[kosta50]

The East never believed in the Immaculate Conception, and it was not the official teaching of the West for centuries. This is one of those insurmountable theological obstacles to our reunion since it has been elevated to dogma in the 19th century.

Eastern Mariology is every way comparable to its western tradition, and perhaps even surpasses it in some aspects. Also, the East maintained the belief in her bodily assumption but the Eastern Church does not teach it. In the West it became dogma (i.e. required belief) only in the mid 19th century by papal fiat.

Immaculate Conception was unknown to the Church in the 5th century at the Council of Chalcedon. The following FAQ puts is succinctly:

"One of the main arguments of Eutyches was that, if Christ had a real human nature, He would also have inherited the stain of sin. Since at that date Mary's immaculate conception was unknown, Pope Leo could not argue from it, but had to make a distinction between the nature, which Christ did indeed assume from Mary, and the guilt which He did not assume, 'because His nativity is a miracle'... Any idea of Mary's own preservation from original sin, however, is ruled out not only in the Tome but also in Leo's sermons, for example: In 62,2 we read "Only the Son of the blessed Virgin is born without transgression; not indeed outside the human race, but a stranger to sin... so that of Adam's offspring, one might exist in whom the devil had no share." -- Hilda Graef, Mary, A History of Doctrine and Devotion

The same source talks about the Orthodox concept of the original sin

By contrast, the Orthodox understanding is conveyed concisely in St Athanasius' treatise On the Incarnation (318 AD). When man (in the persons of Adam and Eve from whom we all derive our human nature) first sinned, he became separated from God. This separation from God is what Orthodox understand to be original sin and it has two consequences: First, separated from the source of all good, man becomes morally corrupt, with an innate tendency to sin; secondly, separated from the source of all Being, man begins to return to his original state, the nothing from which God created him. Corruption and death come into the world.

Immaculate Conception "makes sense" from the Augustinian point of view of the original sin, but not that of St. Athanasius, from whom the East teaching gets its doctrine. As the article puts it, the East sees the original sin not as a "stain" but as "absence."

The fact is that the Church existed united despite these Mariological differences because their were not required. Neither the teaching of St. Auguistine or St. Athanasius (the one whose canon the Church accepted in full as the Christian canon) before him was a matter of dogma but of theologoumenna (religious opinions, hypotheses) ; both treated Mary as sinless and the mother of our Lord and God. There is simply nothing in the faith once delievered and believed everywhere and always that makes one or the other teaching truer.

This all changed when the West made the Immaculate Conception a dogma that is binding, and thereby erecting an insurmountable theological wall that bars any possibility of reunion with the East without the penalty of one side being forced to change its teaching. Not a very smart move in my opinion.

[BaBaStooey]

I rather like the Eastern Orthodox teaching on the Assumption (or as they refer to it, the Dormition of Theotokos, or God-bearer).

Mary was visited by the angel Gabriel who informed her that very soon, she would die. Over the next couple of days, all of the living Apostles (except one) all miraculously showed up. She died in their presence and they buried her.

Three days later, the late Apostle (Thomas!! ...who else could it be?) asked to see her body. They opened the tomb to find that it was empty, and an angel appeared to inform them that her body had been taken to Heaven.