The Iraq War is next year for them and you choose to warn them about that pompous irrelevance? Good grief, man.
it's far too late to tell them they should have deposed Saddam back in '91.
The Iraq War is next year for them and you choose to warn them about that pompous irrelevance? Good grief, man.
This could be the oldest necro so far.
Formally the pope never called a crusade against the Orthodox but many Catholics have used it as a pretet to invade the Orthodox people.
i.e. Alexander Nevsky (Novgorod) vs Teutonic Order + 4th Crusade (the point of no return for many eastern christians)
The Catholic rulers persecuted Orthodox Christians (Franks & Latins from the 4th Crusade onwards, Poland Lithuania, Habsburgs). At many points in history the Orthodox peoples would prefer Islamic rule over Catholic rule because they regarded the Turks as the "safer choice" - imagine that!!
See article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Eastern_Orthodox_Christians#Crusades
How dramatic was this event? The Byzantines lost mainland Greece to the Crusaders, they where squeezed in Anatolia between the Traitor Frankish Crusaders & their Latin Merchant Allies of the West and the Turkic Nomads of the East (whom would come in even larger nomadic numbers fleeing from the mongols). The Byzantines never fully recovered & fought an uphill battle for survival. Turkic Beyliks would take advantage, siding with either side when it suited them in order to take more land, integrating Greek, Persian & Nomadic customs into an Islamic Turkic Culture through "Turkification." While the Frankish Crusaders may have acquired land they never truly acquired the loyalty of their new subjects. Unsurprisingly the Crusader states failed (how could they succeed when they back stabbed their strongest local potential allies the Byzantines). Their local Orthodox support was already diminishing as they had in the past slaughtered Orthodox people - it was foolish of them to believe purely distant Catholic support was the solution (if anything it hastened islamization).
The Crusaders have only themselves to blame for their failure - at times Orthodox people would side with Turks simply because they felt safer under them than Catholics (then when the Catholics where gone they would fight Turks but by then it was too late). Rather than uniting Christians the Crusaders divided them, making it easier for Muslims to conquer them.
I'm not excusing Turkic, Arab or any Muslim atrocities against the Christians (they where responsible for just as many) but the reason why Anatolia was lost is clear - even the Pope himself excommunicated the 4th Crusaders for their heresy.
Mazikert was the nail and the 4th Crusade the hammer that ended Byzantium - they unwittingly made the situation unsalvagable for Christianity in Anatolia & the Middle East.
Its strange - Westerner Europeans either admire the Crusaders or denounce them for their war against Islam but seem to forget how it impacted the local Orthodox people (I'll tell you now though, Eastern Europeans never forgot what really happened).
Pious Russians just love to cite obscure mystical prophecies whenever they want to justify knee jerk xenophobia. No different from superstitious people anywhere.You're right. In Russia, a film about this event was filmed. The film is called "The Fall of the Empire: A Byzantine Lesson". Gives instruction to the audience how to conduct with the West.
This event can be attributed to the bombing of Yugoslavia by NATO in 1999. The spectator will say: the West has not changed.
Here is an excerpt from the film :" About the pitiful Romei! - the monk Gennady Scholarius prophetically wrote from his prison after the signing of The Florentine Union and 14 years before the fall of Constantinople. — Why did you stray from the righteous path: removed from the hope of God and began to hope for the power of the Franks? Together with the city in which soon everything will be destroyed, you have retreated from your piety! Be merciful to me, o Lord! I testify before God that I am innocent of this. See, unhappy citizens, think about what you are doing?!
Together with the captivity that will soon befall us, you have departed from the paternal tradition and have begun to profess ungodliness. Woe to you when judgment comes to you! "
It wasn't the Latins who conquered Jerusalem, Alexandria and Antioch from the East Romans. They managed to lose those places all fine just on their own. Credit where credit is due...The pope used to be only one of the five patriarchs. This is the Constantinople, Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandrian and Roman Ecumenical churches. It was in the time of Justinian