So I’ll offer a slightly different perspective to that of u/Noble_Devil_Boruta. I study Joan from the perspective of late medieval sanctity, and the often incredibly thin line that divided a saint from a witch or heretic, particularly in the case of women.

Before we kick off, there is one significant error in your question. Joan was never (formally) accused of being a ‘demon-possessed witch’. Demonic possession is something that was regarded as fact for most people in the Middle Ages, but it was generally not considered something that was the fault of the possessed person, or a negative comment on their character or morality. Possession was usually held to be involuntary, and something that the sufferer was rescued from (usually by a handy saint or the invocation of a benevolent intercessor such as the Virgin Mary). It would be very unlikely that one would be punished by the ecclesiastical authorities for being demonically possessed, let alone by being put to death.

The ‘witch’ part of your question is more accurate – sorcery and witchcraft were offered as explanations for Joan’s success by a number of parties, ranging from the Theology Faculty of the University of Paris (a solidly pro-English institution at this point) to the anonymous author of De Quadam Puella, a work that is generally supportive of Joan, but addresses the suggestion that she was some other form of being disguised as a human. However, the fundamental issue in your question is to assume that a) either of these points represented prevailing opinion about Joan, and b) that they led to her being burnt. Once we have considered these two points, we’ll understand what exactly led to Joan’s condemnation, which puts us in the best position to understand why this was later overturned.

We’ll deal with point b) first: why was Joan burnt? The Twelve Articles of Condemnation produced by the prosecutors at Joan’s Condemnation Trial (Rouen, 1431) give us the clearest indication of her initial ‘crimes’. These cover Joan’s claim to experience visions of St Michael and St Catherine (Articles I, II, III and IX), Joan’s visions of the future (Article IV), her wearing of men’s clothes (Article V) her writing of letters (Article VI), military involvement (VII), attempted suicide (VIII), claim the Saints Michael and Catherine are on the side of the French (X) and refusal to obey the Church if it commanded something contrary to the will of God (XII). Joan was convicted of these articles, which made her a repentant heretic, on 24th May 1431. Later that same day, she resumed the wearing of male clothing, and four days later, on 30th May, she was burned at the stake as a relapsed heretic. The final sentence is very clear about the logic behind Joan’s condemnation:

‘Therefore it follows that, declaring you to have fallen once again into the sentence of excommunication that you had originally incurred, and into your previous errors, we call you a relapse and heretic, and by our present sentence…we judge that you are a rotten limb that, so you do not infect the other limbs, must be cast out from the unity of the Church, cut off from her body and given up to the secular power [i.e. sentenced to death]’

Note that there is no real mention here of witchcraft, beyond a brief allusion in the Articles of Condemnation, and no mention at all of demonic possession. Joan was initially condemned as a heretic, and then, when she returned to her original behaviour after abjuring, was burned as a relapsed heretic. And here, I’m afraid, I have to disagree with u/Noble_Devil_Boruta. By the standards of the medieval Church, Joan was indisputably a heretic. Following the initial formation of the inquisition in response to earlier heresies, one of the main defining characteristics of heresy was obedience to ecclesiastical authority. The Church was positioned as the only means by which the will of God could be known and disseminated, and any claims that allowed individuals to bypass the institutional Church and claim unmediated access to knowledge of God were strictly policed, and demarcated as heresy unless they could be clearly controlled.

This is where we return to point a) – what was the general opinion about Joan, and perhaps more importantly, what context can we set this in? The late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries were a time of significant uncertainty and instability within the medieval Church. From 1378 the papacy was embroiled in the Great Schism, from the early 1400s the Franciscans and Dominicans were undergoing painful and contentious internal reforms, and the provision of pastoral and sacerdotal attention to the laity was inconsistent, at best. It is in this context of upheaval that we find coming to light and prominence a whole host of female visionaries and mystics, experiencing mystical visions and prophecies that they interpret as coming directly from God. Now, mystical women weren't a new phenomenon in this period (think Hildegard of Bingen in the 12th century, or Mary of Oignes a little later), but the prominence and breadth of their involvement in the later medieval period was extremely new. The two most famous examples of this are probably St Catherine of Siena and St Birgitta of Sweden (note that both are saints – this is significant). However, this upsurge in female spiritual activity prompts a counter-reaction from the institutional church, which Herzig has called the ’hereticization’ of female spirituality, and Elliot considers a ‘criminalisation’ of female religious activity.

