Eastern Orthodox fundamentalism/hyperdoxy

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Augustinian said:
Most Russian Orthodox aren’t Russian
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That is incorrect.

The Russian Orthodox Church accounts for about 50% of all Eastern Orthodoxy worldwide - of the approximately 150,000,000 Russian Orthodox Christians, close to 100,000,000 are Russians living in Russia.

Of the remaining 50,000,000, about 15,000,000 are estimated to be Russian.

So of 150,000,000 Russian Orthodox Christians, the large majority (about 115,000,000) of them are Russian. The minority in the Russian Orthodox Church are the other 35,000,000 of all different nationalities.

The numbers are similar for the other Eastern Orthodox Churches.

Of the ~300,000,000 Eastern Orthodox Christians in the world, about 225,000,000 of them are ethnically Orthodox (so Greek, Bulgarian, Russian, etc.) Only a minority of about 75,000,000 are not ethnic Orthodox.
 
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Imagine a bycicle wheel with a hub in the middle. God is the hub and we are the spokes. Near the hub, the spokes are close together. The same is true for Catholics and Orthodox. The closer we are to God the closer we are together. The fundies are far from God.
 
Thank you for the encouraging words.
But I am drinking red wine and eating paella with sea fruits right now at my workplace celebration
The Greeks eat sea fruits during Lent but so many nations so many rules of fastibg here in EO.
 
Many protestants have converted to Orthodoxy, some are now priests, and they brought over their anti-Catholic baggage.

Just a thought.

ZP
 
ziapueblo said:
Many protestants have converted to Orthodoxy, some are now priests
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Really think there are “many”. Many is sort of a flexible adjective, but besides the Bible Answer Man Hank Hanegraaff I can’t think of any and I don’t think that he’s a priest. The CRI and Hanegraaff’s predecessor Dr. Walter Martin weren’t particularly anti-catholic.
 
I believe there is still a serious mistrust of the West from the part of the East, just based on history. It will still take a while for that distrust to decrease. The East and West still seems to be 2 totally different worlds.
 
Your right, not many, but I have heard that there rise of converts to Orthodoxy.

This is a nice video (I know that youtube is probably not always the best place for info):


The video does show some stats of former pastors from other Christian denominations are now priests. I think its like 78%.

Here is a good article from the Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese:
http://ww1.antiochian.org/node/18474

And this one from the New York Times:


Worth reading!

ZP
 
Sometimes I wonder why the West assumes that mistrust of the West is necessarily a bad thing. If we are honest and a little more reflective, we know better. Are the Orthodox ‘wrong’ or ‘in error’ when they seek to defend Eastern Orthodoxy from Western secular or Catholic or Protestant influences? Sometimes I detect a kind of condescending attitude from Catholics lamenting Othodoxy’s failure to see the light of unity and Catholic sympatico-osity. It doesn’t seem to occur to some Catholics that this could offend an Orthodox or that these suspicious and/or critical views held by the Orthodox are informed, justified, based on their faith and their history. Necessitated by their faith as the true Church of Christ I would even say.

Still, I agree that there is often an irresponsible, rabid tone about it. I don’t think most Orthodox act this way, but it is kind of herding cats to try and make a call there. I agree on this venom coming from one direction of Protestant influences in some jurisdictions, but you do see it in ex-Catholics too on occasion, though not usually. I find this regrettable. The other direction is ethnic extremist elements. And, lastly, the Internet Orthodox hate rants are truly bizarre and do not reflect well on the faith from any perspective. This is a very small radicalized Internet community and dare I say not representative of any form of Christianity. Avoid this. Period. And yes you see this on Catholic and Protestant forums too.

I guess my larger point is having backbone is not necessarily a bad thing. Justfied, properly maintained and exercised. Resistance to the modernism of the West does not always equal rabid rigid extremist. My guess is there is a Catholic or two out there who would agree with this statement as it applies a little closer to home these days. It is very annoying to keep getting dismissed as rigid and/or wacko when you are simply defending your faith.
 
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I was just echoing what Olivier Clement was saying in his reflection on what the Orthodox can do for reunification in his book “You are Peter”. I found it to be very enlightening.
 
Don’t know it. I was just making some general comments anyway. As for the EO, I do hope they consecrate Italy to Mary soon though. 🙂😉
 
Interestingly, when I ceased to be a Protestant and was visiting catholic and orthodox churches, that hatred was what turned me away from Orthodoxy.
Eventualy I became a Catholic because it’s the true Church, but I was disgusted by that behaviour.
 
LostSheep7 said:
hatred was what turned me away from Orthodoxy.
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Although I’m glad your Catholic now, sorry that you experienced hatred. Here in Pittsburgh, I haven’t seen hatred at all from our Serbian Orthodox neighbors. They’ve always been decent folks at the Serbian Club where they have fish fry every Friday during Lent, and Catholics are welcome.
 
I’m happy that the orthodox in your city are nice 🙂
In fact the most curious thing about my experience is that the ethnic russians in the parish were in fact very kind and receptive; the rabid hatemongers were all brazilian converts!
 
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Spyridon said:
That is incorrect.

The Russian Orthodox Church accounts for about 50% of all Eastern Orthodoxy worldwide - of the approximately 150,000,000 Russian Orthodox Christians, close to 100,000,000 are Russians living in Russia.

