Alex

Pope Joan, Was a Women the Pope?

Posted on: 06/24/2010 20:06

I watched the movie Pope Joan last night. It was fascinating and a great movie, especially if you are a history or religious geek.

It is a fictionilised account of what might have happened to Pope Joan. A women (perhaps a trans man) who was elected Pope, but who lived her life as a man, in order to be educated and to be able to serve God with her great gifts and wisdom.

It<s a good story, and it is believable and provides insites to the ninth century. It has been in the news lately because it was just released in Italy, where the Vatican has denounced it as a lie created by Protestants to shame the Catholic Church. However for years after she was pope, cardinals nominated for Pope had to sit in a chair with a hole where another cardinal would check for testicles. The chair is no longer used, but it remains on display in a Vatican museum.

What do you think?

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Rowan

To my knowledge Pope Joan is

Posted on: 06/27/2010 11:20

To my knowledge Pope Joan is a known historical figure. No clue how accurate the movie is. Here is a link to the Wikipedia article on her http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Joan it has some reasonable references listed.

Crunchy

Oooh, I had forgotten about

Posted on: 06/28/2010 10:01

Oooh, I had forgotten about this one.

I'll have to look it up.

WSchnauzer

Rowan wrote: To my knowledge

Posted on: 07/09/2010 08:55

Rowan wrote:

Pope Joan is described in the article as a legend and a fable. Given that mention of her appear centuries after her supposed reign and no contemporaries mention her (come on she supposedly gave birth in a procession and no one of the day wrote about it- not even the enemies of the papacy?) I think you would be hard pressed to find any serious historien who believed this "historical figure" actually existed.

Rev. Steven Davis

Have read extensively about

Posted on: 07/09/2010 09:02

Have read extensively about "Pope Joan" over the years. It's fiction. There's no evidence for her existence, although the story was certainly not a Protestant invention to discredit the papacy, since the legend significantly predates the Reformation.

lastpointe

The book is very

Posted on: 07/09/2010 09:28

The book is very entertaining. True? no way to know with out doing all the research involved but it seems plausible.

In the book she is a girl, who is raised as such. Her brother gets the education as due the time and she the chores. Then when the brother dies she takes his place.

Falls in love eventually, plans to leave and marry , gets pregnant and discovered.

Plausible perhaps, entertaining certainly.

Goes to show the lengths women would and could go to look after themselves at a time when only men could do that

Northwind

I just started reading the

Posted on: 07/09/2010 09:30

I just started reading the book. So far so good, whether or not she was a real person. I didn't realize there was a movie. I will have to watch for it.