Orthodox and the Blessed Virgin Mary

[Mickey]

except that the Orthodox were split along the lines of ethnic nationalisms

The Catholics have Ruthenians, Chaldeans, Maronites, Ukrainians, Melkites, etc. They can be extremely nationalistic and although you may say they are all under Rome, I can assure you that many hold closer to the “Orthodox” theology.

the Orthodox are “stagnant in theology” and "[reject] the filioque clause (and the son)

Most of the Eastern Catholic Churches I listed above reject the Filioque clause and hold to the same understanding on certain doctrinal issues as the Orthodox.

Of course, there’s also the one positive statement about Orthodoxy, that it is “wonderful for its liturgy and tradition”.

Well, he got one thing correct.

What was the purpose for posting that ridiculous statement by Mr Hahn?

 

[josephdaniel29]

From what I understood/misunderstood Orthodox feel that Our Lady is still on her Way to Heaven and we are traveling behind her. At least that was what I gathered from your explanation. Where is the Mother of God now?

I think you may be misunderstanding what he is saying. Heaven is not a static place. Heaven is not the goal of the Christian life. God is infinite and we (including Mary) are finite. There will always be room for us to grow in communion with God as we proceed from Glory to Glory (2 Corinthians 3:18). Even after we die and even after the last judgment the process doesn’t end for all eternity.

The same applies to Mary. She is our great protector and intercessor, the shining example of Christian humility and obedience that we all strive to imitate. She is the Mother of God, the vessel through which the Divine Logos entered time. She is without a doubt the highest of created beings, “More honorable than the Cherubim and more glorious beyond compare than the Seraphim.”

That being said Mary is no exception. She is still growing in communion with God and always will. Although she is at the front of the pack, leading us to salvation she is still with us.

Through the prayers of the Theotokos O Saviour, save us!

 

[Peter_J]

The Catholics have Ruthenians, Chaldeans, Maronites, Ukrainians, Melkites, etc. They can be extremely nationalistic and although you may say they are all under Rome, I can assure you that many hold closer to the “Orthodox” theology.

Most of the Eastern Catholic Churches I listed above reject the Filioque clause and hold to the same understanding on certain doctrinal issues as the Orthodox.

Well, he got one thing correct.

What was the purpose for posting that ridiculous statement by Mr Hahn?

I hate to break this to you, but “that ridiculous statement” is from a hugely popular book, written by two hugely popular Catholic speakers. You’re not going to make it go away by ignoring it.

As to why I quoted it, I think it makes an interesting contrast with the “Orthodox are basically Protestants” line that Catholics often use (and vice versa). (See the part in my last post that started with "Whether or not you agree with Hahn’s claims … ") And I thought it might be interesting to see if others see it that way too, and/or to see whether they agree with the accusations Hahn made against the Orthodox.

 

[Peter_J]

Two additional comments about Dr. Hahn’s statements:

1. I’ve been looking into / reading up on various debates between RC apologists and Protestant apologists (largely as a result of the same “Scott Hahn” thread I mentioned before). What I think would be really interesting would be a debate between Hahn and an Orthodox apologist, especially with regard to Hahn’s aforementioned accusations.
2. In the interest of fairness, here’s an Orthodox commentary on the same: A Note for Evangelicals Considering Rome.

 

[Hesychios]

1. In the interest of fairness, here’s an Orthodox commentary on the same: A Note for Evangelicals Considering Rome.

Personally I am in general agreement with Dr. Carlton as expressed here.

However one must realize that he is essentially the Orthodox equivalent of a Dave Armstrong on the polemical scale. I don’t like to read him or quote him.

 

[bpbasilphx]

Originally Posted by Peter J View Post
the Orthodox are “stagnant in theology” and "[reject] the filioque clause (and the son)

---

Is refusal to change anything considered “stagnant in theology”?

 

[Chaldean_Rite]

Originally Posted by Peter J View Post
the Orthodox are “stagnant in theology” and "[reject] the filioque clause (and the son)

---

Is refusal to change anything considered “stagnant in theology”?

No, the refusal to change anything is not the stagnant part, its the lack of the Magesterium and as a result, a development of doctrine.

 

[Harpazo]

I hate to break this to you, but “that ridiculous statement” is from a hugely popular book, written by two hugely popular Catholic speakers. You’re not going to make it go away by ignoring it.

As to why I quoted it, I think it makes an interesting contrast with the “Orthodox are basically Protestants” line that Catholics often use (and vice versa). (See the part in my last post that started with "Whether or not you agree with Hahn’s claims … ") And I thought it might be interesting to see if others see it that way too, and/or to see whether they agree with the accusations Hahn made against the Orthodox.

