You're saying these things on purpose, right? Just to drive me crazy! :) Concerning love, the last sentence in the universe I would have expected from you is that it is all God and nothing us. You're stealing my line! :)
The Catholics on this thread have been more than crystal clear that with God's aid, love-based works on our part are absolutely necessary to final salvation. "What is faith without love?" To a Catholic, "love[ing] Him in a selfish-way" is the road to perdition. As for everything in this paragraph, I'm with the Catholics! :) (We just look at the logistics a little differently :)
Now, without accusing anyone of anything, and if I understand what you're saying (maybe I don't), this seems like a major difference between EO and RCC. Was this difference a cause of the split? I vaguely remember from about a million posts ago that the split happened a little after the reformation because of "differences", but I don't remember what they were. I have noted several posts from Catholics and EOs that wish for or hope that there will be a reunification. Can there be if one side says that man cannot "truly" love God?
the last sentence in the universe I would have expected from you is that it is all God and nothing us
No I am not. And I assure you that our Roman Catholic brethren would agree with me. It is arrogant and presumptuous to believe that our contribution to the God-man relationship is anything but a one way affair.
The Protestants echo this, but they forget something: God is everything, yet He is humble. We are nothing and we are arrogant and proud. So, no matter how little or insignificant our love for Him is, He loves us nonetheless.
Was this difference a cause of the split? I vaguely remember from about a million posts ago that the split happened a little after the reformation because of "differences"
The Great Schism occurred five hundred years before Reformation. The main difference was papal authority and the issue of Filioque as it was inserted in the Nicea Creed by the Spanish clergy in the 6th century.
However, the great Palamite theology based on hesychastic practices shows that our thinking with regard to the Holy Spirit is not different at all (namely that the Holy Spirit is the eros that exists between the Father and the Son; the disagreement is on the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father alone (since the HS is only because of the Father, before all ages) and the illegitimacy of the Latin insertion contrary to the canon.