MIRACULOUS MIRACLES™

Saint — Bl. Pope Innocent V

All Saints
Bl. Pope Innocent V
c. 1225 AD, Champagny-en-Vanoise, Savoy (Savoyard Catholic family) — June 22, 1276 AD, Rome
185th Pope (January 21 – June 22, 1276); first Dominican pope; co-worker of St. Thomas Aquinas
Basilica of St. John Lateran, Rome — his episcopal cathedral; tomb in the cathedral, Italy
Feast
June 22
Canonized
Beatified 1898 by Pope Leo XIII
Life

Innocent V (baptismal name Peter of Tarentaise, not to be confused with the earlier Peter of Tarentaise, 12th-century Cistercian archbishop) was born around 1225 in Champagny-en-Vanoise in Savoy to a Savoyard Catholic family.

He entered the Dominican Order around 1240 and studied at the University of Paris under St. Albert the Great — as the contemporary and fellow-student of St. Thomas Aquinas.

He became Master of Theology at the University of Paris around 1259 (the third Dominican master of theology at Paris after Sts. Albert and Thomas), holding the Dominican chair for multiple periods over the decades. He composed commentaries on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, Aristotelian commentaries, and theological treatises — one of the principal early-Dominican scholastics.

In 1272, Peter of Tarentaise was elected Archbishop of Lyon by Pope Gregory X. He served as one of the principal theological advisers at the Second Council of Lyon (May–July 1274) — the ecumenical council that attempted the reunion of the Latin-Catholic Western Church with the Greek-Byzantine Eastern Church (the reunion not lasting past the death of Byzantine Emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus in 1282).

At the Second Council of Lyon, Peter worked in collaboration with St. Thomas Aquinas (who died on the way to the Council on March 7, 1274 at the Abbey of Fossanova) and St. Bonaventure (who died during the Council on July 15, 1274) — the tragically brief overlap of the three principal Dominican-and-Franciscan theologians at the Council.

In 1273 Peter was created Cardinal-Bishop of Ostia. On the death of Pope Gregory X (January 10, 1276), Peter was elected Pope on January 21, 1276 at the conclave held at Arezzo — taking the papal name Innocent V and becoming the first Dominican Pope.

His pontificate lasted only five months (January 21 – June 22, 1276) — devoted to the implementation of the Second Council of Lyon's reunion-decrees, the reconciliation of the Guelph and Ghibelline factions in Italy, and the planning for the new Crusade to the Holy Land.

He died at Rome on June 22, 1276.

Miracles & Phenomena

  • The first Dominican Pope (1276)

    Bl. Innocent V's election as Pope on January 21, 1276 — the first Dominican Pope — institutionally recognized the full integration of the Dominican Order into the highest levels of the Catholic ecclesiastical hierarchy, just 60 years after the papal recognition of the Order in 1216. The Dominican papal succession would include Bl. Benedict XI (1303–1304, the immediately-Dominican pope), St. Pius V (1566–1572, the post-Tridentine Reforming pope), and Benedict XIII (1724–1730, the Baroque Dominican pope).

  • The Second Council of Lyon (May–July 1274) collaboration

    Innocent V's role as principal theological adviser at the Second Council of Lyon of May–July 1274 — in collaboration with Sts. Thomas Aquinas (who died en route on March 7, 1274) and Bonaventure (who died during the Council on July 15, 1274) — established the Dominican-Franciscan theological collaboration at the highest ecclesiastical-political level. The Council's reunion-decree between the Latin-Catholic Western Church and the Greek-Byzantine Eastern Church — not sustained past the death of Byzantine Emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus in 1282 — institutionally pre-figured the Council of Ferrara-Florence (1438–1445) reunion attempt.

Relics
  • Body
    Tomb of Bl. Pope Innocent V
    Basilica of St. John Lateran, Rome — in the cathedral

    Buried at the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome; memorial veneration in the Dominican Order houses worldwide.

Iconography
  • Innocent V at the Second Council of Lyon

    The late-13th-century Dominican pope in papal vestments at the Second Council of Lyon of May–July 1274 in collaboration with Sts. Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure, the Latin-Catholic Western episcopate and the Greek-Byzantine Eastern hierarchy seated before them, the reunion-decree being promulgated — the iconography of Catholic Dominican-and-ecumenical papal tradition.

Patronages
Order of Preachers (Dominicans) — first Dominican popeCatholic Second Council of Lyon (1274) ecumenical-reunion tradition (his role as principal theological adviser)Catholic Savoyard tradition
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