www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Orthodox Christian in Communion with Rome

leaving the preposition aside for the moment, we do indeed believe and accept the papal position of the first Millennium.



Dear, dear. That would mean that the Church of Greece, the Church of Cyprus, the Church of Poland, the Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia, the Russian Old-Ritualist Orthodox Church, and the "Orthodox Church in America" do not fit the qualification to be considered Orthodox. I might be so rude as to suggest that this "mirror image" is an attempt to devise a Catholic-style definition which is not going to fit the wonderful world of the Eastern Churches.

But don't start shopping for a bullet-proof vest; I have no desire to shoot you!

Fr. Serge

Father, bless. By mirror image I meant most Orthodox are Byzantine Rite just like most Catholics under Rome are Roman Rite.

As for the autonomous churches, changing under to in communion with 'one of the Orthodox patriarchs' fixes the problem with the language. (Greece is sort of under Constantinople but autonomous and those who don't recognise OCA autocephaly says it's still the American metropolia of the Russian Church.) The point is they're in the Orthodox communion. Greek Catholics including high-church восточники (OicwR) are not; no knock on them, just a fact.

Schisms like the Russian Old Ritualist Church and the cluster of Old Calendarist ones fall into an interesting grey area: not in Orthodoxy but obviously related to it and part of the family (not like Western vagantes claiming to be Orthodox). Sedevacantist RCs are a good parallel.

Nationalist schisms like the Kyiv Patriarchate are more like the SSPX: obviously from the same church and not separate in principle but out of communion for being uncanonical.

Likewise as I like to say I don't call things Roman Catholic that aren't really and truly under Rome. (Partial exception for the SSPX: Rome agrees it's an internal disciplinary/canonical matter not a matter of a separate church.) There's been a lot of bad, slanted news coverage of a little protest/spite schism calling itself Roman Catholic Womenpriests. The offending, sensationalistic headlines and opening paragraphs say things like 'Local woman makes history by being ordained a Roman Catholic priest' then four ’graphs down it says 'Not recognised by the Vatican'. (Like 'I'm an NBA player. I'm not listed on their rosters, they don't pay me and I'm not allowed to play in their games but I say I'm an NBA player.')

RISU and other RC-orientated news services tend to report on the various schisms in the Ukraine (KP, UAOC) as though they were Orthodox like the Moscow Patriarchate (the country's canonical Orthodox church) is. I've pointed out this is bad reporting as would be calling the Polish National Catholic Church Roman Catholic.

ISTM a good Greek Catholic as Rome envisages him is somebody who is unlatinised liturgically and holds to everything Rome teaches — 21 ecumenical councils, the post-schism papal claims and definitions of doctrine — but tries to explain/express it in Byzantinese: Rome's vision of OicwR or what it thinks Orthodoxy should be.

Even though the two sides are so close, the Orthodox would say that 'Orthodoxy with the Vatican glued on top' as Brendan Ross once put it wouldn't be Orthodoxy any more.

The Blessing of the Lord!

Sorry - the Church of Greece, the Church of Cyprus, the Church of Poland, the Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia are all autocephalous, not autonomous - and the Orthodox Church in America holds a Tomos from Moscow giving it autocephalous status.

There are, strangely enough, some "Western Orthodox" groups who have no active connection with any Orthodox autocephalous Church but nevertheless insist on being called "Orthodox". A priest of one of them once said to me with an air of disdain that "Orthodoxy means right belief, not right connections"!

Then again, trying to decide precisely who is "in the Orthodox communion" and who is not can be an Excedrin headache, if you'll forgive my slightly archaic terminology.

The Russian Old-Ritualist Orthodox Church would indignantly, and with a serious show of reason, deny that much of anybody has a right to judge their Orthodoxy. They have my sympathy, but that alone does not solve the ecclesiological problem.

The cluster of Greek Old-Calendarist groups (Romania and Bulgaria are a different discussion) seems to re-align with amazing, even dazzling, frequency. Perhaps someone will offer a computer program to enable us to keep track of them. But that might be considered cheating.

So far as I know, the "Society of Saint Pius X" has nothing to do with anyone's nationalism. But I could easily be mistaken. The Kyiv Patriarchate's claim is rather complicated. But they publish good books, which makes it worthwhile to keep track of them.

As to the "Roman Catholic Womenpriests" nonsense; this is not a schism (having no authentic bishops or clergy), it is simply heretical and idiotic. But such things seldom if even have much staying power.

RISU is Catholic-oriented? Can't say I'd noticed. Perhaps I should read them more often.

"The Polish National Roman Catholic Church" Now there's an idea: a church which asserts that it is simultaneously Polish, nationalist, oriented to one Italian city, and universal! [Just in case I might mislead anyone: there is no judicatory calling itself by that name, and you did not suggest it; just for fun I assembled it from a couple of elements you mentioned.]

