ROCOR Western Rite Charter

[AlNg]

No disrespect intended to the good bishops, but that epistle is a “TLR” if I’ve ever seen such a thing.

But if you did read it, there are so many objections written by Greek Orthodox clergy which are unrelated to Russian nationalism.

Russian nationalism is in the way .

“one condition of reunion is that you discontinue this practice, economia can’t be used to allow people to live in adultery”.

I don’t believe that this question will be solved by the end of this year.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

HomeschoolDad:

No disrespect intended to the good bishops, but that epistle is a “TLR” if I’ve ever seen such a thing.

But if you did read it, there are so many objections written by Greek Orthodox clergy which are unrelated to Russian nationalism.

I’ll read it when I get a chance. Much going on here, have to take my father to the next county for more tests, then oversee my son’s homeschool. 80+ pages is kind of daunting.

HomeschoolDad:

“one condition of reunion is that you discontinue this practice, economia can’t be used to allow people to live in adultery”.

I don’t believe that this question will be solved by the end of this year.

I don’t see that happening either.

 

[Isaac14]

And as far as divorce and remarriage is concerned, I do have to wonder if Rome would be willing to say “one condition of reunion is that you discontinue this practice, economia can’t be used to allow people to live in adultery”.

I don’t think it would be unrealistic to put this particular exercise of economia on the table for discussion. But, likewise, I think from the Orthodox perspective we’d want to also re-examine the annulment/tribunal system. Both seem like to ways to get around the issue of remarriage.

As an Orthodox Christian who’s gone through the annulment process so that I could marry my Catholic wife, my experience is that both churches examined the same/similar factors in coming to a conclusion. The Orthodox conclusion was to grant permission to remarry (though I understand other jurisdictions call it an “ecclesial divorce”), while the Catholic conclusion was that I’m free to marry since my previous marriage was null.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

HomeschoolDad:

And as far as divorce and remarriage is concerned, I do have to wonder if Rome would be willing to say “one condition of reunion is that you discontinue this practice, economia can’t be used to allow people to live in adultery”.

I don’t think it would be unrealistic to put this particular exercise of economia on the table for discussion. But, likewise, I think from the Orthodox perspective we’d want to also re-examine the annulment/tribunal system. Both seem like to ways to get around the issue of remarriage.

As an Orthodox Christian who’s gone through the annulment process so that I could marry my Catholic wife, my experience is that both churches examined the same/similar factors in coming to a conclusion. The Orthodox conclusion was to grant permission to remarry (though I understand other jurisdictions call it an “ecclesial divorce”), while the Catholic conclusion was that I’m free to marry since my previous marriage was null.

You bring in a valuable point of view that I’ve never heard put in quite that way before. In either case the end result is the same — your previous marriage no longer binds you, and you are free to remarry.

Two things I’d like to bring into this, the second one especially speculative from a Roman Catholic point of view, and I submit it totally to the magisterium:

• Might the Orthodox be able to “tweak” its use of economia in these cases, to come to some sort of conclusion that a true sacramental marriage never existed?
• And I am “just saying”, or “just putting this out there” — to use two contemporary turns of phrase — might it be a legitimate development of doctrine, to say “it is true that Our Lord said not to put asunder what has been joined together, but in spite of that ideal, sometimes marriages get sundered anyway, by people, by circumstances, by things that happen to destroy them, or sometimes they just disintegrate, dissolve, cease to be the sacrament they once were — in short, they die”. Is it possible that just as the Eucharist disintegrates and dissolves due to natural processes, ceases to be the Body and Blood of Christ, and grace ceases to exist in these decomposed elements, so might the sacrament of matrimony dissolve as well, in these sad cases?

Just something I’ve always wondered. I will gladly renounce my “white” in favor of the Church’s “black”, as Loyola would say. I have to think that Rome has expressly repudiated and rejected this concept — or has she?

 

[dochawk]

That is not what Vatican I said.

*shrug*

refinement, not contradiction.

the effort to reconcile would remain trivial.

Cardinal Ratzinger rejected Zogby, No?

Cardinal Ratzinger wrote that nothing more can be demanded of the East than the situation in the first millennium.

