A Brief History of the Papacy

Protestant opinions of the papacy have taken many forms throughout the ages, ranging from confessional anathemas to the modern proponents of "Evangelicals and Catholics Together" (ECT). One of the reasons for the wide variety of views is often a lack of awareness of how the papacy has acquired its current form.

At the commencement of the papal narrative, as seen in the works of Clement, Hermas, and even Ignatius of Antioch, the church exhibited a concern to defend and establish a general sense of Episcopal authority and not the primacy of the Bishop of Rome. Since early in the third century, the word "pope" or "Papa" was used as a title of respect for any bishop and was not used especially of the Bishop of Rome until early in the sixth century.

Even though the early church exerted a good deal of effort to record and trace apostolic succession, they did not do so to defend a notion of the supremacy of the Roman bishop, but rather to demonstrate that the teachings of the Church had an undeniable apostolic pedigree. Irenaeus (c. 130-200) provides a classic example of these endeavors:

It is within the power of all, therefore, in every church, who may wish to see the truth, to contemplate clearly the tradition of the apostles manifested throughout the whole world; and we are in a position to reckon up those who were by the apostles instituted bishops in the churches and [to demonstrate] the succession of these men to our own times…. For it is a matter of necessity that every Church should agree with this Church (Rome) on account of its preeminent authority … inasmuch as the apostolical tradition has been preserved continuously by those [faithful men] who exist everywhere.

When tracing the increasing power and authority accorded to the Bishop of Rome, it initially seems to have arisen more from conflict with the political sphere than from within the church itself. Constantine himself had established some significant precedents that permitted the emperor a great deal of power over the church's affairs and by the late fourth century, the church, feeling the pressure of this arrangement, began to assert its power over the ecclesial sphere in much bolder ways. Ambrose brought much of this to a head when he excommunicated the emperor Theodosius in 390 arguing that, "The Emperor is within the Church, not above the Church." Elsewhere he stated, "Where matters of faith are concerned, it is the custom for bishops to judge Christian emperors, not for Emperors to judge bishops."

But as the Church dealt with one doctrinal controversy after another, a growing number began to look to Rome as source of stability, power, and authority. Innocent I (410-417), while not the first to make claims of Roman supremacy, nevertheless buttressed the idea in innovative language when he stated, "It has been decreed by a divine, not a human authority, that whatever action is taken in any of the provinces, however distant or remote, it should not be brought to a conclusion before it comes to the knowledge of this See, so that every decision may be affirmed by our authority."

It was left to Leo the Great (440-461), however, to solidify the doctrine of the supremacy of the Roman bishop.

Bishops indeed have a common dignity, but they have not uniform rank, inasmuch as even among the blessed apostles … there was a certain distinction of power. While the election of all of them was equal yet it was given to one [i.e., St. Peter] to take the lead of the rest…. [T]he care of the universal Church should converge toward Peter's one chair, and nothing anywhere should be separate from its head."

Indeed it was Leo who in many ways gave shape to the form that the papacy would take for many centuries. His leadership in both ecclesial and secular affairs encouraged many to look to him for guidance during the collapse of the Roman Empire to such a degree that in 452, "for the sake of Rome and the Roman name," Leo, not the emperor, rode out to Mantua and astonishingly managed to dissuade Attila the Hun from destroying Rome.

During the next century, Gregory the Great (590-604), the last Roman and first medieval pope, took the papacy to what many consider its greatest level. As the first pope to have been a monk, Gregory had a significantly pastoral focus as witnessed in his Pastoral Care which became the textbook of the medieval episcopate. Like Leo he personally intervened to save Rome, this time from the Lombards, and as a result was essentially ruler of Italy by 593.

Pope Leo III (795-816) cemented this link between the papacy and the political sphere when, on Christmas Day in 800, he took the unprecedented step of personally crowning Charlemagne king of the new Holy Roman Empire. As Brian Tierney has described:

But by one brilliant gesture Pope Leo established the precedent, adhered to throughout the Middle Ages, that papal coronation was essential to the making of an emperor, and thereby implanted the germ of the later idea that the empire itself was a gift to be bestowed by the papacy. [Thus,] from the eighth century onward the essentially political claim of the popes to be the rightful rulers of Rome came to be increasingly confused with an essentially theological claim that they were the overlords of all Christian kings by virtue of their supreme spiritual office."

