Any converts from Eastern Orthodoxy?

[Cavaradossi]

Setting the Lossky issue aside, what did you think of the rest of the article?

Hart’s mistreatment of Lossky is not a “minor issue.” His mistreatment (or rather, his outright dismissal) of Lossky basically forms a major part in justifying his proclamation that the filioque is not a theological problem for unity. In fact, his use of Lossky is a bit more of a caricature than anything else, as some sort of anti-union bogeyman (or perhaps the better word is straw man), which he dismisses out of hand, without any theological reasoning at all.

See, there is a pattern (and I am beginning to believe it to be intentional) wherein you read an article that is not to your liking, so you find the one or two things that are technically questionable, and you focus on those smaller issues to divert attention away from the entire rest of the article. Perhaps you think by nit-picking on lesser points, you can divert the discussion away from the majors.

First you presume to tell me what God will say to me on the day of judgment, and now you tell me you can read my innermost thoughts.

You did this before with both Mark Bonocore’s Timeline and Dave Armstrong’s listing of the large number of heretical Eastern Bishops.

I don’t think that an argument assuming reification as one of its premises is a “minor issue.” It is in fact a rather major issue as far as logic and reason are concerned.

The author’s PRIMARY point was that there really isn’t all that much that is separating East and West and that those differences could be overcome with a bit of attention EXCEPT for the fact that some Eastern polemicists DO NOT WANT any reconciliation with Rome.

And that is precisely why Hart’s theologically unsubstantiated maltreatment of Lossky in that article is a major and not minor issue with the article. He presents Lossky as a bogeyman which he handily pretends to defeat with his superior agreeableness. But being agreeable is hardly a marker of whether what one says is true or not. In fact, Hart’s article is remarkably void of theological opinions. What few opinions he does offer—like that the filioque could be defended as showing the relationship of the Spirit proceeding from the Father through the Son or that the Neo-Patristic synthesis of Florovsky and Lossky came at an unacceptably high cost theologically—are unfortunately not well substantiated in the article.

So, I’m asking straight up: Do you, Cavaradossi, want to see a reconciliation and healing of the division that has separated East and West for a thousand years?

If Rome will condemn the proposition that the Son is cause of the Holy Spirit and that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son as one principle, limit the papal primacy to one of mediate jurisdiction, return some of its later dogmata to the status of theological opinions, and condemn certain errors of Aristotelian ontology, then I would be happy for the name of the bishop of Rome to be inserted back onto the diptychs.

 

[josie_L]

If Rome will condemn the proposition that the Son is cause of the Holy Spirit and that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son as one principle, limit the papal primacy to one of mediate jurisdiction, return some of its later dogmata to the status of theological opinions, and condemn certain errors of Aristotelian ontology, then I would be happy for the name of the bishop of Rome to be inserted back onto the diptychs.

How very “eastern” of you, i.e., repudiate all that is Latin, i.e., Latin Fathers/theology/thought because apparently the only legitimate thought/theology comes from the East.

 

[Randy_Carson]

Hart’s mistreatment of Lossky is not a “minor issue.” His mistreatment (or rather, his outright dismissal) of Lossky basically forms a major part in justifying his proclamation that the filioque is not a theological problem for unity. In fact, his use of Lossky is a bit more of a caricature than anything else, as some sort of anti-union bogeyman (or perhaps the better word is straw man), which he dismisses out of hand, without any theological reasoning at all.

Okay. Now, what did you think of the REST of the article, Cav?

First you presume to tell me what God will say to me on the day of judgment, and now you tell me you can read my innermost thoughts.

Our innermost thoughts are revealed by our actions, aren’t they?.

You’ve panned Soloviev, Bonocore, Armstrong and now you’re ignoring this article, too.

Of course, you could prove me wrong and actually discuss the general theme of the article. I’ll make it easy for you…the author writes:

the most intransigent and extreme members of our respective communions—and those, I fear, who in the East are usually at present the most impassioned and obstreperous among us—seem often incapable or unwilling to acknowledge any recognizable distinction between substantial and accidental differences, between real and imagined difficulties, between obvious and merely suppositious theological issues, and between matters of negligible import and those that lie at the heart of our division.

As regards my own communion, I must reluctantly report that there are some Eastern Christians who have become incapable of defining what it is to be Orthodox except in contradistinction to Roman Catholicism; and among these are a small but voluble number who have (I sometimes suspect) lost any rationale for their Orthodoxy other than their profound hatred, deranged terror, and encyclopaedic ignorance of Rome. For such as these, there can never be any limit set to the number of grievances that need to be cited against Rome, nor any act of contrition on the part of Rome sufficient for absolution.

