Michael of Cesena

Michael of Cesena (c. 1270–1342) was the Franciscan minister general whose defense of apostolic poverty broke with Pope John XXII and carried him into the emperor's camp. Born at Cesena, he studied theology in Paris before his election as minister general in 1316.

At first he sided with the pope in suppressing the Spiritual Franciscans, but in 1322 the Perugia chapter endorsed his teaching that Christ and the apostles owned no property, and John XXII condemned it. Summoned to Avignon in 1327 and forbidden to leave, Michael fled in 1328 with William of Ockham to Pisa, where Emperor Louis IV, himself in conflict with the pope, protected him.

Excommunicated and deposed by the Paris chapter in 1329, he was expelled by the Perpignan chapter in 1331 and stayed in Munich until his death in 1342; he was rehabilitated in 1359.