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I was hoping to get some input on a subject which is on my mind. What is the relationship between what the Latins would call, "Sanctifying Grace", and what the East refers to as, "Uncreated Energies?" Are these two different terms for the same reality? From what I can gather, the West seems to make somewhat of a distinction between God and His Grace; whereas, the East holds that the Uncreated Energies are God Himself. Either way, the concepts are very similiar. Sanctifying Grace and Uncreated Energies both serve the purpose of attaining union with God.

I eagerly await your scholarly answers.

Columcille

Colm --

It depends on whether you consider "grace" to be created or not.

Traditionally, it appears that Western theology considered (and may still consider) grace to be a created thing -- something created by God, but not God Himself. According to this view, the grace present in the sacraments is not God himself but a thing gifted from God.

The Eastern view, clarified by St. Gregory Palamas, is that the presence of God in the sacraments is God His uncreated self. Therefore, when we receive God in the sacraments, we are receiving his uncreated nature -- whether in Holy Baptism, Chrismation, Eucharist, etc. Because this creates some metaphysical problems, St. Gregory clarified the meaning of this by refining the distinction -- already present in the writings of St. Basil the Great -- between the divine essence and the divine energies, and specifically clarifying that our participation in the divinity through the sacraments involves the divine energies and not the divine essence. That is, we remain, in essence, human, but we are divinized by patricipation in the divine energies of God. This is true patricipation in God Himself, as the energies are God, and not a creation of God -- but it is not a participation in His essence, as this would negate our humanity.

The critique of the view that grace is created often runs along the lines that if the sacraments merely confer created grace, then they do not confer communion with God or participation in the divinity of God directly -- that is, if the grace in the sacraments is created, you have communion with a created thing, and not directly with God himself who created that grace (although you may have communion with God by *means* of that created grace -- that is, God creates grace to allow one to have communion with Him, indirectly, through the created grace present in the sacraments). If grace is viewed as uncreated, however, then the receipt of grace is the receipt of God Himself, and in that case would be similar to -- but somewhat more vague than -- the Palamite doctrine of the essence and energies of God.

Brendan

Dear Columcille and Brendan,

(I feel like I'm at a Celtic festival! ).

It would seem that the Latin theologians that didn't like St Gregory Palamas (especially commemorated on the Second Sunday of Lent) seemed to have confused "Divine Energies" with "Divine Essence." They also accused Gregory of "Quietism" and even a form of Monism.

Even the Melkite Archbishop Raya is somewhat reticent about Gregory in his "Byzantine Daily Worship" and says that certain Greek and Russian theologians corrected the "errors" of Palamas - see "Second Sunday of Lent."

Brendan, do you know what that was all about?

And of course there is Lossky's analysis of iconography in East and West as reflective of created Grace vs. Divine Energies (Western Saints' haloes are above their heads, detached from their bodies, Eastern Saints' haloes are around their heads and attached to their spiritualized bodies).

But as St Gregory Palamas is recognized as a saint within Roman Catholicism, this also means his theology of the Divine Energies et al. is also approved and that Western Catholics may also subscribe to it as well.

This is something like the coexistence within Roman Catholicism of two "alternative" views of the Immaculate Conception.

But there is no doubt that the more one goes back to the Fathers, the more Palamas' theology is the order of the day.

Alex

Alex-

Off the topic, I've been trying to PM you for the last couple days. However, your box is full.

Make some room for me, man

Columcille

Dear Columcille,

Sorry about that, Big Guy!

My e-mail is: alex_roman@ontla.ola.org

God bless,

Alex

Dear Columcille,

There is a small book entitled Uncreated Energy: A Journey into the Authentic Sources of the Christian Faith (Amity House Inc., Warwick, NY, 1987) by George Maloney. Fr. Maloney was the founder of the Pope John XXIII Center for Eastern Christian Studies. The "book is an attempt to gather something of the dynamic vision of the Greek Fathers into a presentation, using the model of God's uncreated energies as
distinct from God's eternal essence."(p.3)

He suggests ways that the teaching affects modern theology (albeit 1987) of grace. (pp. 89 - 92) I found the book to be useful to me when I encountered the teaching on Uncreated Energies. Perhaps it will be for you, too.

If I understood what I read correctly, he states that the two teachings deal with the same issue but that the Western view is flawed.

In his words:

"The West has suffered from the thought categories taken from Neo-Platonism by Augustine and inserted into Western theology and spirituality. But when Western schoolmen no longer were mystics like the earlier theologians who could discourse on contemplation and never separate it completely from God as life, theology fell into a rationalization of man's anthropomorphic view of God. It forgot to view God from God's view as revealed in Holy Scripture and as commented on by the early Fathers in their view of salvfic history through God's revealed Word." (p.92)

"Grace all to often became a 'thing' to be amassed and stored up in some heavenly bank as security against the day of reckoning, instead of the Trinity living its uncreated energies within us, working dynamically to divinize us and through us to bring the Incarnation and Redemption to the world." (p.90)

And some of you guys thought my writing was complex!

Hope this helps.

Steve

[ 05-08-2002: Message edited by: Inawe ]

[ 05-08-2002: Message edited by: Inawe ]

Hi Alex --

"Brendan, do you know what that was all about?"

