Lentorama 2025: Perfunctory Popes

Day 23: Leo II

Leo was born in Sicily, but left for Rome (along with many other clergy) in the face of raids on that island by forces loyal to Caliph Uthman. Not much is known of his pre-pope life in Rome, other than that he had an interest in music and showed great charity towards the poor.

Leo was elected pope early in 681, but wasn't consecrated until August of the following year. His predecessor, Pope St. Agatho, had entered into negotiations with the Byzantine emperor to change the ways in which the empire was involved in papal elections. Rather than make him pope and potentially throw these discussions off, Leo had to wait until the negotiations ran their course.

So for waiting nearly a year and a half to officially become pope, Leo served in the role for just under a year. His main accomplishment was supporting and publicizing the church's stance against monothelitism, which we talked about earlier. He died in June 673, and became a saint sometime afterwards (there's no information that I could find about how and when he became a saint).