Posted on 04/05/2005 6:39:32 PM PDT by sionnsar
[To the Traditional Anglican ping list: I am posting this article not because I think Anglicanism is fundamentally flawed (at the very least, such is a rush to judgement because it has not reached the final act), and not because I think the Continuing churches ought to be dismissed (I belong to a Continuing church, after all!). And I am not posting this to say Constantinople is better than Rome or anywhere else for "sincere Anglicans." I am posting this because I have found Orthodoxy difficult to understand, due to lack of exposure and communication. I am sure many of you have observed my public exchanges with Kolokotronis as I try to learn, to understand. What I've realized is that it's not just a matter getting tangled up in all the Greek I don't understand, there's a lot more going on. And I have not found an English word that expresses it: "mysticism" certainly doesn't -- it misses the mark by a mile. When the author says: "The consequence of this difference is a radically different worldview overall and an equally radically different view of the Christian life", this is exactly what I've learned, in limited fashion. I know I'm not the only one curious; I get the occasional question from members of the Traditional Anglican ping list. So when I encountered this article (on the same site where memory says an earlier article posited Rome as the answer), after two days of dithering I decided to post it for purposes of better ecumenical understanding -- at the risk, perhaps, of flame wars between the Orthodox and Roman Catholic FReepers. (And I will note to those FReepers, descend to that level and you won't look good to potential converts. *\;-) --sionnsar]
Reading the discussion on this blog, I have come to the conclusion that the issues of the internal problems of Anglicanism must be treated separately from the question of where Anglicans should turn. If I see a flaw in my pervious essay on Anglican Comprehensiveness, it is that I tried to deal with the two together in such a brief form that it sounds, even to me, rather triumphalistic. I hope that this piece will be rectify that problem to a degree. This is not to say that I recant anything I said before. I think, however, it can be safely said that all who read here recognize that Anglicanism is fundamentally flawed, and that the fundamental flaw is a lack of authority. The question then becomes, where are sincere Anglicans to turn? The options presented in Pontificator’s essay “Looking into the Crystal Ball” are three: Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, and Continuing Anglicanism. The last of these he dismisses and I believe that his reasons are sound and need no further elaboration. This leaves Rome and Constantinople, and I chose Constantinople. But why? To date, historically, some Anglicans have gone one way and others the other way. Two prominent figures are John Cardinal Newman and, more recently, Bishop Kallistos (Timothy) Ware. Newman, from what little I have read of him saw essentially the same problems that I saw years ago when I was faced with the moral obllgation to leave the Anglican Communion. Why then, I even asked myself, did I choose Orthooxy? Looking back at where I was 23 years ago (a year before I was faced with the choice), I’d have to say that Rome simply wasn’t an option to me. If Orthodoxy hadn’t come along (what a backward way of saying it!), I think it would have taken A LOT for me to be convinced to go to Rome. The fact is, that I never seriously considered Rome.
I never bought my mother’s anti-Catholicism. Even though I was raised in a broad-church parish, I was always more of an Anglo-catholic, no, Orthodox mind. I might even have bought more into scholasticism eventually, in the absence of the Orthodox option, but indulgences and papal supremacy/infallibility were a real problem. In reference to those two points I like to borrow from the 39 Articles: they are fond things, vainly invented, with no warranty of Scripture, rather repugnant to the Word of God. I am, of course, conflating the language from various articles here. I see this all the more with the indulgences than with the papal claims. The whole doctrine of merits and everything associated with indulgences I just find as horrifying and I find no substantive basis for it in Tradition.
