Adrian VI

Subject of the Bishopric of Utrecht. The only Dutch pope; last non-Italian to be elected pope until John Paul II in 1978. Tutor of Emperor Charles V. Came to the papacy in the midst of one of its greatest crises, threatened not only by Lutheranism to the north, but also by the advance of the Ottoman Turks to the east.

He refused to compromise with Lutheranism theologically, demanding Martin Luther's condemnation as a heretic. However, he is noted for his attempt to reform the Catholic Church administratively in response to the Protestant Reformation. Adrian VI's remarkable admission that the turmoil of the Church was the fault of the Roman Curia itself was read at the 1522–1523 Diet of Nuremberg. His efforts at reform, however, proved fruitless, as they were resisted by most of his Renaissance ecclesiastical contemporaries, and he did not live long enough to see his efforts through to their conclusion.