The pope (from Latin: "papa" or "father" from Greek πάπας , pápas , "papa", Papa in Italian) is the Bishop of Rome and as such, is leader of the worldwide Catholic Church (that is, both the Latin Rite and the Eastern Catholic Churches in full communion with the Roman Pontiff). The current office-holder is Pope Benedict XVI, who was elected in papal conclave on 19 April 2005.
The office of the pope is called the Papacy , and his ecclesiastical jurisdiction the "Holy See" ( Sancta Sedes in Latin) or "Apostolic See" (the latter on the basis that both St. Peter and St. Paul were martyred at Rome). The pope is also head of state of the Vatican City, a sovereign city-state entirely enclaved by Rome.
Early popes helped to spread Christianity and resolve doctrinal disputes. After the conversion of the rulers of the Roman Empire (the conversion of the populace was already advanced even before the Edict of Milan, 313), the Roman emperors became the popes' secular allies until, with the loss of the emperors' power in the west, Pope Stephen II was forced in the 8th century to appeal to the Franks for help, beginning a period of close interaction with the rulers of the west. For centuries, the forged Donation of Constantine also provided the basis for the papacy's claim of political supremacy over the entire former Western Roman Empire. In medieval times, popes played powerful roles in Western Europe, often struggling with monarchs for power over wide-ranging affairs of church and state, crowning emperors (Charlemagne was the first emperor crowned by a pope) and regulating disputes among secular rulers.
Gradually forced to give up secular power, popes now focus almost exclusively on spiritual matters. Over the centuries, popes' claims of spiritual authority have been ever more clearly expressed, culminating in the proclamation of the dogma of papal infallibility for rare occasions when the pope speaks ex cathedra (literally "from the chair (of Peter)") to issue a solemn definition of faith or morals. The first (after the proclamation) and so far the last such occasion was in 1950, with the definition of the dogma of the Assumption of Mary.
History
Main article: History of the PapacyCatholics recognize the Pope as a successor to Saint Peter, whom, according to the Bible, Jesus named as the "shepherd" and "rock" of the Church. Peter never bore the title of "Pope", which came into use much later, but Catholics recognize him as the first Pope, while official declarations of the Church only speak of the Popes as holding within the college of the Bishops a position analogous to that held by Peter within the college of the Apostles, of which the college of the Bishops, a distinct entity, is the successor.
The study of the New Testament offers no uncontested proof that Jesus established the papacy nor even that he established Peter as the first bishop of Rome. The Catholic Church does not say that Jesus personally appointed Peter bishop of Rome and in its dogmatic constitution Lumen Gentium makes a clear distinction between apostles and bishops, presenting the latter as the successors of the former, with the Pope as successor of Peter in that he is head of the bishops as Peter was head of the apostles. Some historians have argued that the notion that Peter was the first bishop of Rome and founded the Christian church there can be traced back no earlier than the third century. The writings of the Church Father Irenaeus who wrote around 180 AD indicate a belief that Peter "founded and organised" the Church at Rome. However, Irenaeus was not the first to write of Peter's presence in the early Roman Church. Clement of Rome wrote in a letter to the Corinthians, c. 96 about the awesome persecution of Christians in Rome as the “struggles in our time” and presented to the Corinthians its heroes, “first, the greatest and most just columns, the “good apostles” Peter and Paul. St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote shortly after Clement and in his letter from the city of Smyrna to the Romans he said he would not command them as Peter and Paul did. Given this and other evidence, many scholars conclude that Peter was indeed martyred in Rome under Nero.
Various Christian communities would have had a group of presbyter-bishops functioning as leaders of the local church. Eventually this evolved into a monarchical episcopacy in certain cities. Some historians would argue that it is possible that the monarchical episcopacy probably developed in other churches in the Christian world before it took shape in Rome. For example, it has been conjectured that Antioch may have been one of the first Christian communities to have adopted such a structure. Indeed, in Rome there were many who claimed to be the rightful bishop though again Irenaeus stressed the validity of one line of bishops from the time of St. Peter up to his contemporary Pope Victor I and listed them. Some writers claim that the emergence of a single bishop in Rome probably did not arise until the middle of the second century. In their view, Linus, Cletus and Clement were possibly prominent presbyter-bishops but not necessarily monarchical bishops. Though this would not necessarily affect their authority as Popes in terms of Catholic Theology.
The see of Rome was early accorded prominence in issues related to matters of the universal church.
Early Christianity ( c. 30 – 325)
It seems that at first the terms 'episcopos' and 'presbyter' were used interchangeably. The general consensus among scholars has been that, at the turn of the first and second centuries, local congregations were led by bishops and presbyters whose offices were overlapping or indistinguishable. There was probably no single 'monarchical' bishop in Rome before the middle of the second century ... and likely later."
In the early Christian era, Rome and a few other cities had claims on the leadership of worldwide ("Catholic") church. James the Just, known as "the brother of the Lord", served as head of the Jerusalem church, which is still honored as the "Mother Church" in Orthodox tradition. Alexandria had been a center of Jewish learning and became a center of Christian learning. Rome had a large congregation early in the apostolic period whom Paul the Apostle addressed in his Epistle to the Romans, and Paul himself was martyred there.
During the first century of the Christian Church ( ca. 30–130), the Roman capital became recognized as a Christian center of exceptional importance. Pope Clement I at the end of the 1st century wrote an epistle to the Church in Corinth, Greece, intervening in a major dispute, and apologising for not having taken action earlier. However there are only a few other references of that time to recognition of the authoritative primacy of the Roman See outside of Rome. In the Ravenna Document of 13 October 2007, theologians chosen by the Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox Churches stated: "41. Both sides agree ... that Rome, as the Church that 'presides in love' according to the phrase of St Ignatius of Antioch ( To the Romans , Prologue), occupied the first place in the taxis , and that the bishop of Rome was therefore the protos among the patriarchs. They disagree, however, on the interpretation of the historical evidence from this era regarding the prerogatives of the Bishop of Rome as protos , a matter that was already understood in different ways in the first millennium." In addition, in the last years of the first century AD the Church in Rome intervened in the affairs of the Christian Church in Corinth to help solve their internal disputes.
Later in the second century AD, there were further manifestations of Roman authority over other churches. In 189 AD, assertion of the primacy of the Church of Rome may be indicated in Irenaeus of Lyons's Against Heresies (3:3:2): "With , because of its superior origin, all the churches must agree... and it is in her that the faithful everywhere have maintained the apostolic tradition." And in 195 AD, Pope Victor I, in what is seen as an exercise of Roman authority over other churches, excommunicated the Quartodecimans for observing Easter on the 14th of Nisan, the date of the Jewish Passover, a tradition handed down by St. John the Evangelist (see Easter controversy). Celebration of Easter on a Sunday, as insisted on by the Pope, is the system that has prevailed (see computus).
Early popes helped spread Christianity and resolve doctrinal disputes.
Nicea to East-West Schism (325–1054)
During these seven centuries, the church unified by Emperor Constantine effectively split into a Greek East and a Latin West. The pope became independent of the Emperor in the East, and became a major force in politics in the West.
Imperial capitals: Rome and Constantinople
With the conversion of Roman Emperor Constantine to Christianity and the Council of Nicea, the Christian religion received imperial backing.
At the time of the Council (325), Rome was still seen as the capital of the empire, although the emperor rarely lived there. With the establishment of a new fixed capital in Constantinople (330), there arose a new centre, which soon grew in prominence, rivalling those in Rome, Alexandria and Antioch, which previously had been the most important centre
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