www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Hus and the Catholic Church

The problem with Jan Hus wasen't so much that he was a heretic, but rather that he was such a great admirer of a heretic, i,e, John Wycliffe.

Re-interpret the Bible on the basis of human genetics ??? I can see it now. I just brutally murdered ten people, but it's really not my fault becuse I'am genetically predisposed to commit murder, and I'll have a note signed by three psychiatrists with me on judgement day.

Dear Lawrence,

Before I go on my deserved sabbatical, just a note to say that the issue of Wycliffe and Hus has been treated extensively in recent times.

Catholic historians note that Hus gave a Catholic "inflection" to Wycliffe that was not in Wycliffe's original writings.

And Wycliffe's student, Jerome of Prague, who was a friend of Hus and was burned to death a year after him, travelled to Latvia where he became an Orthodox Christian - Jerome's Orthodox baptismal certificate has been found and the Czech Orthodox church or some groups in it, are considering the possibility of glorifying Jerome of Prague as an Orthodox Saint.

Hus became a great hero of the Cyrillo-Methodian movement of the 19th century which hailed him as someone who was essentially dedicated to restoring the Cyrillo-Methodian heritage of Bohemia.

And the Ukrainian poet and bard, Taras Shevchenko had this to say about John Hus in his poem called "The Heretic:"

Accept my "duma" about
the Holy Czech
the Great Martyr
the Glorious Hus!

And I will pray that all Slavs may one day become as "heretical" as the great Heretic of Constance!"

After his death, images and icons and statues of Hus appeared all over Bohemia and beyond.

The Jesuits tried to get rid of the popular cult of John Hus and, toward this end, introduced the cult of St John Nepomuk, the saint of the confessional, drowned because he would not reveal a queen's sin mentioned in confession.

But, in 1963, the Catholic Church, having studied the ongoing charges by Czech and other historians concerning the historicity of John Nepomuk and the real reason for his cult, removed the name of St John Nepomuk from her universal calendar.

Also, Matthew Spinka has written a number of irenical books on the subject of John Hus and the Council of Constance toward the end of aiding the rehabilitation movement of Hus in the Catholic Church.

John Hus is honoured in the calendars of the Polish National Catholic Church, the Old Catholic Churches, those of the Hussite tradition and ALSO among converts to Orthodoxy who were formerly of the Hussite tradition.

A Czech Orthodox priest once wrote me to say that he wished the Orthodox Church would formally allow the liturgical veneration of Hus and Jerome of Prague - his entire parish consisted of former Protestant Hussites who continued to privately revere these and he could, he said, bring even more over to Orthodoxy as a result.

I wrote the akathist that has caused so much trouble here specifically for those who venerate Jan Hus, including converts to either Orthodoxy or Catholicism who continue to venerate Hus privately. The Lutherans have also taken an interest in this and have seen in this a kind of bridge of understanding (it has been published by the Lutherans and is used in some parishes in Germany).

I've met a Lutheran pastor who was in Ukraine, converting Ukrainians over to Lutheranism.

But he now wishes to become an Orthodox priest as he says he sees he's been in the wrong church.

He appreciates my little "bridge-making" efforts and I'm sorry if that offends people here.

Hus was a Catholic priest who was known for his great piety, especially toward the Blessed Virgin Mary and the doctrine of her Assumption into heaven. He preached frequent prayer, scripture-reading and reception of the Sacraments.

He gave many retreats and wrote much on spiritual renewal in a time when morality among celibate priests in Bohemia was at an all time low and when the religious life of the people was also in a state of great crisis.

That national conflict between the Germans and the Czechs was also at play is shown by the fact that the Czech Inquisitors that investigated his theological views gave him a clean "bill of health" - but not so when it came to the German Inquisitors.

And the movement to rehabilitate Hus is actually strongest in the German Catholic Church today - as I also know from several conferences I've attended over the years at St Michael's University here in Toronto.

The memory of Hus is preserved in the Czech Republic today (and in Slovakia) by public services - the day of his martyrdom is the National Day of the Czech Republic and the RC Primate also participates in services at Hus' statue in the Prague square.

His condemnation by Constance can be overturned - it is not written in stone. The Pope has, once again, expressed public regret over Hus' death and has encouraged a Vatican commission to reopen his case.

Can Hus become a saint of the RC Church? I think we will all live to see that one day. But there are many who venerate him privately, Orthodox, Catholics and others, and who will continue to do so.

God bless you and take care!

Alex

There are several fundamental Christian groups in Ukraine who are making inroads into the Eastern part of the country. There is at least one (can't remember the name) which recognizes Taras Shevchenko as a modern Ukrainian Saint. Will they adopt Hus also ?

