www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Christianity in ancient Ireland - Catholic or Orthodox?

Alex wrote:

Yep, that's what I meant. But I have heard people express the sort of views that Stuart mentioned.

Dear Eric,

Do you see how well I understand you!

Did you get my message about St Eric of Sweden?

And did it convince you?

Alex

It seems a little arrogant for Orthodox Christians to claim that these Celtic peoples were Orthodox back then. Naturally, every member of the Church before the schism was considered Orthodox by the Orthodox, and Catholic by the Catholics. However, to be fair, after the schism all (or a very overwhelming majority) of the Celtic peoples sided with the West and continued to be members of the Catholic Church. This being said, I think that these Celtic practices are a wonderful addition to the West (since they are Western) and to the whole Church in general.

ChristTeen287

Any examination of the practices of the Celts shows that some of them are not Western in the Roman sense, but of Eastern origin.

We have to be careful of using Eastern-Western as though they are opposites and as though Western=Roman and Eastern=Orthodox. As the last point says - before the schism the entire Church was Catholic, Orthodox and Orthodox. In fact, if we were to drop any of the labels it would be Orthodox; this label only became necessary after the schism.

The way that Western is been used in this argument is meaningless: the Celts were a unique combination of aspects of Eatern and Western Christian tradtition and do not fit into any convenient 21st century niche. However, if we have to find the most similar tradition today, archaeology and history would tip the balanca in favour of Orthodoxy. Yet, this doesn't mean that they were necessarily Orthodox. The same comparison would equate the Copts and Armenians with Orthodoxy - but they are not Orthodox, and remain separated from the Universal Church (at least from that bit of it which still remains loyal to the Councils and fathers).

With love in Christ -
Fr Mark.

I would like to take something that Fr Mark said one step further. I know this is off topic but I must say it.

I agree with this, but to take it one step further.

Should we attempt to bring back something from our Traditions that have died out years, centuries, ago? Like the Cathedral rite or deaconesses, just to name two.

Shouldn't we try to explore the reasons that these traditions died out in the first place rather than just tring to restart them becuase they once were practiced?

Just thinking out loud,
David

The last post raises excellent points!

Perhaps I should be me more specific with my use of the word Tradition. By this I mean the whole corpus of Tradition.

The issue of deaconesses is a good example. Whilst this practice lapsed in Orthodoxy, it was revived in Russia in the 19th century and in Greece in the last century. This was one aspect of the Byzantine Tradition. This aspect of the Tradition had lapsed, but the Tradition itself continued.

In the case of the ancient western liturgies, they and the Tradition they represented came to an end. Of course, local rites continued within the Roman Catholic Church, but from an Orthodox perspective the Milanese, Ambrosian, Mozarabic, Sarum rites etc. died.

Within Orthodoxy various aspects of Tradition have been revived, but these have only been aspects within a living Tradition.

With love in Christ -
Mark, monk and sinner.

Dear David,

Yes, but this is assuming that traditions and roles and even Rites that did die out, died out for "natural reasons."

One could say that this is what happened to the role of deaconesses, for example (and I think we've said enough about that issue!).

But with respect to the Celtic, Sarum, Gallican, Mozarabic and other Particular traditions of the West, I think it is safe to say that these were "done to death" by Roman Church ascendancy that imposed ritual uniformity on the West - and largely continued this policy with respect to the Eastern Catholic Churches in communion with it by way of Latinization.

St John Maximovitch of San Francisco loved the Western traditions and the Saints. His great contribution was to try and precisely do what Fr. Mark mentioned - disassociate "Eastern" from "Orthodoxy" by his restoration of some Western liturgies, the establishment of the French, Netherlands and Spanish Orthodox Churches etc.

The Celtic Church is a "Western" Rite geographically, to be sure. It is a unique combination of Western liturgy, Coptic monasticism and uniquely Celtic traditions. Its highly de-centralized ecclesial structure has led many today to see it in terms of their own ecclesial traditions, be it Orthodox or even Protestant.

It was a Particular Church within the united One, Holy, Orthodox-Catholic and Apostolic Church of Christ.

