Apostolic Canon 45, in the West?

[Kmon23]

I was wondering if Apostolic Canon 45 is applied in the Catholic Church, that we do not pray with heterodox/heretics? This is accepted by Orthodox but I never seem to hear this in Catholic forums.
Is it even accepted, or was it superseded by some other future canon?

 

[Pat_Payne]

I was wondering if Apostolic Canon 45 is applied in the Catholic Church, that we do not pray with heterodox/heretics? This is accepted by Orthodox but I never seem to hear this in Catholic forums.
Is it even accepted, or was it superseded by some other future canon?

Looking at the canon (or at least the translation on New Advent), two things spring to mind:

1. The canon forbids praying only with heretics, i.e. pretty much being a dissenter from the church. It doesn’t seem to forbid praying with heretics on a one-to-one basis (for instance praying with them that they may come back to the fold).
2. I suspect (but have scant evidence to back it up) that it’s been superseded in the Church, as looking over the numerous excommunicable offenses there are in these canons and looking at what the Code of Canon Law makes an excommunicable offense, there is a wide gulf between them. Some don’t even really apply any more to Church life (such as the canons decreeing whom a priest or bishop cannot marry – we reduced that down to “anyone – period” or the rules forbidding foreign clergy from practicing without having been vetted, that being a function of the persecutions. A remnant of that is in priestly faculties, but for a different reason)

 

[Genesis315]

I was wondering if Apostolic Canon 45 is applied in the Catholic Church, that we do not pray with heterodox/heretics? This is accepted by Orthodox but I never seem to hear this in Catholic forums.
Is it even accepted, or was it superseded by some other future canon?

I just did a quick search on Orthodox common prayer as a legitimate form of ecumenism, and it seems it is permitted and practiced by many in the hierarchy. They always seem to have a bishop at these events.

I suspect it is viewed similarly as it is in the Catholic Church. It is permitted so long as there is a good reason for it; the prayers prayed do not have anything heterodox in them; the event does not witness against the integrity and unity of the Church, serve as an example of religious indifferentism, or lead to approval of the heresies; and it does not pose a risk of harm to the faith of the participant. Certainly there are both Catholic and Orthodox critics who will argue that many of these common prayer events violate these principles, but common prayer in and of itself can also certainly fit within this framework.

But anyway, these are the reasons it was generally forbidden in the past, as well as to get the point across to the heretics that they were in the wrong to separate. Now, we are dealing with those who did not initiate the separation, but have simply found themselves mixed up in it. Prayer can be used as a way to obtain the grace of reconciliation for those who desire it (as opposed to the obstinate).