www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Violence to the Sacraments

Here we go!!

After several times prodding me, without producing a response, Mor Ephrem has succeeded in getting me to open up a thread explaining my assertion about "violence to the sacraments" on the "Graceless Heretics" thread!

I warn you all in advance--read very carefully and try to understand what I am actually saying. I know Mor Ephrem needs no such caveat, but some on the forum might get enraged if they skimmed this post without really reading it.


Well, here goes--

I was very intrigued by Seraphim Reeves' assertion that the Sacraments could not be confected at all, outside the One True Church. This has been backed up as the "conservative" opinion by other Orthodox posters.

Nevertheless, the traditional Catholic teaching is quite different. In the Catholic understanding, the sacraments work "ex opere operato," or "from the work performed." Thus, provided that the minister in question has the power to perform the sacrament (e.g., the Eucharist requires a validly ordained priest; Ordination requires a valid bishop, etc.), and that he uses correct matter and form, and that he intends to do what the Church does, then the Sacrament objectively takes place.

Thus, a priest can take bread and wine and perform the consecration on my coffee table. It would be valid. The Change would occur. NEVERTHELESS, it would be a sacrilege, (an offence against the Sacrament), for him to consecrate outside of the Liturgy. He would be taking what is sacred (the Sacrament of the Eucharist) and doing violence to it. The REAL Sacrament, mind you--fully valid and all--but that is precisely why his offence would be so grave. No spiritual fruit would come to his soul--on the contrary, he would be committing the gravest of sins.

This situation is analogous to that of those who knowingly perform the Sacraments outside the bosom of the Church. They are taking what was entrusted to the Church, and casting it about. The Sacraments do not belong outside the Church any more than they belong on my coffee table.

I emphasize again that I offered this only in response to Seraphim's assertion that the Sacraments CAN'T be taken outside the Church (for him, the EO Church). If the Sacraments could not truly be offered by vagrante priests, then said priests wouldn't be nearly as evil as they are!! The reason why vagrantism is so bad, is because the ACTUAL SACRAMENTS are being profaned.


Now, does all of this apply to the Orthodox Church? Are the Orthodox doing violence to the Sacraments? Certainly, if people are not aware that they are outside the Church, then they cannot be judged guilty. Nevertheless, the objective reality remains that those who confect the Eucharist outside the Catholic Church are doing violence to It.

ARE the Orthodox outside the Catholic Church? Have the actions of the most recent vicars of Christ all but eliminated the terrible split? I need more studyand prayer over those questions.

All I know is that for myself, I must stick to Peter's successor.


I hope that this suffices for an explanation of what I meant on the other thread. I am sure that more discussion will ensue.


God bless, Phil.


Btw, I am moving up to Westchester so let me know when you're down from school. I am sure that we could discuss stuff more fruitfully in person. And I realize that you are not a Monophysite! :p


LatinTrad

LatinTrad,

Glory to Jesus Christ!

Isn't the church of Christ both Orthodox and Catholic? How can Orthodox Holy Mysteries be a sacrilege? After all they have the same sacramental mysteries as we do. Our Orthodox brethren could assert the same about us Catholics.

John, a sinner

Here something important. Now we say that mysteries performed outside the Church cannot confer grace for sure cause they're not in communion with World Orthodoxy; and that it's not about Apostolic Succession or the matter or validity as the Roman Church enphasizes.

But I recall that during the 1000's, the most important complaints by Eastern Christianity to Rome were all about matter and validity! Wasn't Roman Baptism seen as invalid when given through pouring, and their Eucharist seen as invalid because of the nature of the bread (unleavened)?

Why not getting a more centrist ecclsssiology? Both reasons seem logical. Sacraments outside the Church make few sense as modern Ecclesiology teaches, but an invalid sacrament or invalid order is just that (the Anglicans for example).

Dear LT,

Thanks for finally starting the thread so we can examine this question.

