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Isa_Almisry
Guest
I don’t see how, nor have they so stated here (not that I have seen). But I have seen a number of Latins here defend the Orhtodox feelings on the matter.
The issue of the schism was not brought up by me. For Constantonple, 1204 was when the schism of 1054 became real.
Many fled for their lives.
Somebody said “if they persecute in one city, flee to the next.”
What church are you talking about? Certainly not the Orthodox (and yes, plenty remained).
Of course. That is how all the Crusader states, like any colony, were run.
I don’t think the synod of Constantinople had a signle Orthodox bishop in it.
since Antioch had nary a Latin before they arrived, what brought on the shift? (Actually, I’ve seen that the patriarch was expelled by the Crusaders).
The Treaty of Devol in 1108 specifically called for the appointment of an Orthodox patriarch, which would have hardly been necessary if it was just a question of one showing up.
A papal legate also signed the treaty of Devol.
Btw, when the Roman Emperor Manuel retook Antioch, he reestablished the resident Orthodox Patriarch, but let the Latin patriarch stay.
“Deus lo volt”
So was Jerusalem, until the Vatican I, Giuseppe Valarga, al-Jazzar “the Butcher” came.
Lets throw this in:
“By thoughtless violence you oppress the Russian people and urge them on to revolt. You are aware of the censure of the simple people, that it would be better to be in Turkish captivity than to endure such persecutions for faith and piety. You write that you freely drown the Orthodox, chop off their heads, and profane their churches. You seal their churches so the people, without piety and Christian rites, are buried like non-Christians. In place of joy, your cunning Uniatism has brought us only woe, unrest, and conflict. We would prefer to be without it. These are the fruits of your Uniatism. It would have been better not to have given us nationwide strife and hatred, and instead to have preserved us from nationwide condemnation.”
March 12, 1622
Letter of Leo Sapiega, Roman Catholic and Chancellor of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Representative of the Polish Crown
Addressed to Josaphat Kuntsevich
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=198205
Some things never change.
Blessings,
Marduk
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mark_a
Guest
I went to a Greek Orthodox Labor Day Festival this year where they had the church open for visitors. On display was a timeline of Orthodox history that did not include any of the major schisms that plagued Eastern sees…
As a matter of fact, no mention was made of the Ottoman capture of Constantinople or the Russian Revolution!
(No mention either of the massacare of the Venetians or the abuse of Pope Saint Silverius or Pope Vigilius at the hands of Emperor Justinian I) But, I guess the “really important thing” does get mentioned on the timeline… the **“Sack of Constantinople by the Latins”. **
To the man, when speaking with Orthodox polemicists on this one (and sadly a few Eastern Catholics with chips on their shoulders large enough to dam a stream) when this issue is brought up (by them) the scathing and seething anger (which seems well cultivated) just pours out as though it just happened to them, and I was the one that did it!
So reallly this is a two-way street, and 42+ generations on, wagging fingers at “Latins” (and what a very different ethnic and national make-up the “Latins” are today - from Italy to Mexico, Uganda to Korea!!!) for some event 800 years ago they just as likely as not had NO ancesteral connection to is silly, bizarre and small minded.
Some folks just need someone to be mad at.
Family problems? Its dad’s fault.
Work problems? Its the boss’ fault.
Politics? Its the president.
Faith? Its the pope.
Its usually the one with the most authority that catches all the grief.
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ASimpleSinner
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Was waiting for you to jump in Bob - this one is a fav of yours… what took you so long?
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SiempreFiel
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Saint Josaphat Kuntsevich, pray for us!!
http://blog.ancient-future.net/uploaded_images/Saint-Josaphat-750806.jpg
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Petergee
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What? You’re seriously telling us that you think that the “Latins” might one day again sack Constantinople, profane its churches and kill and rob thousands of its Christian citizens?I guess that shows us what dwelling on this incident does to someone’s mind and heart.