I know I'm going to set of storm of debade, but here goes......

As DJS righly points out, behaviour is a complex phenomena which can't easely be atributed to one single element. However, new technologies such as MRI in combination with our vastly improved understading of genomics are rapidly increasing our overall comprehension of the complex relationship between; human genotype, morphological neurological phenotype, (both within varied biochemical environments) and expressed behaviour (within a social environment). Of course biochemical stimuli in eutero vs neonatal environments can vary significantly and ultimately produce various phenotypes and ergo behaviour. The variables are almost endless, but there appear to be several constants which are clearly indicative of certain behaviour.

There may very well be 'uncontrolable' biological basis for what we consider 'sinfull behaviour'. It may not be controlable the way other 'impulses' or sinfull behaviour can be managed (ie: liying, stealing, etc...). We (or at least part of humanity) may be hotwired (genetically predisposed) and unable to control these 'needs'. When I say unable, I mean the way you can't control the colour of your eyes, or the height you grow over your lifetime.

I would rather not list some of the 'sinfull behaviour' because I got in hot water for being too graphic when speaking about AIDS in another thread. Basically, it was suggested that I go to another site to further that discussion. I guess this is more of a 'familly channel'

The next 20 years will produce an exponential amount of hard data regarding our understanding of biology in relation to behaviour. Probably more than the last millennium.

Mike,

If you were a young lady and were thrown in prison and hanging around a bunch of male warriors, wouldn't you want some form of protection? We tolerate nuns wearing pants and man-suits because their superiors and bishops tolerate it.


Alex,

It is quite obvious that your 2.46 x 10^6 departure is making less a statement every week. Anyway, it doesn't mean anything to anyone anymore. I believe the impact level has finally touched its asymptote (read: zero effect).

I invite you to seriously consider finding other things to keep yourself busy, especially in regard to church life. The Internet forum is not usually a place to learn, but where one only gets better in articulating their position on some issue, not necessarily their faith, to the chagrin of fellow Christians. You are a good man who can truly contribute elsewhere where your impact can be felt better.

You want to be heard so much. There is obviously an undertoe of hurt you are feeling. Many of us have been there. We dealt with church politiks, being misled and lied to, the Peter Principle, and Christians whose interest in theology and ministry is only to promote their own position. Church can become, to those burnt by inept caregivers, a necessary evil. Charles Kimball wrote a book entitled "When Religion Becomes Evil." I'm sure we can all write a chapter for the next edition.

Maybe it is time to find meaning in life elsewhere ... where Evil doesn't harbor?

God bless,
Joe Thur

Dear Cantor Joe,

Yes, I won't be back here and just as much as there are those who have had enough of me, I've had enough as well.

It is time to move on and I have found something else to keep me occupied - you are more than correct.

I wish you every success in your professional and ecclesial life - may God richly bless you always!

Alex

Alex,

It is times like these when we can/should take a retreat and write. You are pretty good at that, eh? I am sure that many more can appreciate your erudite knowledge of things Eastern Christian if you can write up some pamphlets and/or brochures to be approved and distributed in our churches.

Our parish mostly has pro-life literature on the literature stand. Nothing against pro-life literature - I support it 100% - but I believe the Church can say more, especially to those who don't kill their babies or grannies. We have to stop preaching to the choir, especially the ones who know it all. We get visitors who find the same literature in their own parishes or congregations. We need literature to pass out to guests and visitors who have never been to an Eastern Church. No sooner we get a good handout from the eparchy, we run out of them and they are never replenished. I only find copies in our eparchial museum or on the floor behind the counter of the bookstore at our shrine in Burton (so all that Tridentine lit can be passed out instead)! We can't rely on eparchial newspapers. Many of them are just cut-and-paste newswire articles about the Latin Church. There are too many pics of our church administrators conducting more senseless Evangelical meetings and conferences that go absolutely nowhere. It is times like these that laity must step up to the plate and finish the ballgame. I think you can do it, big guy.

There is a serious void in good material to find in our narthexes. The Mormons, Protestants, and Jehovah Witnesses are more apt to push their wares via printed media - and for free! It would be nice to read a few 'good ones' written by our knowledgable professor from Canada. (BTW, I have French ancestry from Acadia - BEFORE the Brits made them leave in 1755. They were the LeBlanc family that later settled in Baltimore, MD after the Great Deportation from French Acadia. So, we DO have a Canadian connection. Someday, we will have to drink a Molson to that.)

You have written thousands of posts on these forums, including the ones that got lost due to the server/website crash. Unless one is keen enough to dig deep into the archives and use the 'search' command, all that well-written articles become lost. Maybe it is time to wrap up the golden ones and re-publish them elsewhere? I know that you already contribute to an Orthodox website regarding theology and such.

