Redjester

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In our Church, the EO to be more specific, an OO person can be admitted through Confession of Faith alone while a RC person has to be Chrismated on their forehead. The main reason for this is that greater strides have been made towards unification with the OO than with the RCC. The other thing I would say is, the OO have the same problem that the EO have with reunifying with Rome. The problem centers around the fact that you are headed by Patriarchs and probably don't accept the universal supremacy of Rome which is why you are not part of the Eastern Catholic Church or the Coptic Catholic Church which have placed themselves under Rome. However reconciliation is much more likely between our two churches because you continue the structure of local church, much like we do. You would not be placed under a supreme Bishop and that makes sense for your Orthodox Church structure. That is also the reason that reconciliation with Rome seems impossible because that has always been the sticking point in Rome since the 11th century. Unless you submit to the Pope as the head Bishop over the earth, you cannot have communion(truely) with Rome, although if they become more liberal in the future maybe they will give that up. However then I doubt we would even want to join.
 
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rakovsky

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Happy New Year Erini

I liked what you and others explained in your first posts of this thread, explaining the idea of a United nature made of two natures. However what I find doubtful is that this correct idea means that there are no longer two natures, as you wrote:
St. Cyril the Great taught us not to talk about two natures after their unity.





So we can say that the Divine nature united hypostatically with the human ture within the Virgin’s womb, but after this unity we do not ever speak again about two natures of Christ. In fact, the expression "two natures" implies in itself division or separation, and although those who believe in "the two natures" admit unity, the tone of separation was obvious in the Council of Chalcedon - a matter which prompted us to reject the Council and caused the exile of St. Dioscorus of Alexandria.


The detail of what actually happened in the Council of Chalcedon is followed in the next post.


love and blessings
erini
Where did St Cyrill say that one can no longer speak of two natures? Actually he said that the natures remain preserved and distinct after the union.
A nature just means a set of qualities or a category. The epistle of James says that the nature of man tamed every nature (physis) of animal, e.g.. snakes , dogs etc.
In this case wouldn't Christ be in a human nature and also in the nature of God? He still has both sets of properties.

Now does that mean it's natures are separate? Iron can have a hot Nature and a red hot nature. So a iron can have a red hot nature also. But is it's hotness separate from its redness? In a way, no. If it were not hot it would not be red. But it still has two natures and also a red hot nature that is made of both.

So something can have two natures that are United together and also have two natures. CHRIST's natures are not separate in the sense of disjointed, but as st Cyrril says they are still distinct.

Regards.
 
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grandvizier1006

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You mentioned that you acknowledge Dioscorus as a saint. Do you do the same to Timothy Ailouros?

What is your church's position on Pope Leo of Rome? Pope Hilary of Rome? Flavian of Constantinople? The council of Ephesus in 449?

-Philip.

I'll tell you my church's:

"Who? What? Huh? What are you talking about?" :D :doh:
 
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MoreCoffee

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I read all the posts in this thread. I like what I read. It gives hope to me that union may come even if it takes a long time to come. May God send balm to heal all of our wounds and clear away whatever clouds our vision. Thank you all for being so irenic in tone. It is refreshing to see the brethren speaking kindly one to another.
 
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grandvizier1006

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I read all the posts in this thread. I like what I read. It gives hope to me that union may come even if it takes a long time to come. May God send balm to heal all of our wounds and clear away whatever clouds our vision. Thank you all for being so irenic in tone. It is refreshing to see the brethren speaking kindly one to another.

Not sure if that unity shows up on Earth, but I think we Christians are more united than we realize. If we all worked together on the big things, we'd be able to show the world that we can hold our own ^_^
 
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Nikti

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I contend that there is quite a simple answer. Indeed, there is wisdom in understanding that we know where the Church is, but not where it isn't. In this moment, we have to understand therefore that if we don't make such judgments, then there must be more than just mere ecclesiology that binds the Church together. It is the Orthodox faith.

