Pope Question

Modern Popes, obviously, take special papal names upon their elevation to the papacy.

Peter, Clement, Antecletus, Linus and the earliest popes were all known by the given names, as were Somewhere along the line, I'm sure Wolseley knows when, it became common practice for Popes to being to refer to themselves by the name of a previous pope, taking their name as a papal name (there hasn't been an "originally" named pope, prior to JP1, since Pope Lucius in 1145). My guess would be it is done to represent the transition from the person who was just a bishop to the person who is now the Vicar of Christ, and ties into the monarchial practice of royalty taking "crown" names. Royals usually use their own given name as their reigning name, but they don't have to... Prince Charles could, if he wished, be King Frodo.

Often times this was done due to a certain feeling of affection for or connection to a predecessor. The pope before Karol Wojtyla took the unusual step of taking the names of his two immediate predecessors, John XXIII and Paul VI, who were the popes of the Second Vatican Council. This gave him the first ever compound papal name, Pope John Paul, and the first papal name in 800 years not followed by a Roman numeral.

Upon his untimely death, his successor, Wojtyla, took up his fallen predecessors name as Ionnes Paulus P.P. II, or Pope John Paul II.

It would be unthinkable at present for a modern pope to draw upon names other than the papal names of predecessor for his papal name. However, no pope would ever take the name Pope Peter II. Mainly due to superstition and fears regarding various Catholic prophecies about the end of the Church.

it doesn't matter what name
it is just a name
so long he is the pope
who cares about the name

I wonder who the Pope's patron saint is?

John Paul II is quite into Mary. His personal motto, "Totus Tuus" is meant for Mary.

My FIL has that tattooed on himself somewhere because it struck him so...

editorial note: FIL has a ton of tattoos from when he went through a mid-life crisis. At least most of them are religious - Wheat and grapes, "fiat", a cool Trinity symbol, an angel, and countless others that I'm not remembering.

I don't know if this is right or not, but this is what I heard:

The first Pope whose name was changed, had a pagan god as first name, so he decided to change it, and thats how the tradition got started.

I also remember hearing something to that effect.

sorry, I gave some wrong info so I deleted it

The mandatory custom of changing ones' name began with Pope Sergius IV, elected in 1009. He changed it because his given name was Peter, and he did not want to presume to hold the office of Bishop of Rome with the same name as the Apostle Peter. (Pope John XIV made the same decision in 983; his given name was also Peter.)

Occasionally before this, several Popes had changed their names; for example Sylvester II (real name Gerbert); John XII (real name Octavius); and Gregory V (real name Bruno).

The story that the first Pope who changed his name did so because he held the given name of a pagan god is a myth; Pope Zephyrinus (199-217) for example, had the name of the Greek god of the west wind, and Pope Dionysius (259-268) had the name of the Greek god of wine and revelry.