Healing the Great Schism: Catholic/Orthodox Reconciliation

Christ prayed for the unity of His Church. Collectively, we have made quite a hash of it. What divides us? How far are we apart, really? Is reconciliation and reunification really impossible? I don't think so.

Doctrinally, there is more that separates the liberal and conservative wings of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches than separates Catholicism and Orthodoxy. Many of the doctrinal differences that there are date back to the early centuries, but were not a bar to us all being One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church for more than half of the history of Christianity.

Historical missteps, and more than a little stubbornness, divide us, but this division is unnatural and indeed unholy. We cannot simply ACCEPT it as a given. It is not what Jesus wanted of us, and we have a duty to try and put back together what He made whole but what we have sundered.

For starters, look at how very much unites us still. The Orthodox Church is Holy. The Catholic Church is Holy. Both are apostolic, in unbroken lineage back to the apostles. We share the same sacraments. We believe the same things about those sacraments. In extremis, we can give confession too and take extreme unction or viaticum from one another's priests. Because somewhere, at the bottom of it, we each really do know that it's the Latin, Russian, Greek, Syrian and Coptic rites of the same Holy catholic Church.

Indeed, within the Catholic Church proper, in union with Rome, are Byzantine and other Eastern Rite churches that are for all appearances Orthodox. That the Orthodox Liturgy of St. John Chysostom is beautiful, and sonorous, and long, should be no barrier. There is no reason that the Orthodox rite should not remain exactly as it is. Indeed, there is a very good reason to revive, in the West, the old Latin Rite of the Catholic Church: many people want it back. Why should they be denied it? The Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom and the Liturgy of the Tridentine Mass were Holy and are Holy. There is no reason at all they they cannot all be practiced within a reunited Church. There is no reason for Russian Orthodoxy to cease using Slavonic, and Greek Orthodoxy to cease using Greek, just as there is no reason that Latin Rite Churches should not be able to reassume Latin if their parishoners desire it. For over a thousand years the different parts of the Church used different languages, and yet we were all one Church. Today, with the vernacular, the Catholic and Orthodox Churches use many, many, many languages. None of this diminishes their Holiness. Latin, Greek and Slavonic are not holy, they are old. And there is nothing wrong with old.

So again I ask: what really divides us? There is nothing of the liturgy of either Latin or Greek or Russian rite that would need to change were the Churches to come back into unity.

All that divides us, really, is the question of authority. It is a political question, about the office of the Pope. Cut through it all, and that is what is at the heart of it.

And this can be resolved. Indeed, the tension ALWAYS existed, and flared up at different times during the long millennium of Church unity. Our spiritual ancestors had the wisdom to settle for an arrangement of metropolitans and patriarchs, with the Bishop of Rome considered one of them, but primus inter pares at the "round table". Like the Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court, he sets the agenda and "assigns cases", but each preserves his dignity as a co-equal justice. In order to maintain Christian unity, it was necessary for the Pope to exercise discretion in this role. And most handled it well. It also required discretion on the part of the Eastern Patriarchs. And most handled it well. It is the contrivance of the Devil that the time arose whereby stubborn (and corrupt) Pope encountered stubborn (and beleaguered, by the Muslim invasion) eastern Patriarch, and the Schism erupted.

Surely we can repair this wound in the visible Body of Christ on Earth. Indeed, it is not really optional. It is our DUTY to attempt it.

What is it that the East wants? Surely it is not to compel the Cathedral of Notre Dame to start conducting masses in Slavonic! No. It is to be recognized in its liturgy and in its territorial area. Should Latin Rite missionaries be attempting to sieze Russia for Catholicism? No. Russia should be under the Russian Rite, subject to the Metropolitan of Moscow, sovereign in his sphere, who is in union with the Bishop of Rome. I should be able to give confession and take absolution in a seamless Church from Gibraltar to Vladivostok.

What is it that the West wants? Too much, probably. At the Council of Florence, the last moment of unity in the Church, the West acknowledged the customs of the East, and the East acknowledged "the traditional privileges of the Bishop of Rome", which is to say, primus inter pares.

Now, if there were deep and abiding spiritual and doctrinal divides, such as there are between the Catholic Church and, say, the Anglican Communion or the various Protestant Churches, reunification would be out of sight. Primus inter pares would lead directly to Papal interference. But the Orthodox and the Catholic are each so doctrinally close that there need not be ANY real interference in the West by the East, or the East by the West. Indeed, it would immeasurably help the post-Vatican II Western Church to have a Vatican III at which the Metropolitan of Moscow and the Patriarch of Constatinople and their affiliated Bishops, and the Eastern Cardinals, sat, spoke, voted. The Church needs the counterweight of Orthodox Tradition to offset some of the less propitious "modernizing" elements that have run unchecked in parts of the West.

