Timeline of Orthodox Church and Roman Catholic relations

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This timeline of Orthodox Christian and Roman Catholic relations chronicles major dates which concern the relationship between the two communions.

Apostolic and Ante-Nicene Era

  • ca. 37-53 Episcopacy of Apostle Peter in Antioch.
  • 50 Apostolic Council of Jerusalem overrules St. Peter's Judaizing.
  • 64 Martyrdom of Peter in Rome.
  • 67 Election of Linus, first bishop of Rome.
  • 135 First recorded use of title Pope by a Roman bishop (Hyginus).
  • 255 Cyprian of Carthage rejects Pope Stephen I's ruling on the Donatist controversy.

Conciliar Era

  • 325 Original Nicene Creed ratified at First Ecumenical Council.
  • 330 Founding of Constantinople as New Rome, renaming the city of Byzantium.
  • 357 Pope Liberius signs Semi-Arian creed (possibly under duress).
  • 379 Emperor Gratian permits Roman pope authority over neighboring bishops.
  • 381 Nicene Creed expanded at Second Ecumenical Council.
  • 382 First use of papal title Pontifex Maximus (formerly a pagan religious title reserved to the emperor).
  • 410 Rome sacked by Visigoth invaders.
  • 417 Pope Zosimus waffles on Pelagianism.
  • 451 Fourth Ecumenical Council notes that Rome's primacy is because it was "the imperial city"; Tome of Pope St. Leo I endorsed by Council after review.
  • 455 Rome sacked by Vandals.
  • ca. 537 Pope Vigilius allegedly writes letter endorsing Monophysitism.
  • 589 Insertion of Filioque into Nicene Creed by local council in Toledo, Spain.
  • ca. 590-604 Pope St. Gregory the Great rejects the title of "universal bishop" for any bishop.
  • 680-681 Sixth Ecumenical Council anathematizes Pope Honorius as a Monothelite heretic.
  • 710 Last papal visit to Constantinople until 1967.
  • ca. 750 Forging of the Donation of Constantine, a false document claiming to be from St. Constantine granting universal secular power to the Pope and his successors.
  • 732-33 Byzantine Emperor Leo the Isaurian transfers the territories of Southern Italy (Sicily and Calabria), Greece, and the Aegean away from the jurisdiction of the Pope to that of the Ecumenical Patriarch in response to Pope St. Gregory III of Rome's support of a revolt in Italy against iconoclasm, in effect throwing the Papacy out of the Empire.
  • 752 Founding of Papal States (lasting until 1870).