While Zogby was rejected by many of the heavily latinized “eastern” bishops at the time, it’s pretty much what the Melchites do say now.

Also solved by the end of the year would be the question of artificial birth control which is allowed by some Orthodox priests

No.

Just, NO.

It is not “allowed” by any EO, in spite of this being repeated on a regular basis on CA.

In each and every case, it is a matter of economia.

Calling it “allowed” is as false/disingenuous/mendacious/whatever as stating that the annulment process “allows” divorce.

do have to wonder if Rome would be willing to say “one condition of reunion

there aren’t going to be any “conditions of reunion” in either direction. Nonstarter both direction. “After you admit that you are wrong and we are right” is never the basis of a successful negotiation.

And, besides, there is not, and never has, been a possibility of “reunion”. It is communion that is sought; there has never been a time of union . . .

 

[HomeschoolDad]

HomeschoolDad:

do have to wonder if Rome would be willing to say “one condition of reunion

there aren’t going to be any “conditions of reunion” in either direction. Nonstarter both direction. “After you admit that you are wrong and we are right” is never the basis of a successful negotiation.

And, besides, there is not, and never has, been a possibility of “reunion”. It is communion that is sought; there has never been a time of union . . .

You are quite right. Both Churches would remain what they are, they would just need to recognize each other, and — here’s the sticking part — find unity in all those things that are absolute, and once and for all refine the role of the Bishop of Rome in the undivided Church.

 

[ReaderT]

Might the Orthodox be able to “tweak” its use of economia in these cases, to come to some sort of conclusion that a true sacramental marriage never existed?

Sin can enter a marriage and cause the couple to divorce - in that case, it’s not that a marriage never existed, so in my mind the answer would be no.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

HomeschoolDad:

Might the Orthodox be able to “tweak” its use of economia in these cases, to come to some sort of conclusion that a true sacramental marriage never existed?

Sin can enter a marriage and cause the couple to divorce - in that case, it’s not that a marriage never existed, so in my mind the answer would be no.

Which then gets to my second point.

 

[Vico]

My reaction:

ROCOR still exists? Why?

The Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church acknowledged ROCOR (Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia, Moldova, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Japan, China) as an autonomous church.

 

[AlNg]

Calling it “allowed” is as false/disingenuous/mendacious/whatever as stating that the annulment process “allows” divorce.

Well first of all the annulment process not only allows divorce, it requires a civil divorce before the proceedings begin. Secondly, what you are telling me is not what I have been told by different Orthodox priests. Does not the following OCA link imply that artificial birth control is allowable when the birth of a child will bring danger and hardship?
https://www.oca.org/orthodoxy/the-orthodox-faith/spirituality/sexuality-marriage-and-family/family
Further, according to wiki: " Constantinople, in its 2020 document, For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church , says: “The Orthodox Church has no dogmatic objection to the use of safe and non-abortifacient contraceptives within the context of married life, not as an ideal or as a permanent arrangement, but as a provisional concession to necessity” (§ 24)."
Do you claim that this document is mendacious?
“the Orthodox Church typically views these situations as ethically identical re: contraception, and thus allows non-abortifacients if their use is blessed by the couple’s spiritual father.”
" In summary, most Orthodox churches do allow both birth control and some forms of contraception within marriage, subject to the following conditions:"

The Orthodox Church's Teaching on Contraception » Saint John the Evangelist Orthodox Church

And:
"In my experience (I have dialogued with many Orthodox on this issue), it is common knowledge that the Orthodox, broadly speaking, permit contraception (as they do divorce). " “contemporary Orthodox teaching and pastoral praxis have changed insofar as the morality or relative immorality of the use of artificial contraception is concerned. This change which has been accepted by most (but not all) Orthodox jurisdictions is in direct contradiction to the biblical, liturgical and patristic patrimony of Byzantine Orthodoxy.” So there are Orthodox on both sides of this issue.

Orthodoxy & Contraception: Continuity Or Compromise? | Dave Armstrong

Also:

Cardinal Ratzinger wrote that nothing more can be demanded of the East than the situation in the first millennium.

Did Cardinal Ratzinger reject the Zoghby initiative? I read that he did. Why would he change his mind and accept it before the end of the year?

refinement, not contradiction.

