Posted on 05/29/2005 7:55:52 AM PDT by kosta50
BARI, Italy (AP) -- Pope Benedict XVI visited the eastern port of Bari on his first papal trip Sunday and pledged to make healing the 1,000-year-old rift with the Orthodox church a "fundamental" commitment of his papacy.
Benedict made the pledge in a city closely tied to the Orthodox church. Bari, on Italy's Adriatic coast, is considered a "bridge" between East and West and is home to the relics of St. Nicholas of Myra, a 4th-Century saint who is one of the most popular in both the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches.
Benedict referred to Bari as a "land of meeting and dialogue" with the Orthodox in his homily at a Mass that closed a national religious conference. It was his first pilgrimage outside Rome since being elected the 265th leader of the Roman Catholic Church on April 19.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
Yes, those were the wonderful folks praying for Pope JPII's fiery death a few years back, no?
"Both the Orthodox and the Catholic optimists are high if they think either's going to happen in this lifetime."
I think most of us Orthodox here agree with you, which is why we have said it would take at least 100 years of catechesis in the Western Church to accomplish anything like reunion. But...what will be the effect of a Pope who speaks like one of the Eastern Fathers, who clearly thinks in a patristic fashion? One result I think is likely. Orthodoxy will become much more comfortable with, less suspicious of, Rome and its Pope. I don't know what the effect will be in the West, at least in terms of theology and ecclesiology which is of course where the rub lies in this reunion stuff. You may find that the new Pope speaks more our language than yours. If I am right, what do you think this will mean in the West?
Well, you might get to Heaven, but it would only be through the infinite mercy of Christ, and in spite of your disbelief.
I am a Catholic (with Orthodox sympathies) and I think your comment strays uncomfortably close to Feenyism.
A poster had implied that converts to Orthodoxy and Catholicism were the zealots who would stand in the way of reunion, and if we all just disappeared, then "cradle Orthodox" and "cradle Catholics" would, so to speak -- leap into each others' cradles without hesitation.
My point was that, notwithstanding the inappropriateness of dividing Orthodox and Catholics up into "real Orthodox" and "real Catholics" based on the age at which one was received into either Church and who one's parents are (there's that pesky bit in St. Paul about "neither Jew nor Greek..."), this showed an ignorance of how a whole lot of cradle Orthodox, especially in the "old countries," think.
You are of course right that there are some intemperate monastics. Never heard the "fiery death for JPII" thing, but I wouldn't put it beyond some zealous monk or nun to say such a thing.
Our priest once jokingly said that the difference between Orthodoxy and Catholicism at this point in time can be summarized by our nuns: ours "throw rocks" at the Pope because they love their faith and are intent on defending it, yours "throw rocks" at the Pope because they want to dismantle theirs.
And note that I said that this opposition is "as things currently stand." Some of the most fervent opponents to current rapproachment would change their positions radically if things change to where we do share a common faith.
In most Orthodox Churches, at Pascha we read a Gospel passage in as many languages as possible. This also always includes Latin (my son read the Latin in our parish this year), and traditionally, it is one of the first languages read. I read the story of a pilgrimage to Mt. Athos that indicated that this practice continues there, as well. This practice indicates many things, but given the fact that Latin is a dead language, its continued presence in our services -- even on Mt. Athos -- is, I believe, the expression of hope for the future...
Fascinating question! I can only sketch a very brief answer to it at this time. We should start by saying that there has been profound change in the Orthodox Church and that we can dispense from the myth of its supposed immutability.
Take the Liturgy, for example. The Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom is itself a development, codified in the 5th century during the time of that great Saint. Since then, it has slowly acreeted new developments, in its externals as well as in its internals. We may readily see this in Dom Gregory Dix's masterful study, The Shape of the Liturgy. Change is possible in the Orthodox Church and therefore, change has happened.
Take the change of attitudes toward the Ecumenical Patriarchate, for example, historically taken by the Muscovite Patriarchate. It declared itself "the Third Rome" after the first one fell into "schism" and the second one "into heresy." This suspicion of Constantinople by Moscow continues in our time. Consider the near-excommunication of the First See of Orthodoxy by its Muscovite counterpart back in 1999, when Constantinople recognized the autocephaly of the Orthodox Church in Latvia, in contravention to Moscow's pretentions in the Baltics. "Organizational confusion" is not restricted to North America, but extends to the Old World, because it is intrinsic to Orthodox ecclessiology itself, which in its attempt to make all bishops equal, it has in turn created a Church in which no bishop knows his place. As a consequence, the Orthodox Church has no one pope, it has many.
I'm going to stop now.
In Christ,
-Theo
Wrong, very wrong.
His #12. I'll tell Ann you think it was her posting.
How can anyone so confused about the sex of one person opine on the procession and the begetting of three persons?
The above was a joke. Agree with your post, and it will take centuries to heal the schism.
I do tend to agree. We're not going back; there's no point in lingering over that daydream. So we must go on. A brotherly dialogue informed by the Holy Spirit will enable us to discern and desire a resolution to what now seems insoluble and, sad to say, not especially desireable. It is not a question of which side wins; it's a question of both sides giving themselves over to God for conversion. And no, if we don't wish to be converted, any imposed top-down fix will be every bit as phony and doomed as the self-congratulating publican who left the temple, his ears ringing with his own false pieties.
I've said a number of times that I never go to bed worried that my Irish Catholic relatives are going to Hell and they aren't worried about me.
