Is it possible that the old Latin practice, as lamentable as it may seem today and indeed may well have been then, really had absolutely nothing to do with the state of the theology or liturgical praxis of that church?
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I can agree with that, I think, fairly wholesale.
By vagaries . . . maybe I should have said congregational distinctives.
I don't care how homogeneous a doctrine is . . . even rules and bylaws . . . each congregation will have it's own distintives of greater or lesser importance.
Freud's IN-GROUP/OUT-GROUP stuff still functions in spite of all of us--far too often and far too much.
And those not exactly like us--and who is--especially group-wise-- are suspect in at least a few ways.
Perhaps the Orthodox have preserved more healthiness significantly than the Roman system. I believe that's true. Have always gotten on well with those Orthodox believers in my social network.
I just know that the older organizations are and the larger they are, the more deadly they tend to become--to individuals . . . and, imho, to The Gospel.
"I don't care how homogeneous a doctrine is . . . even rules and bylaws . . . each congregation will have it's own distintives of greater or lesser importance."
If you mean in areas like friendliness, openness to "outsiders", what they eat, what minor feastdays are celebrated, then yes, I agree there are such differences from parish to parish and certainly from one ethnicity to another. I guess I fail to see what if anything that might have to do with faithfulness to The Faith as delivered.
"I just know that the older organizations are and the larger they are, the more deadly they tend to become--to individuals . . . and, imho, to The Gospel."
I think as a general observation what you say is true. But consider that Orthodoxy has believed the same things and worshipped in the same way since not all that long after Pentecost. There have been conciliar definitions of particular points of theology in response to various heresies through the 7 ecumenical councils and there have been some surface changes in liturgical practice (styles of iconostasia, vestments, the adding or dropping of a prayer here and there) but really nothing of any consequence. The theology of Orthodoxy and its praxis is so fixed and so ancient that itis likely that if I were to be dropped into a church in 2nd century Corinth, I could participate in the liturgy and discuss theology with the people and priest in exactly the same manner as I can this Sunday here in 21st century America. In sum, what you see in orthodoxy is for all intents and purposes what anyone at anytime virtually since Christ would have seen. That can't be said of "Protestantism" at all, and of Roman Catholicism somewhat more, though not to the extent of Orthodoxy.
In your understanding of what God requires of us in the way of belief and praxis, would you say that Orthodoxy has had it wrong pretty much from day one?