Forgive me, but don’t many of our saints such as St. Mark of Ephesus teach that the Latins are not only schismatics, but also heretics? (Moderators - I am using this as a technical term and not in the pejorative!) In that case it would be more than an issue of schism. I am fairly certain that there have been synods that have expressed that the Latins are heretics, but I’d have to go digging through some books.
The issue wasn’t so much “the Latins”, but rather basic principles concerning where the Church is and where it is not. The Sacraments having grace in them it is believed when and only when the Sacraments are in the Church. You see if St Cyprian was wrong then when a jurisdiction is in schism from all other jurisdiction (in doesn’t matter who, could be the Latin Church, or a Greek Church, whatever) then that Jurisdiction is still in the Church! The canons of the 1st Ecumenical Council ordered that Schismatics are to be treated as being still in the Church. But I was always taught that they were not in the Church and their reception into the Church was done by an act of economia, and their Sacraments did not have grace until they were joined to the Church by that act of economia. If St Cyprian is wrong, they are not just treated as being in the Church, they really are in the Church, there is no “act of economia” involved at all, their Sacraments were real and true both before and after they entered communion with other jurisdictions in the Church.
When reading St Cyprian I often wondered why he never spoke of economia. I often thought that a good discourse on economia would have cleared up his heated arguments he had with Pope Steven of the issue of the Baptism of Schismatics and Heretics. But economia never seemed to come up. St Cyprian believed that when Pope Steven accepted baptism outside of the Catholic communion he was establishing “rocks” other than the rock of St Peter outside of the Church. He even went so far as to strongly imply that the Pope could put himself outside of the Church by creating these false rocks! Basically St Cyprian taught that unless the bishops are in union with the Chair of St Peter there can be no grace in the Sacraments, but he also taught that Rome could brake from that unity with the Chair of St Peter too and be outside the Church and without grace. Where St Cyprian was wrong was that cutting off communion did not put a local church outside the Catholic (Orthodox) Church. Therefore there were no “rocks” being made outside of the Church and baptism and all the Sacraments were all still in the Church. Hence, “economia” really doesn’t have anything to do with it!
I don’t wish to have you assume that I just came the the belief that St Cyprian was wrong because “Rome said so”. No, I don’t give Rome that much authority. It was because I used to understand that St Basil the great also taught what St Cyprian taught only he settled the issues involved with the use of economia. I thought that it was very clear that canon 1 of St Basil affirmed St Cyprian’s teachings in principal. Brother [user]mardukm[/user] showed me that in reality what St Basil did was explain what St Cyprian taught only to teach what there was about it that was not correct. I had never looked at it that way before, and after much re-reading of St Basil I realized that Brother [user]mardukm[/user] was right! I still highly respect St Basil and so I cannot go against what I now see that he really taught. I just wanted to make that clear.
I’m still sorting out what all the implications of this may be as it pertains to things that I believed for over 20 years!
As far as the matter of St Mark of Ephesus teaching that the Latins are not just schismatics but are also heretics, so therefore it is not right to unite with them. Well if he was right that they are also heretics then he would be right in saying that orthodox should not unite with them. The 1st Ecumenical Council did order that separation from heretics is the correct thing to do. Was St Mark right about the Latins? I honestly don’t know! Every issue that has been raised in the past that was claimed to be a heresy can be shown, when looked at more carefully, to no longer appear to be a heresy after all. On the other hand, Rome seems so different from what I have known the Church to be I don’t think I could feel like I was really in the Church if I went to a Roman Catholic Church. But can I explain substance to this feeling and explain how it is not a Church? No, I don’t know how to do that. I’m not going to say, one way or the other, based on only a feeling, that would not be right.
I wish to say that I definitely believe Brother [user]mardukm[/user] is in the Church, and he is in communion with Rome. You see that’s another thing, I used to believe that even if someone was totally orthodox in every way you can think of, yet he was also in communion with Rome, then that one thing alone would put him outside of the Church. St Cyprian was wrong and so that way of thinking was wrong! It wasn’t, by the way, an issue only with Rome, I used to think the very same way about anyone who was in communion with the Moscow Patriarchate. I used to see the Moscow Patriarchate as a para-synagogue (false church), so I also believed that anyone who was in communion with it was, by that fact alone, outside of the Church. So I’m not picking on Rome, I’m just explaining the way I used to think. I do think that when the new mindset settles in it will be for the best, as a non-Cyprian mindset is bound to be more healthy!
