An absolutely bizzarre theory too. Authority comes from God. Romans 13, St. John 19, etc.
Show me where I ever said anything of the kind! I insist on nothing of the sort! I am an old-fashioned Catholic monarchist and would support a Christian emperor any day of the week and twice on Sunday. I simply do not hold *any* temporal ruler to be above the authority of the Pope.
Neither did the Most Christian Emperors. See the Code of Justinian.
True enough, but that sounds a little elitist. The Germans adopted Roman culture and were capable of becoming just as refined and civilized over time as anyone.
Yes, over time, provided they did not pervert the culture in the interim. The later affinity of my Anglo-Tuetono-Scandanavian brethren for Protestantism suggests this did not happen in the main.
By the time Rome became Christian it was not very well united at all. The Church tried to restore this system as soon as it was able, but the very fact that Rome collapsed meant that it had to take some time before any relative peace could be reestablished.
Not very well united? Romans remained united for centuries after the German conquest. The Franks were dealing with Roman revolts in the 8th century.
So there is not doubt about the identity of the revolutionaries in Gaul, we quote a contemporary Frankish chronicler who reports that in 742, the year of Charlemagne's birth, the Gascons rose in revolt under the leadership of Chunoald, the duke of Aquitaine and son of Eudo, mentioned above. Charlemagne's father and uncle "united their forces and crossed the Loire at the city of Orleans. Overwhelming the Romans, they made for Bourges." [10 Fredegarii, Chronica Continuationes 25.] Since Chunoald is here described as a beaten Roman, this means that his father Eudo was also a Roman, and not a Frank, as claimed by some. (FRANKS, ROMANS, FEUDALISM, AND DOCTRINE, Fr. John Romanides)
The Romans had no doubt who their rulers were (Emperor and Pope), and who they were not (the Franks).
And if unity was important, that is certainly something Europe lacked until Napoleon.
I simply prefer the de-centralized system of the Holy Roman Empire, wherein the Emperor had authority over defense and foreign relations, leaving other matters up to the local authorities and where the Church was recognized as being paramount in all matters, temporal and spiritual. The Roman and Byzantine rulers, as much as I admire many of them, simply had a little too much arbitrary power for me to be 100% comfortable with.
There is no such thing as a Byzantine Emperor or Empire. Its a figment of your imagination. The last Roman Emperor and the Roman Empire itself died on the field of battle in 1453 against the Turks at Constantinople New Rome.