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Hesychios
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It is actually built with columns from Greek churches and public buildings. Multitudes of them in varying styles. Saint Marks was designed to show them off as trophies. It adds a new dimension to the concept of triumphal architecture.
The interior has a fabulous collection of Byzantine jewel encrusted icons and other doo-dads.
http://mangalorean.com/circle/images/travel/20061125italy16.jpg
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Volodymyr
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It is very odd to see such a painting of Iosofat of Polotsk who was so cruel to the Orthodox people of Ukraine who lived in the Polish Lituanian Rechpospolita - as one writer says - he may be martyr for his faith, but a quite cruel man. But I agree at least with writing at bottom of painting - Да вси будутъ єдино - that all can be one. But not by force!
Catolic Church left Orthodoxy not in 1054 - which is kind of ceremonial date. Actual separation is due to events in next 200 years. Immediately after were still good relations. We in Ukraine and Russia celebrate the 1087 transfer of reliks of St. Nicolai from Mir to Bari - so must not have thought Italian Christians (some of whom were at that point Greek speaking Italians) were part of separate church. But Catolic church
Catolic Church left Orthodoxy not in 1054 - which is kind of ceremonial date. Actual separation is due to events in next 200 years. Immediately after were still good relations. We in Ukraine and Russia celebrate the 1087 transfer of reliks of St. Nicolai from Mir to Bari - so must not have thought Italian Christians (some of whom were at that point Greek speaking Italians) were part of separate church. But Catolic church
- Lost contact with Greek and Slavic world because of Turkish and Tartar invasions.
- Papacy constructed along monarchical lines after Cluny reform.
- Disastrous events of Sacking of Constantinople and disrespect for Greek holy shrines
- Disastrous events of Fall of Byzantine empire without hellp promised from West.
- Greeks dont learn Latin, Latins dont learn Greek - do not read other theologians.
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brotherhrolf
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My ancestors were northwestern Europeans and largely peasants. Challenge me on this - I’ve done the genealogy. I’m Saxon English - should I hold eternal enmity to the Norman French conquerors?
I am Irish and Scot -look at what the English did to us but we don’t sit back moaning and groaning.
I am Acadian (Cajun) - look at what the English did.
I am a Southerner. No, I will not forget Appamattox nor will I forget the firing on Ft. Sumpter…
The difference is that I do not hold the English or Yankees of today accountable for what their ancestors did to mine. As a Southerner, I rejoice that the Union was upheld. We would not be the nation that we are without it.
I am fairly certain that I am of northern European peasant stock.
The nobility which sacked Byzantium - well, I suppose it is theoretically possible but my Irish and English ancestors were up to their eyeballs in problems locally. Frankly, what was going on 1500 + miles to the east did’nt have much to do with the Latin church.
I am Irish and Scot -look at what the English did to us but we don’t sit back moaning and groaning.
I am Acadian (Cajun) - look at what the English did.
I am a Southerner. No, I will not forget Appamattox nor will I forget the firing on Ft. Sumpter…
The difference is that I do not hold the English or Yankees of today accountable for what their ancestors did to mine. As a Southerner, I rejoice that the Union was upheld. We would not be the nation that we are without it.
I am fairly certain that I am of northern European peasant stock.
The nobility which sacked Byzantium - well, I suppose it is theoretically possible but my Irish and English ancestors were up to their eyeballs in problems locally. Frankly, what was going on 1500 + miles to the east did’nt have much to do with the Latin church.
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Hesychios
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Hi Petergee,
I guess that shows us what dwelling on this incident does to someone’s mind and heart.
No, no one seriously expects a repeat of that bloody shameful mess. But I think that there is a tendency to try an dismiss it as one little incident, an “accident” of history, like an unfortunate riot.
But it actually lasted about seventy four years, or about three or four generations by various calculations. The affair was institutionalized and the sack carried on and on. It was the equivalent in time to the longevity of the Soviet regime in Russia.
