Pope Francis Bound for Having Historic Meeting 1,000 Years in the Making

[Judi Lynn]

Source: ABC News

Pope Francis Bound for Having Historic Meeting 1,000 Years in the Making

By Meghan Keneally
, Kirit Radia
and PATRICK REEVELL
·Feb 12, 2016, 12:05 PM ET

A sombrero-wearing Pope Francis appeared to be excited about his trip to Mexico today as he boarded the plane transporting him, but the most historic part of his trip comes before he lands south of the border.

The head of the Catholic Church will meet today with the head of the Russian Orthodox Church in Havana before heading to Mexico for a six-day trip. The meeting will bring the heads of the Russian and Catholic churches together for the first time since Christianity split.

Patriarch Kirill has already landed in Cuba.



Lengthy Lead Up to the Meeting

The meeting is about 1,000 years in the making as the two split back in the 11th century.

Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/International/pope-francis-historic-meeting-1000-years-making/story?id=36891449

[frazzled]

1. Well, it's about time

Heh, I actually know next to nothing about the split of the Roman and Orthodox churches. But it seems like a thousand years is a bit too long to hold a grudge about anything.

I hope the Pope and the Patriarch work things out!

[Odin2005]

3. The East-West schism stems from disagreement over who rules the church.

Catholics believe the Pope is superior to everyone else in the church while the Orthodox consider the Pope to be just the first among equals among the 5 original patriarchs (the other 4 being the patriarchs of Constantinople, Jerusalem, Antioch, and Alexandria)

[dixiegrrrrl]

4. Thank you for that info...

I had no idea what it was all about.

[Odin2005]

5. No problem!

The early history of Chistianity and Christian theology is a side interest of mine.

And it is important to remember the existence of the Monophysites (such as the Copts in Egypt) and Nestorian Christians (such as some Assyrian Christians) in the Middle East, who broke away from the Orthodox-Catholics around AD 500 and were heavily persecuted by the imperial government in Constantinople. This is why when the Arabs came the Levant and Egypt fell to them so quickly, those areas were mostly Monophysite and folks decided being ruled by the Arabs was better than Roman persecution.

These sects were the result of 2 centuries of arguing about the exact nature of Christ. To Christian coverts in the Roman Empire the appealing thing about Christianity was that it emphasized God becoming a man and suffering and dying as a man to redeem the world, and so there were a lot of arguments and angry nit-picking that one group was over-emphasizing the human nature of Jesus or the divine nature of Jesus in their theologies. The Church tried to end the bickering by a ham-fisted compromise and this offended many people in the Empire's Near-Eastern provinces, who became Monophysites and Nestorians.

[frazzled]

6. Thank you for the explanation ...

but it boggles the mind that this disagreement could engender 1,000 years of refusal to speak to one another.

[Odin2005]

7. A lot of it comes not from the schism itself, but from the 4th Crusade.

The crusaders, rather than going to Jerusalem, were bribed by the Venetians to seize Constantinope, and the leaders of the short-lived "Latin Empire" tried to impose Catholicism. The Pope was genuinely horrified by the whole disgusting event and excommunicated everyone involved but the PR damage was done, afterwards Orthodox people despised the "Latins".

[Judi Lynn]

2. The Latest: Pope arrives in Cuba for historic meeting

The Latest: Pope arrives in Cuba for historic meeting
Feb 12, 2:01 PM EST

HAVANA (AP) -- The Latest on Pope Francis's historic meeting in Cuba with Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill and his subsequent trip to Mexico (all times local):

2:00 p.m.

Pope Francis has landed in Cuba for the first-ever papal meeting with the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, a historic development in the 1,000-year schism within Christianity.

The pope's jetliner set down at Havana's Jose Marti International Airport, where he's scheduled to have a two-hour meeting with Patriarch Kirill before heading off on a five-day visit to Mexico.

While the meeting Havana has been hailed in some Catholic circles as an important ecumenical breakthrough, some have complained that Francis has also come under criticism for essentially allowing himself to be used by a by a Russia eager to assert itself among other Orthodox Christians and on the world stage at a moment when the country is increasingly isolated from the West.

More:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/LT_POPE_PATRIARCH_THE_LATEST?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2016-02-12-14-01-37