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5/13/2008 9:17 PM
Q&A
2 of 9
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ways.)
The Catholic Church has the Eastern rites. Why dont you all just
join those?
Roman Catholicism holds the Orthodox have real bishops and real
sacraments and therefore that corporate reunion with the Orthodox as
whole Churches, not as individual converts, is possible. (This is not true
of Protestants.) This in part makes the existence of the Eastern Catholic
Churches (also called the Eastern rites or the Oriental rites) possible.
But:
The creation of the Eastern Catholic Churches from the late 1500s
onwards reflected a thinking among many Catholics that identified the
Church in its fullness with the Roman Rite. Rather than seeking
corporate reunion, Roman Catholics sought to gain individual
conversions at the Orthodox expense, angering and hurting the
Orthodox to this day. The Eastern-rite Catholic churches were set up as
vehicles to steal people and local churches from the Orthodox and also
with the long-term goal of making the converts Roman Catholics, with
the Eastern rites tolerated as an interim measure. While Roman
Catholicism (including the Popes) did not officially sanction this
latinisation, it did view its Eastern rites as some sort of substitute or
replacement for the Orthodox: a strategy called Uniatism.
Today, one of the few good outcomes of Roman Catholicisms Second
Vatican Council (1962-65) otherwise a dbcle of mistakes in
prudential judgement in favour of that counterfeit of Christianity called
liberalism is that this approach to the Orthodox has been dropped,
and again, corporate reunion a restoration of communion between
the Churches, not the liquidation of the Orthodox is the goal. (The
late Metropolitan Joseph (Slipyj) of the Ukrainian Catholic Church
agreed.) The Balamand Statement signed by officials from both sides in
1993 reaffirmed this. Here is a list of the Orthodox signers.
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The terminus ad quem of all legitimate ecumenical dialogue and the goal of this site: One Catholic
Church under the Pope much as it was in the first millennium A.D. with an equality of rites, including a
restored Roman Mass and office, and the Christian East not in the diminished state of the present-day Eastern
Catholics but rather as Metropolitan Andrew (Sheptytsky), Blessed Leonty (Leonid Feodorov) and Pope St
Pius X (nec plus, nec minus, nec aliter: no latinisations) envisaged it with full Orthodox usage.
OOK down, most merciful Lord Jesu, our Saviour, upon the prayers and sighs of thy sinful and
unworthy servants falling down before thee and unite us all in one, holy, Catholic and apostolic church.
Pour thine ineffable light into our souls. Resolve religious differences so that we as thy disciples and
beloved children may glorify thee with one heart and one voice. Most merciful Lord, quickly fulfil thy promise
that there be one flock and one shepherd of thy church and grant that we may worthily glorify thy holy name
now and ever and unto endless ages. Amen. Blessed Leonty
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really ethnic Ruthenians (more) like Fr Alexis, whom one Orthodox Church has declared a saint. (In
Orthodoxy, local Churches can glorify their own saints, whom all Orthodox recognise.)
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to emphasise the glorified, transfigured, risen Christ more than His earthly sufferings, but the latter are not
ignored. Orthodox use and venerate the crucifix.
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crossed, with one nail going through both.) There are several stories
to explain why the bottom bar is often slanted. One identifies it with
the X-shaped cross on which St Andrew later was killed. (St Andrew the apostle is a patron saint of Byzantine
Churches legend has it he visited Scythia, which later became the Ukraine.) Another is a legend that says
the bar tilted like a scale to show the good thief crucifed next to Jesus, St Dismas, joined Him in paradise
while the thief who mocked Him was lost. Still another explanation simply says Jesus was in such pain He tried
to move His legs, causing the bottom board to shift. Most often identified with the Orthodox and particularly
with the Russian Church, the three-bar cross pre-dates the conversion of the Russians in 988. In Byzantine
iconography it has been used as a symbol of martyrdom. Click on the Russian three-bar crucifix at right for a
more detailed explanation of its symbolism.
What do you believe about Roman Catholic saints who lived after the
split between the churches?
My understanding is the only limit to recognition of the other sides post-schism saints is theyre not
commemorated liturgically, that is, in church. Entirely fair and in a way humble the bishops dont claim the
authority to rule either way on phenomena outside their church.
Private devotion, however, is free: at home you can venerate anybody from the other churchs post-schism
saints to your deceased relatives.
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in communion with Rome after that year, which is why the Russians commemorate the moving of St
Nicholas body to Bari, Italy, and the Greeks dont: it happened after 1054.
The Schism was a gradual estrangement in the Middle Ages, exacerbated by the rise of Islamic power in the
Middle East, which cut off contact between Latin Christian western Europe and the Greek Christian
Byzantines, and by the sacking of Constantinople by soldiers of the Latin Fourth Crusade in 1204, and
narrowed with attempts at reconciliation (the councils of Lyons and of Ferrara-Florence). Some Orthodox
sees, like the metropolitanate of Kiev in Rus (now Ukraine) and the patriarchate of Antioch in Syria, tried at
times to maintain communion with both Rome and Constantinople during the medival years. The reunion
effected at Florence was broken in 1473 after the Turks destroyed the Byzantine Empire (conquering
Constantinople in 1453).
So there was no great falling away in 1054. The Russians schismed because they were angry at Poland for
stealing Galicia (the southwestern Ukraine) in the 1300s and the Turks restarted the Greek schism in 1473
because like the Communists 400-some years later (who banned and persecuted the Eastern Catholics for the
following reasons) they didnt want their Christian subjects in a church they couldnt control they didnt
want them in a church with a foreigner in charge. Theology really had nothing to do with it differences in
method were used as excuses.
Some say the Schism wasnt final until the creation of the Eastern Catholic Churches by Rome outraged the
Orthodox.
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The walls which divide us... do not reach up to heaven. Paraphrased from Metropolitan Platon of Kiev
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