That doesn't answer the question of why Orthodox and Catholic are not in communion. Catholics now say it is okay for Orthodox to take communion in a Catholic service, but Orthodox have not reciprocated. Why not?
I presume, like in other issues, that we have different definitions of what constitutes "communion". Apparently, there is some sort of "list" in the minds of bishops, and the West's list is shorter or less demanding - whether you take that as good or bad.
All we can do as laity is speculate. I am not going to solve this problem. I have enough to do at my own home and parish!
Regards
The Catholic position is one more akin to the Church in the first millennium where significant theological differences existed, knowingly or unknowingly (but known to the Pope and many others), and yet the Church did not act on them because they didn't change the cor belief (which is debatable).
Thus, Pope Leo III allowed filioque but refused to make it official because it would be a violation of the unchangeable Councils to which Rome subscribed. However, he fully agreed with its theology!
The Orthodox, however, take a more rigorous stand, in line with St. Photios's way of reasoning in the 9th century (speaking of such orthodoxy, interestingly, most of the serious heresies originated in the See of Constantinople, and were stopped by the Popes!).
The midnset is: either the Church will have an identical theology, to the "t," or it is not the same Church. He even went as far as calling the Eucharistic wafer "heresy." But it is well known that in the undivided Church there were many theological opinions on both sides being proposed by various Fathers.
St. Photios, however, missed that Catholics kneel on Sundays, something that was prohibited by the First Ecumenical Council. But since many Orthodox have started using pews and kneel on Sundays themselves, all of a sudden this is not such an "important" issue!
Likewise, the only Church that strictly observes St.Paul's commandment that women should not be in church uncovered is the Russian Orthodox Church (ROCOR included). All other Orthodox Churches do, and pretend that they smply do not "see" uncovered women.
Even more disturbing is something that was already brought up (by me) in previous posts: allowing communion to the monophysites (Copts) and other non-Chalcedonians (Ethiopnians), simply because they "look" Orthodox, or something like that!
The Antiochan Orthodox Church is especially notorious for allowing Copts and Ethiopians to take communion, but I have seen OCA churches do the same as well.
Thus, one must be on guard against squeaky clean Orthodox purists who notice only those "heresies" that have not infected them — yet!
But, they will have no problem splitting hairs on some much more trivial issues (inasmuch as they do not affect our understanding of the Holy Trinity, Christolofy or the Theotokos) such as whether the fires of the Purgatory are "real" or not.
Needless to say, the Orthodox community in America (SCOBA) is dead silent on this abomination, for — although the Christilogy of the Catholics is identical to ours, unlike that of Copts or Ethiopians — they are subjected to the same "conversion" rituals that would be used on Arian heretics (by chrismation), for example, whereas so many Orthodox churches allow non-Chalcedonians to simply recite the Creed sans filioque and to receive the communion.
Instead of settling on what is expected to be the "core" and allowing theolgoumena on the rest, the idea is that we will all look, walk, kneel, sit, and pray in an identical way before we can partake of the Eucharist in each others' temples.
Interestingly, the Catholics and the Orthodox in the Middle East simply ignore both sides and happily intercommune and the Church, East and West, remains silent.