With regard to the Papal claims, I am much more convinced by the Orthodox interpretation of the role of the Papacy in Church history. Likewise, and in part consequently, I am also more convinced by the Orthodox understanding of Tradition itself being the authority, not an institution - even a church institution. Not only do I accept the Orthodox understanding of Roman primacy, I also am keenly aware that no ecclesial institution is a priori infallible. The doctrinal declarations of every saint, every bishop, every council, but face the test of Tradition. No council was a priori ecumenical. This will indeed be a worry for some Anglicans who are desperately seeking an absolute organ of Truth. Still I don’t see a problem, because the standard is still there - the kanon pisteos. While no ecclesiastical institution is a priori infallible, the grace of God acting in the Ecumenical Councils is discernible and undeniable. My questions about which Episcopal priest to believe about the veneration of the Theotokos and other matters were settled when I learned about the Ecumenical Councils and Tradition as a whole. The authority is there in the life of the Church expressed by her liturgy, her saints, her councils, and whatever other means I might have forgotten. The Orthodox identification of catholicity with conciliarity I believe is true to Apostolic Tradition, reflected in the Apostolic Council of Jerusalem that we read about in the Acts of the Apostles. Furthermore, it reflects the Truth of the Triune Godhead – the perfect communion of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. That speaks volumes to me if I ask, “what do I think Christ intended?” Although authority was the original key issue for me, one which inevitably and immediately led to ecclesiology, I have to say that over the course of my years in the Orthodox Church I have determined that there are two issues that divide the West from the East on such a fundamental level that they must be overcome for any real reunion to take place. These are the Latin (Augustinian) doctrine of original guilt, and the anti-Palamite scholasticism. The former problem, seems to me to underlie so much of Western Theology, both Roman and Protestant, and is, as far as I can tell, the necessary presupposition to the doctrines of purgatory, indulgences, and the Immaculate Conception (“a very poor solution to a non- existent problem” as an Orthodox priest friend calls it).
The difference between the Orthodox and Roman doctrines of original sin arises from the Latin translation of Romans 5;12, The Augustinian teaching is based on the Latin “in quo omnia peccaverunt” or “in whom all have sinned” as opposed to the Greek original, “in that” or “because all have sinned.” The former implies a personal guilt of the entire human race. While Roman Catholics and Protestants may differ on how the guilt is transmitted, the end result is the same. All people are personally guilty unto damnation. This single presupposition has set a particular context for all of Western theology. What is Christian life all about? Why do I go to church? Why do I receive the Holy Sacraments? In the end, it is to make it up to God. Hence there arose the doctrine of indulgences, acts of supererogation and merits. From the Tridentine version of the teaching in which this guilt is passed on through sex, one arrives at the Immaculate Conception, and then the confusion among Roman Catholics about the Assumption of the Theotokos. Furthermore, devotional prayers like Salve Regina and acts of reparation before the Blessed Sacrament reflect a a spirituality based on the presupposition of personal guilt for Adam’s transgression and consequential damnation – and the hope that if one is good enough – nicely behaved before God, properly contrite and appreciative of His mercy, one might escape the eternal torment of hell that one deserves just for having been born a descendant of Adam.
The Orthodox Church affirms that we have inherited not Adam’s guilt, but the full consequences of his sin. My favorite analogy is to a baby born to a drug- addicted mother. The baby is not guilty of being a druggie, but he or she bears in the body, as well as in the environment, the consequences of the mother’s addiction. The baby will be physically impaired and will live in an environment that inclines toward following the path of addiction; so likewise, we bear in our bodies the consequence of illness and death and in our environments the myriad of temptations we face. I would affirm with Augustine, as Twelve-Step programs have amply demonstrated in the secular world, that we are POWERLESS. We absolutely require the grace of God. Yes, I affirm the Orthodox doctrine of synergy, but the doctrine of synergy does not deny the absolute need for God’s part in that synergy.
The consequence of this difference is a radically different worldview overall and an equally radically different view of the Christian life. In the Orthodox understanding, Christian life is about communion with God. While Orthodox would not deny that our own personal sins demand divine justice, we are confident as we say at the end of so many prayers, hymns, and litanies, that “Thou art a merciful God Who lovest mankind.” The result of this conviction is that I am free to focus on finding a life of “mystic sweet communion with” the All- Holy Trinity and “those whose rest is won.” I can be certain that if communion with God, yes, through repentance for my many sins, is my chief aim in life, I shall, with God’s help, and only with His help, inherit the crown. This is not to say that I get to sit back and take it easy. No, there is a lifetime of work to do, and repentance is certainly a chief component of that work. Communion is not something that happens overnight or in the grave. It is something that is nurtured in this life and cared for like a plant. One need only read the liturgical texts for Great Lent to see how much importance Orthodox place on the inner life. One also need only look at the scandals that rock even Orthodox churches to know how a travesty of that inner life can bring the opposition of deification and communion.