Estrangement and Schism

  • 792 Charlemagne accuses "Greeks" of deleting Filioque from original Creed.
  • 800 Usurpation of Western Roman Empire by Charlemagne.
  • 809 Pope Leo III forbids addition of Filioque to Creed and has original Creed in both Greek and Latin inscribed on silver tablets displayed in Rome.
  • 869-870 Council in Constantinople deposes St. Photius the Great.
  • 879-880 Council in Constantinople (endorsed by papacy) reinstates St. Photius and anathematizes any changes to Nicene Creed, including the Filioque.
  • 962 Founding of Holy Roman Empire.
  • 1014 First use of Filioque by Pope of Rome, at coronation of Holy Roman Emperor Henry II.
  • 1054 Excommunication of Ecumenical Patriarch Michael Cerularius by Cardinal Humbertus, papal legate, the conventional date point of the Great Schism. Michael returns the favor by excommunicating the Pope (who had died, rendering his legate's authority null).
  • 1059 Beginning of the use of the term transubstantiation in West.
  • 1066 Invasion of England by Duke William of Normandy, carrying papal banner and with papal blessing as a crusade against the "erring English church," engineered by Hildebrand, archdeacon of Rome.
  • 1073-1085 Hildebrand becomes Pope Gregory VII and institutes Gregorian Reforms, the largest increase of papal power in history, including the claim to be able to depose secular rulers.
  • 1075 Pope Gregory VII issues Dictatus papae, an extreme statement of papal power.
  • ca. 1078-80 Council of Burgos reorganizes national Church of Spain as Roman Archbishopric, replaces use of Mozarabic rite with Roman. Sentences Bishops who refuse to recognize decrees to imprisonment.
  • 1095-1272 Crusades promise salvation to warriors from the West.
  • 1180 Last formal reception of Latins to communion at an Orthodox altar, in Antioch.
  • 1182 Maronites (formerly Monothelite heretics) submit to Rome.
  • 1204 Fourth Crusade sacks Constantinople; Crusaders set up Latin Empire and Patriarchate of Constantinople (lasting until 1261).[note 1]
  • 1205 Latins annex Athens and convert the Parthenon into a Roman Catholic Church - Santa Maria di Athene, later Notre Dame d'Athene.
  • 1211 Venetian crusaders conquer Byzantine Crete.
  • 1224 The Byzantines recover Thessaloniki and surrounding area, liberated by the Greek ruler of Epirus Theodore Ducas Comnenus.
  • 1259 Byzantines defeat Latin Principality of Achaea at the Battle of Pelagonia, marking the beginning of the Byzantine recovery of Greece.
  • ca. 1259-80 Martyrdom by Latins of monks of Iveron Monastery.
  • 1261 End of Latin occupation of Constantinople and restoration of Orthodox patriarchs; Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos makes Mystras seat of the new Despotate of Morea, where a Byzantine renaissance occurred.
  • 1274 Council of Lyons fails to force Orthodox capitulation to papacy.
  • 1281 Pope Martin IV authorizes a Crusade against the newly re-established Byzantine Empire in Constantinople, excommunicating Emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos and the Greeks and renouncing the union of 1274; French and Venetian expeditions set out toward Constantinople but are forced to turn back in the following year due to the Sicilian Vespers.
  • 1282 Death of 26 martyrs of Zographou monastery on Mount Athos, martyred by the Latins.
  • 1287 Last record of, Amalfion, Benedictine monastery on Mount Athos.
  • 1300-1400 The "Chronicle of Morea" (Το χρονικό του Μορέως) narrates events of the establishment of Western European feudalism in mainland Greece, mainly in the Morea/Peloponnese, by the Franks following the Fourth Crusade, covering a period from 1204 to 1292.
  • 1302 Papal bull Unam Sanctam declares submission to pope necessary for salvation.
  • 1379 Beginning of Western "Great Schism," during which there are eventually 3 rival popes.
  • 1341-1351 Councils in Constantinople vindicate Palamite theology of hesychasm against Barlaamist philosophy.
  • 1414-1418 Council of Constance ends Western "Great Schism;" this council emphasized the Conciliar Movement over the authority of the pope.
  • 1423-24 Council of Siena in the Roman Catholic Church was the high point of conciliarism, emphasizing the leadership of the bishops gathered in council, but the conciliarism expressed there was later branded as a heresy.
  • 1433 Nicolas of Cusa writes his major work on church government, The Catholic Concordance (De concordantia catholica), a manifesto of conciliarism, advancing the notion of a constitutional papacy subject to the authority of a council representative of the different parts of Christendom, balancing hierarchy with consent.
  • 1439 Council of Florence fails to force Orthodox capitulation to papacy and confesses Purgatory as dogma.
  • 1444 Catholic priest Lorenzo Valla proves Donation of Constantine a forgery.

Renaissance and Modern Era

WWII and Post-WWII Era

  • 1941-45 Croatian Ustasa[note 6] terrorists, part of whose ideology included Roman Catholic Clericalist Fundamentalism, kill 500,000 Orthodox Serbs, expel 250,000 and force 250,000 to convert to Catholicism.[note 7]
  • 1943-44 Hundreds of Orthodox priests of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church eliminated, tortured and drowned by Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists - Ukrainian Rebel Army, aided by Uniate Metr. Josyf Slipyj who was a spiritual leader of Nazi military units[note 8] that were later condemned by the Nuremberg tribunal, and who was imprisoned by Soviet authorities for aiding the UPA; zenith of the Papist[note 9] persecution in Poland against Orthodox faithful in the region of Helm and Podlaskia - Holy Poles martyred by the Papists.
  • 1946 State-sponsored synod held Ukraine dissolves the Union of Brest-Litovsk and integrates the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church into the Russian Orthodox Church, with Soviet authorities arresting resisters or deporting them to Siberia.
  • 1947 Death of Alexei Kabalyiuk, Apostle of Carpatho-Russia, who played a major role in reviving Orthodoxy in Transcarpathia in the early 20th century.
  • 1949 Papal Decree against Communism by Pope Pius XII excommunicates all Catholics collaborating in communist organizations.
  • 1950 Declaration of Bodily Assumption of Mary as dogma.
  • 1962 The secretive Metz Accord is made between the Holy See and the U.S.S.R. (attended by Metr. Nikodim (Rotov) of Leningrad) at Metz, France, on 13 August 1962, renewing the previous pacts of 1942 and 1944 concerning the Vatican's Ostpolitik, by which Eastern Orthodox participation in the Second Vatican Council was authorized in exchange for a non-condemnation of atheistic communism during the conciliar assemblies.[4][5]
  • 1962-1965 Vatican II institutes major reforms, especially liturgical, into Roman Catholic Church.