Hello Peter,

I held the views that Mr. Hahn does about the Orthodox before I learned about them and attended services. I think it is fairly prevalent amongst not only Catholics but also Protestants and others who see the Orthodox from the outside as a “grouping of divided ethnicities squabbling amongst themselves and each other.” When I looked at the early Church I saw that there were ethnic jurisdictions, to a degree. For example, the Georgians, the Armenians, et al.

But the good news is that the Orthodox Church in North America is trying to unify itself into one administrative body. This will take time though.

In Christ,
Andrew

 

[Peter_J]

Originally Posted by Peter J View Post
the Orthodox are “stagnant in theology” and "[reject] the filioque clause (and the son)

---

Is refusal to change anything considered “stagnant in theology”?

I can’t speak for Dr. Hahn. As I said before, I would be highly interested in seeing him in a debate with an Orthodox apologist on the matter (especially seeing as I don’t know of any place where he has elaborated on what he wrote).

Just for “the heck of it” I googled “stagnant in theology”. Out of the six results that I got, one was an article called “The Faith-Development Dialogue” by Sophie Price, MA, BA; the other fives webpages all quoted Hahn’s statement “Further study lead me to conclude that Orthodoxy was wonderful for its liturgy and tradition but stagnant in theology.”

 

[Peter_J]

Is refusal to change anything considered “stagnant in theology”?

P.S. This is rather interesting as well. (Or at least the beginning of it is. It seemed to get off-track after a few posts, and I stopped reading.)

P.P.S. Although I can’t pass it by without commenting that the “Roman Catholic anti-apologists” bit was really comically bad.

 

[Hesychios]

No, the refusal to change anything is not the stagnant part, its the lack of the Magesterium and as a result, a development of doctrine.

I disagree.

If by Magisterium you mean Teaching Office the Holy Orthodox church does indeed have it in the bishops. But we would not be using a Latin word to describe it.

 

[Mannyfit75]

sign Why dose the Orthodox Church constantly have to attack us Catholics? There was absolutely no need to bring up the Catholic teaching on Mary and than compare it to the Orthodox teaching on Mary in a way to say Catholics are wrong. Just say what you Orthodox believe and let non-Orthodoxs be!

And for the record, we don’t believe Mary is sinless because she didn’t have Original Sin. We believe she is sinless by a singular grace which Jesus won for her by His death on the Cross, since by His Death He redeemed man and won for us every grace of God. By God’s grace, Mary was sinless throughout her life, from conception to the last breath.

Basically, Mary was holy due to God’s Mercy. It is the same as with a man who receives Holy Communion. Jesus gives him many graces, among them sanctifying grace, and so His Mercy acts in the man’s soul, turning it into a perfect mirror of God’s Image - i.e., Jesus Himself - just as He turns the bread and wine into His Body and Blood and just as He turned the water at Cana into wine.

As a Catholic, I see nothing hostile in Hesychios’ reply. He only presented the Eastern Orthodox position concerning the Blessed Virgin Mary.

 

[Father_Gregory]

Glory to Jesus Christ!

Hello Bernadette,

I have not ever heard that prayer at the beginning of Divine Liturgy in going to Orthodox Churches or Byzantine Catholic Churches. Do you think you could post the link from where you found the prayer? Forgive me if I am being obtuse, but I fail to see in those prayers (which are lovely BTW) how it points to Orthodox believing the same as the Immaculate Conception.

Andrew

Dear Andrew,

I did not see this question answered after you expressed it so here I go:

These prayers are prayers you are unlikely to hear unless you arrive at the Church way, way, before the Liturgy starts. The priest (and deacon) pray these prayers before entering the Altar in front of the Royal Doors (they are the “Prayers of Entrance” ). They can be found in any (complete) Divine Liturgy book (the one published by St. Tikhon’s Press for example).

The prayers do not teach Mary’s Immaculate Conception, but they certainly don’t contradict it either. In fact, as Fr. Lev Gillet (a Monk of the Eastern Church pointed out), a certain understanding of the Immaculate Conception is a (debated) part of our own Orthodox tradition the most famous adherent being St. Gregory Palamas. Certainly it is not a dogma to us as Orthodox, but it is also not a doctrine an Orthodox is bound to reject either. To adhere to or to reject this doctrine (in one form or another) is for us not a matter of dogma but to us as Orthodox but a matter of pious (and respectable) opinion.

Our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters, in my view, are not separated from us here by dogma (since the Bull on the IC is not binding for me as an Orthodox Priest, it is from MY pov not a dogmatic issue even if it is such for a Roman Catholic) but by a particular emphasis on a pious opinion (which can be the opinion of an Orthodox, but is not necessarily so).

