“There went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that the whole world should be enrolled. And Joseph went up from Galilee to be enrolled with Mary his espoused wife, who was with child.” (Luke 2:1-5) +++ "Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar's..." (Matt 22:21) +++ “Honour all men. Love the brethren. Fear God. Honour the Emperor [Caesar].” (1 Pet 2:17) +++ “Then Paul said: I stand at Caesar's judgment seat, where I ought to be judged….I appeal to Caesar.” (Acts 25:10-11)
Her Majesty the Queen's first Minister, the Right Honourable Theresa May MP, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the First Lord of the Treasury, by letter to the President of the European Union activated Article 50 of the Treaty of the European Union, today, Wednesday 29 March 2017, and started the process by which the UK will leave the European Union...
Her Majesty's first Minister, the Rt Hon Theresa May MP,
Prime Minister of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
signing the letter triggering Article 50 of the TEU
The letter of the Prime Minister activating Article 50 of the Treaty of the European Union...
European Union
(Notification of Withdrawal) Act 2017
2017 CHAPTER 9
An Act to confer power on the Prime Minister to notify, under Article
50(2) of the Treaty on European Union, the United Kingdom’s intention to
withdraw from the EU.
[16th March 2017]
Be it enacted by the
Queen’s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords
Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and
by the authority of the same, as follows:—
1. Power to notify
withdrawal from the EU
(1)The Prime Minister may notify, under Article 50(2) of the Treaty on
European Union, the United Kingdom’s intention to withdraw from the EU.
(2)This section has effect despite any provision made by or under the
European Communities Act 1972 or any other enactment.
2. Short title
This Act may be cited as the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal)
Act 2017.
Constantine XI Dragases Palaiologos (Κωνσταντῖνος ΙΑ' Δραγάσης Παλαιολόγος) lived from 8 February 1405–29 May 1453,
dying on the very day that his imperial city, Constantinople, and his Empire,
fell to the heathen Islamic marauders.
He was the last reigning Byzantine Emperor, a member of the
Palaiologos imperial family. He and his elder brother, Emperor John VIII Palaiologos, were both supporters of reunion with Rome and both became Catholics, as did the sons of Emperor Constantine XI.
His death marked the end of the Eastern Roman Empire, which had
continued for 977 years after the fall of the Western Roman Empire
in 476 (later revived in 800 with Charlemagne).
He was the eighth of ten children born to Emperor Manuel II
Palaiologos and Empress Helena Dragaš, the daughter of the Serbian magnate
Constantine Dragaš.
Devoted to his mother, he added her surname (Dragases) to
his own upon becoming Emperor.
Contemporaries spoke well of the Emperor Constantine and he was highly regarded by all.
While his brother John VIII Palaiologos was Emperor, Constantine had became the Despotes ("Despot" meaning "lord" or "master" and not having the same meaning as its English derivative) of the Morea (the medieval name for the Peloponnesus) in October 1443. He ruled from the fortress and palace in Mistra, a fortified town also called Sparta or Lacedaemon due to its proximity to that ancient Greek city.
Constantine XI married twice, on 1 July 1428 to Theodora Tocco, niece of Carlo I Tocco of Epirus and, after her death, on 27 July 1441 to Caterina Gattilusio, daughter of Dorino of Lesbos but she died in August 1442 after suffering a miscarriage. He had no children by either marriage.
After his imperial coronation in 1449, Constantine XI sent a commission under George Sphrantzes asking Mara Branković, daughter of the Serbian Despot Đurađ Branković and Byzantine princess Irene Kantakouzene, to marry him.
The proposal was welcomed by her father, Despot Đurađ Branković, but it foundered on the objection of Mara herself who had vowed that "if God ever released her from the hands of the infidel she would lead a life of celibacy and chastity for the rest of her days".
Accordingly, the courtship failed and Sphrantzes took steps to arrange for a marriage with a princess either from the Empire of Trebizond or the Kingdom of Georgia.
The choice eventually fell to an unnamed Georgian princess, daughter of King George VIII of Georgia.