I must reiterate this again and again. Unless you believe in Roman Catholic theology, one does not think Christ was referring to St. Peter as the "rock of the Church." Neither does Christ make it clear about any council as the "rock of the Church." In fact, this would assume that a council actually defines dogma. It's however the other way around: it is the Orthodox dogmatic faith that would define the council's validity. Nicea is not the rock, but what it teaches is the rock. Many other Arian councils afterwards called and approved by Constantine was successfully rejected because of its heretical teaching, even though the whole world seemed to have accepted them. Thanks to St. Athanasius, the correct dogma, the rock of the Church contained in Nicea was preserved.

Therefore, the rock of the Church is neither Peter nor Paul nor Apollo, neither Leo nor Dioscorus, neither Ephesus 449 or Chalcedon 451 literally, but it's what they represent, the ORTHODOX FAITH. The OO's and EO's have not talked with one another for 1500 years, and yet nothing separates us, not even ecclesiology, not even rejection of RC or Protestant dogmas, not even iconography, not even spirituality and theosis. Praise be the Lord! The rock of the Church exists in both EO's and OO's.

When Christ promised St. Peter that the gates of Hades shall not prevail against this rock, what happened later? St. Peter denied Christ three times. The Apostles scattered to hide from persecution. Christ was all alone with John and the three Mary's. Has Hades truly prevailed against the rock? NO! Peter was not this rock, but like the rest of the Apostles, the rock and the keys of heaven was entrusted to him. This rock, the Orthodox faith and spirituality, Satan can never prevail against it because he forever chooses to continue his own blasphemy and heresy against the Christian faith. But as light destroys darkness, true faith can always destroy Satan.

This promise is forever to any Christian who keeps the faith and the Apostolic succession. This Church exists in both the EO's and the OO's. If a new ecumenical council is convened to unite the two, it is not that the council has defined a new dogma, but has confirmed what has been true for the past 1500 years, the EO and the OO churches are the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Orthodox Church. To say otherwise would be inconsistency.

God bless.

I like this a lot, the rock being the confession of faith not necessarily councils themselves and that EO and OO share the same faith essentially. It's really tragic that the churches are not united.

I'm neither EO or OO but an inquirer into Orthodoxy. I'm basically convinced the Orthodox Church in confession and faith is the the Body of Christ, but the separation between EO and OO makes it especially difficult to know which to join. After learning the history, semantics and POV of each side, I too believe they are the same faith but it's so discouraging to see the separation :(
 
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Wgw

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I like this a lot, the rock being the confession of faith not necessarily councils themselves and that EO and OO share the same faith essentially. It's really tragic that the churches are not united.
:(

Agreed.
 
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Vicomte13

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I don't think we could unite with the whole EO. That is because they are not even united among themselves and can't hold ecumenical council. How can they accept us? is it by some archbishop declaring we have the same faith? They don't have a pope to declare we are united.
We are a lot closer to RC then EO, RC have declared that what happened at the council of Chelcedon was a misunderstanding therefore we should work together toward a unity with them, EO can't make such claim because they have no one voice that speaks for them.

Well, for my part, I will tell you truly the discussion of the different "phytisms" is not something that the rather less reflective and philosphical children of the West and the North (like me) have ever contemplated before meeting the different orthodoxies in places such as this, when I simply read the words and descriptions, my instinct - be it guided by the Holy Spirit or simply by human logic I cannot say - instinctively finds the most self-evident sense in the view that is here expressed as "Miaphysite".

And seeing what a bad hash the Western Church has made of some things over the ages because of misunderstandings - consider this one: we tried a saint of God, Joan of Arc, in a church tribunal and burnt her alive as a witch! - it is easy for me to see how such a really delicate, almost ethereal theological point as to the different kinds of will, would do poorly at the hands of ardent believers in a far-flung Church beset with the slow and imperfect communications techniques of the time.

