Eastern Catholics

[Apotheoun]

[quote]Is it necessary for Catholics of the Eastern Churchs to hold the docrines dogmatically defined by the last fourteen Oecumenical Councils and by the Supreme Pontiffs?[/quote]
As a Byzantine Catholic I do not accept the fourteen Latin Church councils as ecumenical.

[Apotheoun]

[quote]Then, therefore, must Eastern Catholics believe in such doctrines as the primacy of the Roman Pontiff and the infallibility of the same . . .[/quote]
As far as the primacy of the bishop of Rome is concerned, I accept the doctrine of primacy as it was "formulated and lived in the first millennium" [Joseph Carinal Ratzinger, [u]Principles of Catholic Theology[/u], page 199], while I reject the modifications to that doctrine that have arisen in the West over the course of the second millennium (including the teaching of the First Vatican Council).

[quote]. . . the Immaculate Conception . . .[/quote]
No man, in Eastern theology, is born with a stain of sin upon his soul; and so, there is no need for an "immaculate conception" in Byzantine theology. It is important to remember that Eastern Christians do not accept the Augustinian view of the nature of the "original sin", which is ultimately the source of the Western theory of the "immaculate conception."

[quote]. . . Assumption of the Mother of God . . .[/quote]
The Dormition (i.e., the falling asleep) of the Holy Theotokos and her Assumption into heaven are accepted as pious theologoumena in the Eastern Churches.

[quote]. . . the consecratory power of the Words of Institution . . .[/quote]
The Eastern Churches (both Catholic and Orthodox) have never accepted the Western theory which holds that the words of institution consecrate the Eucharistic elements offered during the divine liturgy into the body and blood of Christ; instead, the East holds that the whole Eucharistic anaphora, and in particular the epiklesis, is consecratory.

[quote]. . . and the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son as from a single principle?[/quote]
The idea that the Father and the Son are a single principle in the existential procession ([i]ekporeusis[/i]) of the Holy Spirit is a form of the Sabellian heresy, and as such it is unacceptable to Eastern Christians.

In Byzantine theology the Father alone is the source ([i]pege[/i]), principle ([i]arche[/i]), and cause ([i]aitia[/i]) of the hypostaseis of the Son and the Spirit.

Edited November 8, 2007 by Apotheoun

[CatholicCid]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1416230' date='Nov 8 2007, 03:14 PM']The Eastern Churches (both Catholic and Orthodox) have never accepted the Western theory which holds that the words of institution consecrate the Eucharistic elements offered during the divine liturgy into the body and blood of Christ; instead, the East holds that the whole Eucharistic anaphora, and[b] in particular the epiklesis[/b], is consecratory.[/quote]

If I may ask, why do you say the bolded? If if the whole prayer is seen as consecratory, why put 'emphasis' on a single part of the prayer?

God Bless.

Edited November 8, 2007 by CatholicCid

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='CatholicCid' post='1416233' date='Nov 8 2007, 12:25 PM']If I may ask, why do you say the bolded? If if the whole prayer is seen as consecratory, why put 'emphasis' on a single part of the prayer?

God Bless.[/quote]
I say that because in Byzantine theology it is the Spirit (who has been called down upon the gifts) that changes the elements into the body and blood of Christ, just as He caused the conception of the God-man in the womb of the Theotokos.

[CatholicCid]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1416242' date='Nov 8 2007, 03:40 PM']I say that because in Byzantine theology it is the Spirit (who has been called down upon the gifts) that changes the elements into the body and blood of Christ, just as He caused the conception of the God-man in the womb of the Theotokos.[/quote]

So, would it be accurate to say that, in Byzantine theology, that the Holy Spirit descends on the gifts at the point of the Epiklesis during the prayers of Consecration?

God Bless.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='CatholicCid' post='1416245' date='Nov 8 2007, 12:48 PM']So, would it be accurate to say that, in Byzantine theology, that the Holy Spirit descends on the gifts at the point of the Epiklesis during the prayers of Consecration?

God Bless.[/quote]
Yes. The word "epiklesis" means to "invoke" or "call down" the Spirit.

