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Pope St. Gregory II
(Reigned 715-731).
Perhaps the greatest of the great popes who occupied the chair of Peter
during the eighth century, a Roman, son of Marcellus and Honesta. To his
contemporaries in the West he was known as Gregory Junior or the Younger; to
those in the East, who confounded him with Gregory I (author of Dialogues
) he
was Dialogus
. The year of his birth is not known, but while very young he
showed a desire for the Church and was placed by the pope in the schola
cantorum
. He was made a subdeacon and sacellarius (paymaster and almoner) of
the Roman Church by Sergius I. Then the care of the papal library was entrusted
to him, and he has the honour of being the first papal almoner or librarian
known to us by name. By the time he had become a deacon, he had given such signs
of character and superior intelligence that he was chosen by Pope Constantine to
accompany him when he had to go to Constantinople to discuss the canons of the
Quinisext Council with the truculent tyrant, Justinian II. The pope's trust was
not misplaced. The deacon Gregory by his admirable answers
, solved every
difficulty raised by the emperor. One of the first things which Gregory took in
hand when he became pope (19 May, 715) was to put in repair the walls of Rome.
Not for the last time had the Lombards, those old enemies of the Romans,
attacked their city and now a new foe had shown itself. The Mediterranean was
fast becoming a Saracen lake, and there was fear that the Moslems might make a
descent upon the Eternal City itself. Gregory had made good progress with his
work of repair, when various causes combined with a devastating flood of the
Tiber to prevent him from completing it. But throughout all his pontificate,
Gregory failed not to scan with anxiety the movements of the Saracens, and he is
credited with having sent tokens of encouragement to the Frankish leaders who
were stemming their advance in Gaul.
In the first year of his pontificate, he received a letter from John,
Patriarch of Constantinople. Addressed to the sacred head of the Church
, it
was really an apology for his having shown himself subservient to Philippieus
Bardanes in the matter of Monothelism. Gregory also received several
distinguished pilgrims during his pontificate. Among the many Anglo-Saxon
pilgrims who came to Rome during his reign, the most famous were Abbot Ceolfrid
and King Ina, of whom the one took to the pope the famous Codex Amiatinus, and
the other founded the Schola Anglorum
. Duke Theodo I of Bavaria also came to
Rome to pray, and no doubt to obtain from the pope more preachers of the Hospel
for his country. Among those whom Gregory dispatched for the conversion of
Bavaria was St. Corbibian, who became one of its apostles. But the great apostle
of Bavaria, as of Germany generally, was St. Winfrid, or Boniface, as he was
afterwards called. Anxious to preach to the heathens, he went to Rome, and God
moved the pontiff of the glorious See
to grant his wishes. He sent Boniface
to the wild nations of Germany
, bidding him, by the irrefragable authority of
Blessed Peter, go forth and preach the truths of both Testaments
. Gregory
watched and encouraged the work of Boniface unremittingly. In 722 he consecrated
him bishop and interested the famous Charles Mantel in his labours. Gregory was
a great supporter of the monastic order. On the death of his mother, he
converted his parental mansion into a monastery, and founded or restored many
others. Among those he helped to restore was the famous Abbey of Monte Cassino.
During the early portion of his pontificate, Gregory was on good terms with the
Lombards. Their king drew up his laws under his influence; but their dukes, with
or without the consent of their king, embroiled the peninsula by seizing
portions of the possessions of the Greek empire. The Greek exarch at Ravenna was
quite unable to stem the advance of the Lombards, so that Gregory appealed for
help to Charles Martel and the Franks. Charles could not or would not come, but
greater commotion in Italy than could have been caused by his advent was aroused
by the publication there of the decrees of the Greek emperor, Leo III, known as
the Isaurian or the Iconoclast (727). The Italians had been previously enraged
by his attempt to levy an extraordinary tax on them. Despite the attempts of
Greek officials to take his life, Gregory opposed both the emperor's illegal
taxes and his unwarrantable interference in the domain of ecclesiastical
authority. Now was the opportunity of the Lombards. When the exarch attempted to
compel the pope to obey the imperial decrees, they became his defenders. Nearly
all the Byzantine districts of Italy also turned against the emperor, and but
for the pope would have elected another emperor to oppose him. When all seemed
lost to the Byzantine cause in Italy, Eutychius, the last of the exarchs,
contrived to wean the Lombards from the pope and to make them turn against him.