It seems to me that what you proposed is a direct contradiction to the the doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church that the pope , by reason of his office as Vicar of Christ and as pastor of the entire Christian Church , has full , supreme , and universal power over the whole church .

 

[ReaderT]

ReaderT:

HomeschoolDad:

Might the Orthodox be able to “tweak” its use of economia in these cases, to come to some sort of conclusion that a true sacramental marriage never existed?

Sin can enter a marriage and cause the couple to divorce - in that case, it’s not that a marriage never existed, so in my mind the answer would be no.

Which then gets to my second point.

I read it also, but I think we’d still take issue with the idea that “marriage never existed”. We acknowledge that sin can creep into a marriage after it was contracted in good faith, just as sin can corrupt a priest after ordination or a convert after conversion. But it seems this is seldom represented at the marriage tribunal, where the vast majority of applicants receive annulment (correct me if I’m wrong).

 

[Isaac14]

Might the Orthodox be able to “tweak” its use of economia in these cases, to come to some sort of conclusion that a true sacramental marriage never existed?

@ReaderT also offered some thoughts, with which I agree. I justl have a hard time understanding the reasoning behind the idea that it can be determined a sacramental marriage never existed.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

HomeschoolDad:

Which then gets to my second point.

I read it also, but I think we’d still take issue with the idea that “marriage never existed”. We acknowledge that sin can creep into a marriage after it was contracted in good faith, just as sin can corrupt a priest after ordination or a convert after conversion. But it seems this is seldom represented at the marriage tribunal, where the vast majority of applicants receive annulment (correct me if I’m wrong).

And my second point should have implied that a sacramental marriage once existed, but exists no more. Sorry if I didn’t do the best job of bringing that out.

If I’m understanding the tribunal process correctly, it operates in a European-style, codified, “keep probing and digging until you find something, if indeed there is anything that can be found” — kind of like peeling back an onion. Once you find evidence of ab initio nullity, you’re done, no further investigation is needed. If you don’t find evidence when you’ve peeled back that layer, then peel back another one. It’s similar to “symptom-hunting” in medicine, a tactic commonly used when trying to find reasons to give someone a disability check. Back to the tribunal scenario, they only throw up their hands and say “sorry, no annulment for you” when they’ve peeled back all the layers they possibly can, and find nothing. In practice, that doesn’t happen often, hence the high approval rates.

HomeschoolDad:

Might the Orthodox be able to “tweak” its use of economia in these cases, to come to some sort of conclusion that a true sacramental marriage never existed?

@ReaderT also offered some thoughts, with which I agree. I just have a hard time understanding the reasoning behind the idea that it can be determined a sacramental marriage never existed.

Well, it can be. The question that then begs to be answered is “why isn’t there enough ‘quality control on the front end’ — to use a business analogy — to ferret out these psychological impediments, immaturities, deficiencies in due discretion, what have you, that would render the marriage invalid in the first place?”. I wouldn’t mind seeing there be a kind of “lay novitiate while living in the world”, or some kind of “scrutinies” similar to RCIA, perhaps a year’s preparation, to determine whether this particular marriage is a good idea, something that will last, or whether there are problems that, if left undiscovered, will just end up in the divorce court and the marriage tribunal in a few years. But the presumption has always just been that two people can show up, want to get married, and have that happen within a relatively short time. Civil law allows marriage-on-demand with only a very short waiting period, if that much — many places, such as Las Vegas, Gatlinburg, and so on, are legendary for “instant marriages”. Even from a civil standpoint, marriage is much easier to get into, than to get out of, and perhaps that needs some reconsideration also.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

And besides, even when people approach the Church for marriage, probably as often as not, or more often than that, they are already in a sexual relationship that Almighty God has reserved only for marriage (not that they let this stop them!), and are very often living together as well. If they are told “not just now, you need to think this over”, many of them will just hie themselves to another church, or to a justice of the peace, because people no longer fear eternal damnation over violating the Church’s marriage canons, nor do they fear being in an invalid marriage. Or they may just continue in their existing situation.

