Dear brethren,

From my understanding, it appears that Roman Christianity, Alexandrian Christianity, and Syriac Christianity tend (!) see the doctrine of the Atonement through a "legalistic" lense. Byzantine Christianity however takes a more "holistic" approach towards to the Atonement. One of the many issues dividing the Greco-Russian Orthodox Churches and the Catholic Church is the question of the Atonement.

I am concerned about the issue. All my life I have understood the Atonement through the Roman legalistic lense. Most Protestants (from what I understand) hold, in one way or another, to the legalistic concept of Roman Christianity, so that was the understanding that was imbued to me. Now I have learned that an equally ancient and Apostolic Christian traditions looks at it through a holistic understanding.

My question revolves around who is "right."

Due to my experience with Byzantine Catholics, who my Melkite-Greek priest affirms are essentially Greco-Russian Orthodox in communion with Rome, I firmly believe that the Catholic Mystery (i.e. the true faith defined by the 21 Ecumenical Councils) can be expressed through many different lenses. Hence, Rome does not object to the Byzantine Catholic Church not having a "legalistic" understanding of the Atonement.

HOWEVER, in some of the Ecumenical Councils, particularly Trent, the doctrine of the Atonement appears (at least to me) to have been "defined" through the lense of scholastic legalism, which is common in Roman Christianity.

I am now stuck in an impasse. If it appears as though the Ecumenical Council of Trent defined the Faith with scholastic/Roman legalism terminology, then how can the Church hold to the Councils and allow a "holistic" understanding in the Byzantine Catholic Churches?

The tenuous conclusion I am clinging to is that, while the Council did use scholastic terminology (since most of the East had gone into schism anyway thus the Church of Christ remained largely "Roman"), that does NOT mean that scholasticism ALONE is the only way the Paschal Mystery can be expressed. The Paschal Mystery is just that, a mystery. We use philosophy to try to explain what Christ did on the Cross, but in the end it is a divine truth of the Triune God.

Thus, Byzantine Catholics are free to view the doctrine of the Atonement through any lense they want, HOWEVER they cannot reject the scholastic legal definition of Rome or the Coptic understanding of Alexandria, even if they choose not to express the Paschal Mystery through those definitions.

Is this conclusion Orthodox? I am seeking help in this for I wish to resolve this issue in my mind. I think it is a critical question for the One, Holy, CATHOLIC (katholikos), and Apostolic Church.



I eagerly await replies,

-Antonius Ioannes

Just a quick response...

Bear in mind that Trent was primarily a reform Council called to respond to many of the negations of Luther. Its definitions should not in any way be considered comprehensive, especially not on their own. The treatment of the priesthood makes barely any mention of the need for preaching the Gospel, which was highlighted by Vatican II.

Very often differences between East and West are really more of emphasis. The East primarily exercises its magisterial authority through the liturgy which makes it less systematic in its presentation, but often more robust and rich. The West certainly has a tradition of liturgy as an expression of the magisterium, but is more prone to make official magisterial statements, which also can be rich.

God bless,

Fr. Deacon Daniel

I will agree with Gordo- these differences are more of emphasis than substance; one can find support for both understandings of the Cross in the New Testament.

Knightwolf:

I think that this question, like so many others, must be answered in the affirmative of "both/and" rather than "either/or." What we are learning in this era of Church history is that the riches that each Church brings to the discussion of these mysteries helps all of us to fully understand a bit better. I think that that is what Pope John Paul II of blessed memory meant when he said that the Church must breathe with both her lungs.

The idea that one Church must be right and one must be wrong because we have different emphases or different approaches is something that has caused much damage to the One Body of Christ and to the many of us who are members of it. We are impoverished when we are apart from one another. And this impoverishment comes because Christ came here to find each of us and to bring us together, not to separate us by language, culture, or theological approach.

Another problem that arises with many of my brethren who have studied the councils of the Latin Church is that they get fixated on the teachings of one or another without learning the historical context or of failing to view all of them through the prism of the latest. The latest calls us to a whole new way of looking at people, ritual expressions, theological expressions, and everything else that seems to divide us. While there are certainly serious theological issues, many of the things people run aground on are really different ways of approaching the same Mystery--the Mystery of God Who has come among us to befriend us.

In Christ,

BOB

From my limited understanding (please recognize brethren that I am still very much a neophyte), the West tends to emphasize a view that sin is more of a "crime." Thus Atonement becomes, as St. Anselm appears to have argued, a substitutionary sacrifice to atone for the crime that was committed. The East (I am really only familiar personally with Byzantine Easterners) has this IMO odd notion of sin as a "disease." And so from what I hear the Atonement is less (if any) of a notion of atonement for sins against a just God, but rather a healing of the disease. I have seen what I believe to be traces of the "crime" mentality and the "disease" mentality in things like the differences between East and West on Original Sin.

