During most of their tenure as Byzantine emperors, the Palaiologan dynasty was not well-liked by their subjects. Not only were the means the family had used to gain the throne grim, but their religious policy alienated many within the empire. The Palaiologan emperors aspired to reunite the Eastern Orthodox Church with the Catholic Church of Rome, to ensure legitimacy in the eyes of the West and in an attempt to secure aid against the many enemies of their empire. Michael VIII succeeded in a union at the Second Council of Lyons in 1274, which formally reunited the churches after more than two centuries of schism. Michael VIII was taunted with the words "you have become a Frank", which remains a term in Greek to taunt converts to Catholicism to this day. The union was passionately opposed by the Byzantine people and of Byzantine rulers not actually under Michael VIII's control, such as John II Megas Komnenos, Emperor of Trebizond, and Nikephoros I Komnenos Doukas, the ruler of Epirus. Despite Michael VIII's efforts, the union was disrupted in 1281, after just seven years, when he was excommunicated by Pope Martin IV. When Michael VIII died in 1282 he died condemned as a traitor and a heretic by his people, who saw him as someone who had bullied them into submission under the Church of Rome. He was denied the traditional funeral pomps of an Orthodox Emperor.