The exarch was to help Liutprand, the Lombard king, to bring the almost
independent Lombard Dukes of Benevento and Spoleto into complete subjection of
his authority, and Liutprand was to assist him in bringing the pope to his knees.
But the personal influence of Gregory over Liutprand was able to dissolve this
unnatural alliance, and he repaid the exarch's treatment of him by furnishing
him with troops to put down a rebellion against the imperial authority.
In connection with Gregory's struggle against the Iconoclast emperor and his
Italian representatives, certain doubtful points have been hitherto passed over.
For instance, it is certain that about the year 730 Ravenna fell for a brief
space into the hands of the Lombards, and that by the exertions of the pope and
the Venetians, it was recovered and continued to remain for a year or two longer
a portion of the Byzantine empire. It is not, however, certain whether it was
Gregory II or Gregory III who rendered this important service to Leo III.
Probably, however, it was done by Gregory II about the year 727; though perhaps
it is not quite equally probable that the two famous condemnatory letters which
Gregory II is said to have sent to Leo III are genuine. If they are authentic,
then it is certain not only that Ravenna was captured by the Lombards about 727,
but that the independent temporal authority of the popes which in fact began
with Gregory II was consciously felt by him. But when later Greek historians
asserted that Gregory separated Rome and Italy and the whole West from
political and ecclesiastical subjection
to the Byzantine Empire, they are
simply exaggerating his opposition to the emperor's illegal taxes, and
Iconoclastic edicts. Despite all provocation, Gregory never for a moment swerved
in his loyalty to the Iconoclast emperor; but, as in duty bound, he opposed his
efforts to destroy an article of Catholic Faith. By his letters sent in all
directions he warned the people against the teachings of the emperor, and in a
council at Rome (727) proclaimed the true doctrine on the question of the
worship of images. To the best of his power, also, he supported St. Germainus,
the Patriarch of Constantinople, in the resistance he was making to the gospel
of Leo
, and threatened to depose Anastasius, who had replaced the saint in the
See of Constantinople, if he did not renounce his heresy. Gregory recognized
both the Patriarch of Forum Julii (Cividale) and the Patriarch of Grado as joint
heirs of the original metropolitan See of Aquileia, and for a time caused these
rival prelates to live in peace.
Gregory died in February, and was buried in St. Peter's (11 Feb., 731). He is honoured as a saint in the Roman and other martyrologies.
Liber Pontificalis (Paris, 1886), I, 396 sqq., ed. DUCHESNE; PAUL THE DEACON, in Mon. GERM. Hist.; Scripores Longob.; BEDE; THEOPHANES; JOHN THE DEACON OF VENICE. etc.; Letters of ST. BONIFACE in Mon. Germ. Hist.; Epp., III; HEFELE, History of the Councils (Edinburgh, 1896), V, tr,; HODGKIN, Italy and her Invaders (Oxford, 1896), VI; BURY, History of the Later Roman Empire; HIRSCH, Il ducato di Benevento, Italian tr.; MALFATTI, Imperatori e Papi; BRUNENGO, I primi Papi Ree Pultimo dei Re Longobardi; DUCHESNE, The Beginnings of the Temporal Sovereignty of the Popes, tr.; PARGOIRE, L'eglise Byzantine, 527-847; MARIN, Les Moines de Constantinople; MANN, Lives of the Popes in the Early Middle Ages (London, 1902), I, Pt. II.
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