[Kolokotronis]

“Yep, and for well over 1000 years in places where they were in power, neither Church held religious freedom/tolerance in very high regard (if at all).”

AR, you know history better than that. Orthodoxy, even Russian Orthodoxy, has been remarkably tolerant of “ecclesial assemblies” outside The Church and always has been.

“What defines us is not the day to day whim of one man or movement within the Church.

Unless of course that one man happens to be the current Pope...(or perhaps for EO, a majority of Patriarchs)”

AR, 100% of the Orthodox Patriarchs in agreement cannot proclaim anything and make it stick without the OK of the Orthodox laity. The rest of your post is breathtaking in its Western ethnocentrism. Protestantism is NOT the child or problem of Orthodoxy and laying a Roman strawman veneer over the Orthodox Church does nothing whatsoever for your arguments. It never ceases to amaze me that so many Protestants insist on applying their bogeyman opinions of th Church of Rome on Orthodoxy which has nothing and never has had anything to do with the complaints, justified or otherwise, which Protestants have against Rome. Orthodoxy is no more Greek speaking Roman Catholicism than it is an early form of Protestantism.

[Paradoxpat]

Please forgive me but your comment reminded me of the observation of some Orthodox scholars that Protestants are crypto-Papists. Some say Protestantism would have looked very different if it had evolved in the Orthodox world. However, having originated in the Catholic consciousness where discipline, authority, and “administration” are key, it must continually define itself by, for the lack of a better word, protesting. As such no matter how biblically oriented it strives to be, it must perpetually define and redefine itself, leading to a endless variations with some variations appearing more “magisterial.” Arguably then, it could have never evolved in the more mystical, theologically subtle milieu of Orthodoxy. As an aside, reading into your comments, I must respectfully suggest as a Tiberian that we do possess that same authenticity also found in Constantinople otherwise the primacy of Rome (even if only one of honor) would not still be recognized by all the ancient churches.