Patru episcopi, mai mulți preoți și numeroși cărturari catolici au semnat o declarație în care resping o declarație recentă a Papei Francisc despre primirea Sfintei Împărtășanii, potrivit căreia „toată lumea este invitată la cina nunții Mielului (Apocalipsa 19:9).Pentru a fi admis la sărbătoare, tot ceea ce se cere este haina de nuntă a credinței care vine din auzirea Cuvântului Său.” Papa a scris aceste cuvinte în Scrisoarea sa apostolică din 29 iunie despre liturghie, Desiderio desideravi, dar a omis „tema esențială a pocăinței pentru păcat – pentru a putea primi vrednic Euharistia.”
Prin urmare, cuvintele papale despre „veșmântul credinței” ca singura cerință pentru primirea Sfintei Împărtășanii, „contradic[] credința Bisericii Catolice”, după cum scriau autorii. Ei explică:
Biserica Catolică a învățat întotdeauna că, pentru a primi Sfânta Euharistie cu vrednicie și fără păcat, catolicii trebuie să primească absolvirea sacramentală, dacă este posibil, pentru orice păcate de moarte pe care le-ar fi comis și să se supună tuturor celorlalte legi ale Bisericii referitoare la primirea Euharistiei ( precum, de exemplu, legile referitoare la postul înainte de primirea Euharistiei).
Dacă o spovedanie sacramentală nu este posibilă, dar primirea Sfintei Împărtășanțe este urgentă (cum ar fi pentru un preot care celebrează Liturghia), Taina Pocăinței trebuie căutată cât mai curând posibil după aceea, iar pocăitul trebuie să aibă deplina parere de rau pentru păcatele sale de moarte. Citând pe larg din documentele Conciliului de la Trent, semnatarii precizează, de asemenea, că astfel de învățături, așa cum sunt prezentate în documentul Papei Francisc, au fost deja condamnate ca erezie. „Pretenția”, scriu ei, „că credința este singura cerință pentru primirea cu vrednicie a Sfintei Euharistii a fost condamnată de Conciliul de la Trent ca fiind erezie”.
Această învățătură falsă ar putea deveni mai importantă acum în acest moment istoric. In mai, episcopul american – arhiepiscopul Salvatore Cordileone – i-a interzis public lui Nancy Pelosi, Președinta Camerei Reprezentanților, să primească Sfânta Împărtășanie pentru că sfidează învățătura Bisericii împotriva avortului. „Un legiuitor catolic”, a scris el apoi, „care susține avortul, după ce cunoaște învățătura Bisericii, comite un păcat vădit grav care este cauza celui mai grav scandal pentru alții”.
Se pare că documentul Papei Francisc din iunie 2022 este un răspuns la această hotărâre diecezană, afirmând acum că doar credința este suficientă pentru a primi Sfânta Împărtășanie.
După cum subliniază noua declarație, „în ziua în care a fost emis Desiderio desideravi, Papa Francisc a primit-o în audiență pe Nancy Pelosi, Președinta Camerei Reprezentanților a SUA”, iar în acea zi, ea a primit Sfânta Împărtășanie la o Liturghie papală, în Sf. Petru, pe care a prezidat-o Papa Francisc, „scandalizandu-i pe catolicii din întreaga lume. Textul continuă: „Când a fost întrebat despre primirea ilegală a comuniunii, Papa Francisc nu și-a exprimat dezaprobarea. În schimb, el a răspuns spunând: „Când Biserica își pierde natura pastorală, atunci când un episcop își pierde natura pastorală, aceasta creează o problemă politică. Asta este tot ce pot spune.” Acest răspuns îl mustră pe Arhiepiscopul Cordileone pentru aplicarea îndreptățită a Canonului 915.”
Printre semnatarii acestei noi declarații se numără episcopul Joseph E. Strickland, episcopul André Gracida, episcopul Athanasius Schneider, episcopul Robert Mutsaerts, părintele Gerald E. Murray, părintele James Altman, părintele John Lovell și alți câțiva preoți, alături de cunoscuți academicieni. profesori precum profesorul Claudio Pierantoni, dr. John Lamont, dr. Peter Kwasniewski, profesor Anna Silvas, dr. Anthony Esolen, profesor John Rist și profesor Paolo Pasqualucci. Printre savanții catolici se regăsesc Julia Meloni și George Neumayr. John-Henry Westen și Liz Yore de la LifeSite au semnat, de asemenea, documentul.
https://www.lifesitenews.com/blogs/bishops-priests-and-scholars-correct-pope-francis-statement-on-holy-communion/?utm_source=digest-catholic-2022-09-19&utm_medium=email
Vaticanul transmite: ”Vineri, 25 martie 2022, papa Francisc va consacra Rusia și Ucraina Inimii Neprihănite a Mariei.” (1) ”De la izbucnirea războiului din Ucraina, papa a primit mai multe cereri de consacrare a Rusiei și Ucrainei Inimii Neprihănite a Mariei… Cererea de consacrare a venit și din partea episcopilor din Ucraina, la 10 martie. În cadrul apariției din 13 iulie 1917, Fecioara Maria de la Fatima s-a adresat copiilor păstori cărora le apăruse și s-a exprimat în acești termeni cu privire la consacrarea Rusiei: „Pentru a împiedica [un alt război mondial], voi cere consacrarea Rusiei la Inima mea Neprihănită și la Împărtășanie reparatoare în fiecare primă sâmbătă din lună”. La momentul aparițiilor mariane de la Fatima, Ucraina făcea parte din imensul teritoriu al Rusiei.” (2)
Consacrarea a fost, sau nu, făcută?
Don Gabriel Amorth, Președintele onorific pe viață al Asociației Internaționale a Exorciștilor, spune destul de clar că Consacrarea Rusiei, așa cum a cerut Preacurata Maica Noastră de la Fatima, nu a fost niciodată făcută:
„Sr. Lucia a spus întotdeauna că Fecioara a cerut Consacrarea Rusiei și numai a Rusiei… într-o ceremonie publică, de către Papă împreună cu toți episcopii catolici din lume. Acest lucru a fost precizat în detaliu, de către Isus, pentru că El a vrut ca sfințirea să fie recunoscută drept Triumful Inimii Neprihănite a Mariei, astfel încât ea să fie cinstită împreună cu Sfânta Sa Inimă… Dar timpul a trecut și consacrarea nu s-a făcut, așa că Domnul nostru a fost profund ofensat …
Domnul nostru i s-a arătat Luciei și i-a spus: „Ei vor face consacrarea, dar va fi târziu!” Simt fiori pe șira spinării când aud aceste cuvinte „va fi târziu!”.
Da, în 1984 Papa (Ioan Paul al II-lea) a încercat destul de timid să consacre Rusia în Piața Sf. Petru. Eram acolo la doar câțiva metri distanță de el pentru că eram organizatorul evenimentului … el a încercat consacrarea, dar în jurul lui erau niște politicieni care i-au spus „nu poți spune numele Rusia, nu poți!” Și a întrebat din nou: „Pot să spun?” Și ei au spus: „Nu, nu, nu!”
Profețiile de la Fatima… permiteți-mi să vă spun ce cred despre ele, citându-l pe Papa Benedict al XVI-lea: „Cine crede că misiunea Fatimei este încheiată, se înșală”. Uitați-vă la importanța acestor apariții! Uitați-vă la pagubele și prăbușirea pe care le-am experimentat în Biserică… Permiteți-mi să-l citez pe Papa Paul al VI-lea: „Se credea că după Conciliul Vatican II vom avea o renaștere a Bisericii, dar în schimb a fost un dezastru! În interiorul Bisericii, fumul Satanei a intrat în Vatican” A fost un dezastru, în rândul clerului, în cadrul liturghiei și, de asemenea, printre credincioși, care și-au pierdut credința și și-au abandonat religia cu milioanele. ”(3)
Mesaj dat de Maica Domnului pr. Stefano Gobbi în ziua consacrarii de către Papa Ioan Paul al II-lea a „poporului Rusiei” la Inima Neprihănită a Mariei
„Circumstanțe particulare nu i-au permis încă Sfântului Părinte să-mi consacre în mod expres Rusia, așa cum am cerut în repetate rânduri. După cum v-am spus deja, această consacrare mi se va face atunci când sunt în curs de desfășurare evenimente sângeroase. Binecuvântez actul curajos al acestui Papă „al meu”, care a vrut să încredințeze lumea și toate neamurile Inimii mele Neprihănite; o primesc cu dragoste și recunoștință și, pentru acest act, promit să intervin pentru a scurta mult orele de purificare și pentru a face încercare mai puțin împovărătoare”. —Mesajul 287 pe 25 martie 1984; „Preoților, copiii iubiți ai Maicii Domnului”
Și în mesajul 425c, 13 mai 1990, Maica Domnului îi spune aceluiași pr.Gobbi: „Rusia nu mi-a fost consacrată de către Papa împreună cu toți episcopii și astfel nu a primit harul convertirii și și-a răspândit erorile în toată lumea, provocând războaie, violențe, revoluții sângeroase și persecuții ale Bisericii și ale Sfântului Părinte”.
A treia parte a secretului revelat Luciei la 13 iulie 1917 în Cova di Iria-Fatima:
”Îngerul indicând pământul cu mâna dreaptă, cu o voce puternică a spus: Penitență, Penitență, Penitență! Și am văzut într-o lumină imensă care este Dumnezeu: «ceva ca atunci când vezi într-o oglindă persoanele care îți trec prin față» un episcop îmbrăcat în alb «am avut presimțirea că era Sfântul Părinte». Alți episcopi, preoți, persoane consacrate urcau pe un munte abrupt, în vârful căruia era o mare cruce din trunchiuri necojite de culoare gri, de parcă ar fi fost de plută. Sfântul Părinte, înainte de a ajunge acolo, a traversat o mare cetate jumătate în ruină și aproape tremurând, cu pas șovăitor, marcat de durere și de suferință, el se ruga pentru sufletele cadavrelor pe care le întâlnea în drumul său; ajuns în vârful muntelui, prosternat în genunchi la picioarele marii cruci, el a fost ucis de un grup de soldați care au tras asupra lui cu focuri de armă și cu săgeți, și în același mod au murit unii după alții, episcopii, preoții, persoanele consacrate și mai multe persoane laice, bărbați și femei de diferite categorii sociale. Sub brațele crucii erau doi îngeri, fiecare cu o stropitoare de cristal în mână, în care adunau sângele martirilor și cu el stropeau sufletele celor care se apropiau de Dumnezeu.” (5)
Doi Papi să fie, oare?
