Hormisdas

Pope Hormisdas (c. 450–523) served as Bishop of Rome from 514 to 523 and is best remembered for ending the Acacian Schism — a thirty-five-year rupture between the churches of Rome and Constantinople that had strained Christian unity since 484. The schism had begun when Patriarch Acacius of Constantinople endorsed the 'Henotikon,' Emperor Zeno's attempt to reconcile the Chalcedonian and non-Chalcedonian parties through a compromise formula that effectively sidelined the Council of Chalcedon's Christological definition. Rome rejected this compromise, and excommunications followed on both sides. Hormisdas's diplomatic persistence finally bore fruit when a change in imperial policy under Emperor Justin I created an opening for reconciliation. On March 28, 519, in a ceremony in the Cathedral of Constantinople before a large crowd, the Eastern bishops formally accepted the 'Formula of Hormisdas' — a document affirming the authority of the See of Rome and the Chalcedonian definition. Over 2,500 bishops eventually signed the Formula, making it one of the most significant assertions of papal authority accepted by the Eastern Church. The Formula of Hormisdas continues to be cited in discussions of papal primacy.