The Rise of the Papacy: Christianity in the Middle Ages (12th–13th centuries). The Rise of the Papacy: Christianity in the Middle Ages (12th-13th Centuries)

The content of the article

PAPACY, the position and holy dignity of the Pope as head of the Roman Catholic Church. The Pope is Bishop of Rome, Archbishop and Metropolitan of the Province of Rome, Primate of Italy and Patriarch of the West. The pope is elected by the Roman cardinals, who then assist the pope in his office; when cardinals die or reach the age of 80, the pope appoints new ones to take their place. The pope governs the church through the Curia, which is made up of various congregations, secretariats, and tribunals. The most important of these is the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (formerly called the Sacred Chamber), responsible for the purity of Catholic doctrine and Christian morality. The most important of the tribunals is the Holy Roman Company, which considers cases related to the conclusion and dissolution of marriages. The pope was once the secular ruler of much of central Italy. Since 1929, he has been the head of the Vatican, a tiny sovereign state located on the territory of Rome. see also VATICAN.

THEOLOGICAL JUSTIFICATION OF PAPAL AUTHORITY

The papacy played such an important role in the history of Christianity that it inevitably had to become the subject of theological reflection not only for Catholic, but also for Orthodox and Protestant theologians. The doctrine of the papacy is one of the key topics of ecclesiology (a field of theology that considers the essence and structure of the Church).

Roman Catholicism.

According to Catholic tradition, papal authority was established by Jesus Christ and handed over to the Apostle Peter. The Gospel says that Jesus spoke the following words: “...you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it; and I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven” (Mt 16:18-19). Indeed, the Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles depict Peter as the head of the twelve apostles chosen by Jesus. The doctrine that Jesus Christ gave authority over the church to Peter and made him responsible for its administration, and that this authority and responsibility is inherited by Peter's successors, the bishops of Rome, is known as the doctrine of Peter's succession. This doctrine underlies the traditional Catholic views on papal authority.

According to modern Catholic doctrine, the pope is distinguished from other bishops by his alone infallibility (infallabilitas) and primacy of jurisdiction (primatus iurisdictionis).

Especially a lot of controversy was associated with the dogma of papal infallibility. According to tradition, the church is believed to be infallible in proclaiming the doctrine of faith and morality communicated to it in divine Revelation. This acknowledges that the official teaching of the Church is always true. The teaching role of the church in Catholicism is denoted by the term "magisterium ecclesiae" ("teaching of the church"). When a pope, a council, a bishop, a preacher, a confessor, a theologian, or a catechist teach what is actually accepted as truth by the church, they are carrying out the magisterium ecclesiae. However, only the official teaching of the Church is recognized as infallible; the truths proclaimed by it, which received the status of dogmas. With the development of theological thought, dogma can be interpreted in a new way, but cannot be canceled. Naturally, the authority of church teaching is not called into question when it does not cause controversy (for example, that Jesus Christ is God incarnate); problems arise when there is disagreement on some specific or particular provision (for example, that the use of contraceptives is morally unacceptable). The first of these propositions is a dogma, and the second, although put forward by the pope, is not a dogma.

The doctrine of papal infallibility implies that the pope can speak on behalf of the whole church on matters of dogma, that he can single-handedly exercise the magisterium Ecclesiae, giving dogmatic status to some generally accepted opinion. In ancient times, a similar role was usually performed by ecumenical councils ( see also CHURCH CATHEDRALS). However, already in the Middle Ages, the idea that the pope alone could fulfill this role began to be expressed more and more often, and with the beginning of the New Age, this idea gained considerable currency among Catholic Christians. In 1854, Pius IX, relying on the principle of papal infallibility, declared the doctrine of the "Immaculate Conception" (according to which the curse of original sin does not apply to the Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ) a dogma.

The First Vatican Council in 1870 approved the principle of papal infallibility as a dogma with the following wording: “The Roman Pontifex, when he speaks ex cathedra, i.e. when exercising his duties as a pastor and teacher of all Christians, and on the basis of the apostolic authority bestowed on him from above, he determines the doctrine concerning faith or morals and binding on the whole church, then he possesses, by virtue of the promise to him in the person of St. Peter of divine help, infallibility in determining the teachings concerning faith or morals, which the Divine Redeemer bestowed on his Church ... " Pope Pius XII took advantage of this power in 1950, proclaiming the dogma of the "Assumption of the Virgin Mary" (Assumptio), according to which the Virgin Mary at the end of her earthly life was taken to heaven alive, i.e. soul and body. see also INERRORITY.

The principle of the primacy of papal jurisdiction attracted far less attention, but was not inferior in its importance to the principle of infallibility. According to this principle, the pope can act as the immediate pastor of all Christians, i.e. replace the authority of any patriarch, bishop, or pastor in the whole church with his authority. It is on the basis of this primacy of jurisdiction that the pope is entitled to impose disciplinary punishments and penalties (or release from them) on all members of the church without the consent of local bishops or local councils; establish, change or abolish dioceses and appoint bishops to all sees; determine the order of the performance of religious rites, canonize saints and supervise the performance of the sacraments; convene ecumenical councils and preside over them.

Two reasons lead us to regard the primacy of jurisdiction as a principle more important than even the principle of infallibility. First, the adoption of dogmatic definitions on the basis of papal infallibility is extremely rare. The vast majority of the doctrines put forward by the pope do not formally claim to be infallible. Moreover, "infallible" dogmatic definitions can be proclaimed only in those cases when they have to consolidate a certain position that has already been established in the minds of Catholics as a dogma. It is a common misunderstanding to think that "infallibility" gives the pope the status of a prophet proclaiming new truths directly revealed to him by God; in fact, it assumes that the content of the "infallible" definition is some teaching, even earlier proclaimed (at least in a hidden form) to the ancient church by God. Secondly, most Catholic theologians accept that the pope can be deposed if he falls into heresy. Since the mechanism for such a procedure has not been developed, such a deposition would be an extraordinary and extremely painful act, but theoretically such a possibility exists. In contrast, traditional Catholic ecclesiology does not provide for any measures or means that could prevent the abuse of the primacy of papal jurisdiction, except for exhortations, prayers and, in the most extreme case, the reversal of the decisions of the pope by his successor.

After the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), the issue of papal authority became the subject of heated debate within the Catholic Church itself. On the one hand, conservatives (such as Pope John Paul II) sought to strengthen the authority of the pope by insisting that Catholics must not only respectfully consider even the ordinary opinions put forward by the pope, not subject to the principle of infallibility, but also obey them. . Indicative in this sense was the encyclical of Pope Paul VI humanae vitae(1968), which declared the practice of using contraceptives morally unacceptable. Of course, this was not an ex cathedra definition. Millions of married Catholics did not agree with this teaching and continued to act according to their own understanding, without thinking at all that the rejection of this teaching of the pope makes them bad Catholics or sinners. And many progressive Catholic theologians supported them. After all, in the past, the church has repeatedly changed its views on moral issues - for example, in relation to usury or slavery. Even such a prudent theologian as K. Rahner, regarding the encyclical humanae vitae wrote: "If, after a mature test of his conscience, a Catholic Christian remains convinced that - after responsible and self-critical reflections - he was forced to come to a point of view that diverges from the norm established by the pope, and if he adheres to this in practice in his married life ... then such a Catholic should not consider that he has incurred sin or has shown formal disobedience to church authority.

On the other hand, the most progressive theologians are trying to rethink the essence of papal authority, asking whether Jesus Christ really intended to establish a one-man jurisdiction and whether extra-biblical provisions can really be accepted as dogmas that all Catholics are obliged to believe. It was precisely for such questions that John Paul II deprived H. Küng of the right to act as a Catholic theologian.

Orthodoxy.

The Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church, as independent and separate organizations, have evolved over several centuries. Almost identical in regard to the essential points of doctrine and worship, they differ sharply in the interpretation of papal authority. In the ancient church, in the last century of the existence of the Roman Empire, the dominant position among all Christian dioceses was occupied by five patriarchates (the so-called pentarchy - “five-heads”): Roman, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem. From the Orthodox point of view, this structure was determined by the geopolitical structure of the Roman Empire: the See of Rome became the see of the senior bishop of the whole of Christendom only because Rome was the capital of the empire.

When the doctrine of the primacy of the Pope of Rome, based on the succession of power from the Apostle Peter, was put forward, attempts were made in the East to justify the primacy of the Patriarch of Constantinople, based on the tradition that the Church of Constantinople was founded by the Apostle Andrew, who was not only the brother of Peter, but also first led Peter to Jesus Christ (John 1:35-42). However, for the most part, Orthodox theologians considered the power granted to Peter as a prototype of episcopal power in general, and not the power belonging to the bishop of any particular department.

The condemnation of Pope Nicholas I by Patriarch Photius of Constantinople in 867 and the excommunication of Patriarch Michael Cerularius of Constantinople by papal legates in 1054, of course, testified to the strife between Rome and Constantinople, but the approval of the Latin Patriarch to the episcopal see of Antioch in 1100, during the First Crusade, played a much more important role. campaign, which was tantamount to Rome's refusal to recognize the legitimate authority of Orthodox bishops. The split became irresistible after the capture of Constantinople by the Crusader troops in 1204, during the IV Crusade, as a result of which hostile relations were established between the Greek and Latin worlds for a long time.

Protestantism.

The Reformation was concerned with solving fundamental problems related to the relationship between God and man, but historically it took the form of a rejection of papal authority. The primacy of the pope was recognized throughout the Western Church, and it was established so long ago that the leaders of the Reformation in the 16th century. faced the most urgent need to justify their break with Rome and, ultimately, to remove the solution of the problems of faith from the purview of the pope, with whose authority it was firmly associated.

THE PAPEST IN THE ANCIENT PERIOD

In the 1st century AD Rome was one of the most important centers of Christianity, and already in antiquity there is a tradition according to which Peter and Paul labored here. Although the Catholic tradition regards Peter as the first pope, the names of Peter and Paul were often linked together in papal documents. At the end of the 1st c. Clement of Rome sent an exhortation to the Corinthian Christians. This epistle is usually considered the first post-apostolic papal document, although in reality we do not know for sure how the Roman church was organized in the era of Clement.

The earliest evidence of the recognition of the authority of the Roman episcopal see dates from the reign of Pope Victor I (189–199). In Rome, Passover was celebrated on the Sunday after Nisan 14 according to the Jewish calendar, while in Asia Minor Passover was celebrated on Nisan 14 (regardless of what day of the week it fell on). When Pope Anicetas appealed to the Eastern churches to adopt the Roman custom, Polycarp of Smyrna went to Rome to present the case in favor of the Eastern tradition. He persuaded Anikita to withdraw his demand, and the dispute remained unresolved. When Victor became pope, he invited the bishops to convene local councils in the East and in the West, so that they could present their point of view there. After which he renewed the original demand of Pope Aniceta and excommunicated the eastern bishops who disobeyed his order. Subsequently, Polycarp of Smyrna removed the curse, and on conditions about which we know nothing, the churches of Asia Minor peacefully accepted the Roman custom.

Aurelian, Roman Emperor from 270 to 275, decided to hand over the Church of Antioch to a party of Antiochian Christians supported by the Italic bishops, in particular the Bishop of Rome. Thus, during the first three centuries of Christianity, when the church was outlawed and periodically subjected to persecution, Christian communities turned to Rome, but only occasionally, in especially difficult and important cases.

Organization of the church hierarchy.

In an era of persecution, it was impossible to create a stable structure for the church. However, the persecution ended with the promulgation of the Edict of Milan (313), which proclaimed tolerance for Christians, and a number of edicts of the late 4th century, which banned pagan cults and proclaimed Christianity the religion of the Roman Empire. Throughout the 4th c. the structure of the church hierarchy acquired its finished form.

Naturally, in its main features, the administrative structure of the ancient church reproduced the territorial and administrative structures of the Roman state power, which took shape during the reign of Emperor Diocletian and his successors. The administrative unit in the Roman Empire was the municipalities, united in the provinces, which, in turn, were included in 12 regions, or dioceses, 7 of which were under the control of the eastern emperor, and 5 - under the control of the western. Roughly speaking, each municipality had its own episcopal see. Bishoprics were united in provinces, and the bishop of the main city of the province became a metropolitan or archbishop, while the rest of the bishops were subject to his jurisdiction. Especially great authority from the 4th century. used by the bishops of the largest cities - Rome, Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem and Carthage, the main of which was considered Rome.

Constantinople became the second most important bishopric, since starting from the 4th century. it was the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. The third canon of the Council of Constantinople (381) proclaimed that "the Bishop of Constantinople in terms of privileges of honor will be next after the Bishop of Rome, since Constantinople is the New Rome." So the diocese of Constantinople developed and flourished primarily as a result of the growth of the political influence of the capital itself. Seeing a potential rival in Constantinople, the popes rejected this conciliar decree. Seventy years later, the eastern bishops gave Constantinople, hitherto subordinate to the episcopal see of Heracleia, the status and rights of metropolis over Pontus, Asia Minor and Thrace. In the canon of the Council of Chalcedon, confirming the rights granted to Constantinople, it was said that the fathers of the council had granted privileges to the episcopal see of Old Rome, because it was the capital of the empire, and that therefore they would have the right, if they considered it necessary, to grant the same privileges to the New Rome. Pope Leo I challenged this canon, stating that Rome's prerogatives date back directly to the apostle Peter, and are not determined by the political situation of Rome or the decisions of the councils.

The position of the papacy in the ancient church.

Throughout the fourth century, the Roman Pontifex often acted as the authoritative judge on matters of faith and ecclesiastical discipline. So, Sylvester I confirmed the decisions of the First Council of Nicaea (325), directed against Arianism. His successor, Julius I, led through his legates the Council of Sardis (343-344), where he spoke in defense of Athanasius the Great, who was condemned by the Eastern bishops and turned to the Bishop of Rome to consider his case. This Council directly stated that "Rome is the throne of Peter, to which all bishops of any provinces must address."

At times, popes were inferior in prestige to such great bishops as Ambrose of Milan or Augustine of Hippo. However, the authority of the papacy was never questioned, since it was associated more with the see itself than with the personality of a particular pope. Even popes such as Damasus, who had difficulty controlling his own bishopric, could insist on the primacy of papal authority, saying: “The Holy Roman Church is exalted above all others, not by the decrees of councils, but by the words of our Lord, who said: you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.”

In the 4th c. Eastern bishops appealed to Rome only in exceptional cases. However, Western bishops made it a rule to turn to the Roman Pontifex for the solution of common problems concerning obedience, clergy, ecclesiastical punishments and marriages. The pope's answers to such questions were called decretals - official messages, the first of which was sent by Pope Siricius in 385 in response to questions from Bishop Gimerius of Tarragona.

In the 5th c. the papacy further strengthened its influence. The popes insisted that not only bishops, but all Christians in general, have the right to appeal to the Bishop of Rome. The institution of the institution of papal legates also dates back to the 5th century. The popes delegated their power to the legates on a permanent or temporary basis, making them their representatives (often in countries and regions far from Rome).

Several cases of the use of papal power in the 5th century. turned out to be especially important for the strengthening and development of the papacy. At the beginning of this century, Pope Innocent I decreed that the customs of the Roman Church should be universally to be given precedence over any local customs. In addition, Innocent condemned the Pelagian heresy, referring to the words of Augustine, which became winged: "The discussion is over!" In 404 John Chrysostom, bishop of Constantinople, unjustly deposed by the emperor, turned to the pope for support. Pope Innocent excommunicated John's opponents and forced them into submission.

