When was the last ecumenical council

The issue was that the Emperor had appointed Photius as Patriarch of Constantinople, but subsequently, there were many confusing factors exacerbated by the distance and slowness of communication between Rome and Constantinople. A full account is given by Mgr. To summarise the status of Councils of the first millennium, the Eastern Church does not recognise Constantinople IV as ecumenical but they judge the first seven councils as representing the basic criteria upon which all subsequent councils should base their findings.

In the words of the Orthodox theologian George Recoveanu:. It cannot be maintained that the properties that made a council "ecumenical" vanished after [i. Jaeger, , p. All of the councils of the early period were called by reigning emperors and took place in the East with limited representation by Western prelates.

It is clear nevertheless that a decisive factor - although there were also other important factors besides union with Rome - in determining an ecumenical council was not the proportion of bishops present relative to the entire episcopate, but their organic union with their head and centre of unity, namely the Bishop of Rome:.

Their agreement, reached through the guidance of the Holy Spirit is judged to infallibly proclaim the Church's faith. I p, Given his enthusiastic presence as a Father at Vatican II, the eventual Cardinal Jaeger would no doubt subscribe to the additional later scholarship, for example:. There is a basic distinction recognised even in the early Councils, between doctrinal decrees and disciplinary ones In other words, after it has been decided which councils are to be regarded as ecumenical and which decrees are to be regarded as having been promulgated by them, the work remains of establishing the texts of the decrees.

Needless to say that Tanner enlarged in his book on the four factors enumerated, Earlier in his book, he noted that there is little difficulty in establishing which are the decrees of Trent, Vatican I and Vatican II as the decrees were published shortly after the Council closed.

The Great Schism of was indeed a tragedy. A striving for re-union with them is a major feature of the post-conciliar western Catholic Church. To continue with the historical narrative of the Councils, the second Christian millennium began with the split between the Eastern and Western Churches and witnessed attempts by the papacy to reform the church in a climate of serious interference from secular authorities.

A series of distinctly papal councils were called, five of which were held at the Lateran Palace in Rome. The list of those invited was extended beyond bishops to include the heads of monastic orders, theologians and even lay people. Although, other Councils intervened chronologically, it is convenient to describe the first four as a group. The first Lateran Council ratified the right of the Church as opposed to monarchs or nobles to invest bishops with the insignia of office.

Lateran II introduced compulsory celibacy for clerics from sub-deacon upwards and declared that the marriage of a cleric was not only unlawful but also invalid. This Council brought to an end the power struggle between the papacy and the German king, Barbarossa, laid down the voting procedure for the election of the pope and set agreed qualitative requirements for the ordination of bishops. These first three Lateran Councils were judged to be ecumenical; they were mainly disciplinary but they dealt with matters pertinent to the church as a whole.

The subject matter, however, was not as critical as the earlier Trinitarian and Christological councils concerned with essential doctrine. They are also seen as a prelude to the Fourth Lateran Council. Lateran IV, was forced to confront and condemn the Cathar, or Albigensian, heresy with its aversion to all things of the flesh, which by implication would include a rejection of Christ's incarnation, of marriage and of the resurrection of the flesh.

The council also produced decrees for the minimum annual reception of the sacraments of penance and communion. It required bishops of large dioceses to appoint teachers to help them fulfil their preaching responsibilities, and sought to end abuses involving relics. Unfortunately, the overall positive record of Lateran IV was tarnished by the inclusion of several anti-semitic canons.

The thirteenth Ecumenical Council was held in Lyons in with the chief subject being the conflict between the pope and German emperor, although some canons were agreed involving reforms of the clergy.

A second council of Lyons was opened in by Pope Gregory X the finally chosen candidate for election following a three year selection debate by the cardinals with invitations extended to abbots, cathedral chapters, representatives of orders of knights, kings, princes and the Eastern Emperor, Michael VIII Paleologous.

During the course of the council, an act of union which acknowledged the primacy of the popes was agreed with the Greek Church but this was ultimately rejected by the overwhelming majority of the Greek hierarchy. The next council, the fifteenth, took place in Vienne, South of Lyons, effectively at the prompting of the French king Pope Clement V was French and with only a selected number of bishops present. The principal item on the agenda was to secure the condemnation and suppression of the Knights Templar which had become a powerful and wealthy religious order whose assets had been targeted by Philip of France.

