Византийское миссионерство

The conversion of the Roman Empire changed the situation. Christian emperors of the 4^thcentury regarded the support of Christian communities outside imperial borders as their imperial duty. But there is still no evidence of the missionary efforts of Romans among pagan «barbarians»; meanwhile, this association of Christianity with loyalty to the Romans caused great damage to mission: from this period onward the political authorities of all the countries bordering on the Empire suspected their Christian subjects of hidden loyalty to Constantinople. As a consequence, they backed rivaling religions or «heretical» trends within Christianity. This is how Monophysites and Nestorians, cursed by the «Orthodox», became the most numerous Christian communities in Persia, Ethiopia, Sudan, Central Asia, India and even in distant China, whereas Arianism, another Christian «sect», became the religion of European «barbarians».

As Christianity became imperial ideology, the attitude of Church authorities towards «barbarians» began to change: the classical GrecoRoman perception of «other» as a non‑human finds its way to the writings of theologians. Some of them insist that a «barbarian» cannot be a Christian, other Fathers of the Church praise the conversion of the «beasts», explaining that this is a way to pacify them and make them harmless. One of the very few exceptions is John Chrysostome who still holds to the old Christian «internationalism». There is still no trace of any deliberate missionary activities of the church among «barbarians» outside the imperial borders.

Only when the Western Empire collapsed and the Church on its territory remained the only organized institution in the midst of chaos, did the Popes of Rome begin the activities which may be regarded as missionary. It should be dated to the end of the 6^thcentury. However, the «real» mission as we understand it today must be accredited not to them but to itinerant Irish monks who sailed to the continent by the scores in the 7^thcentury. It was these «barbarians», preaching in «barbaric» languages, living side by side with their converts, working indefatigably, who formed the image of a missionary which survived up to this day. So, we may state that mission proper began when the Roman Empire, with its cultural isolationism and visceral hatred of «barbarians», perished.

II