However, of all the popes of the ancient church, perhaps the most clearly aware of his rights and most effectively used his influence both on the eastern and western bishops, and on the secular rulers, Pope Leo I (440-461). In all the western provinces, he established strict discipline and eradicated heresies with the firmness of a powerful person. Evidence of the ever-increasing secular power of the pope was his trip to Mantua in 452, where he managed to convince the leader of the Huns, Attila, to abandon the invasion of central Italy, completing a task that was clearly beyond the strength of the Roman troops or the frightened emperor. Three years later, Leo the Great met the Vandal king Gaiseric outside the walls of Rome and took from him a promise to spare the population of the city.

However, the most important victory of Pope Leo I was that he obtained from the Eastern bishops the official recognition of the authority of the Pope in matters of doctrine. During the Monophysite disputes, Leo the Great sent Patriarch Flavian of Constantinople Tomos- a dogmatic message containing an exposition of orthodox doctrine. When the Ephesian Council of Eastern Bishops refused to accept Tomos, Pope Leo condemned the recalcitrant bishops and in 451 convened an ecumenical council in Chalcedon. Through his legates, the pope demanded that the bishops assembled at Chalcedon accept "the statement of faith contained in our dogmatic epistle". Deciding that "Peter spoke through the mouth of Leo," the Eastern bishops accepted the creed of Leo the Great. This identification of the pope with the prince of the apostles testified to the undoubted recognition by the Eastern Church of the primacy of the popes.

THE PAPERS IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES

From the end of the 4th c. the popes were preoccupied with consolidating the church and protecting it from barbarian invasions. During the periods of these invasions, the popes and bishops of the Roman Empire acquired possessions and power, released from the hands of the agonizing Roman administration. Such a concentration in the hands of bishops of not only ecclesiastical, but also political powers led to serious problems. However, during the early Middle Ages, two popes, Gregory I (590-604) and Nicholas I (858-867), were especially strong in favor of strengthening and developing the papacy.

Gregory I.

Being the offspring of an aristocratic Roman family, Gregory was a monk before he was elected pope, and later - the representative of the pope in Constantinople. Gregory the Great was a zealous champion of the prerogatives of the See of Rome. He protested against the title of "ecumenical patriarch" given to him by the Patriarch of Constantinople, and corresponded with bishops in Spain, North Africa, Ravenna, Mediolanum and Illyricum in order to end the schism and suppress heresy. Pope Gregory initiated the conversion of the Visigoths and Lombards and sent St. Augustine of Canterbury with the aim of converting the Angles and Saxons to Christianity. Within the limits of his metropolis, Gregory the Great appointed and dismissed bishops, brought order to the dioceses, and encouraged the negligent clergy to return to their duty. In addition, he carried out and improved the management of vast ecclesiastical possessions in Italy.

Nicholas I.

It is believed that during the reign of Nicholas I, the papacy reached its highest point at the first stage of its development. Pope Nicholas forced Lothair II, the ruler of Lorraine, to leave his concubine and return to his lawful wife Tietberga. In addition, he reversed the decision of the gifted but too independent Archbishop Hinckmar of Reims, who deposed one of his suffragan bishops, and excommunicated the Archbishop of Ravenna for rebelling against papal authority. However, historically more important was his conflict with the remarkable scientist, Patriarch Photius of Constantinople. In 863, Pope Nicholas excommunicated Photius from the church on the grounds that the latter's predecessor had been forcibly forced to abdicate. In 867, Photius, in turn, excommunicated Nicholas as a result of a dispute over whose jurisdiction Bulgaria should be. These disputes to the extreme exacerbated relations between Rome and Constantinople.

Papacy and the Franks.

The decline of papal power.

After the death of Charlemagne (814), a political crisis began in Western Europe. Like other institutions, the papacy fell victim to the political and social chaos of this era and lost its power, prestige, and moral authority. The popes of this time were proteges of various Roman political parties or were appointed by the German emperor.

PAPER IN THE LATE MIDDLE AGES

The establishment of feudalism brought the Roman Catholic Church into the most deplorable state. In an era of social upheaval caused by barbarian invasions, bishops and other ecclesiastical men in authority took over the exercise of civil and political functions, which the civil authorities were unable to perform. Then, with the development of the feudal system in the 10th and early 11th centuries, the Holy Roman Emperor and other great feudal lords preferred to allocate land to bishops rather than secular vassals, since the former could not have dynastic claims that posed a threat to the sovereign. As a result, many bishops and abbots turned out to be not only ecclesiastical, but also powerful worldly rulers. Bishops were chosen as vassals, not so much for their spiritual qualities, but for their administrative ability and willingness to do the will of the sovereign. Such church leaders, who were preoccupied with worldly affairs and the control of their incomes, often had little interest in religion. They could often be accused of simony (trading in church positions) and cohabitation with concubines. In these decades of decline, the need for reform was ripe and recognized, but the feudal system of relations, in which secular sovereigns could exercise effective control over bishops and abbots, made such reform a difficult task.

Reform of the Papacy

Cluny.

At first, the reform movement was not connected with politics. Its main goal was the moral revival of the clergy. However, in the 11th c. the reformers were convinced that it was possible to complete the reform only if the practice of appointing clergy by secular authorities was abolished and people who were spiritually suitable for this were appointed to church positions.

Reform of the papacy.

Starting among monasticism, the reformist movement reached the papal throne with the installation of Leo IX, formerly Bishop of Toul. The new pope united around himself the most active reformers of that time (among them was the monk Hildebrand), who were to begin the struggle for the liberation of the papacy from the control of secular power and make it the center of durable and effective reforms. Leo IX crossed the Alps three times to visit France and Germany. Conferences were convened everywhere to stop abuses, abolish simony, strengthen the celibacy of the clergy, and remove unworthy clerics.

A significant step forward was made at the Lateran Council, convened by Pope Nicholas II (1059). The Tusculan counts were against the election of Nicholas and tried to impose their candidate. In order to stop this kind of influence on the papal throne from the side of the local aristocracy, Pope Nicholas initiated the proclamation by the Lateran Council of a new procedure for electing popes - by direct vote of cardinals alone. The Roman clergy and people were allowed to express their consent, but no more, and the Holy Roman Emperor was left with the right to confirm the election. Although this new electoral procedure was directed primarily against the Roman aristocracy, it also contributed to the removal of the election of the pope from the sphere of the competence of the imperial authorities, as evidenced by the election of Pope Alexander II in 1061, bypassing the candidate nominated by the emperor.

Gregory VII.

The reform of the papacy and the Catholic Church as a whole culminated in the pontificate of Gregory VII (1073-1085), who, as a monk under the name of Hildebrand, was the de facto leader of the reformist part of the Curia for 15 years. Pope Gregory's goal was to completely remove the church from the control of secular authorities, so that it could freely carry out its true tasks. Thus he attempted to abolish the established order of the ages and to establish a relationship between church and state that would presuppose the superiority of the church, founded by God, over all human institutions.

To achieve these goals, Gregory used all the means that contributed to the centralization of church power in the process of implementing reforms. He revived the practice of appointing permanent and temporary legates, using them much more widely than ever before. In addition, he often convened councils in Rome, to which bishops were invited not only from Italy, but also from other countries. Both were supposed to limit the power of the metropolitans, for which other means were also used. The consideration of cases, which until recently were under the jurisdiction of the metropolitans, was now entrusted to the legates, and in some cases the legates even supervised the election of bishops. In addition, Pope Gregory ordered canon lawyers to bring together canonical decrees and collections of canons in order to clarify and expand the boundaries of the pope's jurisdiction in internal church affairs. A means of reconciliation of many conflicting canons was the principle proposed by Yves Chartres and Bernold of Constance: if two laws contradict each other, then the law emanating from the highest authority should be given preference over the law established by the local authority. By the middle of the 12th century. this and similar principles were already universally followed, and Francis Gratian used them in his famous Reconciling Differences in the Canons(Concordia discordantium canonum). All these measures contributed to the centralization of power in the hands of the pope.

Fight against Henry IV.

At the same time, the problem of church reform, transferred to the plane of everyday life, brought to the fore the question of jurisdiction over the church hierarchy: who should appoint bishops and determine the scope of their duties and the requirements that they must meet - the pope or the king?

In this dispute, it was possible to bring certain arguments in favor of both sides. The kings and the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire believed that it was they who should exercise control over the bishops, since the latter were accountable to their worldly masters. The papacy insisted that the episcopal ministry was primarily of a spiritual nature, and therefore the bishops should be primarily responsible to their metropolitans and the pope. This issue began a conflict between Pope Gregory VII and the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV, when the latter deposed Atton, Archbishop of Milan, ordained by Pope Gregory's predecessor, replacing him with the anti-reformist Tedald.

At the Council of Lenten (1075), Pope Gregory passed a decree banning secular investiture, dismissed a number of German bishops, and forbade lay people to attend mass celebrated by married priests. Henry IV, in response to this, convened a synod of German bishops in Worms, and those, alarmed by the reforming zeal of the new pope, declared him a usurper and demanded that he abdicate the papacy. In turn, Gregory responded to this with an unprecedented step, declaring Henry deposed and freeing his subjects from any obligations towards the emperor. The German bishops used this as an excuse to dethrone the emperor. Henry hastened to conclude peace with Pope Gregory, which was done in Canossa.

Worms concordat.

Under the successors of Gregory and Henry - Pope Calixte II (1119-1124) and Emperor Henry V (1106-1125) - the issue of secular investiture was finally settled by the Concordat of Worms in 1122. This compromise agreement recognized the duality of the position of bishops and left the secular sovereign the right to clothe the candidate for the episcopal chair with signs of worldly power, and for the ecclesiastical ruler - to endow him with signs of spiritual power. This symbolic distinction actually meant that candidates for episcopacy had to be acceptable to both ecclesiastical and secular authorities. The emperor guaranteed the free election of bishops. In turn, Pope Calixtus allowed Henry V to participate in elections (of course, provided that simony and coercion were excluded) and to have a say in the settlement of possible disputes. In recognition of temporal vassal obligations, bishops were allowed to take an oath to the emperor, who, in turn, introduced them into possession of church lands by means of a scepter. However, the ring and staff, and with them the recognition of church authority, the bishops received from the metropolitan.

Outside of the Holy Roman Empire, the Treaty of Worms received the widest recognition. In England, the London Concordat had already been concluded (1107; it served as a prototype for the subsequent Concordat of Worms), which was followed by a long struggle between St. Anselm of Canterbury and the English kings William II and Henry I. In France, the problem of investiture never came to the fore due to strong reformist tendencies and the weakness of secular rulers, which led to a decrease in the role of bishops as secular vassals.

THE FLOWING OF PAPS IN THE 12TH AND 13TH CENTURIES

Subsequent disputes with the Holy Roman Empire.

Under the successors of Pope Gregory VII, especially under Alexander III, the struggle with the emperors of the Holy Roman Empire for independence and the superiority of spiritual power over secular power continued. Alexander III led the League of Free Lombard Cities, which defeated Emperor Frederick Barbarossa of the Hohenstaufen dynasty in the decisive battle of Legnano (1176), and forced the emperor to withdraw his support of the antipopes, whom he tried to oppose to the legitimate pope. Under Innocent III, the papacy reached the pinnacle of its power: Sicily, Aragon, Portugal and England recognized him as their feudal overlord. Pope Innocent was invited to decide the validity of the election of emperor in Germany, subjected France to a six-month interdict when Philip II refused to submit to Catholic marriage law, and proclaimed the deposition of King John of England in a dispute over appointments to the See of Canterbury.

Theoretical foundations of disputes.

In the course of all these disagreements between popes and secular sovereigns about the boundaries of jurisdiction and the degree of their independence from each other, both put forward solid theoretical justifications for their own claims. The "legists", who from the standpoint of civil law supported the superiority of royal power, and the "canonists", from the standpoint of canon law defended the superiority of papal power, exaggerated the rights of the side they defended.

imperial claims.

Supporters of the emperor and kings referred to the fact that all power is from God - both imperial and papal. Both receive their power directly from God, and therefore both are subject only to God.

papal claims

were formulated by Pope Gregory VII in the course of the investiture dispute and acquired a more radical character under his successors (up to Boniface VIII at the beginning of the 14th century). Pope Gregory, continuing the tradition of Ambrose of Milan and Pope Gelasius, argued that the spiritual power is higher than the secular and that the secular sovereign, being a Christian, is subject to the church in everything that concerns morality and spiritual life. Gregory believed that the pope is the sovereign head of the church, and not in the feudal sense of limited sovereignty, but in the Roman imperial sense of absolute sovereignty, limited only by God and divine law. According to Gregory, only the pope, as the sole head of the church, has the right to appoint and depose bishops, only he can convene general church councils and carry out their decisions. Papal decrees cannot be repealed by any terrestrial authorities, and any case submitted to the papal court can no longer be considered or reviewed in any other instance.

The Decline of the Papacy at the Rise of the Nation-State

In the pontificate of Boniface VIII (1294-1303), when the rights of the papal throne were defended with particular resoluteness, papal power actually began to weaken. The papacy, having successfully faced off against the Holy Roman Empire, met a more serious opponent in the person of the nation-state that arose at the end of the medieval era. Boniface VIII protested when Philip IV of France tried to impose taxes on the clergy without asking for the pope's permission, and began to ignore the right of the clergy to appear before an ecclesiastical, not secular, court. With the support of the highest French clergy, Philip the Handsome successfully fought the pope, and then, sent by the king, Guillaume de Nogaret, even arrested the pope. Philip planned to put the pope on trial, but he died three weeks later.

"BABYLON CAPTIVITY" OF THE CHURCH

After the seven-month pontificate of Benedict XI, the cardinals elected the Archbishop of Bordeaux as the new pope under the name of Clement V (1305–1314). Instead of going to Rome, Pope Clement settled in Avignon, a papal enclave in Provence, separated from France only by the river Rhone. The papacy remained here from 1309 to 1376 (Petrarch called it the "Babylonian captivity"). There were already precedents for such a removal of the papacy from Rome. In the previous two centuries, the popes had been away from Rome for a total of 122 years. However, the Avignon period was the longest period of uninterrupted stay of the papal residence outside Rome, and it fell at a time when the national consciousness of the European peoples was especially aggravated as a result of the Hundred Years War between France and England. Popes gradually began to look in the eyes of their contemporaries something like French court chaplains. All seven of the Avignon popes were French, as were three-quarters of the cardinals they appointed.

Clement V agreed to ban the Knights Templar, whose property Philip IV wanted to use to cover the costs of the war against England, and in return, Philip agreed to drop his charges against Boniface VIII. Clement convened a general church council, three sessions of which were held in Vienna from October 1311 to March 1312. Since the acts of the Council of Vienna have not been preserved, we have almost no direct information about its decisions and conclusions. At the council, the case of the Templars was considered and plans were made for a new crusade. In addition, disciplinary decrees were passed at it regarding the licentiousness of the clergy, episcopal visitations (inspection trips) and disagreements between the parish priesthood and monasticism.

