www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology "Upon this rock."

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Three Cents:
However, in the Antiochian Archdiocese, the pre-Schism discipline continues with the 22 Western Rite parishes and missions fully integrated into the Archdiocese's Regions (praise God).


What is the distinction that you are making between the Antiochian and other Orthodox jurisdiction? I am a little confused as to the different jurisidictions and thier relationship to each other.

Forgive my very basic questions- but I know little of the organization of the Eastern Orthodox. Can a member of one Orthodox Church- say Russian Orthodox, attend an Orthodox Church in another juridiction, say Antiochian? The reason I ask this is that I was on an Orthodox mailing list for a short period of time, and there seemed to be so many HEATED disputes between members of different Orthodox Churches that I left it feeling somewhat shocked. However, that sort of thing can, sadly, be found in any Church.

Also, what role does the Patriarch have in each of the Orthodox churches?



[This message has been edited by Catherine Kostyn (edited 06-03-2000).]

Katherine,

A brief history.

After the Church started to grow, bishops were appointed to preside over groups of churches, usually in a city. In turn, as the organization grew, more senior bishops were required. These would be the metropolitins or archbishops. Five major see, or thrrones of the Church were recognized. They are Rome, Constantanople (Present day Istambul), Jeruselem, Antioch, and Alexandria. Of these, the Bishop of Rome was "First among Equals" or had "Primacy."

As Constantanople deminished, mostly due to the fall fo the Byzantine Empire and the rise of the Ottoman Turks, the balance of power shifted to Moscow. The Russian Church was founded due to the evangalization of the Byzantine Church.

Patriarchs are supreme in their jurisdiction. At one point, the Pope was, (and still is I suppose) the "Othodox" Patriarch of the West.

The issue of supremacy in jurisdiction is the major point of contention when dealing with Papal Supremacy. While all sides agree to Papal Primacy, the degre of control is the sticking point. If you go through history, the behavior on all sides gives fuel to suspicion of the other's motives.

Andy,

Francis Dvornik wrote a monumental study on the Photian Schism - only to conclude that everything the West has taught is mythical. We forget that there were two parties in Constantinople vying for control - almost like the Liberals vs. Conservatives today. Much of the commentary on Photius' "ambitions" was a post-humus interpretation by his enemies. Dvornik analyzes each history and uncovers each 'agenda' which led many Westerners to discredit St. Photius the Great. Much of the "politiks" was Rome's meddling in canonical procedures unlike its own. The issue of a layman becoming a Patriarch was not uncommon even in the West, which some of the antagonists of Photius somehow forgot.

Elias

Elias' patristic numbers is his kickoff posting re: Mathew 16:18 are troubling to me. Only 20 percent (17 out of 85) of the church fathers feel that the "rock" is Peter. (I wonder how many or if any of the 17 fathers were Easterners?) Somewhere I read that in the Catholic view, revelation was a combination of Scripture plus "the unanimous consent of the Fathers" (the phrase used at Trent.) Looks like the Primacy of Peter was a decidedly minority view of the fathers. Are the Orthodox and Protestant polemicists correct when they say that Papal primacy-- let alone infallibility--has no basis in the New Testament and an uncertain basis in Tradition?

Andy �

Of course, the Photian situation was not without precedent. Most pointedly, St. Ambrose of Milan, the most widely-respected Western churchman of his day, was similarly appointed to the Episcopate while he was still a layman. We can all rest assured that this particular objection to Photios was a red herring and an excuse.

Catherine �

The Orthodox Churches that are in communion with Constantinople are all in communion with each other, such that any Orthodox Christian who is a member of any of them may receive the mysteries in any of them. This always seems a little strange to Catholic ears, because jurisdiction and communion are linked in Catholic eyes, whereas in Orthodox eyes they are two separate ideas � a critical point to understanding why East and West are still separated.

The Patriarch is the head of a group of local churches. Not all heads of groups of local churches are Patriarchs, however (for example, the Church of Greece is headed by a Metropolitan Archbishop). The Patriarch is first among equals � that is, he sets the agenda, steers the ship, so to speak, but can make no major changes other than through an episcopal synod (in theory) � he�s not supposed to be like a �mini-pope�. In practice, historically some Pariarchs have abused their position and tried to run things single-handedly, and have been (rightly) accused by some Orthodox as �neo-papal�.

The one thing you have to understand about Eastern Christianity, in comparison to Western Christianity, is that it is not simply a matter of �x, y and z� being different, but rather a case of two very different, complete, aproaches to the Christian faith and life. The differences impact almost every point � theology, spirituality, piety, liturgy. Rather than attempting a point-by-point comparison, it is better to understand each system from the perspective of its own internal logic and structure BEFORE making any comparions in order to avoid overly simplistic contrasts.

Brendan

Brendan

I, to, am like Catherine in so far as a lack of knowledge of Eastern Christianity. I did the same thing that AndyM did and that is to find a thread about this subject and read as much as I could in order to better understand the differences. To date, I have learned enough from Br. Maximos, AndyM, and you to realize I need to learn a bunch more. What I'm leading up to is, would you be so kind as to recommend any books I could read which would better educate me? As a RC, I feel that I NEED to learn more about this and as I stated before, I want to. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Yours in Christ
John T

John,

The two best books I can recommend are both by Bishop Kallistos Ware: "The Orthodox Church" and "The Orthodox Way". The former is a Penguin paperback widely available in most bookstores. The latter is published yb St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, and is best obtainable from on-line sources.

Bishop Kallistos is himself a convert to Orthodoxy from Anglicanism, and so his perspectives are particularly useful for Western readers.