[rkwright]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1416230' date='Nov 8 2007, 02:14 PM']As far as the primacy of the bishop of Rome is concerned, I accept the doctrine of primacy as it was "formulated and lived in the first millennium" [Joseph Carinal Ratzinger, [u]Principles of Catholic Theology[/u], page 199], while I reject the modifications to that doctrine that have arisen in the West over the course of the second millennium (including the teaching of the First Vatican Council).[/quote]
Apo, I started a thread on this topic in the debate board. Simply put, I don't get it... how can you be in communion and reject the "modifications" of Vatican I? I mean this with all respect; I wish to understand here. I'm not a traditionalist with an agenda, just seeking understanding.
[quote]No man, in Eastern theology, is born with a stain of sin upon his soul; and so, there is no need for an "immaculate conception" in Byzantine theology. It is important to remember that Eastern Christians do not accept the Augustinian view of the nature of the "original sin", which is ultimately the source of the Western theory of the "immaculate conception."
The Dormition (i.e., the falling asleep) of the Holy Theotokos and her Assumption into heaven are accepted as pious theologoumena in the Eastern Churches.[/quote]
Why are these dogmas binding on me, as a Latin Catholic, but not you? If I don't like these can I simply start (or find) a theology which does not require them and yet still be in communion with Rome?

Could one say for example, that under my theology there is no need for Christ to be divine. Obviously this is incorrect, but under your logic above it seems to work. How can one pick and choose doctrines based on how well they mesh with a certain theology??

[rkwright]

double...

Edited November 8, 2007 by rkwright

[Resurrexi]

[quote name='Oik' post='1416172' date='Nov 8 2007, 11:11 AM']Do you have an agenda or a point to prove here? Just say if you do.[/quote]

It you call wanting all men to believe in the dogmas of the Holy Catholic Church founded by our Lord Jesus Christ an agenda, then, yes, I have an agenda.

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1416212' date='Nov 8 2007, 12:30 PM']As a "traditionalist" in the Latin Church, his agenda is to force Byzantine Catholics to accept Western doctrinal formulations.[/quote]

I'm [b]not[/b] a traditionalist. I am a Catholic who happens to belong to the Latin Church, and it's a simple as that.

[quote name='AD BEATISSIMI APOSTOLORUM; Encyclical of Pope Benedict XV promulgated on November 1' date=' 1914.']24. It is, moreover, Our will that Catholics should abstain from certain appellations which have recently been brought into use to distinguish one group of Catholics from another. They are to be avoided not only as "profane novelties of words," out of harmony with both truth and justice, but also because they give rise to great trouble and confusion among Catholics. Such is the nature of Catholicism that it does not admit of more or less, but must be held as a whole or as a whole rejected: "This is the Catholic faith, which unless a man believe faithfully and firmly; he cannot be saved" (Athanas. Creed). There is no need of adding any qualifying terms to the profession of Catholicism: it is quite enough for each one to proclaim "Christian is my name and Catholic my surname," only let him endeavour to be in reality what he calls himself.[/quote]

Edited November 9, 2007 by StThomasMore

[Resurrexi]

double post

Edited November 9, 2007 by StThomasMore

[Apotheoun]

StThomasMore,

We shall have to agree to disagree. I am a Ruthenian Catholic, and a member of the Byzantine Catholic Metropolia of Pittsburgh, and I do not accept the fourteen particular synods of the Latin Church, which where held during the course of the second millennium, as ecumenical. Moreover, I do not believe in the "immaculate conception" because in the doctrinal tradition of my [i]sui juris[/i] Church no one is held to be born with a "stain of sin" upon his soul, instead all men are born mortal. Sin is a personal, not a natural reality. I also do not believe that grace is a created habitus, nor do I believe that men (as individual persons) are predestined to heaven or hell, and I refuse to confuse the Latin concept of papal supremacy with the patristic doctrine of primacy within synodality. Finally, I have already stated my theological views in this thread, and in several other threads as well over the course of the past few weeks, and I do not care whether you agree with me, because you are not my bishop, and so you have absolutely no authority within the Catholic Church.

