Roman Catholicism, wrote Fyodor Dostoevsky “has proclaimed a new Christ, not like the former one, but one who has been seduced by the third temptation of the devil — the temptation of the kingdoms of the world: “All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me!”[1] This is the main reproach made by the Orthodox to the Roman Church. I find it entirely justified, and I would add that the Catholic false Christ is in fact Yahweh in disguise.
Unlike the Patriarch of Constantinople or later that of Moscow, who only claimed the “spiritual sword” (sacred authority), the medieval popes also claimed the “temporal sword” (secular power). Not only did they directly govern one of the richest principalities in Italy, but they claimed to rule over kings and emperors (read “The Failed Empire: the Medieval Origin of the European Disunion”).
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