www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West difference betweem Eastern Catholicism and Orthodoxy?

Good day to all!

I've recently discovered that there was other catholic churches other than the Latin Church. It's been weeks that i am trying to figure out what is Eastern Catholicism vs Orthodoxy. I haven't found a plain answer to my question and i am really confused. So here it is:

Does Eastern Catholicism is Orthodoxy in Communion with Rome?

Your answers will be really appreciated and enlighting. It might also lead me to more questions.

(I am sorry if this question was already answered in this forum, i wasn't able to find it!)

IC
Ben

This might help!
http://www.catholiceducation.org/en/culture/catholic-contributions/the-eastern-rite-church.html

The term "Eastern Catholics" refers to a lot of different groups with different origins. In the case of Byzantine or Ukrainian Catholics, we are talking about communities that were formerly Orthodox but which joined with Rome on the condition that they could keep their distinctive rites, canonical traditions, etc. while accepting Rome's dogmas. Some of these communities were forced into this arrangement, and some came into it willingly.

"Orthodox in communion with Rome" is a catchphrase which is basically meaningless. If you're in communion with Rome, you accept Rome's dogmas, including Papal supremacy, and are therefore not Orthodox.

Thank you for your answers!

A lot of the research that i did on Internet on Eastern Catholicism led me to Orthodoxy. So does all the material that applied to the Orthodox Church (ie:Byzantine rite/Ukrainian culture) can be applied to Eastern Catholicism as well or this Orthodox material will lead me away from Eastern Catholicism?

Dear Swan,

It depends on your POV, doesn't it?

To be "Orthodox" means simply "right believing" and "right worshipping."

The Oriental Churches also call themselves "Orthodox" - is this meaningless too, from your vantage point?

The original, united Orthodox Catholic Church held to the Petrine Primacy via the popes of Rome.

To be "Orthodox in communion with Rome" is far from meaningless, therefore. Yes, we are not in union with Orthodoxy which is out of communion with Rome as of, as many believe, 1204 or even later.

But we believe that the faith of the Roman Church is simply a development of Latin theology, both legitimate and Orthodox. And, to boot, by being in union with Rome, we express the unity of the early Church of the first millennium.

There are issues, of course. As there are in Orthodoxy.

As for being forced into union with Rome or not - how was Orthodoxy inaugurated in Kyivan Rus' if not by royal command? And later, did not the Russian Orthodox Church "bring back" Orthodoxy by its being complicit with state force, with respect to both Tsarist forces and later with its involvement of the destruction of the UGCC via the USSR?

I remember very well the spiritual wounds left on the souls of my grandfather, a UGCC priest and his colleagues who were forced to repudiate their communion with Rome - or else it was Siberia.

I really shouldn't speak of this because it hits very close to home with me. But any Orthodox should NEVER criticize Rome for using force, given the anti-Christian behaviour of prelates of the ROC as they worked, hand in hand, with the "servants of satan," as my Orthodox icon of the News Martyrs calls them, of the USSR.

(To the Administrator and the Moderators - if I have overstepped propriety here, please let me know and I will both apologise and do penance).

Alex

When i was browsing on the web about Eastern Catholicism, a lot of the results lead me to orthodoxy. So if i want to deepen my knowledge on Eastern Catholicism, can i read stuff on Orthodoxy(not the Church) or it will lead me out of the Catholic teachings?

When i was browsing on the web about Eastern Catholicism, a lot of the results lead me to orthodoxy. So if i want to deepen my knowledge on Eastern Catholicism, can i read stuff on Orthodoxy(not the Church) or it will lead me out of the Catholic teachings?

Would you like to do some investigative research and determine this for yourself? I am a cradle Roman Catholic, who married an Eastern Catholic but just prior to that we both considered Eastern Orthodoxy (Antiochian, ROCOR). We spent a whole year rediscovering, discovering our shared Catholic Orthodox faith. They tell you to give it a year. Since I know that in my own lifetime a reconciliation between East and West would not happen, we sort of made a compromise and became Eastern Catholics. Our particular sui iuris has the distinction of being Eastern yet has always been in communion with Rome. Maronite.

No. The OO's have not innovated any erroneous dogmas as the Latin church has.


