The Myth of Pope Joan

Sorry, but there was never a female pope

Conclave is over, and once again a man sits the papal throne. The sequestered cardinals have chosen the next pope as American Robert Prevost, a centrist, who shall reign as Leo XIV. It’s a certainty that all the most recent candidates considered for the papacy have a penis, but according to Church rules such an appendage is strictly to be used for the connecting of one’s bladder to the outside world.

Many believe, however, that once upon a time in the ninth century, a woman ruled the Catholic Church as pope. So the story goes, Popess Joan was an educated woman who disguised herself as a man to follow her male lover into the Church so they could be together. It is said she so impressed the leadership she eventually attained the highest position in the Church. It’s worth noting that celibacy didn’t become mandatory in the priesthood until the eleventh century, done for political reasons because the Church wanted to maintain control of choosing leadership for its bishoprics and abbeys, and there was a problem of bishops and abbots passing these titles to their offspring. Anyfuckingway, back at the time of the alleged female pope, fucking was still allowed.

Pope Benedict III served as head of the Church from 855 to 858 and was succeeded by Pope Nicholas I who reigned as pontiff from 858 to 867. However, it is alleged that Benedict’s reign was far shorter, and Joan snuck in there to rule for a time between the two. It is said by some that her reign came to an untimely end when, during a procession she went into labor and gave birth right there in front of God and everybody. She either died during said birth, which was totally plausible considering the shit state of medical technology, or the shock of seeing the pope squeeze a human out of their body caused the assembled to commit murder via stoning, which was also plausible due to the shit state of women’s equality.

What’s not plausible is that any of this actually happened. It’s a myth with evidence so scant it’s on par with belief in the Loch Ness Monster.

It was four centuries after the alleged Popess Joan, who supposedly used the name John VIII, that the myth of a female pope began. The real John VIII ruled from 872 to 882, and was the first pope to be assassinated, not for being female, but mostly for sucking at money management. Anyway, the fact that it was such a long time afterward that this tall tale finally began is the biggest of the red flags regarding the veracity of a female pope. It’s a glaring statement that the entire story falls under “shit some people made up.” The Church always had enemies, and if there had been a female pope, it would not have taken 400 years for people to start using that fact to talk shit about them. There is simply no way it took almost half a millennium for such a secret to be uncovered, because there was no secret to uncover.

Alas, once the tale finally did begin, it was popefuckery that people believed for several more centuries, often used to criticize the Church; the Protestant Reformation helped perpetuate it. It was largely debunked as having originated as satire in the seventeenth century. And yet, just like with the denial of climate change and the claims that Jesus never existed, there are a small minority of investigators who proclaim Popess Joan to have been real.

Those who cannot remember the past … need a history teacher who says “fuck” a lot. Get both volumes of ON THIS DAY IN HISTORY SH!T WENT DOWN.