The Eastern Church on Marian Dogma/Doctrines

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Apotheoun said:
You left out the word “Roman” in your post when speaking about Catholics (n.b., I added it to your post for you). What binds Roman Catholics may not bind Melkite Catholics or Ukrainian Catholics, to name just two sui juris Eastern Catholic Churches. I should also add that theological theories that are prominent in Roman Catholicism do not necessarily bind Eastern Orthodox Christians. As far as Protestants are concerned I have no opinion, since I do not see the various Protestant sects as true particular Churches.
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I did not realize at the time that you belonged to one of the Eastern churches in communion with Rome, or Rome in communion with your church, which ever way sounds more inviting.👍
 
Apotheoun said:
Yes. The Melkite Patriarch and Holy Synod see the Pope (and the Roman Church) as in communion with them, and they (i.e., the Melkite Patriarch and Holy Synod) even accept papal authority according to the limits established by the Holy Fathers of the Church in the first millennium.
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Is that the case with the other Rites? I think there are 23 altogether; correct me if I am wrong.
 
joe370 said:
I did not realize at the time that you belonged to one of the Eastern churches in communion with Rome, or Rome in communion with your church, which ever way sounds more inviting.👍
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I became Eastern Catholic when I formally transferred out of the Roman Church in March 2005. I had been Roman Catholic for 18 years prior to my canonical transfer.
 
Apotheoun said:
I became Eastern Catholic when I formally transferred out of the Roman Church in March 2005. I had been Roman Catholic for 18 years prior to my canonical transfer.
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Well, in a way we still belong to the same church - right?
 
joe370 said:
Is that the case with the other Rites?
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You mean the other Eastern Catholic Churches? Not being a member of all of those Churches I have no intention of speaking for them.
joe370 said:
I think there are 23 altogether; correct me if I am wrong.
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There are 22 self-governing Eastern Catholic Churches, and when you add the Latin Church there are 23 Churches within the Catholic communion.
 
joe370 said:
Well, in a way we still belong to the same church - right?
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I am a member of the Melkite Catholic Church, and that defines my spiritual, liturgical, and theological life, while you are a member of the Roman Catholic Church. Moreover, I do not subscribe to the Late Medieval Western ecclesiology that speaks of one worldwide Church; instead, I see each particular Church (that is, each diocese or eparchy) as the whole Catholic and Apostolic Church in a given area. In this sense the Church is an icon of the Trinity, for just as each of the three persons is wholly God, so each and every particular Church is the whole Church.
 
Apotheoun said:
I am a member of the Melkite Catholic Church, and that defines my spiritual, liturgical, and theological life, while you are a member of the Roman Catholic Church. Moreover, I do not subscribe to the Late Medieval Western ecclesiology that sees there being one worldwide Church; instead, I see each particular Church (that is, each diocese or eparchy) as the whole Catholic and Apostolic Church in a given area.
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So no then…BTW, I agree: there is no one worldwide church; Christendom is terribly fractured.
 
Cavaradossi said:
:confused: I don’t think that’s what he meant. I think he meant that every dogma was so declared because teaching otherwise dissolves the economy of salvation. Every major teaching, the divinity of the Son, the divinity of the Holy Spirit, the hypostatic union, the teaching of two natures, the two energies and wills, the veneration of icons, and the Essence-Energies distinction, has soteriological importance. We condemn the heresies which contradict the above teachings because teaching them is the same as teaching that God did not save us. What soteriological justification is there for elevating the Immaculate Conception to be a necessary belief, like the hypostatic union?
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I think that you may be right about what he meant to say. I was only responding to what he actually said. I think that response it important.
I think the issue you raise is interesting. In effect, the idea is that dogmatic decrees are not made simply in the interest of safeguarding the truth or advancing the spiritual well-being of the faithful, but to prevent the “dissolution of the economy of salvation”. I am not entirely sure what this means. I think that the perpetual viginity of the Theotokos is dogmatized. I don’t see why the economy of salvation depends on it, but I imagine that one could create a reason. Where does the filioque, or the idea that the filioque is heresy figure in? I don’t think that there is compelling evidence for the dissolution of the economy of salvation in churches that either hold to it or call it heresy - but again I don;t doubt that an argument could be conjured up. Moreover, while the essencce-energy distinction safeguards an important theological truth, it is clearly not a unique means to safeguard that truth. So I am unconvinced.

On the IC, I have made the point, at the level of safeguarding the truth and advancing the spiritual well-being of the faithful, several times. I see the working of Divine Providence. After centuries of discussion, during which there was too much speculation about theories of ensoulment and quickening, it was Providential that the truth was declared with finality. This declaration embedded within the consciousness of the church the critical truth that life and humanity begins at conception. We were being prepared with unequivocal conviction to lead the resistance to the the spiritual scourge of the culture of death.
 