This is my two cents …

• Fr. Gregory

 

[Harpazo]

Dear Andrew,

I did not see this question answered after you expressed it so here I go:

These prayers are prayers you are unlikely to hear unless you arrive at the Church way, way, before the Liturgy starts. The priest (and deacon) pray these prayers before entering the Altar in front of the Royal Doors (they are the “Prayers of Entrance” ). They can be found in any (complete) Divine Liturgy book (the one published by St. Tikhon’s Press for example).

The prayers do not teach Mary’s Immaculate Conception, but they certainly don’t contradict it either. In fact, as Fr. Lev Gillet (a Monk of the Eastern Church pointed out), a certain understanding of the Immaculate Conception is a (debated) part of our own Orthodox tradition the most famous adherent being St. Gregory Palamas. Certainly it is not a dogma to us as Orthodox, but it is also not a doctrine an Orthodox is bound to reject either. To adhere to or to reject this doctrine (in one form or another) is for us not a matter of dogma but to us as Orthodox but a matter of pious (and respectable) opinion.

Our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters, in my view, are not separated from us here by dogma (since the Bull on the IC is not binding for me as an Orthodox Priest, it is from MY pov not a dogmatic issue even if it is such for a Roman Catholic) but by a particular emphasis on a pious opinion (which can be the opinion of an Orthodox, but is not necessarily so).

This is my two cents …

• Fr. Gregory

Father, bless.

Thank you very much for your (name removed by moderator)ut! I figured that prayer was a part of something that those of us in the nave might not hear. I probably should have stated that it is a theologoumenon (theological opinion) in Orthodoxy, but the reasons that were stated by myself and others are rejections against the belief. I am certainly not going to damn anyone for believing in it, but I myself find it to be unnecessary.

In Christ,
Andrew

 

[Volodymyr]

I Dr. Scott Hahn’s statements

There were Orthodox bodies that called themselves Greek, Russian, Ruthenian, Rumanian, Bulgarian, Hungarian, Serbian and so on. They have coexisted for centuries, but more like a family of brothers who have lost their father… I became convinced that it was mistaken in doctrine, having rejected certain teachings of Scripture and the Catholic Church, especially the filioque clause (and the son) that had been added to the Nicene Creed

This man’s (I am assuming Scott is a man’s name after Keltic people of Britain) is obvious not objective. The above is the statement of a man who looks at Orthodoxy as a Roman Catolic papalist and not as an objective observer. I am quite certain by saying Orthodoxy is like family losing its father - that he thinks Papa of Rome is the “father”. I can similarly look at Roman Catolicism and say it seems frightened, conforming sons living in fear of dictatorial father. How could he think that Orthodoxy was wrong for rejecting Catolic teaching of Filioque unless he believed and accepted this teaching. This is a man who has never taken an objective look at Orthodoxy I would think. He looks at Orthodoxy through prism of papalism and believes he is saying something clever, original, insightful. Rather he is saying something foolish,worn out and trite.

 

[Peter_J]

I am quite certain by saying Orthodoxy is like family losing its father - that he thinks Papa of Rome is the “father”. I can similarly look at Roman Catolicism and say it seems frightened, conforming sons living in fear of dictatorial father.

I think I know what you mean, Volodymyr. It’s like C.S. Lewis said about deriving “illegitimate emotional power” from the word “stagnant”:

Against this view the modern mind has two lines of defence … The second claims that to tie ourselves to an immutable moral code is to cut off all progress and acquiesce in ‘stagnation’. Both are unsound.

Let us take the second one first. And let us strip it of the illegitimate emotional power it derives from the word ‘stagnation’ with its suggestion of puddles and mantled pools. If water stands too long it stinks. To infer thence that whatever stands long must be unwholesome is to be the victim of metaphor. Space does not stink because it has preserved its three dimensions from the beginning. The square on the hypotenuse has not gone mouldy by continuing to equal the sum of the squares on the other two sides. Love is not dishonoured by constancy, and when we wash our hands we are seeking stagnation and ‘putting the clock back’, artificially restoring our hands to the status quo in which they began the day and resisting the natural trend of events which would increase their dirtiness steadily from our birth to our death. For the emotive term ‘stagnant’ let us substitute the descriptive term ‘permanent’. Does a permanent moral standard preclude progress? On the contrary, except on the supposition of a changeless standarnd, progress is impossible. If good is a fixed point, it is at least possible that we should get nearer and nearer to it; but if the terminus is as mobile as the train, how can the train progress towards it? Our ideas of the good may change, but they cannot change either for the better of the worse if there is no absolute and immutable good to which they can approximate or from which they can recede. We can go on getting a sum more and more nearly right only if one perfectly right answer is ‘stagnant’.