”Lucia, în viziunea ei, vede doi papi ca atare. Prima este o imagine oglindită a ceea ce pare a fi papa, dar este de fapt „un episcop îmbrăcat în alb”, care dă „impresia” că este papa. Adevăratul papă și urmașii lui urcă muntele în mijlocul pericolului și distrugerii, se roagă pentru cei morți spiritual de-a lungul drumului, înainte de asta ei trec printr-un oraș pe jumătate în ruine, reprezentând Biserica supusa măcelului. La sfârșitul călătoriei lor, ei sunt martirizați pentru loialitatea față de Isus răstignit”. (6)
”Mult iubita Mea fiică, profețiile de la Fatima acum încep să se împlinească în lume. Guvernele noii ordini mondiale, create în acele națiuni care complotează neobosit împreună, sunt aproape de finalizarea lucrării lor care în curând va fi prezentată lumii. Ca urmare, va fi instaurată nouă religie unică mondială, care constituie o urâciune în Ochii Tatălui Meu.” (13 octombrie 2012)
”Eu am dat lumii profețiile din 1917, însă ultimul secret de la Fatima nu a fost dezvăluit, într-atât de terifiant a fost el considerat de către cei din cadrul Bisericii Catolice. … Biserica a fost infestată de către inamicii lui Dumnezeu, din interior. Ei – și există 20 dintre ei care controlează din interior – au creat cea mai mare înșelătorie. Ei au ales un om, care nu este al lui Dumnezeu, în timp ce Sfântul Părinte căruia îi fusese acordată coroana lui Petru a fost îndepărtat cu grijă.”( 22 iulie 2013) citiți mesajul integral aici (8)
”Pentru a-i convinge pe copiii Lui Dumnezeu că ei rămân loiali adevăratului Cuvânt al lui Dumnezeu și tradițiilor Bisericii Catolice, vor crea ceremonii despre care ei vor spune că mă onorează pe mine. Vor folosi profețiile de la Fatima pentru a profana imaginea Mea, prezentând lumii o mare înșelăciune.” (17 august 2013)
”Voi, preaiubiții Mei discipoli, sunteți martori la tot ceea ce Preaiubita Mea Mamă v-a anunțat la La Salette și Fatima. Voi trebuie să înțelegeți că planul constă în a desacraliza fiecare Biserică a lui Dumnezeu, înainte ca anticristul să fie înscăunat în Templul Meu în toată Gloria sa josnică. Cei care pun întrebări vor fi ignorați și mai târziu ridiculizați pentru că au îndrăznit să îi pună sub semnul întrebării pe cei care se pretind conducătorii Bisericii Mele de pe Pământ.” (10 martie 2014)
”Dragii mei copii, timpul ca profețiile de la La Salette și Fatima să se împlinească este foarte aproape. Nu trebuie să vă temeți de aceste timpuri, ci mai degrabă să le primiți cu bucurie, pentru că trebuie să știți că Legământul Tatălui Meu va fi în cele din urmă împlinit așa cum a fost menit să fie. Anticristul se va întrona în cele din urmă în Biserica Fiului meu pe pământ și nimic nu va împiedica acest lucru să se întâmple. Mulți vor nega profețiile pe care eu le revelez lumii și astfel se vor pune în pericol. Aceia care refuză să accepte avertismentele date lumii și cei care îi urmează pe dușmanii lui Dumnezeu își vor pune sufletele în pericol și pentru aceste suflete înșelate vă rog să vă rugați fierbinte.” (13 august 2014)
”Comunismul va fi la baza acestui rău. Nu doar pentru faptul că acest comunism promovează ateismul, ci pentru că promovează ura față de Dumnezeu. Rusia și China vor fi la putere în multe țări, începând cu Europa. Uniunea Europeană, fiara cu zece coarne, va fi devorată de cea de-a doua fiară, mai nemiloasă și mai puternică. Apoi, Comunismul va prinde rădăcini înainte de a se răspândi peste tot. Perioada asta nu va dura mult timp. Va fi scurtă. Rugăciunile voastre vor diminua impactul, dar acest lucru a fost prezis și se va întâmpla.” (19 iulie 2012)
”Comunismul, de care lumea occidentală s-a temut atâta vreme, prinde contur în secret printr-o alianță globală între guvernele de pretutindeni. Cei care, în națiunile voastre, s-au opus vehement față de ceea ce ei numeau un regim malefic, vor îmbrățișa acum comunismul. În acel stadiu, ei vor controla tot ceea ce faceți, ceea ce mâncați, cât câștigați, dacă aveți sau nu o casă în care să locuiți și dacă puteți sau nu să vă practicați religia. Să nu cedați niciodată. Niciodată să nu vă pierdeți speranța. Este important să fiți puternici în această perioadă de opresiune. Rugăciunea va fi armura voastră și vă va ajuta să perseverați.” (12 septembrie 2012)
”Războaiele vor escalada până când Marele Război va fi declarat și apoi cel mai mare dușman, care este comunismul, va crea mari tulburări în toate națiunile.” (04 martie 2014) citiți întreg mesajul aici (10)
”Furtunile se vor înteți iar tulburările se vor resimți în atât de multe țări. Neliniște se va vedea în națiuni pe măsură ce guvernele privează de libertate poporul pe care îl guvernează. Apoi bisericile, inclusiv toate acelea care Îl iubesc pe Dumnezeu, unicul Dumnezeu Sfânta Treime, vor începe să nu mai oficieze liturghiile și își vor închide ușile. Numărul bisericilor care vor fi închise va fi observat în toate țările occidentale. În curând, marca comunismului va fi văzută printr-un semn special ce va apărea în bisericile care vor rămâne deschise, în media, pe articolele de îmbrăcăminte, în filme iar acest semn va fi purtat cu mândrie de aceia care se află în poziții înalte. Va fi văzut ca o insignă a onoarei și va fi etalat de către membrii ierarhiilor din toate bisericile și cultele religioase principale. Veți vedea acest simbol în locuri publice; pe altare; în aeroporturi și pe veșmintele purtate de liderii bisericilor. Acest semn, care nu trebuie confundat cu Semnul Fiarei, va simboliza noua Religie Unică Mondială. Aceia care se fac responsabili de acesta nu se vor mai teme de a-și etala semnul care este un simbol al controlului și credinței față de bestie. Ziua în care Jertfele zilnice ale Liturghiilor vor fi oprite, în formatul în care acestea trebuie să fie oferite în Numele Meu Sfânt, va fi ziua când acest simbol va apărea pe altare și înaintea tuturor tabernacolelor din lume. Rugați-vă, discipolii Mei iubiți, să găsiți alinare în acei slujitori sfințiți ai Mei care Îmi rămân fideli, căci veți avea nevoie de consolare în timpul acestor încercări. Eu întotdeauna vă voi ridica și vă voi purta. Nu vă voi părăsi niciodată dar voi nu trebuie să deviați de la Învățăturile Mele, nici să acceptați practici păgâne care vor substitui Adevărul ” (17 aprilie 2013)
”Când venerația față de mine este dată deoparte și cererea mea pentru a proteja țările împotriva comunismului este răstălmăcită, atunci înseamnă că dorința mea nu a fost îndeplinită. … Iubita voastră Mamă, Mama Mântuirii” (10 noiembrie 2013)
The East–West Schism (also known as the Great Schism or Schism of 1054) was the break of communion which occurred in the 11th century between the Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Church.[1] Immediately following the schism, it is estimated that Eastern Christianity comprised a slim majority of Christians worldwide, with the majority of remaining Christians being Catholic.[2] The schism was the culmination of theological and political differences which had developed during the preceding centuries between Eastern and Western Christianity.
In 1053, the first step in the process that led to a formal schism was taken: The Greek churches in southern Italy were forced to conform to Latin practices and, if any of them did not, they were forced to close.[9][10][11] In retaliation, Patriarch Michael I Cerularius of Constantinople ordered the closure of all Latin churches in Constantinople. In 1054, the papal legate sent by Leo IX travelled to Constantinople for purposes that included refusing Cerularius the title of „ecumenical patriarch” and insisting that he recognize the pope’s claim to be the head of all of the churches.[1] The main purposes of the papal legation were to seek help from the Byzantine emperor, Constantine IX Monomachos, in view of the Norman conquest of southern Italy, and deal with recent attacks by Leo of Ohrid against the use of unleavened bread and other Western customs,[12] attacks that had the support of Cerularius. The historian Axel Bayer says the legation was sent in response to two letters, one from the emperor seeking assistance in arranging a common military campaign by the eastern and western empires against the Normans, and the other from Cerularius.[13] On the refusal of Cerularius to accept the demand, the leader of the legation, Cardinal Humbert of Silva Candida, O.S.B., excommunicated him, and in return Cerularius excommunicated Humbert and the other legates.[1]
The validity of the Western legates’ act is doubtful because Pope Leo had died and Cerularius’ excommunication only applied to the legates personally.[1] Still, the Church split along doctrinal, theological, linguistic, political, and geographical lines, and the fundamental breach has never been healed, with each side sometimes accusing the other of falling into heresy and initiating the division. The Latin-led Crusades, the Massacre of the Latins in 1182, the West’s retaliation in the Sacking of Thessalonica in 1185, the capture and pillaging of Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade in 1204, and the imposition of Latin patriarchs made reconciliation more difficult.[1] Establishing Latin hierarchies in the Crusader states meant that there were two rival claimants to each of the patriarchal sees of Antioch, Constantinople, and Jerusalem, making the existence of schism clear.[14] Several attempts at reconciliation did not bear fruit.
In 1965, Pope Paul VI and Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras I nullified the anathemas of 1054,[1] although this nullification of measures which were taken against a few individuals was essentially a goodwill gesture and did not constitute any sort of reunion. The absence of full communion between the churches is even explicitly mentioned when the Code of Canon Law accords Catholic ministers permission to administer the sacraments of penance, the Eucharist and the anointing of the sick to spontaneously requesting members of eastern churches such as the Eastern Orthodox Church (as well as the Oriental Orthodox churches and the Church of the East) and members of western churches such as the Old Catholic Church.[15] Contacts between the two sides continue. Every year a delegation from each joins in the other’s celebration of its patronal feast, Saints Peter and Paul (29 June) for Rome and Saint Andrew (30 November) for Constantinople, and there have been several visits by the head of each to the other. The efforts of the ecumenical patriarchs towards reconciliation with the Catholic Church have often been the target of sharp criticism from some fellow Orthodox.[16]
Jaroslav Pelikan emphasizes that „while the East-West schism stemmed largely from political and ecclesiastical discord, this discord also reflected basic theological differences”. Pelikan further argues that the antagonists in the 11th century inappropriately exaggerated their theological differences, whereas modern historians tend to minimize them. Pelikan asserts that the documents from that era evidence the „depths of intellectual alienation that had developed between the two sections of Christendom.” While the two sides were technically more guilty of schism than heresy, they often charged each other with allegations of blasphemy. Pelikan describes much of the dispute as dealing with „regional differences in usages and customs,” some of which were adiaphorous (i.e. neither right nor wrong). However, he goes on to say that while it was easy in principle to accept the existence of adiaphora, it was difficult in actual practice to distinguish customs which were innocuously adiaphoric from those that had doctrinal implications.[17]
Philip Sherrard, an Orthodox theologian, asserts that the underlying cause of the East-West schism was and continues to be „the clash of these two fundamentally irreconcilable ecclesiologies.” Roger Haight characterizes the question of episcopal authority in the Church as „acute” with the „relative standings of Rome and Constantinople a recurrent source of tension.” Haight characterizes the difference in ecclesiologies as „the contrast between a pope with universal jurisdiction and a combination of the patriarchal superstructure with an episcopal and synodal communion ecclesiology analogous to that found in Cyprian.”[18] However, Nicholas Afansiev has criticized both the Catholic and Orthodox churches for „subscribing to the universal ecclesiology of St. Cyprian of Carthage according to which only one true and universal church can exist.”[19]
Another point of controversy was celibacy among Western priests (both monastic and parish), as opposed to the Eastern discipline whereby parish priests could be married men. However, the Latin church has always had some priests who were legally married. They have been a small minority since the 12th century.
There are several different ecclesiologies: „communion ecclesiology”, „eucharistic ecclesiology”, „baptismal ecclesiology”, „trinitarian ecclesiology”, „kerygmatic theology”.[20] Other ecclesiologies are the „hierarchical-institutional” and the „organic-mystical”,[21]and the „congregationalist”.[22]
The Eastern Churches maintained the idea that every local city-church with its bishop, presbyters, deacons and people celebrating the eucharist constituted the whole church. In this view called eucharistic ecclesiology (or more recently holographic ecclesiology), every bishop is Saint Peter‘s successor in his church („the Church”), and the churches form what Eusebius called a common union of churches. This implied that all bishops were ontologically equal, although functionally particular bishops could be granted special privileges by other bishops and serve as metropolitans, archbishops or patriarchs. Within the Roman Empire, from the time of Constantine to the fall of the empire in 1453, universal ecclesiology, rather than eucharistic, became the operative principle.[23][24] The view prevailed that, „when the Roman Empire became Christian the perfect world order willed by God had been achieved: one universal empire was sovereign and coterminous with it was the one universal church”.[25] Early on, the Roman Church’s ecclesiology was universal, with the idea that the Church was a worldwide organism with a divinely (not functionally) appointed center: the Church/Bishop of Rome. These two views are still present in modern Eastern Orthodoxy and Catholicism and can be seen as foundational causes for the schisms and Great Schism between East and West.
„The Orthodox Church does not accept the doctrine of Papal authority set forth in the Vatican Council of 1870, and taught today in the Catholic Church.”[26] The Orthodox Church has always maintained the original position of collegiality of the bishops resulting in the structure of the church being closer to a confederacy. The Orthodox have synods where the highest authorities in each Church community are brought together, but, unlike the Catholic Church, no central individual or figure has the absolute and infallible last word on church doctrine. In practice, this has sometimes led to divisions among Greek, Russian, Bulgarian and Ukrainian Orthodox churches, as no central authority can serve as an arbitrator for various internal disputes.
