RICHARD West (Catholic Herald, Sept 18) gives us a very interesting historical background to the present conflict in the former Yugoslavia.
However, the impression that in 1054 a kind of medieval Iron curtain came down between "Catholic" Croatia and "Orthodox" Serbia is a little simplistic.
Communion between Rome and much of the eastern Church was not automatically broken by Cardinal Humbert's stupid and arrogant excommunication of the Patriarch of Constantinople.
For example, Stephen II of Serbia asked to be recognised as king by Pope Honorius III and was duly crowned by a papal legate in 1217.
In 1222 he was again crowned by his brother, Archbishop Sava.
Sava, although ordained a bishop by Patriarch Manuel 1, had informed the Holy See of his own episcopal ordination. St Sava is regarded as the patron saint of Serbia.
Kingsley Fulbrook Bristol