Rome, love and peace from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." Here is the substance of his letter:
"In reading the letter you have sent to our Humility, we have approved of the zeal of your Holiness for our mutual union in the faith. But I will not conceal from you what has greatly embarrassed me in your letter. It amazes me, in fact, that you call the Church of Rome one and universal, since it is well established that the Church is divided into particular churches, governed by pastors, under one sole, supreme pastor, Jesus Christ. And what I do not further understand is, that you call the Church of Rome the mother of the other churches. The mother of the churches is that of Jerusalem, which surpasses them all in antiquity and dignity. I cannot, therefore, plead guilty to the accusation, which your Holiness makes against me, that I divide the single and seamless coat of Christ. When, on one side, we behold our own Church carefully preserving the ancient doctrine of the Procession of the Holy Ghost, and, on the other, your Church fallen into errour on this point, we may well ask you which of them has rent the coat of Christ?
"I am not the less disposed, for all that, to second the kind intentions of the Emperor for good."
The Emperor also answered the Pope, who replied in two letters from which we will give some extracts. He writes to the Patriarch: "The primacy of the Roman see has been established, not by man, but by God, or rather, by the Man-God; this can be proved by numberless evangelic and apostolic evidences, confirmed by canonical constitutions which attest that the most holy Roman Church was consecrated in Saint Peter, the prince of the Apostles, to be the mistress and mother of all the others." Innocent cites many texts from Scripture, interpreting them in his own way.[1] He wonders
- ↑ We have already determined their true sense in the first chapter of this work.
