Would It Be Wrong to Meet with an Orthodox Priest to Hear their Side of the Catholic/Orthodox Debate?

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Mickey said:
And I went through the same process and came to a different conclusion (the fullness of truth of Holy Orthodoxy).

Yes, the best advice is to pray for discernment.
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And I am not saying that this is not possible. I was going through this the same time someone I know was going through it, we came to different conclusions.

I hold nothing against those who come to a conclusion than I do.

What have issue with is what mardukm says advises here.
mardukm said:
Dear brother Nsper7

To answer your question directly: Listen to what an Eastern Orthodox Christian has to say about Eastern Orthodoxy – DON’T listen to what he/she says about Catholicism.

Similarly, listen to what a Catholic Christian has to say about Catholicism, but DON’T listen to what he says about Orthodoxy.

Take it from the horse’s mouth. Let the horse tell about the horse, and let the cow tell about the cow.

If you go to an Eastern Orthodox priest (or Oriental Orthodox priest), and he starts to put down Catholicism, just kindly remind him that you are there to learn about Eastern Orthodoxy, not Catholicism.

Blessings,
Marduk
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nsper7 said:
After meeting with my spiritual director earlier today, I think I will do the following:
  1. Contact an Eastern Rite Catholic Priest to try and meet with him, learn more about the Eastern Rites and possibly consider a Rite change
  2. Read why the Eastern Rites groups made the change from Eastern Orthodox to Catholic
In regards to Point 2, can anyone suggest any good articles on this subject?
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I ask you to fully explore this plan with your spiritual director and for you to be obedient to him in this matter. You may not be in a place right now to do this sort of research.
 
nsper7 said:
In regards to Point 2, can anyone suggest any good articles on this subject?
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Hi nsper. You can check out this informative site. stirenaeus.net/index.htm

And, with respect to the Ukrainian Catholic Church, which is probably the largest Eastern Catholic Church, I suggest you check out our Church’s Home Website which has articles on our history and newsitems.

ugcc.org.ua/index.php?L=2

I do hope this helps. May God Bless You. 🙂

Andrew
 
Although each of them are almost a couple of hours away. There is an Orthodox parish right in my city.
 
I don’t know much about Florida’s geography.😊

St Mary’s Ukrainian Catholic Church in North Port, Florida (fl)

Name: St Mary’s Ukrainian Catholic Church
Street: 1078 North Biscayne Drive
North Port, fl 34286-3801
Phone: (941) 426-7931

St. Mary ‘Protectress’ Ukrainian Catholic Church
245 Lake McCoy Drive
Apopka FL 32712
U.S.
Fr. Joseph. M. Tamburro, Administrator
Tel: 407-880-1640
Fax: 407-880-1640
Email: Jtamburro@cfl.rr.com

plus this Ukrainian Catholic Church in Miami I believe may know more about parishes in Florida.

uccm.us/links.php?lang=eng
 
nsper7 said:
Then there is the heavily legalistic thread within Catholicism, especially in the Traditionalist backlash, which I seem to have latched onto (i.e. if I just avoid mortal sin, then who cares about anything else).
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Not trying to be argumentative, but there is more to traditional Roman Catholic piety than that. As a traditional Roman Catholic, I believe we have to care about more than just avoiding the grossest of sins. We are called to die to ourselves and let the love of Christ rule our hearts. We are called to let our actions reflect the will of God. It is regretable that we often do otherwise.

Avoiding mortal sin is just part of the picture. I expect that your spiritual director will be able to give you some good advice on positive actions to take, beyond sins to avoid, if you ask for it.
 
MikeDunphy said:
Not trying to be argumentative, but there is more to traditional Roman Catholic piety than that. As a traditional Roman Catholic, I believe we have to care about more than just avoiding the grossest of sins. We are called to die to ourselves and let the love of Christ rule our hearts. We are called to let our actions reflect the will of God. It is regretable that we often do otherwise.

Avoiding mortal sin is just part of the picture. I expect that your spiritual director will be able to give you some good advice on positive actions to take, beyond sins to avoid, if you ask for it.
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This brings up a question from another thread: what if we don’t want to die to ourselves or let the love of Christ rule within our hearts? Are we still Saved as long as we avoid mortal sin? It is a question that plagues me. Sorry for the off-topic nature of the question.
 