To cut a long story short, churchmen developed a theoretical process called ‘spiritual discernment’, which was applied to female (and occasionally male) visionaries to determine if their visions were divinely inspired, or came from the Devil. And no prizes for guessing one of the main criteria for approval……. ding ding ding, that’s right, it was obedience to the institutional Church, usually in the form of oversight by a male confessor. Other criteria included an assessment of the visionary’s way of life, with particular focus on her virtue and humility, as well as an assessment of the visions reported to ensure that they did not contradict Church teachings. So what we’re looking at here is a period where female spirituality is subject to increasing and unfavourable scrutiny, and the bar by which it is deemed orthodox or heretical is the extent to which the visionary is subject to the control of the Church. Joan’s condemnation is twofold – on the one hand, as u/Noble_Devil_Boruta argues, it’s a politically motivated act that removes a thorn in the side of the Anglo-Burgundian alliance. On the other, it’s the logical conclusion of the medieval Church’s attitude towards unregulated female spirituality and in this latter sense it is entirely in-keeping with the attitude of the Church as a whole.

So, we’ve set out one possible interpretation for Joan’s execution, and set it in the context of the religious climate of the time. However, that climate of course changed. In 1450, the French King Charles VII cautiously began proceedings to challenge to Rouen Trial, and prompt a re-evaluation of Joan. This ultimately concluded in 1456, when it overturned the results, and condemned the Twelve Articles produced by the Rouen Trial as defamatory. However, contrary to what u/Noble_Devil_Boruta suggests, I don’t think the Nullification Trail actually pronounced on Joan’s orthodoxy, and I don’t recall it leading to Pierre Cauchon being accused of heresy (though I’d be happy to be corrected here). It certainly pronounced the 1431 trail invalid, but that’s about as far as it went. Taylor points out that the result of the Nullification Trial ‘was not as widely publicised as supporters of Joan might have hoped’, and that celebration of Joan was (officially) largely neglected outside of very specific places until the modern period.

In 1920, Pope Benedict XV canonised Joan. This concluded a lengthy process that began in 1869, and was the result of the increasing attention being paid to Joan as a symbol of French resistance and French religious expression over the course of the Third Republic. Here we come to the heart of your question – why was Joan canonised, if she had previously been condemned? Firstly, as we have seen, her initial condemnation was overturned in 1456, so that posed no obstacle. Secondly, the initial condemnation stemmed from a religious and judicial milieu that was predisposed to regard any expression of uncontrolled female religiosity as suspect at best, and heretical at worst. This was a climate in which performing apparently supernatural feats was a cause for alarm and concern, rather than automatically reverence. It is telling that the process for making a saint in the medieval period is effectively identical to the process for judging a heretic. These were very much two ends of a spectrum, rather than diametrically opposed identities. By the early 20th century, ideas about sainthood and heresy had evolved, and there was sufficient distance from the events to be able to separate the political elements of the trial from the religious ones. The diversity of opinions about Joan had coalesced into a sense of approval and reverence, and this provided fertile grounds for the reassessment of a historical figure.

May I ask for clarification? It seems from your question that you believe the Vatican position would consider Joan of Arc a demon-possessed witch. One interpretation, from Joan of Arc : the legend and the reality by Gies, 1981, is that this was the view of the English and that contemporary Catholics and Catholics at the time of her canonization might not consider her such.

While the English charged her for a variety of faith-based offenses, I would be interested in seeing a source where the Vatican would consider her a demon-possessed witch? Thank you :)

The premise of the question is not necessarily correct. In general, if anyone said that Jeanne of Arc was possessed by the devil or practiced witchcraft, it would have been only some of the English clergymen who had vested political interest in such allegations.

