www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Eastern Catholics are Roman?

The Eastern Orthodox are Roman, too. For did not the Byzantines call themselves "Rhomaioi" rather "Hellenes"? And did not the Turks place all the Orthodox Christians in the Rhum Milet? Latins and Byzantines are all "Western Christians", from the perspective of the Syrians and the Assyrians.

Yes,but the capital was New Rome, not Old Rome, which reverted back to little more than a clump of huts.

Rome retained its prestige well into the seventh century. The last Emperor to visit the old capital was Constans II in 663. Old Rome retained its legal status as capital city right up to the expulsion of the Byzantines from Italy in the 9th century.

As to the population of Rome, it had indeed declined greatly from its mid-second century peak of about 2 million (my own estimate, which I am quite willing to defend), due to a combination of plague (the first under Marcus Aurelius in the 180s, the second under Justinian in 541-42, which saw a global population loss of about 50%), war, and de-urbanization. The Gothic Wars of Justinian were a major blow to Rome, because it saw both the cutting of the aqueducts as well as the destruction of the canals that drained the Pontine Marshes. Without fresh water, and with the return of swamps, the population was afflicted both by repeated bouts of typhus and malaria. But the population of Rome did not reach its nadir of about 25,000 until the 9th century, when it was reduced almost to the status of villages clinging to the slopes of the Palatine and Vatican hills.

As for Constantinople, its population never reached the levels achieved by old Rome. At its peak, in the age of Justinian, the city may have held as many as 500,000 people, but for most of its existence, probably did not exceed 250,000. This was by far the largest city in Christendom, but relative to the area enclosed by the Triple Walls, it was only a fraction of what it could have held. Indeed, Constantinople had huge tracts of pasture and forest within the walls, as well as lakes, reservoirs, cisterns and empty lots. This was part of the secret of its survival: livestock and people could be brought in from the hinterlands and sheltered behind the walls indefinitely, while the besieging armies outside slowly starved to death.

By the Paleologian period, the worm had turned: Old Rome was undergoing a renaissance as the Popes reclaimed land from the marshes, built new churches and housing, refurbished the aqueducts and roads. Rome by the 14th century had easily surpassed Constantinople in population, while New Rome in the aftermath of the Latin Sack, was becoming a ghost town. On the eve of the final siege in 1453, it's doubtful the population of Constantine's city exceeded more than 20,000 people.

It's silly, therefore, to make any sort of claims based on population.

You should ask for an elaboration. He/she has left open three possible explanations:
1. that Eastern Churches that aren't Roman are going to hell
2. that Eastern Churches that aren't Roman aren't really Eastern
or
3. that Eastern Churches that aren't Roman aren't really Churches

Dear Peter the Rock,

It's interesting that the Turks throughout the period of the Ottoman Empire referred to the Ecumenical Patriarch as the "Patriarch of the Romans."

The term "Roman" need not be offensive to Byzantine Christians. The great Melkite Archbishop Raya in his writings used the terms "Rhoum Orthodox" and "Rhoum Catholics."

Churches of the Byzantine tradition tended to oppose the Western name for them of "Greek" (unless one was an ethnic Greek) almost as much as the term "Roman."

You've put your finger on a perennial issue for many EC's - their proper name and title. The main reason Ukrainian Catholics hold to "Greek Catholic" is because the churches taken by force from them in 1946 were all registered under that title (first given them by the Austro-Hungarian Empire).

Mgr. Eugene Ivankiw of Chicago once wrote that he would prefer "Orthodox Catholic" to be our formal name.

I concur, of course . . .

Any ideas what we should be called? I mean not your personal epithets you hold in private . . .

Alex

Obviously it is vital to the preservation and robust practice of the Holy Faith that not one of the faithful should ever miss a single opportunity to get his panties in a bunch.

I like the remark an Oriental Orthodox posted recently elsewhere. Basically he said all of us - RCC, EO alike are westerners having received the gift of western civilization from the Greeks through the Romans.

