www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Kievan Christianity

Latin, Greek and Syriac

It seems to me quite normal that our spiritual forbears in the one Church of Kyiv did not consider "Catholic" and "Orthodox" to be mutually exclusive terms, just as they did not consider it hopelessly incongruous to maintain Eucharistic communion with both the Elder Rome and the New Rome.

I would disagree that the Alexandrian is a "substream"; this may oversimplify and pass over the unique Alexandrian as well as by extension Armenian contributions.

Either this means that Orthodox theology is identical the world over - in which case, why bother to study the Greek theologians, Byzantine theology (cf. Fr. John Meyendorff's book by that title), the Syriac theologians (including such people as Saint Ephrem the Syrian, Saint Isaac the Syrian, and above all Saint John of Damascus), the Russian theologians (the list is long and impressive) and so on - or that the Ukrainians are so absymally ignorant that they never produced any indigenous theologians (Saint Peter Mohyla either never existed or never produced his Great Trebnyk, his Catechism, or much of anything else; Saint Paissy Velychkovsky is a myth, and on, and on).

This is particularly rich when Halia 12, who identifies herself as Ukrainian Orthodox, writes that

Quote:
We Ukrainian Orthodox have to keep reminding the Eastern Catholic Ukrainians about this.


The fact of the matter is that the Greek-Catholic Ukrainians are, indeed, far more interested in Ukrainian Orthodox theology than present-day Ukrainian Orthodox seem to be. To give only one example, Arkady Joukovsky, who is himself Orthodox, and went to considerable trouble to do his beautiful reprint of the Great Trebnyk of Saint Peter Mohyla, tells me that the Greek-Catholics purchased the large majority of the copies of the book. It doesn't surprise me, but it is a striking example of what Ukrainian calls меншевартість.

I could continue at some length.

Fr. Serge

"To be sure, the Orthodox Confession of Faith by Petro Mphyla needs to be viewed in its seventeenth-century context. To use the document today as a defense for Orthodox Theology or as a response to protestant or Roman Catholic criticism would be a betrayal of orthodoxy. Rather the document's theological importance and relevance lie in its role as a purely historical treatise of the living faith. Petro Mohyla was a leader of a confused and shattered Church, who kept the spirit alive by contributing, however erroneously, in the larger perspective, to he sanctity."
Andriy Partykevich,
"The Orthodoxy of Petro Mohyla" Faith and Culture, 7 (1985-1989), p. 82.

In Western Canada, the some Ukrainian Catholics have in the past claimed that we could create a "Ukrainian" faith based on Petro Mohyla's works.

You'll have to cite some specific references to be fair. I've never heard this at a Sobor or seen it in any theological journals. To base a faith on the writings of one man, even a saint, does not seem sensible.

Perhaps I should explain the context of my comments. This topic came up in the form of a question at our church's recent Sobor in Saskatoon this past August and was answered by no less a theologian and professor that Dr. Fr. Oleh Krawchenko.
He said there is no such thing as a "Ukrainian Orthodox faith". We Ukrainian Orthodox share the same faith as the rest of the Orthodox church: Greek Orthodox, Serbian Orthodox, Bulgarian Orthodox and yes even Russian Orthodox.

But I would keep in mind the fact that there is no such thing as Kyivan Spirituality, Russian Spirituality, Greek Spirituality. There is only ORTHODOX and HETERODOX spirituality.

The ethnic flavors are secondary.

"To be sure, the Orthodox Confession of Faith by Petro Mohyla needs to be viewed in its seventeenth-century context. To use the document today as a defense for Orthodox Theology or as a response to Protestant or Roman Catholic criticism would be a betrayal of orthodoxy. Rather the document's theological importance and relevance lie in its role as a purely historical treatise of the living faith. Petro Mohyla was a leader of a confused and shattered Church, who kept the spirit alive by contributing, however erroneously, in the larger perspective, to her sanctity."

In Western Canada, the some Ukrainian Catholics have in the past claimed that we could create a "Ukrainian" faith based on Petro Mohyla's works.

Your statement was quite direct. This quite clearly makes allegations of statements by Ukrainian Catholics.

You return by citing Ukrainian Orthodox sources. Your initial statement is no closer to substantiation. As I have stated no such proposal as you allege to have been made has appeared in any proceedings of a Ukrainian Catholic sobor or in any journals that I know of. I have the article in question from Faith and Culture; nowhere can I find any assertion of the creation of "a 'Ukrainian' faith based on Petro Mohyla's works" by a Ukrainian Greek Catholic theologian or cleric.