Posted on 02/25/2015 6:11:56 AM PST by BlatherNaut
Yesterday, on February 23, it was reported that Pope Francis formally declared Gregory of Narek to be a Doctor of the Universal Church. Gregory of Narek was an Armenian priest, monk, and poet who is greatly revered by Armenians but virtually unknown otherwise. So far as I can tell, he is the first and only non-Catholic among only 36 doctors of the Church. He lived and died in the bosom of a schismatic jurisdiction, and he was most likely an adherent of the Miaphysite heresy. Traditionally, a Doctor of the Church is chosen only among recognized Catholic saints.
Is this a problem? Well, the words of the Catholic Encyclopedia are somewhat consoling:
“It is not in any way an ‘ex cathedra’ decision, nor does it even amount to a declaration that no error is to be found in the teaching of the Doctor. It is, indeed, well known that the very greatest of them are not wholly immune from error.”
And yet, and yet …. this is setting a potentially disastrous precedent. Gregory of Narek may have been a man of extraordinary sanctity; he may have been a great teacher; and it may be a laudable thing that his works become known to the larger Christian world outside of the Armenian community. But if a man is declared a “Doctor of the Universal Church”, the faithful have the right to assume that he is, at the very least, a Catholic. Furthermore, as Ann Barnhardt drives home, granting this title to a non-Catholic Armenian priest sends an unmistakable message to all the faithful: heresies that amount to attacks on the First Commandment are no big deal; heresy itself is no big deal; and schism is no big deal.
At this point in this sorry pontificate, given what we know about Pope Francis and his many expressions of religious indifferentism, it is safe to assume that he has an ulterior motive. Bypassing what must be dozens if not hundreds of qualified orthodox Catholics (Dom Prosper Gueranger is already de facto a doctor of this stature), Pope Francis instead chose an obscure mystic who died in schism and presumably held to the heresy of his co-religionists at the time. Why this choice? Let me make a little prediction: By this act, Pope Francis is preparing the faithful for the canonization of the first non-Catholic “Catholic” “saint”. Anyone care to guess who that might be?
Just saw this blog elsewhere....
I completely agree that we could see a St Luther in the Novus Ordo church under Francis’ “reign”. It would be so ecumenical you see.
Although I'm a Presbyterian, I went to a Lutheran church a few times. It was nice.
A MIAPHYSITE???? The horror!
Gregory of Narek was not in schism with the Catholic Church.
Prove it.
Aw, that’s “nice”.
Prove that he was. If I recall the reputed great schism was in 1054, some nearly 50 years after his death. What part of his life and writings tell you otherwise?
The Catholic Church calls St Basil the great a Doctor of the Church, and he was once even the patriarch of Constantinople.
Even the Orthodox know that he was not Catholic.
"...Basil was one of the giants of the early Church. He was responsible for the victory of Nicene orthodoxy over Arianism in the Byzantine East, and the denunciation of Arianism at the Council of Constantinople in 381-82 was in large measure due to his efforts. Basil fought simony, aided the victims of drought and famine, strove for a better clergy, insisted on a rigid clerical discipline, fearlessly denounced evil wherever he detected it, and excommunicated those involved in the widespread prostitution traffic in Cappadocia. He was learned, accomplished in statesmanship, a man of great personal holiness, and one of the great orators of Christianity. His feast day is January 2.
http://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=261
There was no Armenian Catholic Church until around 700 years after Gregory died. He was a member of the Armenian Apostolic Church which is part of the Oriental Orthodox communion. They have not been in communion with Rome since AD 554.
PiusV is correct, Bayard, as is NRx. Interestingly, however, if +Gregory were to arrive at my Greek Orthodox parish Sunday and approach for communion, the priest would give him, as he would, say, a Copt, the holy gifts. He cannot give them to a Latin, though I understand that a Latin priest would give them to me.
It has to do with the nature of what seemed to be Non Chalcedonian theology vis a vis that held by the rest of the Church at the time of the Council of Chalcedon. Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox theologians have now come to understand that the differences are in the way we talk about the natures of Christ rather than in what he hold to be dogmatically true. Thus, a Copt, for example, or an Armenian, can receive in an Orthodox Church if there are no Oriental Orthodox churches reasonably close. The ecclesiology of the Latin Church, probably more than any theological issues, is what keeps our bishops out of communion with the Latin bishops and thus prevents us Orthodox from communing Latins or receiving communion at a Latin Mass. On the other hand, I am quite confident that lightning would not strike if piusv received at an Orthodox Liturgy or I at a Latin Mass. I do think it would be inappropriate, however.
Martin Luther King, of course.
Who else?
The Armenian Church isn't Eastern Orthodox. It split with the Catholic/Orthodox churches much earlier, after the Council of 451. The Armenians and the other "Oriental Orthodox" churches (the Syrians, Copts, Ethiopians, and Malankaras of India) are regarded not only as schismatics but heretics by both the Catholic and Orthodox churches (or used to be, before the world went crazy).
A silly article. While the factionalism that would lead to the Great Schism were already in place during St Gregory’s life, the Eastern and Western churches were still in unity; St Gregory was therefore as Catholic as St John Crysostom or St. Basil of Caesarea.
Herr Doktor Martin Luther
FROM CONFLICT TO COMMUNION Lutheran-Catholic Common Commemoration of the Reformation in 2017
The objective evidence proves otherwise. See post #13.
The Egyptian Coptic Church describes themselves as Miaphysites.
The 21 Christian men who were executed on the beach in Libya were Egyptian Coptics.
Not one of them said the bismallah to save their lives, and they died with the Name of Jesus on their lips.
I, for one, will NOT question their salvation.
No, what’s silly is that you posted this before reading subsequent posts that explained quite clearly the status of the church that “St” Gregory was a member of at the time he was alive.
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