Pope Clement's successors, while remaining in Avignon, constantly declared that their stay there was only temporary and that they would return to Rome as soon as circumstances permitted. John XXII (1316–1334) unsuccessfully used both military force and excommunications to bring peace to Italy, but it was only after 1350 that papal troops, led by Cardinal Albornoz, began to restore order in Italy. In 1367 Pope Urban V returned to the throne of St. Peter, however, a new uprising that broke out after the death of Albornoz forced him to flee back to Avignon. Ten years later, Pope Gregory XI re-established himself in Rome.

Centralization of power under the Avignon popes.

Meanwhile, the Avignon popes made a significant contribution to the centralization of papal administrative structures and streamlining finances. Pope Urban V issued new regulations governing the activities of the Apostolic Chamber (which managed the treasury). Further steps were aimed at streamlining judicial activity and were associated with the creation of the Roman Rota (Rota Romana), which accepted for consideration all cases related to disputes regarding beneficiaries, the distribution of which was in the hands of the pope. Under Pope Benedict XII in 1338, the Apostolic Penitentiary received an extensive set of legislative norms designed to terminate various church punishments, in certain cases to grant absolution, to eliminate all kinds of canonical ambiguities and to give permission for marriage if there were any obstacles to its conclusion . Under the Avignon popes, the process of depriving the patrons of their right of nomination and of the chapters of their right of election continued, as more and more offices were filled at the direct direction of the pope. From the time of Gregory XI (1370-1378), the popes assumed the right to distribute all the major benefices, although they often agreed with the royal appointments or the choice of the chapter.

Financial management under the Avignon popes.

Financial problems were exacerbated by the loss of their Italian possessions, and also by the inflation that hit all of Europe at the end of the 14th century. The Avignon popes, especially John XXII, showed great ability and ingenuity in creating a new financial structure that met their interests. One part of the income was payments collected directly by the Curia, for example, one third of the annual income from church benefices. In addition, fees were charged for the preparation of documents, for receiving the pallium (archbishop's mantle) and during official visits of bishops to the Holy See (ad limina, "to the threshold"). Another part of the taxes was collected locally, and for this purpose a network of papal tax collectors was created, covering the whole of Europe. These taxes included church tithes, annates, or beneficiary income for the first year after receiving it. In addition, there was the right of appropriation, according to which papal collectors took away all the movable property of deceased bishops, and the right to income from all vacant beneficiaries replaced by the appointment of the pope.

THE GREAT WESTERN SCHISM

After the return of Pope Gregory to Rome, a serious institutional crisis erupted. Its result was the "great Western schism" (1378-1417), which significantly weakened the papacy and led to the emergence of a new concept of church government, denying the full power of the pope and transferring it to general church councils. The election of Pope Urban VI hastened the schism. After the death of Pope Gregory XI, sixteen cardinals in Rome met in a conclave to choose a successor. While they were sitting, the Roman mob, fearing that the French majority would again elect a Frenchman and move back to Avignon, began to demand the election of an Italian pope. The cardinals unanimously elected the Neapolitan archbishop of Bari, who took the name of Urban VI. The new pope was completely devoid of prudence and tact. His arrogant behavior and inexplicable attacks on the cardinals made the latter regret their choice.

After leaving Rome, the cardinals gradually gathered in Anagni. There they came to the conclusion that the election of Urban VI out of fear of the Roman crowd should be considered invalid. Therefore, they reconvened a conclave and elected the French cardinal Robert of Geneva as pope, who took the name of Clement VII and retired to Avignon. Urban excommunicated Clement and his followers, and Clement did the same to Urban and the latter's followers. In general, the split occurred along national lines, since France and its allies supported the Avignon pope, and the Italians and opponents of France supported the Roman one.

Consolidation of the power of the cardinals.

The most important consequence of the great Western schism was the weakening of the power and prestige of the papacy and the increased power of the cardinals. Christians were embarrassed by the spectacle of two pretenders fighting for the papal throne, despite the fact that the church condemned such a struggle of worldly rulers for their thrones. Clement and Urban not only used excommunications against each other, but also sent troops against each other. The spiritual leaders of Christendom wanted to end the schism, but no one knew how to do it. The simultaneous voluntary abdication of both rivals would be the most sensible solution, since in this case the cardinals from both sides could meet and elect a new pope. However, this plan could not be put into action, since the rival "popes" refused to believe in the conscientiousness of the abdication of the enemy, and Benedict XIII (1394-1424) became the successor of Clement VII in Avignon - an old, intractable and unbalanced man.

Cathedral theory.

In the end, both colleges of cardinals gathered the bishops subordinate to them for a common unifying council in Pisa (1409). The inability of both popes to overcome schism naturally led to the idea of ​​a general church council as the only way to resolve the problem. This, in turn, forced one to listen to the “cathedral” teaching on the essence and structure of the church, which was put forward by Guillaume de Nogaret and Marsilius of Padua in the course of their polemics directed against Boniface VIII and John XXII, respectively. According to this doctrine, the church was understood as the totality of all its members, to whom the supreme power belongs. The popes are the supreme leaders of the church, but they are not endowed with absolute power and are subject to the supreme authority of the church as a whole, whose will is expressed by the general church council (just as the parliament expresses the will of the people in the state). Thus, a general ecclesiastical council stands above the pope: it can depose the pope, and it establishes (and changes) the duties and attendant rights of the popes.

The Council of Pisa failed to end the schism. He proclaimed the deposition of both popes, Roman and Avignon, and elected the "Pisan" pope Alexander V. Since none of the competitors obeyed this decision, after 1409 there were already three popes. In 1414 Emperor Sigismund forced the successor of Alexander V, John XXIII, to convene the Council of Constance. The council condemned all three popes. John was forced to accept his deposition. Following this, the Roman pretender, Gregory XII, called his own council and abdicated. The Avignon pretender, Benedict XIII, was deposed (although he refused to acknowledge his deposition and lived until 1424, surrounded by a handful of supporters). In the end, in 1417, the cardinals, together with 30 delegates of the cathedral, elected Martin V - the first universally recognized pope in 40 years.

THE PAPER IN THE RENAISSANCE

Postponement of reforms.

The conciliar crisis shook the Catholic Church and the papacy to its foundations and proved to be an obstacle to reforms, which were resumed only after the Protestant Reformation. All popes, from Martin V to Leo X (the pope of the beginning of the Protestant Reformation), recognized the need for reform. However, the reform had to begin with the Papal Curia itself, where such vices flourished as the simultaneous filling of several church posts, nepotism and simony. Unfortunately, the college of cardinals consisted mainly of scions of aristocratic families who wished to lead a princely life, and as soon as any pope seriously thought about reform, he was immediately in danger of deposition.

administrative anarchy.

The main weakness of the Renaissance papacy was expressed primarily in the growth of administrative anarchy, which made reform almost impossible. Most ecclesiastical appointments were administered by Rome, and the bishops were not masters in their own dioceses. The popes were seized with fear of the conciliar movement, showed great interest in Renaissance secular learning and took an active part in the Italian wars, and in the meantime the church communities felt themselves more and more independent of any authority. Even the ruling core of the church itself suffered from administrative disorder, and the popes were unable to exercise effective control over the activities of the officials of the Curia. Many bought high positions from the church, considering it a good investment, and corruption flourished as a result.

Reconciliation of Popes.

Beginning with Nicholas V (1447–1455), the popes made Rome the intellectual and artistic capital of Europe. Pope Nicholas built a papal library, collected manuscripts, and arranged for the translation of Greek writings into Latin. Successive popes continued to encourage the humanists and invited artists such as Bramante, Raphael, and Michelangelo to Rome.

pragmatic sanction.

In the 15th century the papacy ceded almost all of its control of the church in France and Spain to the monarchs of these powerful nation-states. In 1439, the French king Charles VII gathered the highest clergy of France in Bourges, where the Pragmatic Sanction was adopted. This document abolished the payment of papal taxes, denied the right of appeal to Rome, and also replaced the right of the pope to control elections to church offices with the corresponding right of the king. In 1516, Francis I and Pope Leo X concluded the Concordat of Bologna, which abolished the Pragmatic Sanction, but which retained royal control over the church in France. The king retained the right to nominate, and the pope the right to confirm archbishops, bishops and abbots. Ferdinand and Isabella similarly expanded their control over the church in Spain, gaining the right to distribute ecclesiastical benefices, exercising complete control over the church in the New World and Granada, forbidding the publication of papal bulls without royal sanction, and denying the right to appeal the verdicts of the Spanish Inquisition in Rome.

Reform of the Papacy in the 16th Century

Protestant riot.

Perhaps the most important event of the 16th century. came the Protestant Reformation. Unlike the medieval reformist movements, it finally broke off relations with Rome and declared the popes to be usurpers. Papal authority was rejected by almost half of Europe. Countries that remained loyal to the Roman Catholic Church, such as France and Spain, were states that independently exercised control over church patronage (the distribution of church posts and privileges), and therefore did not benefit materially from the aggravation of relations with Rome. . The rulers supported the leaders of the Reformation in their countries, if the separation from the Roman Church strengthened their own political power and allowed them to take control of church patronage, as was the case in the Scandinavian countries and in England.

Failed reforms.

Important reasons for the Protestant Reformation were the decline of morals and abuses at the papal court. The need for reform was recognized by many popes, but practically nothing was done in this direction until Luther's break with the Roman Church after 1517. Local reform was carried out in Spain, and even in Rome itself, various reformist movements began to emerge, such as oratorians. However, the only attempt at reform, undertaken before 1517 and sanctioned by the pope, ended in complete failure. It was undertaken at the Vth Lateran Council (1512–1517), convened by Pope Julius II to discuss and initiate reforms. However, the participants in the council limited themselves to magnificent speeches, which completely satisfied Julius II, since his real goal was only to get ahead of the French king Louis XII, who intended to convene his council.

Adrian VI.

The Council of Trent (1545-1563) became the center of the reform of the church and the papacy, but a significant part of the work was carried out even before it was convened, and a number of reforming popes of the last third of the 16th century. strengthened and supplemented the disciplinary regulations of the Council of Trent. The reformist party in Rome hoped that its program would be implemented by Pope Adrian VI, elected in 1522, who was just over a year old.

Clement VII.

Adrian's successor was the indecisive Clement VII, who was more interested in the divorce of the English king Henry VIII and the sack of Rome by Charles V in 1527. Nevertheless, Clement - albeit hesitantly and without much success - nevertheless attempted reform. In 1524 he created a commission of cardinals who were to work out a reform of the Curia. He ordered an inspection among the Roman clergy and a test for knowledge of the order of the Mass. In addition, Clement issued ordinances against simony and from time to time opposed the practice of holding several offices at the same time. Papal decrees were also aimed at reforming the parish and diocesan clergy. The implementation of these decrees was interrupted several times by wars, but work in this direction continued until the death of Pope Clement in 1534.

Pavel III.

Clement VII's successor was chosen in one of the shortest conclaves in the history of the church, lasting about an hour. Paul III was a learned humanist who turned to a true spiritual life in 1513 and became one of the most prominent champions of reform. From the party of reformers, he chose able men, on whom he could, with a clear conscience, entrust the carrying out of the necessary work. Over time, Paul III got rid of the oldest cardinals, thus overcoming the main obstacle in the fight against abuse, as he was able to give all important posts to new people appointed by him. At the same time, at the very first meeting of the consistory, he announced his intention to convene a general church council, and two years later he issued a bull ordering a council to be convened in 1537 in Mantua (the council was postponed until 1545).

At the end of 1534, he announced that the reform of the papal curia and the college of cardinals should precede the general church reform to be carried out by the council. Realizing this intention was very difficult due to the fact that the Curia was a stronghold of people with worldly interests who were opposed to any reforms that threatened to reduce their income. Paul foresaw this difficulty. In 1535 he appointed a prominent reformist from Venice, the layman Contarini, as a cardinal, and in the following year such outstanding reformers as Caraffa, Sadoletto and Polé received the cardinal cap from him.

In 1535, Pope Paul appointed a reform commission, and in early 1536 a series of decrees were issued aimed at reforming the way of life of the Roman clergy. By these decrees, the clergy were ordered to wear church vestments and carry out divine services, not to approach brothels, gambling establishments and theaters, to live in their parishes and celebrate Mass at least once a month. The Pope knew that reform in Rome alone would not be enough. Therefore, he appointed the so-called. The Commission of Nine, which included people devoted to the reform, and instructed her to consider the problem and propose measures to remedy the situation. This commission, chaired by Contarini, presented its famous report at the beginning of 1537. The report contained the core of the reform program that was subsequently adopted at the Council of Trent. In all bluntness, the Commission of Nine blamed the abuses in the church on the papacy itself. The main evil was the transformation of the spiritual community into a corrupt bureaucracy. The commission also dwelled on the specific vices of simony, pluralism (the replacement of several church posts by one person) and nepotism (nepotism). She reported to the pope that the bishops were incapable of reforming their dioceses as long as there was a practice of buying benefits and privileges.

The commission ruthlessly denounced other vices as well. She condemned the sins against the charter, so frequent in monastic orders, and insisted on depriving the monks of the right to buy permission not to wear monastic vestments and on restricting them from selling indulgences. She condemned the ease with which it was possible to buy permission to marry close relatives, called for a reform and streamlining of the activities of monastic orders.

When Pope Paul realized that it would not be possible to convene a council in the near future, he himself set about reforming the papal administration. He appointed a commission of four cardinals, which included Contarini and Caraffa, whose task was to combat abuses in all divisions of the Curia, starting with the Datarius, who was in charge of the distribution of papal dispensations, indulgences and other privileges. Although the fees were originally intended only to justify the expense of each case, over time their amount became determined by the nature of the privilege. As a result, Datarius' income began to account for almost half of all income of the papal treasury. This encouraged the Datarius officials to distribute privileges to anyone who was able to pay for them. Now this division has been reformed in such a way that the pay has again become strictly in line with the costs.

Paul III enlarged the Commission of Four, bringing the number of its members to eight, and then to twelve, so that they could eradicate abuses in the Rota, in the Chancellery, in the Penitentiary and in the Judicial Chamber. Everywhere the reforms were carried out with difficulty - because of the clash with bureaucratic interests. In addition, in each of these cases, the reforms reduced the income of the pope. However, Pope Paul III and his staff were not so easily forced to retreat, and by 1541 tangible results had been achieved in the reform. The Pope also took up arms against the evil of absenteeism (absentee administration of dioceses). In 1540 he summoned 80 bishops and archbishops who lived in Rome and ordered them to return to their dioceses. However, absenteeism was so deeply rooted that it was extremely difficult for Paul III to enforce his orders. He and his followers had again and again to remove entire groups of bishops from Rome, until the entire episcopate adopted the custom of placing their residence in their own diocese. Paul also ordered the publication of collections of rules and regulations for preachers, so that believers could receive a clear instruction in dogma and morals.

Trent Cathedral.

The beginning of the Council of Trent (1545–1563) was extremely unsuccessful. By the time of the proposed opening of the cathedral in Trient (now Trento, Italy), only 10 bishops had arrived, and only 30 bishops were present at the first meetings. There were reasons for that. Emperor Charles V wanted the cathedral to take place on the territory of the Holy Roman Empire, while the French king insisted on a cathedral in Avignon; the pope, for his part, wanted to hold a council in one of the Italian cities in order to avoid control by secular authorities. As a result, Trient was chosen, a city that was within the borders of the empire, but located not far from France and Italy. The pope wanted the council to decide on controversial dogmas, while the emperor insisted on considering only disciplinary issues. In addition, there was no unanimity in Catholic circles themselves as to whether the supreme authority in the church was the pope or the council, and many bishops suspected that the pope wished to consolidate the elusive power. And finally, there was opposition to the council from the secular sovereigns of the Catholic countries.