Starting from the second half of the 20th century, eucharistic ecclesiology is upheld by Catholic theologians. Henri de Lubac writes: „The Church, like the Eucharist, is a mystery of unity – the same mystery, and one with inexhaustible riches. Both are the body of Christ – the same body.”[27]Joseph Ratzinger calls eucharistic ecclesiology „the real core of Vatican II’s (Second Vatican Council) teaching on the cross”.[21] According to Ratzinger, the one church of God exists in no other way than in the various individual local congregations.[28] In these the eucharist is celebrated in union with the Church everywhere.[29] Eucharistic ecclesiology led the council to „affirm the theological significance of the local church. If each celebration of the Eucharist is a matter not only of Christ’s sacramental presence on the altar but also of his ecclesial presence in the gathered community, then each local eucharistic church must be more than a subset of the universal church; it must be the body of Christ ‘in that place’.”[30]
The ecclesiological dimension of the East-West schism revolves around the authority of bishops within their dioceses[31] and the lines of authority between bishops of different dioceses. It is common for Catholics to insist on the primacy of Roman and papal authority based on patristic writings and conciliar documents.[32]
The Catholic Church’s current official teachings about papal privilege and power that are unacceptable to the Eastern Orthodox churches are the dogma of the pope’s infallibility when speaking officially „from the chair of Peter (ex cathedra Petri)” on matters of faith and morals to be held by the whole Church, so that such definitions are irreformable „of themselves, and not by the consent of the Church” (ex sese et non-ex consensu ecclesiae)[33] and have a binding character for all (Catholic) Christians in the world; the pope’s direct episcopal jurisdiction over all (Catholic) Christians in the world; the pope’s authority to appoint (and so also to depose)[citation needed] the bishops of all (Catholic) Christian churches except in the territory of a patriarchate;[34] and the affirmation that the legitimacy and authority of all (Catholic) Christian bishops in the world derive from their union with the Roman see and its bishop, the Supreme Pontiff, the unique Successor of Peter and Vicar of Christ on earth.[citation needed]
Principal among the ecclesiastical issues that separate the two churches is the meaning of papal primacy within any future unified church. The Orthodox insist that it should be a „primacy of honor”, and not a „primacy of authority”,[35] whereas the Catholics see the pontiff’s role as required for its exercise of power and authority, the exact form of which is open to discussion with other Christians.[b] According to Orthodox belief, the test of catholicity is adherence to the authority of Scripture and then by the Holy Tradition of the church. It is not defined by adherence to any particular see. It is the position of the Orthodox Church that it has never accepted the pope as de jure leader of the entire church.
Referring to Ignatius of Antioch,[38] Carlton says:
Contrary to popular opinion, the word catholic does not mean „universal”; it means „whole, complete, lacking nothing.” …Thus, to confess the Church to be catholic is to say that She possesses the fullness of the Christian faith. To say, however, that Orthodox and Rome constitute two lungs of the same Church is to deny that either Church separately is catholic in any meaningful sense of the term. This is not only contrary to the teaching of Orthodoxy, it is flatly contrary to the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church, which considered itself truly catholic— Carlton 2007, p. 22
The church is in the image of the Trinity[39] and reflects the reality of the incarnation.
The body of Christ must always be equal with itself… The local church which manifests the body of Christ cannot be subsumed into any larger organisation or collectivity which makes it more catholic and more in unity, for the simple reason that the principle of total catholicity and total unity is already intrinsic to it.— Sherrard 1996, p. 15
The iconoclast policy enforced by a series of decrees of Emperor Leo III the Isaurian in 726–729 was resisted in the West, giving rise to friction that ended in 787, when the Second Council of Nicaea reaffirmed that images are to be venerated but not worshipped. The Libri Carolini, commissioned by Charlemagne, criticized what a faulty translation gave as the council’s decision, but their objections were rebutted by Pope Adrian I.
From the Catholic Church’s perspective, the ecclesiological issues are central, which is why they characterize the split between the two churches as a schism. In their view, the Eastern Orthodox are very close to them in theology, and the Catholic Church does not consider the Orthodox beliefs to be heretical. However, from the perspective of Orthodox theologians, there are theological issues that run much deeper than just the theology around the primacy of the Pope. In fact, unlike the Catholics, who do not generally consider the Orthodox heretical and speak instead about the Eastern „schism”,[40] some prominent Orthodox theologians do consider the Catholic Church to be heretical on fundamental doctrinal issues of theology, such as the Filioque. These issues have a long history as can be seen in the 11th-century works of Orthodox theologian and Saint Nikitas Stithatos.
In the Catholic Church too, some writers can be found who speak pejoratively of the Eastern Orthodox Church and its theology, but these writers are marginal.[41] The official view of the Catholic Church is that expressed in the decree Unitatis redintegratio of Vatican II:
In the study of revelation East and West have followed different methods, and have developed differently their understanding and confession of God’s truth. It is hardly surprising, then, if from time to time one tradition has come nearer to a full appreciation of some aspects of a mystery of revelation than the other, or has expressed it to better advantage. In such cases, these various theological expressions are to be considered often as mutually complementary rather than conflicting. Where the authentic theological traditions of the Eastern Church are concerned, we must recognize the admirable way in which they have their roots in Holy Scripture, and how they are nurtured and given expression in the life of the liturgy. They derive their strength too from the living tradition of the apostles and from the works of the Fathers and spiritual writers of the Eastern Churches. Thus they promote the right ordering of Christian life and, indeed, pave the way to a full vision of Christian truth.[42]
Although the Western churches do not consider the Eastern and Western understanding of the Trinity to be radically different, Eastern theologians such as John Romanides and Michael Pomazansky argue that the Filioque clause is symptomatic of a fatal flaw in the Western understanding, which they attribute to the influence of Augustine and, by extension, to that of Thomas Aquinas.[43][44][45]
Filioque, Latin for „and (from) the Son”, was added in Western Christianity to the Latin text of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, which also varies from the original Greek text in having the additional phrase Deum de Deo (God from God)[46][47] and in using the singular „I believe” (Latin, Credo, Greek Πιστεύω) instead of the original „We believe” (Greek Πιστεύομεν),[47] which Oriental Orthodoxy preserves.[c] The Assyrian Church of the East, which is in communion neither with the Eastern Orthodox Church nor with Oriental Orthodoxy, uses „We believe”.[52]
Filioque states that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Son as well as from the Father, a doctrine accepted by the Catholic Church,[53] by Anglicanism[54] and by Protestant churches in general.[d] Christians of these groups generally include it when reciting the Nicene Creed. Nonetheless, these groups recognize that Filioque is not part of the original text established at the First Council of Constantinople in 381,[58] and they do not demand that others too should use it when saying the Creed.[59] Indeed, the Catholic Church does not add the phrase corresponding to Filioque (καὶ τοῦ Υἱοῦ) to the Greek text of the Creed, even in the liturgy for Latin Rite Catholics.[60]
At the 879–880 Council of Constantinople the Eastern Orthodox Church anathematized the Filioque phrase, „as a novelty and augmentation of the Creed”, and in their 1848 encyclical the Eastern Patriarchs spoke of it as a heresy.[61] It was qualified as such by some of the Eastern Orthodox Church’s saints, including Photios I of Constantinople, Mark of Ephesus, and Gregory Palamas, who have been called the Three Pillars of Orthodoxy. The Eastern church believes by the Western church inserting the Filioque unilaterally (without consulting or holding council with the East) into the Creed, that the Western Church broke communion with the East.[62]
Orthodox theologians such as Vladimir Lossky criticize the focus of Western theology of God in ‘God in uncreated essence’ as misguided, which he alleges is a modalistic and therefore a speculative expression of God that is indicative of the Sabellian heresy.[63] Orthodox theologian Michael Pomazansky argues that, in order for the Holy Spirit to proceed from the Father and the Son in the Creed, there would have to be two sources in the deity (double procession), whereas in the one God there can only be one source of divinity, which is the Father hypostasis of the Trinity, not God’s essence per se.[43] In contrast, Bishop Kallistos Ware suggests that the problem is more in the area of semantics than of basic doctrinal differences:
The Filioque controversy which has separated us for so many centuries is more than a mere technicality, but it is not insoluble. Qualifying the firm position taken when I wrote The Orthodox Church twenty years ago, I now believe, after further study, that the problem is more in the area of semantics than in any basic doctrinal differences.— Bishop Kallistos Ware, Diakonia, Zoghby 1992, p. 43
Lossky argues the difference in East and West is because of the Catholic Church’s use of pagan metaphysical philosophy (and scholasticism) rather than actual experience of God called theoria, to validate the theological dogmas of Catholic Christianity. For this reason, Lossky states that Eastern Orthodox and Catholics have become „different men”.[64] Other Eastern Orthodox theologians such as Romanides[45] and Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos have made similar pronouncements.[65] According to the Orthodox teachings, theoria can be achieved through ascetic practices like hesychasm, which was condemned as a heresy by Barlaam of Seminara.
Orthodox theologians charge that, in contrast to Orthodox theology, western theology is based on philosophical discourse which reduces humanity and nature to cold mechanical concepts.[66]
Roman Catholicism rationalizes even the sacrament of the Eucharist: it interprets spiritual action as purely material and debases the sacrament to such an extent that it becomes in its view a kind of atomistic miracle. The Orthodox Church has no metaphysical theory of Transsubstantiation, and there is no need of such a theory. Christ is the Lord of the elements and it is in His power to do so that ‘every thing, without in the least changing its physical substance’ could become His Body. Christ’s Body in the Eucharist is not physical flesh.— Lossky 1969, p. 87
Orthodox theologians argue that the mind (reason, rationality) is the focus of Western theology, whereas, in Eastern theology, the mind must be put in the heart, so they are united into what is called nous; this unity as heart is the focus of Eastern Orthodox Christianity[67] involving the unceasing Prayer of the heart. In Orthodox theology, in the Eastern ascetic traditions one of the goals of ascetic practice is to obtain sobriety of consciousness, awakeness (nepsis). For humankind this is reached in the healing of the whole person called the soul or heart. When a person’s heart is reconciled with their mind, this is referred to as a healing of the nous or the „eye, focus of the heart or soul”.[68][69] Part of this process is the healing and reconciliation of humankind’s reason being called logos or dianoia with the heart or soul.[70] While mankind’s spirit and body are energies vivified by the soul, Orthodoxy teaches man’s sin, suffering, and sorrow are caused by his heart and mind being a duality and in conflict.[69] According to Orthodox theology, lack of noetic understanding (sickness) can be neither circumvented nor satisfied by rational or discursive thought (i.e. systematization),[68] and denying the needs of the human heart (a more Western expression would be the needs of the soul) causes various negative or destructive manifestations such as addiction, atheism and evil thoughts etc.[71][72] A cleaned, healed or restored nous creates the condition of sobriety or nepsis of the mind.
Orthodox theologians assert that the theological division of East and West culminated into a direct theological conflict known as the Hesychasm controversy during several councils at Constantinople between 1341 and 1351. They argue that this controversy highlighted the sharp contrast between what is embraced by the Catholic Church as proper (or orthodox) theological dogma and how theology is validated and what is considered valid theology by the Eastern Orthodox. The essence of the disagreement is that in the East a person cannot be a true theologian or teach the knowledge of God, without having experienced God, as is defined as the vision of God (theoria). At the heart of the issue was the teaching of the Essence-Energies distinctions (which states that while creation can never know God’s uncreated essence, it can know his uncreated energies) by Gregory Palamas.
Original sin, free will and the Immaculate Conception
No Catholic or Orthodox writer before the mid-to-late twentieth century ever claimed that Catholics and Orthodox have different understandings of original sin.
Augustine’s doctrine of original sin
Some Eastern Orthodox polemicists claim that Orthodox do not accept Augustine‘s teaching of original sin. His interpretation of ancestral sin is rejected in the East as well. Nor is Augustine’s teaching accepted in its totality in the West.[73] The Catholic Church rejects traducianism and affirms creationism. Its teaching on original sin is largely based on but not identical with that of Augustine, and is opposed to the interpretation of Augustine advanced by Martin Luther and John Calvin. Its teaching departs from Augustine’s ideas in some respects.[73][74] Another Orthodox view is expressed by Christos Yannaras, who described Augustine as „the fount of every distortion and alteration in the Church’s truth in the West”.[75] This view is ahistorical. In fact, Augustine’s teaching on original sin was solemnly affirmed by the ecumenical Council of Ephesus,[76][77] and the ecumenical Second Council of Constantinople numbered Saint Augustine among the great doctors of the orthodox Church, alongside Athanasius of Alexandria, Hilary of Poitiers, Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nazianzus, Gregory of Nyssa, St. Ambrose, Theophilus, John Chrysostom, Cyril of Alexandria, and Pope Leo the Great.[78] The late modern denial by some Orthodox writers of the supposedly „Western” teaching on original sin is regarded by some traditionalist Orthodox as a form of modernism.[79][80]
Orthodox teaching on original sin
What the Eastern Orthodox Church accepts is that ancestral sin corrupted their existence (their bodies and environment) that each person is born into and thus we are born into a corrupted existence (by the ancestral sin of Adam and Eve)[81] and that „original sin is hereditary. It did not remain only Adam and Eve’s. As life passes from them to all of their descendants, so does original sin. All of us participate in original sin because we are all descended from the same forefather, Adam.”[82] The teaching of the Eastern Orthodox Church is that, as a result of Adam’s sin, „hereditary sin flowed to his posterity; so that everyone who is born after the flesh bears this burden, and experiences the fruits of it in this present world.”[83]
Similarly, what the Catholic Church holds is that the sin of Adam that we inherit, and for the remission of which even babies who have no personal sin are baptized,[84] is called „sin” only in an analogical sense since it is not an act committed like the personal sin of Adam and Eve, but a fallen state-contracted by the transmission of a human nature deprived of original holiness and justice.[85]
Both East[citation needed] and West[85] hold that each person is not called to atone for the actual sin committed by Adam and Eve.
