Posted on 04/26/2005 10:19:24 AM PDT by TaxachusettsMan
"We don't know if that's going to affect (relations) with the Russian Orthodox church. The future will show," Interfax new agency quoted Patriarch Alexy II as saying. Metropolitan Kirill, a senior official in the Russian Orthodox church, attended the meeting with Benedict on Alexy's behalf.
Alexy ruled out the possibility of inviting Benedict to Russia in the near future, calling on the new pope to address the proselytizing of Orthodox followers by Catholic missionaries that he alleges went on during John Paul's reign. These accusations led Alexy to block John Paul from visiting Russia in 2004, ending the late pontiff's long-held dream to visit the country.
"There cannot be a visit for the sake of a visit. There cannot be a meeting purely for television cameras," Alexy said Monday.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalcatholicreporter.org ...
Thank you for putting forth the most reasonable argument on this thread.
"I would welcome a union between my Church and the Orthodox churches, but I have the sense many Orthodox would not."
While the Orthodox have retained many traditions from the first millenium, the "sensus catholicus" is not one of them. Their phronema is heavily influenced by centuries of autocephaly resulting in the psychology of contented local churches which are intrinsic to and co-extensive with the national identity and boundaries of mainly small near-Eastern countries.
Consequently there is no sense of urgency or imperative in the Orthodox mentality to seek the unity of all Christ's followers. They have no real sense of the universality of the Church, or the need of the Church to be universal, because for them the universality of the Church is completely present in each local church.
The Ecumenical Patriarch is not an Eastern version of the Pope - he is not the centre and foundation of earthly unity for them like the Pope is for us. I think many Orthodox would hardly notice or care if his office disappeared. Their whole ecclesiology has diverged significantly from ours over the last millenium, and a significant factor in this is their separation from the Petrine ministry.
It has also effected the whole outlook on "mission" generally. Until relatively recently, the Orthodox Church had been a total dead duck with respect to the mission of Christ's Church. If you lack the "universal urge" then you have no need or desire to see the Gospel preached to the very ends of the earth. Instead the world is canonically divided up into territories and national boundaries which are either Christian or not, and woe betide anybody who crosses those boundaries, even if its to further the mission which Christ gave to us. Consequently the whole concept of "mission" can be distorted to the extent that it can be seen as a form of aggression, and missionaries seen as hostile invaders.
This may appear ludicrous to Western Christians who see the goal of the Church as being the conversion of the world to Christ, but that is where Alexy is coming from when he sees missionaries "in his territory" and the Pope of Rome wanting to drop in for tea.
In their view, they have done alright without the Pope for a thousand years, why should they be in such a rush to change things?
"When do you expect the RC to start having HUGE revival meetings and begin sending RC missionaries into ALL of Western Europe in order to regain their lost members and gain converts?"
Its starting in August in Germany and they are calling it "World Youth Day".
"Catholics and Orthodox are the closest, doctrinally."
Technically you are correct, but in mentality Bible-believing Protestants are the closest to us. They are far closer to us than we would care to admit and they are far more Catholic than they would care to admit.
In deferense to those of us who practice our faith at an Eastern Catholic Church, I would appreciate your refraining from the use of the word uniatism. In case you missed my previous post on this concept, here it is again, hopefuly for the last time.
EXPLANATION OF SELF-GOVERNING EASTERN CATHOLIC CHURCHES
I'm sure I've posted this before but, if not, here it is again. My resource for this information is Rev. Anthony J. Salim, author of Captivated By Your Teachings - a resource book for Maronite Catholics. He says:
In the 16th century, several Eastern Churches began a process of restoring communion with the Vatican in Rome, which by now had clearly become the center of the Catholic Church in the West. To some degree, these newly reunited Churches retained their Eastern traditions and became known as the "Eastern Catholic Churches", as distinct from their Orthodox counterparts. (exceptions: Maronite Catholic Church and the Italo-Albanian Catholic Church which never separated from Rome.)
The process of reunion adopted then was known as "Uniatism", implying union with Rome. Such union was one-sided in that it meant a union on Western (Latin) terms. Practically speaking, this meant the loss of some authentically Eastern liturgical customs and disciplines (ex: iconostasis of the Byzantine Tradition and use of unleavened bread in any Eastern Tradition). Ultimately, uniatism came to be perceived as a pejorative term in both Eastern Catholic and Orthodox Churches.
Even for the Maronite Church, the pressure to conform to a Latin norm caused deep scars.
