www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology The Rule of the Mother of God

Alex, dear man, you have made 4 very significant statements about Orthodoxy. It would be a great help in future if you could substantiate such statements.

I do not believe in purgatory, but I do believe that our prayers assist the dead in the never-ending process of theosis as they are stretched into God for all eternity.

In my ignorance about Byzantine Catholics I do not know if they are obliged (by Lumen Gentium) to give internal assent to papal teaching, both undeniably infallible teachings and alsowhat the Pope teaches via his ordinary magisterium?

Anyway here is the papal teaching (Pope Paul VI) on Purgatory, indulgences and the temporal punishment due to sin....

"2. It is a divinely revealed truth that sins bring punishments inflicted by God's sanctity and justice. These must be expiated either on this earth through the sorrows, miseries and calamities of this life and above all through death,[3] or else in the life beyond through fire and torments or "purifying" punishments.[4] ........

"These punishments are imposed by the just and merciful judgment of God for the purification of souls..."


"INDULGENTIARUM DOCTRINA" http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/P6INDULG.HTM

Bless Father Ambrose,

Does Orthodoxy believe differently here? We are not punished for our sins etc.?

If not, where do I sign up to become Orthodox?

Also, about the above four significant statements, I believe you alreay answered two of them. St Peter Mohyla did include a statement on purgatory in his Catechism which was expunged by the Synod at Jassy, but he continued to keep it in his Catechism for the faithful of his Metropolia.

I've seen that in a number of articles which I should look up.

HOWEVER, getting back to the Rule of the Theotokos, my prayers have been answered by the Most Holy Queen of Heaven, and I begin my new job, the job I wanted, on Monday!!

My purgatory on earth has been abated . . .

Reverencing your right hand, I again ask for your blessing,

Alex

Orthodoxy has no teaching of temporal punishment due to sins.

Christ assumed every single iota of the eternal punishment due to our sins.

Surely it is of no importance in the fulness of the Church and its Tradition that one bishop expressed a theologically erroneous belief about Purgatory. The Synod of Bishops affirmed the true Orthodox teaching by removing his statement.

Bless Father,

Erroneous or simply a theological opinion? He wasn't condemned for heresy at Jassy.

Archbishop Kallistos Ware has written that an Orthodox Christian, should he accept something like the Immaculate Conception as a theologoumenon, would not be branded a heretic as a result.

And certainly St Dmitri Tuptalenko of Rostov and others weren't.

Alex

Met. Kallistos has done a volte-face on this. If you search CAF there is a letter from him on this. He has rejoined the Church in its rejection of the IC and now sees it as damaging to orthodox theology (Christology or soteriology, I don't remember which.)

That proves the point that there is no spiritual benefit in presenting the idiosyncratic beliefs of either Mogila or Ware as if they were indicative of true orthodox teaching. Mogila's teaching of Purgatory was synodically renounced at Jassy. Ware, with the typical good grace of an Englishman, renounced himself.

You focus a lot on the Ukraine and I am getting the impression that the intertwining there between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches has in past centuries had a destabilising effect on Orthodox theology in that region. Does the converse hold true? Have Ukrainian Catholic Bishops and/or synods adopted and proclaimed Orthodox doctrines not taught by the Vatican and the Church's Magisterium?

Is what I wrote not in harmony with the teaching of the Church?

With all respect., I would assess it as a rather low key harmony but I appreciate that Byzantine Catholics walk a tightrope on a number of beliefs where there is disharmony between them and Roman Catholics. I was reading a thread on Purgatory last night which highlighted this disjunct. Some wrote they are 100% in harmony with Roman Catholic teaching on Purgatory. Others categorically rejected it.

Ref. "Purgatory and Orthodoxy"
https://www.byzcath.org/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/307920/1

Bless, Father,

I focus not so much on Ukraine (not longer the Little Russian province of "the Ukraine," fyi), but on the Kievan Baroque era.

And what is in Russia throughout this era that does not emanate from Kiev directly?

That era produced great Orthodox saints who were undoubtedly influenced by the West.

And they were influenced by the West NOT because of the existence of Eastern Catholics in western Ukraine (in fact, relations between the two were not good then), but because of other factors, such as Poland's political pressures, those of the European Jesuits and of Catholic and Protestant European civilization as a whole.

The EC's figured very little in this. As for Russia and Constantinople - the former had not come into its own as yet and the other was dominated by an anti-Christian foreign power.

So, yes, a focus on Kiev and the Kievan Baroque of that era (including a number of leading Greek Orthodox teachers and saints who read and appreciated a number of aspects of the Catholic West) is entirely justified.

Eastern Catholic bishops have, in fact, sought to move toward a more Orthodox approach to their own spiritual heritage and move away from a Latinist one (and this ALSO goes for a number of Orthodox circles which, by their own admission, have been "infected" by Western theological paradigms).

The EC bishops have a long way to go, but they are no longer the "Latin-imitating uniates" of yesteryear.

We also have our local parish priests who have set a brilliant example in this respect and have moved forward with the "Easternizing" paradigm.

Such parishes don't use the Filioque, don't talk about purgatory or other decidedly Latin issues, discuss papal primacy within a collegial context while emphasizing more their own rights as Particular Churches.

Then they also focus on Eastern liturgical and spiritual life, Divine Liturgy, the horologion, the Jesus Prayer, the Fathers of the Church and the like.

However, I think we have strayed very far from the original theme of this thread and that perhaps these posts should be re-routed elsewhere.

Alex

Since a significant number of their deceased family members and friends are undoubtedly among the Holy Souls in Purgatory, it seems odd that they would not talk about this. Presumably they would not seek to shorten the suffering of the Holy Souls by offering indulgenced prayers?

Metr. Kallistos' correspondence with Daniel Barton reveals that he now sees the Immaculate Conception as producing some kind of distortion in the history of mankind. Under those circumtances it would be highly irresponsible of any bishop to allow his flock to profess a belief in what he judges to be a distortion.

Daniel Barton:
"In sharing my thoughts with Greek Orthodox Bishop Kallistos Ware, he informed me by letter that he "personally does not believe the doctrine as it changes all of history of
mankind"."

Taken from MY BELIEF IN THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION DOCTRINE
DANIEL JOSEPH BARTON (Of the Byzantine Ruthenian Catholic Church of America)

http://mysticalrose.tripod.com/barton3.html

This is helpful but somewhere Met. Kallistos has expressed himself in stronger terms.

Bless Father,

I totally agree.