ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

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Laetentur Caeli: Bulla Unionis Graecorum (The heavens rejoice. The Bull of Union with the Greeks) was a papal bubble promulgated on 6 July 1439 by Pope Eugene IV during the Council of Florence.

The bubble officially reunited the Catholic Church with the churches of the East, temporarily ending the Great Scysm. However, a short time after the agreement was rejected by the majority of the bishops of the Eastern Churches. Lincipit of the bubble – from which the title comes – comes from in the translation of the Vulgata.

Political context

In 1439 the Ottoman Empire had gained ground over the Byzantine Empire and had come to extend throughout Europe. The capital Constantinople was still in Byzantine hands. During the reign of John V Palaeologist in the previous century, the Byzantine emperor had called for help to the West by offering in return the reunification of the Greek Orthodox Church with the Roman Catholic Church. The papacy had remained impassive to these appeals, as was the King Louis I of Hungary.

In 1369, after the Ottoman conquest of Adrianopoli, John V again launched a request for help, rushing to Rome and publicly converting to Roman Catholicism. The aid was not granted and John V was forced to become vassal of Sultan Murad I.

A brief truce from the Ottoman control came later when Timur pressured the Ottomans to the east, but in 1420 the Byzantine emperor John VIII Palaiologos again and dramatically warned the need for Western aid. He renewed the appeal of his predecessor, presenting himself with a delegation to the Council of Ferrara-Florence to ask for the reunification of the two Churches. He consulted with the neoplatonic philosopher Gemisto Pletone who advised him to seek an identical voting power in the conciliar seat for the Catholic and Greek Orthodox delegation. The emperor underwent much closer proximity to the Roman Pontiff in the direction of a reunion between the two ecclesial communities. To help the Russian Orthodox Church to join the Western Church, in 1436 John VIII appointed Isidore Metropolitan of Kiev against the will of Basil II of Russia.

Theological context
The Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church had developed different theological differences during the east-west schism of 1054 and the following centuries. The main difference was the inclusion of the word ‘’Filioque’ in the Latin version of the Nicene Creed by the Roman Catholic Church, that the Orthodox bishops had refused to accept : according to the Eastern Orthodox dogma the Holy Spirit proceeded from God the Father, while according to the Roman Catholic dogma it proceeded both from the Father and the Son. Although the Council of Florence had an ecumenical character, the Eastern bishops strongly denied that something could be added to the Creed.

A second central issue