John had realized, however, that to destroy the weed of the Fraticelli, he needed to condemn as heretical the idea that Christ and the apostles had not owned any property, either individually or in common; and since the general chapter of the Franciscans in Perugia had held this opinion only a year earlier, in condemning the Fraticelli the Pope condemned the whole order. It would seem strange that a pope should consider perverse the idea that Christ was poor, but advocating the poverty of Christ was clearly a very short step from advocating the poverty of his church, and a poor church would
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