What is your opinion?

If Rome will condemn the proposition that the Son is cause of the Holy Spirit and that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son as one principle, limit the papal primacy to one of mediate jurisdiction, return some of its later dogmata to the status of theological opinions, and condemn certain errors of Aristotelian ontology, then I would be happy for the name of the bishop of Rome to be inserted back onto the diptychs.

In other words, if we Catholics become Orthodox, you’re happy. Is that about it?

 

[Cavaradossi]

the most intransigent and extreme members of our respective communions—and those, I fear, who in the East are usually at present the most impassioned and obstreperous among us—seem often incapable or unwilling to acknowledge any recognizable distinction between substantial and accidental differences, between real and imagined difficulties, between obvious and merely suppositious theological issues, and between matters of negligible import and those that lie at the heart of our division.

As regards my own communion, I must reluctantly report that there are some Eastern Christians who have become incapable of defining what it is to be Orthodox except in contradistinction to Roman Catholicism; and among these are a small but voluble number who have (I sometimes suspect) lost any rationale for their Orthodoxy other than their profound hatred, deranged terror, and encyclopaedic ignorance of Rome. For such as these, there can never be any limit set to the number of grievances that need to be cited against Rome, nor any act of contrition on the part of Rome sufficient for absolution.

What is your opinion?

For charity’s sake, I shall ignore your insulting and bizarre attempts at psychoanalysis (I am not the topic of discussion), and stick to my criticism of Hart.

Hart here is being foolish with this premise. What it is to be Orthodox is to adhere to the decisions of the ecumenical councils and the faith of the fathers, and in this, we do not define Orthodoxy in contradistinction to Rome (or out of some hatred for Rome as Hart asserts), but rather we only remark on where we perceive that Rome has deviated from the truth as we have come to know it. He mistakes the latter for the former, and that is a fundamental error, which leads him to misrepresent Lossky’s and other Orthodox scholars’ rejection of Latin Scholasticism as being something done out of prejudice (and if there was any prejudice involved at all, it was probably a product of the general theological climate in Lossky’s time which had turned against Neo-Scholasticism, rather than any special Orthodox bigotry on Lossky’s part).

Anyway, to be rather frank, because you seem not to understand just how much of this criticism is aimed at Lossky and the Neo-Patristic synthesis, I think you severely underestimate how central Hart’s misrepresentation of Lossky is to his article, which is why you may find it to be something of peripheral importance, while I do not. Hart’s essential argument is that age-old prejudices have influenced modern Orthodox theology, and that these then make any talk of reunion impossible. It may be conceivable that this criticism is true with some lines of Romanidean thought (though for all of Hart’s disdain for Romanides, he cannot avoid the fact that Romanides has seemingly had an impact upon modern scholarship in the West, which generally recognizes that St. Augustine’s notion of original sin differs from that of the earlier fathers), but then his blanket condemnation is decidedly untrue when he attempts to apply it to Lossky, who was more tempered in his assessment of the West than say Romanides, Metropolitan Hierotheos, and Christos Yannaras.

His assessment of the filioque controversy I find rather anemic. He does not address at all the Council of Blachernae or the fact that we do not accept the notion that proceeding through the Son is equivalent to the Latin teaching that the Son is cause of the Spirit’s subsistent being (as taught at Florence). Instead, he tries to equate the two without any substantiation (despite the fact that the Council of Blachernae condemns this proposition), and then dismisses out of hand (and without any reasoned argument whatsoever) Lossky’s analysis of the filioque as “historically absurd and theologically catastrophic.” (In fact, I might proffer the conjecture that perhaps it is Hart’s assessment of the filioque which is at the very least absurd, if not also theologically catastrophic in how nebulous it is.)

 

[Peter_J]

How very “eastern” of you, i.e., repudiate all that is Latin, i.e., Latin Fathers/theology/thought because apparently the only legitimate thought/theology comes from the East.

There’s no denying that there are some Orthodox who are anti-Western (I know that firsthand) but why do you assume that Cavaradossi is one of them?

