Pope John, with a view to diminish…

Pope John, with a view to diminish the violence of faction in Rome, holds several synods in Rome and elsewhere in 898.

They not only confirm the judgment of Pope Theodore II in granting Christian burial to Pope Formosus, but also at a council held at Ravenna decree that the records of the synod held by Pope Stephen VI which had condemned him should be burned.

Re-ordinations are forbidden, and those of the clergy who had been degraded by Stephen are restored to the ranks from which he had deposed them.

The Slavs of Moravia, to keep their independence, which is threatened by the Germans appeal to John to let them have a hierarchy of their own.

Ignoring the complaints of the German hierarchy, John sanctions the consecration of a metropolitan and three bishops for the Church of the Moravians.

Finding that it is advisable to cement the ties between the empire and the papacy, John IX gives unhesitating support to Lambert in preference to Arnulf during the Synod of Rome, and also induces the council to determine that henceforth the consecration of the Popes should take place only in the presence of the imperial legates.

The sudden death of Lambert on October 15, 898, shatters the hopes which this alliance seemed to promise.