POPE JOHN XII (937-964)

An insatiable bisexual, he was accused of running a brothel out of St. Peter’s. He used the papal treasury to pay off his gambling debts, and enjoyed pranks such as ordaining a ten-year-old boy as bishop. Deposed once, he restored himself by force. He died, in his late twenties, after being badly beaten by a jealous husband.

POPE BENEDICT IX (1020-1055)

He turned the Lateran Palace into the site of lavish homosexual orgies, and by the time he was twenty-three his riotous conduct was so appalling that he was deposed. He was reinstated and deposed several times over the next five years. After finally being driven out once and for all in 1048, he died in obscurity. Some Catholic records, perhaps self-servingly, portray him as having died as a penitent in a monastery.

POPE PAUL II (1417-1471)

He wore a papal tiara that, according to one source, “outweighed a palace in its worth,” and he plundered the papal treasury to satisfy his love of glitter and finery. Known to his cardinals as “Our Lady of Pity” for his tendency to cry at the slightest provocation, he allegedly died of a heart attack while being sodomized by one of his favorite boys.

POPE SIXTUS IV (1414-1484)

He took one of his beautiful young nephews, Pietro Riario, as his lover. Riario was charming and witty, and Sixtus made him a millionaire by plundering the papal treasury. Another young nephew, Girolamo, was also alleged to have been Sixtus’s lover. When Sixtus died, he left several million dollars in debts; but he is perhaps best remembered for consenting to the establishment of the Spanish Inquisition and for his appointment of Torquemada as its inquisitor-general.

POPE LEO X (1475-1521)

He acquired a reputation for being wildly extravagant. Among other things, he would play cards with his cardinals, allow the public to sit in as spectators, and toss huge handfuls of gold coins to the crowd whenever he won a hand. His expenses for both cultural and military endeavors, along with his taste for increasingly ornate papal gowns, drove the papal treasury into bankruptcy.

POPE JULIUS III (1487-1555)

He was lovers with both his bastard son, Bertuccino, and his adopted son, Innocente, and made the two of them cardinals, He also appointed numerous other handsom teenage boys as cardinals, and allegedly enjoyed bringing them together for orgies where he would watch them sodomize on another. Della Casa’s famous poem “In Praise of Sodomy” was dedicated to him.