But these bishops, it may be said, were, in spite of the Emperor's Exarch, Latins. St. Sophronius of Jerusalem († 638) was not a Latin. While he was fighting against Monothelism, he chose one of his bishops, Stephen of Dora, to go to Rome, since he could not do so himself. He first takes his envoy to Mount Calvary, and there solemnly adjures him: "Go through all the world," he says, "till you come to the Apostolic See (Rome was a long way off from Jerusalem, and the journey was a dangerous one then), where is the foundation of the Orthodox belief. Tell the most holy persons of that see all about our difficulties: do not cease to beg and entreat them until their Apostolic and divine wisdom shall pronounce the victorious sentence, and shall canonically destroy and root out this new heresy."[1] Stephen comes to Rome several times. The last time was in 649. Before Pope Martin I (649–655) he makes his denunciation: "I desire to denounce Monothelism to the chief see, mistress of all sees; I desire to do so to your highest and divine see, that it may altogether heal the wound. Your see is accustomed to do so since the beginning by its Apostolic and canonical authority. For it is evident that Peter received not only the keys of heaven, he alone amongst all. Besides the keys of heaven this true Head and Prince of the Apostles was first charged to feed the sheep of the whole Catholic Church. … He alone was to confirm his colleagues and brethren, since God, who became man for us, gave him power and priestly authority over all. … And Sophronius, the former Patriarch of blessed memory, knowing this, told my lowliness without delay to come to this great Apostolic See."[2]
About 669 two monks of Gangres, Theodosius and Theodore, wrote an account of the chief adversaries of Monothehsm. They call the Martyr-Pope, St. Martin (p. 56), "Supreme and Apostolic Pope, chief of all the priestly hierarchy under the sun, Sovereign and Œcumenical Pope, Apostolic Prince."[3]
In the 8th century St. Stephen the Younger says of the Iconoclastic Synod of Hieria (753): "How can you call a synod œcumenical when the Bishop of Rome has not consented to it,