The latter circumstance, however, turned out to be in the hands of the pope, since it gave him the opportunity to gather his supporters. The council was presided over by three papal legates, who had the exclusive right to put forward questions for discussion. The papal delegates took control of the organization of the council, replacing the vote based on the principle of national representation (adopted at the Council of Constance, which ended in the great Western schism) with individual voting, thereby reducing the possibility of influence on the results of the vote by the emperor and European monarchs through the obedient national factions of the participants in the council . Each issue put on the agenda by the legates of the pope was considered by a group of theologians and specialists in canon law, and the results of this consideration were brought to the attention of the bishops, who made the final decision. Then, at the general meeting, a resolution was adopted. In the period from 1545 to 1563 the cathedral resumed its activity three times; a total of 25 plenary sessions were held during this time.

As a result, the official Catholic doctrine of original sin, justification, the Mass, and the sacraments was developed. In addition, the council adopted disciplinary regulations on the minimum age for entering the monastery, on the certification and improvement of the training of the priesthood, on church vestments and episcopal control over parish priests. However, behind all the issues discussed at the Council of Trent, there were two main problems related to the position of the papacy. The first of these was the problem of participation in the council of Protestant theologians. The papal legates invited them to come to the council and state their arguments, but denied them the right to vote - until they returned to the bosom of the Roman Catholic Church (which meant submission to the authority of the pope and the decisions of the council). It also remained unclear whether bishops receive their orders directly from God or indirectly, through the pope. In the first case, the bishops turned out to be practically independent of the pope, and the general church council became the only supreme authority in the church. The papal legates avoided directly posing this question, but in fact advocated the primacy of the pope. The Roman Church was recognized as the mother and mistress of all other churches. All who are ordained to one position or another must take a vow of obedience to the pope. The pope is responsible for the whole church and has the prerogative to convene ecumenical councils. Finally, all decisions of the council must be approved by the pope.

The latter requirement posed a serious problem, as the officials of the Curia tried to obtain the relaxation of certain regulations, which reduced the number of cases requiring an appeal to Rome, and thereby the income of the office. However, Pius IV (1559-1565) strongly approved these decrees and forbade the publication of "commentaries, glosses, annotations and scholia to the above decrees" without the consent of the pope. In addition, he created a cardinal congregation to interpret the ordinances of the Council of Trent.

In addition, the cathedral left unfinished reform Missala and Breviary and the question of correcting the text of the Vulgate. The completion of this work also fell on the shoulders of the popes. Reformed Missal and Breviary were published by Pius V, but the Vatican edition of the Vulgate was carried out only in 1612.

Pavel IV.

The reforms carried out by the popes in the second half of the 16th century not only put an end to abuses, but also strengthened papal control over the church. The most decisive reformer of this period was Pope Paul IV (1555-1559), whose intransigence was compared with the intransigence of the Old Testament prophets.

Paul IV set himself the goal of purging the church of heresy, eradicating abuses and vices, strengthening internal church discipline and freeing the Roman Church from control by secular monarchs. In the eradication of heresy, he relied on Index of banned books and to the Inquisition, whose authority increased enormously, and the severity went beyond the limits of reason. Pope Paul's reforms were quite effective. Under him, pagan trends that had penetrated Rome a century earlier were eradicated. He put an end to dispensations (indulgences) for bishops and monks. Cardinals and bishops were required to renounce all benefices except for their sees. The 113 diocesan bishops who lived in Rome were twice warned to retire to their dioceses, and six weeks after the second warning was issued, they all had to leave Rome hastily. Pope Paul solved the problem of Datarius without hesitation, abolishing all duties at once and thereby cutting his own income by two-thirds. All other departments of the Curia were subjected to the same ruthless reform. Making appointments to the highest church positions, the pope flatly refused to listen to any recommendations from secular monarchs. Paul IV put an end to nepotism in a dramatic way when he discovered that his own nephews, whom he had entrusted with the administration of the papal provinces, were found to be dishonorable people. Indignant, he publicly broke off relations with them and expelled them from Rome.

Subsequent Reform Popes.

The popes following Paul IV, especially Pius V, Gregory XIII (1572-1585) and Sixtus V (1585-1590), also remained very strict in regard to the granting of dispensations and privileges of every kind, they insisted that the residences of bishops were in their dioceses, and demanded that the priests live in the parishes, and that the nuns observe the rules of their monasteries. Within the borders of the Papal States, Pope Pius V introduced measures against spectacles, feasts, gambling and other public entertainments. As a result of his reform Breviary and Missala the annual cycle of worship was restored, and Gregory XIII completed this reform. In 1582, he introduced the "Gregorian calendar" (now accepted almost all over the world) in order to bring the dates of the celebration of the main Christian holidays in line with the astronomical cycle. Initially, the Protestant countries refused to accept an improved calendar, but by the end of the 18th century. it was accepted by all major countries (except Russia).

Gregory XIII

He is also known as the founder of the modern system of seminaries, where future priests were trained. The Council of Trent decreed that such seminaries should exist in every diocese, however, for various reasons, this decree was never implemented in practice. A serious obstacle was the lack of funds. An even more serious obstacle was the lack of experienced teachers. Finally, most bishops did not understand the crucial role of education in the reform of the Catholic Church. Therefore, the task of organizing seminaries that corresponded to the spirit of the Council of Trent also fell on the shoulders of the popes. In 1564, Pius IV decided to establish a seminary in Rome, and a commission of cardinals appointed by the pope entrusted its organization to the Jesuit order. see also JESUITES.

However, it was Gregory XIII who put the business of establishing seminaries on a firm footing. The Roman College (Collegium Romanum) of Pope Pius was rebuilt (1572) and became a seminary in which young people of all nationalities studied. In addition, Gregory XIII restored the German College, founded the English and Greek Colleges. In each case, he has shown a wide-ranging mind and a genuine interest in the success of the priesthood education work. For example, in the Hellenic College, Greek professors taught, seminarians wore cassocks, and worship was carried out according to the "Eastern" rite and in Greek. In addition, Gregory XIII established 23 papal seminaries in Germany and other European countries where the bishops were unable or unwilling to comply with this decree of the Council of Trent. Gregorian seminaries were attached to the Jesuit colleges, in which students were educated at the expense of the pope.

Sixtus V,

who became the successor of Gregory XIII, was an exceptionally talented ruler. Under him, the reform of the church was brought to an end, and civil peace was again established in the Papal States. His ruthlessness in the fight against lawlessness was explained by his fear that a situation might arise in Rome similar to that which once forced the popes to retire to Avignon and opened the way for the great Western schism and the strengthening of the “cathedral” movement. He wanted the Papal States to become a model of political prosperity and moral integrity. Under him, Rome was renewed and prettier: the columns of Trajan and Antoninus Pius were restored, the construction of the Basilica of St. Peter. Sixtus V initiated the creation of such famous architectural landmarks as the Piazza di Spagna, the Lateran Palace and the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore.

Pope Sixtus steadily implemented the reforms initiated by his predecessors: the decrees on residences in the dioceses, on the prohibition of changing the monastery, on episcopal visitations and other disciplinary decrees of the Council of Trent. His own contribution was the issuance of a decree that is still in force today on compulsory and regular visits to Rome by all diocesan bishops. The reformist activity of Pope Sixtus was more political than religious. More than anyone else, he gave the governing structures of the church their modern form. He limited the number of members of the College of Cardinals to 70 cardinals and established 15 permanent congregations and commissions responsible for matters formerly in the hands of the pope and the cardinals of the consistory. The newly formed congregations included the Congregation of the Sacred Rite, whose competence included questions of liturgical practice, the Congregation of Educational Institutions, which supervised all Catholic universities, the Congregation of Monastic Orders. Each Roman cardinal was required to take part in the activities of one or more congregations. Thus, by 1590, when Sixtus died, the papacy had reformed itself, modernized the structures of church government and strengthened its secular power in the Papal States.

PAPER IN THE AGE OF ABSOLUTISM AND REVOLUTION

In the period of 17-18 centuries. The Catholic Church and the papacy have largely lost their influence in the daily lives of church members. At the same time, the remarkable upsurge of the spiritual and missionary life in the Church of France led to the fact that the center of Catholicism actually moved from Rome to France, called "the eldest daughter of the Church."

Gallicanism.

The opposition to papal authority on the part of the national church was called Gallicanism, since it was based on claims to the autonomy of the French (Gallican) church. Gallicanism was at the same time a program, a position and a theoretical concept. As a program, he provided for the use of all means that would contribute to the acquisition of the national church as much independence as possible and the weakening of the influence of the pope within the country. Sometimes these funds were used to strengthen the authority of the national assembly of bishops, and sometimes to expand the influence of the king in the affairs of the national church. As an ideological position, Gallicanism was a religious form of manifestation of nationalism. It expressed itself in a tendency to ignore Rome and develop an exclusively national church. The theological justification of Gallicanism consisted in the assertion that the ecumenical council was higher than the pope and that the power of the latter over churches in foreign countries should have strictly defined limits.

Louis XIV refused to obey the pope and usurped papal authority in France. Pope Innocent XI (1676-1689) managed to stop the French king - at the moment when Louis tried to arbitrarily extend the régale (the king's right to use the income from vacant benefices) to all the bishoprics of France. When the French bishops supported their king, Bishop Bossuet proposed a compromise solution, embodied in the "Four Fundamental Principles of the Gallican Church" (1682): 1) neither the pope nor the church has power over secular sovereigns, so that the king cannot be deposed by spiritual authority, and his subjects cannot be released by her from the oath sworn to the king; 2) according to the decrees of the Council of Constance, the power of the pope is limited by the power of the "ecumenical" (general church) council; 3) the exercise of papal power is limited by the customs and privileges of the Gallican Church; 4) although the pope "has the first voice in matters of faith ... his decision is not indisputable until it is approved by the church."

Febronianism.

The principles of Gallicanism, like other political ideas of the Sun King, were assimilated by most of the Catholic sovereigns of other European countries. In these countries, the doctrine of the divine origin of royal power was implanted, while in the pope it was proposed to see the elected head of the church, whose power is limited like the power of a constitutional monarch. The Gallican movement reached its peak in the German lands with the publication in 1763 of a book published under the pseudonym Febronius. Its author, the suffragan bishop of Trier, argued that the pope's power claims were a usurpation of the rights that actually belonged to the bishops and the whole church. If the church wants, it can delegate papal powers to any other bishop, since the primacy of the bishop of Rome involves only the performance of administrative duties assigned by the church to the pope. Thebronius denied the infallibility of the pope and his right to receive appeals directly from all members of the church. The primacy of power in the church, according to Febronius, belongs to the general church council, the power of the pope is limited by the decrees of the council, and the pope himself is only the executor of his will. Therefore, the abuse of papal power must be suppressed by a general church council, local councils of national churches and a secular sovereign in each particular country.

The book of Febronius was condemned by Pope Clement XIII in 1764, and the author himself (Hontheim) renounced it in 1778. Nevertheless, the prince-archbishops of Cologne, Mainz and Trier accepted this teaching. They publicly opposed the "usurper" infringement of their jurisdiction by the papal Curia and issued 23 theses in which they resolutely demanded that Rome return to the prince-bishops their rights: the abolition of all decisions on the withdrawal of individual monasteries from episcopal jurisdiction; recognizing that the powers of bishops, confirmed every five years when they visit Rome, are granted to them forever, that the publication of papal documents in the diocese can be carried out only with the permission of the bishop; and finally, the replacement of the text of the episcopal oath to the pope, pronounced at the consecration.

Persecution of the Jesuit order.

Another blow to the papacy during this period was the prohibition of the activities of the Jesuit order. The Jesuits were opponents of Gallicanism and strong supporters of papal authority. The Jesuits were persecuted in Portugal, Spain and France, and then the Catholic rulers belonging to the Bourbon dynasty put pressure on the pope, forcing him to abolish the Jesuit order in 1773. The Society of Jesus was one of the largest monastic congregations with great power. It had about 25,000 members and established 273 foreign missions, in addition to numerous educational institutions in Europe. The Jesuits were the confessors of many kings and nobles and constituted the teaching backbone of almost all papal seminaries in Europe. Thus, they were the last strong structure of the church, which remained viable at a critical moment for the church in the middle of the 18th century, and were the last stronghold of the papacy outside of Rome.

The decline and the beginning of the rise.

The papacy again almost completely lost its influence and power in the era of the French Revolution and in the era of Napoleon, and only gradually, throughout the 19th century. managed to regain both; The position of the papacy finally improved only in the 20th century.

In France, the Catholic Church was associated with the "old order", so the revolution of 1789 was inevitably directed not only against the state, but also against the church. The August decrees of 1789 abolished church tithes, and the so-called. The civil charter of the clergy practically cut off all ties with the papacy, depriving it of the right to appoint bishops and establish the boundaries of dioceses in France, and turned the clergy themselves into civil servants. After much deliberation, Pope Pius VI condemned the Civil Rule of the Clergy, which in France was accepted by only four bishops and about half of the lower clergy. The latter constituted a schismatic "Constitutional" (i.e., agreed to the Civil Charter) church, while the clergy, who remained loyal to Rome, were forced to emigrate or go into hiding.

Church under Napoleon.

In 1797, during the first Italian campaign, Napoleon Bonaparte, one of the generals of the Directory, imposed on the pope the so-called. Treaty of Tolentino. Under the terms of this treaty, the pope had to cede part of the areas belonging to him to the puppet republican government created by Napoleon in northern Italy, pay a large indemnity, provide the winners with 100 works of art, close their ports to the English merchant fleet and refuse to assist the enemies of France. The following year, General Berthier, Napoleon's chief of staff, captured Rome and established the Roman Republic. On the grounds that the presence of the pope in Rome might lead to a mutiny, the French authorities ordered Pope Pius VI to leave the Vatican. He was escorted to Siena under escort, and then delivered across the Alps to France, where he died in 1799. Some time later, the papal conclave met on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore, near Venice, and three months later elected Cardinal Chiaramonti as pope, who took the name Pius VII.

As soon as Napoleon came to power as the first consul of France, he tried to regulate relations with the church in order to ensure civil peace. He had to overcome the opposition of the Jacobins, especially strong in the army, and such prominent statesmen as the former Bishop Talleyrand and the former priest Joseph Fouche. The concordat of 1801 was not only a personal victory for Napoleon, but a great success for the papacy, since the concordat abolished the schismatic "Constitutional Church", and the Roman Church again received a legislative basis for its activities in France. The Holy See renounced any claim to the lands taken from it during the revolution; in addition, Napoleon was allowed to appoint a large group of new bishops acceptable to himself and to the pope. In exchange for possessions and property taken away from the church, the French government promised support for the Catholic Church in France.

