MARTIN I, SAINT

born , Todi, Tuscany died Sept. 16, 655, Cherson, Crimea [now Kherson, Ukraine]; feast day April 13 pope from 649 to 655. Martin succeeded Theodore I in July 649. Martin's pontificate occurred during an extensive controversy that had strained relations between the Eastern and Western churchesnamely monothelitism, a heresy maintaining that Christ had only one will. To bring an end to the controversy, Martin convoked and presided over the Lateran Council of 649 that condemned monothelitism and the Typos, an order by the Byzantine emperor Constans II Pogonatus that forbade discussion on Christ's wills. Constans, who had not approved Martin's election, ordered the pope's arrest. Martin was taken to Constantinople (Sept. 17, 654), publicly humiliated, and banished to the Crimea in May 655. He was honoured as a martyr.