For its part, much of Eastern Orthodoxy is subject to, and under the thumb of, Islam. And abused. We see this right now even in secular Turkey. There is no religious voice on earth more powerful than Rome. And no other religion has its own seat in the United Nations. The lot of Eastern Christians would be bettered by having the full weight of Western Christianity brought to bear within the Church.

I do not believe that this is a pipe dream. Reuniting the Pentecostals and Rome might be, but bringing Moscow, Constantinople and Rome together again at the same round table should not be. It is what Jesus intended from the beginning. What God has joined, let no man sunder. With God, everything is possible. There is nothing that goes on in Orthodox Churches that would not be able to continue in unity with the West, and nothing that goes on in Latin Churches that would have to stop to be in Union with the East.

Perhaps the fears of the East would be quelled if the Patriarchs were favored for election to the Papacy.

This is actually where our divergence begins! Where we see Peter as a primate of honor, Catholics see him as having authority above and beyond that of other Apostles.

The Church Fathers, those Christians closest to the apostles in time, culture, and theological background, clearly understood that Jesus promised to build the Church on Peter, as the following passages show.

"Simon Cephas answered and said, ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.’ Jesus answered and said unto him, ‘Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah: flesh and blood has not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say unto thee also, that you are Cephas, and on this rock will I build my Church; and the gates of hades shall not prevail against it" (The Diatesseron 23 [A.D. 170])
Tatian the Syrian

"[T]he Lord said to Peter, ‘On this rock I will build my Church, I have given you the keys of the kingdom of heaven [and] whatever you shall have bound or loosed on earth will be bound or loosed in heaven’ [Matt. 16:18–19]. . . . What kind of man are you, subverting and changing what was the manifest intent of the Lord when he conferred this personally upon Peter? Upon you, he says, I will build my Church; and I will give to you the keys" (Modesty 21:9–10 [A.D. 220]).
Tertullian

"The Lord says to Peter: ‘I say to you,’ he says, ‘that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell will not overcome it. And to you I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven . . . ’ [Matt. 16:18–19]. On him [Peter] he builds the Church, and to him he gives the command to feed the sheep [John 21:17], and although he assigns a like power to all the apostles, yet he founded a single chair [cathedra], and he established by his own authority a source and an intrinsic reason for that unity. Indeed, the others were that also which Peter was [i.e., apostles], but a primacy is given to Peter, whereby it is made clear that there is but one Church and one chair. . . . If someone does not hold fast to this unity of Peter, can he imagine that he still holds the faith? If he [should] desert the chair of Peter upon whom the Church was built, can he still be confident that he is in the Church?" (The Unity of the Catholic Church 4; 1st edition [A.D. 251]).
Cyprian of Carthage

My real point all along is that the politics are impossible and we should stop the bickering and share the sacraments.

Let me change the frame of reference.
Today, the novus ordo Catholic Church operates Lourdes.
At Lourdes, there is an international medical committee that has documented 7000 startling medically inexplicable, or very unlikely, cures over the past many decades. 66 of these cures have been designated as outright miracles.

Lourdes exists. It is real. It is a recent development, less than two centuries old. Whatever the merits of whatever happened 14 or 10 or 5 centuries ago, one century ago and since God has opened a fountain of miracles, demonstrating his abiding presence, in a garishly Catholic shrine at a muddy pool in France. Lourdes openly proves that God's grace is upon the Catholic Church. It does not prove that God's grace is NOT with any other Church, only that He remains with the Catholic Church as well, in a startlingly open way.

Since God's grace is demonstrably still with Catholicism in spite of whatever doctrinal errors may or may not have been committed by the Catholics, those of us who love God - Orthodox, Catholic or Protestant - are reminded that what we believe is worse than worthless if we lose sight of the fact that it is all about pleasing God. Adhering to a religious faith is bad if it is not about God, because religious faiths set up doctrines that divide people and make them fight.

For whatever reason, God clearly is still present in the Catholic Church because the miracles and marvels at Lourdes on ongoing, continuing, daily facts, present to us in the here and now, hundreds a year. From Lourdes, we know that whatever WE think is bad, rotten, erroneous, etc., about the Catholic Church, God's grace is still particularly upon the Church. Otherwise He would not grace Lourdes with His manifest presence. Since He does indisputably grace Lourdes with His manifest presence, that means that He remains within the Catholic Church.

