Have we ever had an Eastern Catholic Pope?

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I’m embarrassed not to know this. I tried to websearch Eastern Catholic Pope for an answer but I didn’t get one.

Also, customarily, would an Easterner elected Pope wear an Eastern cassock or would he switch to the Roman one? I’ve been watching Shoes of the Fisherman and I keep wondering that.

(And, of course, by “Pope” I mean the Bishop of Rome, not the Coptic Patriarch of Alexandria.)
 
JesuXPIPassio said:
I’m embarrassed not to know this. I tried to websearch Eastern Catholic Pope for an answer but I didn’t get one.

Also, customarily, would an Easterner elected Pope wear an Eastern cassock or would he switch to the Roman one? I’ve been watching Shoes of the Fisherman and I keep wondering that.

(And, of course, by “Pope” I mean the Bishop of Rome, not the Coptic Patriarch of Alexandria.)
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Do a search for “Greek” Popes. We had many.
 
There were a string of Greek and Syrian popes in the 7-8 centuries.

The differences in rite were not that great in this period.
 
Canonically, the Pope is the bishop of Rome, so it would necessitate a transfer of Rite.

Of course, the bishop of Rome as Pope (not as the bishop of Rome, or Patriarch of the Latins) does not theoretically have a Rite to which he is restricted. In fact, ideally, his role as “Pope” does not touch upon the matter of Rites, but only to those things which pertain to the Church UNIVERSALLY, such as Faith, morals, and canons for the universal Church. As far as local matters, he has a divine obligation, according to Vatican I, to respect, preserve, and defend the rights and prerogatives of his brother bishops.

Blessings
 
It is rumored that Cardinal Lubomyr of the Ukrainian Church was a close runner up in the last conclave. This was mentioned by several cardinals.

in the 2nd and 3rd millenia, no EC’s have been elected… for the 3rd millenia, it’s still possible that one might. One of the EC Patriarchs would clearly make an impact that would weaken the polemic about the ECs as “merely roads to Romanism.”

Several have been nominated, according to various “leaks”…(no official release of information from within the conclave is permitted.)
 
mardukm said:
. . .
Of course, the bishop of Rome as Pope (not as the bishop of Rome, or Patriarch of the Latins) does not theoretically have a Rite to which he is restricted. . . .
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I think that he has dropped the title “Patriarch of the West”.

Maybe that will help.
 
Aramis said:
HH JP II didn’t use it, nor does HH B XVI.
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I frankly wish Benedict would not have officially dropped that title, it was a set back for Ecumenical relationships with the Orthodox not in union with Rome.
 
Re Eastern Pope - The list of Popes in the Catholic Almanac lists several popes from Greece in the first couple of centuries. A quick scan gave me St Zachary [December 10, 741-March 22, 752] as the last, but I may have missed some. There were also a couple from Syria.
 
lanceg:
It shouldn’t be a set back in ecumenical relations. The Pope still functions as the Patriarch of the Latin Church. The Vatican has explained why the title was removed from the official list of papal titles. For one, the office of “patriarch” never really fully developed in the West, and thus is somewhat foreign to the Latin ethos. Secondly, it is possibly that HH Pope Benedict XVI is opening up the possibility of future new patriarchates in the West, a possibily Joseph Ratzinger proposed many decades a go (though he hasn’t mentioned it, to my knowledge, as pope). Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, the Latin Church today is truly global in scope and culture. The Holy Father no longer wishes to give the impression that the Latin Church is simply the Church of the “Western World”. “The West” carries with it historical, social, and political baggage that does not reflect the situation of millions of Latin Catholics in Africa, Asia, and elsewhere. African Latin Catholics have inherited a Rite that developed in “the West”, but they have adapted it to a local culture which is anything but Western.
 
It is rumored that Cardinal Lubomyr of the Ukrainian Church was a close runner up in the last conclave. This was mentioned by several cardinals.
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Is there a source for that or is it just speculation. I have heard that at least 90% of the Conclave participants have been attrubuted to have been close runners. The rules of the Conclave are that no one is aloud to provide any information under pain of excommunication. Logically alll this speculation is media related.

