Requirements for Orthodox

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Hi everyone,

Apparently, my last thread was deleted for reasons I was never notified of before I could respond to anyone, but there was one comment in that thread that I wanted to understand a bit better.

It was said that Orthodox are absolutely required to believe in certain things…but those “certain things” were never explained. So, what exactly are Orthodox required to believe? Is it just the creeds? Is it more than that?
 
jinc1019 said:
Hi everyone,

Apparently, my last thread was deleted for reasons I was never notified of before I could respond to anyone, but there was one comment in that thread that I wanted to understand a bit better.

It was said that Orthodox are absolutely required to believe in certain things…but those “certain things” were never explained. So, what exactly are Orthodox required to believe? Is it just the creeds? Is it more than that?
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What is in our Liturgy.
 
jinc1019 said:
Ok…so for instance, is “only women can be priests” in your liturgy? I didn’t think something like that would be. Does that mean you are not required to believe that?
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You don’t see women behind the iconostas during our Liturgies. That is you answer right there.

To add, you also do not have any women celebrated as presbyters or bishops in our Liturgical calendar, you do not see any icons of them.
 
That may be a representation of the beliefs EO has, but it doesn’t explain the question. There has to be a better explanation than “whatever is in our liturgy.” For one thing, liturgy can be interpreted in a million different ways.
 
You have to believe Orthodoxy. If you don’t know if something is Orthodox or not you ask your godparents or priest. That’s what they’re there for.

Constantine’s note about the Liturgy is actually a very good one - to know what we believe listen to the hymns sung during Vespers, Matins, and Liturgy. Look at what we do. For us Orthodoxy and orthopraxy are indissolubly tied together. That’s one reason why we are so concerned about the orthopraxy of churches who are interested in reuniting with us.
 
I think that was me who said that, and it is a difficult question to answer fully.

Essentially what must be believed are those teachings which relate directly to Christ and the Trinity.

That is a simplistic explanation though, because there are teachings that relate directly to Christ that don’t necessarily appear that way at first glance. The aforementioned teaching of a male priesthood - we teach that because Christ selected only men to take on that aspect of his ministry.

To be honest, this is information that you would be better off getting from a face to face conversation with a member of the Orthodox clergy, rather than the slow back-and-forth of a Catholic forum. I would recommend finding a parish that primarily speaks English, which probably won’t be too hard in a city like Chicago (I assume), where you can ask your questions.

edit: I found these two English speaking Churches in Chicago. Both OCA. There may be some Antiochan ones as well:
holytrinitycathedral.net/
xcthesavior.org/
 
jinc1019 said:
That may be a representation of the beliefs EO has, but it doesn’t explain the question. There has to be a better explanation than “whatever is in our liturgy.” For one thing, liturgy can be interpreted in a million different ways.
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That is where tradition comes in. People shouldn’t just interpret the Liturgy on their own, that is as bad as trying to interpret the Bible on your own (and almost all the words in the Liturgy are from the Bible).

But the Liturgy is, as I have termed it, a codification of our beliefs. This is mainly because the place of Liturgy in the Orthodox faith is to unite us in one mind with each other, and with God. So whatever is said in Liturgy is what God wants us to believe about Himself, and all of us saying the same thing together unites us to a common mind as well.
 
Heck, if he’s in Chicago he’s not very far from my Godbrother’s parish of St. Joseph under Father John Matusiak, of info@oca.org fame (the question and answer potion of the OCA website). He’s rather used to answering questions lol. I suppose all priests are though, really.
 
All good responses. I have actually already been in touch with Father John at one of the parishes here in Chicago to talk about just this subject, but I was wondering if there was something more concrete and doctrinal. It doesn’t appear that is the case…I don’t mean to say there isn’t a defined set of requirements for Orthodox, only that what exactly is required for belief is more complicated than in other denominations. If I am wrong, hopefully someone will correct me.
 
jinc1019 said:
All good responses. I have actually already been in touch with Father John at one of the parishes here in Chicago to talk about just this subject, but I was wondering if there was something more concrete and doctrinal. It doesn’t appear that is the case…I don’t mean to say there isn’t a defined set of requirements for Orthodox, only that what exactly is required for belief is more complicated than in other denominations. If I am wrong, hopefully someone will correct me.
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How is the Liturgy more complicated? You are there every Sunday listening to it and singing the responses? You don’t even have to attend a class or pick up a book to know about it, if you are a practicing Orthodox Christian.
 
Depends on what you mean by complicated, but yes it can be. We do not have an authoritative catechism, because you should be integrating yourself into the community and learning from your fellow Orthodox.