As I struggled with this last night I opened the Catechism of the Catholic Church and viewed its explanation of the Paschal Mystery. The Catechism quotes the Council of Trent saying:

"Jesus atoned for our faults and made satisfaction for our sins to the Father." (CCC 615).

Now, to my newbie mindset, this sounded very much like the "sin is a crime" legal idea. IOW, we had a debt to pay (or price) that Christ made a substitutionary satisfaction for our sins and now we are able to approach God. The Byzantine Catholics rarely approach it in that manner as I understand it....they tend to go off into some tangent that ends with a theosis mentality (not that that's a bad thing, I tend to like Theosis).

Also, please understand something else. I may simply be totally missing the mark on this whole problem I am struggling with because prior to my full Initiation I almost embraced Eastern Orthodoxy. Thus, I still have (IMO) some baggage from alot of the anti-ecumenical wing of Orthodox apologetics.

In the end the big struggle I am having is:

If Rome has defined something with a certain terminology, then aren't we as Catholics (of whatever sui iuris Church) bound to believe the theology according to those terms?

In the end this issue is bringing back "up the bile" that I meddled in when Orthodox polemicists would teach me that Rome had marred the original Tradition with Latin scholastic stuff and that Eastern Orthodoxy had perserved the Faith undefiled.

I took a brief look at the "Christus Victor" theory, and that only helped to further cause doubt in the Catholic Church. It seemed, in many ways, to be an attempt to discredit the Roman Catholic Church as having a theology corrupt with legalism whereas Eastern Orthodoxy had maintained the "original" Christus Victor notion.

Antonius,

Your posts indicate you're really thinking deeply about these matters--this is good, since it helps get some of us thinking about them as well.

As far as your being a neophyte, it doesn't hurt to remember that before an infinite God we all have very little understanding.

If I may present my own reflections on "sin as crime" vs. "sin as disease," the important thing to note is that we can distinguish between God's attributes, but we can never regard them as entirely separate. Thus, we can regard sin as an offense against God's justice OR as an offense against God's love, and in either case we would only have part of the picture. An offense against Justice would certainly qualify as a "crime," while an offense against Love would be more along the lines of "disease" (i.e. our woundedness makes us unable to respond to God's love).

On the other hand, one could go so far as to argue that Love, being God's "greatest" attribute, takes precedence over Justice ...

I've got to wrap this up--to be continued.


Peace,
Deacon Richard

Antonius,

I admire your desire to understand more fully the mysteries of Our Lord's salvific work for us! Just be sure that your searching is always based in prayer, fasting, and humility.



There is some truth to what you say, but you are building a greater wall than truly exists. If you read deeply in both the East and the West, you will see that there is definite "bleeding" between the two in regards to most doctrines. For example, there are Eastern saints who tend to speak of sin as a "crime" and Western saints who likewise see sin as a "disease". As both outlooks contain truth within them, this is understandable.



In short, no. What we as Catholics are not allowed to do is to reject such terminology as heretical. However, that does not mean that we must personally accept it as the only means of describing a certain mystery. We recognize that human language and philosophy is incredibly limited in comparison to the divine realities. For example, I believe it was Chrysostom who said that even the Scriptures were like God using "baby-talk" to describe His saving work, due to the inadequacy of human language to explain the eternal Word and His work. If this is true of the inspired Scriptures, surely it is true of theological definitions!



Again, you are too quick to see "either/or" where "both/and" is more applicable. The Western Church also sees Christ as the Victor on the cross - for example, note that the last Sunday of the liturgical year is "Christ the King" and his kingship was inaugurated on the cross.

We see this multi-faceted outlook within the Gospels themselves. John emphasizes more the reality of Jesus as divine victor over sin and death. The synoptics on the other hand, emphasize his humanity and weakness as a man. For example, Matthew has Jesus saying in the garden of Gethsemane:



John, however, omits any reference to Christ's suffering in the garden, and even includes the following:



To our limited human viewpoint, it could look like John and the synoptics are talking about a different Jesus. But of course, they are just emphasizing different truths about the God-man. The East and West have also done so over the centuries.

And to think that one tradition has withstood all corruption is at best naive, and at worst, a deliberate misstatement of the facts. Both Churches have had occurrences of taking specific doctrines too far in one direction without appreciating other aspects of the mystery.

Over time, I have come to appreciate both the Western and Eastern outlook to divine mysteries, as they allow me to grasp (even if still on a very limited level) their reality more fully.