The Orthodox Church, to my knowledge, would agree with all of this, but not quite the way the Catholic Church would, and this is because of the way the Orthodox view Holy Orders. With regard to the Holy Eucharist, the position you state above requires a minister with the proper power, and for this, he must be validly ordained. But this view only looks at what happened on ordination day. The Orthodox teach that it is not merely what happened on that day that is important, but the fact that the minister in question is in the Church. The power does not come merely from the rite of ordination, absolutely essential as this is, but from one's communion with Christ's Body, because it is from Him that the power to confect the sacraments comes; He is the One Who performs the sacraments. How, then, can someone cut off from Christ's Body, the Church, confect the sacraments at all, when that person is cut off from the Power that confects them?

Right, which is why the Orthodox view makes more sense. The sacraments do not belong outside the Church; why would they ever be outside the Church anyway?

I don't know what you base your view that vagante "priests" are evil on. I imagine that many of them are quite nice, and believe sincerely in what they are doing. Nevertheless, they are outside the Church, and so they cannot confect the sacraments. I don't know if I'd call them evil as much as confused. If you believe that they can validly confect the sacraments, and they do so outside the Church, then I can understand why you would think they are evil. But I have never heard that they are evil, and I don't think that is the only view one can/must take about their situation based on Holy Tradition.

This is a reasonable answer. Of course, one might ask the question "Are the Roman Catholics in the Catholic Church?" since the Orthodox Church recognises itself as the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, but that sounds like another thread. :p

I sent you a PM inviting you for coffee some weekend that I'm home, but you never replied back. Send me another PM, or an email to enlightenedsince1981@excite.com, and let me know when you are moving to Westchester, and where you will be. I go home every other weekend at least, and after December I should be out of school and back there permanently. I look forward to meeting you and discussing these and other issues with you...knowing that I don't have to whack you over the head for mistakenly thinking I'm a heretic will make coffee all the more enjoyable for both of us, I assure you.

God bless!

Dear Latin Trad,

Good to hear from you. Thanks for your offering the explanation of the meaning of your comments that violence is done to the sacrament in some circumstances.

I'm still puzzled by your use of the term violence. Perhaps that is at the heart of my confusion.

What is the meaning of the word violence as you are using it here?

Is your use of the word peculiarly yours to mean an illicit action that is the result sin of sacrilege on the part of the priest who deliberately celebrates the sacrament in this way? Is it a technical term in canon law? From whence does it come?

I ask this because I've been told that even in those churches which are led by vagante bishops, the celebrations are most respectful. The effects of the sacraments that are celebrated among them are received by those who participate in them in good faith. The members of such communities would point out that they are indeed celebrated in the midst of a community with a bishop and priests in communion with him.

The assertion that the priest or bishop is evil because of the celebration is argueable, it seems to me. The Sacrament celebrated certainly is not.

In regard to the celebrations of sacraments among the Churches of the Orthodox Communion, haven't the decrees of the Second Vatican Council and other documents like Dominus Jesus recognized the fact that they celebrate the Eucharist? There has been no suggestion in those documents, as far as I know, that there is any violence to the sacraments done when the sacraments are celebrated among them.

Did I miss the teaching by authoritative teachers that said something to the contrary?

As you can tell, I still don't understand what violence you're pointing to.

Am I still missing what you are saying?

Thanks for your response.

Steve

Steve, what I am saying is not really that esoteric.

OF COURSE vagrante bishops and priests, if they have valid orders, are offering the Eucharist. OF COURSE the Orthodox-not-in-communion-with-Rome are offering the Eucharist.

Both groups often do so with great reverence.

But the very fact that the celebration takes place outside the Church is an offence against the Eucharist.

That is what I was saying.

LatinTrad

Dear Latin Trad,

Thanks!

Can you point me in the direction of official Church teaching that says this:

"But the very fact that the celebration takes place outside the Church is an offence against the Eucharist....?"

I ask this for a couple of reasons. I've been told that in case of a lack of a community that belongs to a Church of the Catholic Communion, we can ask to celebrate the sacraments in an Orthodox community. I cannot understand how this is possible if the "very fact that the celebration takes place outside the (Catholic, I assume that this is what you mean) Church is an offense against the Eucharist."

How can we be permitted to participate in an offense against the Eucharist?

Isn't the real offense to Church discipline and to Canon Law?

I don't understand how the Eucharist is profaned in what you are saying or what the violence is.

I don't want to belabor the issue, but it seems real to me.

Thanks for bearing with me.