As to concrete and doctrinal, I’ve yet to find a church that stands as firmly on their doctrines as Orthodoxy does to her’s (in my completely biased and abominably un-humble opinion). We do, however, I think have fewer actual doctrines than many other churches.
 
Rawb said:
Depends on what you mean by complicated, but yes it can be. We do not have an authoritative catechism, because you should be integrating yourself into the community and learning from your fellow Orthodox.

As to concrete and doctrinal, I’ve yet to find a church that stands as firmly on their doctrines as Orthodoxy does to her’s (in my completely biased and abominably un-humble opinion). We do, however, I think have fewer actual doctrines than many other churches.
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Good point, I’ve always yearned for “discipleship”, that is learning from the foot of one who knows. It is one of the things that has attracted me to Orthodoxy, especially that I have a very good priest to learn from.
 
Rawb said:
Depends on what you mean by complicated, but yes it can be. We do not have an authoritative catechism, because you should be integrating yourself into the community and learning from your fellow Orthodox.

As to concrete and doctrinal, I’ve yet to find a church that stands as firmly on their doctrines as Orthodoxy does to her’s (in my completely biased and abominably un-humble opinion). We do, however, I think have fewer actual doctrines than many other churches.
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I appreciate the response.

Perhaps I haven’t been clear enough in my responses. What I am trying to find out is which doctrines do the Orthodox Church teach as authoritative and required for the faithful? You mentioned that there are “fewer actual doctrines,” but what doctrines are these? There must be a difference between things the Orthodox teach and do and things that Orthodox Christians absolutely must believe?
 
jinc1019 said:
I appreciate the response.

Perhaps I haven’t been clear enough in my responses. What I am trying to find out is which doctrines do the Orthodox Church teach as authoritative and required for the faithful? You mentioned that there are “fewer actual doctrines,” but what doctrines are these? There must be a difference between things the Orthodox teach and do and things that Orthodox Christians absolutely must believe?
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The things taught by the Great and Holy Councils, mostly.

The thing is, and it’s generally found to be a most unsatisfactory answer to those I’ve given it to before but it’s true, you just pick it up. You ask questions and learn the ‘mindset’ which helps you answer questions or situations you find yourself in. It works, probably because of the Holy Spirit. You just sort of come to know what is absolute law - like the Divinity of Christ, the title Theotokos, Confession forgiving sin, and what you can have some leeway on - like the Lenten fasts, prayer rules, and toll houses. You learn that the Lenten fasts are something you work out with your priest but that the fast before Communion is very, very rarely up for debate. That you can have varying opinions on the judgement and such, but that you must pray for the dead. That you might only Confess once a month or so, but that you have to believe God forgives sins.

But there is very little difference between what we do and say and what we believe, and what we believe is generally so interwoven and connected that distinguishing “this is necessary, but this isn’t” isn’t really something we do. We’re more likely to agree than not, and more likely to regard certain things as having some wiggle room for interpretation rather than being ‘necessary’ or ‘dogma’ or ‘little t-tradition.’ From the outside it sounds like a huge mess, but when you’re in it and living it it makes complete sense. Ultimately, though, it like this: We baptize infants because you must believe Baptism is a Holy Mystery for salvation and entrance into The Church. Same with Chrismation and Communion. We address Mary as the Theotokos because she is the Theotokos. We conduct reverent Liturgies because God is worthy of reverence, and describe Him in apophatic terms because He is the Indescribable. We do metanias before everyone in our parish on Forgiveness Sunday because everyone is an image of Christ, and we sing that the Virgin is the burning bush and the ladder to Heaven and the eastern gate because these are all pre-representations of her. To learn what we believe you look to our hymns and actions and ask what they mean.
 
jinc1019 said:
I appreciate the response.

Perhaps I haven’t been clear enough in my responses. What I am trying to find out is which doctrines do the Orthodox Church teach as authoritative and required for the faithful? You mentioned that there are “fewer actual doctrines,” but what doctrines are these? There must be a difference between things the Orthodox teach and do and things that Orthodox Christians absolutely must believe?
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I’ll have to go back to what I said and point again to our Liturgy. Those certainly are the authoritative ones.

