Libellus

Libellus ad Leonem Decimum is a long letter addressed in 1513 to the new pope Leo X. The authors of the document were two Camaldolese monks, Paolo Giustiniani and Pietro Querini, convinced that the Church needed imminent reform. There had been many and multiple calls for church reform for centuries, and they would continue. The Libellus predates the Theses of Martin Luther by three years. The Libellus was written almost one hundred years after Jan Hus (1369-1415) was executed for his reforming position. The monks’ call for reform agreed in principle with some points in the previous reformers’ understanding of the problems and their solutions. But their orientation was fully in support of the core of traditional doctrine and of the supremacy of the bishop of Rome and the steadfast tradition of previous councils.

Both Giustiniani and Querini had given thorough thought to the conditions which the western church was experiencing. They were moved by an encompassing care and an intense love of the church to produce this document. It seems unfortunate that their intense motivation did not rub off effectively and in the same way onto the members of the Venice group from years before whose members later rose to influential positions in the church.