The closest Cardinal from the East to ever come close to being elected was Cardinal Grégoire-Pierre Agagianian. We all know what happened after that, Cardinal Roncalli was elected as Pope John XXIII and VII was underway. The rest is history.
 
twf said:
For one, the office of “patriarch” never really fully developed in the West,
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Not so actually. It was a patriarchate for sure whatever it may be called. It functioned as one.
twf said:
Secondly, it is possibly that HH Pope Benedict XVI is opening up the possibility of future new patriarchates in the West, a possibily Joseph Ratzinger proposed many decades a go (though he hasn’t mentioned it, to my knowledge, as pope).
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This is probably what is most controversial to Orthodox. No one expects new patriarchs in the west under such a scheme to be equal to the one in Rome. They would surely be completely dependent upon Rome and whatever authority they might hold would be delegated to them. In the new model church they would be faux patriarchs, actually merely deputies.
twf said:
Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, the Latin Church today is truly global in scope and culture. The Holy Father no longer wishes to give the impression that the Latin Church is simply the Church of the “Western World”. “The West” carries with it historical, social, and political baggage that does not reflect the situation of millions of Latin Catholics in Africa, Asia, and elsewhere. African Latin Catholics have inherited a Rite that developed in “the West”, but they have adapted it to a local culture which is anything but Western.
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The western church will always be the western church theologically, and that is all that really matters.

It is not that cultural distinctions do not matter, they certainly do and should be respected. But the distinction that counts above all the others is what you believe. In that sense it will always be the western church.
 
Hesychios: More than one school of theology operates within the Latin Church…and I’m sure distinctly African, Asian, etc Latin theologies are and will continue to develop over time. Would their roots be “Western”? Sure, but by that logic, we might as well insist on calling Byzantine theology a simple variant of Syriac theology…
 
LumenGent said:
Is there a source for that or is it just speculation. I have heard that at least 90% of the Conclave participants have been attrubuted to have been close runners. The rules of the Conclave are that no one is aloud to provide any information under pain of excommunication. Logically alll this speculation is media related.
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It sounds like speculation to me. I did my senior thesis on modern Conclaves, and I found no reliable sources to back that up about the Ukrainian Cardinal nearly getting elected Pope. John Allen reports that the only other major contender was Cardinal Bergoglio of Argentina – and he didn’t even come close to Cardinal Ratzinger’s growing margins.
 
Hello twf,
twf said:
Hesychios: More than one school of theology operates within the Latin Church…
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Perhaps we are not using the same terminology.

I would amend that to state that there are different schools of spirituality in the Latin church. Theologically they are all the same… dogmatically. Perhaps there are varying opinions on theolugemena, but I do not see that as determined by geographical region.
twf said:
and I’m sure distinctly African, Asian, etc Latin theologies are and will continue to develop over time.
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Hmmm…I am not sure that’s a good thing. I hope you are mistaken.
twf said:
Would their roots be “Western”? Sure, but by that logic, we might as well insist on calling Byzantine theology a simple variant of Syriac theology…
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Not so bad. They are quite interdependent, it does not matter what we call it.
 
Joe_Kelley said:
Re Eastern Pope - The list of Popes in the Catholic Almanac lists several popes from Greece in the first couple of centuries. A quick scan gave me St Zachary [December 10, 741-March 22, 752] as the last, but I may have missed some. There were also a couple from Syria.
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This period coincides with the Byzantine era in Rome, from Justinian and afterward. (Dante, writing long afterward, had high praise for Justinian.)

The emperors then influenced or approved the selections. I don’t know if this had much influence on the liturgy in the city of Rome, I rather doubt it. (There was a chapel archaeologists uncovered recently in Rome that was very Byzantine in style. If I remember correctly the speculation was that it was being used by soldiers, merchants or government officials in that era.)

Subsequently the Holy Roman emperors assumed that role and the type of candidates for bishop of Rome accordingly changed.

Then there was the Gregorian Reformation, and a long period where the successful candidates often came from the powerful families of central Italy.
 
What does it mean that there were eastern popes? It wasn’t like today where the Cardinals gathered and they elected a pope from among them. I think it was the Nicene Council which outlawed the transferance of a bishop from one see to another. That is why there was a controversy about Gregory of Nazianzen being bishop of Constantinople. He was already appointed the bishop of Nazianzen by St. Basil.

So what does it mean that there was an eastern pope? Does it mean that a man with Greek or Syriac blood was elected pope?
 
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