Catholic or Orthodox - Searching

[Markie Boy]

Posting this here and in the Catholic forum.

I was baptized Catholic as an infant, but raised only marginally Catholic.

I currently attend a Catholic Church, and thought that's the place for me. I came to faith in a Baptist church, but after much reading and struggle, decided protestant is not my home.

I live in a small town, and the Catholic Church is the only option - the closest Orthodox Church is almost an hour and a half drive. Things I am growing to not care for so much in Catholicism is the way they seem to view grace as a commodity to be saved up and dispensed (read - merit, indulgences, general thought processes), and the thought on Original Sin. As I read more it seems even Eastern Catholics don't really see Original Sin like Roman's, as they don't celebrate the Immaculate Conception.

When I talk to them about Papal Infallibility it has watered down to "it's only been used officially twice, and going back in history even canon lawyers don't agree on what was and wasn't a use of it". So it seems you can't prove it either way.

Catholics will say the Orthodox don't have quite the unity among themselves, but what I found is that once I really got inside the Catholic Church, there is tons of variation. Much of the clergy is liberal(more so than in my Baptist background even), and sort of support doctrine on paper, but not so much in action.

I am starting to feel the "unity" claimed by the Catholics is more theoretical than actual. I must also say I live in a liberal dioceses, and neighboring ones seem much less wishy-washy and limp. And their demand that you must agree with the exact verbage of all Dogma's (200 plus I think), or you are anathema - doesn't seem to match with teaching of the Apostles. It's funny that you could have been a Catholic for 1800 years and disagreed or just been unsure of the Immaculate Conception, Assumption, or Papal Infallibility, but today you can't, you must agree - makes my brain hurt.

Thank you and God Bless

 

[~Anastasia~]

Posting this here and in the Catholic forum.

I was baptized Catholic as an infant, but raised only marginally Catholic.

I currently attend a Catholic Church, and thought that's the place for me. I came to faith in a Baptist church, but after much reading and struggle, decided protestant is not my home.

I live in a small town, and the Catholic Church is the only option - the closest Orthodox Church is almost an hour and a half drive. Things I am growing to not care for so much in Catholicism is the way they seem to view grace as a commodity to be saved up and dispensed (read - merit, indulgences, general thought processes), and the thought on Original Sin. As I read more it seems even Eastern Catholics don't really see Original Sin like Roman's, as they don't celebrate the Immaculate Conception.

When I talk to them about Papal Infallibility it has watered down to "it's only been used officially twice, and going back in history even canon lawyers don't agree on what was and wasn't a use of it". So it seems you can't prove it either way.

Catholics will say the Orthodox don't have quite the unity among themselves, but what I found is that once I really got inside the Catholic Church, there is tons of variation. Much of the clergy is liberal(more so than in my Baptist background even), and sort of support doctrine on paper, but not so much in action.

I am starting to feel the "unity" claimed by the Catholics is more theoretical than actual. I must also say I live in a liberal dioceses, and neighboring ones seem much less wishy-washy and limp. And their demand that you must agree with the exact verbage of all Dogma's (200 plus I think), or you are anathema - doesn't seem to match with teaching of the Apostles. It's funny that you could have been a Catholic for 1800 years and disagreed or just been unsure of the Immaculate Conception, Assumption, or Papal Infallibility, but today you can't, you must agree - makes my brain hurt.

Thank you and God Bless

Hello again, and glad to see you made it over to TAW -welcome!

(And since St. Justin's is for debate, realize you may get exactly that - from anyone - though it is an Orthodox board. It serves a good purpose though, allowing the hashing out of questions that people need to address. )

Wow, I didn't actually realize the part about agreeing with 200 dogmas perfectly or you can't "be Catholic"? I have an Eastern Catholic priest friend who does not agree with the western parts (and he was originally a Latin rite priest) but I didn't want to put him on the spot by questioning how that works for him. Maybe next time I see him I can have that talk in a gentle way and get his input for my own curiosity.

As to the rest - we certainly don't agree with measured "units of grace" or applying them like currency - we view grace as the very Energies of God Himself - so that is clearly impossible.

And for unity, well, I've never compared us to Catholics, but not only are we all in Eucharistic communion, but we all have the same teachings, canons, history, and even mostly the same practices. There exists a western rite in Orthodoxy (I've yet to experience it) but as far as I know it's just a difference in the Liturgy. And of course our Liturgy will be in different languages for different peoples (I think that's a strength, not a weakness - Orthodoxy has always favored translation into the languages of reached peoples). Sometimes there's a different flavor to the sound of the hymns, between Greece and Africa, for example. Again, that's a concession for the people. In my parish (Greek) if we approach the priest during the Eucharist with our arms crossed across our chest, it means we only wish a blessing, while in some parishes it is the normal position to receive the Eucharist. (My priest knows this though, and communes people from other jurisdictions when they approach this way.) The most significant difference that I know of is frequency of Confession - some view it as necessary before every reception of the Eucharist, while some see it as strictly necessary only for reconciliation, but still offer it as often as desired.