And that means that all of us, Catholic or not, have a duty to respect God's choice here. If you are an SSPX Catholic, where is the SSPX Lourdes? Where is it? It does not exist. That does not mean that God is not with the SSPX. But it means that you err if you say that God is not with the novus ordo Catholic Church. Because there is no getting around it: God is visibly present at Lourdes, and God knows what He is doing. Because God is visibly present, at a novus ordo Catholic Shrine, to Mary no less, if you have a beef with Marianology, you need to get over it: God does not oppose the cult of Mary, and religion is about serving God, right?
If you are a Catholic and have a beef with the novus ordo mass, which is what they perform at Lourdes, you need to get over it: if God did not like the novus ordo mass, he would withdraw his grace from Lourdes, wouldn't He? But He doesn't. And there is your answer: YOU may not like the novus ordo mass, but God manifestly does not hate it.

If you are an Orthodox believer and you disagree with all of the Catholic "innovations" since the Seven Ecumenical Councils, you are certainly entitled to your rites and practices and beliefs. But if you believe that the Catholic Church has become heretical, God does not entitle you to that belief. He opened a Shrine at Lourdes in the 19th Century. You certainly do not have to adopt all of these Catholic innovations, but you certainly also cannot claim that God rejects these innovations...because God opened His miraculous fountain of healing at Lourdes in recent times, not at Nicaea or anywhere else.

History is history. In the present, the world is beset by the evil of religious oppression from the jihad on one side, and by the lapse into libertinism by the loss of faith in the secular West on the other. We Catholics and Orthodox, and Protestants too have been bickering about points of doctrine since time immemorial. Nobody is going to climb down on those points. We are not going to resolve them, because we do not have the perfect knowledge to know the right answers. We have our faith and our traditions. But we DO have Lourdes, to remind us ALL that God is REAL, and present, and has an opinion. To degrade the miracles at Lourdes is to spit in the face of God. Call Lourdes "politically incorrect miracles", but miracles they are.

Before Lourdes, we should fall silent and contemplate what it all means. It means that our faith is true: there is God. It means that God did not cease intervening directly and miraculously in human affairs in the first century of the fifth, but does it still in the 21st, in a way that is scientifically unambiguous. And it means that God has favored a Shrine to Mary where the novus ordo mass is practiced as the most obviously, visible fount of his miracles.

Nobody should take that as meaning that, therefore, whoever you are, you must embrace the Novus Ordo mass and modern Roman Catholicism. It does mean that God is telling each of us that he does not object to either of those things. And if HE doesn't object to them, and indeed continues to pour forth open miracles from that place to a degree and on a scale unknown anywhere else in the world, then we need to take a hard look at ourselves and ask who we think WE are for objecting to them. Religion is not about serving what WE want, it is about serving God.

Lourdes does not prove that everybody needs to be a Novus Ordo Roman Catholic. It DOES prove that God does not object to the Novus Ordo Roman Catholics, because He keeps on performing open medical miracles, by the hundreds, in that place and not elsewhere, not like that. He doesn't transfer His grace - certainly he COULD, but He doesn't. And if HE doesn't object, who does any one of us think he is by objecting more strongly than God?

We can't resolve the arguments of the past. We cannot undo the Schism by resolving those issues. We can observe God's presence in the world to day, at Lourdes especially, and focusing on that and not the past, decide that what matters today is that we should share the sacraments in love and charity. Evil is still abroad in the world. And it does not repose in the Curia of the Vatican or in the Eastern Patriarchs. Therefore, let us stop making issues of our divisions that exceed God's express opinion. If the Catholics erred, God forgave them long ago and put Lourdes in the Catholic West as a sign of that forgiveness. We should respect God's choice and forgive each other too.

"Actually to understand Vicomte's post you would need to read through all the posts here. He, and other CAtholics are frustrated with the Orthodox's attitude to even a united front againstIslam."

I thought I read the thread fairly carefully, and nowhere did I see a united front against Islam at the heart of the discussion. What I saw were arguments about why there should be inter-communion. I see no reason why inter-communion is a necessary part of a united front against Islam. Leaving aside the historical record of what has sometimes happened when Orthodox look to Rome for help against Islam, we can, at a minimum, look at the here and now of the Balkans, where the Vatican could have argued that it was in the best interests of Christendom to keep Islam contained, rather than to encourage and embolden it by the West siding with the Muslims. I have no problem with the fact that the Roman Catholic world did not side with the Orthodox, because it was looking out for its own interests in the region, and it saw its interests being more served by a weakened Orthodox populace than by a weakened Islam.

