What does "fullness" mean? Complete? If so, then I don't think any man or any group of men have fullness. I certainly look to my church for guidance, but I always test everything against scripture. ...... I am certain that my God is the true God because He has revealed Himself to me, including by faith and by scripture. My trust isn't in my church, but in God directly.
FK: "Presumably, if the Orthodox Church knew the truth fully, it would have said so and published so in order to witness to the rest of us."
It does, repeatedly, that the fullness of our faith is in the Church. Our Creed reminds us every Sunday that Christ is True God of true God.
OK, then "fullness", as you are using it, is closer to "everything we need to know", rather than "everything there is to know". That is perfectly fine by me. :) Therefore, with my previous explanation, I can say that my church agrees with the Creed. So in your eyes, it should be true that my church has the fullness of the faith.
FK: "Do those three dogmas constitute the "truth fully"?"
Absolutely, God's revealed truth, that is.
OK, I should have read ahead. LOL! Now you know how I answer posts. :)
... which is why all mainline Protestants and Baptists are Christians.
Thank you. I knew you thought that, but it's always nice to hear once in a while. :)
If the Church does not know the fullness of God's revealed truth, how can the Church know what is heresy and what orthodoxy?
Yes indeed. If heresy only means disagreeing with the Dogmas or the Creed, then I'm right with you. I've just seen it thrown against me in a broader sense. :)
How could the Church agree on what is inspired and what is not or have you forgotten that it was the Church that put together the Bible you believe in by discerning, based on orthodox faith, which writings were inspired and which profane?
Well, now you are confusing me again. :) When you say "Church" do you mean to include the people? Or, do you mean the men of the Council(s) who Canonized it? If you mean the former, then I agree that the Spirit was clearly with the Church. The Spirit is always with God's Church. As to the latter, I have been often asked to thank the members of certain Councils for giving me the Bible that I disagree with them so much about! :)
“When you say “Church” do you mean to include the people?”
Orthodoxy holds that no proclaimed dogma is in fact dogma and true unless the people give their great AXIOS, which is to say their judgment that it is in fact True, by living out the dogma in their lives. Its not simply the province of hierarchs.
The people were not instrumental in determining the canon; the Church hierarchy was. Anything that was read in a church was considered "inspired." From the oldest Christian Bibles we know that this included books which are not considered canonical (Epistle of Barnabas, etc.).
The concordance as to which books were inspired and which were not had to be reached among the very people your Church denies, the hierarchs.
My point was that if they collectively did not know the fullness of revealed God's truth, it would have been impossible for them to know which books were inspired and which were not, and therefore the Bible would be a guesswork.
On the other hand, if they were led by the Holy Spirit in their discernment, then you have no authority to dismiss them or their authority as successors of the Apostles.