UNION
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UNION
Galicia, Armenia, and elsewhere, may perhaps amount
to some three milhons and a half, though trustworthy
statistics are difficult to obtain. As in the case of the
Nestorians, by the side of each of these sections of
Monophysites is a corresponding body of Uniats who,
once Monophysites, have at one date or another in the
past renounced their heresy and been reconciled to the
Catholic Church, which has cordially sanctioned the
retention of their native rites. Of these the Melchites,
Coptic and Syrian included, amount to about 35,000,
the Uniats of St. Thomas to about 90,000, and the
Uniat Armenians to about 60,000 or 70,000. Of
Abyssinian Uniats there are practically none.
t>. Pholinnism. — The next great schism which divided Christendom was that which is known as the Photian schism, and led to the separatist existence of that vast body of Christians which has come to be called "the orthodox Church". We shall employ both these names as names wliirh have become current desig- nations, though without accepting the impUcations that attach to them. Certainly Photianism. is a name which well expresses the character of a separa- tion motived, at all events in the first instance, not by any doctrinal reasons, but by one man's endeavour to realize his personal ambitions, that one man being Photius, the usurping Patriarch of Constantinople in 8.57. It is true that the schism initiated by Photius did not long survive his death, but he was a man as rediarkable for his learning and ability as for his unscrupulousness, and so was able to create — doubt- less out of pre-existing materials — and to equip with an effective controversial armoury an ecclesiastical party animated by his own separatist ambitions and anti-Latin animosities.
The history and vicissitudes of this most lamentable of all schisms have been sufficiently told in other articles (Ignatius op Con.st.\ntinople, Saint; Photius of Constantinople ; M ich ael C^rdlaruts ; Greek Church), but we must note here how entirely unprovoked it wa.s, both in the time of Photius and in that of Michael Cxrularius, by any harsh or incon- siderate action on the part of the popes. When Barda.s, the uncle of the Emperor Michael III, presented himself to the Patriarch Ignatius to receive Communion while living in incest with his daughter- in-law — when the empress mother and her daughter were brought to the patriarch against their will to receive the veil of religion — what else could a con- scientious prelate do save refuse what was so improp- erly .sought? Yet it was just for this that the Patri- arch Ignatius, on refusing to resign his see, was banished to the island of Terebinthus, and under just these circumstances that Photius mounted the still occupied patriarchal throne and sought confirmation of his appointment from Pope St. Nicholas I. The letter which he addressed to St. Nicholas ("Opera", in P. G., CII, .5JS6-B18) misrepresented the facts, and besides bore on its face such signs of unreality as could not but arouse the suspicions of the pope, who, when at last he found out what the true facts were, did the only thing that a conscientious pope could do, pronounced the election of Photius null and void, and laid Photius under excommunication. Later, when Photius saw that Rome could not be induced to sanction his u.surpalion, he threw off his disguise and, professing to have discovered that certain usages of the West were scandalous and even heretical, ad- dre.ssed an encyclical to the other Oriental prelates inviting them to meet in a general council at Con- stantinople and pass judgment on St. Nicholas.
Though the pope's real offence, in the eyes of Photius, was that, as successor of St. Peter, he exer- cised an authority which stood in the way of Byzan- tine ambitions, the schismatic felt that, if he would recommend his cause to the religious world, he must provide it with a dogmatic basis, and accordingly he formulated the following charges, only one of which
raised an issue which had even the appearance of
being dogmatic. The Westerns, he said, fast on
Saturdays, use laclicinia during the first week in
Lent, impose the yoke of ceUbacy on their clergy,
reconfirm those who liave been confirmed by simple
priests, and have added the "Filioque" to the creed.
To these five points he added four others, in a sub-
sequent letter to the Bulgarians, namely, that they
sacrifice a lamb along with the Holy Eucharist on
Easter Sunday, obhge their priests to shave their
beards, make their chrism of running water, and
consecrate deacons pt-r sallurn to the episcopate.
Nothing could be more trivial than these charges on
the ground of which this man was prepared to break
up the unity of Christendom; but for the time the
schism thus caused was only transitory. Photius
himself was quickly displaced by a fresh court intrigue,
and though, on the death of Ignatius, he attained to
a more legitimate po.s.scssion of the patriarchate, he
died in 8(17, after which there was a reconciliation
with the Holy See which lasted for the next two cen-
turies.
Then came the Patriarch Michael Caerularius, who in 10.53 — that is at a time when not only was there no tension between the emperor and the pope, but the Norman invasion of Sicily just then occurring made it peculiarly desirable that they should unite to oppose the common enemy — caused letters to be WTitten and brought to the notice of the pope, in which he renewed the old condemnation of the Latins for fasting on Saturdays, consecrating the Holy Eucharist in unleavened bread, and requiring clerical celibacy. Also, at Constantinople, he invaded the churches built for the use of the Westerns, where the Latin Rite was used, and ignominiously handled the Blessed Sacrament there reserved, on the plea that, being consecrated in unleavened bread, it was not truly consecrated. Again there was a saint on the throne of St. Peter, and St. Leo IX in a temperate letter contrasted the violence offered by Michael to the Latin Church at Con.stantinople with the pope's cordial approval of the many monasteries of the Greek Rite in Rome and its neighbourhood. Further, at the request of the Emperor Constantine Mono- machus, who by no means shared the patriarch's bitter spirit, St. Leo sent two legates to Constanti- nople to arrange matters. There was nothing, however, to be done, as the emperor was weak, and the patriarch was allowed to carry all before him. So the legates returned home, having first left on the altar of St. Sophia a letter in the pope's name by which Michael Cierularius and one or two of his agents were deposed and excommunicated. Of course the excommunication touched only the persons named in the document, and not the whole Byzantine Church; indeed the excommunication of a whole Church is an unknown and unintelligible process. If the whole Church or patriarchate from that time fell away from unity, and has remained out of it ever since, it wa.s because, and in so far as, its members of their own initiative adhered to Michael and his successors in breaking off relations with Rome.
This fact, however, must remind us of the mistake we should make were we to regard the vagaries of a patriarch like Michael Ca>rulariu8 as the adequate cause of so persistent and far-reaching an effect. L^ndoubtedly, he had with him in his secession, if not the whole population of his patriarchate, at all events a party strong and influential enough to compel the submission of the rest. This party was the one to which we have referred as formed and consolidated by Photius. In a less pronounced form it is traceable back to the secular struggle between the Greek and Latin races for universal dominion ; and since the time of Photius its antipathies had been further stimulated by the growth of Western kingdoms hostile to the empire and by the amicable relations in which their