But ... our prayers are the same for us all. The readings and hymns are the same for us all. There will never be a guitar suddenly introduced into the music. The Liturgy remains the same except for minor additions (I'm sure St. John Chrysostem's Divine Liturgy didn't originally include prayers for those who travel by air as well as by land and sea). I can and have walked into any kind of different jurisdiction and understood what was going on and knew what was being said, even if I didn't know the language, and even if the priest didn't come as far out during the Great Entrance in one jurisdiction as he did in another.

The Church is made up of human persons, and many (in the case of Orthodox) from nations torn by war, oppression, persecution, and so on, so it's true that ethnically they can be a little wary at first, but I've never seen it last beyond the start of coffee hour that I wasn't warmly welcomed in like family, regardless of where the people were from.

I'm sure a lot more can be said. That's my two cents so far (stretched to about a buck-thirty-five ... sorry for being so long-winded lol!).

Again, welcome to TAW. I hope you find your answers. God be with you.

(Oh, and I understand distance ... it's something a lot of us deal with. My Church is just about an hour's drive for me, but there are ways to make that better and things that can help. I know folks who have to travel over two hours. But f you end up interested we can share more suggestions about that. Sometimes there's a parish you don't even realize is close, I just learned a few weeks ago of a Russian western rite parish near me I hope to visit soon.)

 

[Gregory Thompson]

Posting this here and in the Catholic forum.

I was baptized Catholic as an infant, but raised only marginally Catholic.

I currently attend a Catholic Church, and thought that's the place for me. I came to faith in a Baptist church, but after much reading and struggle, decided protestant is not my home.

I live in a small town, and the Catholic Church is the only option - the closest Orthodox Church is almost an hour and a half drive. Things I am growing to not care for so much in Catholicism is the way they seem to view grace as a commodity to be saved up and dispensed (read - merit, indulgences, general thought processes), and the thought on Original Sin. As I read more it seems even Eastern Catholics don't really see Original Sin like Roman's, as they don't celebrate the Immaculate Conception.

When I talk to them about Papal Infallibility it has watered down to "it's only been used officially twice, and going back in history even canon lawyers don't agree on what was and wasn't a use of it". So it seems you can't prove it either way.

Catholics will say the Orthodox don't have quite the unity among themselves, but what I found is that once I really got inside the Catholic Church, there is tons of variation. Much of the clergy is liberal(more so than in my Baptist background even), and sort of support doctrine on paper, but not so much in action.

I am starting to feel the "unity" claimed by the Catholics is more theoretical than actual. I must also say I live in a liberal dioceses, and neighboring ones seem much less wishy-washy and limp. And their demand that you must agree with the exact verbage of all Dogma's (200 plus I think), or you are anathema - doesn't seem to match with teaching of the Apostles. It's funny that you could have been a Catholic for 1800 years and disagreed or just been unsure of the Immaculate Conception, Assumption, or Papal Infallibility, but today you can't, you must agree - makes my brain hurt.

Thank you and God Bless

Could you elaborate on the grace currency thing? This reminds me of something else, is there any literature on it?

 

[ArmyMatt]

Posting this here and in the Catholic forum.

I was baptized Catholic as an infant, but raised only marginally Catholic.

I currently attend a Catholic Church, and thought that's the place for me. I came to faith in a Baptist church, but after much reading and struggle, decided protestant is not my home.

I live in a small town, and the Catholic Church is the only option - the closest Orthodox Church is almost an hour and a half drive. Things I am growing to not care for so much in Catholicism is the way they seem to view grace as a commodity to be saved up and dispensed (read - merit, indulgences, general thought processes), and the thought on Original Sin. As I read more it seems even Eastern Catholics don't really see Original Sin like Roman's, as they don't celebrate the Immaculate Conception.

When I talk to them about Papal Infallibility it has watered down to "it's only been used officially twice, and going back in history even canon lawyers don't agree on what was and wasn't a use of it". So it seems you can't prove it either way.

Catholics will say the Orthodox don't have quite the unity among themselves, but what I found is that once I really got inside the Catholic Church, there is tons of variation. Much of the clergy is liberal(more so than in my Baptist background even), and sort of support doctrine on paper, but not so much in action.

I am starting to feel the "unity" claimed by the Catholics is more theoretical than actual. I must also say I live in a liberal dioceses, and neighboring ones seem much less wishy-washy and limp. And their demand that you must agree with the exact verbage of all Dogma's (200 plus I think), or you are anathema - doesn't seem to match with teaching of the Apostles. It's funny that you could have been a Catholic for 1800 years and disagreed or just been unsure of the Immaculate Conception, Assumption, or Papal Infallibility, but today you can't, you must agree - makes my brain hurt.

