THEODORE I

born , Jerusalem died May 13, 649, Rome pope from 642 to 649. Although noted for his generosity to the poor, he had to devote most of his pontificate to combatting Monothelitism, a heresy maintaining that Christ had only one will. Theodore refused to recognize the uncanonically installed patriarch Paul of Constantinople. Paul and his predecessor, Pyrrhus I, had relapsed into Monothelitism, for which Theodore excommunicated Pyrrhus in 648 and deposed Paul in 649.