It would seem that the Concordat of 1801 settled the problems that arose in the French Church as a result of the Revolution. At the same time, however, Napoleon published the Organic Articles, which were drawn up without the knowledge of the Holy See and published unilaterally as legislative acts regulating religious life in France. They provided that, without the official permission of the government, the papal legates were not entitled to enter the territory of France. These restrictions also applied to papal letters. Even the resolutions of a general church council could not be published in France without the consent of the authorities. In addition, the "Organic Articles" contained many provisions on issues directly related to the implementation of divine services - for example, regarding the ringing of bells or the vestments of the clergy. Finally, they ordered the introduction in all French seminaries of the compulsory study of the "Four Fundamental Principles of the Gallican Church" in 1682.

One of the most powerful blows inflicted on the church by Napoleon was his reforms in the German lands. He confiscated church property and abolished the institution of prince-bishops in Germany, deprived seminaries, cathedrals and monasteries of their livelihoods, and left many episcopal sees vacant.

Pope Pius VII tried to oppose Napoleon. He refused to annul Jérôme Bonaparte's marriage to Elizabeth Patterson of New Jersey and Napoleon's own marriage to Josephine. When the pope refused to close his ports to the British merchant fleet, Napoleon captured part of the Papal States and Rome itself. In 1809 he annexed the Papal States to his empire, arrested the pope and brought him across the Alps to Savona. After that, the pope was a prisoner in Fontainebleau until the defeat of Napoleon in the "battle of the nations" near Leipzig (1813).

Reorganization of the Papal States.

By his resistance to Napoleon, Pius VII won the sympathy of European sovereigns, and at the Congress of Vienna all papal territories, with the exception of papal enclaves in France and a small strip of land on the left bank of the Po River, were returned to the Holy See. Immediately after 1815, the pope faced two problems: 1) establishing friendly relations with various political forces in Europe; 2) reorganization and modernization of the Papal States. Pius VII and his talented secretary of state, Consalvi, entered into agreements with most European sovereigns, which were an indirect recognition (on the part of not only Catholic, but also Protestant monarchs) of the fact that the Holy See had demonstrated its effectiveness. It was only in France that a group of bishops was found who again tried to raise the idea of ​​a conciliar structure to the shield.

For many centuries, the Papal States remained a clerical state, the life of citizens there was regulated by an extremely intricate system of canon and civil law, local edicts and ancient customs, the observance of which was unsuccessfully monitored by clerics - both cardinals and clerics. Papal rule was not harsh, and taxes were not particularly high. However, at the same time, the clergy led not only the religious, but also the civil life of the laity; the main defect of this system was its inability to provide law and order. Napoleon introduced a more efficient administrative system, and in the face of civil laws, the laity were equal in rights with the clergy.

The Pope and Consalvi were supporters of reforms. However, other cardinals, whose party was called zelanti ("zealots"), opposed all reforms and persistently sought to maintain the pre-revolutionary order.

NINETEENTH CENTURY

In 1846 Mastai-Feretti, the liberal Bishop of Imola, was elected pope and took the name of Pius IX. The new pope immediately undertook the transformation of the administrative system of the Papal States. In the first month, he granted amnesty to more than 1,000 people who were in papal prisons on political charges. Plans were developed for customs reform, the construction of a railway network, and street lighting in Rome. The criminal justice system has been simplified, prison conditions have been improved, more liberal press laws have been enacted, and penal code reform has begun.

The reforms of Pius IX only brought the revolution of 1848 closer, when the revolutionaries seized power in Rome, executed the prime minister of the papal government, and the pope himself was forced to flee. After that, Pope Pius IX became disillusioned with the reforms and in the subsequent years of his pontificate - the longest in history (1846-1878) - remained in positions of consistent conservatism. In the course of the struggle for the unification of Italy, which unfolded after 1848, the papacy finally lost secular power. Pius IX refused to lead an armed patriotic struggle against Austria for the unification of Italy, putting the patriots before a choice: either Italy without Rome, or Italy at war with the papacy. The Italian nationalists chose the latter, and the last step towards the unification of Italy was the capture of Rome in 1870.

This led to the emergence of the "Roman problem", which could not be solved until 1929. When the Italian army moved to Rome in 1870, Pope Pius IX ordered his troops to show only the appearance of resistance, and he himself locked himself in the Vatican Palace as a voluntary prisoner. He refused to accept the "Law of Guarantees" from the Italian government, since he himself, according to this law, ceased to be a sovereign sovereign. Pius IX and his successors continued to insist that they were legally the sovereign rulers of Rome and that this power had been removed by force and in violation of the law.

Dogmatic innovations of Pius IX.

Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary.

The long pontificate of Pope Pius IX was marked by three more important events that were of great importance for the consolidation of the power and prestige of the papacy. The first of these was the adoption in 1854 of the dogma of the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary by her mother. Having previously discussed with all the bishops the question of the expediency of the solemn proclamation of this dogma, the pope instructed a group of theologians to carefully develop its justification. However, he then proclaimed it in his own name, thus confirming the traditional claims of the papacy to infallibility.

Syllabus.

In 1864 the pope published the famous List of misconceptions(Syllabus). This list of doctrines condemned by the pope and his predecessors did not contain anything new, but was drawn up in an extremely harsh form, and the condemned provisions were taken out of context, so that Syllabus turned out to be a highly unreasonable and erroneous document. He embarrassed liberal Catholics and turned against him the vast majority of non-Catholics. The liberal French Bishop Dupanlou published a pamphlet in which he tried to interpret Syllabus so as to reconcile the church with the true progress and virtues of modern civilization. These clarifications received the approval of the pope and over 600 bishops, who enthusiastically thanked him for such an interpretation, but irreparable harm had already been done by the publication and wide circulation Syllabus which was supposed to serve as a kind Index- a guide for bishops and priests who allegedly had at their disposal the writings from which the condemned theses were extracted. Syllabus clearly testified to the hostility of the papacy to progress, liberalism and modern civilization.

Pope's infallibility.

In 1869, Pope Pius IX convened the First Vatican Council. Initially, it was supposed to consider, firstly, the Catholic doctrine in connection with the modern development of science and philosophy, and secondly, the essence and organizational structure of the church. Definitions were adopted regarding the traditional Catholic teaching on the essence of God, Revelation and faith and on the relation of faith and reason. Initially it was not supposed to discuss the issue of papal infallibility, but the party of supporters of "infallibility" nevertheless raised this issue at the council, and then included the chapter on papal infallibility among the first in the decree De Ecclesia.

Some bishops did not recognize papal infallibility; still more bishops thought it imprudent to proclaim it in the face of a skeptical world; however, the majority was in favor of this definition. Free discussion of this question lasted seven weeks; during this time, 164 speeches were delivered in defense of and against the principle of papal infallibility. As a result, it was decided that when the pope determines a doctrine concerning faith or morality, ex cathedra (i.e., as head of the church), he has the infallibility that was promised to the church by God. After the adoption of this definition, the pope, as the main teacher of the faith of the Roman Catholic Church, only once exercised his right to proclaim a new doctrine ex cathedra: this happened in 1950, when Pope Pius XII proclaimed the dogma of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Encyclicals of Leo XIII.

Pope Pius IX was succeeded by Leo XIII (1878-1903), who attempted to bring papal authority into line with the changed conditions. He made peace with Bismarck, who was actively campaigning against the church, known as the Kulturkampf, and recommended that French Catholics show loyalty to the Third Republic and refrain from attempting to restore the monarchy. Leo XIII issued many encyclicals, or epistles, on various theological, philosophical and social topics, among them - Aeterni Patris(about scholastic philosophy and the need to be guided by the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas); Rerum novarum(on the problem of the workers and the need to maintain a middle course between socialism and uncontrolled capitalism); Immortal Dei(about the main political problems, the essence of the state and the relationship between church and state); Libertas praestantissimum(about freedom - "the most precious gift of God to man").

THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Pius X.

After the death of Pope Leo XIII (1903), the church was much stronger than at the beginning of the 19th century, but it still urgently needed significant administrative changes. The next pope, St. Pius X (1903–1914), zealously took up this task. At the beginning of his pontificate, the administration of the church was still carried out through the 15 congregations established by Sixtus V in 1587. The consequence of this system was an insufficient division of powers and duplication of functions; some of the congregations were overwhelmed with work, the existence of others lost all meaning. The Pope undertook a radical reorganization of the congregations: he abolished some congregations, created a number of new ones to replace them, and outlined a clear range of specific tasks for each of them. As a result, the Curia began to include 12 congregations, 3 tribunals, 4 secretariats and numerous papal commissions.

In addition, Pius X reorganized the papal conclave in order to ensure full freedom of expression in the election of the pope. He abolished the right of preliminary veto (when the secular sovereign indicates to the cardinal leaving for the conclave which of the possible candidates he would like to exclude in advance), which was granted to the Austrian emperor and which he took advantage of at the conclave that elected Pius X. He also banned - under the threat of excommunication from churches - to disclose the content of the discussions that are being held at the conclave. Under Pope Pius, the number of non-Italian cardinals increased, so that for the first time in many centuries, the Italians lost their numerical superiority in the college of cardinals. Perhaps the most important of his transformations was the codification of canon law. Many canons were adapted, and all 2414 canons received the force of law, among them some had only advisory power until they were included in the new code of 1917. The work of codification greatly facilitated the assimilation and application of the norms of church discipline, since the rights and obligations of clergy and laity were now formulated very clearly.

Pope Pius X entered the history of the papacy also thanks to a number of his other initiatives aimed at strengthening the church. One of them was his somewhat ill-advised campaign against theological "modernism", reminiscent of the infamous Syllabus. Another initiative was to demand frequent communion. In addition, he reformed the liturgy and church music and strongly encouraged the in-depth study of Holy Scripture.

Benedict XV.

Pope Pius died shortly after the outbreak of the First World War. His successor, Benedict XV (1914–1922), was a capable diplomat who managed to maintain a strict and appropriately under the circumstances neutrality throughout the war. In 1915, he addressed a message to all warring peoples and their governments, calling for an end to the war and a just peace. In 1917, the pope took the unprecedented step of sending a diplomatic note to all warring countries, outlining seven points that could form the basis of a peace treaty and offering his mediation to end the conflict. However, his proposal was not taken seriously by any of the warring parties.

At the very beginning of the war, Benedict XV established an office for prisoners of war in the Vatican. The bureau received lists of missing soldiers from German and French prisoner-of-war camps and passed this information on to the soldiers' families. The bureau organized the exchange of certain categories of prisoners of war, in particular the seriously wounded, and the transfer to neutral Switzerland of the fathers of large families (more than four children). In addition, it provided for the exchange of civilian prisoners and secured the release of many women, children, men over 50, doctors and clergy.

Pius XI.

After the end of the First World War, the papacy faced the following tasks: 1) the expansion of the Catholic Church, mainly through missionary work in the countries of the "third world"; 2) strengthening the influence of the pope himself - both as the head of the church and as the highest authority in matters of dogma and morality; 3) the expansion of the influence of the church on society as a whole, expressed primarily in the fight against Soviet communism, the fight against phenomena that were considered by the popes as grossly contrary to moral standards, for example, abortion and the use of contraceptives, and in humanitarian work aimed at alleviating the fate of poor people and poor countries; 4) adaptation of church practice, especially in the field of liturgical reforms, to modern ideas; 5) the preservation of traditional Catholic doctrines and institutions (in particular, an exclusively male, celibate - for the Latin rite - priesthood). The implementation of these tasks was undertaken by a number of energetic and active popes, the first of which was Pius XI (1922-1939). Beginning in 1870, the popes lived as voluntary captives in the Vatican, where the Italian government allowed them to maintain relations with bishops throughout the world, formally recognizing their sovereignty, but at the same time continuing to consider them subjects of Italian law. It was this that became the main point of contention between the Holy See and the Italian government, since the popes believed that they could not effectively manage the Catholic Church, while remaining subjects of any sovereign or government. For many years, both the popes and the Italian government linked the solution of this issue with the question of power over Rome and the area adjacent to it. However, already under Pope Pius X, there was a shift in relations between the papacy and the government.

In 1929, Pope Pius XI took advantage of the difficult situation of B. Mussolini in order to resolve this problem, as a result of which the Lateran Accords were concluded. They consisted of three parts. The first part was the treaty itself, according to which the two sovereign partners agreed on the creation of the state of the Vatican, ruled by the pope. This tiny state, covering an area of ​​about 44 hectares, was guaranteed all the rights associated with sovereignty: the freedom to establish diplomatic relations with other countries (even those at war with Italy); diplomatic immunity for officials accredited to the Holy See; inviolable neutrality of the Vatican; recognition of cardinals as princes of the church, retaining their Vatican citizenship even when they are forced to live in Rome itself. The second part was a financial convention: Italy pays some compensation to the papacy for the loss of the Holy See of Rome and other territories belonging to the church. The third part - the concordat (revised in 1984) - dealt with the conditions for the existence and activity of the church in Italy.

Pius XI issued three encyclicals condemning modern totalitarianism. Divini Redemptoris condemned communism in the Soviet Union, Mit Brennender Sorge contained a decisive verdict on Nazism, Non abbiamo bisogno was directed against Italian fascism. In the encyclical on marriage Casti connubi Pope condemned birth control. Perhaps the most famous of Pope Pius's encyclicals was Quadragesimo anno, published for the fortieth anniversary of the publication of the encyclical of Leo XIII Rerum novarum devoted to the situation of workers, and developed, in relation to modern conditions, provisions concerning the rights and obligations of employers and workers.

Pius XII.

The next pope, Pius XII (1939-1958), for the first time since the declaration of the principle of papal infallibility by the Vatican Council I, proclaimed a dogmatic definition directly based on this principle (1950). According to this definition, the Virgin Mary was taken up in the flesh into heaven. In the same year, in the encyclical humani generis, he warned scientists against being carried away by certain philosophical systems, in particular existentialism, which undermined the foundations of Catholic doctrine. In other encyclicals of Pius XII, those changes are outlined, which were subsequently enshrined in the decrees of the Second Vatican Council. In the encyclical Mediator Dei Pope Pius explained the essence and meaning of liturgical worship and urged the faithful to take an active part in the liturgy. In the encyclical Mystic Corporis he saw the essence of the church as the Mystical Body of Christ and the relationship between the church and Christ as its founder.

After the war, Pius XII became the first pope to make extensive use of the opportunities for personal contact with the masses of lay Catholics that arose as a result of the conclusion of the Lateran Accords. From the late 1940s into the 1950s, he held large public audiences in Rome and at Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer residence; in just the years of his pontificate, he addressed more than 15 million pilgrims.

John XXIII.

Pius XI and Pius XII were skilful diplomats, brilliant writers, and people in step with the modern age, but Pope John XXIII (1958–1963) came to the throne with the firm conviction that the church needed to be reformed. After the Council of Trent, Catholic liturgical practice did not change significantly. The anti-modernist campaign launched by Pius X did not go unnoticed, jeopardizing the further development of free theological thought. In the West, millions of Catholics lived in a spiritual environment shaped by the secular culture of the new age, which placed individual experience and personal freedom above all else. In the Third World countries, the Catholic doctrine was most often preached by European missionaries with a European view of the world. And the centuries-old tradition of mutual distrust and hostility overshadowed relations between the Roman Catholic Church and other religious associations and organizations.

In his first great encyclical, Mater et magistra, Pope John applied the principles of the Catholic doctrine of society to relations between peoples. He spoke of the world as a community of interdependent states, where people are connected by a complex system of social relations. These ideas he developed in the encyclical Pacem in Terris. Addressing in this encyclical to "all people of good will", he emphasized the obligation of prosperous nations to provide economic support to poor countries.