Steve

With specific reference to those Eastern Churches which are not in full communion with Rome, the Second Vatican Council teaches that "through the celebration of the holy eucharist in each of these Churches, the Church of God is built up and grows." [Unitatis Redintegratio, 15] That is and remains the magisterial teaching of the Catholic Church on this topic. The Church teaches nothing of the sort about vagantes clergy, "underground Masses", and similar phenomena. Incognitus

Mor Ephrem,

You say that the Orthodox perspective is that for the priest to actually confect the sacraments, he must be within the Church. As you know, the Catholic position is quite different.

From a Catholic POV, as we all know, sacraments are indelible, un-erasable truths. If a priest has been ordained, he is a priest for the rest of his life (and afterlife) even if he breaks communion, is laicized, etc. The mark is indelible. The state of a priest's soul and/or his being inside or outside of the Church takes away from the fact that is it God Who really gives us the sacraments, not the priest. One cannot say that sacraments can't be confected by a priest bearing Apostolic Succession outside of communion with the Church without in some measure saying that the sacraments power comes from the priest himself, instead of from God.

St. Thomas Aquinas speaks of much of this in his Summa. Here's the link to the specific section: http://www.newadvent.org/summa/406409.htm

Logos Teen

Dear TL,

First of all, no one has said anything about the state of the priest's soul. That is Donatism, if I'm not mistaken, and I believe we addressed that elsewhere.

I do not understand how you can think that saying a priest's communion with the Church matters in the validity/invalidity of the sacraments takes away from God being the One Who really provides the sacraments, and makes it more of an action proper to the priest. I guess I can kinda see the logic there, but one could also make the point that the Catholic position (that as long as the ordination was valid, and proper matter, form, and intent are present, communion with the Church does not matter, and the sacraments are valid) takes away from the power of Christ working in His Body, the Church. Christ is the One Who really provides the sacraments for the faithful through the priest. But if the priest is cut off from Christ's Body, how does he have the power to do anything? Is there a separation between Christ and His Body?

A corrolary question, I think, is what exactly does priestly ordination give a man the power to do in Roman Catholic theology? If I'm not mistaken, you need faculties from your bishop to validly absolve. Perhaps to anoint the sick? You usually need special permission to confirm. Baptisms can be done by anyone, even someone outside of the Church, apparently. Marriages are only witnessed by the priest, and even this can be delegated to a deacon or other individual authorised by the Church. Priests cannot ordain. So what exactly can they do on their own? As far as I know, the only thing they can do without any faculties is celebrate the Eucharist. If this is true, why is this the case? If it is not, what other sacraments can be done without special faculties from the Church?

Acctually No!
The Orthodox do not do violence to the sacraments.
They are the Church, the have valid ministers, they are not outside of the Church.
In fact John Paul II has stated it may not even be said that they are in Schism. Schism he said is too strong a word to describe the situation of the Eastern Orthodox Churches.
He said that it might more acurately be described as a family dispute.
Stephanos I

Hello,

Well, I don't know about other Orthodox posters, but that is my position exactly.

There is only One True Church, and nobody can be saved except though her. Now, the means for this salvation are the Sacraments. It follows that the Sacraments are the responsibility of the Church and of her alone.

Then why we Catholics consider Orthodox Sacraments as valid? Well, because we consider Orthodox Churches to be true Particular Churches, and therefore, the reality of the One True Universal Church is very really present within them, even if their communion with the Catholic Church is not full and perfect at the time.

Whatever graces the Orthodox need to celebrate the Sacraments, they received it when we were all in Communion, and we do acknowledge they have preserved those graces.

Same logic applies to Protestant Baptism and Matrimony. Protestants are Christians, and they are so because they received the faith directly or indirectly from the Catholic Church, and as long as they preserve the bare essentials of that faith, they can still validly communicate it to others, and they still can reflect God's love for His people.

Nobody invents Christianity, we all have received it, and if you trace the chain backwards, you will eventually reach a member of the Catholic Church.

Shalom,
Memo.

Orthodox posters? I was once told that Catholic posters are all prepared with SacroSticky - a variety of glue made with Lourdes water. What are Orthodox posters made with? Incognitus

Are Presbyterian posters perhaps made with Scotch tape? Incognitus