The Roman liturgy was imposed on the Celtic Christians, but this does not mean that the Celts have ever lost their longing for the fullest possible expression of their Celtic spirituality such as is to be had within their ancient Celtic Rite.

The Celtic liturgical rite, having suffered an untimely death under the Roman Church, remains something that can be brought to life to produce much evangelical fruit in the lives of Celtic Christians. It is already being "resurrected" by all sorts of groups with different agendas . . .

The same can be said of other liturgical traditions in the West.

This argument can also be extended to include Eastern Catholic Churches which are struggling to return to their Byzantine, Alexandrian, Armenian and Syriac traditions.

Some would say that because Latinisms have been so much a part of our liturgical lives for so long that these are now "integral parts" of our Particular ecclesial/liturgical existence - despite what Vatican II said.

Some could use the same argument against the meaningful resurrection of Western liturgical Rites within Orthodoxy and Catholicism with respect to our situation with Latinization!

The Catholicism of the Celtic lands shows a great desire for more Celtic spirituality and religious expressions of it. And the same can be said for what just might be dormant (rather than "dead") desires for ritual resurrection in other Western Churches that were once "Particular" with their own liturgical and theological traditions.

I know several Orthodox priests belonging to Western Rites.

There is tension and struggle along the path they walk. But, from what I can see at least, it is all well worth the effort.

Alex

Alex,
I couldn't agree with this more stongly, that is why I said;

David

Dear David,

Then we see "I to I" on this!!

God bless,

Alex

Father Aidan Nichols has written extensively re this. Gimme a minute. I'll look up the book and get right back to you.

ZT

Dear Edric:

Found it! Bingo!

Go to this website:

http://www.christendom-awake.org/pages/anichols/publicat.html

About halfway down the page, you'll come to an article entitled, "The Roman Primacy in the Ancient Celtic and Anglo-Celtic Church."

Unfortunately, it's from an Italian journal. :p

However, if you write to Father Nichols, I bet he'll send it to you in translation...or at least let you know the gist.

I believe you can reach him through:

webmaster@christendom-awake.org

God bless,

ZT whose Irish ancestors (on one side) were most certainly Catholics...saints preserve us!

Stuart wrote:

It's just as anachronistic to claim that "nobody" thought of the pope in such a way. Just because some historians make such claims does not make it true. From everything I've read by the fifth and sixth centuries the papacy enjoyed a very high prestige in the Church. For example:

Writing about AD 730, Venerable Bede explains how Pope St Gregory is credited with the conversion of England: In the year of our Lord 605, having ruled the apostolic Roman Church most illustriously for thirteen years, six months, and ten days, the blessed Pope Gregory died and was taken up to his eternal home in heaven. And it is fitting that he should receive special mention in this history, since it was through his zeal that our English nation was brought from the bondage of Satan to the Faith of Christ, and we may rightly term him our own apostle. For during his pontificate, while he exercised supreme authority over all the churches of Christendom that had already long since been converted, he transformed our still idolatrous nation into a church of Christ. [A History of the English Church and People, Bede, Book Two, Chapter 1.]

Dave Ignatius DTBrown@aol.com

What did the likes of Bede mean by primacy? The primacy of honour given to the first among equals, or the absolute monarchical primacy which caused so much division in the following centuries?

With love in Christ -
Mark, monk and sinner.

Dear Dave,

Father Mark makes a good point.

But I place your comments in context with your concern with Stuart's earlier commentary which makes me consider your conclusions to not be in collision with Fr. Mark's concept concerning your consternation.

Alex

Dear Reverend Father:

I believe "the likes of Bede" accorded a heck of a lot more than mere "primacy of honor" to the pope. It's the "mere first among equals" concept that's anachronistic, IMHO. It arose from medieval polemics, but it has no foundation in patristics. As early as Clement of Rome -- heck, as early as Peter -- we see the popes exercising a primacy of jurisdiction, with real authority.

I know this is a vexed issue, and neither your airy assertions nor mine will settle it. But I submit that the patristic record overwhelmingly supports a papal universal primacy of jurisdiction, and I think there are many folks (on this board and others) well equipped to demonstrate this from copious patristic citations.

With all due respect and asking for your blessing despite our differences....

ZT