The most significant event of his pontificate was Vatican II (1962-1965), the third in the entire post-medieval era. At this council, no dogmatic teachings were proclaimed and no heresies were condemned, however, in the documents of the council, a view was expressed of the church as a community of believers, and not as a theocratic monarchy, the important role of lay Catholics in church life was emphasized, a liturgical reform was approved, and called for fraternal relations with other Christian churches and with adherents of non-Christian religious traditions.

Pavel VI.

Pope John died before the cathedral completed its work. His successor, Paul VI (1963-1978), brought the Council to its end and took upon himself the task of putting the decisions of the Council into practice. One of the most notable changes that took place during his pontificate was the replacement of Latin - the traditional language of Catholic worship, incomprehensible to most lay believers - by national languages. Even more important was the establishment of regular national and regional episcopal conferences and the decentralization of ecclesiastical authority by delegating some of its power from Rome to these new institutions.

Like his predecessor, Pope Paul VI increased the number of African and Asian-born bishops and cardinals and brought about a genuine internationalization of the Catholic hierarchy. In addition, he became the first pope since Napoleonic times to travel outside of Italy and visited Jerusalem, the United States, Latin America and India.

This spirit of innovation encouraged many laymen and theologians, although some lamented the boldness with which they were carried out, seeing it as a danger, and some insisted on their adherence to the Latin Mass. In his encyclical Populorum progressio Pope Paul VI, following John XXIII, spoke out in support of the right of poor countries to help in their development. In 1968, Paul VI tried to put an end to what he considered to be dangerous tendencies in the field of morality, condemning in an encyclical humanae vitae use of contraceptives. However, the wave of protests among Catholics clearly demonstrated that after Vatican II the church really became different from what it was during the times of Pius IX and Pius XII.

John Paul II.

After the pontificate of John Paul I (1978), which lasted only one month, the conclave elected the Polish cardinal Karol Wojtyla as pope. John Paul II became the first non-Italian pope since the Renaissance. An exceptionally energetic person by nature, Pope John Paul II traveled the world far more than any of his predecessors. He visited all continents and used the media to proclaim his teachings. In the encyclical Sollicitudo rei socialis(1988) he denounced the viciousness of both Soviet communism and Western consumer capitalism. John Paul II constantly opposed the use of contraceptives, he refused to consider the ordination of women to the priesthood and soften the law on celibacy. In the political sphere, the pope's public and covert support for the Polish opposition greatly accelerated the fall of the communist regime in Poland, which can be considered the greatest success of Vatican diplomacy since the Lateran Concordat. He died on April 2, 2005 at his residence in the Vatican.

Literature:

Kovalsky Ya.V. Popes and papacy. M., 1991
Christianity. encyclopedic Dictionary, tt. 1–3. M., 1993–1995
Zadvorny V.L. History of the Popes. Volume I. From St. Peter to St. Simplicia. M., 1995
Zadvorny V.L. History of the Popes. Volume II. From St. Felix II to Pelagius II. M., 1997



As a result of the transformation of Christianity into the dominant religion in both the Eastern and Western Roman Empires, a strong and centralized church organization was formed, headed by bishops who ruled over separate church districts (dioceses). By the middle of the 5th c. five centers of the Christian church, or five patriarchies, were formed, the bishops of which received the titles of patriarchs - in Constantinople, Rome, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem. The further history of the Christian Church in Byzantium and in the West developed differently, in accordance with the peculiarities of the development of feudalism in them.

The Eastern Christian Church based its organization on the administrative division of the Eastern Roman Empire. At the same time, of the four patriarchates that were part of the Eastern Christian Church (Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem), at the Church Council of 381, the Metropolitan Patriarchate of Constantinople received a leading position. The strong imperial power, preserved in Byzantium, sought to ensure that the church was an obedient instrument of the state and was completely dependent on it. Byzantine emperors already at the cathedrals of the middle of the 5th century. were recognized as persons having supreme rights in the church with the title of "emperor-bishop". Although church councils were considered the highest body of the Eastern Christian Church, the right to convene these councils belonged to the emperor, who determined the composition of their participants and approved their decisions.

The position of the church was different in the countries of Western Europe, where very significant changes took place after the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the disappearance of imperial power. The adoption of Christianity by the "barbarian" kings and nobility contributed to the fact that the church, which had infiltrated the "barbarian" society, which was going through the process of feudalization and enslavement of the peasants, was able to occupy a special position in this society.

Taking advantage of the weakness of the early feudal "barbarian" states and their mutual struggle, the bishops of the "eternal" city of Rome, from the 4th century. called popes, very early assumed administrative and political functions and began to come forward with claims to the highest authority in the affairs of the Christian church as a whole. The real basis of the political power of the Roman bishops - popes was the richest land holdings concentrated in their own hands and in the monasteries subordinate to them. In the second half of the VI century. nominally dependent on Byzantium, whose power in Italy by this time had greatly decreased, the popes became in fact completely independent. To justify their claims, the popes spread the legend that the Roman episcopal see was allegedly founded by the apostle Peter (who was considered a disciple of the mythical founder of the Christian religion, Jesus Christ). Therefore, the popes called their vast land holdings “the patrimony of St. Peter." This legend was supposed to create an aura of "holiness" around the popes. Pope Leo I (440-461), in order to confirm the rights of the Roman bishop to primacy among other bishops, resorted to forgery. In the Latin translation of the decrees of the first "ecumenical" council, he inserted the phrase: "The Roman Church has always had primacy." The same ideas were developed by subsequent popes, despite the fact that the claims of the Roman bishops-popes to a dominant role in the entire Christian church provoked the most decisive opposition from other bishops, especially from the east.

The medieval Christian church in its structure reproduced the feudal hierarchy. So, in the West, the Pope became the head of the church. Below the pope were large spiritual feudal lords - archbishops, bishops and abbots (abbots of monasteries). Even lower were priests and monks. The heavenly world of medieval Christianity was an exact reproduction of the earthly world. At the very top of the heavenly hierarchy, according to the teachings of the church, was the almighty "God the Father" - a copy of the earthly rulers - surrounded by angels and "saints". The feudal organization of the heavenly world and the church itself was supposed to sanctify the feudal order on earth in the eyes of the believers.

A huge role in the medieval Christian church was played by monasticism, which became widespread both in the East and in the West. Monasticism arose in the period of early Christianity as a form of seclusion or flight from the society of those people who had lost faith in the possibility of getting rid of social oppression. However, by the 6th c. hostels (monasteries) created by monks turned into the richest organizations. Labor ceased to be obligatory for monks, and the asceticism of monasticism in the period of its inception was long forgotten. In the East, monasticism became a major political force that tried to influence the affairs of the state. In the West, starting with Benedict of Nursia (480-543), who founded the Monte Cassino monastery in Italy and thus laid the foundation for the Benedictine order, monasticism became a faithful support of the popes and, in turn, took an active part in the political affairs of Western European states.

By helping the ruling class in every possible way to formalize and strengthen the feudal dependence of the peasantry, the church, both in the East and in the West, was itself the largest landowner. She received huge land holdings in the form of gifts from kings and large feudal lords, who sought to strengthen the position of the church organization, which sanctified their dominance. With gifts in favor of the church, they hoped at the same time to secure the “kingdom of heaven” for themselves. Both in Byzantium and in the West, churches and monasteries owned approximately one-third of the entire land. Thousands of serfs worked in the monastic farms, who were subjected to even more cruel exploitation than on the lands of secular feudal lords. Particularly large were the land holdings of the church in Italy. In the 5th century three Roman churches - Peter, Paul and John Lateran - received, in addition to income in kind, another 22 thousand solidi (about 128 thousand rubles in gold) of annual income.

The greed and greed of the clergy knew no bounds. Enormous land wealth was obtained by the church through deceit, forgery, forgery of documents, etc. Clerics and monks used threats of heavenly punishments and extorted wills in favor of the church. Church possessions enjoyed the right of immunity in the West and a similar right of excursion in Byzantium. Church ministers were subject only to ecclesiastical court.

Bishops were also vested with administrative functions. All this exalted them in society and contributed to the strengthening of their power. The way of life of the higher clergy was not much different from the way of life of the largest secular feudal lords.

As a result of the transformation of Christianity into the dominant religion in both the Eastern and Western Roman Empires, a strong and centralized church organization was formed, headed by bishops who ruled over separate church districts (dioceses). By the middle of the 5th c. five centers of the Christian church, or five patriarchies, were formed, the bishops of which received the titles of patriarchs - in Constantinople, Rome, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem. The further history of the Christian Church in Byzantium and in the West developed differently, in accordance with the peculiarities of the development of feudalism in them.

The Eastern Christian Church based its organization on the administrative division of the Eastern Roman Empire. At the same time, of the four patriarchates that were part of the Eastern Christian Church (Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem), at the Church Council of 381, the Metropolitan Patriarchate of Constantinople received a leading position. The strong imperial power, preserved in Byzantium, sought to ensure that the church was an obedient instrument of the state and was completely dependent on it. Byzantine emperors already at the cathedrals of the middle of the 5th century. were recognized as persons having supreme rights in the church with the title of "emperor-bishop". Although church councils were considered the highest body of the Eastern Christian Church, the right to convene these councils belonged to the emperor, who determined the composition of their participants and approved their decisions.

The position of the church was different in the countries of Western Europe, where very significant changes took place after the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the disappearance of imperial power. The adoption of Christianity by the "barbarian" kings and nobility contributed to the fact that the church, which had infiltrated the "barbarian" society, which was going through the process of feudalization and enslavement of the peasants, was able to occupy a special position in this society.

Taking advantage of the weakness of the early feudal "barbarian" states and their mutual struggle, the bishops of the "eternal" city of Rome, from the 4th century. called popes, very early assumed administrative and political functions and began to come forward with claims to the highest authority in the affairs of the Christian church as a whole. The real basis of the political power of the Roman bishops - popes was the richest land holdings concentrated in their own hands and in the monasteries subordinate to them. In the second half of the VI century. nominally dependent on Byzantium, whose power in Italy by this time had greatly decreased, the popes became in fact completely independent. To justify their claims, the popes spread the legend that the Roman episcopal see was allegedly founded by the apostle Peter (who was considered a disciple of the mythical founder of the Christian religion, Jesus Christ). Therefore, the popes called their vast land holdings “the patrimony of St. Peter." This legend was supposed to create an aura of "holiness" around the popes. Pope Leo I (440-461), in order to confirm the rights of the Roman bishop to primacy among other bishops, resorted to forgery. In the Latin translation of the decrees of the first "ecumenical" council, he inserted the phrase: "The Roman Church has always had primacy." The same ideas were developed by subsequent popes, despite the fact that the claims of the Roman bishops-popes to a dominant role in the entire Christian church provoked the most decisive opposition from other bishops, especially from the east.

The medieval Christian church in its structure reproduced the feudal hierarchy. So, in the West, the Pope became the head of the church. Below the pope were large spiritual feudal lords - archbishops, bishops and abbots (abbots of monasteries). Even lower were priests and monks. The heavenly world of medieval Christianity was an exact reproduction of the earthly world. At the very top of the heavenly hierarchy, according to the teachings of the church, was the almighty "God the Father" - a copy of the earthly rulers - surrounded by angels and "saints". The feudal organization of the heavenly world and the church itself was supposed to sanctify the feudal order on earth in the eyes of the believers.

A huge role in the medieval Christian church was played by monasticism, which became widespread both in the East and in the West. Monasticism arose in the period of early Christianity as a form of seclusion or flight from the society of those people who had lost faith in the possibility of getting rid of social oppression. However, by the 6th c. hostels (monasteries) created by monks turned into the richest organizations. Labor ceased to be obligatory for monks, and the asceticism of monasticism in the period of its inception was long forgotten. In the East, monasticism became a major political force that tried to influence the affairs of the state. In the West, starting with Benedict of Nursia (480-543), who founded the Monte Cassino monastery in Italy and thus laid the foundation for the Benedictine order, monasticism became a faithful support of the popes and, in turn, took an active part in the political affairs of Western European states.

By helping the ruling class in every possible way to formalize and strengthen the feudal dependence of the peasantry, the church, both in the East and in the West, was itself the largest landowner. She received huge land holdings in the form of gifts from kings and large feudal lords, who sought to strengthen the position of the church organization, which sanctified their dominance. With gifts in favor of the church, they hoped at the same time to secure the “kingdom of heaven” for themselves. Both in Byzantium and in the West, churches and monasteries owned approximately one-third of the entire land. Thousands of serfs worked in the monastic farms, who were subjected to even more cruel exploitation than on the lands of secular feudal lords. Particularly large were the land holdings of the church in Italy. In the 5th century three Roman churches - Peter, Paul and John Lateran - received, in addition to income in kind, another 22 thousand solidi (about 128 thousand rubles in gold) of annual income.

The greed and greed of the clergy knew no bounds. Enormous land wealth was obtained by the church through deceit, forgery, forgery of documents, etc. Clerics and monks used threats of heavenly punishments and extorted wills in favor of the church. Church possessions enjoyed the right of immunity in the West and a similar right of excursion in Byzantium. Church ministers were subject only to ecclesiastical court.

Bishops were also vested with administrative functions. All this exalted them in society and contributed to the strengthening of their power. The way of life of the higher clergy was not much different from the way of life of the largest secular feudal lords.

In the Middle Ages, the church in Europe was directly involved in the process of feudalization. Churches and monasteries owned a huge amount of land. According to the calculations of a number of researchers, in the early Middle Ages in Western Europe, a third of the cultivated land was ecclesiastical and monastic. The rapid growth of church land ownership was facilitated by the fact that it had a number of benefits, including tax benefits. A large number of farmers, in order to get rid of the tax oppression beyond their strength, passed into land and personal dependence on the church and monasteries. Church and monastic possessions were the same feudal possessions as those of secular feudal lords.

Bishops and abbots in Western Europe also owned many cities. Therefore, often the struggle of the townspeople for self-government resulted in a struggle against seniors from among the clergy and monasticism.

The top clergy and abbots were gradually drawn into the feudal hierarchy with its relations of suzerainty - vassalage. So, from the time of Charlemagne, bishops and abbots were obliged, by order of the king, to supply their vassal knights to his army. The entry of church leadership into the feudal hierarchy led to such a phenomenon as the appointment of bishops, abbots by secular authorities (kings, dukes, counts). This act was called secular investiture. Thus, in the course of feudalization, the church became dependent on secular authorities. This process, with its attendant decline in morals and discipline, is often referred to as the "secularization of the church."

Part of the clergy and monasticism was aware of the perniciousness of such a path for the church, and from the 10th century. a movement to reform the church began. The main slogans of this movement were the demands for the independence of the church from secular authorities and the strengthening of the power of the pope. These demands were formulated most clearly by Pope Gregory VII in his Dictate of the Pope (1075). According to the statement of Gregory VII, the power of the pope is higher than any secular power, the pope can even overthrow emperors, kings, and release their subjects from the oath to worthless emperors. The leaders of church reform saw the main obstacle in fulfilling their demands in secular investiture. The refusal of the German king Henry IV to fulfill the demand of the pope not to appoint bishops and abbots led to an acute conflict between the king and the pope. During the conflict, the excommunicated king had to beg for a humiliating forgiveness from Pope Gregory VII in the castle of Canossa.