 

[AlNg]

even when people approach the Church for marriage, probably as often as not, or more often than that, they are already in a sexual relationship

Well does that go hand in hand with the explosion in the number of marriage annulments? If after twenty years of marriage and three children, a church tribunal can declare that you were never married in the first place, what was the point of going through the expensive marriage ceremony? Some marriages end up with parties costing ten thousand dollars or even much more.

 

[ReaderT]

Huh. Wasn’t aware of that situation in Ireland - very interesting.

Back to the tribunal scenario, they only throw up their hands and say “sorry, no annulment for you” when they’ve peeled back all the layers they possibly can, and find nothing. In practice, that doesn’t happen often, hence the high approval rates.

I wonder (with all due respect) - shouldn’t one see it as problematic that there is a high number of voided sacraments - problematic to the point that there seriously needs to be some rectification? Presumably that wouldn’t be a good thing on one’s record; “reprehensible” might be the right word?

 

[CathBoy1]

Happy cake day!

 

[jeannetherese]

But a priest who sins is still a priest. I would think that a spouse who sins is still a spouse.
I’m not sure how the undoing of the sacrament would occur.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

But a priest who sins is still a priest. I would think that a spouse who sins is still a spouse.
I’m not sure how the undoing of the sacrament would occur.

This is exactly the idea I was going to bring out. As you say, a sinful priest remains a priest, and a baptized sinner remains baptized as well. The only thing that would remotely make sense — getting back to my “the sacrament dies” scenario (in which I humbly submit to the magisterium) — is that matrimony does not confer an eternal character to the souls of the spouses, and that it is a sacrament between two people (no other sacrament is like that), such that a breakdown of the bonds between them, could indeed “dissolve” the sacrament in the same way that a consecrated Host, placed in a cup of water, will eventually disintegrate and quit being the Body of Christ, quit being a sacrament.

HomeschoolDad:

Back to the tribunal scenario, they only throw up their hands and say “sorry, no annulment for you” when they’ve peeled back all the layers they possibly can, and find nothing. In practice, that doesn’t happen often, hence the high approval rates.

I wonder (with all due respect) - shouldn’t one see it as problematic that there is a high number of voided sacraments - problematic to the point that there seriously needs to be some rectification? Presumably that wouldn’t be a good thing on one’s record; “reprehensible” might be the right word?

Again, as I said above, “better quality control on the front end”.

I realize that such a characterization may raise the hackles of some, who might say that I am challenging the “dignity of the human person” by allegedly reducing prospective spouses to commodities being screened for quality, but my point should be clear. The military does the exact same thing — as Gunnery Sergeant Hartman said in his otherwise unrepeatable soliloquy from Full Metal Jacket, “my orders are to weed out all non-hackers who do not pack the gear to serve in my beloved Corps”. Ditto for seminaries and convents — “sorry, we know this hurts, but despite what you might want or feel, this is not your vocation”.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

HomeschoolDad:

even when people approach the Church for marriage, probably as often as not, or more often than that, they are already in a sexual relationship

Well does that go hand in hand with the explosion in the number of marriage annulments? If after twenty years of marriage and three children, a church tribunal can declare that you were never married in the first place, what was the point of going through the expensive marriage ceremony? Some marriages end up with parties costing ten thousand dollars or even much more.

Weddings, like everything else in American life, are big business. People shouldn’t spend money on things they can’t afford. A big blowout of a wedding and reception certainly doesn’t make the sacrament any more holy, or the marriage any more durable.

And I am fully aware that huge, tricked-out wedding celebrations aren’t exclusively an American thing, witness the German Hochzeit, literally “high time”, or the wedding scene in The Deer Hunter (which, mutatis mutandis for a Roman Catholic Nuptial Mass instead of a Russian Orthodox Divine Liturgy, was very similar to my own wedding in Poland), and yes, I know it was set in Pennsylvania, but it was clearly a cultural transplant from “the old country”. I have wondered whether such elaborate celebrations are an atavistic manifestation of rejoicing in fertility for the continuation of the race, a carryover from paganism. Should my circumstances ever change to enable me to marry validly, and should I choose to do that — I probably wouldn’t, I’m pretty much a confirmed bachelor for life — I’d be perfectly content with a simple ceremony and a small reception with sparkling wine and petits fours. (But I realize that would not be totally my call to make.)