The Thrift-Shop Pope

had changed his policy on verification. Previously, verification had been subject to a rigorous evaluation to verify the accounts of public figures and organizations, but now the coveted blue check was available to anyone with eight dollars a month to spare. The end result was that, at least temporarily, a blue check mark or public figures and organizations no longer conferred

any meaningful marker of identity. Those unwilling to pay for it, like Pope Francis, were simply unceremoniously stripped of their blue check. If you were, like me, someone who often found yourself on the history nerd side of Twitter, you might have noticed a couple of odd terms trending as the verification mayhem unfolded, namely, Auvignon and Western Chisholm. In the early fourteenth century, Pope Clement the fifth had moved his court

from Rome to Avignon in what is now France. The papacy would remain there unchallenged for over seventy years and through six more popes, until Gregory the eleventh moved his court back to Rome in thirteen seventy six. What does this have to do with Elon musk ask The answer

lies in a third trending term, antipope. When Gregory the eleventh died in thirteen seventy eight, the College of Cardinals in Rome set about their usual business of electing a new pope, which they did Urban the sixth, But some cardinals opposed the move from Avignon back to Rome, so they elected a pope of their own in Avignon, who would become known as the anti Pope, Clement the seventh,

though they just called him Pope Clement the seventh. A total of three antipopes would be elected and reign from Avignon and two more from Pisa. From June fourteen o nine to May fourteen fifteen. There were popes in all three cities, each believing wholeheartedly that he alone was the world's singular direct line to God. Twitter story argued mostly jokingly, that Musk's decision to unverify Pope Francis was akin to

a modern day Western chism. With the Pope in Rome stripped of the mark that made it clear he was the one and only Pope, Musk was leaving the door open for someone else to claim the papal throne, at least on Twitter. The brief verification of Pope Francis was many things, a technological oversight, a notable day in Twitter's slow downfall, an opportunity to laugh, perhaps nervously, at the idea of Elon Musk accidentally taking control of the Catholic Church.

But it was not, in fact a crisis in the Vatican. The papalexperts of Twitter dot com, however, were quick to point out that a Twitter verification schism, funny as it was, would not have even given us the first modern antipope. In the last sixty or so years, at least ten men have claimed the Holy See, each girded by a variable number of followers but an equally fervent belief in

the righteousness of their pontificate. Most of these were clergy associated with specific offshoots of the Catholic Church before they claimed an appointment to the papal throne. But Twitter that day was almost entirely focused on a man named David Bowden, a former real estate agent and furniture maker originally from Oklahoma, who, in the Year of Our Lord nineteen ninety decided that he was the only one who could lead the church

in the right direction. I'm Danas Schwartz, and this is noble blood.

In January nineteen fifty nine, when Pope John the twenty third announced his intention to convene a second Vatican Council, the world had been irrevocably changed by the horrors of the world wars, by the trepidation of the rebuilding and globalization that followed, and by the tension that came with the brewing Cold War. We're about to get into some complicated religious bureaucracy. So before we get any further, I

figure it would be helpful to explain some terms. The Second Vatican Council, or Vatican two as it often called, was an ecumenical council, which is the term they used to describe a gathering of all bishops and other church authorities during which they consider and rule on questions of doctrine, administration, church practice, and the like. Despite its name, Vatican two was not the second ever ecumenical council, just the second

to take place in the Vatican City. There have been twenty seven ecumenical councils in total, dating all the way back to the fourth century CE, with different sects of Christianity accepting the conclusions of some and not others as they saw fit. The Catholic Church accepts twenty one of them. When Pope John called the Ecumenical Council that would be known as Vatican two, there had not been an ecumenical council in nearly one hundred years since the First Vatican

Council had concluded in eighteen seventy. It took roughly three years to prepare for the Second Vatican Council. Before putting together the council, the Vatican first needed to conduct an evaluation of the Catholic world from bishops to the faculty of Catholic universities. Thousands of individuals and institutions replied with their wishes for the future of the Church, and immediately the conflict was clear. This Ecumenical Council would be divided.