From the end of the X century. the church made attempts to at least partially curb anarchy and arbitrariness in fragmented Europe, accompanied by internecine wars of the feudal lords, which claimed thousands of lives of civilians and caused enormous material damage. Councils of the clergy in different countries began to adopt resolutions on the "God's truce" and "God's peace." The first of them forbade feudal lords to fight on church holidays, fasts and certain days of the week (at first only on Sundays, and then this ban extended from Wednesday evening to Monday morning). The decrees on the "God's Peace" required the feudal lords not to kill or harm the clergy, peasants, merchants, women and other categories of civilians. However, the effect of this was small.

Freed from the strict tutelage of secular power, the Catholic Church was a serious consolidating factor in fragmented Western Europe during the High Middle Ages, because one faith, one church united Western Europeans. And it was this consolidating force - the church led by the papacy - that managed to direct the destructive forces of Western European society beyond its borders to the Gentiles. This was done by organizing crusades.

The peak of the political power of the papacy was the XIII century. Then many monarchs of Europe recognized themselves as vassals of the popes (especially Innocent III). In their struggle with recalcitrant kings, the popes used various means, up to such as excommunication of kings from the church, interdict (a ban on worship and rituals in a certain territory), and even crusades. In the XIII century. the will of the popes largely determined political relations in Europe.

The political power of the papacy was undermined by the creation of centralized states in Europe. The clash of Pope Boniface VIII with a strong French monarchy ended with the defeat of the papacy and almost 70 years of Avignon "captivity" from the French kings. The “great schism” that followed (1378-1417), which took place during the Hundred Years War and almost led to a split in the Catholic Church, once again showed that the papacy was becoming an instrument of political intrigues of powerful centralized states. The decline of the papacy in the late Middle Ages led to the creation in a number of countries, for example, in England, France, of de facto national churches, the clergy of which were subordinate not so much to the popes of Rome as to their kings.

Klishina M.V. Ph.D., Professor, Zhubekova A. student gr. MO-12

KEUK, Karaganda, Kazakhstan

The word dad comes from the Greek papas which means "father". In early Christianity, believers called their spiritual leaders that. At the turn of the 2nd and 3rd centuries in Eastern Christianity, the title of pope was given to the patriarch of the Church of Alexandria. In the west, the title was held by the bishops of Carthage and Rome. In 1073, Pope Gregory VII declared that only the bishop of Rome had the right to bear the title of pope. It should be noted, however, that until today the official nomenclature used in Catholic ecclesiastical law does not use the word pope. It is replaced by the expression Pontiff of Rome, which reflects the two main functions of the pope: the bishop of Rome and the head of the entire Catholic Church. The official non-use of the word "dad" is perhaps determined by the biblical testament of Christ "... call no one father, for God is your father." According to Catholic doctrine, the Pope of Rome is considered "the vicar of Jesus Christ, the successor of St. Peter (Roman bishops consider themselves the direct heirs of the Apostle Peter), the highest head of the universal church, the western patriarch, the primate of Italy, the archbishop and metropolitan of the Roman province, the sovereign of the state-city of the Vatican. Pope crowns the multi-level hierarchy of the organization of Catholicism. The combination of religious and secular power is the rarest case in the history of modern times. Undoubtedly, the influence of the pope as a person on the entire Catholic Church, this is quite understandable and understandable, of particular interest are the brightest personalities from among the popes, and their personal contribution to the history of Catholicism.

Who is the Pope and how do Catholics themselves teach about him? His official title is: “Bishop of Rome, Substitute of Christ, Successor of the Prince of the Apostles, Supreme High Priest of the Universal Church, Patriarch of the West, Primate of Italy, Archbishop and Metropolitan of the Province of Romagna, Sovereign of the Vatican City State, Servant of the Servants of God.”

The Latin word vicar literally translates as "deputy" or "viceroy" - it is in this sense that the role of the Bishop of Rome is understood by Catholics. By the Prince of the Apostles is meant the holy Apostle Peter, who is conceived by Catholics as a kind of absolute, monarchical head of the apostolic community. Primus - this means "the oldest", "preeminent" of the bishops. The word sovereign means an independent secular ruler. It is very symptomatic that to this day the pope strongly insists on remaining an independent head of a secular state, even if it is so small, the territory of which occupies less than a hectare.

What follows from this title in practice? In Roman Catholic law it is written: "The supreme see cannot be judged by anyone."

From this short phrase it follows that the Roman High Priest is not subject to the judgment of the Ecumenical Council and that in the Roman Catholic Church itself there is no such body that could tell the pope that he is mistaken, does wrong, and condemn him. The Pope is above the Church and above the Ecumenical Council. And also the very rules of the Ecumenical Council cannot be recognized as valid if the Council was not convened by the pope and these rules were not approved by him. Not a single bishop in the world can be considered a true bishop if he received his consecration without the sanction of the Pope.

From the teaching that the pope stands above the Universal Church, that he is beyond the jurisdiction of not only human, but also ecclesiastical courts, Catholics drew another conclusion. They have a dogma of papal infallibility.

Catholic teaching says that the Roman High Priest, when he speaks on behalf of the whole Church (there is such a term ex cathedra, that is, “from the pulpit” - not in the sense that he necessarily pronounces his words, having ascended the pulpit, but in the fact that he speaks officially) about questions of dogma or morality, he cannot be mistaken, and his definitions are infallible in themselves and neither confirmation nor acceptance by the Church Plenitude is needed, i.e. the property of infallible teaching, which belongs to the whole Church as a whole, is assigned to one person - the Bishop of Rome.

This is a fairly new dogma. It was adopted only in 1870 at the First Vatican Council, which Catholics call the Twentieth Ecumenical Council. They continued to count the Ecumenical Councils, adding to them some of their Councils of the period of the Middle Ages, the Renaissance and the New Age. Now they number twenty-one Ecumenical Councils.

In the Middle Ages in Western Europe, a church organization led by the Pope played a huge role.

Initially, most Christians did not recognize the authority of the Bishop of Rome - the Pope - over themselves. The bishop of Constantinople, the patriarch, had great influence, and the popes also obeyed him. Rome itself after the conquests of Justinian was under the rule of Byzantium.

However, at the end of the VI century. this power is weakened. The emperors, busy repelling the onslaught of the Arabs and Slavs, could not help Rome in its struggle against the Lombards. In 590, Gregory I, a skilled and wise ruler, became pope. He stopped the onslaught of the Lombards and managed to provide Rome with everything necessary. Gregory, nicknamed the Great, won enormous authority. In most countries of Western Europe, the church began to obey the Pope. Later, in 754, arose papal state. With the rise of the popes, there was an expansion of differences between the Christians of the West and the East. The Western Church was called Roman Catholic (universal), and the Eastern Church was called Greek Orthodox (true). There were disputes over many issues. For example, the Catholic Church taught that divine services could only be conducted in Latin, while the Orthodox Church taught in the languages ​​of every nation. According to Catholics, only church ministers were allowed to read the Bible, and Orthodox preachers often created writing for different peoples so that everyone could read the Holy Scriptures. Catholics were baptized with five fingers, and Orthodox - rattling or two. In Catholicism, priests were eventually banned from names, families, and in Orthodoxy, celibacy extended only to monks.

An open clash occurred in the second half of the 9th century. under Pope Nicholas and Patriarch Photius. Nicholas announced the deprivation of Photius from the rank of patriarch. In response, Photius cursed the pope. During the dispute, Nikolai used a collection of old documents that he allegedly found. From them it followed that Emperor Constantine the Great handed over to the then pope power over the entire church and full power over the western part of his empire. Only in the XV century. Italian scientists have proved that this entire collection of documents is a fake. The final split between the Orthodox and Catholic churches occurred in 1054.

According to its structure, the Catholic Church resembled a "feudal staircase". The lowest level were priests parishes. The parish united the inhabitants of a village or part of a city who prayed in one church. They became priests after a special ceremony. He was held bishop - head of the priests of the diocese (region).

The parish priests elected the bishop of the diocese. During the initiation ceremony, the bishop was given a ring and a staff as a sign of power over the faithful. The bishops of several dioceses were often under the leadership of archbishop. Bishops and archbishops were subordinate to the pope.

In the X century. the rulers of the East Frankish kingdom (Germany) led the fight against the Hungarian raids, created a powerful knightly army. Initially, there was no clear "feudal ladder" in Germany. Vassals of the king were not only dukes and counts, but also many knights. King Otto I in 955 finally defeated the Hungarians in the battle on the Lech River. Otto strengthened his power, subjugated many dukes. To strengthen his authority, the king established a special relationship with the church. He granted her many benefits, but arrogated to himself the right to approve bishops - he handed them a ring and a staff. The Church in Germany passed from the authority of the Pope to that of the King.

Otto was favored by the decrease in the authority of the pope at that time. The nobility of Rome and the Italian kingdom put their proteges on the papal throne. Otto made several campaigns in Italy, took the title of King of Italy, defeated the enemies of the pope. In 962, the pope crowned Otto with the imperial crown. This is how the empire was recreated, which later became known as the Holy Roman Empire. The popes became completely dependent on the emperors. Because of this, the papacy further lost its authority. Some church leaders sought to change the situation. It was they who initiated the Cluniac reform. Initially, they were supported by the emperors, the successors of Otto, because they also wanted to increase respect for the church, which was one of the pillars of their power. However, having strengthened the church, the popes began the struggle for liberation from the power of the emperors. A law was passed according to which only a few cardinal bishops could participate in the election of popes. The emperor was removed from participation in the elections. The pope then proclaimed that bishops should be subject only to him and not to the emperor.

In 1073, an ardent supporter of reforms became pope Gregory VII. An open struggle for power over the bishops developed between him and Emperor Henry IV. It continued under their successors. In the end, the popes won an almost complete victory over the emperors. It helped them that over time, imperial power in Germany weakened, and Italy actually fell away from the empire.

In the XII century. the power of the popes increased. The word of the clergy was the law for the common man, and for the feudal lord, and for the king. The attempts of some rulers to resist the popes ended in failure. In the middle of the XII century. Frederick Barbarossa became emperor. He was a smart and determined man. He managed to somewhat strengthen his power in Germany and wanted to re-subjugate Italy, but his knightly army was defeated by the militia of the Italian cities that supported the pope. The defeat of the emperor further strengthened the importance of the popes. The most powerful of them was the Pope Innocent III(1198-1616). Innocent called himself vicar of Christ on the ground. He overthrew and appointed emperors and kings. By order of Innocent, wars began. The Pope tried to curb the strife of the feudal lords and clashes between Christian countries, and to direct all his forces to the fight against heretics and Muslims.

Termination at the beginning of the XI century. The raids of the Hungarians, Arabs, Normans contributed to the successful economic development of European countries and the rapid growth of the population. However, by the end of the XI century. this led to an acute shortage of free land. Wars and their companions - famine, epidemics became more frequent. People saw the cause of all misfortunes in punishments for sins. The best way to get rid of sins was considered to be visiting holy places, especially Palestine, where the Holy Sepulcher was located. But after the capture of Palestine by the Seljuk Turks, who were intolerant of non-Muslims, pilgrimage there became almost impossible.

The idea of ​​a campaign against the Muslims to liberate the Holy Sepulcher was becoming more and more widespread in Europe. It was not only a charitable deed, but also a way to provide land for both feudal lords and peasants. Everyone dreamed of rich booty, and the merchants hoped for trade benefits. In 1095 the pope Urban II called for an expedition to Palestine. The participants of the campaign decorated their clothes and armor with crosses - hence its name. Both feudal lords and peasants participated in the First Crusade.

In 1096-1099. Crusaders conquered Syria and Palestine from the Seljuk Turks. There arose the Kingdom of Jerusalem, whose vassal possessions were considered the counties of Edessa and Tripolitan, the principality of Antioch. The crusader states waged constant wars with the Muslim rulers of the surrounding countries. Gradually, the crusaders, who were not very numerous in the East, began to lose their possessions. There were seven other major crusades. Peasants almost did not participate in them, but emperors and kings often walked at the head of the knights. However, all these campaigns were almost fruitless. During the Fourth Crusade, the crusaders attacked Constantinople and took it in 1204. They created the Latin Empire on the lands of Byzantium. Only in 1261 did the rulers of the Nicaean Empire, preserved from Byzantium, manage to liberate Constantinople. But Byzantium has not restored its former power.

In Palestine, with the support of the popes, spiritual and knightly orders were created. Those who joined the order became warrior monks. First arose Order of the Knights Templar. Then it was created Order of the Hospitallers. Later arose Warband. The knight-monks lived off the lands belonging to the orders in Palestine and in Europe. Detachments of order knights differed from the usual feudal troops in their discipline. However, over time, the orders grew rich, and their members ceased to show their former zeal in military affairs. Many of them surrounded themselves with luxury. It was even claimed that the Templars, who were especially rich, secretly renounced Christianity.

Meanwhile, the onslaught of the Muslims intensified. In 1187 the sultan Salah al-Din(Saladin), who united Syria and Egypt, recaptured Jerusalem. In 1291, the last fortress of the crusaders in Palestine, Acre, fell.

Despite the failure and great sacrifices, the Crusades had a positive meaning for Western Europe. They contributed to the acquaintance of Europeans with the higher culture of Byzantium and the eastern countries at that time, and the borrowing of many achievements. Strengthened the position of European merchants. This led in the future to the development of commodity-money relations, the growth of cities and handicraft production. The outflow of the most militant part of the feudal lords and their death contributed to the strengthening of royal power in a number of European countries.

Heresies, i.e. deviations from church dogmas arose during the formation of the Christian church. However, from the XII - XIII centuries. they have become especially strong. The heretics pointed out that many priests, including the pope himself, do not observe what they preach, live in luxury, lead a dissolute life, interfere in the affairs of states. Heretics called for a return to the foundations of the early Christian church, when its ministers were poor and persecuted, but they showed everyone a model of righteousness.

Some heretics taught that the world is ruled by two equal forces - God and the devil. They called themselves the people of God, and all opponents, including the clergy, led by the Pope, - servants of the devil. The heretics called for the destruction of churches and icons, for the extermination of all ministers of the church. There were heretics who advocated the equality of all people, not only before God, but also in earthly life. They offered to divide all the property equally. In communities of such heretics, property was considered common; sometimes even wives were common.

Heretics refused to pray in "spoiled" churches, to pay church tithes. In some places even feudal lords became heretics, including the rulers of large areas, dissatisfied with the claims of the popes to secular power. At the beginning of the XIII century. in some areas in northern Italy and southern France, heretics made up the majority of the population. Here they exterminated the clergy and created their own church organization.

The ministers of the church condemned heresies in sermons, imposed curses on heretics. However, the main way to combat heresies was persecution and punishment. Those suspected of heresy were subject to arrest, interrogation under torture, and then execution. Not relying on the zeal of secular rulers who felt sorry for their subjects, the popes created an ecclesiastical court - the holy inquisition(investigation). A person who fell into the hands of the Inquisition was subjected to the most sophisticated torture. The usual punishment for heretics was their public burning alive at the stake. Sometimes up to 100 or more people were burned at once. In addition to heretics, the Inquisition also persecuted people suspected of having links with the devil - witches and sorcerers. Many hundreds of thousands of women died at the stake in Western Europe because of these ridiculous accusations. The property of the convicts was divided between the church and local authorities. Therefore, the wealthy citizens especially suffered from the Inquisition.

