Consolidation of Roman PRIMACY and the decline of synodality in the second millennium until the Second Vatican Council

Abstract

In the socio-cultural, political and ecclesiastical context of the second millennium, the primacy of the Roman Pontiff developed into a full, supreme and absolute power of universal jurisdiction, culminating in the promulgation of the dogmas of primacy and infallibility at the First Vatican Council. Because of these developments, episcopal power of governance or jurisdiction came to be seen as a concession of the Roman Pontiff, and metropolitan and patriarchal authority as sharing in his supreme power. Synodality and conciliarity virtually disappeared in the West and decreased considerably in the East.