Posted on 03/20/2013 3:37:00 AM PDT by NYer
Fener Greek Patriarch Bartholomew, the spiritual leader of the Orthodox world, attended the installation Mass for Pope Francis in Rome on Tuesday, March 19, for the first time since the Great Schism in 1054.
Acting Patriarch Archbishop Aram Ateşyan from the Armenian Patriarchate of Turkey also presented at the Vatican, with a delegation of clergymen. Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdağ was also expected to attend the ceremony.
“The alienation of old times has disappeared. As two brother churches, we are getting closer each day. We also have a theological dialogue, and the position of the pope in the Christian world is at the center of this dialogue,” Bartholomew said in a televised interview before he left Turkey yesterday.
Fener Greek Patriarchate press secretary Father Dositheos Anagnostopulos told the Hürriyet Daily News, “The first meeting [between the East and West Churches] was in 1054. Nearly 1,000 years have passed since then.”
Asked whether the meeting would contribute to the relationship between the two churches, Anagnostopulos said, “Of course, it has symbolic importance in this regard.”
According to Anagnostopulos, Ioannis Zizioulas, metropolitan of Pergamon and co-president of the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church; Tarassiocs, Orthodox Metropolitan of Argentina; and Gennadios, Orthodox metropolitan of Italy, accompanied the patriarch.
Dr. Lütfü Özşahin, a historian specializing in the history of religions, said the meeting was crucial in many aspects. Özşahin recalled that the Second Vatican Council, which was organized as a first attempt to create dialogue between the two churches, took place in 1965.
“[The meeting] also has a political dimension. Keep in mind that even though it is not officially mentioned, the EU is a holy alliance of Christians, while the Fener Greek patriarch is the spiritual leader of the Orthodox world. Whether Turkey accepts it or not, the Fener Greek Patriarchate is ecumenical, thus it has a primary importance for Orthodoxies,” Özşahin said. Turkey does not currently recognize the ecumenical status of the Fener Greek Patriarchate.
“Greeks, Serbians, Georgians and Armenians have independent churches, which means the Fener Greek patriarch cannot represent the whole Orthodox world in every aspect,” Özşahin said, adding that the Russian Orthodox Church, which has had conflicts with the Fener Greek Patriarchate for centuries, is a good illustration of this.
“This meeting also demonstrates the importance the pope gives to the Islamic world. After resolving the issues between Christians, the new pope might take action to engage in dialogue with the Islamic world,” Özşahin said.
Ateşyan said he welcomed the move. “The meeting is important in terms of resolving the problems between churches and sects, and improving relations between the Eastern and Western Churches.”
Professor İlber Ortaylı, a historian, on the other hand, felt it was misguided to read such far-reaching significance into the meeting. “They are going to congratulate [Pope Francis’ installation]; it shouldn’t be exaggerated.”
Meanwhile Turkey’s ambassador to the Vatican, Kenan Gürsoy, said they had observed a high degree of respect toward Bartholomew.
When asked for his views on the meeting, Gürsoy said it would be more appropriate to leave the comments to historians and experts on the subject.
Ping!
Ping!
I’m sorry if this is offensive, but I’d be on guard for the chessmen to start moving towards that one world church the book of The Revalation of Jesus Christ (even in Douay Reems) talks about.
He really isn’t the spiritual leader of the Orthodox world.
The first sentence creates more misunderstanding than understanding.
Who is then?
Are you sure about that?
Plus the divisions among Christians is really a scandal that hurts the witnessing for both Jesus and the good news of the Gospel.
About what ?
Jesus Christ.
Orthodox are Synodal.
Thanks for these posting keep up the good work
Christ founded one Church for the whole world. What the Bible warns about - according to some - is a one world counterfeit religion. That’s entirely different.
Satan fears seeing the Catholic Church totally reunited more than anything other than the return of Christ.
The One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church Jesus Christ Himself founded whipped Satan and his well entrenched demons once already by leading the world to Christ and could do it again. Satan knows that even though the Self Alone crowd are too blind to see it.
That would set Satan back to the same point he was at when he pumped up Iz Lame to counter Christianity with violence instead of faith in the demons behind pagan gods that had worked so well for so long prior to Christ. A setback like that would mean while Satan has been keeping a lot of people out of heaven, he hasn't made any progress other than that for fourteen hundred years.