 

[mardukm]

Dear brother Chaldean Rite,

No, the refusal to change anything is not the stagnant part, its the lack of the Magesterium and as a result, a development of doctrine.

I would have to disagree with this statement, brother. The Eastern Orthodox have indeed developed in doctrine. Just a few examples:

1. A de-emphasis on the Unity of God. The early Fathers had no problem with using the terminologies of Essence/Energies, while admitting the unity of God. Modern EO’xy often deplore the Latin focus on the Unity of God. Surely a case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. You also won’t find the theological language of “Essence IS God/Energy IS God” in the early Fathers.
2. There is great de-emphasis on the penitential aspect of spirituality.
3. There is a great de-emphasis on the Justice of God.
4. There is a great de-emphasis on the Atonement.
5. There is an ecclesiology that permits lay persons to depose bishops, even without a Synod.

There are many others.

To be fair, these points seems to be characteristic only of polemical EO’xy. There are EO who do not accept these extreme forms of Eastern Orthodoxy, nor the pretended differentiation from Catholicism and Oriental Orthodox on the matter (though ,with the OO, a certain many EO manage to simply overlook these distinctions in an attempt at a false ecumenism, but when it comes to Catholics, these same EO love to pretend that they are divisive).

So it is not so much that there is no development. The problem is the hypocrisy of the polemics.

Blessings

 

[Harpazo]

Dear brother Chaldean Rite,

I would have to disagree with this statement, brother. The Eastern Orthodox have indeed developed in doctrine. Just a few examples:

1. A de-emphasis on the Unity of God. The early Fathers had no problem with using the terminologies of Essence/Energies, while admitting the unity of God. Modern EO’xy often deplore the Latin focus on the Unity of God. Surely a case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. You also won’t find the theological language of “Essence IS God/Energy IS God” in the early Fathers.
2. There is great de-emphasis on the penitential aspect of spirituality.
3. There is a great de-emphasis on the Justice of God.
4. There is a great de-emphasis on the Atonement.
5. There is an ecclesiology that permits lay persons to depose bishops, even without a Synod.

There are many others.

To be fair, these points seems to be characteristic only of polemical EO’xy. There are EO who do not accept these extreme forms of Eastern Orthodoxy, nor the pretended differentiation from Catholicism and Oriental Orthodox on the matter (though ,with the OO, a certain many EO manage to simply overlook these distinctions in an attempt at a false ecumenism, but when it comes to Catholics, these same EO love to pretend that they are divisive).

So it is not so much that there is no development. The problem is the hypocrisy of the polemics.

Blessings

Glory to Jesus Christ!

I do not think that this is germane to the subject. Perhaps you could start a thread elsewhere on this subject?

I think you are finding faults in certain Orthodox Christians (we all have them, I won’t lie) and then positing them on the whole of Orthodoxy. Forgive my bluntness, but some of these claims are rather outlandish.

I’m sorry if some have upset you, since you seemingly love to throw around the phrase “polemical Orthodox” all over the place. But as I am sure you know, the attitude of one part does not reflect the whole.

In Christ,
Andrew

 

[mardukm]

I think you may be misunderstanding what he is saying. Heaven is not a static place. Heaven is not the goal of the Christian life. God is infinite and we (including Mary) are finite. There will always be room for us to grow in communion with God as we proceed from Glory to Glory (2 Corinthians 3:18). Even after we die and even after the last judgment the process doesn’t end for all eternity.

The same applies to Mary. She is our great protector and intercessor, the shining example of Christian humility and obedience that we all strive to imitate. She is the Mother of God, the vessel through which the Divine Logos entered time. She is without a doubt the highest of created beings, “More honorable than the Cherubim and more glorious beyond compare than the Seraphim.”

That being said Mary is no exception. She is still growing in communion with God and always will. Although she is at the front of the pack, leading us to salvation she is still with us.

Through the prayers of the Theotokos O Saviour, save us!

This is interesting if one views this in the language of mathematics. There is a concept in theoretical mathematics called “approaching the limit.” You never GET TO the limit, but you are constantly approaching it.

I think this is just one of the points that differentiates “theosis” from “theopoiesis,” a debate going on in certain circles between the EO and the Copts.

Blesisngs

 

[mardukm]

Yes, you are right. This discussion is off-topic. sorry.

I’m sorry if some have upset you, since you seemingly love to throw around the phrase “polemical Orthodox” all over the place. But as I am sure you know, the attitude of one part does not reflect the whole.

As often as I use the statement “polemical Orthodox,” “not all EO are polemic” is also a statement I often find myself stating, so I am definitely always aware and appreciate that not all EO share the views of polemicists (as my previous post indicated). And I also appreciate you pointing that out. I’ll always oppose false dichotomies between EO’xy and Catholicism.

Blessings