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bobzills
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Yes, the RCC lets it rest, but the Eastern Orthodox do not like it.
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ASimpleSinner
Guest
Not to be dismissive, but non-Catholics will always have or find reasons for being non-Catholic. If we are talking about Eastern Catholics, what some of the EO find problematic… well I can’t make everyone happy, you can’t build an identity on trying to please others.
(Worth noting, as much as militant polemicists fly the filioque flag - for every one Orthodox you find doing that, you find another who is accepting that what difference does exist is not worth fighting over. Moreover, I don’t think 3 out of 100 people who mention that matter have the depth of training to understand the nuances of it, and I admit to being part of the other 97. Repeating what has been read in tracts, we could try to out-clever each other until the Parousia, for what?)
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bobzills
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There is something called the Zoghby initiative according to which Melkite Catholics believe everything that the Eastern Orthodox Church teaches.
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Ghosty
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Yes, but that doesn’t include Eastern Orthodox polemics against Catholics, or against Latins in particular. It means that the Melkite Church (along with the rest of the Catholic Church, incidently) believes the the fundamental Faith of the Catholics and Eastern Orthodox is identical.
The Melkite Church has the additional “unity” with the Eastern Orthodox in that they share the same theological tradition and approach to the Faith.
The Melkite Church, by and large, doesn’t buy into the Orthodox polemics, and doesn’t consider them part and parcel with the “Eastern tradition”. At the same time, however, the Melkite Church doesn’t accept the notion that being Catholic means being Latin, though I have been told by my Melkite Bishop (Sayedna Bustros, Sayedna Zoghby’s partner in the Commission that pushed for unity with the Antiochian Orthodox) that we are not to view the Latin tradition or theological approaches as heretical in any way. The Latin tradition is as Catholic and True as the Melkite tradition.
Peace and God bless!
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anthony022071
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That’s fine,but as Catholics they should also accept this:
“the Holy Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son, not as from two principles but as from one single Principle.”
“…the eternal order of the Divine Persons in their consubstantial communion implies that the Father, as the ‘principle without principle,’ is the first origin of the Spirit, but also that, as Father of the only Son, He is, with the Son, the single Principle from which the Spirit proceeds.’ (Council of Lyons II, DS 850).”
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anthony022071
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bobzills
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It’s confusing, because as indicated above, the Zoghby initiative says that the Melkites beleive everything that the Eastern Orthodox do, and I don;t know if the Eastern Orthodox really beleive this?
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Ghosty
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Does the Zoghby Initiative say “all that the Eastern Orthodox believe, and nothing else”? No, of course not.
That isn’t to say that the Melkite Church adopts a Latin theological approach, but it does mean that we have to be careful in how we understand the Zoghby Initiative. After all, if it was intended as strictly as you seem to imply, then the Melkite Church would have denounced the Papacy in the same breath; yet, on the contrary, it totally affirmed the Papacy while at the same time indicating that the exact role of the Bishop of Rome was still in need of refinement (something Rome has also said repeatedly).
Peace and God bless!
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bobzills
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That’s why I said it was confusing. It’s really not just the papacy, but there are a lot of other issues that could be discussed. For example, someone might say that the teaching that the Catholic Church has one doctrine is somewhat problematical if you focus on the two different approaches that Eastern and Western Churches have toward the doctrine of the filioque.Does the Zoghby Initiative say “all that the Eastern Orthodox believe, and nothing else”? No, of course not.
That isn’t to say that the Melkite Church adopts a Latin theological approach, but it does mean that we have to be careful in how we understand the Zoghby Initiative. After all, if it was intended as strictly as you seem to imply, then the Melkite Church would have denounced the Papacy in the same breath; yet, on the contrary, it totally affirmed the Papacy while at the same time indicating that the exact role of the Bishop of Rome was still in need of refinement (something Rome has also said repeatedly).
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ASimpleSinner
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Bob the question than becomes which voice in Orthodoxy is (or was) Bishop Elias (of blessed memory) assenting to? There is not a singular line of thought on theology or a single organ that speaks for “The Orthodox Church” which is actually a collection of national churches in communion with a chorus of different voices speaking to their readings and interepretaions of a myriad of issues that have never been definatively ruled on in a fashion that is de fide to all Orthodox.
So the sticky part is WHAT is it we understand the Orthodox to believe, WHO speaks on their behalf or definatively and WHERE can we go to know exactly?
The situation in Lebanon and Syria being what it is did you know that there is already regular intercommunion between Catholics, Greek Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and Assyrians in some places? The views being dealt with in that environment are often a far cry from the veiws we get online - half of which in CAF seem to be made by disciples of the virulently anti-western Greek Orthodox priest Father John Romanides who opines that Catholic sacraments are graceless! Now fly over to the Middle East and see what sort of currency such ideas have over there.
