Opinions on the Corrective Baptism issue?

[ArmyMatt]

To be clear, my use of the Greek terms is specifically against the ideas, and meant to condemn their promotion, not judgement of anyone before God. I think that distinction makes all the difference.

indeed it does.

 

[E.C.]

To be clear, my use of the Greek terms is specifically against the ideas, and meant to condemn their promotion, not judgement of anyone before God. I think that distinction makes all the difference. And it is a huge reason why I no longer trust hierarchs.

Yes, we are lucky that his errors were mostly below the radar, and I am grateful for his early book, “The Orthodox Church” (now gathering dust on a shelf in Russia)
But they DID fuel the deception that the Wheel and Fordham people seek to spread, and those errors HAVE to be called out and denounced. If AFR would take the lead in that, that would do a lot to alleviate the dismay and distress I have experienced in recent years over my discovery that so many people in the Church are ready to deny and challenge traditional Church teachings.

I wouldn't expect AFR to take the lead on much. They're very..... Evangelical in their business dealings: skirting around issues and never taking them head-on.

 

[ArmyMatt]

I wouldn't expect AFR to take the lead on much. They're very..... Evangelical in their business dealings: skirting around issues and never taking them head-on.

it depends. AFR did publish two conferences about theological anthropology (one at STOTS and one at Jordanville), where they called out everything from the sexual anarchy we see to secularism.

 

[rusmeister]

it depends. AFR did publish two conferences about theological anthropology (one at STOTS and one at Jordanville), where they called out everything from the sexual anarchy we see to secularism.

For this to be meaningful they would have to be consistent. If I am to believe that they actually call out sexual anarchy, they would have to stop platforming people who promote it. People like Marjorie Kunsch have publicly called on AFR, in the person of Fr AS Damick and others to do so, and have been soundly ignored. My guess is that a good deal of their funding, if not most of it, comes from the Greek Church in the US, headed by... guess who.

 

[ArmyMatt]

For this to be meaningful they would have to be consistent. If I am to believe that they actually call out sexual anarchy, they would have to stop platforming people who promote it. People like Marjorie Kunsch have publicly called on AFR, in the person of Fr AS Damick and others to do so, and have been soundly ignored. My guess is that a good deal of their funding, if not most of it, comes from the Greek Church in the US, headed by... guess who.

I am just pointing out they have stuff on there that calls it out. I am not arguing anything else.

 

[rusmeister]

I am just pointing out they have stuff on there that calls it out. I am not arguing anything else.

Understood. Not saying that you are. (Just as I was NOT saying back then that Fr Andrew was deliberately promoting porn in the Game of Thrones kerfluffle, though he evidently believed that I was, leading him to block me)

But having both stuff that supports these ills AND stuff that calls it out is not consistent. It is a house divided against itself. And now they ought to take a stand, and stop rubber-stamping the subversion of our Tradition.

 

[ArmyMatt]

Understood. Not saying that you are.

roger.

(Just as I was NOT saying back then that Fr Andrew was deliberately promoting inappropriate content in the Game of Thrones kerfluffle, though he evidently believed that I was, leading him to block me)

no, he didn’t think that. I talk to him periodically, and he didn’t think that about you.

But having both stuff that supports these ills AND stuff that calls it out is not consistent. It is a house divided against itself. And now they ought to take a stand, and stop rubber-stamping the subversion of our Tradition.

we’ll see, just gotta keep praying

 

[gzt]

I recommend folks read the earlier editions of his works, as they became more erroneous with each edition from what I have heard.

The only example I have heard people give of this is that the most recent editions accurately describe the fact that some Orthodox are not opposed to contraception, while the edition from the 1960s stated roughly that Orthodox were opposed to contraception. It's probably better when providing a descriptive account of Orthodoxy's stance on various issues to actually be descriptive. If you hear any other alleged "errors", please let me know, I'm quite interested in seeing if there's anything else.