Sphrantzes started official negotiations with the Georgian king, who had sent an ambassador to Constantinople for that reason.
It was agreed that the next spring, Sphrantzes would sail for Georgia to bring the bride to Constantinople, but, alas for the course of true love, Constantine's plans were overtaken by the events of 1453 and total disaster.
During the absence of his older brother, Emperor John VIII, at the Council of Florence in Italy, negotiating a reunion of the Eastern Orthodox back to the Catholic stem, Constantine served as his regent in Constantinople (1437–1440).
Constantine XI was an equally avid defender of the reunion with Rome.
Emperor John VIII Palaiologos from Benozzo Gozzoli's 1459 representation of the Three Kings
At the Council of Florence Emperor John VII was called by the Council "Emperor of the Romans", including in the preface to the decree of re-union, Laetentur Caeli of 1439, and his throne was placed, together with that of Pope Eugene IV, by the empty throne of the Western Roman Emperor, that office being temporarily sede vacante as the Prince-Electors of the Empire had yet to decide upon a new Holy Roman Emperor.
The Council of Ferrara had been moved to Florence in January 1439 and made steady progress on a formula for reunion.
On 6 July 1439 Laetentur Caeli was signed by Patriarch Joseph II of Constantinople and all the Eastern bishops but one, Mark of Ephesus, who, contrary to the views of all others, held that Rome continued in both heresy and schism. Upon their return, the Eastern bishops found their agreement with the West broadly rejected by the monks, the populace and by civil authorities, with the notable exception of the Emperors John VIII and Constantine XI who remained committed to union until the fall of the Byzantine Empire to the Turkish Ottoman Empire two decades later.
In 1446 the Sultan Murad II of Turkey, albeit not so belligerent as some Turkish sultans, came out of retirement, once again to attack the Christian Eastern territories, alleging unjustified action by the Byzantine emperors, and led an army of 50,000–60,000 soldiers into Greece to seize power from Constantine in the Morea.
Constantine and his brother Thomas prepared for the inevitable battle.
Eastern Byzantine Christian Roman Emperor Constantine XI
Sultan Murad used bombards, siege engines and scaling ladders, breaching the walls on 10 December 1446. Murad's janissaries (captive Christian children indoctrinated and turned into Muslim slave-warriors) poured through the opening and the defenders panicked and fled.
Constantine and Thomas barely escaped to Mistra while Murad devastated the coast line, taking 60,000 prisoners for the Turkish slave markets.
When his brother, Emperor John VIII Palaiologos, died childless, a dispute erupted between Constantine and his brother Demetrios Palaiologos over the throne. Demetrios drew support by opposing the union of the Orthodox and Catholic churches. The Empress Helena, acting as regent, supported Constantine.
They appealed to the Ottoman Sultan Murad II of Turkey to arbitrate the disagreement because, by then, the Eastern Empire was having to pay tribute to the Sultan.
Ironically, Murad decided in favour of Constantine, and on 6 January 1449 Constantine was crowned in the cathedral at Mistra by the local bishop. It was rare, but not unprecedented, for an emperor to be crowned in a provincial city.
The Patriarch of Constantinople at the time, Patriarch Gregory III, being in favour of reunion with Rome, was shunned by most of his clergy. Constantine knew that to receive his crown from Gregory would add fuel to the existing fires of religious discord in the capital.
Sultan Murad died in 1451 and was succeeded by his 19-year-old son, Mehmed II, who was obsessed with the conquest of Constantinople and soon found an excuse to besiege the great city. Belligerent Turkish sultans were obsessively bent upon conquering Constantimople (just as they were obsessed to take what they called "the Golden Apple", Vienna, or, even better, Rome).
Facing the imminent threat, and at the eleventh hour, the reunion was officially proclaimed by Bishop Isidore of Kiev in Hagia Sophia, the great Cathedral of Constantinople (now a mosque),on 12 December 1452 (and it is said that Isidore gave communion to Emperor Constantine XI the same day).