Era of Dialogue

See also

External Links

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Other

Notes

  1. Speros Vryonis in Byzantium and Europe gives a vivid account of the sack of Constantinople by the Frankish and Venetian Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade:
    The Latin soldiery subjected the greatest city in Europe to an indescribable sack. For three days they murdered, raped, looted and destroyed on a scale which even the ancient Vandals and Goths would have found unbelievable. Constantinople had become a veritable museum of ancient and Byzantine art, an emporium of such incredible wealth that the Latins were astounded at the riches they found. Though the Venetians had an appreciation for the art which they discovered (they were themselves semi-Byzantines) and saved much of it, the French and others destroyed indiscriminately, halting to refresh themselves with wine, violation of nuns, and murder of Orthodox clerics. The Crusaders vented their hatred for the Greeks most spectacularly in the desecration of the greatest Church in Christendom. They smashed the silver iconostasis, the icons and the holy books of Hagia Sophia, and seated upon the patriarchal throne a whore who sang coarse songs as they drank wine from the Church's holy vessels. The estrangement of East and West, which had proceeded over the centuries, culminated in the horrible massacre that accompanied the conquest of Constantinople. The Greeks were convinced that even the Turks, had they taken the city, would not have been as cruel as the Latin Christians. The defeat of Byzantium, already in a state of decline, accelerated political degeneration so that the Byzantines eventually became an easy prey to the Turks. The Crusading movement thus resulted, ultimately, in the victory of Islam, a result which was of course the exact opposite of its original intention. (Vryonis, Speros. Byzantium and Europe. Harcourt, Brace & World, New York, 1967. pp.152); (Philip Hughes. "History of the Church Vol II", Innocent III & the Latin East. Sheed & Ward, 1948. pp.372.)
  2. Loukas Notaras the last Megas Doux of the Byzantine Empire, had remarked: "better the turban of the Turk than the tiara of the Pope!" This was typical of the sentiment among the monastic party, opposed to the Council of Ferrara-Florence, of whom the future Patriarch Gennadius Scholarius was the leader.
  3. The Dhidhaskalia Patriki or Paternal Teaching, attributed to the Patriarch Anthimos of Jerusalem, and published in Istanbul in 1798, described the attitude of the Orthodox hierarchy during the late eighteenth century to the influence of Western ideas in the Greek world. The Dhidhaskalia Patriki has in fact achieved a certain notoriety among historians as one of the more extreme examples of ecclesiastical anti-Westernism, and its significance was not lost on contemporaries.
  4. The Pope's plans were set down in the rescript Plenitudine Potestatis and the decree Quo aptius, and involved the establishment of Apostolic Administrators in metropolitan centres, to replace the diocesan structures that had existed in Tsarist times. (Christopher Lawrence Zugger. The Forgotten: Catholics of the Soviet Empire from Lenin Through Stalin. Syracuse University Press. 2001. p.229.)
  5. This treaty would have given enormous priviledges to the Roman Catholic Church which was actually a minority church in Yugoslavia (according to the 1931 census 48.7% of population were Orthodox, while 38% were Roman Catholic). The Serbs felt this to be an attack on the Orthodox Church, and the Church together with virtually all the Serbian people mounted unprecedented resistance to the proposed agreement. In the midst of the crisis Patriarch Varnava (Rosic) died. His health had suffered under the strain of the controversy, and it was even rumored that he had been poisoned. The concordat was passed by the parliament on the very day the patriarch died, and was immediately followed by the excommunication of those Serbian deputies who voted in favor of it. There was also a demonstration organized by the Church and headed by bishops and clergy that set out from the cathedral in Belgrade and was violently broken up by the police. The prime minister had a serious crisis on his hands and withdrew the proposal.
  6. A Croatian fascist, anti-Yugoslav separatist movement, whose ideological movement was a blend of fascism, Nazism, Croatian ultranationalism, and Roman Catholic Clericalist Fundamentalism. (Palmer Domenico, Roy. Encyclopedia of Modern Christian Politics. Greenwood Publishing Group. 2006. ISBN 0313323623).
  7. According to the Simon Wiesenthal Center (citing the Encyclopedia of the Holocaust). The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum states that "Ustaša units, often encouraged by Catholic clergy, carried out a program of compulsory conversion of Orthodox Serbs to Catholicism; resistance often resulted in murder. Some Serbs, particularly members of the elite, were not even offered the option of conversion to avoid being killed." (Holocaust Era in Croatia 1941-1945 JASENOVAC: History: II Targeted Populations. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum). The late Bishop Nikolai (Velimirovich) inscribed into the Church calendar by his own hand the following notation for the date August 31 (O.S.): "The 700,000 who suffered for the Orthodox faith at the hands of the Roman crusaders and Ustasi during the time of the Second World War. These are the New Serbian Martyrs."
  8. SS-Galicia division (Galizien/Galichina) and the Wehrmacht Nachtigall battalion.
  9. Papist is a term, usually regarded as a disparaging or an anti-Catholic slur, referring to the Roman Catholic Church, its teaching, practices or adherents. It was coined during the English Reformation to denote a Christian whose loyalties were to the Pope, rather than to the Church of England. Over time, however, it came to mean one who supported Papal authority over all Christians. A similar term, "papalism", is sometimes used.
  10. "...we cannot fail to recognize the infidelities to the Gospel committed by some of our brethren, especially during the second millennium. Let us ask pardon for the divisions which have occurred among Christians, for the violence some have used in the service of the truth and for the distrustful and hostile attitudes sometimes taken towards the followers of other religions." (HOMILY OF THE HOLY FATHER. "DAY OF PARDON". Sunday, 12 March 2000).
