www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology Saint Josaphat:Apostle of Union

Victoria did ask a very valid question, however. There are plenty of websites devoted to denouncing Mother Teresa (of blessed memory) as evil.

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How anyone could denounce Mother Teresa as evil is completely beyond my comprehension! To me, she was an earthly saint who has now become a heavenly saint. I hope none of those websites are Orthodox. If they are, I offer my apologizes.

I did not have Orthodox in mind when referring to websites "exposing" Mother Teresa. I was trying to illustrate how polemics can turn something beautiful into something apparently "evil." Whether this is the case with St Josaphat I cannot answer. I think, however, instead of blindly quoting an "authority" from a rather polemical piece to prove on this forum how "evil" St Josaphat was it would be better to find some other proof.

I agree with Robert about Mother Teresa. I pray fervently for her canonization.

Holy Mother Teresa of Calcutta, pray to God for us!

Dave Ignatius DTBrown@aol.com

Rusnak wrote:
(St Thomas Aquinas believed in astrology!);
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That's a pretty astounding statement; care to back it up?

Mark

Robert wrote:
A man who was so reviled by the Orthodox that he was stoned to death. In all honesty, if the man was as saintly as he is being portrayed here, it would be hard for me to believe the Orthodox reaction to him would have been so violent. Some thing had to spark such a reaction.
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You don't have to look too hard for an example! Consider our Lord's passion, as imitated by St. Stephen, protomartyr.

May the prayers of those who died in witness to our gracious Lord, convert and purge us from all that keeps us apart, that we may together bless the Holy Trinity together in unity for all eternity.

May God bless us all, now and ever and forever.

Acts: 6:8 - 7:59
6:8. And Stephen, full of grace and fortitude, did great
wonders and signs among the people.

6:9. Now there arose some, of that which is called the
synagogue of the Libertines and of the Cyrenians and of the
Alexandrians and of them that were of Cilicia and Asia,
disputing with Stephen.

6:10. And they were not able to resist the wisdom and the
spirit that spoke.

6:11. Then they suborned men to say they had heard him
speak words of blasphemy against Moses and against God.

6:12. And they stirred up the people and the ancients and
the scribes. And running together, they took him and
brought him to the council.

6:13. And they set up false witnesses, who said: This man
ceaseth not to speak words against the holy place and the
law.

6:14. For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth
shall destroy this place and shall change the traditions
which Moses delivered unto us.

6:15. And all that sat in the council, looking on him, saw
his face as if it had been the face of an angel.

[...]

7:54. Now hearing these things, they were cut to the heart:
and they gnashed with their teeth at him.

7:55. But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looking up
steadfastly to heaven, saw the glory of God and Jesus
standing on the right hand of God. And he said: Behold, I
see the heavens opened and the Son of man standing on the
right hand of God.

7:56. And they, crying out with a loud voice, stopped their
ears and with one accord ran violently upon him.

7:57. And casting him forth without the city. they stoned
him. And the witnesses laid down their garments at the
feet of a young man, whose name was Saul.

7:58. And they stoned Stephen, invoking and saying: Lord
Jesus, receive my spirit.

7:59. And falling on his knees, he cried with a loud voice,
saying: Lord, lay not his sin to their charge: And when he
had said this, he fell asleep in the Lord. And Saul was
consenting to his death.

That's a pretty astounding statement; care to back it up?

Glory to Jesus Christ. I thought such might have been common knowledge among those who know such history, such as those who read forums like this. I didn�t mean to offend anybody. My source is an article in the Roman Catholic magazine New Covenant from 1991; I forget which month and who the writer was.

<A HREF="http://oldworldrus.com">Old World Rus�</a>

Dearest in Christ,

It has been my observation, that much of what we think we know of history, is merely the lense that a particular partisan wishes us to view it through. For St. Thomas, author of the Catena Aurea (a compilation of the commentary of the Fathers on the 4 gospels), to have fallen prey to a belief condemned by the fathers and the OT, stands out as a less then likely proposition. Thus I asked the basis of such a claim. Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, the New Covenant does not have back issues on line, so I can't go any farther with this.

The usual example of error cited for St. Thomas was his rejection of the concept of the Immaculate Conception. Yet even this can be reconciled, if one cares to look carefully at what he wrote...

Thanks for responding,
Mark

I'm nervous about some of these quotes from the 'ancient ones'.

While Thomas of Aquinas and lot of other folks have made statements that folks take as 'gospel', they aren't.

God alone is perfect; we humans waddle about in theories and pronouncements that are, of necessity, contaminated with human perspective and error.

Why are we getting all upset about human pronouncements when the Gospel is so straightforward: Love God to the best of your ability; love your neighbor as you would love yourself. Toth wasn't perfect; Mother Teresa wasn't perfect; Aquinas wasn't perfect (!?!?!), nor any other human except Jesus Christ.

They did the best with what they knew. Follow Christ, and allow the rest to be judged according to the knowledge of their times, including Archbishop Ireland, the founder of Orthodoxy in the U.S.