The bishops and people of Constantinople accepted this act as temporary provision, at least until the removal of the Ottoman threat, but it was too late.
On 29 May 1453 Constantinople fell and the reunion with it.
Sultan Mehmed II prepares to invade the great Eastern Christian Roman capital of Constantinople
Constantine led the defence of the city and took an active
part in the fighting alongside his troops.
At the same time,
he used his diplomatic skills to maintain the necessary unity between the
Genoese, Venetian, and Greek troops.
The poor state of the Byzantine economy meant he struggled to defend the city from the huge, invading Ottoman army.
Desperate, he appealed to the West, reaffirming the
union of Florence.
Infamously, Constantine's chief minister and military
commander, Loukas Notaras, said “Better to see the turban of the Turks reigning
in the City than the Latin mitre”.
He got his wish with lasting consequences.
In the end, the saintly and heroic Constantine XI doffed
his imperial finery and fought with his men as a common soldier, leading a
final charge against the invading Islamic marauders.
The Muslim invasion of Constantinople: Emperor Constantine XI leads his troops into battle for the final showdown against the heathen invaders...
These were his last words to his soldiers:
"I would not go if there was any benefit to leave the city, but I cannot go away...I will not leave ever. I have decided to die with you."
He died heroically at the head of his men, sword in
hand, faithful and loyal to the last.
He knew he was defending the ancient Christian capital of Constantine, the Eastern Roman Empire and ‘όι ρωμαίοι ("hoi Romaioi",“the Romans”, as the Easterners always called
themselves) from the infidel horde, a true soldier for Christ defending the bounds of Christendom, faithful unto death.
He remains the hero of heroes to the Greeks (and, indeed, to all
Christians) ever since.
Majorem
hac dilectionem nemo habet, ut animam suam ponat qui pro amicis suis.... μείζοναταύτηςἀγάπηνοὐδεὶςἔχει,ἵνατιςτὴνψυχὴναὐτοῦθῇὑπὲρτῶνφίλωναὐτοῦ... "Greater
love than this no man hath, that he lay down his life for his friends...."
John
15:13
An ikon of the saintly Emperor Constantine XI
He is a saint for our time so threatened by those same
heathen infidel terrorists.
His sons later, living in the West, became Catholics,
bequeathed the title King of Jerusalem to the Holy Roman emperors (who already
claimed it) and the Sacred Military Constantinian Order of St George to the
Farnese Dukes of Parma whose family head, today HRH the Duke of Calabria,
remains the Grand Master of the Order.
Emperor Constantine XI, is venerated privately by both
Catholic and Orthodox as a saint and, in the West, as a champion of the reunion of the
Churches.
Άγιος Κωνσταντίνος ΙΑ, προσευχηθείτε για μας!
Beatus Constantinus XI, ora pro nobis!
Blessed Constantine XI, pray for us!
The imperial double eagle of the Palaiologoi emperors of Byzantium
(The Wednesday of ashes in the time of the 40 days i.e. Lent...)
On this day Catholics the world over receive on their foreheads the sign of the cross in ash, administered by the priest, to symbolise the transience of life, the need for repentance (ash being a sign of repentence) and the hope of immortality in the life to come.
As he administers the ashes the priest says (in Latin in the traditional rites):
Meménto, homo, quia pulvis es, et in púlverem revertéris... Remember, man, that thou art dust, and unto dust thou shalt return...
"What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun? One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh..." [Ecclesiasticus 1]
So may we well begin this Holy Season of Lent which so much reminds us of the transience of this life and, in contrast, the joys of heaven to come.
In a sense, there is both joy and sadness in Lent - sadness at death but joy at life, the life to come. Lent signifies the 40 days that our Lord spent in the desert fasting and doing penance for us and giving us an example of the way in which we can discipline ourselves to withstand the temptations of the world, grow in grace and virtue and become more truly ourselves, rather than our appetites.
This is our recollection behind the imposition of ashes on the forehead on Ash Wednesday. We are reminded of our mortality and that we shall return unto the dust from which man was originally made.