Which we those who believed it was the duty of the Church to remain steadfast to resist change, because to change would be to give in to the pressure from an increasingly secularized world, and those who believed equally strongly that change was necessary for the Church to continue to thrive in that world. The Council opened on October eleventh, nineteen sixty two, and met in four sessions over the

course of a little over three years. Pope John the twenty third died in nineteen sixty three, so the final three sessions were overseen by his successor, Paul sixth.

but some changes that might stand out. This was the moment the Church stopped conducting liturgy in Latin, and when priests began to be allowed to preach facing the congregation for the first time in hundreds of years. Lay people were widely allowed to take communion under both kinds, that is, they could receive both consecrated bread and the wine that

previously had been limited to members of the clergy. Of course, these were only a few of many changes, some of which went to matters of much greater importance to the doctrine than did the issue of in which direction a priest could stand. But it's hard to understate how important a shift Vatican two was for the Catholic world and

how divisive. The conclusion of the Second Vatican Council and all the change that accompanied it did little to quell the dissension that had been bubbling over the past several years,

if not longer. Many people, both lay and clergy, continue to believe steadfastly in traditionalist Catholicism, and some went so far as to espouse the belief that by changing the Church and its practices, hope John the thirteenth committed heresies that effectively nullified his nineteen fifty eight appointment to the papacy. This belief became known as set of a Cantism, coming from the Latin phrase set of a cante, meaning with

the seat being empty. The phrase was generally used to indicate the interregnal periods of the papacy after one pope had died but before a new one was elected. The set of a Cantist's adoption of the term went to their central claim that the nullification of Pope John's appointment meant that, in fact, the Holy See had remained vacant since nineteen fifty eight. But what do you do when you believe the Holy See to be vacant but the

Vatican doesn't agree? Some set of a Cantists saw an obvious solution to the problem of the empty papal throne to take matters into their own hands and elect a pope themselves. David Bodden's life started out about as unremarkably as a life can start out for someone who would later claim to be the rightful pope for decades. David was born in nineteen fifty nine, the very year Pope John the thirteenth called for an ecumenical council in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

His parents, Kennett and Clara, also known as Ticky Bowden, were devout Conservative Catholics, and Vatican Two, which concluded when David was only six years old, felt like a betrayal of their faith. The result was a traditionalist upbringing for David and his brother Brian that sowed the seeds of

set of Acantism. Eventually, the Boden family became involved with the Society of Saint Pius the tenth an international fraternity of traditionalist Catholic priests, which was founded in nineteen seventy by Archbishop Marcel Lefevre, who had been one of the leading clerical voices of opposition during Vatican Two. The Society acknowledged the Pope in Rome, but took enough issue with the reforms of Vatican Two that it was still considered

schismatic by the Vatican. David Baden entered the Society's seminary in nineteen seventy seven, moving to Eccombe, Switzerland to begin his spiritual training, before transferring to a location in Michigan later that year. By the time David was dismissed from the seminary in nineteen seventy eight.

known as the Palmarian Christian Church. David Bowden couldn't have been particularly satisfied by that papal alternative. The Palmrian Christian Church has long been widely considered something of a cult, but that would have been the first significant example in David's lifetime of some kind of conclavist adjacent movement. A little bit more messy theology, there are several different distinct kinds of antipopes, and the differences really boil down to

how those antipopes came into their claims. Many modern antipopes simply claim that God told them that they were pope. Such was the case in the Apostles of Infinite Love, an early traditionalist Catholic movement that began in the thirties but picked up some momentum following Vatican Two.

own successor. But in the decades since Vatican Two, many had to genuinely believe that although the throne of Saint Peter was vacant, the process by which a pope was chosen was still important. One needed a conclave to elect a new head of church. These people became known as Conclavists, espousing the belief that not only was a conclave important, but that one could or even should, convene their own conclave to elect a rightful pope outside of the Vatican.

Despite David's dismissal from the Seminary, which he maintained was due to infighting in the institution rather than any wrongdoing on his part. David Bodden initially remained loyal to the

Society of Saint Pius the Tenth. The Boden family moved to Saint Mary's, Kansas, where the society ran Saint Mary's Academy and Collegevid's brother Brian Bodden, attended school there, and David took a job, hoping to prove himself worthy of readmission to the Seminary, but in nineteen eighty one, several years and a failed seminary application later, David became dissolutioned by the Society of Saint Pius the Tenth and he struck out on his own, with his family quickly following suit.

