What exactly is the "Church"?

[victorinus]

Abortion is murder. Homosexuality is sin. Divorce is permissible if it is for a very serious reason, like abuse or adultery,

okay - how is one saved?

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

Ooops....D P

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

does anyone know what orthodox theology is right now?
no one is in charge
no one can speak for the orthodox

Have you ever been to their boards?

The Ancient Way - Eastern Orthodox
The Ancient Way - Eastern Orthodox
Greek, Russian, Antiochian

The Voice In The Desert - Oriental Orthodox
The Voice In The Desert - Oriental Orthodox
Coptic and Oriental

 

[victorinus]

Have you ever been to their board?
As far as I know, they are the only Denomination that actually has a debate board on it.

who is in charge?
I do not know of any viable institution that does not have someone in charge

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

who is in charge?
I do not know of any viable institution that does not have someone in charge

Patriarch Bartholomew appears to be a main leader, tho there do appear to be more. Perhaps an EO can answer?

Orthodox leaders end historic meeting hailed by pope as 'step forward'

CAIRO - The leaders of the world’s Orthodox Christian churches ended a historic gathering on the Greek island of Crete on Sunday hoping to repeat the meeting within a decade, despite a boycott by the Russian church - the most populous in a religion of some 300 million people - and three other churches.

Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I led prayers attended by the 10 Orthodox church leaders who attended to mark the end of the week-long Holy and Great Council - the first of its kind in more than 1,200 years....................

His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew: The Patriarch of Solidarity - Interviews with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew - The Ecumenical Patriarchate
His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew: The Patriarch of Solidarity

He earned the title “Green Patriarch” as a religious leader addressing alarming environmental issues over at least two decades. In 2008, Time Magazine named His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew as one of 100 Most Influential People in the World, for “defining environmentalism as spiritual responsibility”.

 

[rockytopva]

Patriarch Bartholomew appears to be a main leader, tho there do appear to be more. Perhaps an EO can answer?

Orthodox leaders end historic meeting hailed by pope as 'step forward'

CAIRO - The leaders of the world’s Orthodox Christian churches ended a historic gathering on the Greek island of Crete on Sunday hoping to repeat the meeting within a decade, despite a boycott by the Russian church - the most populous in a religion of some 300 million people - and three other churches.

Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I led prayers attended by the 10 Orthodox church leaders who attended to mark the end of the week-long Holy and Great Council - the first of its kind in more than 1,200 years....................

His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew: The Patriarch of Solidarity - Interviews with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew - The Ecumenical Patriarchate
His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew: The Patriarch of Solidarity

He earned the title “Green Patriarch” as a religious leader addressing alarming environmental issues over at least two decades. In 2008, Time Magazine named His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew as one of 100 Most Influential People in the World, for “defining environmentalism as spiritual responsibility”.

Not a bad guy to lead the church.

 

[victorinus]

Patriarch Bartholomew appears to be a leader.

Orthodox leaders end historic meeting hailed by pope as 'step forward'

I like it if the pope likes it

 

[Friend-of-Jesus]

If you ask a Protestant what the Church is, they'll probably give a variety of answers, although one of the most common is "all Christians"--this answer, unfortunately, has no Scriptural basis, especially since the application of the term "Christian" has widened considerably over the last two thousand years. Although if we narrowed the definition considerably, then it would be another story.

However, I don't blame Protestants entirely for this, since I can see from the Catholic Catechism that Rome has a likewise humanist understanding of the Church, perhaps that is where Protestantism got it. In defining the Church, the Roman Catechism states,

752 In Christian usage, the word "church" designates the liturgical assembly, but also the local community or the whole universal community of believers. These three meanings are inseparable. "The Church" is the People that God gathers in the whole world. She exists in local communities and is made real as a liturgical, above all a Eucharistic, assembly. She draws her life from the word and the Body of Christ and so herself becomes Christ's Body.