I cannot "take sides" in an EO/OO debate, so much as to say that the EO and OO are obviously, to my eyes, just as much "the Church" as the Catholic, and I am pleased to see that the Patriarch of the West has seen this Chalcedonian business as a misunderstanding.

If put to the test, I would have to say that I am a Miaphysite, because that is what makes the most sense to me. I still don't think that my hairy barbarian mind is up to standing through three hours of service, though. Having done it a few times (I have a Russian Orthodox friend), I can say honestly that after hour 1 I am thinking about the discomfort in my feet and not what is being said.
 
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dzheremi

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I don't agree with the poster you quoted at all, Vicomte13 (not that it matters, since that was posted over a decade ago; I kinda doubt they're still around to explain why they think that), but regarding the rest of what you said: if you're at one of our churches in the West, chances are they'll have pews (I've never been to a Coptic church that didn't have them, though I don't know about the other churches in our communion). You can sit down if you need to. It's not normative, but neither is forcing people who are in pain to the point of not being able to concentrate to continue standing as some kind of endurance test. Of course, it is best and customary to stand at least for the gospel readings, during certain deacon's proclamations (e.g., the introductions to the readings), to receive the blessing from the priest when he censes the church or places the cross upon the people's heads, but nobody is going to throw you out of church because your feet hurt and you're not used to 3 hour liturgies. It's something you get used to after a while anyway.
 
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Vicomte13

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I don't agree with the poster you quoted at all, Vicomte13 (not that it matters, since that was posted over a decade ago; I kinda doubt they're still around to explain why they think that), but regarding the rest of what you said: if you're at one of our churches in the West, chances are they'll have pews (I've never been to a Coptic church that didn't have them, though I don't know about the other churches in our communion). You can sit down if you need to. It's not normative, but neither is forcing people who are in pain to the point of not being able to concentrate to continue standing as some kind of endurance test. Of course, it is best and customary to stand at least for the gospel readings, during certain deacon's proclamations (e.g., the introductions to the readings), to receive the blessing from the priest when he censes the church or places the cross upon the people's heads, but nobody is going to throw you out of church because your feet hurt and you're not used to 3 hour liturgies. It's something you get used to after a while anyway.

In the Latin Rite, we also stand for all prayers per se (of course, the whole Mass is a prayer, even the readings - the whole liturgy is a prayer, in truth, but some parts are more solemn than others), for the Kyrie and the Gloria, for the Gospel, for various incantantions - we kneel during the preparation of the gifts and communion, and stand for the entrances and exits of the priest. Whenever there is incense, we stand, because incense solemnizes things.

We don't stand for the homily, or the offertory, or any of the readings other than the Gospel (and the readings and the homily are the most time consuming parts of the Liturgy of the Mass).

Interestingly, as Eastern Orthodoxy has come West and more people have joined it, the EO churches that try to appeal to Westerners rooted around in the archives and discovered that back in the early era, when the East and West were still united, the Westerns were ALWAYS more restless and always had shorter services. The Liturgy of St. Gregory dates from the 300s AD, and was traditionally used in the West. It was revived by the Eastern Orthodox for Western liturgies. It's about an hour long.

Easterners were sophisticated urban dwellers for thousands of years, while Westerners outside of Rome back in the Roman Empire were still fishermen and farmers and foresters, rather rough working folk not accustomed to sitting still.

And the Catholic and Orthodox liturgy of the West reflected that. The Catholic Mass, and the Orthodox Liturgy of St. Gregory, are about an hour long.

I suppose that the Orthodox stand during the homily. I would find that annoying and it would make me think about my feet, even for an hour. It seems utterly proper to me to stand for processionals, recessionals, prayers, incense, the singings of Glorias and Kyries. And it seems especially proper to kneel during the blessing of the sacraments, and whenever the eucharist is exposed.

But standing for awhile gets uncomfortable, so if you really want me to LISTEN TO the readings and the priest's homily, best to let me sit. By standing for the Gospel and singing Allelujia, I think we're making the point that THIS is the very KERNEL of Scripture, so stand up straight and pay attention - all makes sense to me.