Of the remaining 50,000,000, about 15,000,000 are estimated to be Russian.

So of 150,000,000 Russian Orthodox Christians, the large majority (about 115,000,000) of them are Russian. The minority in the Russian Orthodox Church are the other 35,000,000 of all different nationalities.
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Thank you for the clarification. Although I was thinking more locally when I made my observation.

Probably here in Pittsburgh, my statement is correct- most of the Russian Orthodox in these parts were the spiritual descendants of Alexis Toth, a Rusyn that led tens of thousands of his fellow Rusyns into the Russian Orthodox Church. In Pittsburgh, I don’t think I’ve met any Christians of Russian ethnicity, I don’t think we had any waves of immigration from Russia during the industrial age. Immigration from Russia has been mostly Jewish around here
 
FollowChrist34 said:
My guess is there is a Catholic or two out there who would agree with this statement as it applies a little closer to home these days. It is very annoying to keep getting dismissed as rigid and/or wacko when you are simply defending your faith.
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Your well reasoned, well thought out post was the total opposite of what a hyperdox would say…

The people I’m critical of would have said something like “lol does the latin heretic need a bottle? Papist gonna cry?”

Oh, and I know you were tongue in cheek about Orthodox consecrating Italy to Mary, but I would love it if they did that.

Lastly, don’t you think it’s a bit coincidental that Russia was consecrated to Mary in 1984 - and 7 years after that, the godless regime fell and now Russia is basically an entire country who ceaselessly venerates the Theotokos?
 
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Orthodox are taught that Catholics has fallen into heresy, since they have distorted the dogma and reformed the Church.
 
The fact is that that world lags behind the Western world for several centuries. In Ukraine there are also conflicts between the Pro-Kremlin Orthodox Taliban and the Orthodox Ukrainian patriots who are for integration with the West.
There is a third category of people - who believe that we lag behind the European West because of religious Moscow-Philia.
In Ukraine, some educated people are also moving away from the Church, especially outraged by the Church as a strong weapon of Pro-Putin power.
Some intelectuals there have no respect for people who, in their view, have made charlatanism a matter of life and profession.
People do not want to pay for Gundyaev’s or Chaplin’s jewelry out of their pockets, but they have to do it as a taxpayers.
The organization, which became famous for alcoholism, depravity, greed, became an anecdote and a parable, for some reason she decided that it was she who should teach morality.
There are intelectuals who believe that the material well - being, cottages in Gelendzhik, golden watches, fat priests on Mercedes-and, in general, no other reasons for the existence of this organization there. For the skeptics of intellectuals who have moved away from the Russian Orthodox Church , religion is business. Their product called “grace” needs no tatooeing, no warehousing, are not subject to inspections. It is a solid parasitism in all its forms. There are huge amounts of money spinning and nothing fall under taxation.
Where did you get tales of Holy Russia?
Sinners from many countries of the world go there to sin, for all sins are available, accasible ,cheap and unpunished. Russia ( and Ukraine influenced by Russia) breaking all records of corruption and injustice.
I think that not only in Russia but also in Ukraine there are people atheists who are not against spirituality but against ecclesiological mafias, in the political-colonial-expansionalism mission.
The world needs a spiritual revival, but the problem is that the militant Orthodox Taliban believe in this revival through weapons and territorial expansionism.
 
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In our Orthodox churches, the people really are divided into those who against Moscow’s influence on spiritual life in Ukraine and those in favor, those who will bless or inveterate patriot warrior as a hero and those who consider him a fratricide.
Some priests associate the Euro Union with the Antichrist, and do not approve even parishioners biometric passports, and others believe that Russophilia is the root of our national and economic woes.
Russia has decided to focus and to position itself as an Orthodox civilization.
The only question is whether the means used to affect millions of people to civilizational progress or in the dark ages.
The Ukrainian youth who died on the Kyiv Maidan protested not against a civilization of belief, but against the Russian Empire which often changes ideological masks, where religion as agitation has a huge impact on the masses.
 
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@Athanasiy thank you for your well reasoned reply and thoughts!
 
So here’s another great example.

Was watching a YT video of a man who converted from Protestantism to Oriental Orthodoxy, and then went down to comments.

Check this out:

“Cynthia X” wrote "well that’s an improvement I will say 😃 I used to be a prot and am now Catholic but although my views differ from yours in several areas, I view the Orthodox as my “cousins”

Okay, a nice, kind, peaceful, charitable comment, right?

Cue the hyperdox fundamentalist.

“e1n2 a1n2” replies to that comment with this gem - something which would make any Pharisee grin - “and we [Eastern Orthodox] view you catholics protestants coptics and all the rest of you as heretics. Do not try with your poor words to unite The True Church with your herecy [sic]. We will never unite with you/we are the one true Christians. Orthodoxy will spread from east to west and your herecies will be gone. Please come to the Christian Orthodox Church yourself and be baptized the One True Way and live the Truth. Know Our Lord.”

I’m just flabbergasted by this.

Who in their right mind would honestly not see how this is Phariseeism, not Orthodoxy? This is a triumphalist, prideful, boasting, elitist attitude - this is NOT what words of an Orthodox Christian look like - these are words of an ultra-hyperdox pharisee.

And like I said - comments like this exist on EVERY SINGLE video on YT about Eastern Orthodoxy. Every. Single. One.
 
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