Speaking of deification I come to St. Gregory Palamas and the hesychast tradition, totally rejected by Rome. (I must admit that I am perplexed by the Byzantine-Rite Catholics on this point. Gregory Palamas is considered to be a navel-gazing idolater by Rome. What to the Uniates do with this? Palamas is so integral to Byzantine Christianity that I can’t see how Byzantine Catholics can escape him. For this reason, if for no other, I find the Unia untenable.) I think it is significant that Orthodox place more importance on the feast of the Transfiguration than Roman Catholics. It is the Orthodox teaching that one can truly know God, through His divine energies. On Tabor, Christ showed in Himself the potential for deification open to all people. It is not true that Orthodox focus on the Resurrection and Transfiguration instead of the Incarnation. The significance for the human race of the Resurrection and Transfiguration is predicated upon the Incarnation: the fullness of humanity and divinity, unchanged, unconfused, but totally united in the one person of Christ. We are indeed called, as St. Peter said, to be partakers of the divine nature. As St. Gregory the Theologian (Nazianzen) said, God became man that man might become like God.” We are called to be, and able to be, by grace, absolutely everything that Christ is by nature. Thus, real total, communion with God is possible. It is possible and even the ideal for man to have such communion with God as to intimately know God as He reveals Himself in His energies. This is the fundamental basis for the veneration of relics even. A person can be so united to God in communion, as to glow with the light of Tabor as Christ did, as St. Seraphim of Sarov did, so as to have their earthly remains remain vessels and fountains of God’s grace. Does this not answer Article XXII of the Thirty-nine Articles regarding superstition in the veneration of relics? It is not magic, but the grace of God pouring out of created things, like the bones of saints, which is made possible by the intimate contact with God’s divine energies – grace. This comes about through holy living – the radical giving of oneself to the Holy Trinity. Truly, the two teachings are inseparable in Orthodoxy. How could genuine communion be possible if we were inherently (literally) guilty, but how could genuine communion not be possible given that we live by Grace and under the letter of the Law? Together the Orthodox teaching of ancestral sin and personal deification and genuine communion with the All-Holy Trinity make for a very different view of Christian life. It is one that is indeed “full of sweet, pleasant, and unspeakable comfort to godly persons, and such as feel in themselves the working of the Spirit of Christ, mortifying the works of the flesh, and their earthly members, and drawing up their mind to high and heavenly things, as well because it doth greatly establish and confirm their faith of eternal Salvation to be enjoyed through Christ as because it doth fervently kindle their love towards God”–-much more so than the predestination doctrine of Article XVII.
Twenty-two years after my conversion, I still find only one option. If then revisionist Anglican prelates who have the upper hand are right, church is just a silly game, and I don’t want to play. With Roman Catholicism there are the issues of the relationship between teaching authority, the papacy and ecclesiology in general to which I do not find satisfactory answers and there is also that problem of original guilt. Admittedly, if I accepted the Roman solution to the authority problem, I’d have to swallow the bitter pill of original guilt; but this is not the case. Fortunately for me I find the Orthodox teaching on the ancestral curse and deification to be faithful to Apostolic Tradition. More importantly, I find Orthodox sobornost, the identification of catholicity with conciliarity, to be faithful to the genuine Tradition handed down from the Apostles, and iconographic of the All- Holy Trinity.
St. John was a very wise man, as is your spiritual father, for reminding us of this.
Thanks for sharing that.
the biggest difference is that whereas you have St. Augustine and Blessed John Cassian, we have St. John Cassian and Blessed Augustine."
I like this very much, thanks!
If your hand reaches for a pistol and shoots (murders) someone, a single CELL in your hand cannot say, "I am NOT a part of this body, so I am not guilty of murder. If so, in like manner, every cell can just jump ship and claim such exemption until there is no body left to be punished."
IF Adam & Eve were the first physical parents of all mankind, then we all were, to put it as delicately as I possibly can, ALL present physically in their reproductive systems from the start. WE ate the forbidden fruit and it permeated our little microscopic beings, and WE committed the sin as part of the whole.
"I would be interested in a link to an official statement of Catholic faith that specifically rejects the idea of original guilt."
