What's the difference between EOC & RCC?

~Anastasia~ said:

A great deal could be said about this. But it is based on the tendency of where we get our beliefs and how we define them.

Rome added the Filioque to the Nicene Creed, and so most or all Protestants also use it (being descended from Catholicism).

The authority of the Roman Pope over everyone else is another change from early understanding that we do not follow. The result is that Catholics have an ecclesiastical authority different from ours, resting in one man. While Orthodoxy is a synod of head bishops who (in a voting situation) do not have more voice than any other bishop, and everything is essentially ratified by the monastics and laity, so it is impossible for one man (or even a group of men) to make changes all else recognize as error.

Papal infallibility is a much later addition, as is the belief in the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary herself.

The Immaculate Conception is made necessary in Catholic theology by an understanding of original guilt for Adam's sin carried to all (babies born guilty) rather than an understanding in Orthodoxy that we are born into a sin-infected world, with a bent (fallen) nature that tends toward sin, causing all to sin, at which point we become guilty of our own sins.

That understanding of sin has very far-reaching effects in how we view God (Catholics tend to take a more punitive view), mankind, and sin (Catholics tend to take a more legalistic view). Catholics believe there is both an eternal and a temporal punishment for all sin - the temporal must be "paid for" in some way - through suffering, or offset by good deeds of charity or mercy, or bought with indulgences, etc.

Because of this, purgatory (the means of punishment/suffering "paying for" sins not yet paid for by the time a person dies) and indulgences are part of historic Catholic beliefs, though I keep hearing that these are falling out of favor with modern Catholics?

They also define the Eucharist much more - to Orthodox it is simply a mystery, and it is what Christ says it is (His Body and Blood) but it is also wine (and water) and bread. Catholics have a detailed theology concerning when it happens and what it is.

I think our understanding and descriptions of hell would differ.

We have some differences in our Sacraments - Orthodoxy fully admits a person into the Church with Baptism, Chrismation, and receiving the Eucharist happening all at once, while Catholics hold off on the Eucharist until after Confirmation for their youngest members (I'm not sure but I think Confirmation replaces Chrismation, and I think these are different.) Orthodox do not have Last Rites - we don't anoint for death, but rather annoint for healing up until a person's death.

Those are what I would consider some of the major differences.

There are others as well. Catholics practice adoration of the reserved Eucharist, while we do not. Catholics have more changes - many more actually - brought into their Liturgy while ours essentially does not change. Catholics usually have statues, while they are not really done in Orthodoxy.

That's all I can remember offhand. I may be forgetting some, and be unaware of others.

Despite these, we DO have a certain core of faith and practice that make us appear to be very similar (though sometimes there are differences in those similar-appearing things that people may not realize) - and we also have a great deal of shared theology in many things that has not changed in either of us dating back to the first 1000 years of the Church.

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~Anastasia~ said:

No problem. You always ask the easy questions.


(LOL I am teasing you, by all means, ask away! But I hope you are seeing that even with our efforts, you are getting a sort of superficial slice - there is such depth to the questions you ask - and they are all good questions! - but it takes years to dig into them fully. Which is one of the things I find very satisfying for myself in this process. )

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~Anastasia~ said:

No problem. I'm glad others are contributing too. What I gave you was, at best, a partial laundry list with a tiny bit of historical and theological interconnection. A tiny bit.

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~Anastasia~ said:

You are too kind. And I'm sorry you have run into some who were less than kind in their communications.

But I never see a reason in being hateful about it. Especially not when seeking to understand others. After all, that isn't what our Lord called us to.

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