"We reach out over and over again and keep getting slapped down again and again."

I'm new to this discussion, and I'm still deciding whether it is a helpful one, so I don't know what you're talking about here exactly, but I'll take your word for it. Orthodox and Roman Catholics have a different concept of what unity means, and what its prerequisites are. I don't see how that constitutes a "slapping down" when we say that.

"Finally, Vicomte states that, since the EO wish to keep the POLITICAL differences, the only option left for unity is to politically change the persons in the EO world."

You'll have to explain that. It would seem to me that you are turning the Orthodox position on its head. What Orthodox Christians are all for is unity in faith -- sharing the chalice and organizational unity follow that. We do not believe that that unity currently exists, and therefore any union would be only political in nature. It is not that we are for keeping political differences, it is that we oppose a political solution to a spiritual problem.

What is possible are political solutions to political problems (i.e. having a unified political front against Islamic expansionism), and also possible are spiritual solutions to spiritual problems (i.e. genuine dialogue that will allow Roman Catholics to understand the Orthodox approach to the faith, and to therefore understand why union at this time is, from our perspective, not possible or desirable.)

"But let me ask you: is filioque heretical, in your view, or merely schismatic?"

Probably neither, definatly not heretical. The following is an agreed statement of North American Hierarchs of both the Eastern and Roman Churches:

New York, NY – The North American Orthodox-Catholic Theological Consultation concluded a four-year study of the Filioque on October 25, when it unanimously adopted an agreed text on this difficult question that has divided the two communions for many centuries. This important development took place at the 65th meeting of the Consultation, held at St. Paul’s College in Washington, DC, under the joint chairmanship of Metropolitan Maximos of the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Pittsburgh and Archbishop Pilarczyk of Cincinnati.

The original version of the Creed most Christian churches accept as the standard expression of their faith dates from the First Council of Constantinople, in 381, and has been used by Orthodox Christians since that time. Towards the end, this Creed states that the Holy Spirit "proceeds from the Father." The word Filioque ("and the Son") was later added to the Latin version of this Creed used in the West, so that the phrase as most western Christians know it reads that the Holy Spirit "proceeds from the Father and the Son." This modification appeared in some areas of Western Europe as early as the 6th century but was accepted in Rome only in the 11th century. This change in the wording of the Creed and the underlying variations in understanding the origin and procession of the Holy Spirit within the Trinity have long been considered a church-dividing issue between Catholics and Orthodox. The Consultation had been studying this question since 1999 in the hope of eventually releasing an agreed statement.

Entitled "The Filioque: A Church-Dividing Issue?", the ten-thousand word text has three major sections. The first, "The Holy Spirit in the Scriptures," summarizes references to the Spirit in both the Old and New Testaments. The more lengthy second section, "Historical Considerations," provides an overview of the origins of the two traditions concerning the eternal procession of the Spirit and the slow process by which the Filioque was added to the Creed in the West. It also shows how this question concerning Trinitarian theology became entwined with disputes regarding papal jurisdiction and primacy, and reviews recent developments in the Catholic Church which point to a greater awareness of the unique and normative character of the original Greek version of the Creed as an expression of the faith that unites the Orthodox East and Catholic West. The third section, "Theological Reflections," emphasizes our limited ability to speak of the inner life of God, points out that both sides of the debate have often caricatured the positions of the other, and lists areas in which the traditions agree. It then explores the differences that have developed regarding terminology, and identifies both theological and ecclesiological divergences that have arisen over the centuries.

In a final section, the Consultation makes eight recommendations to the members and bishops of the two churches. It recommends that they "enter into a new and earnest dialogue concerning the origin and person of the Holy Spirit." It also proposes that in the future both Catholics and Orthodox "refrain from labeling as heretical the traditions of the other side" on this subject, and that the theologians of both traditions make a clearer distinction between the divinity of the Spirit, and the manner of the Spirit’s origin, "which still awaits full and final ecumenical resolution." The text also urges theologians to distinguish, as far as possible, the theological issues concerning the origin of the Holy Spirit from ecclesiological issues, and suggests that attention be paid in the future to the status of councils of both our churches that took place after the seven ecumenical councils of the first millennium. And finally, in view of the fact that the Vatican has affirmed the "normative and irrevocable dogmatic value of the Creed of 381" in its original Greek version, the Consultation recommends that the Catholic Church use the same text (without the Filioque) "in making translations of that Creed for catechetical and liturgical use," and declare that the anathema pronounced by the Second Council of Lyons against those who deny that the Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son is no longer applicable.

