Posted on 09/27/2005 10:05:14 AM PDT by NYer
Moscow, September 24, Interfax - Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholics, following President Viktor Yuschenko, has spoken in favour of establishing a one Church in Ukraine.
According to the cardinal, all the church problems would be solved, ‘if Ukraine had one patriarch for all’. This is the basis on which both the Orthodox and Catholics could ‘return to the primary unity’, he believes as cited by the Religious Information Service in Ukraine this week.
At the same time, he adds, ‘there are no claims that a Greek Catholic should be the patriarch’; what is only important is that ‘this patriarch should be a person capable of uniting all’.
However, Husar lays down the condition ‘that this Church and this patriarch should be united with Rome’. It seems to mean that if the patriarch is not initially Uniate, he will have to join the Unia afterwards.
The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, its leader affirms, ‘continues the historical policy of the Kiev Metropolia’, but as the cardinal’s present designation of ‘supreme archbishop’ is little known in ‘the tradition of Eastern Churches’, ‘an ordinary Christian does not know what to do with it’. In Husar’s view, the UGCC ‘has long grown up to act as patriarchate, for it is a natural development for a Local Church in the Eastern tradition’.
At the same time the cardinal is concerned about ‘the failure of the Latin theology to appreciate any sharing between Local Churches and Rome’. The Vatican, he believes, understood unity ‘as subjection’ and this process was called ‘Uniatism’.
‘Denouncing Uniatism today’, Husar points out, he seeks ‘a vision of unity which should be built not on uniformity, but on the preservation of everyone’s own tradition in the form of sharing’. This is ‘a rather complicated’ problem and, to the cardinal’s regret, ‘not quite adequately solved’. The Ukrainian Greek Catholics, however, intend ‘to move towards its solution and to be in the vanguard’, though ‘not everyone in Rome has been made to change his mind’.
The Supreme Archbishop underscores that in the matter of one Church ‘much hangs on relations with the Orthodox’, referring to both the Ukrainian Orthodox Church linked with the Moscow Patriarchate and the unrecognized Ukrainian Autocephalous Church.
He believes however that among the Orthodox ‘the spiritual processes develop in a very much disordered way’ - a reason for which ‘we all are in a rather chaotic state, from which we should come out step by step’.
Husar says he would welcome the emergence of three patriarchs in Kiev at once, ‘Russian Orthodox, Greek Catholic and Autocephalous’, because they would make ‘three partners in negotiations’, and this would make ‘a concrete talk much easier’ and help to come ‘to the idea of one patriarch and one patriarchate’ much sooner.
According to the cardinal, ‘neither Moscow nor Rome will give us our unity’. It has to be developed independently. And then ‘Rome, Constantinople or Moscow, which is much younger compared to them, will just accept this fact’. He sees it more desirable to consider this issue ‘in a discussion in which various confessions and the government could participate’, since ‘the Ukrainian president has stated on many occasions that the government would like to see a one Local Church’.
In order to influence those Ukrainians who ‘are not disposed’ to such a dialogue today, the cardinal proposes to use the existing ‘examples of certain decisions’. He cites Northern Ireland, where ‘people are struggling for a life in harmony’. His also cited relations between the Palestinian and the Israeli as a similar example.
In Husar’s opinion, the negotiations on unification should be started by ‘people with higher education and solid religious training’. In doing so, they should understand that the aim of the negotiations is already clear: ‘the Church should be one, and we all recognize it’, so the unification ‘is not a matter of our good will. It is the commandment that is in point’.
"Your Greek, by the way, has become awful... It is filled with Americanisms."
Your command of Greeklish is truly astounding, annalex, to be able to pick up on those subtle Americanisms. You were probably trained in the Greek language at the Vatican to infiltrate Greek society and turn them all into Uniates, weren't you? :-)
Watch out, K!
I had the misfortune of hearing some of the EO leaders speak (Gilquist and Braun, on separate occasions) fairly early after their conversion. Their hearts are indeed in the right place, but their minds are muddled (is that the California bit?), and they were rank neophytes going around lecturing on something they hadn't yet learned to live.
