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Originally Posted by guthmund
Well, I'll be damned. 
Well, then why is everyone talking about the possibility of the first black Pope? It seems pretty clear from that drawing that Miltiades was black. *shakes head
And my how times change. Miltiades managed to make the Papacy and was black, while above him St. Martin DePorres, born several hundred years later, "...friend to Spanish, Indians, Negroes and all people" wasn't even ordained as a priest due to his race. |
Well, I get the feeling that a lot of people wish he was black, but no one is completely sure. Of course when Miltiades was ordained the Europeans hadn't quite settled into their role as Christians. Just a few years before Emperor Diocletian had persecuted Christians, though a decade after that Constantine embraces Christianity. I think they were too busy trying to stay together to develop racist issues within the church. (To be fair I knew
none of this off the top of my head).
I like to think Miltiades was black, but the more I think the less sure I am. I do know that Africa had been exposed to Christianity by that time, mostly in the north of course, by the Meditteranean.