 

[josie_L]

His assessment of the filioque controversy I find rather anemic. He does not address at all the Council of Blachernae or the fact that we do not accept the notion that proceeding through the Son is equivalent to the Latin teaching that the Son is cause of the Spirit’s subsistent being (as taught at Florence). Instead, he tries to equate the two without any substantiation (despite the fact that the Council of Blachernae condemns this proposition), and then dismisses out of hand (and without any reasoned argument whatsoever) Lossky’s analysis of the filioque as “historically absurd and theologically catastrophic.” (In fact, I might proffer the conjecture that perhaps it is Hart’s assessment of the filioque which is at the very least absurd, if not also theologically catastrophic in how nebulous it is.)

We do not believe that the Son is the cause of the Spirit’s subsistent being, i.e., Florence never thought this. The principle (sole) cause of the Spirit’s subsistent being is the Father.

But, if the Western Church agrees with the East that the Spirit proceeds from the Father alone, then what does it mean by “Filioque” – that the Spirit proceeds “from the Father and the Son”? Very simply, and keeping in mind the West’s isolation from the original Greek-language intention of the Constantinopolitan Creed, what the West means to express is a truth that is equally valid, but distinct and parallel to, the original Greek-language intention. For, when the West speaks of the Spirit “proceeding” from the Father and the Son, it is referring to something all-together different than “procession” as from a single source (aitia). It is not advocating two sources or principals for the Spirit, or some kind of “double spiration”, as is all-too-commonly (and wrongly) assumed by many Eastern Orthodox. Rather, it is using the term “proceeds” in an all-together different sense. And the best way to illustrate the two different senses or uses of the term “proceeds” (Greek vs. Latin) is though the following analogy:

If a human father and son go into their back yard to play a game of catch, it is the father who initiates the game of catch by throwing the ball to his son. In this sense, one can say that the game of catch “proceeds” from this human father (an “aition”); and this is the original, Greek sense of the Constantinopolitan Creed’s use of the term “proceeds” (“ekporeusis”). However, taking this very same scenario, one can also justly say that the game of catch “proceeds” from both the father and his son. And this is because the son has to be there for the game of catch to exist. For, unless the son is there, then the father would have no one to throw the ball to; and so there would be no game of catch. And, it is in this sense (one might say a “collective” sense) that the West uses the term “proceeds” (“procedit”) in the Filioque. Just as acknowledging the necessity of the human son’s presence in order for the game of catch to exist does not, in any way, challenge or threaten the human father’s role as the source or initiator (aition) of the game of catch, so the Filioque does not deny the Father’s singular role as the Cause (Aition) of the Spirit; but merely acknowledges the Son’s necessary Presence (i.e., participation) for the Spirit’s eternal procession from the Father to Someone else – namely, to the eternal Son. Father and Son are thus collectively identified as accounting for the Spirit’s procession. This is all that the Filioque was ever intended to address; and it was included in the Creed by the Western fathers at Toledo in order to counter the claims of the 6th Century Spanish (Germanic) Arians. These Arians were of course denying this essential and orthodox truth – that is, the Son’s eternal participation in the Spirit’s procession – an issue which was never challenged or comprehensively addressed in the Byzantine experience, aside from the fact that there does exist throughout the writings of the Eastern fathers the profession that the Spirit proceeds from the Father “through [or ‘by way of’] the Son” – an expression equivalent to the Filioque.

catholic-legate.com/Apologetics/TheChurch/Articles/Filioque.aspx

p.s. Just wondering have you ever read St. Augustine’s “De Trinitate” or parts of it anyway? Did Lossky ever read all of De Trinitate?

 

[josie_L]

There’s no denying that there are some Orthodox who are anti-Western (I know that firsthand) but why do you assume that Cavaradossi is one of them?

I don’t want to assume anything, I’m going by his response, i.e., get rid of the filioque, every other dogmatic proclamation made. . . etc., that in its essence is a denial of Latin patristic thought/theology (not to mention the support of Eastern Fathers who concur). I know that he was sort of pressured to respond, but his response was nonetheless disappointing, i.e., it saddened me (because I’m well aware that there are Orthodox bishops, scholars, theologians, who have no problem with the filioque, i.e., they understand it is not heretical).

 

[Peter_J]

The author’s PRIMARY point was that there really isn’t all that much that is separating East and West and that those differences could be overcome with a bit of attention EXCEPT for the fact that some Eastern polemicists DO NOT WANT any reconciliation with Rome.

So, I’m asking straight up: Do you, Cavaradossi, want to see a reconciliation and healing of the division that has separated East and West for a thousand years?

Yes or no?