Sure - I can post it for you here from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
"404...It is a sin which will be transmitted by propagation to all mankind, that is, by the transmission of a human nature deprived of original holiness and justice, and that is why original sin is called "sin" only in an analogical sense: it is a sin "contracted" and not "committed" - a state and not an act.
405 Although it is proper to each individual, ORIGINAL SIN DOES NOT HAVE THE CHARACTER OF A PERSONAL FAULT IN ANY OF ADAM'S DESCENDANTS. It is a deprivation of original holiness and justice, but human nature has not been totally corrupted: it is wounded in the natural powers proper to it, subject to ignorance, suffering and the dominion of death, and inclined to sin - an inclination to evil that is called concupiscence. Baptism, by imparting the life of Christ's grace, erases original sin and turns a man back towards God, but the consequences for nature, weakened and inclined to evil, persist in man and summon him to spiritual battle.
406 The Church's teaching on the transmission of original sin was articulated more precisely in the fifth century, especially under the impulse of St. Augustine's reflections against Pelagianism, and in the sixteenth century, in opposition to the Protestant Reformation. Pelagius held that man could, by the natural power of free will and without the necessary help of God's grace, lead a morally good life; he thus reduced the influence of Adam's fault to bad example. The first Protestant reformers, on the contrary, taught that original sin has radically perverted man and destroyed his freedom; they identified the sin inherited by each man with the tendency to evil (concupiscentia), which would be insurmountable. The Church pronounced on the meaning of the data of Revelation on original sin especially at the second Council of Orange (529) and at the Council of Trent (1546)."
"Are you saying that the Catholic church now teaches that unbaptized infants who die go straight to heaven, since they have not sinned?"
No, most certainly not. Infants are still born in a state of alienation from God. If they die unbaptised we can only entrust them to God's mercy and just how He deals with them from there is not revealed to us. There used to be a popular belief in "Limbo" where unbaptised infants did not see the face of God and did not suffer the punishments of hell, but I don't think this was ever officially defined as doctrine.
If this is what is implied in rejecting "original guilt", why would the Orthodox want to do so? Pelagianism was condemned by the Council of Ephesus.
"IF Adam & Eve were the first physical parents of all mankind, then we all were, to put it as delicately as I possibly can, ALL present physically in their reproductive systems from the start. WE ate the forbidden fruit and it permeated our little microscopic beings, and WE committed the sin as part of the whole."
So if your mother fornicated with the garbage collector prior to your conception, then you were also guilty of fornication were you?
That I Peter and II Peter are accepted as infallibly written books should be proof enough that St. Peter, the first Pope, exercised infallibility. Even St. Paul, Malachias, Isaias, etc., were able to write infallibly.
As to indulgences: it is clear that there's a difference between eternal guilt for sins and the temporal consequences of sin. The Orthodox accept the idea of purgation, whether they wish to call it that or not. It's clear that our sins and glories are not ours alone but are shared (see, for ex., Exodus 20:5-6, Colossians 1:23-24, and I Corinthians 12:26). It's clear that to St. Peter was given the powers of binding and loosing (see Matthew 16). Put it all together and you have indulgences.
The difference between the Orthodox and Roman doctrines of original sin arises from the Latin translation of Romans 5;12, The Augustinian teaching is based on the Latin “in quo omnia peccaverunt” or “in whom all have sinned” as opposed to the Greek original, “in that” or “because all have sinned.” The former implies a personal guilt of the entire human race. While Roman Catholics and Protestants may differ on how the guilt is transmitted, the end result is the same. All people are personally guilty unto damnation.
First, it isn't so that all are "guilty unto damnation" in the sense of punishment. The teaching of the Catholic Church is that God punishes no one who is not personally guilty of sin, which is why Limbo -- a place of perfect natural happiness -- is posited as a probability (though this is not taught dogmatically). However, He also doesn't reward those who are not born again in water and spirit -- i.e., those who are not baptized can't see the Face of God.
The Latin doctrine of original sin in no way implies "personal guilt," and Church teaching is quite clear in the differences beween original sin and actual sin. See New Advent's entry on this.
This single presupposition has set a particular context for all of Western theology. What is Christian life all about? Why do I go to church? Why do I receive the Holy Sacraments? In the end, it is to make it up to God. Hence there arose the doctrine of indulgences, acts of supererogation and merits.
