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This confusion of the temporal and eternal, of the Uncreated with the created (or the relationship of the Uncreated and created) is the root of all Western departures from the Orthodox Faith (including created grace, of which purgatory is the most well-known example, and the false papal ecclesiology).

I'm curious. What is the Orthodox objection to created grace, and in particular purgatory? I have an understanding of some of the issues that Orthodoxy has with Catholic ecclesiology.

I pray that you will get the chance to debate your interpretation of Scripture with the Harps of the Spirit in the Kingdom. For my own part, I will reply, as St. Aleksander Nevsky did to the Crusaders, "The Traditions of the Seven Councils we scrupulously keep."

I hope that my imperfection and the stain of sin on my soul will be overcome by the Divine Mercy of Jesus Christ. As for the Crusaders who sacked Constantinople, I think that it was an unforunate incident in the history between the Christian East and the Christian West. To speak for myself, I have the utmost respect for Orthodox Christianity.

The Orthodox understanding of grace is as participation in the Uncreated Energies of God. Created grace (including the existence of a created place or state of purgation) separates our salvation from God's direct activity. The reasoning used to support the notion (at least as reported in The Catholic Encyclopedia) is effectively the reasoning of monophysitism applied to those growing into the likeness of Christ rather than to Christ Himself.

As applied to purgatory, St. Mark of Ephesus, wrote that "there is only one fire," by which he meant the River of Fire in the Last Judgement. (The Orthodox understanding of the Last Judgement draws heavily on the vision of the Holy Prophet Daniel.) The Fathers understand the River of Fire to be the Energies of God, indeed the Father tell us "The fires of hell are the love of God."

The patristic dictum, "What He is by nature, we shall become by grace," depend on grace being in fact Divine, Uncreated, not created.

Incidentally, St. Alekander's reply was to the Teutonic Knights, who went Crusading against the pagans of the Baltic region and then turned against Holy Russia.