 

[ArmyMatt]

The only example I have heard people give of this is that the most recent editions accurately describe the fact that some Orthodox are not opposed to contraception, while the edition from the 1960s stated roughly that Orthodox were opposed to contraception. It's probably better when providing a descriptive account of Orthodoxy's stance on various issues to actually be descriptive. If you hear any other alleged "errors", please let me know, I'm quite interested in seeing if there's anything else.

Fr Hopko pointed out in a talk he gave on the death of Christ that His Eminence started leaning more towards universalism in the wrong way, and that came out in later editions, as opposed to how St Maximos understood universalism which Fr Hopko agreed to (as do I).

 

[rusmeister]

The only example I have heard people give of this is that the most recent editions accurately describe the fact that some Orthodox are not opposed to contraception, while the edition from the 1960s stated roughly that Orthodox were opposed to contraception. It's probably better when providing a descriptive account of Orthodoxy's stance on various issues to actually be descriptive. If you hear any other alleged "errors", please let me know, I'm quite interested in seeing if there's anything else.

This is the whole point of the essence of error. The truth, and the Truth, remains the same. People adhere to it or fall away from it. Truth is not up for democratic vote.

The entire Christian world was rightly opposed to contraception until the 20th century, and not because of technological inability, but because of the understanding of the permanent nature of sexual relations that we all shared, at least in that aspect. The Lambeth conference signaled the falling away in the Western world, and, as you point out, most Orthodox still knew better a generation after that. Now many don’t. The Orthodox are falling away, and many in the Church walk around with all kinds of ideas opposed to our Tradition.

The person in error thinks that the truth changes, that the Christians of the past were ignorant and didn’t know it, and that “now we know better”, completely missing the fact that the position of changing truth means that the “truth” he proclaims today can be overturned/debunked, and declared to be ignorance by his grandchildren (should he not be so foolish as to prevent their births by said birth “control”) on exactly the same principle by which he debunks his grandfathers/ancestors, here, the Church fathers. He places at least equal value on the passing knowledge or claims thereto of the passing world, including modern science, and thinks their authority in terms of knowledge equal to, or indeed superior to assertions to the contrary from the revelation from God in our Holy Tradition. He looks to and cites mostly modern Orthodox teachers because he finds himself in increasing conflict with the teachers and saints of the past. He assumes that many miracles described in the Bible must be mere metaphor, that they couldn’t (also) be literally true, because they are not possible according to our modern science. He tends to assume that the men of the past describing such miraculous events did not understand what they were seeing, and would use the ideas of modern science to explain them away. He doubts the claim that God created man specifically and directly and that creatures produce after their own kind, choosing a faith in the modern claims of evolution and a certain and unquestionable age of the earth based on the certainties that faith in claims by scientists gives him over and above what our Tradition actually asserts. He thinks that modern science, modern psychology, and the rest can correct our understanding of Holy Tradition, making the modern sciences effectively part of Holy Tradition in his own mind.

That is a man who chooses his own wisdom over that that the Church offers us. It is we who are the foolish children in need of correction, not the fathers. True wisdom is in letting go of all of the things we think we know and asking, “What ought we to know?”, and listening to the collective wisdom in Holy Tradition and letting it correct us and our ideas, and of modern teachers, accepting those that affirm THAT and rejecting those that contradict it.

 

[gzt]

Fr Hopko pointed out in a talk he gave on the death of Christ that His Eminence started leaning more towards universalism in the wrong way, and that came out in later editions, as opposed to how St Maximos understood universalism which Fr Hopko agreed to (as do I).

That's a fair cop, I think it's a bit of a subtle point as he's definitely not going, say, full Hart, but he should definitely tilt a little more mainstream on that point.