The words said by the priest come from Genesis 3:19 when Adam and Eve were made subject to the corruption of death and dying with the words of God ringing in their ears:
"for dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return"
"Remember friends as you pass by, as you are now so once was I. As I am now so you must be. Prepare for death and follow me."
From the Roman Office of the Dead, the Anglican divines took the words of Job and used them for the Anglican burial service. They have since thereby become famous, used in many a film setting. They are powerful words:
"MAN THAT IS BORN OF WOMAN hath but a short time to live, and is full of misery. He cometh up and is cut down like a flower; he flieth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one stay. In the midst of life we be in death: of whom may we seek for succour but of thee, O Lord, which for our sins justly art displeased. Yet, O Lord God most holy, O Lord most mighty, O holy and most merciful saviour, deliver us not into the bitter pains of eternal death. Thou knowest, Lord, the secrets of our hearts, shut not up thy merciful eyes to our prayers: but spare us Lord most holy, O God most mighty, O holy and merciful saviour, thou most worthy judge eternal, suffer us not at our last hour for any pains of death to fall from thee." [Job 11]
On Ash Wednesday, the ashes are made by the burning of the palms from the previous year's Easter.
The imposition of ashes signifies sorrow for sin, contrition, spiritual aid and the receiving of grace thereby.
The head, being the seat of pride, is then imposed with ashes in the form of a cross as the priest utters the words reminding us of our mortality.
We should wear this sign of penance as a memento mori (remembrance of death) and as a sign of witness against the concupiscence of the world.
This painting shows the return of the Blessed Virgin after the Crucifixion on Calvary.
In the distance can be seen the 3 crosses upon Calvary mount. It is a fitting theme for the penitential season of Lent - or Great Lent as the Greeks call it. Lent is a time of very moving and indeed hauntingly beautiful liturgy and chant.
Ash Wednesday begins with the reading from Joel the Prophet, Chapter 2:
“Now therefore saith the Lord: Be converted to me with all your heart, in fasting, and in weeping, and in mourning. 13 And rend your hearts, and not your garments, and turn to the Lord your God: for he is gracious and merciful, patient and rich in mercy, and ready to repent of the evil. 14 Who knoweth but he will return, and forgive, and leave a blessing behind him, sacrifice and libation to the Lord your God? 15 Blow the trumpet in Sion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly, 16 Gather together the people, sanctify the church, assemble the ancients, gather together the little ones, and them that suck at the breasts: let the bridegroom go forth from his bed, and the bride out of her bride chamber. 17 Between the porch and the altar the priests the Lord's ministers shall weep, and shall say: Spare, O Lord, spare thy people: and give not thy inheritance to reproach, that the heathen should rule over them. Why should they say among the nations: Where is their God? 18 The Lord hath been zealous for his land, and hath spared his people. 19 And the Lord answered and said to his people: Behold I will send you corn, and wine, and oil, and you shall be filled with them: and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations.”
On the First Sunday of Lent the Gospel reminds us of the precedent for Lent: our Lord's 40 days in the desert fasting.
On the Saturday in Ember week of Lent, when it was customary to have Ordinations to the clerical state, there are 6 readings including the Gospel and many beautiful chants.
Ivan Kramskoy. Christ in the Desert. 1872.
It is customary to sing the Lenten chant Attende, Domine, et miserere - "Listen, O Lord, and have mercy".
Here it is in chant:
To Thee, highest King, Redeemer of all, do we lift up our eyes in weeping: Hear, O Christ, the prayers of your servants.
Hear us, O Lord, and have mercy, because we have sinned against Thee!
...
Innocent, He was seized, not refusing to be led; condemned by false witnesses because of impious men; O Christ, keep safe those whom Thou hast redeemed!
Hear us, O Lord, and have mercy, because we have sinned against Thee!
In many communities, both religious and secular, it was also customary to have numerous additional pious devotions including chants, hymns and canticles dedicated to the instruments of the Passion, for instance the Holy Lance and the Holy Nails.
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