Is this person saying that babies don't need to be baptized then? If they do, then why? Are all people destined for Heaven? Romans 5:12 12 "Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned." Now, how'd that happen? Romans 5:17-18: "For if by one man's offence death reigned through one; much more they who receive abundance of grace, and of the gift, and of justice, shall reign in life through one, Jesus Christ. Therefore, as by the offence of one, unto all men to condemnation; so also by the justice of one, unto all men to justification of life."
From the Tridentine version of the teaching in which this guilt is passed on through sex, one arrives at the Immaculate Conception, and then the confusion among Roman Catholics about the Assumption of the Theotokos.
There's no confusion. She was assumed into Heaven. What's confusing about that?
Furthermore, devotional prayers like Salve Regina and acts of reparation before the Blessed Sacrament reflect a a spirituality based on the presupposition of personal guilt for Adam’s transgression and consequential damnation – and the hope that if one is good enough – nicely behaved before God, properly contrite and appreciative of His mercy, one might escape the eternal torment of hell that one deserves just for having been born a descendant of Adam.
No, the point is to attain Heaven and share in the Divine Nature. The other possibilities are Limbo and the Hell of damnation.
The Orthodox Church affirms that we have inherited not Adam’s guilt, but the full consequences of his sin. My favorite analogy is to a baby born to a drug- addicted mother. The baby is not guilty of being a druggie, but he or she bears in the body, as well as in the environment, the consequences of the mother’s addiction. The baby will be physically impaired and will live in an environment that inclines toward following the path of addiction; so likewise, we bear in our bodies the consequence of illness and death and in our environments the myriad of temptations we face.
And that is what the Latin Church teaches. "Original sin" isn't "personal sin," but we suffer the effects of that privation of grace, and only grace can allow us to see the Face of God. I think this writer is making mountains out of molehills.
The consequence of this difference is a radically different worldview overall and an equally radically different view of the Christian life. In the Orthodox understanding, Christian life is about communion with God.
And for Catholics it's about --- ?
While Orthodox would not deny that our own personal sins demand divine justice, we are confident as we say at the end of so many prayers, hymns, and litanies, that “Thou art a merciful God Who lovest mankind.”
We just celebrated Divine Mercy Sunday.
The result of this conviction is that I am free to focus on finding a life of “mystic sweet communion with” the All- Holy Trinity and “those whose rest is won.” I can be certain that if communion with God, yes, through repentance for my many sins, is my chief aim in life, I shall, with God’s help, and only with His help, inherit the crown.
Yes, our mystics think radically differently than this. Ahem.
Thus, real total, communion with God is possible.
Yes, tell that to St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Pio of Pietrelcina, etc. What is it with the patronizing tone on the part of so many Orthodox?
My mother didn't do that, but, yep. I've been born into a totally degenerate race that is completely unable to do even the remotest thing to save itself - except to repent and believe on Christ, the second Adam, the life bringer.
This is like debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. - In the end, it isn't what I think about original sin or the doctrine of the ascension of the Theotokas or how many angels it takes to install a lightbulb. In the end, it is what I believe about Jesus Christ, faith in Him to save me through his blood shed on the cross. "determined to know NOTHING (and maybe I don't) save Christ and Him crucified".
The argument you evince depends upon the traductionist position on the origin of the soul. The Orthodox take the creationist position: souls are created for each person at the moment of conception.
Man is a unity of body and soul. If our souls did not exist at the moment of the Fall, we did not. Your argument based on imputing guilt along the germ-line from Adam is precisely the objectionable aspect of the Western idea of Original Sin, as opposed to the true, Orthodox doctrine of Ancestral Sin: we are guilty of our own transgressions only, but we are no longer clothed in the garment of incorruption, which is the Holy Spirit, and as such are subject to corruption (which, my priest is fond of pointing out is a physiological, not a moral term, encompassing death, disease, injury of all sorts). We are subject to the passions, which are amoral--indeed each having a moral use, hunger, the preservation of our bodily life; the incensive power, the turning away of temptation; and so forth.
But, these passions leave us open to temptation to their misuse.