Which one, the quietist accusations or Archbp. Raya's book?

Regarding the former, I guess I view the hesychast controversy as the context of the articulation of the Palamite refinements, rather than the raison d'etre of them. Had it not been for the dispute with Barlaam, these refinements may never have been expressed -- because the idea was, as is most often the case in Eastern theology, to preserve the possibility for direct participation in the divinity of God. Barlaam's claims that the light seen by hesychast monks was created and not uncreated was merely the opening salvo to a greater discussion about the nature and goal of prayer, the spiritual life and the sacraments, so that Palamite theology, which was called to address this issue, addressed much broader themes, and had to.

I think that because the Western theology doesn't acknowledge the distinction between essence and energy, that there is much confusion about the Palamite refinements -- I think you're right about that.

Regarding BDW, I think that this is one of the leftovers from the prior period of Eastern Catholicism, as is the benediction service contained in BDW. I know that the Melkite parish I belonged to venerated St. Gregory and his thology and never even considered performing a benediction service along the lines described in BDW. I think that these holdovers reflect the state of the Melkites at the time that BDW was compiled -- in the 1960s -- and that there have been some, um, further changes in the Melkite Church over the past 30+ years.

Brendan

Dear Brendan,

Christ is Risen!

And certainly one of those changes is that you are no longer with the Melkites!

Yes, Roman theology is interesting here. To acknowledge a distinction between energy and essence is to somehow separate them so no distinction is made. "Energy" is therefore a created emanation from God understood as Grace.

I wanted to ask you a further question about the "Beatific Vision."

As I understand it, once we get over to the other side, we will see Christ, but won't be able to see God in His Divine Nature. Could you comment on that, do I have that right?

Alex

To add to the discussion, Western scholastic theologians were, are, uncomfortable with talk of the Divine Energies in that, to their minds, a division in the divine Simplicity of God's essence is thereby introduced. In the Western view, there is God, and there is everthing that is not God. There is no room for a third "thing" that is both not the Divine Essence and uncreated.

Peace.

>>>I wanted to ask you a further question about the "Beatific Vision."<<<

Alex-

I know this wasn't addressed to me, but let me take a stab. I always understood the Beatific Vision as seeing God face to face. Not necessarily knowing all things or knowing the inner nature of God. Our Lord said that the angels stare at God's face throughout eternity. That dosen't mean that the angels come to share His nature, correct?

Columcille

Dear Columcille,

And if Brendan agrees to what you've said, we've got a real ecumenical deal here!!

God bless!

Alex

The Orthodox tradition sees eternal communion with God in terms of theosis/deification and the experience of becoming a partaker of the divine nature (See 2 Peter 4 -- the Greek uses the term "physeos", a form of the word "physis" which means "nature" and was subsequently used as such by the Church Fathers of the patristic period). Eternal communion with God is therefore partaking of his nature -- but partaking of that nature in such a way that one's own nature is not obliterated by the divine nature. St. Gregory Palamas explained this by refining the idea so that one can be a partaker of the divine nature, but not obliterate the essence of one's own nature -- that is, by participating in the dynamic aspect -- the energies -- of God's nature rather than the essential aspect. I think that the scholastic criticisms misunderstood Palamite theology in that it does not seek to divide the nature of God, but rather to reflect various aspects of that unitary nature.

I have honestly never studied the beatific vision aspect of Western theology in any great depth. It seems somewhat static to me (at least compared with the dynamic aspect of Orthodox deification ... which, according to most authorities, continues in a dynamic fashion even after theosis has been realized). In any case, I think that the Orthodox perspective would be that we share in God's nature, but only in its dynamic aspect, so that the essence of our own nature is not obliterated. I don't know whether that means we don't see the divine nature in its essence and only experience the divine nature in its dynamic energies -- I haven't seen much written on that, probably because it seems somewhat esoteric -- at least, that is, to me.

In Christ,

Brendan

Dear Brendan,

Well, as long as we get into Heaven, the rest is really academic anyway!

God bless,

Alex

Yes, I noticed the same thing in my copy and was a little befuddled. I was aware it was printed in the 60's, and according to what you said, St. Gregory wasn't accepted universally by the Catholic Church until the 70's, though I would love to get my hands on some report rather than merely his name listed amongst a number of saints on a Catholic website.

A report would serve as concrete evidence to inquiring minds that a post-Schism Orthodox saint is an official recepient of universal veneration in the Catholic Church.

The Benediction service also surprised me--considering this book was used by the Orthodox, with a special blessing by EP Athenagoras of Thrice Blessed Memory, and a letter by al muthal'lath ar'rahamat Patriarch Maximus V, thanking the Archbishop for removing elements foreign to the Byzantine Rite, I didn't expect the note on the "errors of St. Gregory" or the Benediction service.

In IC XC
Samer

Unusually enough, my present Arabic calendar still sets his day of commemoration in Lent aside for the Feast of Relics, which I believe is uniqely a Melkite feast (like the Divine Body) that took the place of St. Gregory Palamus subsequent to our union with Rome, in order to make a suitable substitution. It is surprising we don't reinstitute his Lenten Feast now that he is accepted in the universal calendar.

In IC XC
Samer