The Russia Essays: Chapter Three

The (Not So) Great Schism

Chapter Three

The (Not So) Great Schism

If you’ve made it this far, or if you are just tuning in, you might be asking yourself, “What the fuck does all this early church history sh+t have to do with Russia or Vladimir Putin” and the answer is everything. We are standing at the ledge of one of the greatest catastrophes in all of Christendom. You see, long before MySpace, Twitter, Facebook, or Tiktok, people used to send each other letters, which would take a really long time to get there. Sometimes, those letters had significant consequences, just like social media does today. During the 11th century, some letters began to flow back and forth between Rome and Constantinople, which would fundamentally change the course of history. What were the issues over? Well, power, of course. What the f+ck else could a couple of celibate dudes who are the pentacle of their respective societies have to argue about before Dungeons and Dragons were invented?

Sure, there were a lot of issues surrounding other issues, but they all boil down to one significant disagreement. Allow me to recap: some major differences have been brewing between the East and the West over the last couple of hundred years. Both are really pissed about the important details of things like using leavened or unleavened bread during the Eucharist, original sin, purgatory, Hell, and whether we experience God cerebrally or as a mystery. Then there is this little issue of the Trinity, or at least that’s what it looks like on the surface. There is debate amongst the Orthodox and Roman Catholic Church on whether or not the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father or from the Father and the Son. Now, this is super nuanced, but eventually, the Church of Rome decides that they are just going to go back and make a minor little amendment to the Nicene Creed and add what has become known as the Filioque, which is a Latin term that means, “and from the Son.” Soon, this addition is being said throughout all of the Latin Churches.

If the objective of having a universal creed is to create a unity of beliefs, well, unilaterally chancing that creed might kinda make a few people mad. And, surprise, it did. 

I can not stress enough that the difference between saying that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father or the Father and the Son is not that big of a f+cking deal. I can say that because I am already considered a heretic, and so what the f+ck else are they going to do about it? There have been countless debates on this issue; you can find scriptures to support both arguments, you can find early church documents to support either side, and this is one of those issues that just really does not matter that much. It's just looking at the problems of theology through different prisms, and it really boils down to a preference of understanding. And you know who else knew that? Both Pope Leo IX of Rome and Patriarch Michael I Cerularius of Constantinople. 

But these issues didn’t stop them from sending each other some old-school tweets across their territories until they each excommunicated the other.

Admittedly, there are numerous nuanced issues surrounding these ex-communications, which include wars, disputes over land, and government interference. That all being said and true, the major rub boils down to the Filioque, or more accurately, the fact that the Roman Church just decided that they were allowed to place this little addendum in the creed of the Church without convening a council, as is the custom for such changes, but that one man, on his own authority, could make such a dramatic change and claim that it was universally binding to the whole of the Church.

To better understand this, allow me to rabbit trail every so slightly to explain how the Church of Rome on one side, and the whole of the Eastern Orthodox Church on the other, developed to view a Christian doctrine known as ecclesiology:

First, let's define terms. Ecclesiology is the governance of the Church within those churches governed by bishops. But the East and the West are developing very different ideologies around this.

In the West: the belief has become over time that the bishops govern the Church but do not hold equal power. The sole power of the Church rests on the Seat of Saint Peter, as he was the first of the Apostles and the first bishop of the universal church. As such, they believe that whoever sits on the Seat of Saint Peter holds the Keys to the Kingdom. Eventually, this belief evolves to such an extreme that they begin to believe that the Pope is the central authority of the Church and that he controls, well, everything that happens throughout all of Christendom. This belief led the way towards the Roman Church, believing it had the authority to mandate certain things, such as adding the Filioque to the Creed without having to check with anyone else. They are the original Rome and the holder of all authority that was once bestowed upon Saint Peter, after all. This is like the real-world equivalent of Bilbo Baggins asking, “After all, why not? Why shouldn’t I keep it.” Um, because you are going to destroy everything, genius! Well, all the Gandolfs in the East couldn’t convince Rome that absolute power is a really f+cking horrible idea, and so, as you can imagine, things go to sh+t.

In the East: the whole rest of the Church viewed the Pope as having what’s known as the primacy of honor because it was the first Apostolic appointment, but this didn’t come with any special powers. Instead, the Churches of the East viewed all bishops as equal and from the same line of apostolic succession linking themselves back to the seat of Saint Peter. If decisions are to be made, they must be done by way of council, and not unilateral decision making. This doesn’t mean that this system doesn’t have its own downfalls. It can be difficult to reach a consensus on issues when you don’t have a centralized figure to decide disputes, but this was the way of the East. Constantinople is the Second Rome, and so they’ve got equal power and authority, and no one is going to tell them what to do.

Now that you have a bit of an understanding of the differences in opinion concerning the governance of the Church, you can now see why the Patriarch of Constantinople got a bit miffed over the Patriarch of Rome exalting his power in such a manner. So here we are at both of them excommunicating each other. There is just one minor little issue: Pope Leo decided to go and die, and so his ex-communication didn’t work out so well. But these two fellas went and launched the great divide between the East and the West, and the whole rest of the world took a big deep breath and then didn’t give one flying f+ck about it.