I don't think I need to tell a doctor how to do the research.

God bless,
Joe Thur

PS: Send me your e-mail address via a PM so we can keep in touch.

Dear Cantor Joe,
I agree, we are in desperate need of good material. People with writing talent and the scholarship of the level of Dr Alex can do a great service by helping to create the literature we need to evangelize this culture.

My parish is in need of these things, we would need a lot of help to prepare them ourselves, and I am definately not qualified.

In Christ,
Michael

Dear friends,

I think everybody should be heard here if they have anything to say, as long as we keep our sense of humor. So as to whether any one of us should stop participating all I can say is that I get pretty sick of it myself sometimes and wouldn't blame anyone for leaving. I have cut way back on my participation and I believe I have reached a point where I have very little substance to share now and all I post is opinion anyway. So if you could bear with me this time I want to share another unsubstantiated opinion.

I am addressing the original contention that Jan Hus was a heretic because I believe that it is very easy to dismiss the man as a heretic and forget the very great issues involved in his condemnation. These issues are of great importance to Byzantine Catholics and I believe that they are very appropriate to this discussion group.

While I will not claim to be an authority on all things Hus I will say that I believe Alex is right-on in his assessment of Hus. He was not a heretic, he was a victim of politics. He is a martyr. The German-Austrian bishops and Imperial government are more responsible for the creation of the various heretical factions than anything Hus himself could have done, due to their persecution of Czech nationalists who eventually lost faith in all things Catholic.

The Slavic lands south of the Carpathian mountains were largely evangelized by the mission structure set up by Cyril and Methodius. From the Czech lands all the way to the Black Sea and south to Macedonia the initial successful Christian missions were Eastern Christian using the Slavonic language. There is very compelling reason to believe that even southern Poland (north of the mountain chain from Bohemia) was first reached by the Slavonic Eastern Catholic missions started by Cyril and Methodius before the conversion of Volodymyr at Kyiv.

While Rome was largely indifferent or supportive of the Slavonic missions. Venice and Salzburg were actively competing for the hearts and minds of eastern European peoples, an easy target was the eastern Catholic churches which were pirated away from their Byzantine bishops and transformed into Western churches. The evidence for it is everywhere there if you know what to look for.

Huge mostly Roman Catholic areas comprising Slovakia, Hungary, Bohemia, parts of Croatia, Poland and probably Bosnia were once largely Byzantine, although we cannot make a case that these areas were fully converted before the Latin rite takeover.

In some areas Roman Catholic children are still confirmed at the time of baptism, because the people there were originally eastern and couldn't be persueded to abandon the practice. In Croatia and some other areas the Glagolitic mass was served until VatII, it is actually the Tridentine mass in Slavonic, yet most Catholics are totally unaware that this form of the mass existed and why it was promulgated. I am of the opinion that even the Polish custom of blessing Easter baskets is probably of Byzantine origin, The Poles honor Cyril and Methodius for evangelizing them, yet also honor Saint Adalbert, a Latin rite bishop from 100 years later, the last Greek rite priests were expelled from southern Poland in 1022.
http://csnmail.net/~bocohio/svorad.htm

Hus was primarily targeted for promoting liturgical practices that would be familiar to eastern Slavic Catholics, and still dear to many "untransformed" Czechs of his day. The trumped up and flimsy heretical claims were added strengthen the case for eliminating him. It is a fact that Bohemia was dominated by the Holy Roman (German) empire at the time and the causes for Hus and against Hus took on nationalist or empirialist coloring respectively.

So I would be careful in calling this man a heretic, if ones reading material is limited to Tan books or something like them I wouldn't expect to find anything more than rehashed old one sided polemic dredged up from the days when the German bishops were actively smearing the holy and honorable priests character.

I think I have said all I want to say about this topic. Fire away if you will, but Alex is right!

In Christ,
Michael

Dear Michael,

What a well written piece.

Many of the hitorical facts as you have presented were told to me by my very own father. As a young boy (in Halychyna / Galicia, Ukraine) he was taught that the Polish peasants for a period of time were Byzantine (that's why they like icons), and the hierarchs Latin. The Latin rite was then forced from 'TOP TO BOTTOM' on the peasants. For this reason he said they were taught that it was their responsibility as UGCC byzantines to push 'UP' their rite on any 'Latinizing' or 'Latinphile' rite hierarchs within the church. They didn't want the same mistake happening twice .

I think this would make a great short historical narative which would make good reading in a number of Ukrainian newspapers. Can I get your permission to move forward on this ?