Much is made of the fact that the Pope did not condone the violence, and even excommunicated the leading elements of the Fourth Crusade. But in fact the Pope accepted the gift of the See of Constantinople, and churches all over western Europe were endowed by penitent knights with part of the loot gained there. All was forgiven by a series of Popes who, in their benevolent wisdom clearly saw that the greater good could be served by teaching the Greeks to be good Roman Catholics.
In that time all of the bishops were replaced within the Latin kingdom, and the Greek priests were put under the control of Latin bishops and a Latin Patriarch. Although it might be anachronistic term, these people were now officially U*****s as the Roman Catholic church uses the term.
The episode shattered the East Roman Empire into four contending factions: the Latin central portion and three smaller weak remnant states on either side of the Aegean. The old dynasty was lost and a new one needed to fight it’s way to dominance. When one finally succeeded in reuniting the Greeks and pushing out the Latins the country had lost much of it’s peripheral region, it’s industry, tax base and population through disease and war. It lacked a suitable navy and even horses were in short supply.
As the Latin kingdom began to suffer reverses, the local parishes at the frontier reverted to Orthodox obedience, the population absolutely refusing to remain what we here today are calling Eastern Catholics. The Roman Catholic church became alarmed and there is even evidence of this in the Western Council of the Lateran, 1215AD. It complains of Greeks who are reconsecrating their altars by washing them in decree number four and they are admonished to "rather conform themselves like obedient sons to the holy Roman church, their mother,"
http://www.antiochian.org/assets/asset.php?type=image&id=844
Of course, I myself (having ancestors from the Languedoc and Venice among other places) am far more likely to have ancestors that participated in the attack and occupation of that city than ancestors who inhabited the place. But the concern is really about the raw naked power that the western church exercised at the time, when it had an advantage, and the sense of hurt and betrayal Orthodox feel about it.
It is just one of many disappointments, of which I could include the origins of the Unia in Polish Europe, and the bad treatment of the ‘Greek-Catholics’ in the diaspora. And lastly but not least, the attacks on the Eastern Catholics in the CAF forums, with some RC actually questioning why they are still calling themselves Catholics at all, and others hurling de Fides at them for what they believe. That is really the kind of thing the makes Orthodox Christians remember the events of so long ago.
It is all very much the same to us, one example is like another, yesterday, today or 800 years ago. I have not yet seen evidence on this board of a real change in Triumphal mindset (thank you, Mr. Crocker, for that one) among the vast majority of Roman Catholics. Even here, where threads are started to berate the Orthodox for their long sad memories.
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Alexius
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Wow, that’s a unique church!
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Petergee
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IIRC most of this material was gathered at various times from various parts of the far-flung Venetian empire which they had conquered from the Moslems, and were from churches and other buildings which had previously been de-consecrated, destroyed or were under threat of destruction by the Moslems. In case anyone was inferring that all of the “Greek” material in St Mark’s was simply looted from Constantinople.
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Petergee
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Thank you. I hope I won’t have to read any more garbage about it happening “habitually” and “over and over again” and being “afraid it will happen again”.
Nobody is trying to dismiss it. Big, little, it depends what you’re comparing it with.
I’m sorry, but now you are being offensive, to compare the murder of a few thousand by nominal Catholics 800 years ago with the murder of tens of millions by devout atheists within our living memory.
Are you claiming that if Eastern soldiers had conquered Rome the EO would not have installed its own compliant patriarch there, as its predecessors and the Eastern emperor had tried to do several times previously?
What? I’ve seen no evidence of this.
If someone calls himself a Catholic and has beliefs contrary to the doctrines of the Catholic Church, he should be called to account for it. Being an Eastern Catholic does not excuse him from this.
I thought the thread was started to ask why (some) EOs obsess endlessly about this incident and use it as a metaphorical hammer to beat up Catholics, and instead of getting an answer, (some) EOs just turn the thread into yet another long repetition of more of the same.