Like Adam, we do not sin by necessity but by choice (though unlike Adam, living in this world, rather than paradise, we have
bad examples to follow, people who deceive us into sin (a man who marries a woman who is married, believing her lie that she is single, commits adultery when he consumates the false marriage), circumstances which sometimes seem to constrain us to choose among evils, and the passions, so that it is harder for us to avoid--though Holy Tradition teaches us that both the Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary and the Prophet, Forerunner and Baptist John did avoid the commission of any sin.)
Bookmarking - to get this thread higher in my Ping list.
Catholics don't take the position that we were somehow present in Adam and Eve. I know the post to which you are referring. It is not a good way of fleshing out the doctrine of Original Sin.
Catholics also regard that God creates a human soul for a person at the precise moment of conception.
One of the major problems that I have encountered with trying to speak to Orthodox (not that they are problematic) is that we often times have different words for the same things. This is quite an impediment, actually. What you speak of as Ancestral Sin is actually quite a good definition for what we call Original Sin. Perhaps you do not see this yourself. But for me, it is rather remarkable that this is actually a point of disagreement among Catholics and Orthodox. If there is a difference between the doctrines of Ancestral Sin and Original Sin, it is much smaller than the great similarity that exists.
Long delays are certainly not encouraged in the Orthodox Church, but our infants often tend to be much older when they are baptized, and no-one, including the clergy, seems to be terribly concerned about this.
Strictly speaking, I think that infants are appointed to be baptized and named on the 8th day after birth, but since the mother is not churched until the 40th day, this means that the mother can't be present, so I've never heard of anyone actually doing this. Baptisms on or shortly after the 40th day are most common -- frequently quite awhile after the 40th day. There are jokes that the age of baptism is partially determined by the size of the parish's baptismal font (since the infants are immersed.)
I believe that this relaxed approach toward baptism reflects the Orthodox view of original sin/original guilt -- namely that no guilt worthy of hell is inherited by an infant, that an infant is responsible for his own sins, and that an infant is obviously not capable of moral guilt due to his own choices at that point. Ergo, if an unexpected death were to happen, there is no doubt that the child will go to heaven.
I do not see this as being Pelagianism at all, for while Pelagius did teach that unbaptized infants go to heaven, the heart of his heresy was (as Tatumergo's quotation shows) that he believed that God's grace wasn't necessary to live a morally guiltless life and to achieve salvation. Orthodox Christians certainly do not believe that -- the grace of God is necessary for every salvation. On that, I think we would all agree.
The deacon's comment on the belief that babies who die without baptism die in a state of alienation from God and thus we must leave their fate to the mercy of God may describe or demonstrate the rather fine point of difference between Orthodoxy and the Latin Church on the doctrine of Original Sin. All of us who went to Catholic School in the pre-Vatican II days can remember the nuns taking about the "stain" of Original Sin. Therein probably lies the difference. While no educated Latin actually believes in sinful stains on a "pure white soul" in any literal sense, nevertheless the concept insofar as babies and Panagia is concerned, is foreign to Orthodoxy. The unfortunate result of the Augustinian doctrine of Original Sin isn't so much that he came up with it in the first place, as we all know he was responding to a serious No. African heresy and didn't have the benefit of the Greek Fathers thoughts on the matter, but rather what succeeding generations of protestant and even some Latin churchmen have done with the explanation. As it has spun out through the centuries, it has had a baleful effect on the idea of salvation in the West (for example, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God", etc) and, it has been argued, even on the ecclesiology of the Western Church.
By the way, gbcdoj, we had a long discussion of this question some months ago on FR, mostly among the Orthodox and the Latins, though a few protestants were in on it. The deacon did a masterful job of detailing the dogma of the Immaculate Conception in terms that made the Latin dogma come to be seen as quite close to the Orthodox teaching on The Most Holy Theotokos' condition as "Panagia".
Pelagianism, as I understand it, basically had the idea that man could live a morally guiltless life, and that therefore such a man would have "beaten the system," so to speak, and God would have to let him in to heaven.
This thinking was an outgrowth of a legalistic and juridical concept of salvation: somebody sins, somebody has to pay. So if you don't sin, you don't have to pay.
As we have discussed on other threads, the Orthodox approach to salvation is not juridical. We believe that God pours out his love and mercy on all, and what is necessary is for us to receive it, using the tools available to us.
