Germanus I, Saint, Patriarch of Constantinople

GERMANO I, PATRIARCA DI COSTANTINOPOLI, SANTO

Feast day: 12 May

GERMANUS I, Saint, Patriarch of Constantinople. - Died in 733. When he was bishop of Cyzicus in 712 he yielded to imperial demands and accepted Monothelitism. However, from the time he was made patriarch of Constantinople, in 715, he gave proofs of orthodoxy not only regarding Monothelitism, which he publicly rejected around that time, but especially against the iconoclasm proclaimed by the emperor Leo III, who deposed G. in 730. He spent his last years in solitude and died almost a centenarian. Feast on 12 May.

G. left 4 dogmatic letters, of which the first 3 are of great importance for the iconoclast controversy; the 4th combats Monothelitism. There is also a short theological treatise De vitiae termino and a historical work De haeresibus et synodis composed ca. 727. Among G.'s 9 sermons, 7 of them are of special importance for Mariology, among which 3, delivered in dormitionem, manifest the belief in the Assumption of Mary.

Bibliography4 works

BIBL.: The works of G. in PG 98; Bardenhewer, V, pp. 48-51 (with bibl.); C. Chevalier, Les trilogies homilétiques dans l'élaboration des fêtes mariales, in Gregorianum, 17 (1937), pp. 372-77; J. List, Stud. zur Homiletik G. I. v. Konst. u. seiner Zeit, Athens 1939.

Ignazio Ortiz de Urbina

@incollection{ec6_germano_i_patriarca_di_costant, author = {Ortiz, de Urbina Ignazio}, title = {Germano I, patriarca di costantinopoli, santo}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {VI}, pages = {179--180}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1951}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/germano-i-patriarca-di-costantinopoli-santo} }

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