Thank you and God Bless

it seems the question to ask is did Rome change the Faith? and a follow up would be has the Pope always been seen as he is today?

 

[~Anastasia~]

(Note - we have a detailed active thread on this topic going on right now in St. Justin's ... so rather than continue this discussion and risk derailing the OP's thread, if much more is needed, it should go there. Everyone has permission to quote/reply my post there if very much continued discussion is wanted on this topic. Thanks all!)

created/uncreated grace

Could you elaborate on the grace currency thing? This reminds me of something else, is there any literature on it?

I'm sure Catholics could explain better. It might be in their Catechism. But it has to do with supposed "merits" being stored up by Holy people doing more than needed for their own salvation, and the supposed ability of the Catholic Church to be able to "credit them to your account" in a sense - that is the basis of buying indulgences to get time out of purgatory, for example. Bibles have been published with notes saying if you read so many minutes every day, you get x-amount of time taken off from purgatory. The "purchase" can be made by paying money, reading Scripture, saying prayers, performing an act like going on a certain pilgrimage, etc. Sometimes freely available for the asking I think. It is also supposed to be the reason for the Immaculate Conception (which Orthodoxy rejects) ... Christ's merits were supposed to have been applied retroactively to the Virgin Mary when she was conceived, removing the effects of Original Sin (which we also reject as taught by Catholicism) from her at her conception.


We don't see the grace of God as a "thing" so it cannot be measured or used in this way. This is also why we must reject the idea of the Virgin Mary being the mediatrix of all graces. Rather, God works as He wills, as He sees fit, and we cannot earn it in any way, nor purchase or give it away. We can and do pray for one another though, and ask prayers of others. But grace is the Energies of God, directed by Him, according to His wisdom and mercy.

 

[Gregory Thompson]

(Note - we have a detailed active thread on this topic going on right now in St. Justin's ... so rather than continue this discussion and risk derailing the OP's thread, if much more is needed, it should go there. Everyone has permission to quote/reply my post there if very much continued discussion is wanted on this topic. Thanks all!)

created/uncreated grace




I'm sure Catholics could explain better. It might be in their Catechism. But it has to do with supposed "merits" being stored up by Holy people doing more than needed for their own salvation, and the supposed ability of the Catholic Church to be able to "credit them to your account" in a sense - that is the basis of buying indulgences to get time out of purgatory, for example. Bibles have been published with notes saying if you read so many minutes every day, you get x-amount of time taken off from purgatory. The "purchase" can be made by paying money, reading Scripture, saying prayers, performing an act like going on a certain pilgrimage, etc. Sometimes freely available for the asking I think. It is also supposed to be the reason for the Immaculate Conception (which Orthodoxy rejects) ... Christ's merits were supposed to have been applied retroactively to the Virgin Mary when she was conceived, removing the effects of Original Sin (which we also reject as taught by Catholicism) from her at her conception.


We don't see the grace of God as a "thing" so it cannot be measured or used in this way. This is also why we must reject the idea of the Virgin Mary being the mediatrix of all graces. Rather, God works as He wills, as He sees fit, and we cannot earn it in any way, nor purchase or give it away. We can and do pray for one another though, and ask prayers of others. But grace is the Energies of God, directed by Him, according to His wisdom and mercy.

Thank you for explaining, Oh my, this is very concerning ...
.
One of the distinctives of the Kingdom of God is that resists quantification.
.
I'll have to keep the implications of this in mind as I pray through the neighbourhoods.

 

[ArmyMatt]

Thank you for explaining, Oh my, this is very concerning ...
.
One of the distinctives of the Kingdom of God is that resists quantification.
.
I'll have to keep the implications of this in mind as I pray through the neighbourhoods.

this is also how some folks in the Roman confession can pray that God would allow them to suffer more than they should, in order to get folks out of purgatory. this is a very legalistic take on salvation, and quantifies something that cannot be quantified.

 

[Gregory Thompson]

this is also how some folks in the Roman confession can pray that God would allow them to suffer more than they should, in order to get folks out of purgatory. this is a very legalistic take on salvation, and quantifies something that cannot be quantified.

In my journey to understand the difference between Christianity and the world systems, I noticed that distinctive as well. The kingdom of God cannot be quantified, in fact it resists quantification. So the question remains, what are they quantifying?

 

[ArmyMatt]

In my journey to understand the difference between Christianity and the world systems, I noticed that distinctive as well. The kingdom of God cannot be quantified, in fact it resists quantification. So the question remains, what are they quantifying?

I dunno, glad Orthodoxy doesn't have that problem

 

[Markie Boy]

So I'm getting lot's of Orthodox replies - and very little in the Catholic forum - even in that forum I think I got more Orthodox replies???

I wonder what that says in itself?