I’m betting that you would be interested in the newly-revived thread about Josaphat Kuntsevych, complete with old phrases like

enemies who loved division

and

hearts inflamed by love for dispute

 

[Cavaradossi]

How very “eastern” of you, i.e., repudiate all that is Latin, i.e., Latin Fathers/theology/thought because apparently the only legitimate thought/theology comes from the East.

Where do I repudiate the Western Fathers? The Western Fathers were not any more noticeably Aristotelian than the Eastern Fathers (that would be a post schism development), nor is their version of the filioque completely identical to the filioque as taught at Florence (for as St. Maximus teaches, the Latins meant originally not to confess the Son as cause of the Spirit). The immediate and proper jurisdiction of the papacy in all dioceses of the world similarly was not a principle intrinsic to the thought of the Latin Fathers (most scholars indeed agree that the immediate universal and proper jurisdiction of the papacy was the result of a long process of development).

 

[Cavaradossi]

We do not believe that the Son is the cause of the Spirit’s subsistent being, i.e., Florence never thought this. The principle (sole) cause of the Spirit’s subsistent being is the Father.

But the Council of Florence in its definition states as much. In the name of the holy Trinity, Father, Son and holy Spirit, we define, with the approval of this holy universal council of Florence, that the following truth of faith shall be believed and accepted by all Christians and thus shall all profess it: that the holy Spirit is eternally from the Father and the Son, and has his essence and his subsistent being from the Father together with the Son, and proceeds from both eternally as from one principle and a single spiration. We declare that when holy doctors and fathers say that the holy Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son, this bears the sense that thereby also the Son should be signified, according to the Greeks indeed as cause, and according to the Latins as principle of the subsistence of the holy Spirit, just like the Father.

p.s. Just wondering have you ever read St. Augustine’s “De Trinitate” or parts of it anyway? Did Lossky ever read all of De Trinitate?

I have read fragments (it’s a long work). I do not know how much of De Trinitate Lossky ever read, but I know that in In the Image and Likeness of God he speculates that Augustine’s triadology might be consistent with Orthodox triadology, but that no study on De Trinitate (at the time of his writing the article) had yet been written from an Orthodox perspective.

 

[Randy_Carson]

For charity’s sake, I shall ignore your insulting and bizarre attempts at psychoanalysis (I am not the topic of discussion), and stick to my criticism of Hart.

Heh. How often have you made ME the topic of discussion, Cav? And you attack me again below, but I have grown accustomed to that from you, so I skip over your ad hominems almost reflexively.

But “bizarre attempts at psychoanalysis”? Is that what I’m doing? Am I the only one who sees an obvious truth? Oh…wait…

“But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them.” Jesus of Nazareth, AD 33 (Mt. 15:18)

“Our innermost thoughts are revealed by our actions, aren’t they?” Randy Carson, AD Two Hours Ago

Hart here is being foolish with this premise. What it is to be Orthodox is to adhere to the decisions of the ecumenical councils and the faith of the fathers, and in this, we do not define Orthodoxy in contradistinction to Rome (or out of some hatred for Rome as Hart asserts), but rather we only remark on where we perceive that Rome has deviated from the truth as we have come to know it. He mistakes the latter for the former, and that is a fundamental error, which leads him to misrepresent Lossky’s and other Orthodox scholars’ rejection of Latin Scholasticism as being something done out of prejudice (and if there was any prejudice involved at all, it was probably a product of the general theological climate in Lossky’s time which had turned against Neo-Scholasticism, rather than any special Orthodox bigotry on Lossky’s part).

Anyway, to be rather frank, because you seem not to understand just how much of this criticism is aimed at Lossky and the Neo-Patristic synthesis, I think you severely underestimate how central Hart’s misrepresentation of Lossky is to his article, which is why you may find it to be something of peripheral importance, while I do not. Hart’s essential argument is that age-old prejudices have influenced modern Orthodox theology, and that these then make any talk of reunion impossible. It may be conceivable that this criticism is true with some lines of Romanidean thought (though for all of Hart’s disdain for Romanides, he cannot avoid the fact that Romanides has seemingly had an impact upon modern scholarship in the West, which generally recognizes that St. Augustine’s notion of original sin differs from that of the earlier fathers), but then his blanket condemnation is decidedly untrue when he attempts to apply it to Lossky, who was more tempered in his assessment of the West than say Romanides, Metropolitan Hierotheos, and Christos Yannaras.

