Ecumenical Dialogue with the Orthodox Church

"I appeal to you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that there be no dissensions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment." (1 Corinthians 1:10).

These words of Saint Paul the apostle to the Corinthians reveal to us that there already was a great need for keeping the unity of Church even in the apostolic age of the Church's history. Questions such as "who is Jesus?", "do the converted pagans need circumcision?", or even more human ones parafrasing the Gospel, such as "who is the greatest in the Kingdom of heaven", were always challenging the Christian people and causing disunity. Over two thousand years of Church history we have a huge number of Christian denominations and traditions. In order to bring the Gospel to the world we have to be united as Jesus willed. It is not an easy task since a lot of time passed and there were a lot of misunderstandings and hurt in all "camps". Therefore in order to come closer to the Truth we need to take a serious look at each other that we would get to know the different Christian traditions and heritage. In this essay I am going to look more closely to what is simillar and what is different between the Catholic Church (not only Roman since there are Catholics of different rites) and Eastern Orthodox Church. The Protestant Churches are also involved in this discussion. So by having looked at Catholic and Orthodox Church perspectives for unity I will try to understand why dialogue between Orthodox and Catholics is easier (if it is) and more posible than with the Protestant Churches.

The Dogmatic Constitution on the Church Lumen Gentium distinguishes two kinds of the separated brethren: one is called Churches and the other Ecclesial Communities. The Churches mostly would be called those Churches who separated during the time of the Great Schism and can trace the lineage of Bishops to the succesion of the Apostles (valid priesthood and sacraments): "there flourish in the East many particular or local Churches, among which the Patriarchal Churches hold first place, and of these not a few pride themselves in tracing their origins back to the apostles themselves."¹ The Ecclesial Communities are mainly those who separated from the Catholic Church as a result of Reformation."The ecclesial Communities which are separated from us lack the fullness of unity with us flowing from Baptism, and <...> we believe they have not retained the proper reality of the eucharistic mystery in its fullness, especially because of the absence of the sacrament of Orders."²

In the early ages of Church history the main question which first split the Church was the question "who is Christ?" Now, as it seems, this question does not divide the Christians, the question who divides Church is "how do we interpret Christ's teaching and who has the right to interpret it with authority?" The problem is that every Christian agrees that Christ saves but not every Christian agrees on how Christ saves. In speculating how Christ saves there are disagreements between different denominations (for example the great argument of justification by faith alone with the protestants). In a dialogue with the Orthodox Church it is a different issue than with the Protestants since Orthodox community is recognised by Catholics as Sister Churches and Protestants as Ecclesial Communities.

It is important to look at the names and a bit of historical background of the Churches since the names express the aspects of the Church on which the different denominations give a stress. History helps to understand what were the factors causing disunity and formation of different Churches.

The word catholic means universal or entire. In order to make a difference from the various heretical groups and sects the early Church started to call herself Catholic. This title indicated to the authenticity of the Church's universality as an opposition to parciality. It also indicated the authenticity of the teaching of faith which is inherited from the apostles. Only the Catholic Church had the full or complete teaching as other schismatic sects and groups had their own which was not in accord with the teaching of the apostles. Already by the end of second century Irenaeus of Lyons in his work Against the Heresies insisted that the authenticity of the Church teaching must come from the apostles and the bishops and presbyters who could trace their succession back to the apostles.³ We must not presume that Catholic Church is only Roman Catholic since there are more Eastern rite Catholic Churches in union with Pope such as Syro Malabar, Syro Malankara, Greek Catholic, Ukranian Catholic, Ethiopian – Koptic rite Catholic and so on.

The name Orthodox means the right or true teaching. (The Russian aspect of the name has a slightly different angle: Провославие (provoslavie) means the true worship or true praise). The name Orthodox itself implies an opposition to un-orthodox or not true teaching, which according to them is the Western Church. It is important to notice that "the Orthodox Church is not a unitary Church. It is a communion of sister churches joined by sharing the same faith and the same sacraments."⁴

Since the fourth century, when Christianity became legal and later the religion of the Roman empire, the very strong link between the religion and state started to develop. In order to keep the empire in unity Christianity had also to be in unity, therefore the Christian emperors called the Church Councils to define dogmas of faith. Later when the Roman empire collapsed various arguments began to arise between East and West, for example who's form of liturgy was right, the question of levened or unlevened bread, arguments about marriage of priests, the fasting days, dates of Easter etc. When the Byzantine bishop heard that the Normans do not allow the Eastern rite he banned the Latin rite in Constantinople. Pope Leo IX responded by sending his cardinal Humbert to solve the problem. And later the problem was "solved" when Humbert publicly excommunicated the Patriarch of Constantinope in Hagia Sofia in 1054 and the Patriarch gave a responce to this reaction by cursing the pope's legate. This is the official date of the great schism, although it was not the main reason. The tension between East and West began much earlier. After the official date of schism there were negotiations between Rome and Constantinople especially during the invasion of the Turks in 1095. At this time both East and West were still worshiping together. The main problem started in the twelth and thiteenth centuries because of political and cultural reasons. In 1182 there were great anti-latin riots in Constantinople. Furthermore in 1204 Constantinople was sacked by the Western knights of the crusades.