At this meeting the members also took time to review major developments in the lives of their churches. Among the items discussed were the seminar on Petrine Ministry that was held in the Vatican in May; the granting of autonomous status to the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America; the Orientale Lumen Conference held in Washington, DC, last June; the recent Patriarchal Assembly of the Maronite Catholic Church; the presence of a delegation from the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Rome in late June for the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul headed by Archbishop Demetrios of America; the seminar sponsored by Pro Oriente on the union of Transylvanian Orthodox with Rome in Cluj, Romania, last July; the Faith and Order response to Ut Unum Sint; statements by the two churches on same-sex marriages; and the recent meeting of the Joint Committee of Orthodox and Catholic Bishops in Baltimore.

The 66th meeting of the Consultation is scheduled to take place from June 1 to 3, 2004, at Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology in Brookline, Massachusetts, and the 67th meeting from October 21 to 23, 2004.

The North American Orthodox-Catholic Theological Consultation is sponsored jointly by the Standing Conference of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of the Americas (SCOBA), the Bishops* Committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs of the USCCB, and the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops. Since its establishment in 1965, the Consultation has now issued 22 agreed statements on various topics.

All these texts are now available on the website of the US Catholic Conference at: http://www.usccb.org/seia/dialogues.htm

In addition to the two co-chairmen, the Orthodox members of the Consultation include Father Thomas FitzGerald (Secretary), Archbishop Peter of New York, Father Nicholas Apostola, Prof. Susan Ashbrook Harvey, Father James Dutko, Prof. Paul Meyendorff, Father Alexander Golitzin, Father Emmanuel Gratsias, Dr. Robert Haddad, Father Paul Schnierla, Father Robert Stephanopoulos, and Bishop Dimitrios of Xanthos, General Secretary of SCOBA (staff). The additional Catholic members are Father Brian Daley, SJ (secretary), Msgr. Frederick McManus, Prof. Thomas Bird, Father Peter Galadza, Msgr. John D. Faris, Father John Galvin, Sister Jean Goulet, CSC, Father Sidney Griffith, ST, Father John Long, SJ, Father David Petras, Prof. Robin Darling Young, and Father Ronald Roberson, CSP (staff).

Does this help? :)

Yes, it is immensely helpful, actually, because of all of the things that it indicates.

First, there is serious, sustained, scholarly effort by heavy hitters in both branches of the Universal Church to craft language and policy that gets around this road-block and makes it a bump in the road.

Second, the Consultation recommended that everyone on both sides stop calling the others "heretical" (if they ever were doing so).

Third, it identifies where I think the problem originated and lies: in the power structures of the Church, in an historic fight over power and the will to dominate, by the West in the instance, which was rebuffed by the East.

Fourth, it recommends the same solution I did: agree that the original Nicene Creed is still good (I went farther and recommended an especial reverence for and ecumenical use of the Apostles Creed, given its great antiquity and the lack of any disagreement over it), and suggesting a preference for its use in documents and transactions between the Western and Eastern Orthodox Rites. In Roman Catholic Churches, we can continue to recite the Creed, filioque intact, because that is how (some among) we look at it. But we do not need to assert it in lateral relations across the East and West. (I say "some among" because I don't really believe that most people standing in the pews are theologians, or want to be, and that if you said "and from the Son" or did not say "and from the Son", 80% of the Catholics present at a Mass would notice the difference, 60% would think it was a slip of the tongue, and of the remaining 20%, half would be severely exercised by it, and the other half would understand the ecumenical solution being sought and agreed to it. Of course the 10% who strongly, violently opposed any change like that would be on the streets in a hurry, pouring torrents of ink, and everyone else would be influenced by what they said, but the truth of the matter is that, before someone beat the drums and told him to be outraged...OUTRAGED!!! by this assault on the faith, 80% of Catholics would not think it was a big deal, and 10% would think that it was a GOOD think, bringing the faiths together. The outraged 10% would quickly educate their more staid and apathetic brethren that the Church was under attack, the termites are in the foundation! dogs and cats will soon be living together! and every other apocalyptic vision imaginable in the parade of the horribles...and that is why you can't stop saying filioque in the Catholic pews.

The final point I'd make is not in the article: God doesn't seem to care about this filioque business. If it is wrong, He has not only forgiven it, but given us Lourdes. And if God is not angry enough to withhold His grace from us over this business of understanding the Holy Spirit to proceed from Jesus as well as the Father, then we should not erect it as a barrier between us either.

