Above: PIcture of Pope Gregory

According to the Cain Aigillne, he who was wisest, noblest, wealthiest, most intelligent, most popular, and most powerful of the whole tribe, most determined to exact his own rights and have his neighbour’s wrongs redressed, was best entitled to be at its head. Not so the Church. The Corns Bescna says if an abbacy were vacant, preference should be given to the tribe of the naomh, provided they had among them a suitable monk, even though he might be merely a psalm-singer. Failing such a candidate among the relatives of the naomh, the law was to give the abbacy to some member of the tribe that first bestowed the land.
This was in line with the Roman practice of the time regarding ecclesiastical elections. " By a synodical decree under Gregory in 601 it was provided that on the death of an abbot, no stranger should be elected if a fitting person was to be found amongst the brethren." Four centuries and a half later, another synodical decree made at the Lateran _-in 1059—provided, in reference to the election of Pope, that " if a fit person be found in the Roman Church he is to be taken ; if not, one may be sought elsewhere." 2 The precautions which time found necessary in the matter of papal elections, however, were not universally observed in regard to elections to abbacies or bishoprics. Discipline suffered accordingly. Montalembert, writing of England, quotes Bede as complaining that " numberless places bear the name of monasteries without keeping up the shadow of monastic observances." Again: "what a monstrous spectacle is that of these pretended cells, filled with men having wives and children.
There are even some who have the effrontery to procure similar convents for their wives." How monasteries came under royal control in England is partly illustrated in the strange story of Etheldreda. A like development is  observable  on  the   Continent.    There,bishoprics like Clermont, Metz and, it would appear, Milan ran in families. Royal blood had a claim on wealthy benefices, and thus what the sovereign gave with
one hand he took away with the other. Mediaeval theocracy too often meant a knight in armour, who was consecrated bishop that he might enjoy the resources and command the thousands of serfs attached to a saint’s inheritance."