The argument between East and West continued when the question of Filioque was introduced. The Filioque problem, is an argument in the area of Trinitology about the Holy Spirit: Does it proceed from the Father or from the Father and the Son? Catholic Tradition teaches that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son – Filioque. But this argument mainly was used as a pretext for the historical mistakes of disunity.All these liturgical, political, theological events gradually formed the self identity of Orthodox and Catholic Churches and those different identities separated the Sister Churches.

The real problem is that through the ages in history East and West developed different models of governing the Church. In the eleventh century during the reform the Pope declared authority upon the whole Church which was ignored by the East because the Byzantines saw their Church in an emperial context. In the East the emperor has always had a great influence on the Church and they saw themselves as being very autonomic and independant.

After the Second Vatican Council we are mainly critiqued by the Orthodox for our ecclesiology. "Neither an ecclesiology based on the Vicar of Christ and the de jure divino hierarchy, nor one which separates the invisible and undivided Church from the visible and divided Church can be accepted by Orthodox theology;"⁵ In the Orthodox ecclesiology a great emphasis is put on the notion of Sister Churches. The Orthodox Churches are governed as "autocephalous", "meaning, able to provide themselves with their own head,"⁶ but is not completeley independant from each other. Each of the metropolies with a Patriarch according to tradition have a founding Apostle. For example about the time of Nicea there were 5 metropolies and Rome was one of them. Moreover the founding apostles of the Church in Rome superceeded other Churches since the Roman Church was founded by the apostle Peter; also the apostle Paul was martyred in Rome which also gave a great spiritual foundation for the Church in Rome. But Rome does not have any jurisdictional authority, because it is considered "the first among equals". Nowadays Constantinople is considered the first among equals since they consider Rome to be apostacised. The other reason why Rome would be granted this title at Nicea was the Roman Emperor who had a great role in this council. Down through the ages in the East the Emperor had a much greater influence on the Church than in the West. But after a long period of time even the Orthodox recognise that the model of "autocephalous" is not the best model: "With no single governing head, each autocephalous Church being clothed with juridical authority, we tend to lose even the slightest, the most elementary kind of co-ordination and initiative."⁷

Talking about Tradition Catholic Church and Orthodox Church agree about the necessity of the Tradition, but dissagree on how Tradition passes on faith, because there has been different traditions through the ages in both Churches. In a dialogue with the Protestants it is a very difficult issue to talk about the Tradition, because they reject the Tradition and their moto is Sola Scriptura. So here is one more obstacle for the unity among Catholics and Protestants. All issues in the Catholic Church are based "upon Sacred Scripture and Tradition."⁸ Since the ancient times the Church recognised the necessity of Tradition which is an authentic teaching of the Church. In the ecumenical dialogue between Orthodox and Catholics both sides recognise the Tradition, but Protestants reject it and that causes a problem from the Catholic point of view: "according to Catholic belief, the authentic teaching authority of the Church has a special place in the interpretation and preaching of the written word of God."⁹. In stating Sola Scriptura protestants are contradicting themselves, because interpreting the Scripture they are going to be subjective which causes disunity among their own communities. It becomes a subjective revelation.

Even though both Orthodox and Catholic accept the Tradition they have different a interpretation of what the Tradition is: "the heritage handed down by the apostles was received with differences of form and manner, so that from the earliest times of the Church it was explained variously in different places, owing to diversities of genius and conditions of life. All this, quite apart from external causes, prepared the way for decisions arising also from a lack of charity and mutual understanding."¹⁰ Nevertheless the Tradition is one of the things which make the unity possible even though there are differences which the Catholic Church recognises and does not try to deny them: "from the earliest times the Eastern Churches followed their own forms of ecclesiastical law and custom, which were sanctioned by the approval of the Fathers of the Church, of synods, and even of ecumenical councils. Far from being an obstacle to the Church's unity, a certain diversity of customs and observances only adds to her splendor, and is of great help in carrying out her mission, as has already been stated."¹¹

From the Catholic point of view the Orthodox are almost in unity with us. "These Churches, although separated from us, yet possess true sacraments and above all, by apostolic succession, the priesthood and the Eucharist, whereby they are linked with us in closest intimacy."¹² Sadly we do not have these things with the Protestants, which make communinion more obscure from the Catholic point of view.