Conversely, the history of the heavy handed, brutal politics by which the West attempted to impose filoque on the East through fiat and excommunication of Patriarchs is an object lesson in what it does NOT mean to the the Pope. This was a grave error on a disciplinary matter by the delegates sent to speak with the East about this, all those long years ago, and it opened a wound that is still sore in the Eastern Wing of the Church. Therefore, on this issue, the Pope must exercise his authority in the Western Wing of the Church, and agree to the truth: the exact nature of God is a MYSTERY. The Catholics say the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. Do not the Orthodox say that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father THROUGH the Son? That being the case, it does not take a lawyer to see the subtlety here, the grounds for a compromise. The Pope can reconcile the West to the concept by observing that the words "Father THROUGH the Son" is saying "Father and the Son" in a different way (both parties are there), and emphasizing the origin in the Father, and leave it at that. I do not know the internal mental dynamic of God, neither does the Pope, neither do you, and neither does the Patriarch of Constantinople. We BELIEVE this, and we BELIEVE that, "through" versus "and", but we don't really KNOW, do we? It is a mystery, isn't it? And given that we don't really know, but we each believe, slightly differently, we can respect the difference, never again attempt to impose a solution by brute administrative fiat on the other half of the Church, tacitly agree that a lesson has been learned, and share the Lord's table.

That is the best answer.
I don't think that the East is heretical for adhering to early Conciliar creeds. They were infallible when pronounced, and did not subsequently fail. Personally, I believe that the Western filioque view is an improvement in understanding, but I do not think that it is a MANDATORY understanding for the East, and I certainly do not think that it was ever a very good idea to take such a deeply held and sincere view and try to ride roughshod over it by force of command. THAT certainly failed, and the Papacy knows it failed. I cannot imagine that any Pope will ever assume he has such power again: we all know that the Pope can no longer even command with certitude parts of the avant garde of the Western Clergy. The days of pretence of commanding the East to change 1500 year old words is over. If the days of the East considering the West to be heretical for saying "filioque" are also over, and we can agree to believe what we each respectively believe on the mystery-shrouded aspect of the interior of God's mind, and both admit lovingly that we are seeing this thing through a glass darkly, perhaps we will be less impatient with each other's beliefs.

Other than the filioque, what is there that separates us theologically?

I return to what I thought before: the separation had its origins in ecclesial power. With time, that power has evolved so far in the West that in the most offensive matters, it is not what it was in the Middle Ages. And there is wisdom too: the wisdom of the Schism. And if the Schism is healed, the wisdom of what caused the Schism, and I believe the love to not ever do that again.

I really don't know enough about the Maronites to comment on whether they have an Orthodox phronema.

Ditto! Was the definition of phronema that I posted, correct? It's a new word for me. Going on my understanding of its meaning and, given that I am a Roman Catholic, immersed in a Maronite tradition, I can only compare my experiences with the definition I posted.

Please enlighten me.

There are no short descriptions for an historical record that dates back to the time of the Apostles. At best, I can give you some excerpts along with a link to the entire history of the Maronite Catholic Church.

The Acts of the Apostles (cf. Acts 11:19) tell us that due to the persecution that ensued after the martyrdom of St. Stephen, the Christian community was dispersed and some carried the message to Phoenicia. Describing the journey of St. Paul, chapter 21 of Acts informs us that when Paul came to Tyre he "looked for the disciples there and stayed with them for a week". These references indicate to us that Christianity was established in Lebanon from its earliest days. Very soon, Tyre, Sidon, and Beirut became dioceses with their own bishops.

The Maronites (as well as the Melkites) were staunch defenders of the Council of Chalcedon. The monks of St. Maron took the lead in preaching the true doctrine and stopping the propagation of heresy.

In a letter addressed to Pope Hormisdas in 517, monks of St. Maron (a hermit) address the Pope as the one occupying the Chair of St. Peter, and inform him that they are undergoing many sufferings and attacks patiently. They single out Antiochian Patriarchs Severus and Peter, who, they say, anathematize the Council of Chalcedon and Pope Leo, whose formula the Council had adopted. The Maronites are mocked for their support of the Council and are suffering afflictions. The Emperor Anastasius had sent an army that had marched through the district of Apamea closing monasteries and expelling the monks. Some had been beaten and others were thrown into prison. While on the way to St. Simon Stylite, the Maronites had been ambushed and 350 monks were killed, even though some of them had taken refuge at the altar. The monastery was burned. The Maronites appealed to the Emperor in Constantinople, but to no avail. Now, they appeal to the Pope for deliverance against the enemies of the Fathers and the Council.