It is worth noting that the character of a young mystic who got involved in the war was also questioned by the French, as both Charles VII and members of his royal council were aware that if the girl supporting the French claims is deemed a witch or a heretic, it would severely undermine the political position of the king, as his enemies might accuse him of consorting with devil to maintain his hold on the disputed lands. Following these concerns, Charles VII organized an official investigation of the moral status of Jeanne that took place in April 1429 in Poitiers. Initial proceedings ended with the conclusion that she is authentically pious, humble and honest, as befitting any devout Catholic. The investigators said, however, that it will be prudent to corroborate these findings by an ordeal, to make sure that the Jeanne's presence is indeed a gift of Providence. Thus, they proposed that the girl should arrive at Orleans and attempt rally the troops. If the latter manage to capture the city, it will be a proof of the divine character of Jeanne's visions.

Although she initially was not treated seriously by the commanders, her presence had a very good effects on morale of the troops, significantly compromised by the fact that in the course of almost five moths of the siege, French troops made only one attempt to capture any of the fortifications, which also ended in failure. On the day of Jeanne's arrival, soldiers made an attempt to capture an outlying Saint Loop castle and succeeded. Two days later, she roused the troops to attach the Saint Jean le Blanc castle the attackers found completely deserted. Jean d'Orleans, army commander, possibly fearing that such events will soon expose him as incompetent leader, ordered to close the gates of the city, to prevent Jeanne and soldiers from leaving, but the girl managed to influence the mayor to allow her and the troops to leave subsequently capturing Saint Augustin castle. Soon after, only 3 days after her arrival, she managed to persuade the hesitant commanders to attack Les Tourelles castle, without further preparations and not waiting for the reinforcements. This attack, although met wit resistance, also ended in a successful capture of the target. These victories, along with saving the life of Jean d'Alencon during the siege of Jargeau and miraculous survival after being glanced with a stone cannonball was more than enough to persuade even the biggest skeptics at the court that Jeanne's presence must be a gift from God.

After Jeanne d'Arc has been captured, her process was nothing short of a 'kangaroo court', contradicting most legal requirements of a heresy case and in some areas it contradicted canon law itself. It has been overseen by Bishop Pierre Cauchon who was not competent to do so, all members had obviously vested interests and were political opponents of the accused, it has been financed in full by the lay power, the tribunal denied the accused a right of legal counsel and representation, the court did not follow proper procedures denying the right to papal appellation, no evidence against Jeanne has even been found, and the verdict openly contradicted the court protocols, making the execution a textbook case of a judicial murder.

The process has been challenged only 32 years later, immediately after the war ended. Inquisitor General Johann Brehal, on behalf of Jeanne's mother, petitioned Pope Calixtus III to revise the process for compliance with the Canon law, as the case had all the hallmarks of illegal proceedings. Investigations carried by the Inquisitor General and Father Guillame Bouille in the years 1452-1455 resulted in an appellation process headed by Pope himself and involving the clergy from around the Europe. This process not only ended in 1456 with the cancellation and condemnation of the verdict on the grounds of illegality, but also found Jeanne d'Arc innocent, named her a martyr, and indicted Bishop Cauchon for heresy and a severe breach of canon law.

The case of Jeanne d'Arc regained popularity in late 1810s, after the turbulent period of French Revolution quickly followed by Napoleonic Wars, as she was a perfect candidate for a national hero. Acting in 15th century, she was not directly connected to a recently abolished absolutist monarchy, as a commoner she evoked the egalitarian ideas of the Revolution, as a martyr she was popular among the Catholics and as both spiritual and military leader of French forces during the war with England she was associated with the independence and sovereignty of France, as well as with the budding nationalism. This notion was quickly reflected in her biography written by Philippe-Alexandre Le Brun de Charmettes and published in 1817.

Thus, in the wake of her popularity in France and the fact that she has never been convicted or even considered guilty by the Church that in 1456 additionally named her a martyr, she has been eventually beatified in 1909 by Pius X and then canonized in 1920 by Benedict XV as a patron saint of martyrs, soldiers, patriots and freedom fighters. Additionally, in 1922, Pope Pius XI made her a secondary saint patron of France.