EASTERN RITES 125 



Slavonic Church did not follow it until nearly 200 years later, 

 so that there was one united Catholic Church using the Cyril- 

 lic alphabet and the Slavonic language for almost 400 years 

 after the conversion of these Slavs to Christianity. 



But the Church using the Slavonic language in its Mass and 

 religious services gradually followed Constantinople in its 

 schism and so fell away from unity with the Holy See. The 

 many wars with the Poles and the Teutonic Knights of Ger- 

 many, both of whom were of the Roman Rite, helped to ac- 

 centuate the differences of the two rites, and made the Slavic- 

 speaking peoples of the Greek Rite dislike everything that was 

 Roman or Latin. 



Their Return to Unity 



From 1438 to 1442 the Council of Florence was held for 

 the reunion of Christendom. It was attended by many Greek 

 prelates, among them six Russians. Isidore, Metropolitan 

 (Archbishop), first of Kieff and then of Moscow, with many 

 others, voted for the union of the Eastern and Western 

 Churches, and it was accepted by several bishops of southern 

 Rus. In the north the Russian bishops subject to Moscow 

 would have none of it, and even expelled Isidore when he re- 

 turned to Moscow. In Kieff the new metropolitan, Michael 

 Rahosa, united his whole southern province with Rome, and 

 Kieff remained until 163 1 with the Greek Rite in full com- 

 munion with Rome. In the latter year a newly-elected metro- 

 politan, Peter Mogila, broke away from unity and turned to 

 Constantinople and Moscow with his people. 



But in the Ruthenian portion of the Kingdom of Poland 

 the Greek Orthodox bishops and people found themselves neg- 

 lected, because the Turks had taken Constantinople and fhe 

 Moslems threatened all Europe. Besides, Protestantism was 

 making inroads upon the Greek churches. The effect of the 

 Council of Florence had not died out. Moreover, the Jesuit 

 fathers, then newly established in Poland, set themselves ear- 

 nestly to effect a reunion of the two churches. In 1595 the 

 Greek Ruthenian bishops of Lithuania and Little Russia de- 

 termined to return to unity with the Holy See, and in that 

 year held a council at Brest-Litovsk, where a decree of union 



