Helgesen, the leading Danish example of Reform Catholicism (a minor Danish parallel of Erasmus of Rotterdam) came from the province of Halland. He became a brother of the Carmelite Order and, based at the Carmelite priory, if which he was briefly superintendent, made himself a career as a teacher of theology in Copenhagen. His ideal seems to have been a Christian-human royal power taking care of intellectual and cultural values. Relatively early he opposed King Christian II and at the fall of the king 1523 he was a representative of the rebellious noblemen, probably writing the complaint against the deposed king. However the religious line of the new king, Frederick I, disappointed him gravely.