Brendan

Dear John and Catherine,

While I must agree with Brendan that the two books by Bishop Kallistos are pretty good, we must also be aware of the perspective from which they are written. Both of these books dismiss the Papacy without giving it a fair hearing. While the Orthodox side has a lot of truth behind it, I (as a Byzantine Catholic) think that there is something to be said for the Papacy.

A WONDERFUL book that discusses these topics more fairly is Rome and the Eastern Churches by Father Aidan Nichols. The work objectively documents such events as the so-called "Photian schism," the excommunications of 1054, and the current ecumenical progress between Rome and the Orthodox.

A great advantage of this book is that it fairly looks at both the Orthodox and Roman claims, and attempts to reconcile the two.
While the book is currently out of print, it is in most university libraries, and can be ordered easily through the "out of print" search at Amazon.com.

God bless,
Anthony

Dragani and Brendan,

Thanks for the info on the books. Hopefully I can obtain all three, read them, and understand better. As implied earlier, I have always wondered what actually happened at 1054 and why. Now I might finally find out.

Yours in Christ
John T

It has been stated elsewhere that the passage from Matthew 16:15-19 means that Peter is the
'rock.' Yet we learn from those who have studied the Fathers that 17 state that the rock meant Peter, 44 state that it means Peter's confession, 8 meant the Apostles, and 16 wrote that it meant Christ. Even Blessed Augustine of the West changed his mind in "Retract., lib. i, cxxi" that it meant Peter's faith. The Fathers aren't so agreeable, yet Rome is very sure that it means Peter's person."

Rome is sure that it means Peter's person because it is the obvious meaning of the text. Modern Scriptural exegesis is virtually unanimous on this. As for the statistics you cite, it is very easy to say it. What if I were to say that 54 Church Fathers say that Peter is the Rock, 20 say it is his confession? Can anyone naysay my figures? Of course, my figures are simply made up. But I think my point is made. Without a citing of sources, your figures mean nothing. They are a polemical ploy used by many, but little more than that.
But even if your figures were accurate, what would they mean? Is truth to be determined by majority vote?
But another, more important point is that the above enumeration assumes that there is a contradiction between the notion of Peter as Rock and Peter's confession as Rock. Many of the Fathers actually hold to both interpretations and see no contradiction between them. Indeed, St. John of Damascus explicitly teaches this truth.

By the way, it's St. Augustine, not Blessed Augustine. He was St.Augustine in both East and West prior to the schism and he remains so today despite what some Orthodox say.

Ed

Care must be taken when dealing with statistics and numbers. Phoenix AZ has one of the healthiest climates in the country for people with respitory problems, but ironically has one of the highest morbidity and mortality rates (because many ailing people move there). So wrong conclusions can be miscontrued from the "evidence". A majority vote on this topic could be 1 billion + Ayes, 450 million+ Nays? Anyway, who ever heard of Blessed Augustine Florida??

Evlogimeni or Hagios, the difference is to the Latinos. Hagia Sophia is the Holy Wisdom of God. And Blessed is the Kingdom of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit can only be pronounced by a priest, not even a deacon. In matrimony, a deacon cannot officialte in Byzantine theology, because only a priest can Bless on behalf of the Almighty!

In Roman Catholic theology a possible Saint is beatified and called Blessed, thus not yet full Saint (Sanctus or the Latin translation of Hagios). No such process happens in the glorification of an Orthodox saint. Saint Raphael was not Blessed Raphael and beatified prior to canonization last weekend at st. Tikhon's.

Posters on this board, please do us all a favor and truly think Eastern. There are too many posterslooking for ways to make Latin Superpapalism kinder and gentler to the dissidents by looking for a handfull of the hundereds of thousands of Eastern Orthodox bishops whom may have said something that can make you proclaim that thier real desire was to kiss the ring and receive the pallium. The ultimate truth to you is stating that the only "real" bishop is in Rome.

Kyrie Eleison!

Lord have mercy!

Dear Three Cents,

I am not Eastern Catholic. I am a Catholic of the Roman Rite with an interest in things Eastern. I have been told by many Orthodox that they refer to St. Augustine as "Blessed" because they find his theology to be in error on many essential points. Hence, they demote him to the status of blessed. Perhaps these Orthodox believers were wrong. In any case, I never hear any Orthodox speaking of Blessed Basil, Blessed Gregory or Blessed Photius. The word "Saint" is always used in their regard. Why not with St. Augustine who, after all, even has the approval of conciliar authority?

Ed

The use of the terms "Saint" and "Blessed" is different between the East and the West.

The West uses "Blessed" for a person who has been "beatified", or on the second-to-last-step before "canonization", or being declared a saint, according to Western practice. (The East uses an entirely different process in declaring saints "glorified" ["canonized" in the West].)

In the East, "Blessed" and "Saint" are the same: a person who is glorified, a deified saint in heaven. The difference between using the two words lies in how the Saint's life on earth is perceived. If he (or she) is "Blessed", it is because the Church recognizes that while the person lived a divinized life, he had some bumps; not enough bumps to prevent him from being deified, but some which a person still on earth must view with caution.

Augustine is a saint, but it is common to use the term "Blessed" for him in the East because of the way the East looks askance at some of his writings. This does not mean that he was not a holy and devout man, or that everything he wrote is considered questionable, only that a good portion of it is. He lived (eventually, after he gave up the wine, women and song) a Christian life of witness and he intended no wrong and did the best he obviously could, and God reads what's in the heart just as much as He reads what's on paper.

Speaking of St. Augustine, where can I find the text of his retractions which I have seen mentioned several times on the net?

Vicki (Melkite)