IMC 2007: Sessions

Paper a: The Bulgarian church is the only one among the independent churches, which twice, has changed its church jurisdiction between Rome and Constantinople. The first time, the change happened between 864 and 870, and the second time, between 1204 and 1234. This was a political game of Bulgarian king between Rome and Constantinople wishing to achieve autonomy of their church and, hence an independence for their state. As it is well known, during the Medieval Age patriarchs of the local church consecrated the king of the state.
By the middle of 9th century, at the reign of Boris I (852-889) Bulgaria had to fight for church and cultural freedom by diplomatic turns between the two, eastern and western European centers. Yet from the beginning, the good will of Boris to become Christian and to christianization his people let him into a play between the two ecclesiastical metropolises.
First we should see the principles of the first church jurisdictional change of Bulgaria. Also we will take a look over the king's protection of the interests of his reign, that is why we will explore in our paper the relationships between Bulgaria, Rome and Constantinople during his reign. For detailed presenting of the historical situation, at this moment gradually we will investigate the relationships between Constantinople and Rome that were in a period of disagreements created by the doctrine conflics between Patriarch Fotiy (Photius) and the Popes.

Paper b: The church-politics of the Carolingian Age has weakened the independence of the Church in the West, and this marked how close the confrontation was between the secular and ecclesiastical authority. The anointed ruler considered as his own sacred obligation to do everything for the earthly realization of the Kingdom of Christ, even the promotion of spreading the Christian Faith and supporting the Church. These goals certainly founded the claim of the ruler to define the ecclesiastical activity in his territory. Conflicts arose especially concerning the personal independence of bishops, the freedom of the ecclesiastical legislation and the competence of the ecclesiastical tribunals. The primary goal of the so called Gregorian Reform was to suppress the confusing ideas on the competence of the secular authority and of the ecclesiastical power. The earthly exercised power which originated fundamentaly from the Divine Law, therefore, links specially to the ordained or consecrated persons as 'ius sacrum' was theoretically explained in the well known proclamation of Pope Boniface VIII (1294-1303).

Paper c: Scholars interested in medieval fringes have struggled to understand what 'fringeness' meant to medieval people. In an attempt to address this problem, my paper will take the example of Sweden and discuss the views articulated by popes of this distant land, viewed by the apostolic see as a 'wicked nation in distant lands', a subjective periphery to the Latin-Christian core. What exactly made Sweden, fully converted by this time, so alien? And how did Roman views change as the Swedes drew closer to 'European' society in the century between the legations of Nicholas Breakspear (1153) and William of Sabina (1248)?