Why Does The Filioque Debate Matter?

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Revprodeji' post='1385494' date='Sep 14 2007, 12:00 PM']You cite that the members of the trinity are only known in their energies. (economic revelation, right?) then why are we even arguing this debate? Why is this a debate when it deals with the inner workings? And this isn't just blaming the west, but also the East. The east in working the theology itself is guilty of the same thing it is accusing the west of. Making claims about the inner working of the trinity when all we have the the economic revelation.[/quote]
The uncreated divine energies are not merely economic; instead, they are the eternal glory of God, and so they pre-exist creation, and that is why St. Gregory of Nyssa calls them "the powers that we see around the divine essence," and -- of course -- the three divine [i]hypostaseis[/i] create the world through them (i.e., the energies), for the energies are God as He acts.

Finally, it is important to remember that generation and procession are proper to the person of the Father as He imparts His essence to the Son and the Spirit; while creation is proper to the divine energy, which flows out from the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit, causing the world to exist.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Revprodeji' post='1385494' date='Sep 14 2007, 12:00 PM']I agree that a major step will be in working the language of the spirit's energy and procession of Origin. But (correct me if I'm wrong please) if the east is mad at the west because it invokes the economic revelation as a mirror or sight into the inner workings, what does the east use to determine its inner-working theology? If the east states that we cannot use the economic revelation to determine inner workings, on what grounds do the eastern theologians make any doctrinal statements on the inner workings?[/quote]
Nowhere in scripture does Christ claim that He is involved in the [i]ekporeusis[/i] of the Holy Spirit. The East has remained steadfast in denying any theological innovation that challenges the monarchy of the Father as the sole cause within the Godhead.

[Norseman82]

Wasn't it St. Augustine who, according to legend, was walking by the seashore and saywa boy trying to scoop the sea into a hole in the sand, and when he commented to the boy that it was a futile effort, the boy responded that trying to understand the Trinity was also a futile effort?

There are some things we need to humbly admit that we can't understand and simply take as a matter of faith. That is how this effects me as a western Catholic.

If you are concerned about how to resolve it in order to repair the 1054 schism, though, simply see how how it was handled when the first wave of Orthodox churches reunited with Rome and use that as a model.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Norseman82' post='1386594' date='Sep 16 2007, 11:15 AM']If you are concerned about how to resolve it in order to repair the 1054 schism, though, simply see how how it was handled when the first wave of Orthodox churches reunited with Rome and use that as a model.[/quote]
That method would be unacceptable to the Eastern Orthodox Churches, because initially Rome allowed the Easttern Catholic Churches to continue saying the Niceno-Constantinopolitan creed without the [i]filioque[/i], but then over the course of many centuries the Roman Church forced the Eastern Catholic Churches to accept spiritual, liturgical, and theological Latinization.

It has only been during the last forty years wth the promotion of the process of de-Latinization that the Eastern Catholic Churches have dropped the [i]filioque[/i] from the creed (e.g., the Ukrainian Catholic bishops of Canada only officially dropped the [i]filioque[/i] from the creed about three years ago).

Edited September 16, 2007 by Apotheoun

[kafka]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1386499' date='Sep 16 2007, 08:11 AM']Nowhere in scripture does Christ claim that He is involved in the [i]ekporeusis[/i] of the Holy Spirit. The East has remained steadfast in denying any theological innovation that challenges the monarchy of the Father as the sole cause within the Godhead.[/quote]

it is implied in Sacred Scripture, and it is a part of Sacred Tradition.