Listening to Braun speak set back my journey to Orthodoxy by two years. I left the talk knowing that I would never become Orthodox after hearing such brilliant feats of logic as this: "We looked into the Roman Cathlic church, but we couldn't be priests because we were married, and we knew God had called us to be ministers -- therefore we knew the Catholic church couldn't be the true Church." (!)
LOL!!! Ochi???? Interesting. That's the way we pronounce it in my village and a relatively small area around it. You sure you're Russian?!
By the way, "pedaki mou", pronounced "pethaki moo" is soooo not now...and, well, common; but perhaps a very old fisherman would say it that way. :)
"Why don't you just use Latin. (Alphabet, I mean)"
Because Kosta taught me how to post in Greek and I'm having fun with it! Entxaei;
"Your command of Greeklish is truly astounding, annalex, to be able to pick up on those subtle Americanisms."
Actually, Agrarianian, there were no Americanisms in what I wrote...pure Peloponnesian modern Greek. But to give our fifth columnist his due, his recitation of what a very old Greek fisherman might say is really good and his picking the very way I might say OXI is a little scary! :) I think we need to watch him. He may not even be Russian.
""We looked into the Roman Cathlic church, but we couldn't be priests because we were married, and we knew God had called us to be ministers -- therefore we knew the Catholic church couldn't be the true Church." (!)"
Speaks volumes, doesn't it! I am so glad +Iakovos showed them the door when they came calling with their "conditions".
Great Lent was one of his better books, I'll admit.
I think that the problem at core with Schmemman was that he was more concerned with the academic reputation of St. Vlads amongst Episcopalian professors and WCC functionaries than with how his speculations affected day to day life in the Church. Never mind the fact that a good Orthodox seminary shouldn't try to ape the ivory towers...
I'd rather not go on a roll about the man. He is dead and gone, and his influence is waning. He had good points, and must have been a personally charismatic figure, given the way so many of his students worship him (the others revile him -- few had a balanced response to him -- which says a lot to me.)
"...there were no Americanisms in what I wrote...pure Peloponnesian modern Greek."
Hot dang! My modern Greek is even better than I thought! I need to cruise the Aegean next summer and try it out...
Well, I should hope so, given the company you keep! So I can count on no excuses after Pascha this year?
LOL! As you well know (and as my better half has known for many years), "excuses" is my middle name...whether before or after Pascha.
"and his picking the very way I might say OXI is a little scary!"
It's that blasted Jesuit sword in action. Just when you think you've anticipated their every move...
You realize, do you not, that post 77, following the quote that ended the first paragraph, came out all in Greek letters due to some unterminated tag? Hence the "Americanisms". For example, "truth" came out Tau Roh Ypsilon Tau Eta, "tryte". Differently configured browsers would show it differenlty, I guess.
I wouldn't know how to duplicate it. I'd let Kosta teach me, but I am afraid he'll put that Serbian chip in my head and I'll crave rakia with pickle even more. This is why I always post Greek in transliteration.
Good Lord. I assumed K. had done that on purpose, with tongue firmly planted in cheek! I responded with equal tongue in cheek with regard to my fluency in modern Greek.
K., say it isn't so! Tell us that you *didn't* just accidentally forget to close a tag in # 77!
This is funny. I just checked the post on my IE browser and it came out just as you said, annalex; but on Firefox, which is what I usually use, it came out fine! Anyone know why?
That's what I would call a Uniate browser.
There is a Russian saying that all such problems come from insufficient drinking.
" There is a Russian saying that all such problems come from insufficient drinking"
You sure you're not from a small Greek village in the southern mountains?
"There is a Russian saying that all such problems come from insufficient drinking."
Ha! That reminds me of when I was studying in Europe. I got engaged to my lovely wife (now of 20 years) while we were there studying at different universities. My Scottish roomate, when I told him the news, looked at me a little funny and said: "At your young age? Well, all I can say is that you've got a LOT of drinking to do between now and then... It's much easier, though, when you have a few more years to get it done."
He, of course, offered his assistance...
Now I have alphabet envy. I am working with a Mac and tried this page on Safari, Firefox, Netscape and Internet Explorer. On all four all I get are Latin letters. Any suggestions?
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