Pope Leo X was made a cardinal at 13 and a priest only after his election
Giovanni de' Medici received the tonsure at seven, held dozens of income-paying church posts by ten and was named a cardinal at 13. When he was elected pope on 9 March 1513, he was not even a priest. He was ordained six days later, made a bishop two days after that, and crowned at 37 as Leo X.
He was born in Florence on 11 December 1475, the second son of Lorenzo the Magnificent, who steered him toward the church from infancy and pressed his relative Pope Innocent VIII for the red hat in 1489. Lorenzo worried about the boy's character and wrote urging him to shun vice and luxury, and above all to get up early. Giovanni was schooled at his father's humanist court by figures such as Poliziano, Pico della Mirandola and Ficino.
His family's fortunes swung wildly. Lorenzo died in April 1492, when Giovanni was 16, and in November 1494 an uprising drove the Medici out of Florence. Giovanni travelled through Germany, the Netherlands and France, later served as papal legate with an army sent against the French, and was taken prisoner after a French victory. A bloodless revolution eventually restored the family, with Giovanni managing Florence behind his younger brother.
As pope he spent and borrowed freely, fought a costly eight-month war in 1517 to install his nephew as Duke of Urbino, and drained the papal treasury. He was also a lavish patron: Raphael decorated the Vatican rooms, work continued on the new St. Peter's, and he reorganised Rome's university and championed classical learning.
The money for St. Peter's became his lasting problem. Indulgences granted to donors toward the basilica provoked Martin Luther's 95 Theses, and in 1520 Leo's bull Exsurge Domine condemned Luther's position, closing off dialogue. He died on 1 December 1521 and lies in Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome. No pope since has been elected without first being a priest.
Source: Pope Leo X
