If I were a Roman Catholic that fact would give me great pause. I would wonder who really has the continuity from the early Church considering these two different communions share all the same beliefs and those are in conflict with Roman Catholicism.
It’s no great mystery why your two churches both reject the papacy in this manner. St. Leo the Great sided with and confirmed the Council of Chalcedon. Of course the Oriental Orthodox reject the papal dogmas. They have to in order to avoid Chalcedon.
Anyway, I agree that the Oriental Orthodox are sadly misunderstood, when they’re not being completely ignored. Eutychian monophysites they are
not. Their theological and dialectical priority is the full integrity of the Incarnation. Nothing wrong with that.
Every single ancient patriarchate has broken communion with Rome and in the case of Antioch and Alexandria they have broken communion with Rome twice. And every single one of those ancient patriarchates today have the same faith even though they have not been in communion for over 1500 years and all of them reject post 1054 Roman Catholic dogmas, every single one of them.
They’re not all in communion, though. Not by a long shot.
If anything, the most demographically plausible claimants to the patriarchates of Alexandria and of Antioch - the Coptic and Syriac ones - are not in full communion with the Ecumenical Patriarchate and with (Greek) Jerusalem.
I count no fewer than three claimants to Alexandria, *five *(!) to Antioch, and two to Constantinople.
Until about a century ago (or less), Chalcedonians and non-Chalcedonians still regarded each other as heretics as well.
It’s a mess, and as you probably know, that state of affairs is hardly new. Schisms between major patriarchates were common throughout the first millennium. We even have the bizarre (to our eyes) situation of the Schism of the Three Chapters, when Rome and the eastern patriarchates were in full communion united against much of the rest of the Latin Church, including major sees like Milan and Aquileia.
Look, Church history has - on the human, ecclesiastical side of things - always been messy. The so-called pentarchy never even really took hold in the Latin Church; that’s why we have patriarchs of Venice, Lisbon, etc. who aren’t at all the equivalents of even the patriarchs of Antioch, let alone the Ecumenical Patriarchs or the popes of Alexandria.
So this vision of five patriarchal sees, generally united for 1000 years, and still univocally maintaining full communion with the exception of Rome, is a simplistic caricature of history: it’s an ahistorical fantasy, at best.
So no, it doesn’t give me pause in the manner you describe, because the union you posit looks quite different in reality. And that’s no indictment of your church; far from it - it was just as messy in the ages when we were generally in full communion with each other as well.
Maybe you’re right. Maybe every single ancient patriarchate has gotten it wrong in exactly the same ways and one, single, solitary patriarchate has gotten it right.
Let’s say, for the sake of the discussion, that this description is accurate - and it’s not, for all the above reasons - but let’s say it is.
Even so, why do you impute such significance to the pentarchy? Those aren’t the only apostolic sees, after all, and they aren’t the only patriarchates.
It’s a political model, Seraphim, based on the Byzantine Empire. If we’re going to make it a popularity contest - which sees accept which church - then the (Roman) Catholic Church wins, hands down.
Of course, that would be a stupid way of weighing the evidence, so I wouldn’t presume to suggest it.
Maybe it’s just coincidence that all of the ancient patriarchates agree with each other and disagree with Rome on exactly the same points.
Again, that’s a caricature and an oversimplification. In our grandparents’ days Chalcedonians and non-Chalcedonians still regarded each other as heretical. And, if you visit Oriental Orthodox boards or even ask an OO here, you’ll find that plenty still do think that you and I are heretics.
Remember that from the (Roman) Catholic perspective, our only dogmatic disagreements center on the papacy, anyway. And as I said above, of course the Oriental Orthodox broke communion with the papacy: they had to in order to ditch Chalcedon, which St. Leo confirmed.
And I chose to remain Orthodox because it is the ancient, Apostolic faith. The faith both the Oriental and Eastern Orthodox share.
You should inform your Oriental Orthodox brethren of this fact, then. Plenty will call you a Nestorian and a successor of imperial butchers, to boot, without a moment’s hesitation (and us, too).
Okay. I think this horse has taken its last breath. 