Filioque. An Option Now For Eastern Catholics?

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Peter_J said:
Well, there are many many things about Catholics that Orthodox are unhappy about (and I’m definitely not going to try to list them). The one that’s relevant to this thread is just what you mentioned at the beginning: some Eastern Catholics (in addition to all virtually all Latin Catholics (excepting those who have mass in Greek)) say that “filioque” in the Creed.
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Looking back on this ^^ post, I think I should have instead put it as: Catholics saying the “filioque” in the Creed bothers the Orthodox (period).
 
babochka said:
I am 43 years old, and my Ruthenian parish has not used it in my memory. Our old service books had it in parentheses, but crossed out with pencil. The new books don’t have it at all. We’ve never used it when singing the creed.
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My experience in Ruthenian churches is the same: In the past, it appeared in parentheses but was never used. Over time, some churches pasted white paper over it because it was never used. Now I don’t see it at all.
 
Hmm. My brief experience in a Ruthenian church included the filioque clause, which the priest was very unhappy about. 😦
 
I can understand the unhappiness with the use of the filioque. It might be a good idea if the Church got together, both East and West, and decided on a wording of the filioque that everyone could accept.

What the filioque actually means is open to different interpretations. I think we should finally settle this issue together, both East and West.
 
RomanCatholic66 said:
But I heard it from the lips of Fr. Pacwa’s Guest. Surely Fr. Pacwa would have corrected us viewers… These guests are well vetted… This was an Eastern Rite Catholic Priest on EWTN saying his Church was granted the option to use the Filioque. I am asking if so, then what’s holding back The Orthodox?
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Peter_J said:
dzheremi and RomanCatholic66,

Presumably, “held back” as in “held back from becoming Catholic (i.e. in-communion-with-Rome)” :o. However, I think that’s very misleading; so what say we put it as “What about Catholics bothers the Orthodox?”, or something like that?
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P.S. I guess we could also talk about “What’s holding back The Orthodox from accepting the filioque, given that ECs say it?” But even that question is problematic – not only b/c many ECs never adopted it and b/c those who did adopt it did so under pressure; but also because there’s no reason to assume that Orthodox will accept something just because Eastern Catholics do!
 
jonathan_hili said:
I can understand the unhappiness with the use of the filioque. It might be a good idea if the Church got together, both East and West, and decided on a wording of the filioque that everyone could accept.

What the filioque actually means is open to different interpretations. I think we should finally settle this issue together, both East and West.
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The only form of the Filioque that the Eastern Church will ever happy with is none (i.e., removing it in any form, and never saying it or attempting to put it back in). Filioque is literally “and the Son”, which is a problem. If the Latins mean something else (“per Filium” – through the Son – perhaps?), let them teach it to their catechumens and leave the Creed itself alone. I don’t see why any of us should have to work something out that was never a part of our recitation of the Creed, and indeed wasn’t in the Latin version of the Creed for centuries. It was a Western response to a controversy that was going on in the West. We don’t really have anything to do with it.
 
jonathan_hili said:
What the filioque actually means is open to different interpretations. I think we should finally settle this issue together, both East and West.
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I wonder if the Orthodox would ever consider modifying their Creedal translation (for English and other languages as appropriate) to say " … who proceeds eternally from the Father." That’s really closer to the meaning of the original Greek.

(I’ve mentioned this before, but I forget which thread.)
 
If the creed was designed as a profession of faith and then changed over the centuries to combat heresies. I realize the heresies of the early church were primarily in the east so the creed was amended to reflect that and combat the heresy. Yet after the Church split to east and west that didn’t stop the heresies from coming the only difference was that they happened in the west. That doesn’t make one church better than the other. Just that heresies and contraversies happen. The creed as a profession of faith is important. So I’m curious how was the creed received when it was first revised by the councils? Was there this much opposition to it in the early church?
 
jonathan_hili said:
I can understand the unhappiness with the use of the filioque. It might be a good idea if the Church got together, both East and West, and decided on a wording of the filioque that everyone could accept.

What the filioque actually means is open to different interpretations. I think we should finally settle this issue together, both East and West.
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Been there done that:
Council of Florence:
For when Latins and Greeks came together in this holy synod, they all strove that, among other things, the article about the procession of the holy Spirit should be discussed with the utmost care and assiduous investigation. Texts were produced from divine scriptures and many authorities of eastern and western holy doctors, some saying the holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, others saying the procession is from the Father through the Son. All were aiming at the same meaning in different words. The Greeks asserted that when they claim that the holy Spirit proceeds from the Father, they do not intend to exclude the Son; but because it seemed to them that the Latins assert that the holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son as from two principles and two spirations, they refrained from saying that the holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. The Latins asserted that they say the holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son not with the intention of excluding the Father from being the source and principle of all deity, that is of the Son and of the holy Spirit, nor to imply that the Son does not receive from the Father, because the holy Spirit proceeds from the Son, nor that they posit two principles or two spirations; but they assert that there is only one principle and a single spiration of the holy Spirit, as they have asserted hitherto. Since, then, one and the same meaning resulted from all this, they unanimously agreed and consented to the following holy and God-pleasing union, in the same sense and with one mind.