Even though the Catholic Curch sees the Orthodox in a very positive way, ("Eastern Christians who are in fact separated in good faith from the Catholic Church, if they ask of their own accord and have the right dispositions, may be admitted to the sacraments of Penance, the Eucharist and the Anointing of the Sick. Further, Catholics may ask for these same sacraments from those non-Catholic ministers whose churches possess valid sacraments, as often as necessity or a genuine spiritual benefit recommends such a course and access to a Catholic priest is physically or morally impossible"),¹³it does not mean that Orthodox see us with the same atitude. The main problem for the Orthodox is our ecclesiology and papacy. They do not understand and do not accept the pope as being the supreme pontif. Mainly what they say is that pope is the first among equals and they base their argument on that there were twleve apostles and not eleven plus one – Peter. The Catholic Church states that from the first ages of the Church we are already able to trace the developements of papacy. For example: "Clement of Rome called the church of Corinth to order in 96, <...> around 190 Victor excommunicated the bishops who did not celebrate the festival of Easter on the same day as Rome;"¹⁴ The Catholic Church sees these events as a developement of primacy.

Pope Jonh Paul II in his encyclica Ut Unum Sint also uses the notion of Sister Churches, but it is a different notion from the Orthodox point of view since Papal primacy contradicts to them the notion of Sister Churches and equality. Because of different historical circumstances Papacy in the West took over the role of the Emperor. The West did not have an emperor since 476 A.D. until Charlemagne took the throne in 800 A.D. Nevertheless the emperor in the West (crowned by the Pope) did not have the same authority in the Church as the emperor in the East since the emperor in the West, unlike the emperor in the East, was never able to consistently impose a spiritual kind of authority on the pope, where as in the East it was happening often. In the West the emperor would not intervene in doctrinal issues. In the East the Emperor had a great influence until the Turkish conquest in 1453. Now the Orthodox see the Lumen Gentium ecclesiology as an attempt to justify the monarchical model of ruling which was formed down through the ages of history by the monarch Popes and polemical point of view at the separated Churches. "The Roman Church, after her schism from the East (1054) and the event of the Reformation within her own communion, was obliged to form a solid ecclesiology of order and discipline in order to justify the new interpretation of the monarchical system of government, directed against the Eastern Church, and of the divine nature of the ecclesiastical institution, directed against the Reformers."¹⁵ If we look for the aspects of Sister Churches in the Protestant Churches we find that the Apostolic succession is broken, therefore the Sacraments (most of them) are neglected and dismissed which makes the dialogue with Catholic Church more complicated.

Also what Orthodox do not like in our ecclesiology is the idea of visible Catholic Church and invisible. They say that we separated mystery from material aspects of Church. Also they blame us for reducing the act of the Holy Spirit in the Church by giving all authurity to a vicar of Christ. "Sometimes the Orthodox gets the impression that in the West, either the Church is seen as an end in itself, governed by a direct representative of Christ, who gives authority to him de jure divino and through him to the whole hierarchical structure of the divine institution, or, on the other hand, the Church risks becoming simply a community of believers recognised as such only by the proper administration of the Word and the Sacraments."¹⁶

Other issues like Mariology and notion of Original Sin are more or less close with the Orthodox, but it is far enough with the protestants. The main patristic author in the west is Augustine who is recognised by the East, but he is not a great authority for the Eastern church. The Western Church took a lot of Augustine's writings including the teaching on original sin. Both Churches agree that original sin had an ontological effect on the nature of humanity. The disagreement is on the effects of the original sin: Orthodox would not go as far as Pelagius who did not recognise a change after the fall, but they would not agree with St. Augustine's estimation of the extent of the damage inflicted by sin. Therefore here I see even a bigger difference between the Protestants and Orthodox than Catholics and Protestants who accuse the Catholics of being Pelagian.

"The only kind of Mariological doctrine that the Orthodox possess in the concept of the Theotokos as formed during the Christological disputes of the fifth and sixth centuries."¹⁷ Mediatrix is understood as representation of praying community.Orthodox more or less agree on the issues about the Virgin Mary, but they say that there is no need of creating new dogmas about her, because of a danger of Divinisation and missunderstanding among the popular piety. Protestant tradition would disagree with both East and West about the Virgin Mary since they see us as worshiping her and they accuse us of idolotry. The Orthodox take their theology about the Virgin Mary from the worshiping community and for them it is enough and they criticise Catholics for proclaming new dogmas ex cathedra which is against the ancient tradition and ecumenical ethos.¹⁸ Orthodox accept only 7 ecumenical councils. All the councils of the West after the split are cosidered as local councils which do not have such a great importance for the East.