You might even be surprised to find out who - in spite of all the protests otherwise from people who find it a challenge to their personal definitions and readings and understanding of WHAT is "Holy Orthodoxy - the GO Patriarch of Antioch has invited to concelebrate DL at his patriarchal altar. You might be very surprised indeed.
So even though the Antiochian Orthodox rejected the initiative - which had a big heart - as untennable for them to act unilaterally, and Rome dressed down the matter for similar reasons… well what Bp Elias was promoting was hardly an initiative that got behind a concept of Orthodoxy that is often presented here.
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Formosus
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Just a note, the Pope recently praised the Melkite patriarch, so it would seem the Pope approves of the zogby initiative, or at least is unwilling to condemn it.
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bobzills
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However, I read that Rome rejected it:
I don’t see why Rome would reject such a wonderful idea as expressed by the Melkite Catholic Church leaders in the Zoghby initiative, unless perhaps there really are serious differnces that some people here are not paying proper attention to,.
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GregoryPalamas
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If you had the Turks breathing down your neck you wouldn’t either. But the continuing problem and the one that persists today is the suspicion bolstered by years of submissive behavior by Eastern Catholics is the real concern that Rome or at least many of her bishops don’t take Rome seriously when it says that it is alright not to use the “filioque”. A bit deeper than that is the suspicion, justified or not, Rome still does not understand the difference between proceed and sent. Eastern Catholics have learned to live with the ambiguity from Rome. Most Orthodox cannot. That is yet to be hammered out between Rome and Orthodoxy.
Threads like this do not help.
CDL
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Ghosty
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You can read online why Rome rejected it; it was for the same reasons that the Antiochian Orthodox rejected it, namely that there can’t be unilateral acts of full Communion. The Communions themselves must be involved, not individual Churches.
Peace and God bless!
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Mickey
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The Second Vatican Council, the ecumenical documents of the Holy See, and the writings of the Holy Father, call on Eastern Catholics to preserve their own traditions, both for their own sake and for the ecumenical value they represent in relations with the Orthodox and other Eastern Churches. The Holy See has also taken care to speak clearly of the status of Eastern Catholics, preserving both their freedom of governance and their necessary submission to the supreme authority of the Apostolic See.
ewtn.com/expert/answers/churches_rites_or_sisters.htm
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natsclem
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So what if it was in Constantinople? That is not the Holy See.
I am sorry but your understanding is like the Fundamentalist Protestants asserting an interpretation based on a certain verse without regard to others that touch on similar subject. The right approach must be wholistic and integral. Why don’t you examine the underlying circumstances that led to the declaration? To say that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father is enough to assert the HS’s divine substance–God from God. The divine nature of the HS was in question during that time so they asserted the HS’s divinity with that phrase.
Can you say…the HS proceeds from the Father without the Son…? If you can…your faith is not biblical.
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Mickey
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But when the Paraclete cometh, whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceedeth from the Father, he shall give testimony of me.
John 15:26
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natsclem
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What do you mean?
Catholicity is not defined by devotion to the Supreme Magisterium of the Catholic Church but to the Truth–the Catholic Faith.
There is only One Lord, One Faith. There are no Faith for the Easterns and another Faith for the Westerns.
The reality is that we are like individuals in different distances and angles from the same light. So, we view the same light also differently–some find it so bright; some, so dim; some, blazingly radiant. To those who view it blindingly radiant may refuse to even to take a glance.
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natsclem
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That is only one side of the game.
The whole truth is…
If the Father and the Son are one as the Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father (John 10:30&38), it is correct to say that the Holy Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son not separately but in their oneness. That oneness cannot be divided so the procession of the HS necessarily comes from that oneness–of the Father and the Son. We cannot say that the “Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father without the Son” without losing orthodoxy.
In this verse: “But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me. ” (John 15:26 - New King James Bible), Jesus probably did not add “and Me” because he already mentioned earlier that he is the Truth (John 14:6). If Jesus is the Truth then the HS is His Spirit–the Spirit of Truth. In John 15:26, Jesus is trying to say that the Counselor (Helper) is also the Spirit of Truth (Jesus is the Truth) that proceeds from the Father making the HS also the Spirit of the Father as that can be read in Matthew 10:20.
Finally in John 20:22, the Holy Spirit clearly proceeds from the Son–"…And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
Therefore, the Father and the Son are the one inseparable principle of the Holy Spirit, He (HS) being the Spirit of both the Father and the Son.
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Mickey
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You are mislead.
Start yet another thread on the Filioque–and you will receive very informative responses from Eastern Catholics and Orthodox.
Or search prior threads.
I apologize for contributing to the hi-jacking of this thread.
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