  11. "...Some memories are especially painful, and some events of the distant past have left deep wounds in the minds and hearts of people to this day. I am thinking of the disastrous sack of the imperial city of Constantinople, which was for so long the bastion of Christianity in the East. It is tragic that the assailants, who had set out to secure free access for Christians to the Holy Land, turned against their own brothers in the faith. The fact that they were Latin Christians fills Catholics with deep regret. How can we fail to see here the mysterium iniquitatis at work in the human heart? To God alone belongs judgement, and therefore we entrust the heavy burden of the past to his endless mercy, imploring him to heal the wounds which still cause suffering to the spirit of the Greek people. Together we must work for this healing if the Europe now emerging is to be true to its identity, which is inseparable from the Christian humanism shared by East and West." (ADDRESS OF JOHN PAUL II TO HIS BEATITUDE CHRISTODOULOS, ARCHBISHOP OF ATHENS AND PRIMATE OF GREECE. Friday, 4 May 2001.)
  12. In his first interview with Western journalists since 2002, Patriarch Alexei II reiterated Orthodox complaints against Catholics. "Unfortunately relations are not at their best today because the proselytising activity of the Roman Catholic Church is being carried out in both Russia and in CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) countries. Many missionary orders work in Russia today, especially in the shelters and orphanages, where children who have been baptised in Orthodoxy are being converted to Catholicism." Deep wounds have been inflicted by Uniate Catholics in the western area of Ukraine, he added. (Greg Watts. Russia and Rome Rethink Relations. The Sunday Times. February 14, 2004.)
  13. "Orthodox leaders have always complained bitterly about the various Eastern Rite churches, which follow many Orthodox traditions but are loyal to the Vatican. They are widely perceived as Vatican infiltrators trying to lure away Orthodox followers and erode Orthodox churches." (Brian Murphy. Tale of two Europes: Political unity advances while ancient religious rifts persist. Times-Colonist. January 25, 2003. p.25.)
  14. "It is decided that the assembly of the Holy Martyrs and Confessors of the eparchy of Helm and Podlaska shall be on the first Sunday of the month of June. They are ranked in the chorus of the Saints:
  15. This was the 11th of a series of Orientale Lumen Conferences, since they began in 1997. Orientale Lumen EuroEast I was jointly announced by the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, the Pontifical Oriental Institute, the Catholic and Orthodox Society of St. John Chrysostom, and Eastern Christian Publications. The thematic focus of the 80 participants of Orientale Lumen Euro-East I was "Liturgy as the Foundation of Dialogue." The meeting transpired over the anniversary of the founding of Constantinople on May 11,330 A.D.
  16. From 1863 until 2005, the Annuario Pontificio included also the title "Patriarch of the West". This title was first used by Pope Theodore I in 642, and was only used occasionally. Indeed, it did not begin to appear in the pontifical yearbook until 1863. On 22 March 2006, the Vatican released a statement explaining this omission on the grounds of expressing a "historical and theological reality" and of "being useful to ecumenical dialogue". The title Patriarch of the West symbolized the pope's special relationship with, and jurisdiction over, the Latin Church—and the omission of the title neither symbolizes in any way a change in this relationship, nor distorts the relationship between the Holy See and the Eastern Churches, as solemnly proclaimed by the Second Vatican Council.
  17. The conference was organized jointly by the Pontifical Council for Culture and the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate.
  18. From the perspective of the Church Secular Humanism is defined as a religious philosophical worldview based on atheism, naturalism, evolution, and ethical relativism, attempting to function as a civilized society with the total exclusion of God and His moral principles. At the conference Bishop Hilarion Alfeyev called in most resolute terms for an institutionalized Orthodox-Catholic alliance, without which, he said, it would not be possible to defend traditional values in Europe: "What we are witnessing is the final attack of militant secularism on the remains of Christian civilization in Europe." Note that at its 50th anniversary World Humanist Congress in 2002, the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) published its "Amsterdam Declaration", the defining statement of worldwide secular Humanism, embracing Humanist, atheist, rationalist, secular, skeptic, Ethical Culture, freethought and similar organisations worldwide.
  19. "...These dialogues, together with every effort for peaceful and fraternal relations of the Orthodox Church with other Christians, are unfortunately challenged today in an unacceptably fanatical way – at least by the standards of a genuinely Orthodox ethos – by certain circles that exclusively claim for themselves the title of zealot and defender of Orthodoxy. As if all the Patriarchs and Sacred Synods of the Orthodox Churches throughout the world, who unanimously decided on and continue to support these dialogues, were not Orthodox. Yet, these opponents of every effort for the restoration of unity among Christians raise themselves above Episcopal Synods of the Church to the dangerous point of creating schisms within the Church...moreover, union is not decided by theological commissions but by Church Synods...Beloved children in the Lord, Orthodoxy has no need of either fanaticism or bigotry to protect itself. Whoever believes that Orthodoxy has the truth does not fear dialogue, because truth has never been endangered by dialogue..."
  20. Eastern-rite Jesuit scholar Rev. Robert Taft made a similar appeal for union when he delivered the annual Kelly Lecture at the University of Toronto's St. Michael's College in 2000. (Jesuit slams Catholic-Orthodox rift. Victoria Times Colonist. December 16, 2000. A12.)