Second Vatican council highlights the similarities between the two Churches from the Ancient times: "it must not be forgotten that from the beginning the Churches of the East have had a treasury from which the Western Church has drawn extensively-in liturgical practice, spiritual tradition, and law."¹⁹ All these things namely liturgy, spiritual tradition and law make the dialogue between East and West much easier than with Catholics and Protestants since the Protestants have rejected a lot of these things. These things are what we have in common with the Orthodox and they show the closer relationship between the West and East in practice. The dialogue with the Protestants could be easier in the sense that there is a shorter gap in history between the split in 16^th century than about a thousand year history since the split between East and West. Also I would see Protestants as culturally closer to us than the Orthodox. The other problem not including the sacramental issues with the Protestants which makes a dialogue very difficult is that there are hundreds of Protestant denominations which do not agree among themselves, which is not the issue with the Orthodox since they managed to sustain the unity among themselves, therefore it is not easy to talk about Protestants in general and in a dialogue with the protestants we have to look at each denomination in itself. Therefore by a having look at all the issues mentioned in this essay I could say that dialogue with the Orthodox is easier than with the Protestants especially because of common understanding of the necessity of Tradition and Sacraments.

Bibliography:

Comby Jean, How to Read Church History, Vol. 1 From the Beginnings to Fifteenth Century, SCM Press LTD, 1985

Decree on the Catholic Churches of the Eastern Rite Orientalium Ecclesiarum, Solemnly Promulgated by His Holiness Pope Paul VI on November 21, 1964, §27 http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19641121_orientalium-ecclesiarum_en.html

Decree on Ecumenism Unitatis Redintegratio http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19641121_unitatis-redintegratio_en.html

Dogmatic Constitution on the Church Lumen Gentium Solemnly Promulgated by Holiness Pope Paul VI on November 21, 1964, §14 http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html

Nichols Aidan, O.P. Rome and the Eastern Churches, T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1992

Nissiotis Nikos, A. The Main Ecclesiological Problem of the Second Vatican Council and the Position of the non-Roman Churches Facing It, Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Vol. 2, Number 1, Editorial Leonard Swidler, Duquesne University Press, Winter 1965

Scripture quatation is taken from Revised Standart Version BibleWorks for Windows, Copyright © 2001, BibleWorks, LLC Version 5.0.034a

1Decree on Ecumenism Unitatis Redintegratio §14 http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19641121_unitatis-redintegratio_en.html

2Decree on Ecumenism Unitatis Redintegratio §22 http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19641121_unitatis-redintegratio_en.html

3Cf. Irenaeus of Lyons Against the Heresies, III, 3, 1-2. Comby Jean, How to Read Church History, Vol. 1 From the Beginnings to Fifteenth Century, (SCM Press LTD, 1985), p. 63

4Nichols Aidan, O.P. Rome and the Eastern Churches, (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1992) p. 105

5Nissiotis Nikos, A. The Main Ecclesiological Problem of the Second Vatican Council and the Position of the non-Roman Churches Facing It, Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Vol. 2, Number 1, Editorial Leonard Swidler, (Duquesne University Press, Winter 1965), p. 34

6Nichols Aidan, O.P. Rome and the Eastern Churches, (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1992) p. 107

7Nissiotis Nikos, A. The Main Ecclesiological Problem of the Second Vatican Council and the Position of the non-Roman Churches Facing It, Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Vol. 2, Number 1, Editorial Leonard Swidler, (Duquesne University Press, Winter 1965), p. 60

8Dogmatic Constitution on the Church Lumen Gentium Solemnly Promulgated by Holiness Pope Paul VI on November 21, 1964, §14http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html

9Decree on Ecumenism Unitatis Redintegratio §21 http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19641121_unitatis-redintegratio_en.html

10Op.Cit. §14

11Op.Cit. §16

12Op.Cit. §15

13Decree on the Catholic Churches of the Eastern Rite Orientalium Ecclesiarum, Solemnly Promulgated by His Holiness Pope Paul VI on November 21, 1964, §27 http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19641121_orientalium-ecclesiarum_en.html

14Comby Jean, How to Read Church History, Vol. 1 From the Beginnings to Fifteenth Century, (SCM Press LTD, 1985), p. 103

15Nissiotis Nikos, A. The Main Ecclesiological Problem of the Second Vatican Council and the Position of the non-Roman Churches Facing It, Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Vol. 2, Number 1, Editorial Leonard Swidler, (Duquesne University Press, Winter 1965), p. 33

16Op.Cit. p. 34

17Nissiotis Nikos, A. The Main Ecclesiological Problem of the Second Vatican Council and the Position of the non-Roman Churches Facing It, Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Vol. 2, Number 1, Editorial Leonard Swidler, (Duquesne University Press, Winter 1965), p. 52

18Cf. Op.Cit. p. 53

19Decree on Ecumenism Unitatis Redintegratio §14 http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19641121_unitatis-redintegratio_en.html