The Second Vatican Council recognized that a high price was paid by the Eastern Cathoic Churches in terms of latinization. Thus, the Council directed that the process of coming into communion of the Churches needs to be done differently and the terms "uniatism" and "uniate" must never again be used.
In its Decree ORIENTALIUM ECCLESIARUM , the Council clearly stated the equality of all the ancient Traditions of the Church, East and West. It acknowledged the need for these Eastern Churches to reform what was needed, so that thsese living Churches could be a more authentic witness to their ancient Eastern heritages.
Prior to the Second Vatican Council's "Decree on the Eastern Catholic Churches", a common incorrect way of referring to Eastern Catholics was that they belonged to a "Rite," with no appreciation of them as self-governing (sui iuris) Churches. In the years after the Council a better understanding - because more ancient and authentic - of Eastern ecclesiology was revived. This seemingly newer understanding appreciates more the proper distinctions that need to be observed when we talk about Eastern Catholics. The Council, then, caused us to become more precise abut our individual designations by making the proper distinction between a "Rite," a 'Tradition" and a sui iuris "Particular Church."
While it is preferable to say that an Eastern Catholic individual is a member of a particular Eastern Catholic Church, it is also correct to say that she or he follows a liturgical Rite (or Tradition).
A Rite is a prayer ritual, or, by extension, a liturgical Tradition.
A Tradition has its own natural ways of expressing Catholicism according to proper language, native customs, discipline, theology, spirituality and liturgy. Tradition is broader than and includes rites, hence it is preferable to use the tern Tradition, as in Byzantine Tradition.
A sui iuris Church (sui iuris is Latin for "in" or "according to" "its own right") is a hierarchically-organized, self-governing Church within the Catholic Communion of Churches, derived from a particular Tradition. By "hierarchically-organized" is meant that the individual Church has some kind of governing leader (patriarch, metropolitan, major archbishop) and makes its own decidions for governing the ordinary life of the Church.
Of the one billion Catholics in the world, almost 20 million (2%) follow Eastern Traditions. They are grouped into Particular Churches deriving from 5 major Traditions:
1) Byzantine (Constantinopolitan) - the largest, with 13 Particular Churches;
2) West Syriac-Antiochene, with 3 Churches;
3) East Syriac/Assyrian "Church of the East," with 2 Churches;
4) Alxandrine, with 2 Churches; and
5) Armenian Church.
In the US, there are 16 Eastern Catholic jurisdictions representing 4 Traditions: 10 Byzantine jurisdictions; one Syrian (or Syriac) Catholic jurisdiction and 2 Maronite jurisdictions (both Syro-Antiochene); and one each from the Armenian Catholic, the Chaldean Catholic and Syro-Malabar Catholic. The total Eastern Catholic population in the US is nearly half a million.
Bump to #65
I've really, really grown tired of the Russian Orthodox Church and their un-Christian witness.
IF the RCC wants to regain its position in Europe, they will need more than just one World Youth Day each year. They better get the ADULTS going toward their Churches as well.
I see this as imperative if the spiritually dead EU is to be countered.
I wish the RCC well in Europe and hope they get a huge movement going.
I read from an EOC poster that the ROC has had to open( re-open actually since they were closed during the commie days) several seminaries because the number of men wishing to be Priests in Russia is growing huge.
This is good!! More ROC is good for Russians and should help them stand up to the materialism and gangsterism of the devil.
I think each Christian Church has a big job in their respective regions.
Fight the evil on and fight him hard!
And, I have grown tired of your type of witness as well.
It is very insidious how you spin this story. Are you saying that Russian Orthodox Christians suffered LESS under the rule of militant atheists? Did they lose less clergy and faithful in the Gulag?
Soon you will blame Buddhists for the killing fields of Cambodia and Lutherans or Catholics for the Nazi atrocities. Shame on you.
Dear annalex,
"The Anglicans (American Episcopalians) used to be considered as close if not closer than the Orthodox. The theology was virtually the same, and they had apostolic succession of priests. The differences were that the Anglicans would not recognize the primacy of the Pope. The communion was, I believe, mutually available. However, the Anglican church began to ordain women and practicing homosexuals, and is on its way to bless homosexual 'marriage'. This broke the apostolic succession and put them in gross violation of the Church Doctrine. At this point only some remnant of the Anglican church is a possible candidate for union."
No, not quite. Anglican theology can be difficult to pin down. My own view is that this is because Anglicanism really was a governmental solution to a church riven by severe doctrinal differences. Thus, "Anglican theology" may be a bit of a contradiction in terms.