References

  1. "Greece, history of." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica 2009 Ultimate Reference Suite. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, 2009.
  2. Richard Clogg. The 'Dhidhaskalia Patriki' (1798): An Orthodox Reaction to French Revolutionary Propaganda. Middle Eastern Studies, Vol.5, No.2 (May, 1969), pp. 87-115.
  3. Sergei Govorun. Indulgences in the history of the Greek Church. Transl. by Bishop Tikhon of San Francisco & the West. 25/11/2004.
  4. Chiron, Yves. Paul VI: Le pape écartelé. Perrin, Paris, 1993. ISBN 226200952X pp.186,246.
  5. Interview with Paul-Joseph Schmitt, Archbishop of Metz, in Le Lorrain, 9 March 1963.
  6. Francis X. Murphy. Vatican Politics: Structure and Function. World Politics. Vol.26, No.4 (July 1974). p.554.
  7. Pope apologises for church sins. BBC News. Sunday, 12 March, 2000, 19:48 GMT.
  8. Greg Watts. Russia and Rome Rethink Relations. The Sunday Times. February 14, 2004.
  9. "Communiqué concernant la suppression du titre «Patriarche d’Occident» dans l'Annuaire pontifical 2006". Vatican.va. Retrieved 2010-09-26.
  10. Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent and Paul Bompard in Rome. Vatican joins historic talks to end 950-year rift with Orthodox church. The Sunday Times. November 16, 2007.
  11. Ian Fisher. Vatican City: Catholic-Orthodox Accord on Papal Primacy. NY Times. November 15, 2007. A10.
  12. Catholic Church only true church, Vatican says. CBC News. Tuesday, July 10, 2007.
  13. Russia and the Vatican establish full diplomatic ties. BBC News. 20:59 GMT, Thursday, 3 December 2009.

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