CELESTINE
478
CELESTINE
dus non sequendus. Moreover he threatens severe
penalties for future transgressors. In upholding the
rights of the Roman Church to hear and decide ap-
peals from all quarters, he came for a time into con-
flict with the great Church of Africa (see Apiarius).
The African, bishops, however, though manifesting
some warmth, never called into question the Divine
supremacy of the Holy See, their very language and
actions expressed its fullest recognition; their com-
plaints were directed rather against the sometimes
indiscreet use of the papal prerogative. The last
years of the pontificate of Celestine were taken up
with the struggle in the East over the heresy of
Nestorius (see Nestorius; Cyril op Alexandria;
Ephesus, Council of). Nestorius who had become
Bishop of Constantinople in 428 at first gave great
satisfaction, as we learn from the first letter ad-
dressed to him by Celestine. He soon aroused sus-
picions of his orthodoxy by receiving kindly the
Pelagians banished from Rome by the pope, and
shortly after, rumours of his heretical teaching con-
cerning the twofold personality of Christ reaching
Rome, Celestine commissioned Cyril, Bishop of Alex-
andria, to investigate and make a report. Cyril hav-
ing found Nestorius openly professing Iris heresy
sent a full account to Celestine, who in a Roman
synod (430), having solemnly condemned the errors
of Nestorius, now ordered Cyril in his name to pro-
ceed against Nestorius, who was to be excommuni-
cated and deposed unless within ten days he should
have made in writing a solemn retractation of his
errors. In letters written the same day to Nestorius,
to the clergy and people of Constantinople, and to
John of Antioeh, Juvenal of Jerusalem, Rufus of Thes-
salonica, and Flavian of Philippi, Celestine announces
the sentence passed upon Nestorius and the commis-
sion given to Cyril to execute it. At the same time
he restored all who had been excommunicated or de-
prived by Nestorius. Cyril forwarded the papal sen-
tence and his own anathema to Nestorius. The em-
peror now summoned a general council to meet at
Ephesus. To this council Celestine sent as legates,
Arcadius and Projectus, bishops, and Philippus, a
priest, who were to act in conjunction with Cyril.
However, they were not to mix in discussion but were
to judge the opinions of the others. Celestine in all
his letters assumes his own decision as final, Cyril and
the council are but to carry it out. Nestorius prov-
ing obdurate was excommunicated and deposed by
the council, " compelled by the sacred canons and the
letters of Our Most Holy Father, Celestine, Bishop of
the Roman Church."
The last official act of Celestine, the sending of St. Patrick to Ireland, perhaps surpasses all the rest in its far-reaching consequences for good. He had already sent (431) Palladius as bishop to the " Scots [i. e. Irish] believing in Christ. " But Palla- dius soon abandoned Ireland and died the year fol- lowing in Britain. St. Patrick, who had previously been refused, now received the long-coveted commis- sion only a few days before the death of Celestine, who thus becomes a sharer in the conversion of the race that in the next few centuries was to accomplish such vast works by its countless missionaries and scholars in the conversion and civilization of the bar- barian world. In the local affairs of the Roman Church, Celestine manifested great zeal. He restored and embellished the church of Santa Maria in Traste- vere, which had suffered from the Gothic pillage of Rome, also the church of St. Sabina. besides decora- ting the Cemetery of St. Priscilla with paintings of the Council of Ephesus. The precise date of his death is uncertain. His feast is kept in the Latin Church on 6 April, the day on which his body was placed in the Catacombs of St. Priscilla, whence it was trans- ferred in 820 by Pope St, Paschal I to the church of Sta Prassede, though the cathedral of Mantua like-
wise claims his relics. In the Greek Church where he
is highly honoured for his condemnation of Nestorius,
his feast falls on 8 A^ril.
The extant writings of St. Celestine consist of six- teen letters, the contents of many of which have been indicated above, and a fragment of a discourse on Nestorianism delivered in the Roman Synod of 430. The "Capitula Coelestini " , the ten decisions on the subject of grace which have played such a part in the history of Augustinianism, are no longer attributed to his authorship. For centuries they were affixed as an integral part to his letter to the bishops of Gaul, bu! at present are considered as most probably the work of St. Prosper of Aquitaine. Anastasius Bibli- othecarius attributes to him several other constitu- tions but with little authority. Doubtful also is the statement of the "Liber Pontificalis" that Celestine added the Introit to the Mass.
Sancti Calestini Epistolce et Decreta, P. L., L; Acta .S.S'., X ; Hefele. History of the Councils, II, III; Duchesne, Liher l'i>n( {lira/is, I; Gkisar. Geschichte Roms und der Papste im Mittelaller (Freiburg im Br.. 1S98). I; Cardinal de Noris, II Utoria Pelaouina; Tillemont, Memoires pour servir a V his- toire ecclesiastique,X.TV ; Natalis Alexander, Historic Ecclesi- astica, ed. Roncaglia-Mansi, IX; Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum Amplusima Collectio, IV; Rivington. The Roman Primacy.
J. F. X. Murphy.
Celestine II, Pope, (Guido del Castello, de Castellis), a native of Roman Tuscany, date of birth unknown; d. 8 March, 1144. He was a disciple of Abelard, and added to great learning the reputation of a grave and upright priest. He was made cardinal in 1128, and in 1140 legate to France where he in- curred the displeasure of St. Bernard for the pro- tection he accorded Arnold of Brescia. He suc- ceeded Innocent II, 25 September, 1143, and at once lifted from France the interdict that his predecessor had inflicted because of the act of Louis VII in op- posing his own candidate to the rightfully elected Bishop of Bourges. On the eve of a serious conflict with Roger of Sicily he died, after a short reign of about six months.
Watterich, VitaPontiticum (Leipzig, 1S62), II, 276; Jaffe, Reg. Rom. Pont. (1S8S1, II, 1-7; Mansi. Vila et epislcias in Coll. Cone, XXI, 591; Baronius, Ann. eccl. 11-13-1144; Vacan- dabd, Vie de S. Bernard (Paris, 1S95).
Thomas J. Shahan.
Celestine III, Pope (Giacinto Bobone), the first of the Roman Orsini to ascend the Chair of Peter, b. about 1106; d. at Rome, 8 January, 119S. He was forty-seven years a cardinal when, in his eighty-fifth year, he was elected (30 March, 1191) successor of Clement III; being only a deacon he was ordained priest (13 April) and consecrated bishop the next day, respectively Holy Saturday and Easter. The following day he anointed and crowned King Henry VI of Germany as emperor, and as empress his queen Constantia. The king was then on his way to Southern Italy to enforce against Tancred the claims of Constantia to the crown of the Two Sic- ilies. The Roman people, however, did not per- mit the afore-mentioned solemnities to take place until both pope and king had aided them to satisfy their wrath against the neighbouring Tusculum. The town was levelled with the ground and abandoned to the savage vengeance of the Romans. The aged pope has been blamed for this act of cruelty, in this so unlike his predecessor Innocent II who withstood (1142) a similar passionate insistence of the Romans for the destruction of Tibur (Tivoli). The responsibility, however, rests chiefly on the emperor, whose blood-thirsty Italian career was thus becomingly inaugurated. In spite of the pope the emperor proceeded southward to make good his claims to Sicily, but was defeated anil compelled to retire, leaving the empress a prisoner of Tancred, who freed her at the papal petition. The aged Celes- tine astonished many by his longanimity in dealing
