see thats the thing, thats why i'm discovering Islam, because there are a lot of discrepancies in catholicism, i have looked into the constantiopole aspect, i found out recently the vatican wasnt built until the 1500s, before then they were near constantine, coincidentally, they moved to the vatican, only about 30-40 years after the great schism, and after the 3 popes scandal.
hey Jake!
had a few snags, leaving tomorrow, in shaa allah.
this history of Catholicism is not what we are told. not necessarily a lie, straight out. if you get the readers digest version of the readers digest version, a lot of stuff gets left out.
the pope was never THE pope. the bishops running the largest cees, were called Papa, Pope. so, at the time of Nicea, there was a pope in Rome, 1 in Antioch and one in Alexandria. if you pay attention, you'll notice the "pope" of Rome, was NOT at Nicaea, they couldn't even speak Greek! in New Rome, what we call Constantinople, the Bishop was later called Patriarch. it was considered equal to Rome.
after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the Bishop of Rome began to assert his authority of the population, as there was no emperor. the fought for and got recognized as the leader of the Western Church. later, The Bishop of Rome and the Patriarch of Constantinople, excommunicated each other. they have been separate since. The church at Antioch had a problem with Mary being recognized as the "mother" of god, and got themselves excommunicated. they relocated to parts of Asia. Alexandria got tired of decisions made by Rome and Constantinople and left the "church".
you should check the histories of the popes in the late dark ages. totally disgusting. one of the reasons that people started translating the Bible and forming their own churches was the corruption of the priests and bishops. they were curious about the "bread and wine". they weren't saying that it couldn't be done. they were saying that their local clergy was so corrupt, that "they" couldn't do it. in fact, the Pope issued an edict in the 1600s saying that, no matter the priest, or his reputation, the wine and bread works!
but you see, universities were founded by Franciscan and Jesuit monks. they taught that Rome is, was, and always has been the "leader" of the church. which simply is not true. not by any historical record. they became the leader of the Western church, but that took hundreds of years and breaking with all of the other churches, for that to happen.