According to the Western Church, „original sin does not have the character of a personal fault in any of Adam’s descendants”,[85] and the Eastern Church teaches that „by these fruits and this burden we do not understand [actual] sin”.[83] The Orthodox[citation needed] and the Catholics[86] believe that people inherit only the spiritual sickness (in which all suffer and sin) of Adam and Eve, caused by their ancestral sin (what has flowed to them), a sickness leaving them weakened in their powers, subject to ignorance, suffering from the domination of death, and inclined to sin.[86]
Immaculate Conception
The Catholic doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, which claims that God protected the Virgin Mary from original sin through no merit of her own,[87][88] was dogmatically defined by Pope Pius IX in 1854. Orthodox theology proclaims that Mary was chosen to bear Christ, having first found favor of God by her purity and obedience.[89][90][91][92][93][Luke 1:30–31]
Sin, Purgatory and Hell
Purgatory
Another point of theological contention between the western and eastern churches is the doctrine of purgatory (as it was shown at the Second Council of Lyons and the Council of Ferrara–Florence).[94] It was developed in time in Western theology, according to which, „all who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven.”[95] However, some Eastern theologians, while agreeing that there is beyond death a state in which believers continue to be perfected and led to full divinization, consider that it is a state not of punishment but of growth.[96] They hold that suffering cannot purify sin, since they have a different view of sin and consider suffering as a result of a spiritual sickness.[90] Western theology usually considers sin not only as a sickness that weakens and impedes but also as something that merits punishment.[97]
The Eastern Orthodox Church holds that „there is a state beyond death where believers continue to be perfected and led to full divinization”.[96][citation needed] Although some Orthodox[who?] have described this intermediate state as purgatory, others distinguish it from aspects associated with it in the West: at the Council of Ferrara–Florence, the Orthodox Bishop Mark of Ephesus argued that there are in it no purifying fires.[98]
Damnation
The traditional Orthodox teaching is that „those who reject Christ will face punishment. According to the Confession of Dositheus, „persons go immediately to joy in Christ or to the torments of punishment”.[96] In Orthodox doctrine, there is no place without God. In eternity there is no hiding from God. In Catholic theology, God is present everywhere not only by his power but in himself.[99] Hell is a state of self-selected separation from God.
Eastern theology considers the desire to sin to be the result of a spiritual sickness (caused by Adam and Eve’s pride), which needs to be cured.[100] One such theologian gives his interpretation of Western theology as follows: „According to the holy Fathers of the Church, there is not an uncreated Paradise and a created Hell, as the Franco–Latin tradition teaches”.[101] The Eastern Church believes that hell or eternal damnation and heaven exist and are the same place, which is being with God, and that the very same divine love (God’s uncreated energies) which is a source of bliss and consolation for the righteous (because they love God, His love is heaven for them) is also a source of torment (or a „Lake of Fire”) for sinners (because they do not love God, they will feel His love this way).[102][44][101][103] The Western Church speaks of heaven[104] and hell[105] as states of existence rather than as places, while in Eastern Orthodoxy there is no hell per se, there is damnation or punishment in eternity for the rejection of God’s grace.
Governance
The Byzantine Empire was a theocracy; the emperor was the supreme authority in both church and state.[106][107][108][109] „The king is not God among men but the Viceroy of God. He is not the logos incarnate but is in a special relation with the logos. He has been specially appointed and is continually inspired by God, the friend of God, the interpreter of the Word of God. His eyes look upward, to receive the messages of God. He must be surrounded with the reverence and glory that befits God’s earthly copy; and he will ‘frame his earthly government according to the pattern of the divine original, finding strength in its conformity with the monarchy of God'”.[110][111] In the East, endorsement of Caesaropapism, the subordination of the church to the religious claims of the dominant political order, was most fully evident in the Byzantine Empire at the end of the first millennium,[112] while in the West, where the decline of imperial authority left the Church relatively independent,[113][114][115][116] there was the growth of the power of the papacy. As a result of the Muslim conquests of the territories of the patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, only two rival powerful centres of ecclesiastical authority, Constantinople and Rome, remained.[117] Until this happened, Rome often tried to act as a neutral mediator in disputes among the Eastern Patriarchies.
In Eastern Christendom, the teaching of papal supremacy is said to be based on the pseudo-Isidorian Decretals,[118] documents attributed to early popes but actually forged, probably in the second quarter of the 9th century, with the aim of defending the position of bishops against metropolitans and secular authorities. The Orthodox East contests the teaching that Peter was the Patriarch of Rome, a title that the West too does not give him. Early sources such as St. Irenaeus can be interpreted as describing Pope Linus as the first bishop of Rome and Pope Cletus the second. The Oxford Dictionary of Popes states: „In the late 2nd or early 3rd cent. the tradition identified Peter as the first bishop of Rome. This was a natural development once the monarchical episcopate, i.e. the government of the local church by a single bishop, as distinct from a group of presbyter-bishops, finally emerged in Rome in the mid-2nd cent. The earlier tradition, however, which placed Peter and Paul in a class apart as the pioneers who together established the Roman church and its ministry, was never lost sight of.”[119] St. Peter was according to tradition bishop of Antioch at one point, and was then succeeded by Evodius and Ignatius. The Eastern Orthodox do not hold the primacy of the Pope of Rome over the Eastern church; they teach that the Pope of Rome is the first among equals. The first seven Ecumenical Councils were held in the East and called by the Eastern Emperors; Roman pontiffs never presided over any of them.[e]
The schism between the Western and Eastern Mediterranean Christians resulted from a variety of political, cultural and theological factors which transpired over centuries.[120] Historians regard the mutual excommunications of 1054 as the terminal event.[18] It is difficult to agree on a date for the event where the start of the schism was apparent.[121] It may have started as early as the[citation needed]Quartodeciman controversy at the time of Victor of Rome (c. 180). Orthodox apologists point to this incident as an example of claims by Rome to the papal primacy and its rejection by Eastern Churches.
Sporadic schisms in the common unions took place under Pope Damasus I in the 4th and 5th centuries.[122][123][124] Disputes about theological and other questions led to schisms between the Churches in Rome and Constantinople for 37 years from 482 to 519 (the Acacian Schism). Most sources agree that the separation between East and West is clearly evident by the Photian schism in 863 to 867.
Claims of the See of Rome
While the church at Rome claimed a special authority over the other churches, the extant documents of that era yield „no clear-cut claims to, or recognition, of papal primacy.”[125][126]
Towards the end of the 2nd century, Victor, the Bishop of Rome, attempted to resolve the Quartodeciman controversy. The question was whether to celebrate Easter concurrently with the Jewish Passover, as Christians in the Roman province of Asia did, or to wait until the following Sunday, as was decreed by synods held in other Eastern provinces, such as those of Palestine and Pontus, the acts of which were still extant at the time of Eusebius, and in Rome.[127][128] The pope attempted to excommunicate the churches in Asia, which refused to accept the observance on Sunday. Other bishops rebuked him for doing so.[129] Laurent Cleenewerck comments:
Victor obviously claimed superior authority, probably from St. Peter, and decided – or at least „attempted” to excommunicate a whole group of Churches because they followed a different tradition and refused to conform. One could therefore argue that the Great schism started with Victor, continued with Stephen and remained underground until the ninth century! But the question is this: even if Victor was not acting wisely, did he not have the power to „cut off whole Churches”? This is what Roman Catholics argue with the implication that such an excommunication would be ontologically meaningful and put someone „outside the Catholic Church”. Yet, we do not see bishops „pleading” but indeed „sharply rebuking” and „admonishing” Victor. Ultimately this is why his letters of excommunication came to no effect. Nevertheless it is possible to read in Eusebius’ account the possibility that St. Irenaeus recognized that Victor could indeed „cut off whole Churches” and that such excommunication would have been ontologically meaningful. … In the end, it took some patience and an Ecumenical Council to achieve what Victor could not achieve by his threat to excommunicate.[130]
Despite Victor’s failure to carry out his intent to excommunicate the Asian churches, many Catholic apologists point to this episode as evidence of papal primacy and authority in the early Church, citing the fact that none of the bishops challenged his right to excommunicate but instead questioned the wisdom and charity of his action.[130]
The opinion of the bishop of Rome was often sought, especially when the patriarchs of the Eastern Mediterranean were locked in fractious dispute. However, the bishop of Rome’s opinion was by no means accepted automatically. The bishops of Rome never obviously belonged to either the Antiochian or the Alexandrian schools of theology and usually managed to steer a middle course between whatever extremes were being propounded by theologians of either school. Because Rome was remote from the centres of Christianity in the eastern Mediterranean, it was frequently hoped its bishop would be more impartial. For instance, in 431, Cyril, the patriarch of Alexandria, appealed to Pope Celestine I, as well as the other patriarchs, charging Constantinople Patriarch Nestorius with heresy, which was dealt with at the Council of Ephesus.
In 342, Pope Julius I wrote: „The custom has been for word to be written first to us [in the case of bishops under accusation, and notably in apostolic churches], and then for a just sentence to be passed from this place”.[131] This was also decreed by the Council of Sardica, which declared Saint Athanasius to be the lawful bishop of Alexandria.[132]
In 382 a synod in Rome protested against the raising of Constantinople to a position above that of Alexandria and spoke of Rome as „the apostolic see„.[133]Pope Siricius (384–399) claimed for papal decretals the same binding force as decisions of synods, Pope Innocent I (401–417) said that all major judicial cases should be reserved for the see of Rome, and Pope Boniface I (418–422) declared that the church of Rome stands to „the churches throughout the world as the head to its members” and that bishops everywhere, while holding the one same episcopal office, must „recognise those to whom, for the sake of ecclesiastical discipline, they should be subject”.[134] Celestine I (r. 422–432) considered that the condemnation of Nestorius by his own Roman synod in 430 was sufficient, but consented to the general council as „of benefit in manifesting the faith”.[f]Pope Leo I and his successors rejected canon 28 of the Council of Chalcedon, as a result of which it was not officially recorded even in the East until the 6th century.[136][137] The Acacian schism, when, „for the first time, West lines up against East in a clear-cut fashion”,[138] ended with acceptance of a declaration insisted on by Pope Hormisdas (514–523) that „I hope I shall remain in communion with the apostolic see in which is found the whole, true, and perfect stability of the Christian religion”.[139][140][141] Earlier, in 494, Pope Gelasius I (492–496) wrote to Byzantine emperor, Anastasius, distinguishing the power of civil rulers from that of the bishops (called „priests” in the document), with the latter supreme in religious matters; he ended his letter with: „And if it is fitting that the hearts of the faithful should submit to all priests in general who properly administer divine affairs, how much the more is obedience due to the bishop of that see which the Most High ordained to be above all others, and which is consequently dutifully honoured by the devotion of the whole Church.”[142]Pope Nicholas I (858–867) made it clear that he believed the power of the papacy extended „over all the earth, that is, over every church”.[143][144]
Claims of the See of Constantinople
Hagia Sophia, the cathedral of Constantinople at the time of the schism
In 330, EmperorConstantine moved the imperial capital to Byzantium, which later became Constantinople.[145] The centre of gravity in the empire was fully recognised to have completely shifted to the eastern Mediterranean. Rome lost the Senate to Constantinople and lost its status and gravitas as imperial capital.[g]
The bishop of Byzantium was under the authority of the metropolitan of Heraclea when Constantine moved there.[35] Thereafter, the bishop’s connection with the imperial court meant that he was able to free himself from ecclesiastical dependency on Heraclea and in little more than half a century to obtain recognition of next-after-Rome ranking from the First Council of Constantinople (381), held in the new capital. It decreed: „The Bishop of Constantinople, however, shall have the prerogative of honour after the Bishop of Rome; because Constantinople is New Rome”,[135] thus raising it above the sees of Alexandria and Antioch. This has been described as sowing the seed for the ecclesiastical rivalry between Constantinople and Rome that was a factor leading to the schism between East and West.[146][147] The website of the Orthodox Church in America says that the Bishop of Byzantium was elevated to Patriarch already in the time of Constantine.[148]
Disunion in the Roman Empire contributed to disunion in the Church. Theodosius the Great, who in 380 established Nicene Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire (see Edict of Thessalonica), was the last Emperor to rule over a united Roman Empire. Following the death of Theodosius in 395, the Empire was divided for the final time into western and eastern halves. In the 4th century, the Roman emperor (reigning in Constantinople) started to control the Church in his territory.[149]
The patriarchs of Constantinople often tried to adopt a commanding position over the other patriarchs, provoking their resistance. For example, in 431 Patriarch Cyril of Alexandria impeached for heresy Patriarch Nestorius of Constantinople.[150]
Alexandria’s objections to Constantinople’s promotion, which led to a constant struggle between the two sees in the first half of the 5th century,[151] were supported by Rome, which proposed the theory that the most important sees were the three Petrine ones, of Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria,[152] with Rome in the first place.