So, of course if Satan can he will raise up a counter religion. He tries all the time to do so. People who one minute brag about how many people are leaving the Catholic Church and the next blabber about the Catholic Church being used by Satan are really funny.
Satan will use whatever is most effective and according to the same people who see the Catholic Church as evil, what's most effective isn't the Catholic Church. It's the very anti-Catholic emerging/evangelical/spiritual Churches. So, that's what Satan will use, whatever markets best in the ten major mega churches. It would be far easier for Satan to merge mega churches that ignore most sin and that appeal to Mooze Lames for a number of reasons than to use the Catholic Church. Especially since those mega churches all grew out of the Protestant and Protestant derived heresies of Self Alone.
If it's possible, it'll be possible because of Satan raising up some new, super spiritual, Televangelist who can heal right through your big screen TV to prophecy that Christ isn't going to Rapture Christians, he's going to return and rule rather than judge just any day.
Schisms, factions and divisions are inevitable in any organization that grows above a very small number of individuals. It in man’s nature to form factions and alliances.
Religions act much as political parties. Think of the American Revolution. Once the external threat of England had dissipated the former revolutionaries formed opposing parties. One favored a strong central government the other favored a weak central government.
If you are looking for scandal look here:
“This meeting also demonstrates the importance the pope gives to the Islamic world. After resolving the issues between Christians, the new pope might take action to engage in dialogue with the Islamic world,” Özşahin said.
There can be no dialog with the Islamic world. How do you dialog with an entity who’s dearest wish is to cut your throat?
So what is your solution against the Mega Churches???
Schisms, factions and divisions are inevitable in any organization that grows above a very small number of individuals. It in man’s nature to form factions and alliances.
Religions act much as political parties. Think of the American Revolution. Once the external threat of England had dissipated the former revolutionaries formed opposing parties. One favored a strong central government the other favored a weak central government.
If you are looking for scandal look here:
“This meeting also demonstrates the importance the pope gives to the Islamic world. After resolving the issues between Christians, the new pope might take action to engage in dialogue with the Islamic world,” Özşahin said.
There can be no dialog with the Islamic world. How do you dialog with an entity whose dearest wish is to cut your throat?
For all the bestselling trash about the End Times that's out there, how much of it ever points out that it isn't the Catholic Church that is the most media savvy, media friendly, and secular society friendly church. Nor have any of those End Times books that brag about Catholics leaving the Catholic Church and warn about the Catholic Church being evil bother to mention that it's the mega churches that thrive on the same approach as MTV and are acceptable to all the queers and abortionists, not the Catholic Church. It is, in fact, the Catholic Church that the media and secularists go out of their way to slander which begs the question, why would Satan be attacking his own?
It seems to me any serious consideration of what Satan might use to build a new false church on should at the very least look at what Satan is attacking and what Satan is ignoring and even embracing. Instead, we see the same old trash that's been repeated ever since the lies that underlie it were dreamed up by propagandists five hundred years ago.
I’ve made quite a study of the Turkish treatment of the Greek community in Constantinople. Its a long history of very harsh treatment and sever economic sanctions designed to strip the few remaining Greeks of wealth, property and sustenance in an unending effort to drive them out. Recent census figures indicate only about 2,500 remain in Turkey and fewer than 100 live in the Fener district of Constantinople.
All that being the case I find it extremely remarkable that 1) the Patriarch would leave the city; they’ve always feared denial of the right to return and 2) that the Turkish PM would accompany the Patriarch. Remarkably weird that!
If it's a strategy, they'll be pushing hard on all sorts of little things that they think might convince the EU to let them into the club instead of keeping them at arms length. Besides, the groups that have power within Turkey look at the ME falling apart and into constant chaos where every Mooze Lame country over there may become a whole country like the city of Beirut was at it's worst and they figure they need to be nice to the EU and others in case they need help to avoid that same fate at the hands of idiots like King Barry and his crowd.
We need a definition of terms here. For me, dialog with any and every one is good, provided it conforms to:
Mark 16:14-16
King James Version
14 Afterward he appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen him after he was risen.
15 And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.
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