Perhaps the most famous of all the medieval pontiffs and indeed of all papal history was Gregory VII (1073-1085). A very industrious pope, he magnified the papal claims in both word and deed. His Dictatus Papae established many of his beliefs and objectives at the outset of his reign. They included:

That the Roman Pontiff alone is rightly to be called universal
That he alone can use the Imperial insignia
That the Pope is the only one whose feet are to be kissed by all the princes
That his name alone is to recited in all the churches
That he may depose emperors
That no chapter or book may be regarded as canonical without his authority
That he himself may be judged by no one
That the Roman Church has never erred, nor ever, by the witness of the Scripture, shall err to all eternity

Gregory not only claimed these powers but put them into practice, as his infamous battle of wills with Henry IV of Germany showcased. In 1075 Gregory not only excommunicated the king for his defiance but proclaimed, "I deprive King Henry . . . of the government over the whole kingdom of Germany and Italy, and I release all Christian men of allegiance which they have sworn or may swear to him, and I forbid anyone to serve him as king."

Few deny that the papacy reached the zenith of its political power through the machinations of Innocent III (1198-1216). Elected pope when only 37, he wrote more than six thousand letters, and more than any other pope, consolidated and defined the ecclesiastical and political power of the Roman See. As he said of himself,

To me is said in the person of the prophet, "I have set thee over the nations and over kingdoms, to root up and to pull down, and to waste and to destroy, and to build and to plant (Jer. 1:10). To me is also said in the person of the Apostle, I will give to thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven…. You see then who is the servant set over the household, truly the vicar of Jesus Christ, successor of Peter, anointed of the Lord, a God of Pharaoh, set between God and man, lower than God, but higher than man, who judges all and is judged by no one.

He believed that he was given "not only the universal church, but also the whole world to govern," and acted accordingly.

Others such as Boniface VIII (1294-1303) tried to follow in the wake of Innocent III, but were not able to command the same levels of obedience and respect. In 1302, attempting to curtail the increasing deterioration of papal authority, Boniface's famous Unam Sanctum declared: "Therefore we declare, state, define and pronounce that it is altogether necessary to salvation for every human creature to be subject to the Roman pontiff." Nevertheless, the fragmenting of the papal empire was unavoidable and met with some permanency in the Great Schism.

The Great Schism (1378-1417) irreparably shattered the power of the papacy. When the College of Cardinals reneged on their initial papal selection and sought to establish another, the rival popes excommunicated each other, polarizing all of Europe into rival factions. When, in 1409, the Council of Pisa sought to resolve the problem by deposing both popes and electing another, all three were in contest, each excommunicating the other. The result was devastating for the claims of papal supremacy, power, and authority. As Eamon Duffy has observed, "The high papal prestige and unchallenged papalist theory of the era of Innocent III, however, was gone forever. There was now an important body of opinion in the Church which held that even in emergencies the Pope was answerable to the Church in council, and the Council of Constance solemnly decreed as much." In fact, papal power eroded to such a degree that the Reformation proceeded in many respects unchecked by its threats and anathemas.

After several centuries, Vatican I (1869-1870) attempted to undo this turn toward conciliar authority with its establishment of Papal infallibility under Pius IX (1846-1878). The council's proclamation, however, did not restore the claims made in the medieval papacy. Rather it exchanged its crumbling power in the political sphere for heightened claims in the ecclesial realm. After much heated debate the council proclaimed:

We teach and define that it is a dogma Divinely revealed that the Roman Pontiff, when he speaks ex cathedra, that is, when in discharge of the office of pastor and doctor of all Christians, by virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine regarding faith or morals to [be] held by the universal church, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, is possessed of that infallibility with which the divine Redeemer willed that His church should be endowed … and that therefore such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are of themselves and not from the consent of the Church irreformable" (emphasis added).

This formulation has continued to cause a great deal of controversy within the Roman Catholic ranks, however, and movements are still afoot to retract it.

Now, with the passing of John Paul II and the accession of Benedict XVI, much of the world is watching to see in what direction the See of Rome will lead the more than 900 million people who look to it for guidance and ultimately salvation.