The Moslem conquests of the seventh century had a profound effect on the church of Antioch and the region in which the Monastery of St. Maron was located. Maronite immigration to Lebanon, which had begun some time before, was intensified, especially since the enemies of the Maronites sided with the Moslem armies against the Maronites. The choice of Lebanon was understandable since its mountains were almost impenetrable. The oldest known Maronite establishment in Lebanon is Mar Mammas in Ehden in 749. Maronites had immigrated also to Cyprus and Rhodes.

Thus we see that the Maronite Church rooted in the ascetic spirit of St. Maron, was molded into a community of faith with a monastic stamp. Its origin and early development help to explain why its liturgical life is characterized by simplicity and a hopeful anticipation of the future kingdom. From its birth it has been called upon to defend the faith in its preaching and teaching and to witness to the faith in persecution and martyrdom. Its vocation is to live the Gospel of Christ whatever the circumstances and whatever the place in which it finds itself.

These are the early origins of the Maronites.

I have been told, though by Melkites, that the Maronites want "to be more Roman Catholic than the Pope". I understand that the Maronite Liturgy is a relatively recent creation, from the 1920s perhaps, and that liturgical hymns are being written to this day.

Again, there is no short answer to this but here is a brief summary.

The Maronites aligned themselves with Rome. In 1580 Pope Gregory XIII sent the Jesuits John Baptist Eliano and John Baptist Bruno to Lebanon as his legates. They brought with them many religious articles including a number of books. Because of the need for printed books for Syriac speaking Christians, the Holy Father had established a Syriac printing press in Rome. Among the books that were published and brought by the legates was a catechism printed in karshuni [Arabic written in Syriac letters], which had been composed by Fr. Bruno and translated by Fr Eliano. It was modeled after the one composed by Peter Canisius after the Council of Trent, and it advocated many of the sacramental practices of the Roman Church. Other publications included a book on the decrees of the Council of Trent, a book on the heresies of the Jacobites and the Nestorians, and translations of the Imitation of Christ and the prayers of the Latin Mass.

In aligning themselves with Rome, they subjected themselves to some Latin influences. Perhaps one of the most important results of the Papal legations to Lebanon in 1578 and 1580 was the founding of the Maronite College in Rome. The impact and importance of the Maronite College cannot be underestimated. Students of the College were responsible for the spreading of knowledge in Europe about the East including its language, history, religions and institutions. From the College were graduated scholars whose works have been precious aids to European Orientalists. With the establishment of the Maronite College, Rome was in a position to learn more accurately the customs and traditions of the Maronites. On the other hand, a great number of patriarchs and bishops of the succeeding centuries were graduates of the Maronite College, and therefore attuned to the mind of Rome.

Oh, it's just too long to post excerpts. Suffice it to say that with the establishment of relations between the Maronites and Rome, others were sent to Lebanon to 'latinize' the Maronite liturgy. In the process, some of the Maronite liturgical texts were burned. The loss of many 'Anaphoras' resulted.

The Vatican II Council declared that "all should realize it is of supreme importance to understand, venerate, preserve, and foster the exceedingly rich liturgical and spiritual heritage of the Eastern churches, in order faithfully to preserve the fullness of Christian tradition" (Unitatis Redintegrato, 15). Pope John Paul II said that "the Catholic Church is both Eastern and Western."

The Maronite liturgy has been subjected over the centuries, to many influences. In the post-Vatican II Latin Church, the introduction of the vernacular language into the Roman liturgy has encouraged all nations to celebrate the unique sacrifice of the Lord in the language, music and symbolism proper to each people and culture. While the Latin Church is rediscovering, sometimes painfully, the riches of this liturgical renewal, the Maronites always celebrated a liturgy in which they can recognize their culture and history: their relation to Antioch, their monastic origins, their contact with the Latin Church. It is always with emotion that the Maronites listen to the words of consecration sung by the Maronite priest in Syriac, so close to the language in which our Lord, on the day before He suffered and died, pronounced these words for the first time.

The Maronite liturgy stresses these words with gestures which probably belong to a very old Christian symbolism. After the words, "He gave thanks and praise, and blessed the bread," the priest blesses the bread with the sign of the cross; and after the words "He broke the bread," he touches the four ends of the host. In the same way, the sign of the cross is drawn on the chalice, and after the words, "this blood is to be shed", the priest inclines the chalice to the four sides as if to shed it in reality. With these gestures, the Maronite liturgy likes to stress the universal character of the Eucharist, and the faithful, by their "Amen", participate in this universal gift and universal mission.