However, the power of the patriarch of Constantinople continued to grow.[153] Eastern Orthodox state that the 28th canon of the Council of Chalcedon (451)[154] explicitly proclaimed the equality of the Bishops of Rome and Constantinople, and that it established the highest court of ecclesiastical appeal in Constantinople.[154] The patriarch of the imperial capital succeeded in his efforts[115] to become the leading bishop in the Byzantine Empire: he „headed a vast curia and other bishops who resided in Constantinople constituted a permanent synod, which became the real governing body of the church„.[25]
The idea that with the transfer of the imperial capital from Rome to Constantinople, primacy in the Church was also transferred, is found in undeveloped form as early as John Philoponus (c. 490 – c. 570). It was enunciated in its most advanced form by Photios I of Constantinople (c. 810 – c. 893). Constantinople, as the seat of the ruler of the empire and therefore of the world, was the highest among the patriarchates and, like the emperor, had the right to govern them.[155]
After the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great legalized Christianity (with the Edict of Milan), he summoned the First Ecumenical Council at Nicaea in 325. The bishops at the council confirmed the position of the metropolitan sees of Rome and Alexandria as having authority outside their own province, and also the existing privileges of the churches in Antioch and the other provinces.[156] These sees were later called Patriarchates.[citation needed] These were given an order of precedence: Rome, as the capital of the empire, was naturally given first place, then came Alexandria and Antioch. In a separate canon the Council also approved the special honor given to Jerusalem over other sees subject to the same metropolitan.[157]
Roman dominateEmperorTheodosius I convened the second ecumenical council (Constantinople I) at the imperial capital city in 381. The council elevated the see of Constantinople to a position ahead of the other chief metropolitan sees, except that of Rome, thus raising it above the sees of Alexandria and Antioch.[h] This action has been described as sowing the seed for the ecclesiastical rivalry between Constantinople and Rome which was ultimately a factor leading to the schism between East and West.[146][147][135]It demarcated the territory within the praetorian prefecture of the East into five canonical territories corresponding to the five civil dioceses: Diocese of Egypt (metropolis in Alexandria), Diocese of the East (metropolis in Antioch), Diocese of Asia (Metropolis of Ephesus), Diocese of Pontus (metropolis in Caesarea Cappadociae), and Diocese of Thrace (metropolis in Heraclea, later under Constantinople);[citation needed][158] The council mentioned the churches in the civil dioceses of Asia, Pontus, and Thrace, decreeing that the synod of each province should manage the ecclesiastical affairs of that province alone, except for the privileges already recognized for the sees of Alexandria and Antioch.[158]
No Western bishops attended the council and no legate of the bishop of Rome was present.[159] The Latin Church recognized the council as ecumenical about 150 years later,[clarify][159] in the mid-6th century.
Chalcedon (451)
Rome’s Tome of Leo (449) was highly regarded and formed the basis for the Council of Chalcedon formulation. But it was not universally accepted and was even called „impious” and „blasphemous” by those who condemned the council that approved and accepted it.[160] The next ecumenical council corrected a possible imbalance in Pope Leo’s presentation. Although the Bishop of Rome was well respected even at this early date, the East holds that the concept of the primacy of the Roman See and Papal Infallibility were only developed much later.
The disputed[136][161] canon 28 of the Council of Chalcedon in 451, confirming the authority already held by Constantinople, granted its archbishop jurisdiction over Pontus and Thrace.[154]
Although Leo I, whose delegates were absent when this resolution was passed, recognized the council as ecumenical and confirmed its doctrinal decrees, he rejected its canon 28 on the ground that it contravened the sixth canon of Nicaea and infringed the rights of Alexandria and Antioch.[159]
This canon would remain a constant source of friction between East and West until the mutual excommunications of 1054 made it irrelevant in that regard;[164] but controversy about its applicability to the authority of the patriarchate of Constantinople still continues.[165]
The same disputed canon also recognized the authority of Constantinople over bishops of dioceses „among the barbarians”, which has been variously interpreted as referring either to all areas outside the Byzantine Empire or only to those in the vicinity of Pontus, Asia and Thrace or to non-Greeks within the empire.[136]
Canon 9 of the Council also declared: „If a bishop or clergyman should have a difference with the metropolitan of the province, let him have recourse to the Exarch of the Diocese, or to the throne of the Imperial City of Constantinople, and there let it be tried.” This has been interpreted as conferring on the see of Constantinople a greater privilege than what any council ever gave Rome, or as of much lesser significance than that.[166]
In 476, when the last emperor of the western part of the Roman Empire was deposed and the western imperial insignia were sent to Constantinople, there was once again a single Roman Emperor. However, he had little power in the West, which was ruled almost entirely by various Germanic tribes. In the opinion of Randall R. Cloud, the permanent separation of the Greek East from the Latin West was „the fundamental reason for the estrangement that soon followed between the Greek and the Latin Christians”.[167]
The dominant language of the West was Latin, while that of the East was Greek. Soon after the fall of the West to invaders, the number of individuals who spoke both languages dwindled, and communication between East and West grew much more difficult. With linguistic unity gone, cultural unity began to crumble as well. The two halves of the Church were naturally divided along similar lines; they developed different rites and had different approaches to religious doctrines. Although the schism was still centuries away, its outlines were already perceptible.[168]
In the areas under his control, Justinian I established caesaropapism as the constitution of the Church in a scheme according to which the emperor „had the right and duty of regulating by his laws the minutest detail of worship and discipline, and also of dictating the theological opinions to be held in the Church”.[169] According to the Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms, this caesaropapism was „a source of contention between Rome and Constantinople that led to the schism of 1054”.[170] Explicit approval of the emperor in Constantinople was required for consecration of bishops within the empire. During the period called the Byzantine Papacy, this applied to the bishops of Rome, most of whom were of Greek or Syrian origin. Resentment in the West against the Byzantine emperor’s governance of the Church is shown as far back as the 6th century, when „the tolerance of the Arian Gothic king was preferred to the caesaropapist claims of Constantinople”.[171] The origins of the distinct attitudes in West and East are sometimes traced back even to Augustine of Hippo, who „saw the relationship between church and state as one of tension between the ‘city of God’ and the ‘city of the world'”, and Eusebius, who „saw the state as the protector of the church and the emperor as God’s vicar on earth”.[172]
Decline of three patriarchates
By 661, Muslim Arabs had taken over the territories assigned to the patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, which thereafter were never more than partially and temporarily recovered. In 732, Emperor Leo III the Isaurian, in revenge for the opposition of Pope Gregory III to the emperor’s iconoclast policies, transferred Sicily, Calabria and Illyria from the patriarchate of Rome (whose jurisdiction until then extended as far east as Thessalonica) to that of Constantinople.[173] The Constantinople Patriarchate, after expanding eastward at the time of the Council of Chalcedon to take in Pontus and the Roman province of Asia, which at that time were still under the emperor’s control, thus expanded equally to the west and was practically coextensive with the Byzantine Empire.
Council in Trullo (Quinisext, 692)
The West’s rejection of the Quinisext Council of 692 led to pressure from the Eastern Empire on the West to reject many Latin customs as non-Orthodox. The Latin practices that had got the attention of the other Patriarchates[citation needed] and that had been condemned by this Council included the practice of celebrating Mass on weekdays in Lent (rather than having Pre-Sanctified Liturgies);[174]fasting on Saturdays throughout the year;[175] omitting the „Alleluia” in Lent; depicting Christ as a lamb;[176] using unleavened bread.[177] Larger disputes were revealed regarding Eastern and Western attitudes toward celibacy for priests and deacons, with the Council affirming the right of married men to become priests (though forbidding priests to marry and forbidding bishops to live with their wives)[178][179] and prescribing deposition for anyone who attempted to separate a clergyman other than a bishop from his wife, or for any cleric other than a bishop who dismissed his wife.[180]
The primary causes of the schism were disputes over conflicting claims of jurisdiction, in particular over papal authority—Pope Leo IX claimed he held authority over the four Eastern patriarchs—and over the insertion of the Filioque clause into the Nicene Creed by the Western patriarch in 1014.[185] Eastern Orthodox today state that Council of Chalcedon canon 28 explicitly proclaimed the equality of the Bishops of Rome and Constantinople and that it established the highest court of ecclesiastical appeal in Constantinople.[186] Council of Ephesus canon 7 declared:
It is unlawful for any man to bring forward, or to write, or to compose a different (ἑτέραν) Faith as a rival to that established by the holy Fathers assembled with the Holy Ghost in Nicæa. But those who shall dare to compose a different faith, or to introduce or offer it to persons desiring to turn to the acknowledgment of the truth, whether from Heathenism or from Judaism, or from any heresy whatsoever, shall be deposed, if they be bishops or clergymen; bishops from the episcopate and clergymen from the clergy; and if they be laymen, they shall be anathematized— Schaff 1916, p. 197, Ch. IV The Council of Ephesus, Session I Extracts from the Acts
Eastern Orthodox today state that this canon of the Council of Ephesus explicitly prohibited modification of the Nicene Creed drawn up by the first Ecumenical Council in 325, the wording of which, it is claimed, but not the substance, had been modified by the second Ecumenical Council, making additions such as „who proceeds from the Father”.
Eastern Orthodox argue that the First Council of Ephesus canon 7 explicitly prohibited modification of the Nicene Creed by any man (not by ecumenical church council) drawn up by the first Ecumenical Council in 325.[187] In reality, the Council made no exception for an ecumenical council or any other body of bishops,[188] and the Greeks participating in the Council of Florence emphatically denied that even an ecumenical council had the power to add anything to the creed.[189] The creed quoted in the Acts of the Council of Ephesus of 431 (the third ecumenical council) is that of the first ecumenical council without the modifications that the second ecumenical council, held in Constantinople in 381, is understood to have made to it, such as the addition of „who proceeds from the Father”.[190] Eastern Orthodox theologians state this change of the wording of the churches’ original creed was done to address various teachings outside of the church—specifically, that of Macedonius I of Constantinople, which the council claimed was a distortion of the church’s teaching on the Holy Spirit. This was not a change of the orthodoxy of the churches’ original creed.[191] Thus the word ἑτέραν in the seventh canon of the later Council of Ephesus is understood as meaning „different” or „contradictory” and not „another” in the sense of mere explanatory additions to the already existing creed.[189] Some scholars hold that the additions attributed to the First Council of Constantinople were adopted only with the 451 Council of Chalcedon, 20 years after that of Ephesus,[192][193] and even that the Council of Ephesus, in which Alexandrian influence was dominant, was by this canon excluding the Constantinopolitan Creed, which eventually annexed the name and fame of the creed adopted at Nicaea.[194]
Three councils were held, two by Constantinople, one by Rome.[195] Rome attempted to replace a seated Patriarch with one amenable to the Filioque dispute. The Orthodox responded by denouncing the replacement and excommunicating the pope convening the Roman council, denouncing the pope’s attempt to control affairs outside the purview of Rome, and denouncing the addition of Filioque as a heresy. Each church recognizes its own council(s) as legitimate and does not recognize the other’s council(s).[196][197][198][199][196][200]
Mutual excommunication of 1054
Changes in the extent of the Empire ruled from Constantinople. 476 End of the Western Empire; 550 Conquests of Justinian I; 717 Accession of Leo the Isaurian; 867 Accession of Basil I; 1025 Death of Basil II; 1095 Eve of the First Crusade; 1170 Under Manuel I; 1270 Under Michael VIII Palaiologos; 1400 Before the fall of Constantinople
In 1053 Leo of Ohrid, at the instigation, according to J. B. Bury, of Patriarch Michael Cerularius of Constantinople,[201] wrote to Bishop John of Trani a letter, intended for all the Latin bishops, including the pope, in which he attacked Western practices such as using unleavened bread for the Eucharist, and fasting rules that differed from those in Constantinople, while Cerularius himself closed all Latin churches in Constantinople.
