Paul V (Pope) (Camillo Borghese; 1552–1621; Reigned 1605–1621)

PAUL V (POPE) (Camillo Borghese; 1552–1621; reigned 1605–1621)

PAUL V (POPE) (Camillo Borghese; 1552–1621; reigned 1605–1621), Italian pope. After receiving a doctorate in law at Perugia, Borghese, who was of Sienese origins, was ordained at Rome and took curial positions. In 1593, Clement VIII (reigned 1592–1605) sent him as envoy to Philip II of Spain. Having served as bishop of Iesi (1597–1599), vicar of Rome, and inquisitor (1603), he was elected pope largely because of his neutrality toward Spain and France. He held strong views on papal authority and had able cardinals, Bellarmine and Baronius, for support in controversies.

Paul's plea to James I (ruled 1603–1625) not to punish Catholics in England after the Gunpowder Plot (5 November 1605) brought Parliament to demand an Oath of Allegiance of Catholics, which abjured belief in the pope's power to depose rulers and withdraw their subjects' loyalty to them. Paul condemned this, but his ambiguous communications with James on the duties of Catholics toward their king and disputes among Catholics in England triggered harsh reactions against them.

Paul adopted a tenacious adherence to the principle of clerical immunity from secular jurisdiction. In 1606, this sentiment clashed with the Republic of Venice when two criminal clerics were prosecuted in secular courts in that region. Venice also had passed laws against appropriating immoveable property for the church and against constructing new churches without permission of the Republic. After Venice refused to repeal the laws and release these clerics, Paul excommunicated the doge and government of Venice, placing the city under interdict. In defiance, Venice held religious services and battled Rome in a pamphlet war. A year later, a compromise negotiated by France made clear the ineffectiveness of such sanctions as well as the papacy's weakened position against European powers.

In 1611 Paul condemned the theories of the Gallican church, which held that the king's power came directly from God and was not mediated through the pope. The French king eventually backed away from this position. In 1614, when the Estates-General banned publication of the decrees of the Council of Trent in France, many French prelates resolved to publish them in provincial synods.

In central Europe, tensions between Catholic, Lutheran, and Calvinist princes led to renewed hostilities in 1618 after the collapse of the Religious Peace of Augsburg (1555). Paul eventually gave weighty support to Emperor Ferdinand II (ruled 1619–1637) in this conflict, known later as the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648).

Paul promoted Tridentine reform by enforcing episcopal residency, safeguarding Catholic orthodoxy through the Inquisition and Congregation of the Index, and promoting the work of the newer religious orders (Jesuits, Theatines, Capuchins, and Oratorians). He enjoined both Dominicans and Jesuits to teach their positions on the question of free will and God's foreknowledge (Molinist Controversy) without accusing each other of heresy. He instructed Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) to refrain from teaching as truth Copernicus's theory about Earth's rotation around the sun. He approved the use of the vernacular language in liturgical services for missionaries in China and India, and he encouraged missionary activity in Canada, Japan, Ethiopia, Congo, and the Middle East. Paul canonized Carlo Borromeo (1610) and Francesca Romana (1614) and beatified Ignatius Loyola, Francis Xavier, Philip Neri, Teresa of Ávila, Isidore the Farmer (all canonized in 1623), and many others.

Paul enriched his family, especially his cardinal-nephew Scipione Borghese, who became a great patron of the arts by giving Gian Lorenzo Bernini commissions, constructing the Villa Borghese, and refurbishing churches in Rome. Paul renovated the Quirinal Palace and completed Saint Peter's basilica (and had his own name inscribed on its facade). He enriched the Vatican Library, created the Vatican Secret Archives, and restored the aqueduct of Trajan. In 1614, he published the reformed Rituale Romanum.

Paul suffered a stroke when celebrating the defeat of the Calvinist king, Frederick V of Bohemia, at the Battle of White Mountain (8 November 1620); he died shortly afterward. He is buried in the Borghese Cappella Paolina of Santa Maria Maggiore.

See also Augsburg, Religious Peace of (1555) ; Bellarmine, Robert ; Gallicanism ; Papacy and Papal States ; Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) ; Venice .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Iserloh, Erwin, Josef Glazik, and Hubert Jedin. History of the Church. Vol. 5, Reformation and Counter Reformation. Translated by Anselm Biggs and Peter W. Becker. New York, 1980.

Pastor, Ludwig von. The History of the Popes from the Close of the Middle Ages. Vols. XXV–XXVI. Translated by Dom Ernest Graf. St. Louis, 1929.

Reinhard, Wolfgang. Papstfinanz und Nepotismus unter Paul V. (1605–1621): Studien und Quellen zur Struktur und zu quantitativen Aspekten des päpstlichen Herrschaftssystems. Stuttgart, 1974.

Frederick J. McGinness