www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall The Fall Of Orthodoxy

Alex writes:

[He saw in the "Old Union with Rome" (not "Greek-Catholic") a Church and a people that were culturally Orthodox and had continuing deep ties to their ancestral Church.]

Alex, though it was Orthodoxy that played an important role in the culture identity of the countries it inhabited, one does not become Orthodox by adopting that culture or ritual. One is Orthodox thru the faith they hold upheld by the doctrines they believe and protect. Which define their Orthodox beliefs!

It' a lesson that even some Orthodox have yet to learn.

OrthoMan

Slava Isusu Christu!

EEP! The grammar nazi in me is hanging his head in shame.

In Christ,
mikey.

Dear Orthoman,

Yes, surely!

I think the Metropolitan was using "Orthodox" in a partialized sense only.

Alex

Wasn't thinking grammar at all.
Just that each union came about in different circumstances and by different means.

Dear LatinTrad,

Yes, there are even Orthodox who saw some positive things in the Unia too!

But as for union with Rome being "indispensable" while certainly Rome held that, there is no indication whatever that the Orthodox Bishops who came into union with Rome in 1596 believed that way.

The issues they were facing were much less philosophical.

The bishops had had a number of run-ins with the Patriarch of Constantinople and didn't like the fact, for example, that the Stauropeghial Brotherhoods were appointed as virtual watch-dogs by the EP over them.

The Polish King was also the only one who could appoint Orthodox bishops in his Kingdom. That he appointed those with Western-leaning tendencies (or who developed them after they received their episcopal appointment) is a fact.

The West at that time was at its cultural zenith and closer union with it, even ecclesially, became a desirable thing on the part of even many Orthodox.

The fact is that Westernization/Latinization occurred not only in the Eastern Catholic Churches, but in the Orthodox Churches as well at that time.

The Baroque period gripped the Eastern Churches as did scholasticism. Even St Peter Mohyla's Catechism, meant to define Orthodoxy in the face of Roman Church expansionism, copiously used the scholastic method. Western devotions were predominant in the lives of Orthodox saints, including the 15 Prayers of St Bridget that were highly prized by Russian Orthodox Christians in particular. Russian translations of Western devotions were printed at Florence and I once saw an online listing of a number of them.

The bishops who signed on with Rome in 1596 basically saw their move as a "switch-over" from one allegiance to another. From what we can tell from documents at the time, they saw their union with Rome much like their union with Constantinople.

We know that Rome did not, at first, accept the 33 articles of Brest-Litovske. It took about six months for Rome to even begin considering them - some at Rome felt the Orthodox bishops were cheeky in even attempting to demand any concessions from Rome with respect to assurances their Rite and other traditions (like the married priesthood) would be respected. Rome was not used to being told, even by those seeking union with it, terms and conditions of union.

When the union was complete, the bishops who signed it ensured that very little was done liturgically or otherwise to call public attention to it.

Only the Uniate Metropolitan of Kyiv-Halych commemorated the Pope of Rome liturgically - and that only once. No other noticeable outward change was evident.

And when people were asked why their Metropolitan now commmemorated the Pope of Rome, the popular answer given was "He must have become Orthodox then! What good news!"

In fact, Roman doctrines added nothing to what the Uniates already believed and practiced as part of their Orthodox liturgical heritage.

They venerated the "All PUre and Most Immaculate" Mother of God in her many miraculous icons and feasts like no Latin. They made a "business" of praying for the dead.

And when it came to the Filioque, the Polish gendarmes were actually sent out to the villages later on to enforce its inclusion in the creed (even though the terms of union rejected its use in the Eastern Catholic Church).

But our people, still believing themselves to be Orthodox to the fullest, refused to introduce the Filioque, but to avoid problems, used instead the word "Istynno" rather than "I syna", the former meaning "truly (proceeds from the Father)."

The term "Catholic" was not popular among the Orthodox in communion with Rome as it signified "Polish" identity.

So the idea that union with Rome was a necessity or that Roman Catholicism somehow gave to the Uniates something they didn't already believe or do - that is simply not the historical case at all.

It still isn't.

Alex

Dear LatinTrad,

The one great negative thing about the Unia is that it truly did divide us as a nation.

Imagine, if you will, Irish Catholics (not Protestants) being divided against each other over the issue of authority.

Imagine Irish Catholics, instead of focusing on their true enemies, spending their time fighting in the streets, taking each other to court to take churches from one another, and exerting great amounts of time writing all manner of literary forms to attack one another.

That, in a nutshell, was the case with us in the aftermath of the Union of Brest-Litovske in 1596.

Things did change, years later, particularly in the time of Met. Andrew Sheptytsky.

But, ultimately, I don't think that any serious student of the Unia of 1596 would acclaim it uncritically as one of the brightest pages in our history as a Church and a nation.

Alex

Slava Isusu Christu!

That's my point. There were more than one "Unia", hence the verb following should be in a plural form.

See, I told you I was a grammar nazi

In Christ,
mikey.

Dear djs,

How interesting!

And an important point to make . . .

Alex

Which point, Alex, that of diverse mechanisms of Unia, or the grave objection to "nothing but"?

Dear djs,

Actually, I find everything you have to say to be interesting!

And I esteem and reverence your deep and traditional piety and adherence to the ways of our Church.

Alex