Kosta50,
I am sorry that you felt offended, ok I apologize.
But you should not dismiss the history, if you want to understand this issue. Unfortunately the history tells us that the Orthodox Churches have progressivly adopted a laxer and laxer view on this issue under the pressure of the civil legislations. This did not happen in the West.
This is a short history. As you can see there are several clear declarations from synods and Popes.
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05054c.htm
The synods of all centuries, and more clearly still the decrees of the popes, have constantly declared that divorce which annulled the marriage and permitted remarriage was never allowed. The Synod of Elvira (A.D. 300) maintains without the least ambiguity the permanence of the marriage bond, even in the case of adultery. Canon ix decreed: "A faithful woman who has left an adulterous husband and is marrying another who is faithful, let her be prohibited from marrying; if she has married, let her not receive communion until the man she has left shall have departed this life, unless illness should make this an imperative necessity" (Labbe, "Concilia", II, 7). The Synod of Arles (314) speaks indeed of counseling as far as possible, that the young men who had dismissed their wives for adultery should take no second wife" (ut, in quantum possil, consilium eis detur); but it declares at the same time the illicit character of such a second marriage, because it says of these husbands, "They are forbidden to marry" (prohibentur nubere, Labbe, II, 472). The same declaration is to be found in the Second Council of Mileve (416), canon xvii (Labbe, IV, 331); the Council of Hereford (673), canon x (Labbe, VII, 554); the Council of Friuli (Forum Julii), in northern Italy (791), canon x (Labbe, IX, 46); all of these teach distinctly that the marriage bond remains even in case of dismissal for adultery, and that new marriage is therefore forbidden.
The following decisions of the popes on this subject deserve special mention: Innocent I, "Epist. ad Exsuper.", c. vi, n. 12 (P.L., XX, 500): "Your diligence has asked concerning those, also, who, by means of a deed of separation, have contracted another marriage. It is manifest that they are adulterers on both sides." Compare also with "Epist. ad Vict. Rothom.", xiii, 15, (P.L., XX, 479): "In respect to all cases the rule is kept that whoever marries another man, while her husband is still alive, must be held to be an adulteress, and must be granted no leave to do penance unless one of the men shall have died." The impossibility of absolute divorce during the entire life of married people could not be expressed more forcibly than by declaring that the permission to perform public penance must be refused to women who remarried, as to a public sinner, because this penance presupposed the cessation of sin, and to remain in a second marriage was to continue in sin.
Besides the adultery of one of the married parties, the laws of the empire recognized other reasons for which marriage might be dissolved, and remarriage permitted, for instance, protracted absence as a prisoner of war, or the choice of religious life by one of the spouses. In these cases, also, the popes pronounced decidedly for the indissolubility of marriage, e.g. Innocent I, "Epist. ad Probum", in P.L. XX, 602; Leo I, "Epist. ad Nicetam Aquil.", in P.L., LIV, 1136; Gregory I, "Epist. ad Urbicum Abb.", in P.L., LXXVII, 833, and "Epist. ad Hadrian. notar.", in P.L., LXXVII, 1169. This last passage, which is found in the "Decretum" of Gratian (C. xxvii, Q, ii, c. xxii), is as follows: "Although the civil law provides that, for the sake of conversion (i.e., for the purpose of choosing the religious life), a marriage may be dissolved, though either of parties be unwilling, yet the Divine law does not permit it to be done." That the indissolubility of marriage admits of no exception is indicated by Pope Zacharias in his letter of 5 January, 747, to Pepin and the Frankish bishops, for in chapter vii he ordains "by Apostolic authority", in answer to the questions that had been proposed to him: "If any layman shall put away his own wife and marry another, or if he shall marry a woman who has been put away by another man, let him be deprived of communion" [Monum. Germ. Hist.: Epist., III:Epist. Merovingici et Karolini ævi, I (Berlin, 1892), 482]
Council of Elvira
"Likewise, women who have left their husbands for no prior cause and have joined themselves with others, may not even at death receive communion"
(canon 8 [A.D. 300]).
"Likewise, a woman of the faith [i.e., a baptized person] who has left an adulterous husband of the faith and marries another, her marrying in this manner is prohibited. If she has so married, she may not at any more receive communion--unless he that she has left has since departed from this world"
(ibid., canon 9).
"If she whom a catechumen [an upbaptized person studying the faith] has left shall have married a husband, she is able to be admitted to the fountain of baptism. This shall also be observed in the instance where it is the woman who is the catechumen. But if a woman of the faithful is taken in marriage by a man who left an innocent wife, and if she knew that he had a wife whom he had left without cause, it is determined that communion is not to be given to her even at death"
(ibid., canon 10)
Only the decisions of the General (Ecumenical) Councils were binding for the whole Church, East and West. The synods you mention are local councils. As such they were not binding for the whole Church. Since these were western synods, they applied to the Western Patriarchate, but not the remaining four (Constantinople, Alexandria, Jerusalem, and Antioch).
The same can be said of papal decrees. They had no juridical sway in other patriarchates because the Undivided Church of the first millennium of Christianity was not organized, nor pope-dominated as you want to believe. The Pope had no juridical authority over other Patriarchs. He was one of them, senior in honor, but not their lord.
The undivided Church was apostolic in its makeup: the patriarch stood in place of the major Apostles (The Bishop of Old Rome for +Peter and +Paul, the Bishop of Constantinople (New Rome) for +John and +James; the Bishop of jerusalem for +James; the Bishop of Antioch for +Peter; the Bishop of Alexandria for +Mark). They were equals. None lorded over the other. Peter was the "elder brother" who was respected and who had "head of the line privileges" for the lack of a better word, but lorded over none of the Patriarch.
The Synod of Elvira also dealt with the discipline of celibacy for the priests, I believe. The Western Patriarchate has, from the earliest days, favored celibacy although Latin clergy continued to be married way past the Great Schism in 1054, and even when they were forced to divorce their wives, that was done for economic reasons.
Clearly, the Synod of Elvira or Council of Hereford (Wales) were non binding on the East, and so were the papal statements regarding the marriage of clergy or divorce in general.
You say "Unfortunately the history tells us that the Orthodox Churches have progressively adopted a laxer and laxer view on this issue under the pressure of the civil legislations. This did not happen in the West."
It most certainly did the latest one being the Vatican II. Although the intention of the Vatican II was not chaos, the liberalization attributed to that paericualr Council has certainly been the driving force behind many of the abuses and until then unheard-of changes the Church was subjected to.
We could say (and we do) that the Latin Church introduced innovations theologically (filioque), eccelsiologically (host wafer, crossing with the whole palm, and numerous others) and in terms of discipline (prescribed celibacy for priests, fasting rules, etc.) that were not known to the Undivided Church.
But we do not let these differences become the ammunition for trading insults and discontent. There are always individuals who do and they are not doing anyone any favors, nor are they helping heal the rifts.
We must understand that our Lord did not leave us a Church, with a written Bible and canons. Everything about the Church is man-made. ;
This, we could say that everything in the Church is an innovation. The original Divine Liturgy was longer, much longer than it is today. Can we call modern Catholic fasting and shorter Mass something more "lax?" I would say, of course. So clearly, we Orthodox are not the only ones.
I am not denying your arguments and I am not saying you are wrong and we are right: I am simply telling you what we believe. Accept it and move on or dwell on it, I can't change it.
We prefer to use that which we have in common in order to get closer, rather than to exaggerate marginal differences and blow them out of proportion. Once the system is restored to its God-given union, we can deal with these issues much better through a general, binding Ecumenical Council.