His assessment of the filioque controversy I find rather anemic. He does not address at all the Council of Blachernae or the fact that we do not accept the notion that proceeding through the Son is equivalent to the Latin teaching that the Son is cause of the Spirit’s subsistent being (as taught at Florence). Instead, he tries to equate the two without any substantiation (despite the fact that the Council of Blachernae condemns this proposition), and then dismisses out of hand (and without any reasoned argument whatsoever) Lossky’s analysis of the filioque as “historically absurd and theologically catastrophic.” (In fact, I might proffer the conjecture that perhaps it is Hart’s assessment of the filioque which is at the very least absurd, if not also theologically catastrophic in how nebulous it is.)

See? That wasn’t so difficult, was it? Thank you. I can see why you do not like Dr. Hart…he is an ecumenically-minded Orthodox theologian who has written appreciatively of John Paul II’s ecumenical overtures to the East and his Theology of the Body. Dr. Hart has criticisms of the Latin Church which you would appreciate, but still…anything positive must be unsettling for those who are bent on another course.

Like those mentioned in this portion (quoted previously):

As regards my own communion, I must reluctantly report that there are some Eastern Christians who have become incapable of defining what it is to be Orthodox except in contradistinction to Roman Catholicism; and among these are a small but voluble number who have (I sometimes suspect) lost any rationale for their Orthodoxy other than their profound hatred, deranged terror, and encyclopaedic ignorance of Rome. For such as these, there can never be any limit set to the number of grievances that need to be cited against Rome, nor any act of contrition on the part of Rome sufficient for absolution.

Any truth to this in your experience?

 

[Randy_Carson]

There’s no denying that there are some Orthodox who are anti-Western (I know that firsthand) but why do you assume that Cavaradossi is one of them?

Gee, I dunno…

Maybe its the fact that Cavaradossi has previously stated that Catholics have a different faith than the Orthodox? Or that more may be inferred from his own words? One sample:

I consider our faiths to be different—let’s leave it at that. There is no need to swing around such harsh words as schismatic and heretic, especially when using them is in violation of forum rules.

Or that he has argued with an Orthodox priest in these forums about the efficacy of non-Orthodox baptisms?

 

[Peter_J]

Gee, I dunno…

Maybe its the fact that Cavaradossi has previously stated that Catholics have a different faith than the Orthodox?

Alright.

I’m glad you didn’t see the quote from Henri de Lubac the other day … you’d feel like your heart had been dropped in a pot of icewater.

 

[josie_L]

Heh. How often have you made ME the topic of discussion, Cav? And you attack me again below, but I have grown accustomed to that from you, so I skip over your ad hominems almost reflexively.

But “bizarre attempts at psychoanalysis”? Is that what I’m doing? Am I the only one who sees an obvious truth? Oh…wait…

“But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them.” Jesus of Nazareth, AD 33 (Mt. 15:18)

“Our innermost thoughts are revealed by our actions, aren’t they?” Randy Carson, AD Two Hours Ago



See? That wasn’t so difficult, was it? Thank you.

Now, what do you think of this portion (quoted previously):

As regards my own communion, I must reluctantly report that there are some Eastern Christians who have become incapable of defining what it is to be Orthodox except in contradistinction to Roman Catholicism; and among these are a small but voluble number who have (I sometimes suspect) lost any rationale for their Orthodoxy other than their profound hatred, deranged terror, and encyclopaedic ignorance of Rome. For such as these, there can never be any limit set to the number of grievances that need to be cited against Rome, nor any act of contrition on the part of Rome sufficient for absolution.

Any truth to this in your experience?

Perhaps the expression you are looking for is “don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater” with regards to the other points made by Hart. For those of you interested in who Hart is:

David Bentley Hart (born 1965) is an Eastern Orthodox theologian, philosopher, and cultural commentator.

Hart earned his BA from the University of Maryland, MPhil from the University of Cambridge, and MA and PhD from the University of Virginia.[1] He has taught at the University of Virginia, the University of St. Thomas (Minnesota), Duke Divinity School, and Loyola College in Maryland. He was most recently a visiting professor at Providence College, where he also previously held the Robert J. Randall Chair in Christian Culture

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Bentley_Hart

 

[Nine_Two]

Maybe its the fact that Cavaradossi has previously stated that Catholics have a different faith than the Orthodox? Or that more may be inferred from his own words? One sample:

That belief is implicit in the fact that we don’t share Communion with anyone who is not Eastern Orthodox. However we hold the same stance toward others in the East. So no, it isn’t an anti-western thing.

 

[Randy_Carson]

Perhaps the expression you are looking for is “don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater” with regards to the other points made by Hart. For those of you interested in who Hart is:

David Bentley Hart (born 1965) is an Eastern Orthodox theologian, philosopher, and cultural commentator.

