How to prove that we(Catholics) do not decrease the Holy Spirit(filioque) to orthodoxes?

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shliahgaossimyacob27

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Hi. I am a Catholic who living with a lot of orthodoxes, and they tell me that I am heretic because of “decreasing of holy spirit”. How to prove them that they are wrong and we do not decrease the Holy Spirit?
 
shliahgaossimyacob27 said:
Hi. I am a Catholic who living with a lot of orthodoxes, and they tell me that I am heretic because of “decreasing of holy spirit”. How to prove them that they are wrong and we do not decrease the Holy Spirit?
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I don’t know. Most Orthodox scholars actually know that Catholics don’t mean that.

I really comes down to a difference between Greek & Latin.

I think the best you can do is read up here and use some (or all) of these explanations. Actually, you can even give them this link and have them read it themselves.

https://www.catholicbridge.com/orthodox/catholic-orthodox-filioque-father-son.php
 
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shliahgaossimyacob27 said:
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Catechism of the Catholic Church
248 At the outset the Eastern tradition expresses the Father’s character as first origin of the Spirit. By confessing the Spirit as he “who proceeds from the Father”, it affirms that he comes from the Father through the Son.77 The Western tradition expresses first the consubstantial communion between Father and Son, by saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son ( filioque ). It says this, “legitimately and with good reason”,78 for the eternal order of the divine persons in their consubstantial communion implies that the Father, as “the principle without principle”,79 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 Holy Spirit proceeds.80 This legitimate complementarity, provided it does not become rigid, does not affect the identity of faith in the reality of the same mystery confessed.

77 Jn 15:26; cf. Ad gentes 2.
78 Council of Florence (1439): Denzinger Schönmetzer, Enchridion Symbolorum 1302.
79 Council of Florence (1442): Denzinger Schönmetzer, Enchridion Symbolorum 1331.
80 Cf. Council of Lyons II (1274): Denzinger Schönmetzer, Enchridion Symbolorum 850.
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shliahgaossimyacob27 said:
How to prove them that they are wrong and we do not decrease the Holy Spirit?
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I don’t think you can prove that because of the papal bull of excommunication of 1054 which excommunicated Michael Cerularius and his followers. It condemned the Orthodox or Michael Cerularius and his followers for:
“Like Pneumatomachoi or Theomachoi, they cut off the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Son;”


Some Catholics will claim that this excommunication was not valid. However, it was an official document from a papal legate and i could be wrong here, but I don’t see where any pope officially declared it to be invalid, until 900 years later when Pope Paul VI lifted it, but did not say it was invalid in the first place.
In recent times the Eastern Catholics do not have the filioque in their creed and I am not sure about western Catholics in Greece.
 
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Prove it by being kind to them and generous. Show them charity and love.
 
AlNg said:
Some Catholics will claim that this excommunication was not valid. However, it was an official document from a papal legate and i could be wrong here, but I don’t see where any pope officially declared it to be invalid, until 900 years later when Pope Paul VI lifted it, but did not say it was invalid in the first place.
In recent times the Eastern Catholics do not have the filioque in their creed and I am not sure about western Catholics in Greece.
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If Pope Paul VI lifted the excommunication it must have been valid in the first place. How could he lift something that was invalid.
 
The Filioque controversy is about whether the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son or from the Father and the Son. I do not see where the ‘decreasing’ comes in.
 
No one ever won souls or showed our faith by proving someone else wrong.

I’d read the Orthodox Vatican dialogue documents and stick with those words
 
Montrose said:
If Pope Paul VI lifted the excommunication it must have been valid in the first place. How could he lift something that was invalid.
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You will find the answer to that in the reasons he gave for “lifting” it . . .
 
dochawk said:
You will find the answer to that in the reasons he gave for “lifting” it . . .
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I read it. The reasons don’t affect it being valid in the first place. Whether rightly or wrongly imposed it was imposed. Paul VI lifted the excommunication. You cannot lift something that did not exist.
 
If saying the Holy Ghost is diminished by proceeding from both the Father and the Son, He is still diminished by proceeding from the Father alone. In other words, if that were the case, removing filioque would not solve the supposed problem.

But procession is not a diminution.
 
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