Over the next few years, the Boddends became drawn to the set of vacantist movement, and soon they believed firmly that every pope after Pious the twelfth was a heretic unfit for the papal throne, because the Society of Saint Pius the Tenth, though traditionalist, still acknowledged the Pope in Rome, who by this time was John Paul the Second. The

Bodens deemed that society heretical too. As David continued to study under his own guidance and become more deeply involved with the set of a Cantist movement, or at least as involved as one could be without being ordained, he began to reach a new conclusion that perhaps there was a solution to the problem of the empty papal throne, and before long another conclusion that perhaps he was the one to fill it. In nineteen eighty seven, David began

campaigning for lack of a better word. According to his writings, which he uploaded to the online ebook service script, it was in September of that year that he received a letter that would solidify his conviction that a new pope

must be elected. The letter was otherwise unspecified, but he claimed that it included a quote from what he described as the only Vatican Council, that is, the first Vatican Council, which stated that Saint Peter quote would have perpetual successors in the papacy until the end of time end quote. Apparently from that letter, David immediately knew that a new pope must somehow be elected, and he decided to take.

they believed was a false pope. David and Theresa championed and apparent precedent within the Catholic Church for the election of a pope by quote true Catholics, that is, laypeople, instead of the usual College of Cardinals, which generally consists of senior clerical officials in the Vatican. With the path forward finally clear, David began planning to hold a papal election.

He reportedly sent over two hundred copies of his and Theesa's book to every set of a Cantist priest and set of a Cantist publication he could get a hold of, hoping to inflate the number of voters at the election and thereby its legitimacy. He was hopeful that at least one ordained priest would come and vote in his homespun papal election. A few, he said, expressed interest, but ultimately,

in the end none came. After months of planning and a handful of delays, putting together a papal election on your own is a logistical challenge, after all, the big day finally rolled around on July sixteenth, nineteen ninety, a day which David would later note was serendipitously also the Feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, a liturgical feast which had come under some scrutiny from the Vatican following

Vatican two. With no perish or church to speak of, David Bowden convened the conclave in the thrift store his family owned in Bellevue, Kansas. Out of second hand furniture, the conclave made the best approximation they could of a chapel, homemade pews padded with leopard print cushions, papal throne all

atop some classic nineties shag carpeting. The conclave was composed of six lay believers, including Teresa Stanfill Ben's Kennett and Tickie Bowden, David's parents, and David himself, along with a couple who traveled from Michigan for the occasion. It only took one round of voting by secret ballad before it was decided David Bowden would fill the papal throne that had, according to the conclave, been vacant for over thirty years since Pius the twelfth died the year before David's birth.

The newly crowned pope chose the name Michael first, after Saint Michael, the archangel, who was said to have battled the devil himself and defended the faith against heresy. In a statigy shaky blurry video taken on the day of the election, the videographer, presumably David's father, shows David kneeling before their homemade altar in a white skull cap, a white stole with crosses on it, and a robe that

looked like it may have once been a tablecloth. In a charming, somewhat mid Atlantic accent, David's father, Kenneth declares, habay moose Popham, we have a pope, And then, like all proud dads have done since the invention of the video camera, he struggles to figure out how to zoom in on the new leader of his faith. A farmhouse for a palace, an attic for a chapel, a pickup

truck for a popemobile. In twenty eleven, an independent documentary was made about Pope Michael, detailing his rise to the thrift shop throne and the small but fervent movement that he had gathered around him. The film offers an intimate portrait of Pope Michael that one could never dream of

getting for, say, Pope Francis. We see him eating dinner at home in Kansas with his mother Ticky, and his seminarian and papal secretary, Phil Friedel, a young man from Chicago who had left a girlfriend and an engineering education behind after corresponding with Pope Michael and feeling called to

his church. We see the Christmas lights Michael used to decorate his workspace, slash chapel in his mother's attic, the old computer he used to email with his followers and update his website, and the aviator Sonny's off white trench coat combo he wore when he ran errands. We also hear about the struggles Pope Michael has faced over the years. A primary problem was that he was unknown ordained for

the first twenty one years of his reign. He never did gain acceptance to a seminary after his dismissal in nineteen seventy eight, and he couldn't very well do so while both rejecting the Vatican and claiming.

who were based around the world. He also used it to solicit new followers, to criticiz size the Vatican, and to try to combat those who would seek to delegitimize his reign. For the entirety of Michael's reign, his blog and the Internet in general would be the primary.