Hart earned his BA from the University of Maryland, MPhil from the University of Cambridge, and MA and PhD from the University of Virginia.[1] He has taught at the University of Virginia, the University of St. Thomas (Minnesota), Duke Divinity School, and Loyola College in Maryland. He was most recently a visiting professor at Providence College, where he also previously held the Robert J. Randall Chair in Christian Culture

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Bentley_Hart

In his article on JPII’s, Theology of the Body, Hart spoke of “the banal pieties and prejudices of modernity that characterizes Eastern Orthodoxy at its best.”

He’s not going to be a favorite of our EO friends in this forum.

 

[Randy_Carson]

That belief is implicit in the fact that we don’t share Communion with anyone who is not Eastern Orthodox. However we hold the same stance toward others in the East. So no, it isn’t an anti-western thing.

So, you take a more universal approach to who you discriminate against?

 

[Nine_Two]

So, you take a more universal approach to who you discriminate against?

Much as Catholics do in their own discrimination when they keep Communion closed…
I think some people are just looking for a reason to be offended.

 

[Cavaradossi]

Heh. How often have you made ME the topic of discussion, Cav? And you attack me again below, but I have grown accustomed to that from you, so I skip over your ad hominems almost reflexively.

Anyway, to be rather frank, because you seem not to understand just how much of this criticism is aimed at Lossky and the Neo-Patristic synthesis, I think you severely underestimate how central Hart’s misrepresentation of Lossky is to his article, which is why you may find it to be something of peripheral importance, while I do not. Hart’s essential argument is that age-old prejudices have influenced modern Orthodox theology, and that these then make any talk of reunion impossible. It may be conceivable that this criticism is true with some lines of Romanidean thought (though for all of Hart’s disdain for Romanides, he cannot avoid the fact that Romanides has seemingly had an impact upon modern scholarship in the West, which generally recognizes that St. Augustine’s notion of original sin differs from that of the earlier fathers), but then his blanket condemnation is decidedly untrue when he attempts to apply it to Lossky, who was more tempered in his assessment of the West than say Romanides, Metropolitan Hierotheos, and Christos Yannaras.

If you think this paragraph is a personal attack, then you are perfectly free to report it to the moderator. But frankly, I cannot conceive of how it is a personal attack to argue that your relative inexperience with Orthodox theological thought in the 20th century (something which you in the past have admitted freely that you are not well versed with) is causing you to underestimate how central Hart’s criticism of Lossky is to that article.

But “bizarre attempts at psychoanalysis”? Is that what I’m doing? Am I the only one who sees an obvious truth? Oh…wait…

“But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them.” Jesus of Nazareth, AD 33 (Mt. 15:18)

“Our innermost thoughts are revealed by our actions, aren’t they?” Randy Carson, AD Two Hours Ago

Let the readers decide then, who is being more reasonable. I have no desire to perpetuate this nonsensical topic of discussion.

See? That wasn’t so difficult, was it? Thank you. I can see why you do not like Dr. Hart…he is an ecumenically-minded Orthodox theologian who has written appreciatively of John Paul II’s ecumenical overtures to the East and his Theology of the Body. Dr. Hart has criticisms of the Latin Church which you would appreciate, but still…anything positive must be unsettling for those who are bent on another course.

No, you do not see, frankly. I dislike Hart because I do not agree with his theology (like how he seemingly contradicts Blachernae in that article). I do not dislike those who are more ecumenically-minded, so long as their theology is sound and it does not contradict the fathers and the councils. Frankly, you don’t know very much about me at all, or my theological positions on many matters, so it would be nice if you would cease to be so presumptuous as to attempt to speak for me.

Like those mentioned in this portion (quoted previously):

As regards my own communion, I must reluctantly report that there are some Eastern Christians who have become incapable of defining what it is to be Orthodox except in contradistinction to Roman Catholicism; and among these are a small but voluble number who have (I sometimes suspect) lost any rationale for their Orthodoxy other than their profound hatred, deranged terror, and encyclopaedic ignorance of Rome. For such as these, there can never be any limit set to the number of grievances that need to be cited against Rome, nor any act of contrition on the part of Rome sufficient for absolution.

Any truth to this in your experience?

Hart exaggerates.

 

[Randy_Carson]

Much as Catholics do in their own discrimination when they keep Communion closed…
I think some people are just looking for a reason to be offended.

Look for the humor, 92…it’s there.