John XII was one of a long line of popes elected in the period called by Church historian, Cardinal Baronius, the Saeculum obscurum ("the Dark Age") of the Papacy, when the Holy See was dominated by two courtesans of the family of the Counts of Tusculum, Theodora and Marozia.
"[This quote needs a citation] Pope John XII, in imitation, also led a shameless and corrupt life, according to Liutprand of Cremona who records that he "turned the papal court into a brothel".
[This quote needs a citation] According to Liutprand, Pope John XII was eventually murdered by his mistress's husband In flagrante delicto.
Pope John was repeatedly warned about his corrupt misuse of papal power and his misconduct of the Papacy by the Holy Roman Emperor, Otto I the Great, who threatened to bring his army to Rome from Frankfurt, then the imperial headquarters, and rectify the situation.
After defending Rome and driving Otto back to the Tiber River, John fled the city and took refuge in Tibur.
They accused him of simony, of consecrating a ten-year-old child as Bishop of Todi, of converting the Lateran Palace into a brothel, of a life mostly spent hunting, of unjustly ordering men to be mutilated, of arson and of wearing armour and training for war and battle.
Finally, they declared that he drank a toast to the Devil, and while playing at dice invoked the name of Jupiter, Venus and other pagan gods.
In the absence of John XII (who was apparently hunting in the Catanian hills), the emperor recited the arraignment that the pope was a criminal and a traitor.
This, in turn, had been encapsulated into theological terms by the teaching of Pope Gelasius I on the "Two Swords" or Dyarchy, set out in his letter, Famuli vestrae pietatis, also known by the Latin mnemonic Duo sunt ("there are two"), written in 494 to Byzantine Emperor Anastasius I Dicorus.
Still less can the Synod merely be dismissed as a political manoeuvre of the emperor, as secularist and Protestant historians are apt to do not only with imperial interventions but also with the acts of popes and bishops.
It is also suggested that the election of a layman to the Papacy was illegal but that, too, is unsustainable since it has been done more than once validly and the candidate was simply ordained prior to coronation.
Leo was ordained to the Holy Orders of Porter, Lector, Acolyte, Subdeacon, Deacon and Priest by Sico, the cardinal-bishop of Ostia, who then proceeded to consecrate him as Bishop on 6 December 963.
Their Titular churches were: Present were all of the officers of the papal court, as well as deacons, Regionarii, notaries and the Primicerius of the Schola cantorum.