not do this again, mmmm?" The Synod was followed by a decades long struggle between the Synod's detractors (which was most people), and its supporters, which saw the results overturned, reaffirmed, and overturned again.

And also, Popes murdered. Sometimes by their future successors.

All true. I'm not sure that they burned heretics in the dark ages, but I don't know what punishment they imposed instead.
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
Have the Mongols penetrate into Italy, take Rome, and give the Pope the same treatment they gave the Caliph in Baghdad. Well, a bit different, since the Caliph was killed by being rolled into a carpet and then trampled with horses. But since the Mongols were worried about spilling royal blood, burning at the stake would serve their needs just as well.
 
Was the Avignon Schism ever close to having something like this happen?

I was thinking more like Anglicanism under Henry VIII, which started out as Catholicism with the King instead of the Pope, and then evolved into a Protestant church (although my priest would object to that description).

Have a Gallican church set up its own anti-pope, or a stronger HRE, and watch history evolve.
 
Was the Avignon Schism ever close to having something like this happen?

No, but it could have. For a POD, how about Pisan Pope John XXII succeeds in escaping from the Council of Constance. As in OTL, the Council elects Martin V and Avignon Pope Benedict XIII refuses to recognize the Council's decision, but Roman Pope Gregory XII joins John XXII in not recognizing the Council's decision. The attempt at reducing the number of Popes from 3 down to 1 fails, and there are now 4 Popes. This could fragment even further, in OTL when excommunicated Avignon Pope Benedict XIII died in 1423, his followers schismed, with some choosing Clement VIII and others choosing Benedict IV as Pope. Sooner or later, the followers of one of the four (or more) Popes catch one of the other Popes and execute him.
 
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