SingleMomMonica said:
Not a myraid of problems and not similar to what the OP has described. In our parish, the problems are that the Organ sounds awful and detracts from the choir and the cantor, but their is the family who decades ago purchased it for the parish and the elderly person playing it who would be offended if we stopped the use of it. Then we have most of the parishioners who will come to Wednesday Family/Bible Study night, but only a handful show up for Saturday night Vespers in preparation for Divine Liturgy. Then we also have people who show up late to Divine Liturgy. Then when a priest uses ekonomia for someone, like allowing a new convert couple who has 8 children and the doctor says that due to medical problems because of having back to back children, it is danderous for them to have another child, the priest may say it is permissible for that couple to use birth control so that the wife’s body can heal and the husband and wife can still have intimacy while the husband continues to struggle to overcome his pornography addition, others in the parish who find out that the priest allowed birth control use without the full details of the situation may think it is permissible to anyone rather than what it actually is the spiritual fathers use of ekonomia to aid that couple where they are in overcoming their physical and spiritual illnesses. These are the types of problems in our parish.

In every Orthodox parish I’ve attended, large and small, the catechumins meet regularly directly with the priest to learn the Faith. When the priest feels they’re ready, then they come into the Church through Chrismation.
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SingleMomMonica- Thanks for your very forthright description of issues you’ve experienced in your parish.

What you have described here is what I meant by “a myraid of similar issues”-- not similar to what OP talked about necessarily but that Catholics and Orthodox, being made up of people, have issues, our parishes have issues and the ones you describe here are similar to those in my parish. 🙂 Maybe even that isn’t clearly put. I was coming from the perspective that OP has already been in a number of religious communities prior to becoming Catholic and now, after so few months as a Catholic, is seeking yet another place to go.
 
As a person who was also in your shoes, not so long ago, i tend to realize the the EO (not Oriental Orthodox as they are Orthodox also) is not a full church, when i say church, not fully united with each other, Many EO in this forum will say, they are truly united and concelebrating sacraments, but thats how far this will go.

Look around all the internet sites regarding doctrines of the EO church regarding, original sin, I will tell you, there is not single one document will tell you the full and true teaching of the Eastern Orthodox on this matter. You will find a lot of source regarding their doctrines like the Confession of Dositheus, who wrote what he believed and fully understood and guess what? it is very compatible with the Catholic Church teachings, later, the Eastern Orthodox changed this Confession to make it very different with the Catholic Church. Their refusal to accept equally orthodox but not eastern practice method of worship. like the statues, many EO will tend to hate even the use of status in churches, even proclaiming it as a heresy, when even the Holy saint nikon of russia had a miracle experience with the statue of the Theotokos. The Sign of the Cross, may EO will say the the CC church are in heresy when they cross from left to the right and use 5 fingers. as opposed to right to left with 3 fingers. but look, the russian church which is in union with them uses only 2 fingers, they persecuted them that many was killed, but later on, they have accepted this (2 finger sign of the cross) nevertheless, I wonder, they would not accept the 5 fingers left to right which has ancient origin with orthodox equivalent meaning. Their inabiltiy to understand the latin tradition and practises, they dont believe any writings of the Latin Fathers, and would not accept the latin father writing especially with the procession of the holy spirit from the father and the Son, equivalent to the EO believe of Father through the Son which the Latin father wrote unanimously…Any many many more…(the use of transubstantiation in the EO church, the reduction of their number of sacraments to 7, copied from the Latin church) and many many more…

I suggest, do not rush things, read read read,make sure you know all the facts,pray pray pray, the Seat of Peter, where the church of Rome was build with the martyrdom of Paul consecrated together the church of rome, God will not allow this to fall from heresy as the EO claim.
nsper7 said:
I am new to Catholicism (Confirmed in the Easter Vigil of 2009) and was brought to the Catholic Church by looking at history and coming to the conclusion that the Catholic Church was the original Church founded by Christ.

But as I learn a little about the Orthodox, I get confused. I know the Catholic argument in favor of Papal Primacy (which the Orthodox would agree with, it is issues of Papal Supremacy and Infallibility they disagree with), but in the Middle Ages, there was a great deal of corruption due to the power of the Pope (Papal Supremacy issues).