In an area where there were a lot of heretics, crusades were organized. The largest were campaigns in the south of France against the Albigensian heretics under Pope Innocent III. During the war, the inhabitants of entire regions and cities were exterminated without exception.

After Innocent III, the power of the papacy began to decline. Fights between popes and emperors resumed. As a result, both sides were exhausted. The authority of the Roman popes was undermined during the struggle between Pope Boniface VIII and the French king Philip IV and then "Avignon captivity" popes, which lasted until 1377. All this time, the popes lived in the city of Avignon in southern France and obeyed the will of the French kings. After the return of the popes to Rome, Great Schism in the Catholic Church. For 40 years, two, and sometimes three, popes were elected at the same time. In England and France, the church was actually subordinate to the royal authority.

To overcome the crisis of the Catholic Church, the Ecumenical Council was recognized. He sat in Constance from 1414 to 1418. In 1417 a new pope was elected. Thus the Great Schism was overcome.

Bibliographic index:

1. "Popes and the Papacy", Ya.V. Kovalsky, M. Politizdat, 1991

2. “Maxim Kozlov. Catholic ecclesiology: papal primacy and papal

infallibility" // http://omolenko.com/publicistic/kozlov.htm/

3. "Catholicism", M. P. Mchedlov, 2nd Ed., M. Politizdat, 1974

4. “History. Section III History of the Middle Ages "Artemov V., Lubchenkov Yu

5. “Catholic Church. Crusades" // http://www.student.ru/

UDC 316.74(574)

THE CRUSADES OF THE VATICAN

Klishina M.V. Candidate of Philological Sciences, Professor, Elubay B., gr. Yu-14s KEUK, Karaganda, Kazakhstan

In our difficult days, many are racking their brains: “Why is this such a violent attack on the state of Israel?” There is practically no large international institution or organization left, from the White House administration to the European Parliament, Great Britain, the UN, Russia, the League of Arab States, Iran.

“Bishops from the Middle East, meeting at a conference in the Vatican, adopted a resolution demanding that Israel “stop its occupation of Palestinian lands and stop using the Bible as an excuse for the injustices committed against the Palestinians.” The conference, which lasted 2 weeks, was convened by Pope Benedict XVI to discuss the situation of Christians in the Middle East. Catholics form a religious minority in the region, which is shrinking every year. Israel blames Muslim extremists for this, but the Catholics themselves, as it turns out, have a different opinion.
The bishops called on Israel to comply with relevant UN resolutions and declared that "Holy Scripture cannot serve as a basis for the return of Jews to Israel, the expulsion of Palestinians and the occupation of Palestinian lands." The rights to the "Promised Land" are not the privilege of the Jewish people. Christ abolished this right. »

The situation of Christians in the Middle East is deplorable, and only in the territory of the State of Israel no one persecutes them. Moreover, the Catholic monks who remained in the Arab autonomy would very much like to live on the Israeli side, because they have already figured out where it is good and where it is bad.
He builds a lie into a dogma. The real Yeshu lived under Alexander Yanai. He was recognized as a heretic, for wild ideas, and was killed, thrown into the abyss.
Already after the destruction of the Second Temple, and after the death of the Apostles of Jesus, their works were completed and rewritten. Haggadah where Yeshu is mentioned has been removed from the Talmud. But the Jews who went to the countries of North Africa and Spain kept their books. And it's all there. Why was a lie built into a dogma? For the sole purpose, with a claim to the Jewish Almighty. For this, the first ancient detective story was written, where, as a result of an immaculate conception, according to a warning from above, a baby is born in a manger, in a barn, which the Magi learn about by a star. Since the baby is a "son", then his "father" and "mother" are a single family. The Most High, through Jesus, belongs to Christians. And it is not the Romans who are to blame for his crucifixion, but the Jews, and eternal revenge on them for this. Otherwise, God forbid, there will be one who will say that Christianity was the first marauder of the ancient world, and Muslims were the second. And, since the Holy Scripture cannot be the basis for the return of the Jews to their land, the Vatican, in the person of its bishops, blasphemes, tearing out from the Eternal Testament not pages, but chapters, which say that the first duty of a Jew is life in the Promised Land. Or even worse: the Vatican cancels the ETERNAL TESTAMENT, believing that today it can live without it. Just as the Roman Empire fell under the onslaught of the wild hordes, the “new crusaders” will also fall under their onslaught. And all those who are at the head of this "bloody campaign" and malicious libel. Our right to the Promised Land is eternal as long as we remain Jews. »

As Timothy Garton Ash put it: “Without the Pope, there would be no Solidarity (resistance movement against the government of what was then Poland. Auth.). Without Solidarity, there would be no Gorbachev. Without Gorbachev, there would have been no fall of communism.” The “fall of communism” in this case was expressed not in the collapse of the ideology that now “lives and wins” in the West, but in the collapse of the statehood of the Soviet Union and its allies in Eastern Europe, which, in fact, have long since abandoned the communist ideology. Only a few symbols and names remained from it. It was an external facade that hid a completely different system. It was called Soviet, socialist. But it's not about the name. In essence, it was a system focused on the construction of national statehood, objectively preventing the creation of everything global, including the Global Khaganate. The confrontation between the national and the global lies at the heart of modern political and economic confrontation. During the existence of the Soviet Union, it was he who was the core of everything national, around which the countries of Eastern Europe and the countries of the Third World united, also choosing the path of national statehood. The USSR formed this coalition of national forces, and this coalition rested on it. Thanks to this, the national could defend itself and repel the attacks of the global.

During the Cold War, attempts were repeatedly made to undermine the bloc of national forces. In the 1970s, a strategic decision was made to first undermine the union from within, by disintegrating one of the members, to provoke everyone to a rebellion, to a revolution. And then deliver a mortal blow to the core of the alliance to the Soviet Union. Thus, the question arose in which state to lay that mine, which would subsequently blow up the entire system of national statehood so that small fragments of it remained. »

The implementation of this plan was not easy. In order to turn some state into an explosive device capable of blowing up the entire system of national forces and creating the prerequisites for the destruction of its core, it was necessary to think over a number of conditions that this state must meet.

First, this state must play a significant role in the coalition of national forces, so that the situation in it really affects everyone.

Secondly, since the main blow was directed against the key Russian statehood as the foundation of the national system, it is necessary that this state organically carry an anti-Russian charge in its depths. That is, historically, it was rigidly opposed to Russia, politically and spiritually.

Thirdly, it is necessary that this state be organically connected with the West, which is the core of the coalition of global forces. Organic connection in this case means a historical union with the West in political and spiritual (religious) terms.

Only one country, Poland, met all these three requirements. When we decided on the state, it was necessary to develop a strategy for subversive work aimed at destroying the system of national statehood led by the USSR.

This strategy was to form within Poland such a force that would be able to act in two directions against its own national statehood and against the USSR as the vanguard of the national statehood system in the world.

John Paul II took an active part in the formation of such a force and acted as its spiritual leader.

The authority of the Pope made it possible to ensure the scale and openness of subversive anti-state activities in Poland. John Paul II, a Pole by nationality, gave the revolutionary movement a special pathos and nationalist character. Polish Catholicism has historically been the center of the struggle against the Russian Empire.

And under the spiritual leadership of John Paul II, the process of disintegration of the system of national statehood of the USSR and its allies went at a rapid pace.

In June 1979, the Pope undertook his historic trip to Poland and stayed there for nine days, which then turned the world upside down. In his sermons, lectures and addresses, he did what was later called

"a revolution in the minds of the Poles". Bronisław Geremek, a former Polish foreign minister and a member of the Solidarity movement, recalls: “In 1979, the pope wanted to convey to us that the regime cannot exist without popular support, and he said: “Don’t support it.” »

It is no coincidence that a year later, the Solidarity movement was formed in Gdansk, which organized a strike at the local shipyard, and almost the first thing the members of the movement did was hang a portrait of John Paul II on the gates of the factory.

After this, the rapid rise of the Solidarity movement begins, to which the pope provides comprehensive spiritual and financial support.

Speaking before the two chambers of the Polish Sejm at a solemn ceremony marking the 25th anniversary of Solidarity, its former leader and Poland's first democratic president, Lech Walesa, said the movement was "inspired" by Pope John Paul II. "Then the Polish people and many others woke up from their sleep." According to Walesa, Poles were "awakened" by John Paul II's first visit to Poland as pontiff in 1979. It was after this that Solidarity was born and protests against the communist regime began.

The "revolution in the minds of the Poles" in 1979 prepared the revolution of 1989, after which the process of the collapse of socialist statehood in the USSR and the countries of Eastern Europe went at an especially rapid pace.

The New York Times wrote of it this way: “Historians and statesmen agree that John Paul II played a huge role in creating the Solidarity labor movement in the 1980s. After a series of largely dramatic events led by this organization, in the summer of 1989 the communist regime collapsed in Poland. And this, in turn, caused political upheavals in other socialist countries from East Germany to Bulgaria. .

After 1979, dad made two more trips to Poland in 1983 and 1987. He succeeded in igniting the flame of revolution, which engulfed millions of Poles.

But it all started then with his trip in 1979. As the former head of the Polish state, General Jaruzelski, said: “She served as a detonator.”

It is known that shortly after the election of Karol Wojtylla on October 16, 1978, as the head of the Roman Catholic Church, the KGB informed the Politburo that the Vatican's decision was made under pressure from Zbigniew Brzezinski, who was then the security adviser to US President Jimmy Carter. According to US government sources, three weeks after this meeting, Reagan signed a secret directive aimed at ensuring that the "crusade" through Poland against the USSR with everything necessary. In secret cooperation with the Vatican and through it from the United States, money, faxes, computers, copying and printing machines, printing equipment, communications equipment, etc., were smuggled to help Solidarity.

"The Pope launched an aggressive religious and political offensive", and became "a passionate catalyst for the revolution"...

In 1985, it became clear that the Polish leadership was no longer able to control and contain the revolutionary movement in the country.

Reagan Ambassador Vernon Walters visited the Vatican every six months between 1981 and 1988 to exchange top-secret economic, military, and political intelligence.

In 1986, Jaruzelski announced a general amnesty in the country, including the release of more than 200 political prisoners, and dropped the charges against Walesa.

John Paul II returned to Poland in 1987 and celebrated an outdoor solemn mass in Gdansk in front of an enthusiastic crowd of 750,000 people. Repeating again and again that Polish workers have the right to self-government (well, just a true Marxist), the pope declared:

"There is no more effective struggle than Solidarity."

As a result, in mid-1989, multi-party elections were held in Poland, in which Solidarity candidates won. After that, the process of disintegration of Varshavsk began.

The hurricane of change, launched by the pope's trips to Poland, was rapidly approaching the main point of its destructive historical destiny - the USSR.

The Catholic Church became one of the main forces in the anti-Soviet struggle, and John Paul II became its spiritual leader and inspirer.

The capture and ruin of Jerusalem ended the first crusade of the western feudal lords to the East. The "Holy Sepulcher" was freed from the danger that had never threatened it from the side of the infidels. The official target was achieved with success. However, from the very beginning, for the feudal conquerors from Western Europe, the issue of the coffin played a secondary role. Their actions were of an aggressive conquest character. Religious banners and slogans served only as a cover for the completely worldly, worldly interests of knights and lords. The First Crusade enriched several tens of thousands of feudal lords from various countries of Western Europe. And he allowed the Catholic Church to somewhat expand its possessions and increase influence. Trading people got a certain benefit from this. But this result was achieved at a high price for the peoples of the West. Enormous sacrifices were made mainly by the masses of the people of France, Germany, Italy and other countries. The chivalry suffered heavy losses. The first crusade was organized by the papacy for the selfish purposes of the western feudal lords.

It was once believed that it was the Crusades that brought Europe to the Renaissance, but now this assessment seems to be overstated by most historians. What they undoubtedly gave the man of the Middle Ages was a broader view of the world and a better understanding of its diversity.

The Crusades are widely reflected in literature. An uncountable number of poetic works were written about the exploits of the crusaders in the Middle Ages, mostly in Old French. The Crusades also stimulated the development of historiography. Villardouin's conquest of Constantinople remains the most authoritative source for the study of the 4th Crusade. The best medieval work in the biography genre is considered by many to be the biography of King Louis IX, created by Jean de Joinville.

One of the most significant medieval chronicles was the Historia rerum in partibus transmarinis gestarum, a book written in Latin by Archbishop William of Tyre, which vividly and reliably recreates the history of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.

At first, the peasant poor also participated in the crusades, suffering severely from the oppression of the feudal lords, crop failures and famine. Dark, needy farmers, mostly serfs, listening to the sermons of churchmen, believed that all the disasters that they experience were sent down by God for some unknown sins. Priests and monks assured that if the Crusaders managed to win back the “Holy Sepulcher” from the Muslims, then the almighty God would take pity on the poor and ease their lot. The church promised the crusaders forgiveness of sins, and in case of death - a right place in paradise.

Already during the first crusade, tens of thousands of poor people died, and only a few of them made it to Jerusalem with strong knightly militias. When in 1099 the crusaders captured this city and other coastal cities of Syria and Palestine, all the wealth went only to large feudal lords and chivalry. Having seized the fertile lands and flourishing trading cities of the “Holy Land”, as the Europeans then called Palestine, the “Christ warriors” founded their states. The alien peasants received almost nothing, and therefore, in the future, fewer and fewer peasants participated in the crusades.

In the XII century. the knights had to equip themselves for war under the sign of the cross many times in order to hold the occupied territories.

However, all these crusades failed. When at the beginning of the XIII century. French, Italian and German knights girded themselves with a sword for the fourth time at the call of Pope Innocent III, they did not go against the Muslims, but attacked the Christian state of Byzantium. In April 1204, the knights captured its capital Constantinople and sacked it, showing what all the pompous phrases about saving the "Holy Sepulcher" were worth.

Speech of Urban II In 1095: “All those who go there, in the event of their death, will henceforth have the remission of sins. Let those people who are accustomed to fight against their co-religionists, Christians, oppose the infidels in battle, which should give in abundance trophies ... That land flows with milk and honey. May those who used to be robbers, who fought against brothers and fellow tribesmen, become warriors now. Whoever is woeful here will become rich there.”

Bibliographic index:

1.I. Lavretsky Vatican Religion, finance and politics. M., Gospolitizdat.

p.14, 1957

2.I.R. Grigulevich Papacy. Century XX.M., Publishing house of political

literature. p. 96, 1978

3. "Science and religion" №6 p.3, 2000

4. Encyclopedia for children. The World History. M., Avanta, page 35, 1996

5. Fences M.A. The Crusades. M. Ed. AN SSSR. str. 127, 1956.

6. Vasiliev A.A. Byzantium and the Crusaders: The Age of Comins and Angels. M.

page 57, 1923

7. Vasiliev A.A. History of the Byzantine Empire: from the beginning of the Cross

campaigns before the fall of Constantinople. S-Pb. Aletheia. page 12, 1998

8. Crusade back home. All Lords of Camelot: Vladimir Sverzhin -

Moscow, AST, p. 752, 2003

9. Crusade back home: Vladimir Sverzhin - Moscow, AST, p. 416, 2002

UDC 378

HISTORY OF RELIGIONS