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→East and West since 1054: pretty gross error!
There was no single event that marked the breakdown. Rather, the two churches slid into and out of schism over a period of several centuries, punctuated with temporary reconciliations. During the [[Fourth Crusade]], however, Latin crusaders and Venetian merchants sacked Constantinople itself, looting The Church of Holy Wisdom and various other Orthodox Holy sites. This event and the final treaty established the Latin Empire of the East and the Latin Patriarch of Constantinople (with various other Crusader states). This period of chaotic rule over the sacked and looted lands of the Byzantine Empire is still known among Eastern Christians as Frangokratia. Later attempts at reconciliation, such as the [[Second Council of Lyon]], met with little or no success until the middle of the Twentieth Century.
In 1965, the Catholic Pope Paul VI and Patriarch [[Athenagoras I (Spyrou) of Constantinople|Athenagoras I]] of Constantinople lifted the mutual excommunications dating from the eleventh century.<ref>Joint Declaration [http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/paul_vi/speeches/1965/documents/hf_p-vi_spe_19651207_common-declaration_en.html]</ref>. In 1995 (Jun 29), Pope John Paul II and Patriarch [[Bartholomew I (Archontonis) of Constantinople|Bartholomew I]] of Constantinople again withdrew the previous 11th Century century excommunications and concelebrated the Eucharist together.
In May 1999, John Paul II was the first pope since the Great Schism to visit an Eastern Orthodox country: Romania. Upon greeting John Paul II, the Romanian Patriarch [[Teoctist]] stated: "The second millennium of Christian history began with a painful wounding of the unity of the Church; the end of this millennium has seen a real commitment to restoring Christian unity."
