Feast Day: January 26th
337 A.D., about two decades after Constantine had allowed Christians to practice their faith throughout the Roman Empire, and a bit more than a decade after the First Council of Nicaea had articulated our belief in the Son’s consubstantiality with the Father (and the corresponding Nicaean creed), that great and complicated emperor, baptized at the very end of his life, died. The giant empire, united under him after so many centuries of being split between various emperors, rent by civil wars, and wracked by persecutions, had before it the possibility of unifying under the banner of Christ. Sadly, the coming decades would be more difficult than might have been hoped.
By 340, two of Constantine’s sons were at war with each other with Constantine II killed as he attempted to wrest Rome from Constans. Constans himself would be assassinated a decade later by the usurper Magnentius, leaving the third son, Constantius II, to wage his own civil war against that upstart, eventually gaining the entire empire for himself. He, as history had it, was Christian, but an Arian, and so it is he who exiles Athanasius for his staunch defense of Orthodox, Nicaean, Christianity, and around 355 demands Pope Liberius to appear before him and agree to a semi-arian statement (and a repudiation of his friendship with Athanasius). Theodoret records this epic conversation, the emperor of the world confronting the successor of Peter.
The Emperor: “One question only requires to be made. I wish you to enter into communion with the churches, and to send you back to Rome. Consent therefore to peace, and sign your assent, and then you shall return to Rome.”
Liberius: “I have already taken leave of the brethren who are in that city. The decrees of the Church are of greater importance than a residence in Rome.”
The Emperor: “You have three days to consider whether you will sign the document and return to Rome; if not, you must choose the place of your banishment.”
Liberius: “Neither three days nor three months can change my sentiments. Send me wherever you please.”
As history would have it, even this dramatic show down, and heroic position of Pope Liberius is clouded by the uncertainties of the following years. Constantius exiled the pope and set up his own puppet anti-pope, Felix II, but later he allowed Liberius to return – some say because the pope had finally capitulated to some of his demands – trying to have co-popes with Liberus and Felix both leading the Church… In any case, by 361, things managed to get decisively worse when Julian became the new emperor. He was the one who attempted to un-baptize himself by plunging himself in a vat of bull’s blood, and he did resume animal sacrifices, revived some of the persecutions of earlier centuries, and (begrudgingly recognizing something that Christians had done quite well) commands the pagan priests to increase their acts of charity. It is worth remembering his words here!:
“These impious Galileans not only feed their own poor, but ours also; welcoming them into their agapē, they attract them, as children are attracted, with cakes. Whilst the pagan priests neglect the poor, the hated Galileans devote themselves to works of charity; and by a display of false compassion have established and given effect to their pernicious errors. See their love-feasts and their tables spread for the indigent. Such practice is common among them, and causes a contempt for our gods.” – Julian, Letter to Arsacius, High Priest of Galatia (Letter 22)
But the turmoil outside of the Church was sadly just as evident within its walls (quite literally). In 366, Damasus I and Ursinus were both elected Pope by their respective cohorts of priests and people in Rome (rifts that trace back to the conflict between Felix I and Liberius, and between the Arian and Nicaean disagreements). The gangs around them took up weapons and attacked each other, at one point 137 people were killed inside of the newly built Basilica of Sicininus (now St. Mary Major). Our records of all these events are hopelessly muddled and biased by the acrimony on each side. Those that leaned Arian, of course, side with Ursinus and defame Damasus, and vice versa. That said, the horrible scene stays before our eyes of hatred and bloodshed filling a place dedicated to the worship of Christ. Here is what one young man, baptized by Pope Liberius, and then a protégé of Pope Damasus, writes to his friend
“I was at that time in Rome, and I saw the bloodshed and the disturbance; the factions of Ursinus and Damasus were divided by mutual strife, and the churches were polluted with blood.” – St. Jerome, Letter to Heliodorus (Letter 15):
– Fr. Dominic will bring us back to St. Jerome next week. Crazy twist: the unification of the Christian world, and the conversion of the pagan world, would happen in large part because of Jerome’s efforts. And his life’s work depended on the humility and sanctity of one amazing woman, St. Paula, who we will finally encounter next week!