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What is the source in the pre schism conciliar tradition of the church that allowed for Ea Semper? By what authority did that happen? Why do Eastern Catholics use Annulments? By whose dogmatically defined authority? What is the pre-schism conciliar basis of the provisions of the CCEO?

What was Ineffabilis Deus? The pious opinion of one particular church expressed by an important bishop with vaguely defined prerogatives? Was it the product of illusory powers?

We've been through this before.
By your definition then, Ephesus and Chalcedon are not and were not ecumenical because they have not been received by the OOC and ACoE.

Ahh, but you say, they believe essentially what is in them, just formulated differently.
To which i reply, that might be our udnerstanding now, but it certainly wasn't the understanding in, say, the 12th century.

Therefore, this criteria of yours fails because it was certainly not received by those groups.

Now, if you want to assert some kind of "implicit reception" that only becomes apparent centuries later on, I would then respond, then wait a few hundred years and you'll also see Trent, Vatican I and Vatican II were received all along, it just isn't apparent to you now, but they certainly are, indeed, ecumenical.

The Oriental orthodox and the Church of the East would certainly agree that they do not subscribe to the definitions of either Council, but on the other hand, they subscribe to the faith underlying those formulations, which is the basis for all the Agreed Joint Christological Statements. To me, how you try to define an ineffable mystery is not nearly as important as holding the proper substance of truth--as Pope John Paul II himself said.

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In the twelfth century, nobody was actually listening to anybody else. If they had been willing to get past their own interpretations of what the others were saying, and instead had tried to understand what they were actually saying, a great deal of tragedy could have been avoided. Also, for a variety of reason, much of the material necessary for mutual comprehension just wasn't accessible to everybody back then.


Reception happens when it happens. There is no time limit on it. It's not like a counsel is a proposed amendment to the Constitution, which must be ratified by two thirds of the states within a prescribed time or it fails. Rome, for its part, did not get around to accepting the First Council of Constantinople until the Council of Ephesus some fifty years later (which means the Cappodocian Fathers, technically, died out of communion with the Bishop of Rome--the horror!). But, after 450 years, I am pretty sure that Trent is not going to be received outside of the Roman Church, nor Vatican I after a century and a half. Vatican II more or less proves the point, since by any ordinary (which is to say non-apologetic) reading of the conciliar decrees, it's not at all clear that Rome has still received all of Trent or Vatican I. Rome, no doubt, would call it a "clarification" of the earlier councils, and I am willing to let them do so (wink, wink, nudge nudge. Say no more, say no more!)

I am so sorry the organic reality of Church history is so much messier than the neat theories of history given in textbooks and catechisms, but there it is.

If you don't mind, I'd like to jump to question #6 (highlighted above).

Someone asked a related question a few months ago: Why is the Immaculate Conception considered Ex-Cathedra? I wasn't around at that time so I didn't participate in that thread, but basically my answer to him and to you is: The majority of Catholics consider Ineffabilis Deus to be an ex cathedra statement because Pope John Paul II said it was.

Oh, and Stuart, stop nudging, my ribs are getting sore.

Your response still doesn't fly, Stuart.
It happens when it happens still doesn't support your position.

I will say the same thing you said about Trent, V1, and V2:

I'm offering no neat theories. I'm offering logical conclusions based on the holes you present. I recognize the messiness. You don't recognize what we latins already do, much the same way the Copts didn't recognize back in the 5th century.

In a few hundred years, someone will be saying the same thing you are saying except they will be applying it to the Byzantines in regards to the Ecumenical councils you fail to see today.

Well ... your position is also based on the prediction that Trent will be accepted at some point in the future. Let's not forget that little detail.

Actually, Dan, your theory is based on the premise that Rome is always right.

I don't know about that. His reasoning is quite sound, provided that in "a few hundred years" Trent et al are recognized/received.

And if, in a few hundred years, pigs learn to fly, what would that prove? It's the height of arrogance for the Church of Rome to believe that its unilateral innovations of the second millennium, for the most part alien from or antithetical to, the Tradition of the Fathers, and contrary to the doctrine of every other Church, will just be accepted because. . . ?

The unspoken assumption here is these Latin councils will be universally received because the Church of Rome is the universal Church, and, of course, is always right (or at least, never wrong). But the historical record speaks otherwise, as to current trend in the development of Latin doctrine, all of which point to a return to the common beliefs of the Church of the first millennium. Rome was the Church that deviated, Rome is the Church that is restoring what it changed. If anything, time is on the side of those who would see, if not a rejection of reception for these Latin councils, at least a relativization of them, a demotion of them from being "universal" to merely "particular", and their doctrinal expressions binding only on the particular Church that issued them.

An interesting comparison, as the time limit is a recent innovation. Did they have time limits on amendments in 18th century Russia?

Amendment XXVII hung around for more than two centuries before being ratified by 3/4 in 1992.

If they do, I think that will prove quite a bit.

Similarly, if Trent, Vatican I, and Vatican II are received/recognized in the future, then (as the father in My Big Fat Greek Wedding would say) there you go. But for now we can't make a very substantial argument based on future reception -- which is the point I was making to Dan in the first place.

And why do they think that? Are they living under an illusion?

I'm not quite sure what you're asking.

Why are they conditioned to believe it is an infallible statement? If it is to believed that the post schism conciliar tradition is in fact not a dogmatic tradition, do they believe something that is actually an illusion?
Also
I am actually interested in the answers to those and am not just being obtuse.