History of the Papacy

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  All About Popes (Christian Religious Leaders)

  • (Author)
  • 2014(Publication Date)
  • University Publications

    (Publisher)

  ________________________ WORLD TECHNOLOGIES ________________________ Chapter- 2 History of the Papacy Popes trace their episcopal lineage back to Saint Peter. The History of the Papacy spans for almost 2,000 years from the time of Saint Peter to present day. The Papacy is the office occupied by the Pope, as the spiritual head of the Catholic Church, the bishop of Rome and (since 1929) as the Head of State of the ________________________ WORLD TECHNOLOGIES ________________________ Vatican City. The list of popes includes 265 men, in 267 terms, plus several claimants currently regarded as antipopes. The History of the Papacy's temporal role can be divided into three major time periods: the early church, the Middle Ages, and the modern era. During the Early Church, the Pope had no temporal power and served only as the bishop of the Christian church in Rome. Even in that spiritual role, it was contested whether the patriarchs of the other churches were subordinate to the bishop of Rome. The second major time period runs roughly from the 4th Century until the Kingdom of Italy seized Church lands in 1870. The Middle Ages saw the papacy reach its height of power, consolidating and unifying the churches of Western Europe, and expanding its territories, known as the Papal States. However, it also witnessed the Great Schism, which permanently divided the Church, East and West, Byzantine and Catholic, and then again, the Protestant Reformation, which directly challenged the authority of the papacy. At the end of this time period, the Papal states were taken away from the Vatican. The Modern Era begins with the decline of the Pope's temporal power in the 19th century to the present day. During this period, the Papacy has focused on its role as the spiritual head of the Catholic Church.

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  A History of the Great Schism

  • Mandell Creighton(Author)
  • 2018(Publication Date)
  • Ozymandias Press

    (Publisher)

  THE RISE OF THE PAPAL POWER.

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  THE CHANGE THAT PASSED OVER Europe in the sixteenth century was due to the development of new conceptions, political, intellectual, and religious, which found their expression in a period of bitter conflict. The state-system of Europe was remodeled, and the mediaeval ideal of a united Christendom was replaced by a struggle of warring nationalities. The Papal monarchy over the Western Church was attacked and overthrown. The traditional basis of the ecclesiastical system was impugned, and in some countries rejected, in favor of the authority of Scripture. The study of classical antiquity engendered new forms of thought, and created an enquiring criticism which gave a new tendency to the mental activity of Europe.

  The processes by which these results were achieved were not isolated, but influenced one another. However important each may be in itself, it cannot be profitably studied when considered apart from the reaction of the rest. The object of the following pages is to trace, within a limited sphere, the working of the causes which brought about the change from mediaeval to modern times. The History of the Papacy affords the widest field for such an investigation; for the Papacy was a chief element in the political system, and was supreme over the ecclesiastical system of the Middle Ages, while round it gathered much that was most characteristic of the changing intellectual life of Europe.

  The period which we propose to traverse may be defined as that of the decline of the Papal monarchy over Western Europe. The abasement of the Papacy by the Great Schism of the fourteenth century intensified Papal aggression and wrought havoc in the organization of the Church. The schemes of reform which consequently agitated Christendom showed a widespread desire for change. Some of these movements were held to pass beyond reform to revolution, and were consequently suppressed, while the plans of the conservative reformers failed through national jealousies and want of statesmanship. After the failure of these attempts at organic reform the chief European kingdoms redressed their most crying grievances by separate legislation or by agreements with the Pope. A reaction, that was skillfully used, restored the Papacy to much of its old supremacy; but, instead of profiting by the lessons of adversity, the Papacy only sought to minimize or abolish the concessions which had been wrung from its weakness. Impelled by the growing feeling of nationality, it sought a firm basis for itself as a political power in Italy, whereby it regained prestige in Europe, and identified itself with the Italian mind at its most fertile epoch. But by its close identification with Italy, the Papacy, both in national and intellectual matters, drifted apart from Germany; and the result was a Teutonic and national rebellion against the Papal monarchy — a rebellion so far successful that it divided Europe into two opposing camps, and brought to light differences of national character, of political aim and intellectual ideas, which had grown up unnoticed till conflict forced them into conscious expression.

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  Luther's Revolution

  The Political Dimensions of Martin Luther's Universal Priesthood

  • Montover(Author)
  • 2011(Publication Date)
  • Pickwick Publications

    (Publisher)

  4

  The Social and Political Context of Papal Claims of Temporal Authority

  According to the great medievalist, Walter Ullmann, the social ordering of Western Christian society in the medieval period constituted the cosmology upon which society was constructed.1 The cosmos was understood as a manifestation of the Body of Christ, and, as the sole vicar of Christ, the pope could claim the right of principal authority. Temporal authority—including the authority of emperors—was understood as subordinate to papal power, especially by those who espoused the principles of papal authority. Though the conception of papal authority in the temporal realm was questioned at times, as we shall demonstrate below, the subjugation of the temporal authorities to the spiritual authorities developed gradually as the West moved from being a “neutral world” which contained two separate institutions, the church and the state to a “thoroughly Christianized world” which was, by the ninth century, encompassed by the concept of the ecclesia. 2 Thus, if the authority of the pope were to be challenged, the challenge would also extend to the very structures of temporal and secular power as it was understood in the medieval period.

  By the ninth century there were no longer two separate institutions, the church and the temporal authority. Rather there existed two powers, temporal and spiritual, within the Body of Christ.3 The natural world was incorporated into the spiritual world, and the result was the further development of the concept of papal plenitudo potestatis , or the plenitude of power possessed by the pope.4

  William McCready argues that it was the Investiture Controversy that finally solidified this incorporation of the natural world into the supernatural world and justified the pope’s claim that only the “functionally qualified”5 were justified in claiming to possess authority to rule. As a result of the Investiture Controversy, it was agreed that spiritual issues must be handled by spiritual authorities. The civil powers were reduced to their secular essence, the worldly sword.6

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