www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West What west and east really believe

On CAF I noticed a lot of EC's professing that most don't understand RC doctrines, and that east and west are fundamentally the same. I see some orthodox of corset making division where there need not be any.
But where can I go online to find official ec/eo teachings to verify what east really believes... I know I can go to cc to find what RC believes.
Thanks

The Orthodox, of course, consider that the matters on which they and we Catholics are in disagreement are extremely important; thus I'm not sure one can fairly imply they artificially or unnecessarily posit divisions where there need not be any.

And as a Catholic I can't - nor will I ever - join their Church because I believe in most of the very specifically Catholic things they object to or label as heresies.

The only substantive issue which the Orthodox consider to be important is the prerogatives of the Bishop of Rome with regard to the Petrine Primacy.

Let me add there are plenty of RCs who create a divide as well and are just as polemic as the orthodox. And I am referring to the online world exclusively here.. although there is a local EO parish that has some rather polemical and anti-Catholic material on its site so that's almost "real" right?


But seriously, I see a couple of EC's that are very conciliar in their approach it seems because either they know east/west definitions and beliefs better than east and west folks do or they are skewing what is actually taught.

This also seems to be the prime difficulty behind the filioque as well -- ok that and trying to determine what the two churches actually teach. I.e. What does "is" mean?

IMHO, the solution is that the East recognize that the filioque is not heretical when seen from a latin perspective only because the phrase "and through the son" seemed to be acceptable to both as an understand (eventhough we don't recite it that way). And the west should drop reciting the filioque because it is not proper to change the Creed for the whole Church unilaterally eventhough this was done over a millenium ago. The west can keep its theological understanding, of course, but I think it is very important for ONE Creed for ONE Church.
Just one humble Latin's opinion on the matter.

This paper may be instructive on the realities behind the 'filioque' debate. It can fairly be argued that the real problem lies with the role of the Pope of Rome with respect to the imposition of the filioque and not necessarily the theology behind it. http://www.scoba.us/resources/orthodox-catholic/2003filioque.html

However, the history behind it, and the passion that it enleashes from both east and west (and the 'urban legend' nature of much of the current understanding of the problem by both clergy and laity alike in both Churches) makes the resolution of the issue all the more problematic.

Hope this was of interest!

Of course, with its "Clarification" on the procession of the Holy Spirit, the Church of Rome effectively said the Orthodox had been right all along. The main irritant seems to be the retention of the offending word in the Roman Missal. Since the Church of Rome acknowledges that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father alone, and that the uninterpolated Greek text of the Creed of Nicaea-Constantinople is the only ecumenically binding symbol of faith, the Church of Rome should take the necessary steps to bring its liturgical praxis into line with its magisterial teaching.

I would suppose that the infallible teaching of the dogma of the IC would fall under the same heading -- in that while there is some considerable commonality between the two, there idea that a Pope declared it infallible makes it a difficult obstacle to overcome.

In begetting the Son, the Father is established as the Source of life in the Trinity. But in saying that the Holy Spirit proceeds from Father and Son is not a denial that Father is Source; it rather affirms the coequality, not only of both, but of all three since it clearly establishes a relationship of all. As far as I know, Rome has never said or implied that the Greeks are wrong, but that they err in condemning Rome for altering the text and the orthodox understanding of the Trinity. The text used in the Latin rite also adds the phrase "God from God". Why should these additions be omitted if they do not proclaim an heretical teaching? Rome is not demanding that the Greeks add either one. I find that demanding the unaltered text of the creed, in this case, is an excessive literalism. Gads, the text used in the Latin rite has been used for some 1200 years. Why can't we live with both without taking offense?

Because the Councils of Nicea and Constantinople I expressly mandated that no change be introduced into the Ecumenical Symbol of Faith! Secondly because over many centuries Rome invidiously accused the East of omitting the obnoxious addition! And this from the people who are currently having a hissy-fit over every real or imagined deviation from the 'original' Latin. Read Jeffrey on Translating Tradition and see how perverse our brethren from the waning of the light and the setting of the sun truly are! But I don't like to talk about people!

Yes, brother, there's enough offending actions on both sides to fill many books, but it's going on 2012 and we are trying to make peace with one another so that we may drink from the same cup again, alas. Perverse brethren? Please. From the remotest corner of the waning light and from where the rising sun can be first seen in the USA, I am Utroque.

But besides the additions, the text of Nicaea was changed by Constantinople I.

Rome? Officially? Where and when "over many centuries"?

Perverse, really, you know that? What and where in Jeffrey specifically?

??? "...how perverse our brethren from the waning of the light and the setting of the sun truly are." ??? Oh, the Western Church!?

I wonder why Brother Utroque can't just accept what the "Supreme Magisterium" of the Church has decreed. Also, the Filioque was not accepted in Rome until the eleventh century, and had been official rejected by Rome less than 200 years earlier. So was Rome right before it was wrong, or wrong before it was right, and if so, is it right again, or wrong again?

Also, it was the Council of Ephesus that decreed no changes could be made to the Symbol of Faith, save by another Ecumenical Council. Rome did not accept the Creed of Constantinople until the Council of Ephesus, and was reluctant to adopt the concept of "hypostases" as elaborated by the Cappodocian Fathers, particularly with regard to the Holy Spirit. Given the divergence of emphasis on the nature of the Trinity between the Western and Eastern Churches, it's not clear if the former ever entirely understood or accepted the neo-Nicene theology of the Cappodocians.

Rome did not officialy reject filioque in the 9th century.
Historians, such as Eamon Duffy, say that in private letters to the franks he said he had no objection to the doctrine.
The pope simply did not decree the change, moreover a frankish unilateral one, to the Credo, despite not objecting it.