The Russian Orthodox liturgy was beautiful, certainly, and the logic of it made sense, even the do-everything-thrice aspect, which sort of felt like doing a liturgy for the Father, then doing it again for the Son, and doing it a third time for the Holy Spirit. I'm sure that's not what the Russians think they are doing, but that was what I reasoned out.

I agree with making things as glorious as possible for the Emperor of the Universe, and always appreciate Orthodoxy for that. But I used to dread the Christmas liturgy I'd always get invited to - not because it was so long (it was) - but because there I was a young, strong, fit military man, and standing on those stone floors for upwards of three hours was hurting my legs and feet. It was always an endurance contest, and I found that detracted.

Something confused me too - there was a point where they were handing out leavened bread, and I demurred therefrom, given that even though I think the Orthodox and Catholic religion are the same, I recognize that the Orthodox don't, so I did not want to raise offense by knowingly taking the eucharist when they could see I was obviously a Catholic (crossing myself "backwards", not understanding the Russian, etc.), but the congregation all around me INSISTED that I go take that bread. They urged it and insisted. When in Moscow, do as the Muscovites do, I guess. The eucharist is the eucharist - but my fear of giving offense by taking it when I thought they would think it was inappropriate was transformed into a desire to not offend my hosts. From my perspective, I had communion and that was that.

I noticed that they did not serve the communion in species of wine. In our church there is the bread (unleavened, of course) and then the COMMON cup of wine. They wipe the rim and turn it a quarter turn with each drinker. I drink it, of course, but I find the idea of 500 of us drinking from the same cup one after another kind of squidgy. I make a scruple of NOT taking the wine if I have even a slight cough, but others don't seem always to be as concerned.

I think that thing that particularly draws me to Oriental Orthodoxy, particularly in its Ethiopian form, is the extended canon of Scripture. The book of Enoch, in particular, is only available there. St. Jude refers to Enoch by name, and once I read it, I realized that Christ uses language that is in there on several occasions. So, is it Scripture?

Well, a part of the Church that's as old as any other has it, and the Church was in unity for over 400 years with that being part of the Scripture in one part, so maybe it is, even if the West didn't adopt it.

Certainly the Scriptures take on a different set of meanings and understandings when Enoch is in the Canon.

I don't think Enoch is in the Coptic Canon, but given that the Copts are, I believe, in communion with the Ethiopians, I guess that this difference is not important enough to make a division.

In any case, I would like to see the Church come back together - Latin, Greek and Oriental. Christ prayed for unity, and I myself have never seen anything in Eastern Orthodoxy or Catholicism that would be sufficient to override Christ's call for unity.

I get that the question of Papal authority is important (though Catholics themselves tend to personally honor it more in the breach), the whole "filioque" issue strikes me as another misunderstanding of an earlier age, and Oriental Orthodoxy has not been, to my knowledge, the focus of any particularly fierce Western-Oriental fight. The Latins and the Greeks have more history (the sacking of Constantinople by the 4th Crusade ranks up there with the burning of St. Joan of Arc as bad acts of the distant past that just make one wince), but that was them and then, and not us and now.

I find Church fights to be particularly distressing, and wish we'd remember that Jesus firmly called us to unity.

I think that the Catholics are wrong for forbidding priests to marry, and the Greeks are wrong for forbidding bishops to marry. St. Peter was married - Jesus healed his mother-in-law - and that should be a strong enough example to override the nonsense that says otherwise. Jesus held out celibacy as an ideal, but he did not enforce that on the highest of the high clergy as a disciplinary matter. I think we mar the body of Christ when we do.

But what do I know?
 
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Vicomte13

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Unless you submit to the Pope as the head Bishop over the earth, you cannot have communion(truely) with Rome, although if they become more liberal in the future maybe they will give that up. However then I doubt we would even want to join.