Now it is clear that Rome does understand the Church as the Body of Christ (and so do Protestants), but instead of proceeding from that definition, she ends with it. Which is a problem. Scripture starts from that definition, the Church "is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all." (Ephesians 1:23). Rome starts with the Church as something external to God, which becomes the Body of Christ. In Orthodoxy, the fundamental definition of the Church is God's Body and Fullness. The transformation is rather of the people being united to the Church. This perversion in definition engenders a radically different Roman theology in general, for instance, also from the Catechism,

882 The Pope, Bishop of Rome and Peter's successor, "is the perpetual and visible source and foundation of the unity both of the bishops and of the whole company of the faithful." "For the Roman Pontiff, by reason of his office as Vicar of Christ, and as pastor of the entire Church has full, supreme, and universal power over the whole Church, a power which he can always exercise unhindered."

Now in Orthodoxy, clergy preside in the Church, but the idea of clergy having power over the Church would be sacrilegious, in fact arguably blasphemous.

Further down the line, Catholic ecclesiology seems to have created the idea that the Church can sin. Cardinal Marx, for instance, recently said the Church should apologize for not having been supportive enough of gay rights: Cardinal Marx: Homosexuals deserve an apology from the Church

Now I'm not going to address how inane that is, but I will point out that in Orthodoxy, sin is precisely stepping away from the Church, a sundering from Her. Repentance and Communion as are a rejoining and a repairing of the damage.

The most potent of this dreadful theology can also be found in the Catechism. Concerning the Church, it is said: Here below she knows that she is in exile far from the Lord [769]. This is simply heretical in the highest degree, the Church is the Lord's Body and Fullness, and in joining with it, we become One with him--how is that exile?

So while the Pope and the Filioque might have engendered the Great Schism, it is clear that they are hardly the only things that separate us today. Catholic theology has diverged enormously from Orthodox theology, and saying there are cosmetic similarities like clergy, doesn't mean there is necessarily a lot of common ground.

The church or gathering is all saved people. Some visible church might have more of them, other less, and some, perhaps, have zero.

 

[Friend-of-Jesus]

Not a bad guy to lead the church.

What's up with all the gold? No homeless where he lives? Can find better use for all that gold and gems. Sell all you have and give away to the poor, said Jesus.

 

[Winken]

[Deleted]

 

[victorinus]

The church or gathering is all saved people.

that is not true -
you could say that the church is a gathering of those who want to be saved

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

Friend-of-Jesus said: ↑
The church or gathering is all saved people.

that is not true -
you could say that the church is a gathering of those who want to be saved

Are you implying that all those going to church aren't saved yet?
I would think they would want to stay saved by going to church, imho.
What does it take to be saved in the first place?

 

[victorinus]

Are you implying that all those going to church aren't saved yet?
I would think they would want to stay saved by going to church, imho.
What does it take to be saved in the first place?

no one is saved until it is over -
don't give up

 

[Winken]

that is not true -
you could say that the church is a gathering of those who want to be saved

church (small c) is an assembly. It could be of Christians and non-Christians. One group is saved, the other is not, or is seeking.

Church (large C) is the Body of Christ.

 

[Winken]

no one is saved until it is over -
don't give up

Romans 10:8-13, John 5:24, Ephesians 2:8-9, Romans 8:1, John 3:16-17.

 

[victorinus]

church (small c) is an assembly. It could be of Christians and non-Christians. One group is saved, the other is not, or is seeking.

no group is saved -
where do you get this stuff -
if you are saved, it will be as an individual
and not as being a member of a group

 

[victorinus]

Romans 10:8-13, John 5:24, Ephesians 2:8-9, Romans 8:1, John 3:16-17.

try "might be saved"

 

[The Times]

The Church is one that has shown throughout the last 2000 years to have kept the 7 sacrements of Jesus Christ.

Without the sacrements, there exists no Church that is in obedience to Christ and his unchanging ways.

The Orthodox Church will hold these sacrements, even to the point of death. Will other denominations do likewise.

What is happening within the Catholic Church today, especially where Liberals from within are attacking the traditionalists.

Well here are clips that highlight the sacrements under attack by Liberals from within Catholicism.

 

[The Times]

 

[LittleLambofJesus]

no one is saved until it is over -
don't give up

I won't...

2Ti 1:9
who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began,
1Co 15:1 ¶
Moreover brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand,
by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.