My big pet peeve with his oeuvre is a throwaway remark in The Orthodox Way -- not revised -- about panentheism, which, if one is speaking pretty loosely might be okay but we are really not panentheist as actual modern panentheists describe their theology. He discusses this in a bit more detail in a paper he wrote (as an aside and not the point of the paper, https://www.profligategrace.com/documents/Grant/Ware_God Immanent yet Transcendent.pdf), and, okay, we (all or Christianity, Judaism, and Islam) are panentheist if we define panentheism differently from how panentheists define it. I think this only leads to confusion, especially if you reference this in less detail in a popular introductory work, as the only people who talk about panentheism are panentheists and their critics.

 

[ArmyMatt]

That's a fair cop, I think it's a bit of a subtle point as he's definitely not going, say, full Hart, but he should definitely tilt a little more mainstream on that point.

Fr Tom actually said His Eminence never struck him as going that far, more like only universalism really made sense to him, but he could still be wrong.

My big pet peeve with his oeuvre is a throwaway remark in The Orthodox Way -- not revised -- about panentheism, which, if one is speaking pretty loosely might be okay but we are really not panentheist as actual modern panentheists describe their theology. He discusses this in a bit more detail in a paper he wrote (as an aside and not the point of the paper, https://www.profligategrace.com/documents/Grant/Ware_God Immanent yet Transcendent.pdf), and, okay, we (all or Christianity, Judaism, and Islam) are panentheist if we define panentheism differently from how panentheists define it. I think this only leads to confusion, especially if you reference this in less detail in a popular introductory work, as the only people who talk about panentheism are panentheists and their critics.

agreed.

 

[gzt]

In the end what matters of course is that he was a true man of the Church, desiring to acquire the mind of Christ and rightly divide. Alas, I'm the only one who never seems to be wrong.

 

[rusmeister]

In the end what matters of course is that he was a true man of the Church, desiring to acquire the mind of Christ and rightly divide. Alas, I'm the only one who never seems to be wrong.

But this is the issue, gz. Even heresiarchs desired to acquire the mind of Christ and rightly divide. I’ve become firmly convinced that. the saying (which sounds kind of both pithy and cheap) that “100% of the Church fathers are 99% Orthodox” really is true. I’ve been disappointed by everybody in something. Living leaders like Pats Bartholomew and Kirill, luminaries of the 20th century like Met Anthony, Fr Alexander Schmemann, Alexandr Men’, and so on. Each has said something, or held some idea that seems to me to be contrary to the whole of either/both Holy Orthodox Tradition and that of the rest of the Christian world in history in its agreement with our Tradition.

In this particular conversation, the thread of which began in the issue of corrective (or genuine) baptism, complaints against a proponent of the idea in general, my observation that more serious complaints can be made against much better-known and more prestigious figures. Then LoE asks about Kallistos’ errors, I detail a clearly documented example of one such, which you ignore, proceeding to mention the issue of contraception, which was indeed an earlier error, and an example of dragging the mind of this world into the Church and casting it as the mind of the Church, and then you put the word “error” in scare quotes, directly implying that these are not errors.

I then comment on the source of the errors, the heresy of our age of people thinking themselves, or a collective portion of people living in our time that they agree with, are wiser than the historical Church, the consensus of the saints and the fathers, that “we know better now” under slippery expressions like “living (changing/“evolving”) Tradition” and the rest, that modern science can correct the teachings of the fathers. And you ignore that.

We may all need correction in something. I have in my signature the insistence that I can be corrected by being shown the consensus of the fathers on an issue. I will submit to such correction, because I do NOT always know better, and without that corrective power, I AM subject to error.

To all appearances, you hold this idea yourself, and think that Met Kallistos’s cited errors are not in fact errors at all. That means you need correction. The question is, will you submit to it or not? Do you really need the litany of patristic commentary founded in Scripture speaking against same-sex sexual relations and contraception categorically? Or would you reject it out of hand, because you know better, and are wiser and more compassionate than they?

The most fearful thing I can imagine, more fearful than being a blasphemous atheist, would be to deliberately and knowingly speak and teach heresy, contradicting Holy Tradition as a member of the Church, to consciously and willingly be a heretic. I hope you fear that yourself.

