Felix II (Pope)

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Felix II († March 1, 492 ) was Bishop of Rome from 483 until his death. His name is Latin and means "the lucky one".

With Felix, a member of the senate nobility ascended the Roman bishopric for the first time . Felix was the son of a presbyter . He was already married and the father of several children when he was ordained a deacon , which at that time was a high clerical position in the diocese administration. On March 13, 483 he was elected bishop under the influence of King Odoacer and was the first Roman bishop after the fall of the Western Roman Empire . As the first bishop of Rome, he sent a notice of his election to Constantinople , thereby recognizing the Eastern Roman emperor of Byzantium . However, the relationship of the Roman Church to the Emperor Zenon and his patriarch Akakios deteriorated rapidly due to the disputes between Orthodox Chalcedonians and Monophysites . With his Edict Henoticon , issued in 482 , the monophysite-friendly Zeno tried to achieve a theological compromise between orthodox and heterodox currents in order to religiously unite the Eastern Roman Empire. Felix sat at the head of the resistance against this regulation, which was regarded as heretical in the chalcedony-friendly West, and in 484 imposed the excommunication on the followers of the Henotikon . He declared the authoritative author of the compromise formula, the Patriarch Akakios of Constantinople, in the dispute over the deposition of the Monophysite Patriarch of Alexandria , Petros III, which was demanded by Felix . Mongos , whose Chalcedonian competitor Johannes Talaia had fled to Rome, for deposed. Akakios then had Felix himself deleted from the list of patriarchs and renounced his office. So that was acacian schism , the first schism between Eastern and Western Church, which lasted until the 519th

Despite their conflicts, Felix and Emperor Zenon agreed on an Eastern Roman intervention to end the persecution of Catholic Christians in North Africa by the Arian Vandals . In this context, a synod convened by Felix in Rome in 487 issued penal provisions for Lapsi and regulated the conditions under which Catholics who had converted to Arianism during the persecution of the Vandal religion were allowed to return to Nicene Orthodoxy.

The final years of his pontificate were overshadowed by the turmoil caused by the Ostrogoth conquest of Italy under Theodoric . Felix was regarded as a refuge of Orthodoxy and, at a time when Italy was not directly accessible to East Rome, he advocated the independence of the church of the former West Rome from the emperor . Influential head of politics and author of the papal letters under Felix was his archdeacon and later successor Gelasius . Felix died on March 1, 492 in Rome and was buried in Saint Paul Outside the Walls , his diaconal church. His feast day is March 1st. He is the great grandfather of Pope Gregory the Great .

In some counts Felix II is also called "Felix III.", "Felix III. (II.) ”Or“ Felix II. (III.) ”Because there was another Pope Felix II from 355 to 358 , who was seen partly as an antipope and partly as a legitimate pope.

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Commons : Felix II.  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
predecessor Office successor
Simplicius Pope
483-492 		Gelasius I.
personal data
SURNAME Felix II
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Felix III .; Felix III. (II.); Felix II (III.)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Pope (483-492)
DATE OF BIRTH 4th century or 5th century
DATE OF DEATH March 1, 492