Rawb makes a good point about the “Orthodox mindset”. That is when you live the “Orthodox way of life,” thing just make sense or you know where to get your answer. Orthodoxy lives on synergy, everything we believe in works together in a cohesive way. There are no separate subjects in a sense that each topic can be put in a bucket on its own and tackled separately from the rest. Everything is related to everything and there must be a consistency between every aspect of the faith. For example, I made a decision on the issue on the Papacy based on the Eucharistic model of the Church, that is the Church is the same Communion that we are as people, and the same Communion that the Holy Trinity has. I cannot resolve the individual issues raised by both East and West about the Papacy. If they haven’t resolved it yet, how can I hope to resolve it by myself. But the Eucharistic model made sense to me. If God is a communion of the Trinity, and we are aiming to be in communion with God, and the Church’s members are a communion with one another and God, why does the Church’s ecclesiology be any different? But what is this is not dogmatic, but it helped me make a decision based on what my conscience accepts about the True Christian Faith.
 
Rawb said:
The things taught by the Great and Holy Councils, mostly.

The thing is, and it’s generally found to be a most unsatisfactory answer to those I’ve given it to before but it’s true, you just pick it up. You ask questions and learn the ‘mindset’ which helps you answer questions or situations you find yourself in. It works, probably because of the Holy Spirit. You just sort of come to know what is absolute law - like the Divinity of Christ, the title Theotokos, Confession forgiving sin, and what you can have some leeway on - like the Lenten fasts, prayer rules, and toll houses. You learn that the Lenten fasts are something you work out with your priest but that the fast before Communion is very, very rarely up for debate. That you can have varying opinions on the judgement and such, but that you must pray for the dead. That you might only Confess once a month or so, but that you have to believe God forgives sins.

But there is very little difference between what we do and say and what we believe, and what we believe is generally so interwoven and connected that distinguishing “this is necessary, but this isn’t” isn’t really something we do. We’re more likely to agree than not, and more likely to regard certain things as having some wiggle room for interpretation rather than being ‘necessary’ or ‘dogma’ or ‘little t-tradition.’ From the outside it sounds like a huge mess, but when you’re in it and living it it makes complete sense. Ultimately, though, it like this: We baptize infants because you must believe Baptism is a Holy Mystery for salvation and entrance into The Church. Same with Chrismation and Communion. We address Mary as the Theotokos because she is the Theotokos. We conduct reverent Liturgies because God is worthy of reverence, and describe Him in apophatic terms because He is the Indescribable. We do metanias before everyone in our parish on Forgiveness Sunday because everyone is an image of Christ, and we sing that the Virgin is the burning bush and the ladder to Heaven and the eastern gate because these are all pre-representations of her. To learn what we believe you look to our hymns and actions and ask what they mean.
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I appreciate the detailed response…It sounds like it is very difficult to fully explain to an outsider but I appreciate you trying. I obviously have a lot more to learn and I will continuing looking for answers.

Justin
 
ConstantineTG said:
I’ll have to go back to what I said and point again to our Liturgy. Those certainly are the authoritative ones.

Rawb makes a good point about the “Orthodox mindset”. That is when you live the “Orthodox way of life,” thing just make sense or you know where to get your answer. Orthodoxy lives on synergy, everything we believe in works together in a cohesive way. There are no separate subjects in a sense that each topic can be put in a bucket on its own and tackled separately from the rest. Everything is related to everything and there must be a consistency between every aspect of the faith. For example, I made a decision on the issue on the Papacy based on the Eucharistic model of the Church, that is the Church is the same Communion that we are as people, and the same Communion that the Holy Trinity has. I cannot resolve the individual issues raised by both East and West about the Papacy. If they haven’t resolved it yet, how can I hope to resolve it by myself. But the Eucharistic model made sense to me. If God is a communion of the Trinity, and we are aiming to be in communion with God, and the Church’s members are a communion with one another and God, why does the Church’s ecclesiology be any different? But what is this is not dogmatic, but it helped me make a decision based on what my conscience accepts about the True Christian Faith.
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Thank you for your efforts…You and Rawb have been very helpful, but it’s true that I have found all of this very confusing. I will continue looking for answers on these issues, but in the meantime, I appreciate everything you have done to help explain it to me.

Do you have a good resource I could read on this subject that explains the relationship you and Rawb are talking about?
 
jinc1019 said:
Thank you for your efforts…You and Rawb have been very helpful, but it’s true that I have found all of this very confusing. I will continue looking for answers on these issues, but in the meantime, I appreciate everything you have done to help explain it to me.

Do you have a good resource I could read on this subject that explains the relationship you and Rawb are talking about?
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I am a recent convert so I can tell you it is very confusing. To go from a Catholic way of thinking to an Orthodox one, you have to unlearn almost everything and relearn everything new. You will see here the heart of our divide goes into the very essence of how we understand our Christian faith.

I don’t have online sources, I have books I’ve read in my journey to Orthodoxy. I don’t think this is a topic that can be covered by an article or blog post. Maybe you can ask more specific questions that we can give a more direct answer to help construct this picture in your mind.
 
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