There is another important element in the consecration of the Maronite liturgy. While the Latin Mass brings the consecration to a close by the recitation of the words "Do this in memory of me," the Maronite liturgy continues with the biblical reference "Do this in memory of me . . . until I come again," a verse which always was a favorite text in the spirituality of Antioch.

In this addition, the eschatological character of the theology of Antioch, which the Maronite Church has inherited and enriched, clearly takes form. Once more this theology is situated between the theology of the East and that of the West, as the Maronite patriarch pointed out in one of his interventions at Vatican Council II. While the theology of the West has always stressed the actualization of the world, and while the theology of Byzantine Christianity continues to celebrate the divine liturgy which the Risen Lord accomplishes in His heavenly glory (compared to which all things of this world are vain and idle) the Maronite liturgy celebrates the Eucharist in expectation of the coming of the Lord.

The Maronites in their liturgy are painfully aware of the fact that we are actually not in the glory of the Lord and in the plenitude of His redemption. We are awaiting it. On the other hand, they realize in faith that this sacramental sign is really rahbouno, a pledge of glory to come, and zouodo, a viaticum which really transforms a simple terrestrial being into a pilgrim on the way to his or her home, the "house of the heavenly Father".

Apologies for such a lengthy response ... it might have been longer! The interventions of the Maronite bishops at the Vatican Council and the publications of Maronite scholars show clearly that the Maronites are aware of the precious contribution that the realistic and biblical theology of Antioch can make, not only in the dialogue between Rome and Byzantium, but especially in the delicate interfaith relations with Islam and Synagogue for which the death of God and the divinization of a man remain a scandal.

"Fourth, it recommends the same solution I did: agree that the original Nicene Creed is still good (I went farther and recommended an especial reverence for and ecumenical use of the Apostles Creed, given its great antiquity and the lack of any disagreement over it), and suggesting a preference for its use in documents and transactions between the Western and Eastern Orthodox Rites."

What the statement says is "... in view of the fact that the Vatican has affirmed the "normative and irrevocable dogmatic value of the Creed of 381" in its original Greek version, the Consultation recommends that the Catholic Church use the same text (without the Filioque) "in making translations of that Creed for catechetical and liturgical use,".

Now that is hardly saying that the two formulations are equally correct and that the original form only be used in inter Church matters, but rather in fact recommends that the Western Church in both teaching the Creed and in using it in the Liturgy, drop the filioque.

I don't mean to count coup here, but what the agreed statement says is pretty clear. By the way, I agree that for the overwhelming number of people in the pews, it won't make a tinker's dam worth of difference, but in the East, given our 2000 year old tradition of arguing fine points of theology at the "meat market" or the "barbershop", a change to include the filioque would probably, after awhile, give rise to some fairly broad based objection. Now, whether the objectors would have a clue about what they were arguing would be a totally different matter!

Other theological differences? That would take some thought, but the obvious ones are original sin, transubstantiation, purgatory, indulgences, Papal Infallibility, and the Immaculate Conception, all matters which we have batted about here before to no useful end that I can see. There are undoubtedly others.

One final point. You refer continually to the miracles at Lourdes as some sort of proof that God indeed shows His favor on the Roman Church. Well of course He does. The Roman fascination with miracles and visions has always puzzled me, though. In the East, these things happen all the time and while we think of them as a wonderful blessing, the fact that God, through the intercession of Panagia or a saint would heal a Christian doesn't surprise us particularly. A loving Father would do that for His children. As for visions, our old people have them regularly. My great grandmother's best friend was Panagia. She was a woman with a simple Faith, and a very powerful best friend. She was sharp as a tack to the day she died. We think this is likewise wonderful, but not remarkable particularly. I think maybe in the West we think to much about religion, trying to rationalize, or perhaps a better word is intellectualize the Faith. This can cloud our souls so that when the love of God bursts through at a place like Lourdes, we don't recognize it for what it is and see it as something from beyond us in every sense of the word. In the East, the connection between us here and Panagia and the saints in heaven is intimate, close. There is no great gulf between the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant. I'm sure I'm not explaining this well, but its like there is a constant heavenly presence with us here, with saints and Panagia moving back and forth, like on a visit and then going home. In the 6th century, a monk named John Moschos wrote a book called the Spiritual Meadow about his travels around the Middle East fro Greece down to the Great Oasis in Egypt visiting monasteries. His stories of visions and miracles are told in a very matter of fact manner which reflected not only his beliefs, but those of his readers. We still read the book to this day. Get a copy; it will tell you a lot about the way the Orthodox still view the world.

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