Yes, but primacy is drastically different from supremacy as currently dogmatized in the Latin church (and accepted by all her subordinates). The right, asserted as a dogma, of the Pope to directly rule and intervene in every corner of the church was unknown in the first millennium.


And to be in communion with Rome, you must accept her heterodox dogma, which makes you therefore not Orthodox. So yes, "Orthodox in communion with Rome" is meaningless.


The unity of the early church is based on a different faith than the one currently promoted by the Roman Church.


Saint Vladimir's decree converting people from paganism to Christianity is neither here nor there. It's a simple fact that many were brought into the Unia by force. This does not justify the actions of the Soviet Union or the ROC's complicity in those actions.

Dear Swan,

With respect to Rome's "heterodoxy" - we will continue to have a strong difference of viewpoint.

There are Orthodox professors/teachers which I have both read and met who would disagree with you, even though they would maintain that Orthodoxy and Rome are separated/not in communion with each other.

Is the Filioque "heretical?" There are Orthodox teachers today who would say "no." Should it be in the Nicene Creed? No it shouldn't. Is that something that should justify the separation of Churches? I don't believe it is.

As for Rome's primacy, I would like to simply affirm our position by quoting what the Administrator here has said a number of times before, that Rome is the "crown of Orthodoxy."

As for Roman jurisdiction, let's have a look at how the Moscow Patriarchate, for example, governs itself (which it has every right to do). Would someone like to argue that the way the MP does administrative business today reflects that of the "early Church?" Hmmmm?

With respect to what you say about the Oriental Orthodox Churches - I imagine you realize that Orthodoxy does NOT accept your conclusion here and condemns what it affirms is the Monophysism of the Oriental Churches. There has been a change of perspective in recent years as a result of the ecumenical talks between between the EO and OO families of Churches, to be sure.

As for "forcing," I stand by what I said. No one asked the people of St Volodymyr's empire if they wanted to become Christian - one followed the leaders, plain and simple.

The same held true at the Union of Brest. The Orthodox hierarchs signed the act of Union and expected their flock to follow them. That RC forces used the Unia as a proposed instrument of Latinization is a fact. It is also a fact that the Polish Kingdom later came to oppose the Unia as something that caused disharmony among its people.

There are also certain "myths" which Orthodox polemics, which you so obviously affirm, regarding Rome etc. We've dealt with them before and there is no need to start yet another thread about them now.

My point is that Orthodoxy has had its fair share of forced conversions/returns. For any Orthodox Christian today to cast aspersions on what happened in the aftermath of the Union of Brest is simply disingenuous - as if Orthodoxy's hands are clean of any such thing. I applaud you for your reasoned approach to that matter.

I would suggest that you and any Orthodox Christian with an "axios" to grind against the EC Churches take a closer look at actual EC praxis today. I believe you will find that it is not like what certain polemical Orthodox pamphleteers would have their people believe about it.

Orthodox Christians attend liturgies at my parish rather regularly (but without becoming EC). I've told some of them that they are breaking their own Church's laws in this respect, but they respond by saying, "This is also an Orthodox Church (sic)." In no way does that reflect, of course, official Orthodox teaching and I'm not suggesting, for a moment, that it does.

Today, we don't use or even think about the Filioque. We pray for the reposed without referring to Purgatory. We glorify the Most Holy Theotokos without feeling any need to refer to the Roman Marian dogmas (there were Orthodox saints and teachers, however, who affirmed the Immaculate Conception and I can list a number of them - all of whom are on my icon wall).

We commemorate the Pope of Rome but without calling him "our" as we do in connection to our Primate and local Hierarchs.

Let's also remember that even the great Pillar of Orthodoxy, St Mark of Ephesus went to Florence as a unionist initially and that he believed full union between Rome and Orthodoxy could be achieved if only Rome would remove the Filioque from the Nicene Creed. That was his minimal requirement for union. The Greeks believed the Filioque heretical (and that is still the official position) but St Mark Eugenikos (whose icon is also on my wall) saw it as a Latin innovation and even a 'theologoumenon' however misguided that would eventually be rooted out once unity were achieved.

I appreciate that Orthodox Christianity repudiates any claim by Rome and the EC's to being "Orthodox."