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.

And since the Father gave to his only-begotten Son in begetting him everything the Father has, except to be the Father, so the Son has eternally from the Father, by whom he was eternally begotten, this also, namely that the holy Spirit proceeds from the Son.

We define also that the explanation of those words “and from the Son” was licitly and reasonably added to the creed for the sake of declaring the truth and from imminent need.
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Well … although I cautioned against it, I knew it was inevitable: this just had to turn into yet another, interminable, “filioque” thread, didn’t it? :banghead: :sleep:
 
malphono said:
Well … although I cautioned against it, I knew it was inevitable: this just had to turn into yet another, interminable, “filioque” thread, didn’t it? :banghead: :sleep:
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Come on, you’ve been here long enough to know what to expect!
 
dzheremi said:
The only form of the Filioque that the Eastern Church will ever happy with is none (i.e., removing it in any form, and never saying it or attempting to put it back in). Filioque is literally “and the Son”, which is a problem. If the Latins mean something else (“per Filium” – through the Son – perhaps?), let them teach it to their catechumens and leave the Creed itself alone. I don’t see why any of us should have to work something out that was never a part of our recitation of the Creed, and indeed wasn’t in the Latin version of the Creed for centuries. It was a Western response to a controversy that was going on in the West. We don’t really have anything to do with it.
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Precisely,then I do not understand what is the issue. It works for us Latins and not applicable to the East.
 
dzheremi said:
It is my understanding that, as with many other aspects of their church, the Armenians have inherited and preserved a very ancient form of the Creed. I’m not sure exactly where it comes from, but that’s okay. They believe the same as all OO about the procession of the Holy Spirit (which is to say, they believe it is from the Father alone), so this is not a church-dividing issue. 🙂
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Thanks dzheremi 🙂

I know that they believe the same procession of the Holy Spirit as the other OO Churches they are in communion with but I wasn’t sure why they had a different creed, now I know! 👍

From what I know the Armenian Catholic Church uses the same creed as the west 😦 - armeniancatholic.org/inside.php?lang=en&page_id=6204 - if this being the case I really wish that they would use the creed of the Armenian Orthodox Church instead but hey that’s just my wish 🤷
 
Nicea325 said:
Precisely,then I do not understand what is the issue. It works for us Latins and not applicable to the East.
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Because, as the Eastern view goes, the Latins’ change to the Creed has created a situation in which the East and the West do not profess the same faith anymore. You don’t get to have your own when you’d already been using the common version together with the East.
 
It’s worth remembering that there are two levels to the filioque debate:
  1. Is it true?
  2. Should we recite it in the Creed?
It should be quite OK for ANY Catholic to allow the recitation of the Creed in its original form without the filioque, and in fact recent popes have done so. There is no need for any Latin-rite Catholic to be scandalized over the omission of the filioque in the Eastern Catholic churches, because this deals with #2 above and not with #1. In any reunion between East and West, the filioque would obviously have to be settled, but it need not be settled to allow Eastern Catholic churches the ability to retain their traditions and not use it in the recitation of the Creed.
Consider this: When the popes declared the Immaculate Conception and Assumption as de fide, they did not insert these propositions into the Creed.
 
dzheremi said:
Because, as the Eastern view goes, the Latins’ change to the Creed has created a situation in which the East and the West do not profess the same faith anymore. You don’t get to have your own when you’d already been using the common version together with the East.
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+1.
 
Wryman said:
It’s worth remembering that there are two levels to the filioque debate:
  1. Is it true?
  2. Should we recite it in the Creed?
It should be quite OK for ANY Catholic to allow the recitation of the Creed in its original form without the filioque, and in fact recent popes have done so. There is no need for any Latin-rite Catholic to be scandalized over the omission of the filioque in the Eastern Catholic churches, because this deals with #2 above and not with #1. In any reunion between East and West, the filioque would obviously have to be settled, but it need not be settled to allow Eastern Catholic churches the ability to retain their traditions and not use it in the recitation of the Creed.
Consider this: When the popes declared the Immaculate Conception and Assumption as de fide, they did not insert these propositions into the Creed.
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good points, indeed
 
malphono said:
Where such an “option” exists, the subject phrase would appear in parentheses in the printed text. This does not exist in any Maronite liturgical book, irrespective of language. To the contrary, all Maronite liturgical books invariably contain the latinized form of the Creed, exactly as it appears in Latin books (again, irrespective of language).

For example, in the anglophone diaspora, the Creed is identical to the “new” translation currently approved for use by the ICEL. The only difference is the use of the first person plural (“We”). The Arabic text also contains the subject phrase, as it has since at least 1594, and has not changed. The same is true of the formal Syriac text.

Now as for “what’s holding back the Orthodox,” that’s a different question entirely. It’s one that has been debated over and over in this forum, and I am not reopening that discussion here.
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I meant The Chaldeans… and some others. I thought he was a Maronite.
 
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