But as you say, we don't believe the same thing. In the Body of Christ, this is an intolerable state of affairs, that what may start as different modes of belief puts us at very real risk of beliving things that are irreconcilable. It's not for the sake of pride and power then, but our own grave duty to the integrity of Christ's Body, that mere complacency is unacceptable.
I make all sorts of mistakes regarding he/she on FR. My apologies.
Say, how do I know you're *not* Ann? :-)
Source?
Both the distinction between cradle and convert and its application to relations between the Orthodox and the Latins are specious.
My parish priest, Archimandrite Daniel Griffith (the senior priest of the Antiochian Archdiocese, it so happens) is a convert, and takes a very irenic line toward the Latin Church, almost analogous to their usual position vis-a-vis us 'schismatic, but not heretical', while the late Fr. John Romanides, a 'cradle' Orthodox, is probably the most notable exponent of the idea that raising Blessed Augustine to the status of 'Father among Fathers' and embracing his wilder speculations engendered outright heresy among the Franks which then spread to the entire Patriarchate of Rome.
As posters to the religion forum know, I incline to Fr. John's view (I happen to be a convert), but I am much more hopeful about relations with the Latins since the election of Benedict XVI. (He 'gets' icons, and what went wrong with Western religious art, and is conversant with the Greek fathers, including at least some since the schism--he quotes Cabasilas!) I hope they have a younger version somewhere in the curia, and few of like mind being groomed among their newest bishops. He's made a good start, but it will take a century to re-instill the patristic phronema in the Latin church.
The flip side of your analysis of the lamentable juridictional problems caused by Constantinople's meddling (I would add our jurisdictional disunity in North America to the list--until the founding of the Greek Archdiocese in the wake of the loss of the Second Greco-Turkish War and the diaspora of the Greeks of Asia Minor--North America had canonical unity under Russia, which had evangelized the continent), is the Orthodox view of Latin ecclesiology as the 'peculiar theory that there is only one bishop on the planet'.
Met. Isaiah of Pittsburgh shocked the Latin counterparts at a recent ecumenical dialog by calling Latin bishops (the Pope of Rome excluded) 'altar boys'.
With the exception of infallibility, which rests with the Church as a whole (I have already pointed out that our magesterium permeats the Church, from the Ecumenical Patriarch to the most recently catechized convert laywoman, all are responsible for the defense, preservation, propogation and definition of the Faith--our bishop once told us to know the Faith, and show him the door if he ever taught us heresy, very much in the manner of the Holy Apostle Paul's exhortation against those who taught 'another gospel'), the authority the Latin church vests in the Papacy, is held equally and indivisibly by all bishops of the Orthodox. ("Where the bishop is, there is the catholic church," St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote. The 'Chair of Peter' is the episcopate, not the Papacy--as the context and second edition of St. Cyprian's De Unitate make clear.)
"Met. Isaiah of Pittsburgh shocked the Latin counterparts at a recent ecumenical dialog by calling Latin bishops (the Pope of Rome excluded) 'altar boys'."
Was it +Maximos of Pittsburgh or +Isaias of Denver? Sounds like +Max and coming from him it would have been doubly shocking to the Roman bishops. Another Metropolitan, then a bishop, once ribbed a Catholic Cardinal friend of his here in the States (and in front of a few of us) that the Cardinal was "just a parish priest with an episcopal crown"! The claims of universal jurisdiction made by and for the popes is clearly a problem. But note how the new Pope quotes +Ignatius of Antioch!
The Roman bishops shouldn't have been shocked by this. The original quotation came from one of their own, a Roman Catholic bishop (I can't find the quotation) after Vatican I. It roughly went "we came to the council as bishops, and we left it as sacristans..." I'm still surprised that an Orthodox bishop would have made that kind of comment in public.
B16's writings have indicated that he takes a more traditionally patristic view of the episcopate -- not one that is identical to that of the Orthodox view, but one that shows a noticable shift from that of his predecessors. It will be interesting to see what this translates into in practice during his tenure as Pope. As some have pointed out, Cardinal Ratzinger's theological views may not translate into Pope Benedict's actions.
"Perhaps through the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist and Marriage the rift may be welded shut"
Unity of Faith is demonstrated through the Eucharist. Ultimately, intercommunion through economia will be the first visible step to full communion if it ever comes.
Your addition of Marriage is interesting as both Churches have traditionally looked upon "mixed marriages" as a danger and a challenge. Of late the GOA has recognized the reality of these marriages and has committed itself to making the parishes welcoming to the non-Orthodox spouse. In Lebanon marriages between an Orthodox person and a Maronite or Melchite person are not viewed as "mixed marriages" in any practical sense and de facto, if not de jure, intercommunion there is not uncommon. Another poster noted that it seemed in cases of Orthodox/Roman Catholic marriages, the children are generally brought up Orthodox. That is my present experience too, but that was not the case when I was a kid and it may be that my present sense is born more of who I see on Sunday than anything else.
Reconciliation won't happen until the RCC gets rid of the Pope and the doctrine of infallibility, as well as removes other heretical doctrines, such as the immaculate conception etc.
Perhaps you could explain to me how kissing the Koran which denies Christ has appeased the Muslims?
We should be more concerned with being faithful to Christ than trying to make everyone like us at the expense of our souls.
You need to read the early Church Fathers.
You are speaking as if you understand Catholic teaching when you most certainly do not.
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