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We have always loved you and thought you worthy of our protection as a man of an earnest and modest character.

"The words 'from the seventeenth to the twenty-second hour' suggests lurid deeds in the falling darkness of a July night. In fact the hours at that time were numbered from half-an-hour after sunset. The time given was between one o'clock and six o'clock of the afternoon an innocent enough hour. We also know from another contemporary letter that the occasion for the party was a baptism at which Cardinal Borgia was a godfather. After the ceremony the clergy were invited to see the women dancing in the garden. The Cardinal's gallantry may well have been overdone, and the dancing under the eyes of two very broad-minded cardinals may well have been of the sensual type common enough at the time. Not a very edifying spectacle, no doubt, but one, we venture to suggest, that has had its parallels, allowing for the fashions and manners of different periods, often enough since. It is at any rate clear that the story which had come to the ears of the Pope was very much exaggerated, and Cardinal Rodrigo at once wrote to the Pope to explain what had really happened and to ask his forgiveness for any ill-behaviour on his part." - Michael de la Bedoyere (The Meddlesome Friar and the Wayward Pope, p. 61)

"We admit that, according to a very dubious, or spurious, letter of pope Pius II, cardinal de Borgia once took his recreation at no great distance from a company of Sienese ladies; but there is not a contemporary author to give a single instance, where he ever passed any of his time in female company." - Msgr. Peter de Roo (Material for a History of Pope Alexander VI, His Relatives, and His Time, Vol. 2, p. 269)

"..[T]he professionally celibate young Cardinal, whose good reputation we know, should have conducted himself in his private life in a manner consistent with his status. And there is good evidence that this was the case." - Michael de la Bedoyere (The Meddlesome Friar and the Wayward Pope, p. 63-64)

"The vicechancellor is a good-looking man, of joyful countenance and cheerful aspect, of refined and sweet language, delighting the distinguished women whom he meets, and attracting them in a wonderful manner to love him, more than a loadstone attracts fron; but it is admitted, to be sure, that he sends them off untouched." - Gaspar of Verona, an instructor of Alexander. (Msgr. Peter de Roo, Material for a History of Pope Alexander VI, His Relatives, and His Time, Vol. 2, p. 268)

Also, there are rumors of other mistresses and other children, but they are unsubstantiated, and Alexander only recognized four children (Cesare, Giovanni, Lucrezia, Gioffre) as his. And he stopped seeing Vannozza dei Cattanei, the love of his life, in *that* way well before his election.

“We have always loved you and thought you worthy of our protection as a man of an earnest and modest character.”

Yes, note the past tense there? That was the thought that Pius had held up to that point. He continues on to say:

“Therefore, conduct yourself henceforth so that we may retain this our opinion of you, and may behold in you only the example of a well ordered life.”

Not exactly any kind of exoneration, when you read it in context.

“...but there is not a contemporary author to give a single instance, where he ever passed any of his time in female company”

A blatantly false assertion, since the famous “Banquet of the Chestnuts” was described by a contemporary, and attests that Borgia continued to satisfy the same appetites during his papacy.

“..[T]he professionally celibate young Cardinal”

Again, demonstrably false, unless “professionally celibate” only means that he was keeping the appearance of celibacy for the sake of his profession, and not in actuality. We know he could not have been actually celibate, as he already had fathered several children. Or were those virgin births?

“Also, there are rumors of other mistresses and other children, but they are unsubstantiated, and Alexander only recognized four children (Cesare, Giovanni, Lucrezia, Gioffre) as his.”

According to the research of Durant in “The Renaissance” (http://books.google.com/books?id=sjzi56FhIeIC), Stefano Infessura called the Giulia Farnese, the mother of one child, “the Pope’s concubine”. He also records that Cardinal Farnese, her brother, admitted the child was Alexander’s. Far from this relationship being ended when he ascended, Alexander installed her in a palace with Lucrezia near his own quarters, so that he could more easily continue his dalliances. Then there is another child, by another mistress, spoken of in Burchard’s diary as well.

If all you have to offer is to turn a blind eye to the actual evidence while offering up lame quotes from apologists that most Catholic scholars even admit have failed to rehabilitate the man, please just save it.