In response, Leo IX wrote the letter In terra pax of 2 September 1053,[202] addressed to Cerularius and Leo of Ohrid, in which he speaks at length of the privileges granted through Saint Peter to the see of Rome. In one of the 41 sections of his letter he also speaks of privileges granted by the emperors, quoting from the Donation of Constantine document, which he believed to be genuine (section 20).[203] Some scholars say that this letter was never actually dispatched, but was set aside and that the papal reply actually sent was the softer but still harsh letter Scripta tuae of January 1054.[204]
The advance of the Norman conquest of southern Italy constituted a threat to the possessions of both the Byzantine Empire and the papacy, each of which sought the support of the other. Accordingly, conciliatory letters, the texts of which have not been preserved, were written to the pope by the emperor and Cerularius. In his January 1054 reply to the emperor, Quantas gratias,[202] Leo IX asks for his assistance against the Normans and complains of what the pope saw as Caerularius’s arrogance. In his reply to Caerularius,[205] he upbraided the patriarch for trying to subject the patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch to himself and for adopting the title of Ecumenical Patriarch and insisted on the primacy of the see of Rome.[203]
Division between the Eastern and Western Churches[206]
These two letters were entrusted to a delegation of three legates, headed by the undiplomatic cardinal Humbert of Silva Candida, and also including Frederick of Lorraine, who was papal secretary and Cardinal-Deacon of Santa Maria in Domnica, and Peter, Archbishop of Amalfi. They were given friendship and support by the emperor but were spurned by the patriarch. Finally, on 16 July 1054, three months after Pope Leo’s death in April 1054 and nine months before the next pope took office,[204] they laid on the altar of Hagia Sophia, which was prepared for the celebration of the Divine Liturgy, a bull of excommunication of Cerularius and his supporters. At a synod held on 20 July 1054, Cerularius in turn excommunicated the legates.[203][207] In reality, only Michael may have been excommunicated along with his then-living adherents.[i]
At the time of the excommunications, many contemporary historians, including Byzantine chroniclers, did not consider the event significant.[208][209][210][211]
Efforts were made in subsequent centuries by emperors, popes and patriarchs to heal the rift between the churches. However, a number of factors and historical events worked to widen the separation over time.[212]
East and West since 1054
„Even after 1054 friendly relations between East and West continued. The two parts of Christendom were not yet conscious of a great gulf of separation between them. … The dispute remained something of which ordinary Christians in East and West were largely unaware”.[211]
There was no single event that marked the breakdown. Rather, the two churches slid into and out of schism over a period of several centuries, punctuated with temporary reconciliations.
Sectarian tensions in the Byzantine Empire in the 11th–12th centuries
Starting from the late 11th century, the dependency of the Byzantine Empire on the navies of the Republic of Venice and, to a lesser extent, the Republic of Genoa and the Republic of Pisa, led to the predominance of Catholic merchants in Byzantium—which had received major trading concessions since the 1080s—subsequently causing economic and social upheaval. Together with the perceived arrogance of the Italians, it fueled popular resentment amongst the middle and lower classes both in the countryside and in the cities.[213]
By the second half of the 12th century, the practically uncontrollable rivalry among competitors from the different city-states devolved to the point that Italians were raiding the quarters of other Italians in the capital, and retaliatory draconian measures by the Byzantine authorities led to the deterioration of inter-religious relations in the city.
When in 1182 the regency of the empress mother, Maria of Antioch, an ethnical French notorious for the favouritism shown to Latin merchants and the big aristocratic land-owners, was deposed by Andronikos I Komnenos in the wake of popular support, the new emperor allowed mobs to massacre the hated foreigners. Henceforth Byzantine foreign policy was invariably perceived as sinister and anti-Latin in the West.[214]
Fourth Crusade (1204) and other military conflicts
In the course of the Fourth Crusade of 1202–1204 Latin crusaders and Venetian merchants sacked Constantinople itself (1204), looting the Church of Holy Wisdom and various other Orthodox holy sites,[215] and converting them to Latin Catholic worship. The Norman Crusaders also destroyed the Imperial Library of Constantinople.[216][217][218] Various holy artifacts from these Orthodox holy places were taken to the West. The crusaders also appointed a Latin Patriarch of Constantinople.[215] The conquest of Constantinople and the final treaty established the Latin Empire of the East and the Latin Patriarch of Constantinople (with various other Crusader states). Later some religious artifacts were sold in Europe to finance or fund the Latin Empire in Byzantium – as when Emperor Baldwin II of Constantinople (r. 1228–1261) sold the relic of the Crown of Thorns while in France trying to raise new funds to maintain his hold on Byzantium.[219] In 1261 the Byzantine emperor, Michael VIII Palaiologos brought the Latin Empire to an end. However, the Western attack on the heart of the Byzantine Empire is seen[by whom?] as a factor that led eventually to its conquest by Ottoman Muslims in the 15th century.[citation needed] Many scholars believe that the 1204 sacking of Constantinople contributed more to the schism than the events of 1054.[220]
The Second Council of Lyon was convoked to act on a pledge by Michael VIII to reunite the Eastern church with the West.[222] Wishing to end the Great Schism that divided Rome and Constantinople, Gregory X had sent an embassy to Michael VIII, who had reconquered Constantinople, putting an end to the remnants of the Latin Empire in the East, and he asked Latin despots in the East to curb their ambitions.
On 29 June (the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, a patronal feast of the Popes), Gregory X celebrated a Mass in St John’s Church, where both sides took part. The council declared that the Roman church possessed „the supreme and full primacy and authority over the universal Catholic Church.”
The union effected was „a sham and a political gambit”, a fiction maintained by the emperor to prevent westerners from recovering the city of Constantinople, which they had lost just over a decade before, in 1261.[223][224][225] It was fiercely opposed by clergy and people[226][224] and never put into effect,[227] in spite of a sustained campaign by Patriarch John XI of Constantinople (John Bekkos), a convert to the cause of union, to defend the union intellectually, and vigorous and brutal repression of opponents by Michael.[226][228] In 1278 Pope Nicholas III, learning of the fictitious character of Greek conformity,[229] sent legates to Constantinople, demanding the personal submission of every Orthodox cleric and adoption of the Filioque,[230] as already the Greek delegates at Lyon had been required to recite the Creed with the inclusion of Filioque and to repeat it two more times.[231] Emperor Michael’s attempts to resolve the schism ended when Pope Martin IV, seeing that the union was only a sham, excommunicated Michael VIII in 1281 in support of Charles of Anjou‘s attempts to mount a new campaign to retake the Eastern Roman provinces lost to Michael.[226][232][233][234][235][236][237][238] Michael VIII’s son and successor Andronicus II repudiated the union, and Bekkos was forced to abdicate, being eventually exiled and imprisoned until his death in 1297.
In the 15th century, the eastern emperor John VIII Palaiologos, pressed hard by the Ottoman Turks, was keen to ally himself with the West, and to do so he arranged with Pope Eugene IV for discussions about the reunion to be held again, this time at the Council of Ferrara-Florence. After several long discussions, the emperor managed to convince the Eastern representatives to accept the Western doctrines of Filioque, Purgatory and the supremacy of the Papacy. On 6 June 1439, an agreement was signed by all the Eastern bishops present but one, Mark of Ephesus, who held that Rome continued in both heresy and schism. It seemed that the Great Schism had been ended. However, upon their return, the Eastern bishops found their agreement with the West broadly rejected by the populace and by civil authorities (with the notable exception of the Emperors of the East who remained committed to union until the Fall of Constantinople two decades later). The union signed at Florence has never been accepted by the Eastern churches.
Fall of Constantinople (1453) and thereafter
At the time of the Fall of Constantinople to the invading Ottoman Empire in May 1453, Orthodox Christianity was already entrenched in Russia, whose political and de facto religious centre had shifted from Kiev to Moscow. The Russian Church, a part of the Church of Constantinople until the mid-15th century, was granted full independence (autocephaly) and elevated to the rank of Patriarchate in 1589. The Russian political and ecclesiastical elite came to view Moscow as the Third Rome, a legitimate heir to Constantinople and Byzantium.[229]
Under Ottoman rule, the Orthodox Church acquired the status of an autonomous millet, specifically the Rum Millet. The Ecumenical Patriarch became the ruler (millet başı) of all the Orthodox Christian subjects of the empire, including non-Greeks. Upon conquering Constantinople, Mehmed II assumed the legal function of the Byzantine emperors and appointed Patriarch Gennadius II. The sultans enhanced the temporal powers of the Greek orthodox hierarchy that came to be politically beholden solely to the Ottoman sultan and, along with other Ottoman Greeknobles, came to run the Balkan Orthodox domains of the Ottoman Empire. As a result, the entire Orthodox communion of the Balkans and the Near East became isolated from the rest of Christendom. For the next four hundred years, it would be confined within the Islamic world, with which it had little in common religiously or culturally.
In Russia, the anti-Catholic sentiments came to be entrenched by the Polish intervention during the Time of Troubles in the early 17th century, which was seen as an attempt to convert Moscow to Catholicism. The modern Russian national holiday, Unity Day, was established on the day of church celebration in honour of the Our Lady of Kazan icon, which is believed to have miraculously saved Moscow from outright Polish conquest in 1612. Patriarch Hermogenes of Moscow was executed by the Poles and their supporters during this period (see also Polish–Lithuanian–Muscovite Commonwealth).[239][240]
In the 16th and 17th centuries, there were various attempts at unions between the Roman Church and various groups within Eastern Orthodoxy. The final separation between the Catholic Church on one hand and the Eastern Orthodox Churches on the other came only in the 18th century: in 1729, the Roman Church under Pope Benedict XIII prohibited communion with Orthodox Churches, and in 1755, the patriarchs of Alexandria, Jerusalem and Constantinople in retaliation declared the final interruption of sacral communion with the Roman Church and declared Catholicism heretical.[241]
First Vatican Council (1870)
The doctrine of papal primacy was further developed at the First Vatican Council, which declared that „in the disposition of God the Roman church holds the preeminence of ordinary power over all the other churches”. This council also affirmed the dogma of papal infallibility, declaring that the infallibility of the Christian community extends to the pope himself when he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church. This new dogma, as well as the dogma of the Immaculate Conception, promulgated in Ineffabilis Deus a few years prior, are unequivocally rejected by the Eastern Church as heretical.[61][failed verification]
The Eastern Catholic Churches, historically referred to as ″uniate″ by the Orthodox, consider themselves to have reconciled the East and West Schism by having accepted the primacy of the Bishop of Rome while retaining some of the canonical rules and liturgical practices in line with the Eastern tradition such as the Byzantine Rite that is prevalent in the Orthodox Churches. Some Eastern Orthodox charge that joining in this unity comes at the expense of ignoring critical doctrinal differences and past atrocities.
In 1993, a report written by the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue Between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church during its 7th plenary session at the Balamand School of Theology in Lebanon stated:[246][j] „Because of the way in which Catholics and Orthodox once again consider each other in their relationship to the mystery of the Church and discover each other once again as Sister Churches, this form of ‘missionary apostolate’ described above, and which has been called ′uniatism′, can no longer be accepted either as a method to be followed nor as a model of the unity our Churches are seeking”. At the same time, the document inter alia stated:
Concerning the Oriental Catholic Churches, it is clear that they, as part of the Catholic Communion, have the right to exist and to act in answer to the spiritual needs of their faithful.
The Oriental Catholic Churches who have desired to re-establish full communion with the See of Rome and have remained faithful to it, have the rights and obligations which are connected with this communion. The principles determining their attitude towards Orthodox Churches are those which have been stated by the Second Vatican Council and have been put into practice by the Popes who have clarified the practical consequences flowing from these principles in various documents published since then. These Churches, then, should be inserted, on both local and universal levels, into the dialogue of love, in mutual respect and reciprocal trust found once again, and enter into the theological dialogue, with all its practical implications.
In February 2016, Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), had a meeting in Cuba and signed a joint declaration that stated inter alia: „It is our hope that our meeting may also contribute to reconciliation wherever tensions exist between Greek Catholics and Orthodox. It is today clear that the past method of ‘uniatism’, understood as the union of one community to the other, separating it from its Church, is not the way to re-establish unity. Nonetheless, the ecclesial communities which emerged in these historical circumstances have the right to exist and to undertake all that is necessary to meet the spiritual needs of their faithful, while seeking to live in peace with their neighbours. Orthodox and Greek Catholics are in need of reconciliation and of mutually acceptable forms of co-existence.”[247][248][249] Meanwhile, in the interview published on the eve of the meeting in Cuba, Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev, the chairman of the Department of External Church Relations and a permanent member of the Holy Synod of the ROC, said that tensions between the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church and the ROC’s Ukrainian Orthodox Church had been recently heightened mainly due to the conflict in Ukraine.[250] The declaration was sharply criticised by Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the Primate of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, who said that his flock felt „betrayed” by the Vatican.[251][252][253]
On a number of occasions, Pope John Paul II recited the Nicene Creed with patriarchs of the Eastern Orthodox Church in Greek according to the original text.[254] Both he and his successor, Pope Benedict XVI, have recited the Nicene Creed jointly with Patriarchs Demetrius I and Bartholomew I in Greek without the Filioque clause, „according to the usage of the Byzantine Churches”.[255][256] This accords with the Catholic Church’s practice of including the clause when reciting the Creed in Latin,[257] but not when reciting it in Greek.[258]
In June 1995, Patriarch Bartholomew I, of Constantinople, visited Vatican City for the first time, and joined in the historic inter-religious day of prayer for peace at Assisi. John Paul II and Bartholomew I explicitly stated their mutual „desire to relegate the excommunications of the past to oblivion and to set out on the way to re-establishing full communion”.[259] In May 1999, John Paul II was the first pope since the Great Schism to visit an Eastern Orthodox country: Romania. Upon greeting John Paul II, the Romanian Patriarch Teoctist stated: „The second millennium of Christian history began with a painful wounding of the unity of the Church; the end of this millennium has seen a real commitment to restoring Christian unity.” John Paul II visited other heavily Orthodox areas such as Ukraine, despite lack of welcome at times, and he said that healing the divisions between Western and Eastern Christianity was one of his fondest wishes.
