Posted on 06/13/2016 8:42:35 AM PDT by marshmallow
The scholars said the council is 'an opportunity to commence a new phase of Orthodox witness'
50 Orthodox scholars have signed an open letter to Orthodox leaders, urging them to come together for the Pan-Orthodox Council. The meeting, which is meant to take place in a week’s time, hangs in the balance after two churches withdrew and others expressed major reservations.
The council, for which preparations began in 1961, was supposed to bring together all 14 “autocephalous” Orthodox churches, the largest number ever to have come together. But after the Bulgarian church pulled out for reasons which remain unclear, the Moscow Patriarchate said the meeting could not go ahead unless all the churches were present.
The Georgian church also announced yesterday that they would not come. The Patriarchate of Antioch have also said it might not attend, while the Serbian Orthodox church say they would rather the meeting was considered a consultation rather than a council.
In an open letter sent to the 14 Primates of the churches, the scholars, many of them from US universities and part of the Orthodox Church in America, write: “The Holy and Great Council occasions an opportunity to commence a new phase of Orthodox witness. As the eyes of the whole world are upon the Orthodox Church, we beseech all of our leaders to hear the Spirit’s call to conciliar unity.”
Appealing to Orthodox leaders and to all Orthodox Christians, as well as “all people of good will”, the scholars write: “We pray that the impending Council, so much anticipated and so long prepared, will bear forth the fruits of the Spirit, the first among them being the Pan-Orthodox unity.
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicherald.co.uk ...
Orthodox Vatican II; predict same results.
Ecumenism, the zeitgeist of end times.
Except that these are all the same Church we always told. Clearly we see that ain’t the case.
I am Orthodox but the first to say this is getting a little silly now. This meeting has been in discussion for YEARS. How hard is it to just pick a time and place? Just book a conference room and call it good
” Except that these are all the same Church we always told. Clearly we see that ain’t the case.”
It is The One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, but the Church of Moscow is not the Church of Constantinople... or of Rome or Antioch or Alexandria or Jerusalem.
If they can’t even agree to meet, they’re not the same Church.
John XXIII-approved: aggiornamento
” If they can’t even agree to meet, they’re not the same Church.”
:)
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