But the answer is found in the Nicean Creed: We believe in One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. No mention there of Rome, Hellenes, Russians, Arabs, Egyptians, and so on.

Well, yes and no. I'm thinking of a certain (mostly Western) Catholic web-forum that I participate on, where "Roman Catholic" is pretty much always a shortened form of "Roman-Rite Catholic", hence for an Eastern Catholic to call himself/herself "Roman Catholic" is an admission of ... well, something I wouldn't want to admit.

But anyhow, I like your post. [Linked Image]

P.S. It might be interesting if more Orthodox start calling themselves "Roman". [Linked Image]

I think the answer is to get the Latin Catholics to stop calling themselves "Roman Catholic," unless they actually live in Vrbs Roma. Not only would this be more accurate, but it would de-couple the false conflation of "Latin" and "Roman" both for their benefit and that of the Christian East.

Yeah ... not likely to happen ... nonetheless, it's worth opening minds on the topic whenever possible.

The Greek Churches retain a lot more classical romanitas than the modern Latin church does, IMHO. "Roman-ness" very early on meant a whole lot more than just the Imperial City. Rome is the universality of classical civilization, the blessed empire that witnessed Christ in the flesh, and, lest we forget, was run by Greeks from a Greek city for longer than it was run by Latins from a Latin city.

Clearly the medievals knew this, as the Greeks and the Franks contended over who was more truly "Roman."

While the popular understanding of the term "Roman" complicates the matter, abstractly I believe it to be incredibly accurate of the Greek Churches. Just not exactly in the way most Latin Catholics would understand it.

I theorize (please don't jump all over me, it's just a theory) that the rediscovery of the original meaning of "Roman" is a key element for Eastern Christian evangelism. The Greek Rite is (again, IMHO) plainly more cosmopolitan and aesthetically universal than many of the other rites.

Similarly, the anhistorical word "Byzantine" is in the long-term probably evangelically limiting. I like the word "Greek," because it is one of the three languages written on the Cross and is also the language of the New Testament. Again, it is universal.

Therefore I also challenge Moscow to truly take up the mantle of "Third Rome" and all of its spiritual implications.

Further, there is nice Trinitarian aesthetic in thinking of the universal church in terms of its Greek, Latin, and Hebrew/Syriac branches, just like on the cross. Certainly it's not that simple, but there are nuggets of truth there.

There is of course the constant legitimate tension between the particular and the universal in Catholicism, and if one is significantly more interested in preserving his particularity, most of my arguments will probably read like hash. However, if one truly wants to "go out and make disciples of all nations," then I ask you to consider these points above.

In the interest of not spending two hours on this post, its logical flow my be imperfect, thanks for bearing with me.

Well put. It's a lot better than Roman Catholics being Constantinopolian, even though it was Constantinopole that ended the persecution of Christianity at the time, and made the Church feel whole again.

I suppose we could always tell our Latin confreres that WE are the true Rhomaioi, and they're just a bunch of unwashed Franks.

Love it!

Constantinople did not exist at the time the Edict of Toleration was issued in 312--in Milan. Moreover, the edict did not entirely end persecution, only in those areas where Constantine and Licinius had jurisdiction; i.e., the Britain, Gaul, Spain, Italy and the Balkans. It continued in the East, where Maximinus Daia had declared himself Augustus. Full toleration of Christianity did not become universal throughout the Empire until Constantine emerged as sole Emperor.

I thought I read that the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch is still commonly called 'Rhoum Orthodox' in Syria. I would be very interested to learn more about the historical use of these terms.

I don't know if that de-coupling will ever happen, but it would certainly be nice. For one thing, non-Roman Western-Rite Catholics (Ambrosian-Rite Catholics, Bragan-Rite Catholics, etc.) may be a very small minority in the Latin Church, but they should still be acknowledged ... or at least not excluded, as for example when people are always making statements about Roman-Rite Catholics instead of statements about Latin Catholics.