Even though these disputes had real consequences within the Church as a whole, the average clergy and laity just continued on with their daily lives without much care or concern. It’s kind of hard to get religious folks riled up real quick without Fox News, and we are about a thousand years away from the television. Now, if this event had happened now, it would be trending on Twitter, and we would have hashtags flying in every which direction. But it didn’t; it occurred in a world with limited communication, and as a result, nothing much changed in many ways. Yes, spats happened over issues big and small. Rome began to take over some of the Eastern Churches and impose little things like the Filioque or mandated priestly celibacy. Conversely, the Eastern Churches did similar things, like taking over Latin churches and removing the Filioque, and letting priests get married and have sex.

For nearly 150 years after the big breakup, not too much is going that differently for people on the ground. Then things got a little f+cky when a little military campaign known as the Crusades started to have some unintended consequences outside of the original completely f+cking awful intended consequences.

The Crusades were initially designed to “liberate” the Holy Land from Islamic rule. A little-known fact about these Crusades was that whenever the Roman Church would make its way into places like Antioch and Jerusalem, they would find Christian churches there. This was, of course, no surprise to the Church of Rome because they knew good and goddamn well that the Eastern Orthodox Church had jurisdiction over these regions. Instead of saying, “all right y’all, we’ve come and liberated you or whatever, and so you’ve got your places back, yo.” They instead set up their own competing Patriarchates of the East, just under the rule of the West, and this has grown to be known as the Eastern Rite Church within the jurisdiction of the Pope. So the Crusades weren’t just becoming about destroying the competing religion of Islam, nor was it about helping the Jews, but it also became about destroying the Eastern Orthodox Church while they were at it. As far as Rome was concerned, this was a three-for-one deal.

This became most evident during the Fourth Crusade: Constantinople Drift.

The purpose of this particular Crusade was generally the same as the previous crusades, “Muslims = bad. Christians = Good.” This time, they were supposed to go to Egypt and liberate everyone there. And by liberate, I mean swords to the abdomen paid for by indulgences that would get you out of the pains of Purgatory for things like gutting another human made in the image of God by way of a sword to the abdomen.

That's the mission: get to Egypt. Instead, they went some 900 miles east to Constantinople and decided to sack the city instead. The assault on Constantinople was brutal and lasted for nearly three days. The Romans stole relics, gold, silver, and books. You know, just like Jesus. Now, don’t get me wrong. It’s not like the East has been particularly kind during all of this time, either. Some of this is considered payback for them having killed a considerable amount of Latins during the Massacre of the Latins, which was a genocide of Roman Catholics within Constantinople. So no one's hands are free of blood here. But, also, two wrongs don’t make a right.

For whatever it is worth, the sacking of Constantinople was not the plan, and Pope Innocent III was pretty pissed about it. The pilgrims destroyed much of the Church of the Holy Wisdom (Hagia Sophia), and the loss of life was horrific. The Crusaders killed most civilians, and their homes were looted and destroyed. Without question, this event in history destabilized the region and, albeit some 250 years after the Sacking, is considered the moment that set the stage for the complete fall of Constantinople.

From 1054 when the East and the West first broke up the division between the two churches grew and then, finally and tragically, disintegrated by the 1400s. 

The Ottoman Empire was making its way across the Byzantine Empire, and the Byzantines were absolutely losing. Eventually, Emperor John VIII decides to run to Rome, and he’s all, “hey, y’all really f+cking hate the Muslims, right? So, we’ve got a bit of a Muslim problem ourselves, so how about you whip together one of those crusades you really like?” To which the Pope responds with, “That sounds like a sh+t ton of fun… but, you guys don’t like me very much either, do you?”

Then basically, Pope Eugene IV gets into a big-time debate with Emperor John VIII and Patriarch Joseph II, but this time, it's not happening in letters but face to-face in Florence. Outside of the fact that there isn’t a communication barrier and having to wait on responses to travel across miles of land, they are just hashing it out in real time, and the stakes are higher this time. This isn’t just a little debate between two dudes who are mad about power; this is a Patriarch and Emperor on their knees, begging not to get sacked a second time. So they do the unthinkable and concede: they accept the Filioque, purgatory, and Papal Authority.

But it didn’t matter; it was too late.

On May 29th, 1453, both Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christians met inside Hagia Sophia along with the bishops, priests, generals, and even the Emperor. Bishops and priests from the East and the West ascended the altar and, together, concelebrated the Divine Liturgy. This would be the last time the East and the West would celebrate communion together. Legend says that people within the congregation watched as the Holy Spirit left the sanctuary, and then Constantinople fell. And that, kids, is why it’s called Istanbul and not Constantinople.

Now, the Church is split in two, and history has described it as many things, but divorce seems one of the most apt. Like many divorces, this all started with a silly issue like, should you roll the toothpaste tube or press up from the bottom? I don’t think they should make unilateral decisions like that without checking in on me! You know what, how dare she make the bread with leaven in it? And before you know it, nasty words are shared, and an attempt is made to reconcile a few times, and then someone says, “maybe we should have a baby.” That is always a bad idea in relationships, and it's a really, really f+cking bad idea when two empires are splitting. However, that didn’t stop the East and the West from doing just that. So they both embark on a journey to evangelize to the Kievan Rus’ people. But as the marriage between the East and the West continued to disintegrate, this little baby they made would become stuck between their two parents, constantly fighting until one day, they stood up and said, “you are both wrong!”

Congratulations, Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy, it's a beautiful baby boy; the Patriarchate of Moscow, and he’s ready to kick some ass as the new Apostolic authority of the Third Rome.