I agree with Pope Benedict on the matter. He said that we cannot expect the Orthodox to accept any more regarding the papacy than was generally accepted by all before the Schism.

Primus inter pares is a workable principle, I think. But again, what do I know? I do yearn to see the pieces come back together again.
 
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dzheremi

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Interestingly, as Eastern Orthodoxy has come West and more people have joined it, the EO churches that try to appeal to Westerners rooted around in the archives and discovered that back in the early era, when the East and West were still united, the Westerns were ALWAYS more restless and always had shorter services. The Liturgy of St. Gregory dates from the 300s AD, and was traditionally used in the West. It was revived by the Eastern Orthodox for Western liturgies. It's about an hour long.

I'm no liturgist, but perhaps this is a difference between the Greek and Latin West and our church. I know that the EO and the West have Gregorian liturgies, though I don't know how they relate to ours other than the most basic ways (such as mentioned briefly in the Coptic Encyclopedia, for instance). Our Gregorian liturgy is quite a bit longer than an hour, though. There's not really anything you can do in the Coptic Orthodox Church that will only take an hour...

For comparative purposes, here is ours. Someone more familiar with the development of Western and Eastern Orthodox liturgies than me will no doubt notice many similarities, and whatever differences there may be.



Easterners were sophisticated urban dwellers for thousands of years, while Westerners outside of Rome back in the Roman Empire were still fishermen and farmers and foresters, rather rough working folk not accustomed to sitting still.

This very well may be the case with the Eastern Orthodox or otherwise Hellenized Chalcedonians broadly speaking (I don't know). But my church is still today mostly farmers in Egypt (the stereotype of the Upper Egyptian or Sai'di people is that they are basically country bumpkins, and since the coming of Islam to Egypt the Sa'id has been a stronghold of Coptic Christianity in the country; HH Pope Shenouda III of blessed memory was Sa'idi, for instance), and it doesn't make our liturgies any shorter! ^_^

I suppose that the Orthodox stand during the homily.

The Eastern Orthodox? I wouldn't think so, but I don't know. We (Coptic Orthodox) do not, and I don't think that's a peculiarity of our Church (though I welcome correction).

I would find that annoying and it would make me think about my feet, even for an hour. It seems utterly proper to me to stand for processionals, recessionals, prayers, incense, the singings of Glorias and Kyries. And it seems especially proper to kneel during the blessing of the sacraments, and whenever the eucharist is exposed.

It sounds like you're in a good place for you, then. May God bless you there. We prostrate before the Eucharist in our liturgies, but that's long been observed to be a difference in Eastern and Western modes of offering worship or deference.

ONTHENILEDELTA.jpg



I agree with making things as glorious as possible for the Emperor of the Universe, and always appreciate Orthodoxy for that. But I used to dread the Christmas liturgy I'd always get invited to - not because it was so long (it was) - but because there I was a young, strong, fit military man, and standing on those stone floors for upwards of three hours was hurting my legs and feet. It was always an endurance contest, and I found that detracted.

Hmm. There is something to be said for not being too comfortable in worship (as I've heard it put, semi-jokingly, there are no entries in our synaxarium which commemorate saints remembered for their great love of sleeping in or offering prayers from reclining chairs), and of course it is better to go beyond our personal comfort in prayer than in any other work, but I also can't imagine that if a visitor from another tradition, as you are, were invited to attend a foreign church that they would be expected to hold to the same disciplines as the baptized, particularly if there was some reason why you felt that you could not do as they do in this regard. Generally the bar for inquirers is lower, so "doing as the Romans do" to the best of your ability is appreciated, and anything more is generally not expected. We've had Lutheran, Roman Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox visitors to our church, and they mainly just try their best, don't approach for communion (obviously), and try to take it all in. I'm not sure what else anyone can do.