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Alexius
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Is it contrary to agree with the Orthodox that the Sack of Constantinople? It seems like it was for many centuries until the Pope apologized (why would he if the Catholic Church wasn’t responsible?) I really question why he apologized…To try to get the Orthodox to join him? It seems like that backfired, no? Believe me when I say that I love Pope John Paul II (he’s probably my role model). We share the same ethnic heritage and he was the first Polish Pope and one of the best popes, IMHO, but I’m not so sure his apology was a good thing. It sure raises alot of questions as to 1) the true motives of the Vatican in restoring union, 2) the possible guilt of the Church in this matter and/or 3) other possible reasons and the sincerity of them. Perhaps someone can give an account of what the attitude of Rome was towards the sack through the centuries(?). Was JP II’s apology the first direct one? Did/Does Rome still possess some/all of the stolen relics? If so, why haven’t they been returned?Prayers and petitions,
Alexius
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Hesychios
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That may also be true.
But the facade of St Marks in Venice was renovated in the first half of the 13th century.
Where were the Venetians active at that time? Well, as the Haliburton of the fourth crusade they were very busy…
http://pages.usherbrooke.ca/croisades/big_images/carte_empire_latin1.jpg
here in the Latin empire.
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Hesychios
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Ridgerunner
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It should be remembered that the Byzantines sometimes allied themselves with Turks against other Christians. Of course, there was the matter of the 10,000 Italians massacred by the Byzantines, and the Byzantine attempt to starve the men of the Fourth Crusade, but for which events the sack of Constantinople would not have happened. The Byzantines were as guilty in that matter as were the excommunicated Crusaders, and a great deal more foolish.
But mutuality of responsibility does not matter to those who want to hate. The latter will find a reason, however illogical, to continue in that hate. It may be noted that Orthodox would not keep this event as a sacred tenet of their faith if they did not teach it to their children, generation after generation. The reason the English do not hate the French for the Norman Invasion is that their ancestors did not teach them to do so, generation after generation.
This fixation is so much like the Islamic militants’ fixation on the Crusades. A mythological version of an event is a useful way to teach children to hate, when they might not otherwise do so.
But mutuality of responsibility does not matter to those who want to hate. The latter will find a reason, however illogical, to continue in that hate. It may be noted that Orthodox would not keep this event as a sacred tenet of their faith if they did not teach it to their children, generation after generation. The reason the English do not hate the French for the Norman Invasion is that their ancestors did not teach them to do so, generation after generation.
This fixation is so much like the Islamic militants’ fixation on the Crusades. A mythological version of an event is a useful way to teach children to hate, when they might not otherwise do so.
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Alexius
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It is no more a tenet of faith for Orthodox than the Crusades are for Catholics…
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ASimpleSinner
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Swiftly moving past the needlessly sarcastic comment about “pope crocodile tears”…The end of it, for all of the pope crocodile tears, was to set up a Latin patriarch of Constantinople (which, unlike the Orthodox one, Rome gave recognition as being second in rank), joining the ranks of the Latin Patriarchs that the Crusaders had set up in the ancient sees of Antioch and Jerusalem: the one the pope appointed for Alexandria never set foot there, as they never conquered Egypt.
You have brought this issue up before and what you seem to fail to see or understand is that the creation of “Latin Patriarchates” for Latins is no different than what the Greeks did in creating a NEW GO patriarchate in Alexandria or Jerusalem or Antioch when the men who held THOSE titles went non-Chalcedonian.
It is a distinction without a difference.
If one was bad, they both were.
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Alexius
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I am aware of only the Alexandrian patriarch going non-Chalcedonian. The difference is that the Patriarch in Alexandria is there to serve the Chalcedonians. There was not as much of a reason for Rome to set up Latin Patriarches in Eastern lands except for for the same reasons the Crusades were launched: Power and forced suppression…That is just my opinion, though.
Prayers and petitions,
Alexius
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