Posted on 01/01/2006 4:48:03 PM PST by HarleyD
Yes I am very much aware of it. I was simply asking if the Protestants consider the actual posture of standing (publicly or not), while praying, incorrect for some reason.
If you don't see the Protestants looking and acting all holy, then perhaps it is because they are admonished to do their good works so that they are NOT noticed by men
I am not sure about that, given that the Protestants are the ones who are pushing the issue of school prayer, the Ten Commandments in public buildings, etc.
You are, of course, terribly wrong and rather uninformed, P-Marlowe. The papal legate (of a dead Pope!), with no commission of authority, took it upon himself to excommunicate the Patriarch of Constantinople in 1054!
But this did not cause the Church of the East to break relationship with the Church in the West in "protest." What a distortion that would be!
For centuries, at one time or another, the names of various Bishops were not read at Divine Liturgy, and no one really paid much attention if the names in the triptychs -- of the bishops with whom a particular Church was in communion -- were up to date or not.
The Orthodox and the Catholics did not create a man-made church as Luther did. They simply stopped communicating in the Eucharist because it became obvious that they no longer shared the same faith. Lets be brutally honest: the Latins changed the theology without a General Council of the Church in agreement. Instead, they often followed the local Councils and treated them as Ecumenical Councils in authority.
They didn't see it as something sinister; they developed a different mindset over the centuries of linguistic and liturgical separation, influenced by different political realities, and subjected to different linguistic concepts and cultural influences. They simply grew apart, split (which is what schism is), and stopped talking to each other at one point -- a couple of hundred years after that fateful excommunication in Constantinople!
And that was not the doing of the Orthodox Bishops, but of the lower Orthodox clergy and the people (laity). They, not the hierarchs, rejected the false re-union at Florence -- not in protest, but because the message from Florence was not what the Church taught for 1,200 years.
The Orthodox did not leave. They simply rejected the innovations. But that did not stop Patriarch Jeremiah II from admonishing the Protestants when Luther's followers contacted him in hopes of an alliance with the Orthodox against Rome some 30 years after Luther's death.
Patriarch Jeremiah II considered himself every way a Catholic, although not in communion with Rome. In fact, the Catholic name of the Orthodox Church did not become suppressed until after the Vatican I in 1870, when the real rift occurred between our Churches -- with the introduction of the papal infallibility dogma. And even then, the Orthodox did not "leave" the Church in protest.
The Church, whether Latin or Greek, remains Apostolic in authority, meaning that its bishops can trace an uninterrupted ministry and office to a particular Apostle. That gives both Churches valid clergy. Both Churches share the same sacraments.
Luther was a rebel. While his initial protest had merit, he continued beyond the mere "correction" of indulgences and other transgressions of the Roman hierarchy: he went on to redefine the Faith according to his own taste, intellect and liking. A big difference between the Protestants and the Orthodox.
Chop and change...
You can bet that we are on the same wavelength all along here and that our differences are very few but very deep also. However, the Apostolic Church is of one mind: that God is love, that God gave man reason and freedom of will; that man's will is corrupt because of his fallen nature; that we are born with the consequence of Adam's sin, with a propensity to sin and with a mortal nature; that God would have all men saved but only those who respond to His blessings and come to Him and cooperate with Him can be saved; that works of faith are expresisons of true faith; that Baptism is not a salvation but entry into the Church; that the central point of the Church is the Eucharist; that saints are venerated; that the Holy Trinity is worshiped and adored; that icons and statues of saints are not idolatry, etc.
The Orthodox are the least of your worries, trust me. :-)
Exactly! The Protestant God designed and made the Creation, created man in a pristine world, then "planted" a serpent to tempt him -- knowing exactly that man will fail because God desired it so! This brings terrible demise of mankind, and then God decids to kill Himself on the Cross so as to redeem us when all this is not our doing but His!
Could it be that God decides also what He wnats to know and what He doesn't want to know? Can He will not to know? I don't know! But what I do know is that if He predetined everything, the whole idea of sending His only begotten Son to suffer and die for the redeption of sin that He caused, planned, authored and executed, is somewhat dubious as you hint.
well, many/some Protestants can be smung that they are part of an "elect" so don't need to emulate Christ since they're already chosen to go to heaven.
I would agree -- guardedly. While there are many good Christian individuals in the Protestant groups (and many in this forum), the groups would not be part of The Church in any sense.
Did he tempt Adam and Eve? Yes. Did they choose to sin? Yes.
"Dr. E, the KJV is more distorted from the Scriptures than I had earlier supposed. Thank you for bringing this up and posting it."
You're welcome, Cronos. Reading the King James Version of Scripture is of profit to all.
It appears to me that you do not believe that God is either omnipotent or omniscient.
In other words, it appears that you are saying that God is helpless in the face of evil and that God does not know the future and that he created the world with absolutely no idea as to how it would turn out.
I thought this was something FTD should see. :-)
Never mind.
Zeeba, Kosta's knowledge of scripture is pretty good. Admonishing him to "go and read" isn't quite correct. If you have tracts, quote them
LOL. He should be happy we both thought of him in light of these remarks.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.