 During their rule as emperors, the Palaiologoi were not well-liked by their subjects, mostly on account of their religious policy.The repeated attempts by the emperors to reunite the Greek Orthodox Church with the Roman Catholic Church, and thus place the Byzantine church in submission under the Papacy, was viewed as heresy and treason.Though Constantine XI died in communion with Rome (and thus as a "heretic"), his death in battle against the Ottomans, defending Constantinople, made the Greeks and the Orthodox church remember him as a hero, redeeming popular opinion of the dynasty as a whole.