In twenty eleven, Pope Michael claimed to finally have been ordained and consecrated as a bishop by Bishop Robert b Arneson, who was part of the quote independent Catholic movement that saw clergy and laity break away from Rome and ordain and consecrate clergy without Vatican approval. It was an ordination that would never have stood up to scrutiny by Church officials, but it should be clear by now how little that

would have mattered to Michael. Soon after, Michael wrote and published another book titled fifty four Years That Changed the Catholic Church nineteen fifty eight to twenty twelve, in which he retold his own story and espoused his beliefs on a wide range of doctrinal issues and perceived heresies and sins by the Church in the Vatican not to mention the secular world at large. The other great struggle of

Pope Michael's reign, perhaps unsurprisingly, was near constant criticism. He dealt with pushback not only from modern Catholics, but also from his fellow set of Accantists, and even from former supporters and members of his own family. Teresa Stanfill Bens, who had made up one sixth of Michael's papal conclave, had denounced his papacy as a cult of personality several years prior to the twenty eleven documentary, including him on

her list of anti popes on her blog. David's own brother, Brian Bawden, had been shocked by the election itself, and was quoted in the Miami Herald shortly after the election saying, oh my god, no, I don't know what to think. I don't follow the church in Rome. I don't go around electing popes either. We don't hear much about Brian after Pope Michael's election. From outside his circle, Pope Michael received ridicule from pro Vatican Catholics, from non Catholics, and

of course from supporters of other anti popes. From a mixture of these, he received his many nicknames, the junk store Pope, the second hand Pope, and the thrift shop Pope, among others. He also claimed to have received many threats over the years, with one particularly colorful one promising to cut out his tongue and ship it to then Pope John Paul the Second. The ridicule never seemed to bother

Michael much. In one interview, he equipped quote they called Jesus a kook too, though he did file a police report after that tongue threat. In July twenty twenty two, the Vatican in Exile Twitter account shared that Pope Michael had been admitted to a hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, for emergency surch injury and was in a coma. He never recovered and died on August second, twenty twenty two,

at the age of sixty three. In another interview released shortly after his death, he claimed that his constant efforts online had earned his church over one hundred loyal members. David Bodden's death did not make the waves one might expect from the death of a pope. His obituary is

a curious testament to the precariousness of his position. He was named only as father David Bowden, and his obituary never explicitly mentioned his claim to the papacy, naming him instead as a member of the Saint Helen's Catholic Mission Church in Topeka. It also gave him the titles of President of the Oakland Neighborhood Improvement Association and members member

of the Citizen Advisory Committee. Nevertheless, the obituary did note that he would be lying in state at Saint Helen's in honor not afforded to just anyone, not even regular quote unquote priests. In death as in life, David embodied many of the tensions and contradictions that defined the Catholic

world after Vatican Two. The papacy in the Vatican, as we all know, continued on after Pope Michael's death, with Francis and the cardinals and the bishops and most of the world ignoring him as they always had, But in the eyes of somewhere between thirty and one hundred believers, the throne of Saint Peter was vacant. Once again. That's

the story of David Bodden's peculiar and contested papacy. But stick around after a brief sponsor break to hear about how his followers have continued his mission normally here at Noble Blood. Our episode's focus on a past not always distant, but usually far back enough that by the time we press record there aren't any updates. As in everything, David

Bodden's story is a bit of an anomaly. His church never had very many followers, but he had some, and they have continued to try to honor his legacy and hold his church together in the time since his death. While this episode was being written in July twenty twenty three, they did so by doing exactly what Pope Michael would have wanted, by convening a co enclave and electing a new pope. Their conclave began on July twenty fifth, twenty

twenty three. The Vatican in Exile newsletter reported the venue as being in Vienna, Austria, but several news outlets claimed the event took place in Kansas. The conclave consisted of two American priests and two bishops. The sessions of the conclave were chaired by Pope Michael's Archbishop Rhellia Martinez, who had brought his Pope's movement to his home parish in

the Philippines. It's unclear whether Martinez was counted among those in the conclave, or whether his presence brought their number up to five. This new conclave elected an unnamed priest as their new pope rather quickly, but he didn't pick up the phone when they called to tell him.

the papacy. News outlets reported that his return to the Philippines as Pope was celebrated with a motorcade and growing number of fervent followers, not to mention threats of excommunication from local Vatican officials. Though Pope Francis has yet to

acknowledge his competitor in any way. Since Martinez's election, he has taken up the task of picking up where David Bowden left off, leading his faithful, building his following, and raging against the Vatican and its perceived heresies and the pontifical name he chose that would be his Holiness, Pope Michael.

producers Aaron Manke, Alex Williams and Matt From. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.