As Kolokotronis points out, the Orthodox Church teaches that the Panagia (Theotokos/Virgin Mary) lived a morally guiltless life. She did so, furthermore, with the same tools that had been available to all men -- certainly to all of the people of Israel. This is what made her so special, and what made her a worthy vessel of the Incarnation.
But that morally guiltless life didn't "earn" her theosis -- it simply put her into a position to receive, through synergia, what God pours out. Her salvation was still the result of the combination of the grace of God and her own assent to God's will.
While they have the physical corruption and weakness inherited from Adam, infants are morally guiltless, and one would thus assume that in the next life that they are able to receive the love and mercy of God and the capability of experiencing theosis and growing in it. But this theosis is completely dependent on that outpouring of grace and mercy from God.
One difference that strikes me between the Orthodox view of Adam's sin and the Western view is that the West believes that because of sin, we owe a debt to God that we cannot repay. Hence, the crucifixion is "payment" to God for our sin--since otherwise the very nature of God would require justice, not mercy.
However, the Orthodox, from what I understand so far, sees that because of Adam's sin, we all suffer death, and so the victory of the Incarnation, Crucifixion and Resurrection is that Christ has conquered death. Death has been overcome; God did not need a blood sacrifice in order to satisfy His justice.
Again, my very preliminary understanding, but one which rings true to me, since I have never been able to understand how God could require a human sacrifice in order to have justice completed.
I don't remember my RC priests and nuns teaching anything remotely contrary to that.
God did not need a blood sacrifice in order to satisfy His justice.
I'm not sure I get what you're getting at. The Father may not have needed a blood sacrifice, but Christ is, was and evermore shall be the Pascal Lamb, and blood did flow, from the Crowning of Thorns, Scourging, to the Piercing of His Side. Is that not relevant or relevant in some other way that illustrates the point you were making?
I am still learning about Orthodoxy, I am lying in a crib in diapers, basically, but Jesus' death and resurrection weren't to satisfy a debt owed to God. They were to defeat Death finally--and hence give us Life.
I think this is where an earlier poster came in with the phrase "original guilt." Not that the Western church teaches a doctrin of original guilt, but that the concept of original sin in the Western church leads to the necessity of a blood offering made to God. That idea doesn't exist in Orthodoxy.
Like I said, I come from a very Protestant backgroun--think Jonathan Edwards' sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." Your experience may be different.
Thanks for your responses.
You're correct, Agrarian, that Catholics have traditionally rushed to baptize their children. I'm extremely suprised that the Orthdox practice (in America, or everywhere?) is to delay till the 8th day or even the 40th day. I know that the idea of 8th day baptism was discussed by St. Cyprian and the North African bishops at a Carthaginian synod in the third century, and it was decided to stick to the Church's tradition of immediate baptism on the 2nd or 3rd day.
If you say that there is "no doubt" that the child will go to heaven, what place does that leave baptism? St. Augustine quotes, in his refutation of (Pelagian) Julian of Eclanum, St. Chrysostom on baptism:
(From the Homily to the Neophytes:) For this reason we also baptize infants; although they are not polluted with sins [Julian had translated this as 'sin', but Aug. later quotes the Greek and refutes the mistranslation], so that holiness, righteousness, adoption, inheritance, and the brotherhood of Christ may be added to them, that they may be His members. (Against Julian, bk. I, 6. 21.)
Isn't the corollary of this that without the Mystery of Baptism, infants will not have: holiness, righteousness, the adoption (as sons of God), the inheritance (of eternal life), brotherhood with Christ, and membership in Him? I don't understand how such a person, lacking holiness and justice, could be considered automatically worthy to enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Moreover, I don't think the Pelagian doctrine of infant salvation can be separated from the heresy. Denial of original sin is a key part of Pelagianism's claim that the grace of God is not necessary, since men are, if original sin is excluded, not in need of redemption.