God bless,
Todd

Edited November 9, 2007 by Apotheoun

[kenrockthefirst]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1416230' date='Nov 8 2007, 03:14 PM']No man, in Eastern theology, is born with a stain of sin upon his soul; and so, there is no need for an "immaculate conception" in Byzantine theology. It is important to remember that Eastern Christians do not accept the Augustinian view of the nature of the "original sin", which is ultimately the source of the Western theory of the "immaculate conception."[/quote]
I have a question on this point, purely for my own edification and asked in good faith. The doctrine of Original Sin is concomitant, if I understand it correctly, with the idea of concupiscence, or the tendency on the part of human beings to sin as a result of The Fall. From a purely lay perspective, this tendency seems pretty obvious in human beings from their birth. Does Byzantine theology posit that human beings are born without the tendency to sin? If so, would it be theoretically possible for a human being not to sin, and therefore not to require grace for salvation?

[rkwright]

[quote name='kenrockthefirst' post='1416673' date='Nov 9 2007, 03:04 PM']I have a question on this point, purely for my own edification and asked in good faith. The doctrine of Original Sin is concomitant, if I understand it correctly, with the idea of concupiscence, or the tendency on the part of human beings to sin as a result of The Fall. From a purely lay perspective, this tendency seems pretty obvious in human beings from their birth. Does Byzantine theology posit that human beings are born without the tendency to sin? If so, would it be theoretically possible for a human being not to sin, and therefore not to require grace for salvation?[/quote]
I've wondered this myself also. You don't even need to consider "tendency to sin". If there humans were born with only a tendency to sin, couldn't it still be theoretically possible for a human not to sin by never giving into the tendency?

[kenrockthefirst]

[quote name='rkwright' post='1416695' date='Nov 9 2007, 04:54 PM']I've wondered this myself also. You don't even need to consider "tendency to sin". If there humans were born with only a tendency to sin, couldn't it still be theoretically possible for a human not to sin by never giving into the tendency?[/quote]
Good point. If even a [i]tendency[/i] to sin were part of our nature, but not sin itself, it would still be theoretically possible [i]not[/i] to sin, and therefore not to require salvation through grace.

In light of that, the work of Jesus on the Cross seems to make sense only in light of Original Sin, i.e. human beings are inherently sinful and by nature separated from God.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='kenrockthefirst' post='1416673' date='Nov 9 2007, 01:04 PM']I have a question on this point, purely for my own edification and asked in good faith. The doctrine of Original Sin is concomitant, if I understand it correctly, with the idea of concupiscence, or the tendency on the part of human beings to sin as a result of The Fall. From a purely lay perspective, this tendency seems pretty obvious in human beings from their birth. Does Byzantine theology posit that human beings are born without the tendency to sin? If so, would it be theoretically possible for a human being not to sin, and therefore not to require grace for salvation?[/quote]
In Byzantine theology, which follows the teaching of St. Athanasios, the Cappadocians, St. Maximos, and St. John Damascene, et al., the effects of the original sin are death and corruption (i.e., a return to non-being). No one is born sinful, or with an innate tendency to sin; instead, sin -- in Adam's descendants -- is caused by human mortality and the rupture it caused between man's natural will (i.e., his natural capacity to will) and the hypostatic enactment of his will (i.e., his personal use of that natural faculty). In other words, sin is always a personal, and not a natural reality; and so, there can be nothing (i.e., nothing ontological) in man's nature that causes him to sin, because all that is within man's nature comes from God, who alone creates nature.

That said, men sin, not because they are compelled to do so by some kind of external or internal force, but because they freely choose to sin, and they do this because they try to prolong their mortal existence by their own power, rather than by turning to God who alone is the source of life ([i]zoe[/i], and not merely [i]bios[/i]).

Sadly, the Western / Augustinian position on the original sin tends to turn it into something inherited by all human beings, and in so doing it falls into a form of Manichaean dualism, i.e., it tends to make evil into something that positively exists in man, but evil has no essential being; instead, it is a privation, i.e., it is a relative absence of the good in the hypostatic enactment of the will by each individual person. In fact, the original sin is a particular act of the first man, and as such it (i.e., the sinful action) cannot be inherited by any of his descendants. Only the effects of that original disobedience -- death and corruption (corruption in the sense of a return to non-being) -- can be inherited, and there is no moral quality to the inheritance of these effects.

[quote]If so, would it be theoretically possible for a human being not to sin, and therefore not to require grace for salvation?[/quote]
Man is not predestined to sin, because if that were the case, it follows that God would be the cause of sin, and that is impossible. Adam's descendants still have free will, because the divine image is unaffected by the fall, and that is why human beings are responsible for their own actions.

Edited November 10, 2007 by Apotheoun