Unhappily, the Christian body
deteriorated with the new prosperity and base instincts were indulged.
It is an undoubted historical fact, recorded by St. Jerome himself, that
the election of Pope Damasus, his friend and benefactor, was accompanied
by bloody and fatal riots. From undoubted historical sources we know
that the Christian mob compelled the Prefect of Rome to fly from the
city, and there is very serious evidence (in a document written by two
Roman priests) that Damasus employed the swords and staves of his
supporters to secure his position. Damasus and subsequent Popes then
obtained or sanctioned the use of the Roman soldiers for the suppression
of heresy and schism and Paganism, and Christianity was installed by
violence throughout the Empire. In the Eastern Roman Empire things were
even worse. Violence became the customary device in the seething
religious quarrels of the time, and, literally, tens of thousands lost
their lives. The Byzantine or Greek Christianity entered upon a record
of crime and violence which disgraced it for many centuries.
This development did not augur well for the application of Christian
principles to warfare. We may, however, observe at once that for many
centuries the Roman Church had not the slightest chance of establishing
peace in Europe.
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