Anglo-Catholics uphold a theology very close to our own, but evangelical Anglicans are much more Protestant in their theology, and in many case, are far from Catholic theology.
After King Henry VIII became a schismatic and his daughter became a heretic, finally and formally breaking off the church in England from the Catholic Church, and changing the rites of ordination and consecration, there was no intercommunion, and Anglican orders were considered, at best, suspect. Pope Leo XIII, in the 19th century declared that Anglican orders are invalid, and thus they are no different to us than are any other Protestants.
Anglicans, it is Catholic belief, have no Apostolic Succession.
Catholic belief is that Anglicans do not have the Real Presence when their priests have Eucharist services (and in fact, many Anglicans don't really believe in the Real Presence, either), and that their priests and bishops do not have Holy Orders.
That they ordain women only exacerbates an existing problem.
sitetest
Do you wan the truth? The Stalin's persecution of Ukrainian Catholics was caused by the same motive Crimean Tartars and Chechens were persecuted - many of them collaborated with the Nazi invaders.
That is why Ukrainian Catholics/Uniates in Poland were treated worse that Latin rite/main stream Catholic who were bravely resisting German occupation.
The reason why Stalin's regime decided to reopen part of Orthodox churches was that the Orthodox bishops agreed to ask people to fight against Hitler. Bolsheviks were enemy of the religion in general, but they differentiated their attitude when it was expedient to them. Asking Alexy II for apology for Soviet crime is ridiculous.
Majority of the Ukrainians are Orthodox. How are they treating Catholics in the Ukraine?
Because of this disgusting bashing of the EOC, I NOW understand why so many the EOC finds so many RCs to be unworthy of them.
Why bother to associate with folks who HATE you and YOUR CHURCH SO MUCH THAT BASH YOU DURING YOUR CELEBRATION HOLY WEEK?
BTW, Tsars were protecting the Catholic Church - they were involved in creating of Holy Alliance in XIXc and helped to restore papal state in Italy (after Napoleon), they prevented the dissolution of Jesuit order (Jesuits survived only in Russian occupied part of Poland). Catholic Church in Poland was quite conservative and had good relations with Russian authorities in XIX c.
This is true - but it was to be expected after Germans lost the war. Soviets were not very nice to the colaborators. That is why many Western Ukrainians were evacuated by retreating German army.
Regarding my posts, I was responding to a poster who held the ROC (which was also brutally persecuted and aggressively co-opted by the Bolsheviks) culpable for the actions of the Soviet regime regarding the suppression of Catholicism.
My point was that the Unia (which was a Latin term for a Latin concept) also involved the suppression of one religion (Orthodox) and the promotion of another (Eastern Rite Catholicism in union with Rome) at the instigation of secular powers (the Austro-Hungarian Empire, etc...) and in no small part to promote political ends.
The use of religion to divide and conquer is no less attractive when it is being done by godless Communists in Russia and the Ukraine, by Catholic Austro-Hungarian rulers in Carpatho-Russia, by Anglican kings persecuting Catholics in Ireland, or by German princes using either Protestantism or Catholicism (or both) to promote their secular power.
You will note that the stern words in your own post involve a strict order for *Roman Catholics* not to use the term Uniate, because it promoted the idea of second class citizenship. Look at my posts -- I stated this clearly, and showed that I understood this, so I'm not sure what your post was supposed to accomplish. The reason that hundreds of thousands of former Eastern Catholics in America became Orthodox in the last century was not because they were mistreated by Orthodox, but because they were treated as second-class citizens by Latin Rite Catholic leaders. It was this problem that the statements of Vat II was addressing, not the Orthodox.
Fortunately, this is no longer the case, and Eastern Catholics reached postions of honor and respect under JPII that were very disproportionate to their being only 2% of the world's Catholics. This is a good thing. I would assume that the new Pope, whom I very much like, will carry on in the same vein.
Your post is very thoughtful and thought provoking. I learned from it. Thanks for posting such a CIVIL post. It is refreshing to say the least on this particular thread.
In general, even though our ecclesiology is, if anything, more strictly defined than is Roman Catholic ecclesiology, the Orthodox Church, *in practice* has tended to treat the Roman church as being in schism, rather than non-existent or irrelevant. By contrast, when there are Eastern Catholic Patriarchs holding the same titles and sees as their Orthodox counterparts, the implication is that the Catholic church has a rather different attitude...
But I think Lion in Winter has it right (and not even Orthodox!) -- this is Holy Week, and it's time for me, anyway, to stop all of this and to return to prayer. Which is probably what I should have done in the first place.
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