And if I am wrong, see my signature below.

 

[gzt]

I ran across this letter again while looking for something else and thought I would share as it's relevant to this discussion. Holy Synod - Encyclicals - Letter Concerning the Recent Suspension of Two Priests

 

[ArmyMatt]

I think I know those priests, Lord have mercy

 

[Light of the East]

I ran across this letter again while looking for something else and thought I would share as it's relevant to this discussion. Holy Synod - Encyclicals - Letter Concerning the Recent Suspension of Two Priests

That is profoundly sad. I must agree with His Eminence that this smacks of Phariseeism. The problem with Fundametalists is that they are constantly won't to put form over substance, form being having every "T" crossed correctly and ever "I" dotted just so, whereas LOVE is the substance of our faith. I am not saying that truth is unimportant, but you can niggle things to death and miss the bigger picture.

 

[rusmeister]

That is profoundly sad. I must agree with His Eminence that this smacks of Phariseeism. The problem with Fundametalists is that they are constantly won't to put form over substance, form being having every "T" crossed correctly and ever "I" dotted just so, whereas LOVE is the substance of our faith. I am not saying that truth is unimportant, but you can niggle things to death and miss the bigger picture.

There are two extremes that serve evil in trying to be good. Emphasizing truth at the expense of love, and emphasizing love at the expense of truth. We are called to hold to both.

To make my point, I’m not saying that love is unimportant, but you can approve all sorts of evils in its name. An Orthodox woman was shocked when I suggested speaking the truth about men claiming to be women - she thinks it “loving” to affirm their delusion to them as true.

 

[ArmyMatt]

There are two extremes that serve evil in trying to be good. Emphasizing truth at the expense of love, and emphasizing love at the expense of truth. We are called to hold to both.

correct. if you have the good, you have the beautiful, and you have the true. none of those exists apart from the others.

 

[E.C.]

I ran across this letter again while looking for something else and thought I would share as it's relevant to this discussion. Holy Synod - Encyclicals - Letter Concerning the Recent Suspension of Two Priests

That is profoundly sad. I must agree with His Eminence that this smacks of Phariseeism. The problem with Fundametalists is that they are constantly won't to put form over substance, form being having every "T" crossed correctly and ever "I" dotted just so, whereas LOVE is the substance of our faith. I am not saying that truth is unimportant, but you can niggle things to death and miss the bigger picture.

Ah yes...

First and foremost, Archbishop Dmitri was by all accounts practically a saint. He did not suspend priests easily, so if he had to suspend somebody than they presumably "deserved" it. This encyclical also took place nearly thirty years ago in 1997.

I previously read up on this situation. What it basically boiled down to was disobedience to one's bishop. When there's a discrepancy between what one's bishop says and what monks say, be it Mt Athos or St Tikhon's, than you do what your bishop says.
Archbishop Dmitri, and by extension the majority of the OCA, takes the understanding that in the majority of cases of Roman Catholics and Anglicans becoming Orthodox they shall be received via chrismation. All others, generally, via baptism. Back in the 1970s there was a group of Episcopalian priests who became Orthodox as a result of the Episcopal Church's decision to ordain women. These Episcopal clergy who became Orthodox via the OCA were received via chrismation per OCA standard practices derived from the RUSSIAN practice since roughly the time of Peter the Great. What happened was when these two priests went to Mt Athos, the Athonite monks did NOT recognized them as legitimately Orthodox because they were not baptized Orthodox. Those monks also did not respect the decision of a canonical Orthodox bishop, i.e., Archbishop Dmitri's decision to receive Episcopalians via chrismation. So, when the two priests returned to the USA they started to baptize all converts and even re-baptized some already-converted; both of which are contrary to what Vladika Dmitri had instructed for his diocese. One thing led to another and there was a dispute between them and Vladika Dmitri, so he suspended them. They both left the OCA for other jurisdiction - I think one went from OCA to ROCOR to Jerusalem and then back to ROCOR.