In modern times, the Catholic Church seems to be a mess. Maybe I have spent too much time at Fisheaters, but it seems the Church has liberalized considerably and many members of the hierarchy fall into this view. One seems to find Priests and Bishops who have little concern over sin issues, they view the Sacrament of Pennance as unimportant, there is liturgical abuse, support by many Catholics of things they are not supposed to support (i.e. abortion and contraception). Then there is the heavily legalistic thread within Catholicism, especially in the Traditionalist backlash, which I seem to have latched onto (i.e. if I just avoid mortal sin, then who cares about anything else).

It confuses me because I hear different advice from different Catholic Priests on important issues. For example, I deal with a masturbation/pornography issues, but I know of one Priest who when I confess it, treats it as though it is either not a sin (or at least not a mortal sin) because it is an addiction. I have had another Priest throw me out of the Confessional for going too often and he did not even allow me to confess my sins (I thought the only valid reason a Priest can refuse to grant Absolution is if he feels said penitent is not…well…penitential/repentant, but that was not the issue here).

One sees polls which shows many Catholics don’t even believe in the Real Presence in the Eucharist.

My understanding is that this sort of stuff does not go on in the Eastern Orthodox. They did not have a Protestant Reformation brought on as a backlash to corruption issues, nor do they have the legalistic or modernist/liberal/progressive bent that seems to be pulling the Catholic Church apart at some levels. Whereas Catholic leaders seem hesitant to excommunicate (or at least laicize) individuals who advocate positions contrary to Catholic teaching, the Eastern Orthodox will not tolerate heterodoxy/heresy, regardless of your ecclesiastical rank, nor would they tolerate liturgical abuse.

A part of me wants to meet with an Orthodox Priest to hear their version of the Great Schism and how they deal with the issue of the Petrine issues. But if the Catholic Church is right and Eastern Orthodoxy is wrong, then I maybe buying myself a ticket to Hell because rejection/schism/apostasy from the Catholic Church are mortal sins.

It confuses me because the Eastern Orthodox seem to have the same claim on history as Catholics do and, if one looks at things as they currently are, there seems to be a mess in the Catholic Church (regardless of one’s opinion on Archbishop Lefebvre and the SSPX, his book “An Open Letter to Confused Catholics” points out some serious issues within modern Catholicism).

EDIT: The Eastern Orthodox also seem less obsessed with Hell and Sin than Catholics are.
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I highly doubt your going to find perfect people in the Orthodox Church either. I mean my mother who is lapsed Catholic-now Penteocostal told me about how she worked with Orthodox who were big on ooohhh we are fasting! But then talked about how many extra marital affairs they were having…Every Church has their nominals, their misinformed and yes even leaders who step outside of the teachings of the faith.

The thing is that there are always going to be weat and tares in the Church and false teachers as well. So you really do need to look at the theology and the entire teachings of the Church. And now what the :Church teaches. Why don’t you seek out a Church that actually DOES teach Orthodox Catholicism… I mean I have no doubt they are there…
 
At the risk of repeating what a number of previous posters have said, I would like to point out that the EO Church does have it’s fair share of problems.

There’s a joke in Romania, that one should pray like this: “O Lord, forgive me my sins, for everyone of us, no matter how holy, will sin now and then. Well, except for the priest, who sins all the time”.
Another saying goes like this “One should always do what the priest says, and never what the priest does”.
I could tell you a thousand horror stories about the Romanian Orthodox Church - ranging from jokes like the above to real historical facts of corruption, open support for the communist regime and what not. The neo-protestants are especially successful in recruiting orthodox people who are put off by the moral failings of other orthodox and especially of the clergy.

However, it would not be very Christian of me to judge a whole Church like that, and besides, those would, in fact, be stories about some clergy and laymen within the Church, not the Church itself, and it would not do justice to the high number of Romanian orthodox priests, monks and nuns that have a lot of Christ inside them…

And it might well be that the Greek Orthodox Church or some other EO Church does in fact have more holy priests and less corruption that the present day Romanian Orthodox Church, and perhaps in some Orthodox parishes around the world, and perhaps even in Romania, the clergy and laymen are better than in the coresponding Catholic parishes.

SO WHAT ?

No Church is perfect, when you take the people into account. And if a person seeks God through a Church, then his way should never be that of searching in vain, for a perfect one.
 
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