The Patriarch’s partial participation in the Eucharistic liturgy at which the Pope presided followed the program of the past visits of Patriarch Dimitrios (1987) and Patriarch Bartholomew I himself: full participation in the Liturgy of the Word, a joint proclamation by the Pope and by the Patriarch of the profession of faith according to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed in Greek and as the conclusion, the final Blessing imparted by both the Pope and the Patriarch at the Altar of the Confessio.[260] The Patriarch did not fully participate in the Liturgy of the Eucharist involving the consecration and distribution of the Eucharist itself.[259]
Prospects for reconciliation
Despite efforts on the part of Catholic Popes and Orthodox Patriarchs to heal the schism, only limited progress towards reconciliation has been made over the last half-century. One stumbling block is the fact that the Orthodox and the Catholics have different perceptions of the nature of the divide. The official Catholic teaching is that the Orthodox are schismatic, meaning that there is nothing heretical about their theology, only their unwillingness to accept the supremacy of the Pope which is presented in Catholic teaching as chiefly an ecclesiological issue, not so much a theological one. The Orthodox object to the Catholic doctrines of Purgatory, Substitutionary atonement, the Immaculate Conception, and papal supremacy, among others, as heretical doctrines.[261] With respect to Primacy of the Pope, the two churches agree that the Pope, as Bishop of Rome, has primacy although they continue to have different interpretations of what that primacy entails.
The Catholic Church’s attitude was expressed by John Paul II in the image of the Church „breathing with her two lungs”.[262] He meant that there should be a combination of the more rational, juridical, organization-minded „Latin” temperament with the intuitive, mystical and contemplative spirit found in the East.[263]
In the Orthodox view, the Bishop of Rome (i.e. the Pope) would have universal primacy in a reunited Christendom, as primus inter pares without the power of jurisdiction.[264]
Ecclesiological reconciliation
The Eastern Orthodox insist that the primacy is largely one of honor, the Pope being „first among equals” primus inter pares. The Catholic Church, on the other hand, insists on the doctrine of Supremacy. It is widely understood that, if there is to be reconciliation, both sides will have to compromise on this doctrine. Although some commentators have proposed ways in which such compromise can be achieved, there is no official indication that such compromise is being contemplated.
In his book Principles of Catholic Theology, Pope Benedict XVI (then Cardinal Ratzinger) assessed the range of „possibilities that are open to Christian ecumenism.” He characterized the „maximum demand” of the West as the recognition by the East of and submission to the „primacy of the bishop of Rome in the full scope of the definition of 1870…” The „maximum demand” of the East was described as a declaration by the West of the 1870 doctrine of papal primacy as erroneous along with the „removal of the Filioque from the Creed and including the Marian dogmas of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” Ratzinger asserted that „(n)one of the maximum solutions offers any real hope of unity.”[265] Ratzinger wrote that „Rome must not require more from the East than had been formulated and what was lived in the first millennium.” He concluded that „Reunion could take place in this context if, on the one hand, the East would cease to oppose as heretical the developments that took place in the West in the second millennium and would accept the Catholic Church as legitimate and orthodox in the form she had acquired in the course of that development, while on the other hand, the West would recognize the Church of the East as orthodox in the form she has always had.”[266]
The declaration of Ravenna in 2007 re-asserted the belief that the bishop of Rome is indeed the protos, although future discussions are to be held on the concrete ecclesiological exercise of papal primacy.
Some scholars such as Jeffrey Finch assert that „the future of East-West rapprochement appears to be overcoming the modern polemics of neo-scholasticism and neo-Palamism”.[267]
These doctrinal issues center around the Orthodox perception that the Catholic theologians lack the actual experience of God called theoria and thereby fail to understand the importance of the heart as a noetic or intuitive faculty. It is what they consider to be the Catholic Church’s reliance on pagan metaphysical philosophy and rational methods such as scholasticism rather than on the intuitive experience of God (theoria) that causes Orthodox to consider the Catholic Church heretical. Other points of doctrinal difference include a difference regarding human nature as well as a difference regarding original sin, purgatory, and the nature of Hell.
One point of theological difference is embodied in the dispute regarding the inclusion of the Filioque in the Nicene Creed. In the view of the Catholic Church, what it calls the legitimate complementarity of the expressions „from the Father” and „from the Father and the Son” does not provide it does not become rigid, affect the identity of faith in the reality of the same mystery confessed.[268][clarification needed] The Orthodox, on the other hand, view inclusion of the phrase to be almost heretical (see also the Trinity section).
More importantly, the Orthodox see the Filioque as just the tip of the iceberg and really just a symptom of a much more deeply rooted problem of theology, one so deeply rooted that they consider it to be heretical and even, by some characterizations, an inability to „see God” and know God. This heresy is allegedly rooted in Frankish paganism, Arianism, Platonist and Aristotelian philosophy and Thomist rational and objective Scholasticism. In opposition to what they characterize as pagan, heretical and „godless” foundations, the Orthodox rely on intuitive and mystical knowledge and vision of God (theoria) based on hesychasm and noesis.[citation needed] Catholics accept as valid the Eastern Orthodox intuitive and mystical understanding of God and consider it complementary to the rational Western reflection.[263][269]
Sacraments
Most Orthodox Churches through economy do not require baptism in the Orthodox Church for one who has been previously baptized in the Catholic Church. Most Orthodox jurisdictions, based on that same principle of economy, allow a sacramental marriage between an Orthodox Christian and some non-Orthodox Christians. The Catholic Church allows its clergy to administer the sacraments of Penance, the Eucharist and Anointing of the Sick to members of the Eastern Orthodox Church, if these spontaneously ask for the sacraments and are properly disposed.[270] It also allows Catholics who cannot approach a Catholic minister to receive these three sacraments from the clergy of the Eastern Orthodox Church, whenever necessity requires or a genuine spiritual advantage commends it, and provided the danger of error or indifferentism is avoided.[270] Catholic canon law allows marriage between a Catholic and an Orthodox.[271] The Orthodox Church will only administer the sacraments to Christians who aren’t Orthodox if there is an emergency.
The Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches authorizes the local Catholic bishop to permit a Catholic priest, of whatever rite, to bless the marriage of Orthodox faithful who being unable without great difficulty to approach a priest of their own Church, ask for this spontaneously.[272] In exceptional circumstances Catholics may, in the absence of an authorized priest, marry before witnesses. If a priest who is not authorized for the celebration of the marriage is available, he should be called in, although the marriage is valid even without his presence.[273] The Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches specifies that, in those exceptional circumstances, even a „non-Catholic” priest (and so not necessarily one belonging to an Eastern Church) may be called in.[273]
Criticism of reconciliation efforts
The efforts of Orthodox patriarchs towards reconciliation with the Catholic Church has been strongly criticized by some elements of Eastern Orthodoxy, such as the Metropolitan of Kalavryta, Greece, in November 2008.[274]
In 2010, Patriarch Bartholomew I issued an encyclical lauding the ongoing dialogue between the Orthodox Church and other Christian churches and lamenting that the dialogues between the two churches were being criticized in „an unacceptably fanatical way” by some who claim to be defenders of Orthodoxy despite the fact that these dialogues are being conducted „with the mutual agreement and participation of all local Orthodox Churches”. The Patriarch warned that „such opponents raise themselves above episcopal synods and risk creating schisms”. He further accused some critics of distorting reality to „deceive and arouse the faithful” and of depicting theological dialogue not as a pan-Orthodox effort, but an effort of the Ecumenical Patriarchate alone. As an example, he pointed to „false rumors that union between the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches is imminent” claiming that the disseminators of such rumors were fully aware that „the differences discussed in these theological dialogues remain numerous and require lengthy debate”. The Patriarch re-emphasized that „union is not decided by theological commissions but by Church Synods”.[275]
References
Notes
A late 11th-century pamphlet, Against the Franks,[5] falsely attributed to Photios I of Constantinople, lists this as second point, right after the Filioque.[6][7] In 1995, John Paul II wrote: „With the power and the authority without which such an office would be illusory, the Bishop of Rome must ensure the communion of all the Churches.” He invited „Church leaders and their theologians to examine with me in a patient and fraternal dialogue on this subject, a dialogue in which, leaving useless controversies behind, we could listen to one another, keeping before us only the will of Christ for his Church and allowing ourselves to be deeply moved by his plea ‘that they may all be one … so that the world may believe that you have sent me’[36] The Ravenna document of 13 October 2007[37] is one response to this invitation. Oriental Orthodox churches
The Orthodox attitude to the papacy is expressed by a 12th-century writer, Nicetas, Archbishop of Nicomedia
My dearest brother, we do not deny to the Roman Church the primacy amongst the five sister Patriarchates; and we recognize her right to the most honorable seat at an Ecumenical Council. But she has separated herself from us by her own deeds, when through pride she assumed a monarchy which does not belong to her office… How shall we accept decrees from her that have been issued without consulting us and even without our knowledge? If the Roman Pontiff, seated on the lofty throne of his glory, wishes to thunder at us and, so to speak, hurl his mandates at us from on high, and if he wishes to judge us and even to rule us and our Churches, not by taking counsel with us but at his own arbitrary pleasure, what kind of brotherhood, or even what kind of parenthood can this be? We should be the slaves, not the sons, of such a Church, and the Roman See would not be the pious mother of sons but a hard and imperious mistress of slaves— Runciman 1955, p. 116 and Ware 1963 The First Council of Ephesus in 431 stated that it condemned Nestorius „compelled thereto by the canons and by the letter of our most holy father and fellow-servant Coelestine, the Roman bishop”[135][134] See also the Fall of Rome Following the establishment of Constantinople (the ancient city of Byzantium) as the state capital of the Roman Empire in the early part of the 4th century, a series of significant ecclesiastical events saw the status of the Bishop of New Rome (as Constantinople was then called) elevated to its current position and privilege.[153] „[…] the Roman legates excommunicated him […] But […] there was no […] general excommunication of the Byzantine Church, still less of all the East. The legates carefully provided against that in their Bull. […] They excommunicated Caerularius, Leo of Achrida, and their adherents. […] The real tragedy is that gradually all the other Eastern patriarchs took sides with Caerularius, […] and chose […] to share his schism. […] The emperor (not Constantine IX, but his successor) was on the side of his patriarch and they had learned too well to consider the emperor as their over-lord in spiritual matters too. […] it was the usurped authority of Constantinople, the Erastianism of the East that turned a personal quarrel into a great schism.”[40]
The report contains unofficial suggestions of the commission, „until the competent organs of the Catholic Church and of the Orthodox Churches express their judgement in regard to it.”[246]
Clapsis, Emmanuel (2005). „Papal primacy”. Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. Archived from the original on 17 June 2008. Retrieved 16 October 2008.
Cross, Frank Leslie; Livingstone, Elizabeth A. (2005). „Great Schism”. The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Oxford: University Press. ISBN978-0-19-280290-3.
Schaff, Philip (1913). History of the Christian church. IV: Mediaeval Christianity from Gregory I to Gregory VII, A.D. 590-1073. New York: Scribner’s Sons.
Schaff, Philip (1910a). History of the Christian church. VOLUME VI. THE MIDDLE AGES From BONIFACE VIII., 1294 to the Protestant Reformation, 1517. New York: Scribner’s Sons.
Schaff, Philip (1910). History of the Christian church. V Part 2: From Boniface VIII., 1294 to the Protestant Reformation, 1517. New York: Scribner’s Sons.
The history of the filioque controversy is the historical development of theological controversies within Christianity regarding three distinctive issues: the orthodoxy of the doctrine of procession of the Holy Spirit as represented by the Filioque clause, the nature of anathemas mutually imposed by conflicted sides during the Filioque controversy, and the liceity (legitimacy) of the insertion of the Filioque phrase into the Nicene Creed. Although the debates over the orthodoxy of the doctrine of procession and the nature of related anathemas preceded the question of the admissibility of the phrase as inserted into the Creed, all of those issues became linked when the insertion received the approval of the Pope in the eleventh century.
First Council of Constantinople, miniature inHomilies of Gregory Nazianzus (879–882), Bibliothèque nationale de France
The first ecumenical council, that of Nicaea (actual İznik Province, Turkey) [325] ended its Creed with the words „and [sc. I believe] in the Holy Spirit „. The second, that of Constantinople in 381 spoke of the Holy Spirit as „proceeding from the Father” (ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς ἐκπορευόμενον). This last phrase is based on John 15:26 (ὃ παρὰ τοῦ πατρὸς ἐκπορεύεται).