Dumbness is the hallmark of human endeavor.

Blessings!

Someone asked where he might find an out of print book, so I thought I'd make a suggestion in that vein: Try Bibliiofind [bibliofind.com] for used and out-of-print books. I've found lots of great books through this service, like Dvornik's Photian Schism, Soloviev's Russia & the Universal Church, and Ars Sacra Pekininses (sp? the works of the Fu Jen Catholic University painters, used liberally by the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood).

If you can't find your book, try Bibliofind [bibliofind.com] .

Let me go back to the earlier statement that reunion between the Churches of Rome and Constantinople will only occur if the Ukrainian and Ruthenian churches are liquidated. I would like to suggest to both Latins and Orthodox who expect to participate in our liquidization, they will likely meet about as much success as the Communists did in their failed attempt.

K.

Kurt:

Perhaps we can cut an agreement that upon union between Rome and Constantinople, the Eastern Catholic Churches will return to Constantinople's jurisdiction--because in a reunited Church Eastern Catholics would not have to lose communion with Rome, and no one would really notice the difference.

anastasios

Now here is a saint everyone both Orthodox and Roman Catholic can agree on.
Mother Theresa's canonization.
Its a start. What do you think a joint canonization between the RC's and the O's??
Man, what thought. Maybe Im just dreaming.
But you never know.
JoeS

Dustin,

My point is that it is not my, yours, or anyone else's perogative to liquidate the Ukrainian Autocephalus Catholic Church nor the Byzantine Ruthenian Autonomous Church. With re-union, we will all be in communion with each other. It will take the consent of the full Ukrainian and Ruthenian churches to subject us to Constantinople. From what I have read, this is not a issues from the Orthodox side.

Kurt

Kurt,

I've been waiting for someone to point out that the Eastern Catholic Chruches are just that. Churches! Why would they be absorbed by anyone?

It seems to me that rather being something to assimilate into another Church, they are in communion with each other and the Patriarch of the West. With reunion, they simply come into communion with the Eastern Churches that are not now in communion with the Patriarch of the West.

In this situation, the struggle of the Eastern Chruches in communion with the Patriarch of the West to maintain their communion and their intimate experience with the thought and practice of the West and of the East make them not discardable, but indispensible.

No matter how the Eastern Catholic Chruches came to be, they are and ISTM that they should be valued by the communion to which they belong now and the communion with which ISTM they will commune again. At some time when all of the Chruches answer Jesus' call that all be one, we will look back and recognize the positive impact that the Eastern churches in Communion with Rome have had in the process.

I am a Latin Catholic, but it seems to me that the larger Churches, the Latin and the Orthodox both, can both learn from the wisdom that the Eastern Catholic Chruches have gained from your struggle to be faith-filled and loyal to both of them.

It seems impossible that they will ever recognize your value to each of them and to God's work of building a body in full communion. But to have theological dialogue that realistically moves toward this goal must have seemed impossible to both the Crusaders and their Eastern Christian victims in their day.

We can only pray and build on the work that the Eastern Catholic Churches have done thus far.

Maybe someone has made these points before, but I'm new to the list. It bothers me to read threads that seem to question the importance of these Churches and the Love of God for them.

>>>Why would they be absorbed by anyone?

Dear Latin brother:

It seems that it would be redundant to have in a reunited church two Ruthenian Churches, two Ukrainian Churches, etc.

The Slavic Byzantine Catholics seem a lot less eager for what Kurt calls liquidation, what others call repatriation--because they were mistreated heavily by the Moscow Patriarchate in the 16-17th century, among other things. The Melkite Church, however, has been in the opposite position--they attempted to "liquidate" themselves by en masse being reabsorbed into the Antiochian Patriarchate, provided that they would retain communion with Rome. Neither Rome nor Antioch liked that idea.

I don't see Ukrainians or Ruthenians or Melkites being repatriated with their Orthodox equivalents as being liquidated, however, as in such an agreement two CHURCHES would be comming together--hence the Catholics would be bringing their 500 year existence with them--something which Kurt has constantly defended as valid and "real". It is of course real since real people really did it! So it wouldn't be a wholesale abandonement of one side for the other by any means. However, it just seems redundant to have overlapping jurisdictions in an ecumenically reunited context.

anastasios
(Kurt: hope I didn't misrepresent any of your views; correct me if I did)

My point is that it is not my, yours, or anyone else's perogative to liquidate the Ukrainian Autocephalus Catholic Church nor the Byzantine Ruthenian Autonomous Church.

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When did the Ukrainian Catholic Church become autocephalus? Same question on the Ruthenian Churches automony?

If the above is true then please explain why the celibacy rule is still in effect here in the U.S. for both jurisdictions. Also explain why Bishiops of both jurisdictions had to adhere to Vatican rules for retirement age if they are members of autocephaleous and automonous churches. And why their retirement requests went to the Pope rather than the highest ranking Bishop of both their churches.

Bob