Byzantinese? Definition, please! Until the mid-20th century it was always a Greek-speaking city (conceding that Greek has changed several times over the millennia) and is now, alas, a Turkish-speaking city (a moment, please, while I weep and rend my garments). Although, to be fair, the Phanar does seem to have its own peculiar dialect of Greek - a form of katharevousa closely approximating koine, with an esoteric result making it difficult for most Greek-speakers to read it.

Orthodoxy with the Vatican glued on top sounds like an architectural abomination and is certainly not what we have in mind when we assert that we are indeed Eastern Orthodox and we are indeed in communion with Rome! However, I could lament for the good old days before the invention of the electric light when they used to "illuminate" Saint Peter's for a big feast or the equivalent by having an amazing number of candles both inside and outside the great dome, placed in such a way that the wind would not blow them out. Light bulbs just aren't the same.

with every blessing, fraternally yours in Christ,

Serge

With people from churches outside the recognised communions that have the C or O word in their names the nicest thing to do is use the full name of the church to clear up confusion, much like the qualifying adjectives in the Episcopal priest for the Revd Mary Smith or the Methodist bishop (no need to get into a theological discussion/argument when being polite): The Revd John Bloggs, a priest of the Anglican Independent Catholic Church; Mar Paul, a bishop of the Ecumenical Inclusive Orthodox Church. (Made-up people and church names for illustration.) Lest Mar Paul anathematise us. (Somewhere Peter Anson is smiling.)

The answer to the fact that RCs have a claim on the o word at least as far back as the church fathers as well as the Roman (Gregorian) Canon as has been mentioned, and Orthodox on the C word (again, church fathers): use a big O for Orthodox and tack an adjective onto the C word. The Greek Catholic priest. Some people use a small c (the catholic churches, etc.) to disambiguate from RCs; that's fine but I usually don't.

The SSPX is like the KP not in being nationalist, which the SSPX is not, but obviously related to its parent church, still part of its family.

Byzantinese: Orthodoxspeak, Byzantine theological lingo, from соборность and theosis to mysterion and phronema. But you knew that.

Etnick,
If you wish to be harsh, only The Church of Rome can rightly claim the title "Orthodox" since it has presereved the faith fully.
So please try to be a little more charitable in the future.
Stephanos I
The two terms are not mutually exclusive nor the terms soley the perogative of either Church.
In the 1st Eucharistic Prayer or the Roman Canon it is used to define the Church orthodox catholic faith.

John Paul II of Rome was fond of exhorting everyone to be Orthodox in faith and Catholic in love.

Then of course there is the term "catholic" as in "catholic taste", which has nothing to do with anyone's religion. In that sense, one could presumably be more catholic than the Pope and not orthodox in the least. Come to think of it, I've probably met such people.

Fr. Serge

How do you come to this conclusion when Rome alone devised "Immaculate Conception", "Filioque", et al.

Stephanus, you forgot to add "in my opinion" to the end of your sentence "If you wish to be harsh, only The Church of Rome can rightly claim the title "Orthodox" since it has presereved the faith fully." If you don't, you could be accused (rightfully so in my opinion)of the pot calling the kettle black. Of course, if you intended to omit the phrase, far be it for me to tell you what to do. I do note that you included the phrase "if you wished to be harsh." It remains unclear to me whether or not I should take your statement seriously; if not, I withdraw my comment.

Ethnick, you noted. "How do you come to this conclusion when Rome alone devised "Immaculate Conception", "Filioque", et al." Your argument is just as weak as Stephanus'(assuming his comment is what he believes)! Both of you assume you have a lock on the truth. Under such circumstances, debate is not possible and you should both retire to your own corner.

Who wants to debate what's not debatable? Roman Catholic dogma is not binding or accepted by the Orthodox. It's a non issue as far as we're concerned.

Ethnick, I am a member of the EOC just like you are. You seem to be ignoring the fact that Stephanus could say, "Who wants to debate what's not debatable? Eastern Orthodox dogma is not accepted by Roman catholics. It's a non issue as far as we're concerned." There is always room to debate and agree to disagree. Only Jesus has a lock on the truth, neither you nor I nor Stephanus do. All we can hope is to come close to his role model.


I must admit, darn it, I feel very uncomfortable defending the RCC against comments made by one of my own Orthodox brethern!

I guess my point is that for someone to say that only Rome has preserved the faith, when at the same time they introduce dogmas that are only binding on that church, and not believed in by another just shows how far apart the two really are.

Despite the recent ecumenical gestures, much work needs to be done.

I have no problem with that statement, Ethnick, because you have a good point and I cannot disagree with you.

P.S.,

It's Etnick, not Ethnick.

Good quotation from JPII, Father.

I recall reading about Greek Catholic car-bumper stickers that said something like 'Orthodox in worship, Catholic in dogma', the C word here meaning 'under Rome'. That of course is what Rome wants from the Greek Catholics.