We, on the other hand, affirm that Orthodoxy is indeed the true Body of Christ, even though our current separation persists and there is much more to be done to remove the misunderstandings that have clouded our relations to date (even though those clouds are dissipating in some quarters, but not in others).

We believe that we have the right to call ourselves "Orthodox" and, for us, it is anything but meaningless.

I'm sorry that you see it that way, but I understand why you do.

Alex

Hi Alex,

I think you're assuming a lot of things I believe about the Catholic church that I don't actually believe. No, I don't think the UGCC are a bunch of fakes and I don't think, if I walk into a Greek Catholic church, I am somehow stepping in to a den of gracelessness completely alien to Orthodox Christianity. I wouldn't take communion there, but I recognize that you have in many ways maintained a genuine continuity with your Eastern tradition, albeit with some deforming concessions to Latin dogma.

Re: the filioque, I'm actually quite an agnostic about that. I think a lot of the Orthodox polemics about it are overblown and I suspect we are talking past each other, though I think the prime fault still lies with Rome for inserting it unilaterally and then fomenting schism by demanding that everyone else follow suit.

The immaculate conception is actually a lot more congenial to Orthodox Mariology than modern polemics let on. Ditto purgatory.

Papal supremacy, IMO, is the one real issue. You raise a point about Moscow's contemporary ecclesial governance, but here's the thing: it's not that there is something inherently theologically wrong with a single bishop having universal jurisdiction (though I would hardly consider it ideal), it's the fact that Rome has made this a dogma and anathematizes anyone who denies it. It's not the style of ecclesial organization itself which is heretical, but the assertion that this is part of the unchanging deposit of faith from the beginning.

My point about the forced conversions after the union of Brest was simply to state that they occurred and they were wrong, just as any forced conversed of Catholic to Orthodoxy are wrong, and again I absolutely denounce the use of such tactics by the Moscow Patriarchate or anyone else.

If we disregard the aspects of Laws and Dogmas of both the Catholic and Orthodx Churches, does the theology, spirituality, devotions, liturgy, christian way of living and the administration of the Sacrements(Holy Mysteries) in the Eastern Catholic Chruch are the same as the Orthodox Churches in essence or they are only inspired by the Orthodox cultural background?

Correct me if i am wrong(i probably am!), the Eastern Catholic Churches were in communion with the Orthodox Church before joining the Catholic communion, right?

That's a complicated question and the answer would depend on what specific group we're talking about. Among Ukrainian Catholics, for instance, the liturgy and spirituality looks pretty much the same as with the Orthodox, though some Latin devotions have made it over such as the rosary, stations of the cross, etc. (Granted there were times where you could find Eastern Orthodox who engaged in these practices as well, but it is not indigenous to Eastern Christianity). My understanding is that the Maronites have in many places thoroughly Latinized their liturgy though there is some attempt to reverse this process.



The term "Eastern Catholic" applies to a wide variety of groups with different origins. For instance, yes, Ukrainian Catholics and Melkites both originated from Orthodox communities. Armenian Catholics and Coptic Catholics came from "Oriental Orthodox" churches. Chaldean Catholics came from the Assyrian or "Nestorian" church, as did the Syro-Malabar Catholics of India. Maronites came from a reputedly monothelete or "miathelete" community.

Lets take the Ukrainian Catholics to be more precise. If i want to deepen my knowledge in this denomination and i want to practice some of there devotions(i.e. the Horologion), did their practices, knowledge, spirituality etc came from the Orthodox Church? Can the Orthodox church be considered the Mother of Byzantine catholicism with all the genetical and hereditary of a mother and for some reasons Byzantine catholicism left his mother to get married with the Latin church(by no mean i want to downgrade any entity in this metaphor)?

Just to put more meat around the bone, here is a website of a Byzantine Catholic church that is tagging their material with the word "Orthodox".

http://www.ak-byz-cath.org/about_orthodoxy.html

From what i see of this page, they are claiming to have inherited all of the Orthodox church teachings and that they accept as well to be under the pastoral care of the Latin Church with all their teachings, dogmas etc... Right or i have missed the mark there too?

Dear Swan/Lebed,

Then why didn't you say so to begin with?

I have my own take on things, for example, I do wish that the Union didn't take place, but then again I wasn't around back then and no one would have bothered to ask me anyway . . .

OK, there's nothing in what you said that I would take issue with.

Alex