Cavaradossi said:
What soteriological justification is there for elevating the Immaculate Conception to be a necessary belief, like the hypostatic union?
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There is no soteriological justification for elevating the theory of the Immaculate Conception to a dogma. That said, there is a way in which that theory makes sense, but it is limited to those who accept the theological presuppositions about the fall and sin that are common in the Western Church. Of course that more or less Augustinian viewpoint has never had any real influence in the East, which is why the Orthodox reject the theory as unnecessary.
 
dvdjs said:
This declaration embedded within the consciousness of the church the critical truth that life and humanity begins at conception. We were being prepared with unequivocal conviction to lead the resistance to the the spiritual scourge of the culture of death.
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The dogma of the Incarnation is sufficient to safeguard the truth that life begins at conception, and so there really is no need - even in connection with the “culture of death” - for the theory of the Immaculate Conception.
 
Whereas I have no intention of getting involved in this discussion, FWLIW I will offer one observation. I have ever been amused by the fact that both of the two most “controversial” (for lack of a more charitable word at the moment) dogmatic declarations of the Roman Church were made within 20 years of each other and of course under the very same Roman Pontiff. :hmmm:
 
Apotheoun said:
St. John Chrysostom speaks of the vanity of the Theotokos, a grave sin indeed, and St. Cyril of Alexandria and St. Basil both speak about her doubting Christ and His mission. And I am sure that there are other Fathers who mention failings of the Theotokos, because - of course - in the first millennium there was no sense in which one can say that the Church Fathers believed - as a matter of divine faith - that the Virgin Theotokos must be sinless.
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Hmmm “was, is, will be” - or “must be”. Such a vast difference here that you gloss over.

And another gloss: You mention a few, earlier Fathers - StBasil and StJC were both pre-Ephesus and Chalcedon, and StC pre-Chalcedon, and all were pre-Constantinople II. Had the consolidation of the mind of the Church on the Theotokos begun in earnest during their times? Then you jump ahead six centuries to draw conclusions about the whole first millenium! Where are texts from writers who lived during the latter part of the millenium?

The liturgy served by StB or StJC did not contain the Axion Estin, even the often repeated final phrases. Did it contain the word “Theotokos”, or the injunction: “Most Holy Theotokos, save us”? Did it contain the idea of “ever-virgin”? It is fair to ask: does our liturgy teach something more developed than the liturgy served by StB or StJC and how should that inform the way we read their homilies? *This is a probative question.
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You seem to discount the plain truth of the words we use in the liturgy as merely poetic or proleptic. I am open to such interpretations, but am very wary of them. It is the same track taken by those who wish to dismiss any inconvenient truth - ultimately even the historical reality of Jesus. A conservative approach is highly advisable; I don’t see your approach as sufficiently conservative. IIRC you have used the argument of prolepsis in the context of the Matins of the Entrance but the ostensible proleptic texts are so unlike the text from the Roman canon, that the argument lacks support.
… I hold that your position has more in common with the beliefs of Roman Catholics than with the Eastern Church Fathers or the Eastern Orthodox… you seem content to accept a more or less Latinized viewpoint
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Please feel free to enlighten me on facts, but I’d like to ask that you avoid the analysis of my motivations and mentality. You know that accusations of Latinizing are very grave; you don’t know me well enough to make such a grave charge. Moreover, I think that you are at least a bit glib on “Orthodoxy”. I think that it is not a simple matter to get a handle on authentic Orthodox thinking, especially in the West. There is a mix of Protestant influence and stubborn Romophobia that makes it difficulty to divine authenticity. FWIW, the long and deeply-rooted EOs that I know see me as Orthodox; it is the more recently illumined that treat me with suspicion.
 
malphono said:
Whereas I have no intention of getting involved in this discussion, FWLIW I will offer one observation. I have ever been amused by the fact that both of the two most “controversial” (for lack of a more charitable word at the moment) dogmatic declarations of the Roman Church were made within 20 years of each other and of course under the very same Roman Pontiff. :hmmm:
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Ahh, but this is a very interesting observation. So much of the church-dividing “controversy” is connected to these declarations, that you have to wonder what was the point of division before them? Oh, right: azymes.

Franklin on the convenience of being a reasonable creature:
“So convenient a thing to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for every thing one has a mind to do.”
 
Apotheoun said:
The dogma of the Incarnation is sufficient to safeguard the truth that life begins at conception, and so there really is no need - even in connection with the “culture of death” - for the theory of the Immaculate Conception.
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In light of history, it apparently wasn’t. Much debris accumulated after that dogma. Moreover, there is no a great deal of leadership on life issues from churches who hold to the former and not the latter. Might be coincidental of course.
 
Apotheoun said:
I have not undertaken an extensive examination of what you have written on CAF over the course of your membership at this forum (nor do I really have the time to do so at the present moment), and so I was simply referencing the posts you have written recently in response to me.

If you believe that the ancestral sin causes death (both physical and spiritual) without involving sin and guilt, then we are in basic agreement, but if you hold that people are born with a stain of sin on their souls, then it follows that we are not in agreement.
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The issues is whether or not your perspective is in agreement with the writings of the leaders of the Orthodox church. It is not.
 
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