Pope innocent xi biography sample

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Innocent XI, POPE (BENEDETTO ODESCALCHI); b. at Como, May 16, 1611; d. at Rome, August 11, 1689. He was educated by the Jesuits at Como, and studied jurisprudence at Rome and Naples.

Urban VIII appointed him successively prothonotary, president of the Apostolic Camera, commissary at Ancona, administrator of Macerata, and Governor of Picena. Innocent X made him Cardinal-Deacon of Santi Cosma e Damiano on March 6, 1645, and, somewhat later, Cardinal–Priest of Sant’ Onofrio.

List of martyred popes

As cardinal he was beloved by all on account of his deep piety, charity, and unselfish devotion to duty. When he was sent as legate to Ferrara in order to assist the people stricken with a severe famine, the pope introduced him to the people of Ferrara as the “father of the poor”, “Mittimus patrem pauperum”.

In 1650 he became Bishop of Novara, in which capacity he spent all the revenues of his see to relieve the poor and sick in his dioces