Kolokotronis, is the idea of a stain of original sin really so foreign? From the Patriarchical Encyclical of 1895, issued by the Patriarch of Constantinople and his suffragan bishops against the encyclical of Pope Leo XIII on Reunion of the Church:
XIII. The one holy, catholic and apostolic Church of the seven Ecumenical Councils teaches that the supernatural incarnation of the only-begotten Son and Word of God, of the Holy Ghost and the Virgin Mary, is alone pure and immaculate; but the Papal Church scarcely forty years ago again made an innovation by laying down a novel dogma concerning the immaculate conception of the Mother of God and ever-Virgin Mary, which was unknown to the ancient Church (and strongly opposed at different times even by the more distinguished among the papal theologians).
Isn't saying that the conception of St. Mary is not immaculate the same thing as saying that there was some stain in it? I don't see any other way to read it.
And I must disagree with you on Augustine and the Greek Fathers. He did in fact have the benefit of (some of) their thoughts. For instance, here are the headings in Migne from Bk. I of Against Julian:
5. 15. Testimonies of the Eastern bishops on original sin: Gregory Nazianzen.
5. 16. Testimony of Saint Basil against the original sin introduced by Julian.
5. 17. Another testimony sought from the same book of Basil.
5. 18. Testimony of Basil for original sin.
5. 19. The faith of the Eastern bishops, who gathered in the Synod of Diospolis.
5. 20. All the bishops of the West and East believe in one and the same way.
6. 21. Testimony of St. John Chrysostom from the homily Ad neophitos.
6. 22. Right interpretation of the opinion of St. John Chrysostom.
6. 23. Apostrophe to St. John Chrysostom.
6. 24. Testimonies of John Chrysostom for original sin.
6. 25. From homily 9 Ad neophitos in Genesim.
6. 26. From the homily Ad neophitos.
6. 27. From homily 10 in Epistolam ad Romanos.
6. 28. St. John is far from the Pelagian sense and thinks catholicly.
Agrarian, but Bl. John Cassian is semi-Pelagian, since he holds in Conference XIII that a good will can begin with man.
Would not a lack of righteousness and holiness mean that the infants will stand condemned at their judgment, if they die without reception of the Mystery of Baptism? But perhaps I'm missing something; do the Orthodox not all accept the doctrine of a Particular Judgment at the point of death?
And, here is something that I found. The Pan-Orthodox Synod of Jerusalem, in 1672, stated against the Calvinist heresy:
We believe Holy Baptism, which was instituted by the Lord, and is conferred in the name of the Holy Trinity, to be of the highest necessity. For without it none is able to be saved, as the Lord saith, “Whosoever is not born of water and of the Spirit, shall in no wise enter into the Kingdom of the Heavens.” {John 3:5} And, therefore, it is necessary even for infants, since they also are subject to original sin, and without Baptism are not able to obtain its remission. Which the Lord shewed when he said, not of some only, but simply and absolutely, “Whosoever is not born [again],” which is the same as saying, “All that after the coming of Christ the Saviour would enter into the Kingdom of the Heavens must be regenerated.” And forasmuch as infants are men, and as such need salvation; needing salvation, they need also Baptism. And those that are not regenerated, since they have not received the remission of hereditary sin, are, of necessity, subject to eternal punishment, and consequently cannot without Baptism be saved; so that even infants ought, of necessity, to be baptised. Moreover, infants are saved, as is said in Matthew; {Matthew 19:12} but he that is not baptised is not saved. ... And the effects of Baptism are, to speak concisely, firstly, the remission of the hereditary transgression, and of any sins whatsoever which the baptised may have committed. Secondly, it delivereth him from the eternal punishment, to which he was liable, as well for original sin, as for mortal sins he may have individually committed.
This site says of this Confession (given by the Patriarch Dositheus and signed by the attending bishops): "It is considered one of the major pronouncements of the Orthodox Faith, and an important source of Church teaching."
To me, this looks like in 1672 the Orthodox had the same opinion on original sin as the Catholics...
My experience is somewhat different, but my Priests and Nuns did emphasize the guiltn and stain of sin, and I think there is both advantage and impediment to that teaching.
The impediment is that placing too much emphasis on one's nature as a sinner, one begins to see oneself as unique in that regard. Sort of a pride on the negative side of things, if you know what I mean.
The advantage is that a sense of right and wrong and it's tremendous consequences is firmly established. But I don't think that a preoccupation with guilt or an angry God is in any way, shape or form materially informing present day Roman Catholicism.
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