Toll houses aren’t EO dogma and you are not obliged to hold to it.
Akin’s point about purgatory still applies even if one rejects the notion of “toll houses” - as
many Orthodox do - since Orthodox Christians pray for the dead.
While hardly authoritative in any sense, the
Orthodox Wiki article on purgatory is useful here. Some relevant quotes:
"Greek Orthodox Metropolitan Kallistos Ware acknowledges several schools of thought among the Orthodox on the topic of purification after death. This divergence indicates that the Catholic interpretation of purgatory, more than the concept itself, is what is universally rejected."
"As St. Mark of Ephesus underlined at the Council of Florence, it seems there is no true distinction between heaven, hell and the so-called purgatory: all souls partake differently in the same mystical fire (which, according to St. Isaac of Syria, is God’s Love) but because of their spiritual change they are bound to different reactions: bliss for those who are in communion with him; purification for those in the process of being deified; and remorse for those who hated God during their earthly lives. Because of this confusion and inability of the human language to understand these realities, the Church refrains from theological speculation. Instead, she affirms the unbroken Tradition of prayers for the dead, the certainty of eternal life, the rejection of reincarnation, and the communion of the Saints (those living and those who have fallen asleep in the Lord) in the same Body of Christ which is the Church."
I agree that the Akin article is flawed due to its highly cursory nature, but his underlying point on purgatory is absolutely right.
I’ve read detailed discussions between Catholics and Orthodox on purgatory, and the most detail I can get out of Orthodox is that their
actual problem is with:
(1) purifying fire
(2) indulgences
But the notion of purgatorial fire is an image only, and I have yet to see
any Christian who actually understands what indulgences truly are reject the idea behind them.
Ecumenical creeds can only be changed by an Ecumenical council. This wasn’t done with the addition of the filioque but it was done with the 381 additions. He’s comparing apples with oranges.
(a) The First Council of Nicaea required that the
faith of the creed remained unchanged. Changing the
text is another matter.
(b) The
filioque addition applies only to the Latin Church’s version of the Creed. The Catholic Church does not consider the textual addition to be universally binding. That’s why the eastern Catholic churches don’t use it, and why the pope omits the
filioque when reciting the Creed with non-Catholics in Greek.
As you can see, this tract didn’t convince me.
Nor should it. The tract is irredeemably superficial and cursory, though I don’t think it’s *wrong *most of the time, per se.
There were/are of course no ethnic Polish/Hispanic Catholic parishes who speak little english in the US
.
Yeah, I don’t like that article at all. I find it rather unfair and full of double standards.
He shouldn’t even bring up the whole ethnic thing at all, since in my experience it’s not even true. Besides, individual experiences at individual parishes of individual priests can be bad or good; many people investigating Catholic Christianity have had negative experiences, too!
The central point of his article merits a response, but I find the very approach to be fatally flawed, as any approach will be that can be described - by the very person undertaking it! - with such words:
“Inevitably, in my prayers and studies, I began to wonder whether there was another quick, ‘silver bullet’ argument like the one I had already found to be so fatal for Protestant theology?”
Looking for a quick way to make a decision is just not the right approach here.
Since what was once the “Eastern Christianity” forum was renamed “Eastern Catholicism” precisely to exclude these kinds of discussions, I suspect that the moderators will want us to move this to “non-Catholic religions.” But until they do. . . .
If I become one or the other–and deep down I’ve thought, at least two-thirds of the time for the past 15 years or so, that I ought to–I will probably become Catholic. This in spite of the fact that I think Orthodox theological and liturgical traditions are far purer and richer as developments of the original deposit of the faith, and in spite of the fact that I think the Filioque should not have been added to the Creed, and in spite of the fact that I find most of the things said by Mr. Akin and Fr. Harrison and others along the same lines to be unconvincing.
Why then? Here are my top three reasons, in order of increasing importance:
- Catholicism does, after all, include Eastern churches. Yes, I know everything the Orthodox say about the flawed ways in which these “uniate” churches came into existence, and about the way they have been often treated as “second-class citizens.” These are valid points. But this is a flawed, broken, sinful world. At least the Roman Communion is committed in principle to including Eastern as well as Western perspectives. It is quite possible to prefer Eastern theology and liturgy and be in communion with Rome (and not necessarily as a member of an Eastern Catholic church, either). Much of the “ressourcement” of the 20th century consisted of taking the Eastern Fathers more seriously. Vatican II and the Catechism draw on Eastern sources continuously. And so on.
- On a more theoretical level, the Catholic Church (particularly in Lumen Gentium) has a nuanced, persuasive account of how other churches are related to the Roman Communion. I find this account plausible–which doesn’t mean that I have no problems with it, just that it’s definitely a “live option.” The Orthodox don’t seem to have anything of the kind. On the one hand, you have the traditional, dogmatic, Cyprianic view that there are no grace-filled sacraments outside the Orthodox Church. On the other, you have the generous statements of folks like George Florovsky to the effect that “we know where the Church is–we don’t know where it isn’t.” Orthodoxy being the relatively chaotic affair that it is (something I do not, in contrast to the typical pro-RC polemicist, see as entirely a bad thing!), it really isn’t clear which of these perspectives speaks for the Orthodox Church as a whole ( in contrast to Catholicism, where Lumen Gentium is very clearly the official position). Given the immense respect that monks, especially of Mount Athos, have within Orthodoxy as the maintainers of the Tradition, it’s a bit rasher to enter Orthodoxy because you like Florovsky and Schmemann than it is to enter Catholicism because you like De Lubac and Congar (since De Lubac’s and Congar’s perspectives have been largely written into official Catholicism at Vatican II).
- The big consideration, though, is unity vs. purity. Is the Church first a communion of folks who hold to the same doctrine, or is it first a communion of folks united in fellowship with Jesus through union with other human beings (with all their human, sinful flaws). Orthodox and conservative Protestants believe the former. Catholics and liberal Protestants believe the latter. The difference is that the Orthodox have a sound basis for their claims to hold to the true doctrine, and Catholics (through their understanding of ecclesial authority and infallibility) have a way of highlighting unity that does not sideline doctrine as the liberal Protestant approach does. So if you think conservative Protestants (like J. Gresham Machen) are right in their basic approach but wrong in the specifics of their doctrine, you should become Orthodox. But if you agree with the Episcopal bishop of Washington (and, as far as I can see, the Church Fathers) that schism is worse than heresy, but disagree with him (and agree with the Church Fathers) that it is ever necessary to “choose heresy over schism,” then you should become Catholic.
Oh, and if you want a good Catholic statement of problems with Orthodoxy, I’d recommend
this article by Fr. Aidan Nichols (most of it is actually highly complimentary to Orthodoxy–only at the end does he get to the critique). Even this is a bit questionable in places–he mentions the Serbian nationalistic philosophy that claims that Serbia is a uniquely Christian nation with a “suffering servant” role that somehow reflects that of Christ, but he doesn’t acknowledge that Polish Catholicism developed a very similar idea. But I think he’s right that there is
something wrong with the way nationality and Orthodoxy often interact, and that this is key to the continuation of the schism, and his comments on this point much more nuanced and reasonable than those of most Catholics (not to mention the often absurd Orthodox polemic against Catholicism. . . . . )
Edwin
Edwin, let me say yet again how much I appreciate your contributions to discussions on this forum. You are one of the most level-headed, rational individuals I have ever encountered (online or in real life), and also a model of charity as well as nuance in these discussions.