Something confused me too - there was a point where they were handing out leavened bread, and I demurred therefrom, given that even though I think the Orthodox and Catholic religion are the same, I recognize that the Orthodox don't, so I did not want to raise offense by knowingly taking the eucharist when they could see I was obviously a Catholic (crossing myself "backwards", not understanding the Russian, etc.), but the congregation all around me INSISTED that I go take that bread. They urged it and insisted. When in Moscow, do as the Muscovites do, I guess. The eucharist is the eucharist - but my fear of giving offense by taking it when I thought they would think it was inappropriate was transformed into a desire to not offend my hosts. From my perspective, I had communion and that was that.

What you were offered was undoubtedly antidoron, not the Eucharist. This is the custom of all churches of the East/Orient (we Coptic Orthodox people do it too, except we call it orban, an Arabic word, while antidoron is a Greek word). It is bread that is blessed but not consecrated, and handed out to the people after the liturgy is concluded. In the beginning of the following video you can see HG Bishop Raphael of the Coptic Orthodox Church selecting a blemishless loaf from the bread baked for that day's liturgy and blessing each loaf in the basket before taking the chosen one to the altar where it will be consecrated and become the body of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The unselected loaves are set aside for the day's orban, given to the people (all the people) at the close of the liturgy. While you are right to not approach for communion in an Orthodox Church, it is my understanding that both OO and EO offer the antidoron to all present, who will of course be encouraged to take it (it is blessed, after all, and a blessing to receive it).


I think that thing that particularly draws me to Oriental Orthodoxy, particularly in its Ethiopian form, is the extended canon of Scripture. The book of Enoch, in particular, is only available there. St. Jude refers to Enoch by name, and once I read it, I realized that Christ uses language that is in there on several occasions. So, is it Scripture?

Yes, it is. For the Ethiopians, anyway. As far as I know, it has never been an issue in the East that churches may have differing canons, as unlike in the West (where your church formally closed its canon at Trent, if I recall correctly, in response to Protestant tampering with books that had been considered canonical for centuries) the canon was never formally closed. So the Ethiopians have books that have only been preserved in their language, and that's okay. We are one in faith, so if there are other books that strengthen that one faith for the Ethiopian people and have a special place in making them and their glorious Church what it is, who is anyone to say they can't have them?

Well, a part of the Church that's as old as any other has it, and the Church was in unity for over 400 years with that being part of the Scripture in one part, so maybe it is, even if the West didn't adopt it.

I suppose this is a question to ask people of your own church who might wonder that. For us, the matter is settled.

Certainly the Scriptures take on a different set of meanings and understandings when Enoch is in the Canon.

I can only imagine.

I don't think Enoch is in the Coptic Canon, but given that the Copts are, I believe, in communion with the Ethiopians, I guess that this difference is not important enough to make a division.

Certainly not.

In any case, I would like to see the Church come back together - Latin, Greek and Oriental. Christ prayed for unity, and I myself have never seen anything in Eastern Orthodoxy or Catholicism that would be sufficient to override Christ's call for unity.

May God grant it.

I get that the question of Papal authority is important (though Catholics themselves tend to personally honor it more in the breach), the whole "filioque" issue strikes me as another misunderstanding of an earlier age, and Oriental Orthodoxy has not been, to my knowledge, the focus of any particularly fierce Western-Oriental fight. The Latins and the Greeks have more history (the sacking of Constantinople by the 4th Crusade ranks up there with the burning of St. Joan of Arc as bad acts of the distant past that just make one wince), but that was them and then, and not us and now.

We have other more pressing matters to deal with. The time of spilling blood over Chalcedon or anything else is long over, thanks be to God. You guys have your own churches, and we have ours, and fraternal love may grow between them. Communion is absolutely another matter, and I don't worry about it or even really think about it when there are so many basic things to be dealt with before we can even be sure we're understanding each other. I don't think RCs or most EOs understand us or care to, but that's okay. I'm not particularly interested in any other church, either, so I can understand them at that level. We continue on in our way, we receive those who come to us and wish to join the incorruptible Orthodox Christian faith, and we try our best to guard our own from the snares of the enemy. No different than any other church, I'd guess.

