By RAYMOND DE SOUZA, KM
Leaving aside the multiplicity of churches and sects and denominations and groups of all sorts, colors, and flavors in the plethora of individual creeds in the Protestant doctrinal plateau de fromage, one may ask whether or not there are churches in the world today that are closer to the Church of Jesus Christ. And the answer is yes. The various churches known as “Orthodox” are such churches.
There is not one single Orthodox Church, but many. Not as prolific in multiplication as the Protestant churches, which split and sub-split all the time, the Orthodox churches have, by and large, unity of faith and morals, but not of government. There are four patriarchs — those of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem — but these are mere titles, because the only patriarch who remains from apostolic times is the patriarch of Rome, known to us as the Pope.
Under those patriarchs and outside of their influence you find the churches of Albania, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Georgia, Greece, Poland, Russia, Slovakia, and — of course — the Orthodox Church in America (we couldn’t do without having our own slice in the plateau), and also various independent national churches.
They share the beautiful Byzantine liturgy — inherited from the Catholic Church in the East prior to the separation from Rome — and the same seven sacraments.
Now, you may ask yourself, why, then, are they separated from Rome? Holding so much in common, why aren’t we united? Isn’t it silly to be separated?
Yes, it is silly, I admit. But to answer the main question of the reason for the separation, we must go back in history. The very beginning was just a cultural rift. On Christmas Day of the year 800, Charlemagne was crowned emperor. Some Eastern Christians rolled their eyes as they saw a “barbarian” being crowned emperor. If he had been a Roman general there would have been no problem, since Rome was civilized. But a barbarian….
We must bear in mind that for the first millennium of Christianity, there was only one Church in the East and West, having their various patriarchs under the same papal authority: the Catholic Church. But just 67 years after the crowning of Charlemagne, the patriarch of Constantinople held a council presided over by the emperor, and he excommunicated the Pope. Now, that took some nerve!
That rift was healed in due course, but the big divide came in 1054 when the Patriarch Michael Cerularius attacked the usage of the Latin liturgy in Constantinople and closed down the Latin Rite churches. The Pope excommunicated him. The rift remains to this day. Unfortunately, the Crusaders sacked the city of Constantinople in 1204 in retaliation for the Greeks’ secret deals with Islam. One thing happened after another, and the separation is here to stay — for the time being at least. Perhaps the contemporary threat of Islam will help us reunite.
Two major doctrinal points marked the schism: the papal primacy and the insertion of the word filioque in the Creed, to indicate the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Son as well as the Father. Two attempts were made to resolve the difference, one at the Second Council of Lyons (1274) and the Council of Ferrara-Florence (1438-1439). The representatives agreed to reunite, but as they returned home the schismatic forces won the day.
Although no other attempt has ever been made, some individual bishops of most Orthodox churches have returned home to Rome over the centuries, so that today you find Catholics of the Eastern Rite living side by side with the Orthodox, having the same beautiful liturgy and traditions, with the exception that the Catholics are united with the patriarch of Rome, the Pope.
There are about 15 million Eastern Rite Catholics in the world today. The largest group is the Ukrainian Catholic Church, those who suffered the greatest persecution under the Soviet regime for their blunt refusal to abandon Rome and join the Church of Moscow.
The Orthodox Churches are one in faith and tradition with Catholics on most points. They possess the same Scriptures in both the Old and New Testament (they ignored Luther’s alteration of the Bible). They profess the Nicene Creed and the doctrines proclaimed at the first seven ecumenical councils, up to and including Nicaea II, held in 787. They revere and study the fathers of the Church. They have a hierarchy of bishops. They celebrate seven sacraments, have male and female religious orders, cultivate religious art, practice devotion to the Blessed Virgin and the saints, visit holy places, and practice fasts and conduct pilgrimages.
Having said that, however, there are other aspects that are not so praiseworthy. Although the chief difference is the doctrine of the primacy and infallibility of the Pope, the Orthodox give permission for divorce and remarriage, in blatant disregard to our Lord’s teaching in the Gospel. They refuse to accept papal infallibility — although it is defended by the Gospel — but instead hold that the only infallible authority in the Church is a General Council consisting of the bishops of the entire Church, Greek and Latin. No individual infallible man, but infallibility is spread throughout the council. This raises a dangerous point, because infallibility would depend on the number of bishops voting — and truth is not in numbers. Only St. Peter was given that power (Luke 22:32).
But they have simplified the issue, by simply stating that, since the Latin Church (that means us) is wrong, and holds no communion with them, at the present time, no organ of infallibility exists — period. Therefore, all Church decrees of all councils in which their bishops took no part are rejected. This is the long and the short of it.
And what do they say about the primacy of the Bishop of Rome, the Successor of St. Peter, as firmly rooted in the Gospel and maintained by all Christians in the East and the West as of divine origin for a thousand years? They simply hold that the primacy of the Roman Pontiff is not of divine, but of ecclesiastical, institution, but since the Latin Church has gone wrong, the primacy was transferred to Constantinople. (Oh, really?). As simple as that. How they prove that is anyone’s guess.
But even here they face major problems, because only the Greek, or Eastern, Church believes in this transfer, and the majority of the Orthodox, such as the Churches of Russia and the Balkans, are completely separated from her and from one another.
In this article we have reviewed the historical background. In the next we will consider the doctrinal realities to figure out if any Orthodox Church is the Church of Christ.
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(Raymond de Souza is an EWTN program host; regional coordinator for Portuguese-speaking countries for Human Life International [HLI]; president of the Sacred Heart Institute, and a member of the Sovereign, Military, and Hospitaller Order of the Knights of Malta. His website is: www. RaymonddeSouza.com.)
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