Vienne marked the beginning of a long 'exile' from Rome. This present narrative is about Councils rather than about the papacy and a brief account of Avignon is best left to another expert:.

The seventy-year exile was a disaster for the Church and came to be known as the Babylonian Captivity The exile ended partly due to the relentless interventions of St Catherine of Siena and eventually the last Frenchman to be elected pope - Gregory XI - returned to Rome in There ensued an unhappy period of contention for the papacy, with two and later three candidates claiming to be the true pope, and the obvious way forward was judged to be an Ecumenical Council which was duly convened in Constance in south Germany.

That calling of a council to resolve difficulties relating to the papacy was a high risk exercise as it could be taken to imply the supremacy of a council over a pope. This is exactly what happened at Constance with the passing two decrees; Sacrosancta which proclaimed the supremacy of the council over the pope, and Frequens calling for future councils to be held at regular intervals.

On positive note, the assembled cardinals elected Martin V as pope for the whole church in succession to the Roman Pontiff Gregory XII who had resigned in and in place of the two other rivals, thereby bringing the schism to an end.

The council itself closed in , but it had introduced a form of organisational thinking called conciliarism. Conciliarism contends that a Council is superior to a pope. However, in conformity with the decree Frequens Pope Martin V called a council at Pavia five years later but this was so poorly attended that it was quickly closed. A council is recognized as ecumenical once its works are approved by a pope.

The pope does not need to attend a council for it to be an ecumenical council. The earliest councils were held in the East, and the reigning popes usually sent legates to represent them. Later these popes approved the decrees of the councils, thereby verifying that they were ecumenical councils. Some councils, such as Ephesus, have been mainly doctrinal in their work; others, such as Vatican II, have been mainly pastoral.

Doctrinal definitions are capable of being promulgated infallibly; pastoral decisions, although binding, are not subject to infallibility. Decisions: Condemned Arianism, which denied the divinity of Christ elements of Arianism have reappeared in our own time ; defined the consubstantiality of the Father and the Son; fixed the date for Easter; began formulation of Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. Decisions: Recondemned Arianism; condemned Macedonianism, which denied the divinity of the Holy Spirit; completed the formulation of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed.

Decisions: Condemned Monothelitism, which held Christ had but one will, the divine this heresy arose as a reaction to the monophysite heresy ; censured Pope Honorius I for a letter in which he made an ambiguous but not infallible statement about the unity of operations in Christ an episode commonly used by anti-Catholic writers as an argument against papal infallibility, but for the real meaning, see Catholicism and Fundamentalism , pages Decisions: Condemned iconoclasm which was mainly confined to the East , a heresy that held that the use of images constituted idolatry; condemned Adoptionism, which held that Christ was not the Son of God by nature but only by adoption, thereby denying the hypostatic union.

Decisions: Recondemned Adoptionism; deposed Photius as patriarch of Constantinople, thereby ending the Photian Schism, but this did not completely remove disaffections between the West and the East in came the final break, when the Eastern Orthodox Churches broke away from unity with Rome.

It abolished the right claimed by lay princes, of investiture with ring and crosier to ecclesiastical benefices and dealt with church discipline and the recovery of the Holy Land from the infidels.

Its object was to put an end to the errors of Arnold of Brescia. There were bishops present. It condemned the Albigenses and Waldenses and issued numerous decrees for the reformation of morals. There were present the Patriarchs of Constantinople and Jerusalem, 71 archbishops, bishops, and abbots the Primate of the Maronites, and St.

It issued an enlarged creed symbol against the Albigenses Firmiter credimus , condemned the Trinitarian errors of Abbot Joachim, and published 70 important reformatory decrees. This is the most important council of the Middle Ages, and it marks the culminating point of ecclesiastical life and papal power. Louis, King of France, assisted.

It excommunicated and deposed Emperor Frederick II and directed a new crusade, under the command of St. Louis, against the Saracens and Mongols. It effected a temporary reunion of the Greek Church with Rome. The word filioque was added to the symbol of Constantinople and means were sought for recovering Palestine from the Turks. It also laid down the rules for papal elections.

The synod dealt with the crimes and errors imputed to the Knights Templars, the Fraticelli, the Beghards, and the Beguines, with projects of a new crusade, the reformation of the clergy, and the teaching of Oriental languages in the universities. It became legitimate only when Gregory XII had formally convoked it.