I find Church fights to be particularly distressing, and wish we'd remember that Jesus firmly called us to unity.

And at least as far as I've observed, we certainly do. I would say that one of the few (relatively) 'good' things about being on our own for so long is not only have we mostly preserved our practices (time will tell what challenges we face in the future as more churches are established in the secular West...for sure, it's not getting any easier out there for any church), we have also been absent for the subsequent ~1500 years of development in both EO and RC churches. So sometimes an outsider looking in, it seems dreadfully boring because honestly it looks like one half of a long dead empire fighting over things I can't even pretend to care about with the other half of a long-dead empire, but on the other hand it means that we do not come into these discussions with all the hang ups that 600 additional years of being in communion have brought to RC-EO relations. 1054? That's so late! It might as well be yesterday. Photius who? Filioque? Sorry, I don't speak Latin! (I am saying this all in jest, of course; I know of these things and people, but they're really for other people to debate, since they weren't things my church was involved with in the first place.)

Granted, this also has the downside of leaving us in the dark about things that other people view as essential to establishing communion, but that's why informal and formal meetings have gone on since the 1960s.

I think that the Catholics are wrong for forbidding priests to marry, and the Greeks are wrong for forbidding bishops to marry. St. Peter was married - Jesus healed his mother-in-law - and that should be a strong enough example to override the nonsense that says otherwise. Jesus held out celibacy as an ideal, but he did not enforce that on the highest of the high clergy as a disciplinary matter. I think we mar the body of Christ when we do.

But what do I know?

The issue of celibacy at different levels of service to the Church is a complex one and not something I'm entirely comfortable commenting on one way or another. My own church follows the practice of allowing men to marry only prior to ordination as priests, while bishops are unmarried. As far as I understand, this is the same as the EO practice. Clerical celibacy is something of a Roman/Western peculiarity, and has been so for quite a long time (see for instance, this summary, which provides evidence that this was an issue even as far back as the Council of Nicaea).
 
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abacabb3

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I am considering Orthodoxy, but can I get your view on the schism? Do you believe ecumenical councils have the power to compel the universal Church to accept the position found in the Council? If so, why didn't you accept Chalcedon? If not, then is it legitimate that a bishopric can ignore nicea?
 
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rakovsky

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I am considering Orthodoxy, but can I get your view on the schism?

Do you believe ecumenical councils have the power to compel the universal Church to accept the position found in the Council? If so, why didn't you accept Chalcedon? If not, then is it legitimate that a bishopric can ignore nicea?
These are important questions.
OO views on the schism may be changing over the last 1500+ years. In the 20th c., some major agreements were reached by an EO-OO joint commission acknowledging the two natures, as taught by EOs, as a legitimate expession.

The 1989 statement by Met. Bishoi’s and Met. Damaskinos’ Joint Commission says: “Those among us who speak of two natures in Christ do not thereby deny their inseparable, indivisible union; those among us who speak of one united divine-human nature in Christ do not thereby deny the continuing dynamic presence in Christ of the divine and the human, without change, without confusion.”

Here is Fr. J. Meyendorff's (EO) assessment of Joint Commission work:
The consultations and studies of our times seem to have established quite clearly two crucial points:

That the Orthodox christological position which expresses itself by affirming that Christ, the God-man, is “one hypostasis in two natures,” and which is generally designated as “diphysitism,” is not a Nestorian position. The council of Chalcedon (451), by affirming it, did not depart in any way from the Christology of St Cyril, but intended to exclude Eutychianism: this was a real problem at the time, since Dioscoros (perhaps by temporary misunderstanding) had accepted Eutyches in 449.
Chalcedonians and Non-Chalcedonians: The Last Steps to Unity

This is posted on the Joint Commission blog, run by a Coptic priest, Fr. Peter.

In other words, at the time, OOs rejected Chalcedon, because they saw it as "Nestorian", but in modern times there has usually been a reevaluation by OOs of this.
 
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