The third ecumenical council, held at Ephesus in 431, which quoted the creed in its 325 form, not in that of 381,[1] decreed in its seventh canon:
„It is unlawful for any man to bring forward, or to write, or to compose a different (ἑτέραν) Faith as a rival to that established by the holy Fathers assembled with the Holy Ghost in Nicæa. But those who shall dare to compose a different faith, or to introduce or offer it to persons desiring to turn to the acknowledgment of the truth, whether from Heathenism or from Judaism, or from any heresy whatsoever, shall be deposed, if they be bishops or clergymen; bishops from the episcopate and clergymen from the clergy; and if they be laymen, they shall be anathematized”.[2]
While the Council of Ephesus thus forbade setting up a different creed as a rival to that of the first ecumenical council, it was the creed of the second ecumenical council that was adopted liturgically in the East and later a Latin variant was adopted in the West. The form of this creed that the West adopted had two additions: „God from God” (Deum de Deo) and „and the Son” (Filioque).[a]
Possible earliest use in the Creed
Recent discoveries have shown that the earliest known introduction of „and the Son” into the Nicene Creed may have been the work of a local council in the east, the Council of Seleucia-Ctesiphon in Persia in about 410.[4] This was some twenty years before the Nestorian Schism divided the Church in Persia from the Church in the Roman Empire; the Church in Persia after the schism became known as the Church of the East.[5]
New Testament
In John 15:26 Jesus says of the Holy Spirit: „But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.” In John 16:13–15 Jesus also says of the Holy Spirit „he will take what is mine and declare it to you”, and it is argued that in the relations between the Persons of the Trinity one Person cannot „take” or „receive” (λήψεται) anything from either of the others except by way of procession.[6] Texts such as John 20:22 („He breathed on them and said: Receive the Holy Spirit”), were seen by Fathers of the Church, especially Athanasius, Cyril of Alexandria and Epiphanius of Cyprus as grounds for saying that the Spirit „proceeds substantially from both” the Father and the Son.[7] Other texts that have been used include Galatians 4:6,Romans 8:9, Philippians 1:19, where the Holy Spirit is called „the Spirit of the Son”, „the Spirit of Christ”, „the Spirit of Jesus Christ”, and texts in the Gospel of John on the sending of the Holy Spirit by Jesus (14:16, 15:26,16:7).[6]
Anthony E. Siecienski asserts that it is important to recognize that „the New Testament does not explicitly address the procession of the Holy Spirit as later theology would understand the doctrine.” However, he asserts that there are, nonetheless „certain principles established in the New Testament that shaped later Latin Trinitarian theology, and particular texts that both Latins and Greeks exploited to support their respective positions vis-à-vis the filioque.”[8] The Orthodox believe that the absence of an explicit mention of the double procession of the Holy Spirit is a strong indication that the filioque is a theologically erroneous doctrine.[9]
Church Fathers
Before the creed of 381 became known in the West and even before it was adopted by the First Council of Constantinople, Christian writers in the West, of whom Tertullian (c. 160 – c. 220), Jerome (347–420), Ambrose (c. 338 – 397) and Augustine (354–430) are representatives, spoke of the Spirit as coming from the Father and the Son,[6] while the expression “from the Father through the Son” is also found among them.[10][11]
Tertullian, writing at the beginning of the third century, emphasizes that Father, Son and Holy Spirit all share a single divine substance, quality and power,[12] which he conceives of as flowing forth from the Father and being transmitted by the Son to the Spirit.[13]
Hilary of Poitiers, in the mid-fourth century, speaks of the Spirit as „coming forth from the Father” and being „sent by the Son” (De Trinitate 12.55); as being „from the Father through the Son” (ibid. 12.56); and as „having the Father and the Son as his source” (ibid. 2.29); in another passage, Hilary points to John 16.15 (where Jesus says: ‘All things that the Father has are mine; therefore I said that [the Spirit] shall take from what is mine and declare it to you’), and wonders aloud whether „to receive from the Son is the same thing as to proceed from the Father” (ibid. 8.20).
Ambrose of Milan, writing in the 380s, openly asserts that the Spirit „proceeds from (procedit a) the Father and the Son”, without ever being separated from either (On the Holy Spirit 1.11.20).
None of these writers, however, makes the Spirit’s mode of origin the object of special reflection; all are concerned, rather, to emphasize the equality of status of all three divine persons as God, and all acknowledge that the Father alone is the source of God’s eternal being.”[14]
Procession of the Holy Spirit
Already in the fourth century the distinction was made, in connection with the Trinity, between the two Greek verbs ἐκπορεύεσθαι (the verb used in the original Greek text of the 381 Nicene Creed) and προϊέναι. In his Oration on the Holy Lights (XXXIX), Saint Gregory of Nazianzus wrote: „The Holy Ghost is truly Spirit, coming forth (προϊέναι) from the Father indeed, but not after the manner of the Son, for it is not by Generation but by Procession (ἐκπορεύεσθαι)”.[15][16]
That the Holy Spirit „proceeds” from the Father and the Son in the sense of the Latin word procedere and the Greekπροϊέναι (as opposed to the Greek ἐκπορεύεσθαι) was taught by the early fifth century by Saint Cyril of Alexandria in the East,[6][17] the Athanasian Creed (probably of the middle of the fifth century),[18] and a dogmatic epistle of Pope Leo I,[19][b] who declared in 446 that the Holy Spirit proceeds from both Father and Son.[20]
Although the Eastern Fathers were aware that in the West the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son was taught, they did not generally regard it as heretical:[21] „a whole series of Western writers, including popes who are venerated as saints by the Eastern church, confess the procession of the Holy Spirit also from the Son; and it is even more striking that there is virtually no disagreement with this theory.”[22]
The phrase Filioque first appears as an anti-Arian[23][24] interpolation in the Creed at the Third Council of Toledo (589), at which Visigothic Spain renounced Arianism, accepting Catholic Christianity. The addition was confirmed by subsequent local councils in Toledo and soon spread throughout the West, not only in Spain, but also in the kingdom of the Franks, who had adopted the Catholic faith in 496,[25] and in England, where the Council of Hatfield imposed it in 680 as a response to Monothelitism.[26] However, it was not adopted in Rome.
Church Fathers also use the phrase „from the Father through the Son”.[l] The Roman Catholic Church accepts both phrases, and considers that they do not affect the reality of the same faith and instead express the same truth in slightly different ways.[50][51][52] The influence of Augustine of Hippo made the phrase „proceeds from the Father through the Son” popular throughout the West[53] but, while used also in the East, „through the Son” was later, according to Philip Schaff, dropped or rejected by some as being nearly equivalent to „from the Son” or „and the Son”.[54] Others spoke of the Holy Spirit proceeding „from the Father”, as in the text of the Nicaeno-Constantinopolitan Creed, which „did not state that the Spirit proceeds from the Father alone„.[55]
Hilary of Poitiers
Hilary of Poitiers is one of „the chief patristic source(s) for the Latin teaching on the filioque.” However, Siecienski notes that „there is also reason for questioning Hilary’s support for the filioque as later theology would understand it, especially given the ambiguous nature of (Hilary’s) language as it concerns the procession.”[56]
Ambrose of Milan
Ambrose of Milan, though „firmly rooted in Eastern tradition”, was nonetheless „one of the earliest witnesses to the explicit affirmation of the Spirit’s procession from the Father and the Son”.[57]
Jerome
Siecienski characterizes Jerome’s views on the procession of the Holy Spirit as „defying categorization”. His name is often included in Latin florilegia as a supporter of the filioque and Photius even felt called to defend Jerome’s reputation against those who invoked him in support of the doctrine. However, because Jerome’s writing contains scant references to the doctrine and even those are „far from ambiguous affirmations of a double procession”, Orthodox theologians such as John Meyendorff have argued that he „could hardly be regarded a proponent of the filioque”.[58]
Augustine of Hippo
Augustine’s writings on the Trinity became the foundation of Latin trinitarian theology and serves as the foundation for the doctrine of the filioque.[59]
Pope Leo I
Siecienski characterizes the writings of Pope Leo I on the subject of the procession of the Holy Spirit as a „sword that cuts both ways” in that „his writings would later be used by both Latins and Greeks to support their respective positions.”[60]
Pope Gregory the Great
Pope Gregory the Great is usually counted as a supporter of the Spirit’s procession from the Father and the Son, despite the fact that Photius and later Byzantine theologians counted him as an opponent of the doctrine. Siecienski attributes this apparent contradiction to two factors: Gregory’s „loose and unguarded language” regarding the procession and differences between the original Latin text of Gregory’s Dialogues and Pope Zacharias‘ Greek translation of them. Gregory’s text, in Latin, clearly affirmed the Filioque, but Zacharias’ translation into Greek used the phrase „abiding in the Son” rather than „proceeding from the Son”, thus leading later Byzantine clerics to assert that Gregory did not support double procession.[61]
First Eastern opposition
Saint Maximus the Confessor
In 638, the Byzantine emperor Heraclius, with the support of or at the instigation of PatriarchSergius I of Constantinople, published the Ecthesis, which defined as the official imperial form of ChristianityMonothelitism, the doctrine that, while Christ possessed two natures, he had only a single will.[62][63] This was widely accepted in the East, but before the Ecthesis reached Rome, Pope Honorius I, who had seemed to support Monothelitism, died, and his successor Pope Severinus condemned the Ecthesis outright, and so was forbidden his seat until 640. His successor Pope John IV also rejected the doctrine completely, leading to a major schism between the eastern and western halves of the Chalcedonian Church.[64]
Meanwhile, in Africa, an Eastern monk named Maximus the Confessor carried on a furious campaign against Monothelitism, and in 646 he convinced the African councils to draw up a manifesto against the doctrine. This they forwarded to the new pope Theodore I, who in turn wrote to Patriarch Paul II of Constantinople, outlining the heretical nature of the doctrine. Paul, a devoted Monothelite, replied in a letter directing the Pope to adhere to the doctrine of one will. Theodore in turn excommunicated the Patriarch in 649, declaring him a heretic,[65] after Paul, in 647 or 648, had issued in the name of Emperor Constans II an edict known as the Typos, which banned any mention of either one or two activities or wills in Christ.[63] The Typos, instead of defusing the situation, made it worse by implying that either doctrine was as good as the other.[66] Theodore planned the Lateran Council of 649 but died before he could convene it, which his successor, Pope Martin I, did. The Council condemned the Ecthesis and the Typos, and Pope Martin wrote to Constans, informing the emperor of its conclusions and requiring him to condemn both the Monothelite doctrine and his own Typos.[67] Constans responded by having Pope Martin abducted to Constantinople, where he was tried and condemned to banishment and died as a result of the torture to which he had been subjected.[68] Maximus also was tried and banished after having his tongue and his hand cut off.[69]
Maximus the Confessor (c. 580 – 13 August 662) wrote a letter in defence of the expression used by the Pope Marinus. The words with which Maximus the Confessor declared that it was wrong to condemn the Roman use of Filioque are as follows: „They [the Romans] have produced the unanimous evidence of the Latin Fathers, and also of Cyril of Alexandria, from the study he made of the gospel of St John. On the basis of these texts, they have shown that they have not made the Son the cause of the Spirit – they know in fact that the Father is the only cause of the Son and the Spirit, the one by begetting and the other by procession –but that they have manifested the procession through him and have thus shown the unity and identity of the essence. They [the Romans] have therefore been accused of precisely those things of which it would be wrong to accuse them, whereas the former [the Byzantines] have been accused of those things it has been quite correct to accuse them [Monothelitism].”[70]
As the practice of chanting the Latin Credo at Mass spread in the West, the Filioque became a part of the Latin rite liturgy. This practice was adopted in Emperor Charlemagne’s court in 798 and spread through his empire, but which, although it was in use in parts of Italy by the eighth century, was not accepted in Rome until 1014.[24][74][75]
According to John Meyendorff,[76] and John Romanides[77] the Western efforts to get Pope Leo III to approve the addition of Filioque to the Creed were due to a desire of Charlemagne, who in 800 had been crowned in Rome as Emperor, to find grounds for accusations of heresy against the East. The Pope’s refusal to approve the interpolation avoided arousing a conflict between East and West about this matter. Emperor Charlemagne accused the Patriarch of Constantinople (Saint Tarasios of Constantinople) of infidelity to the faith of the First Council of Nicaea, because he had not professed the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father „and the Son”, but only „through the Son”, an accusation strongly rejected by Rome, but repeated in Charlemagne’s commissioned work the Libri Carolini, books also rejected by the Pope.
Pope Leo III
In 808 or 809 controversy arose in Jerusalem between the Greek monks of one monastery and the Frankish Benedictines of another: the Greeks reproached the latter for, among other things, singing the creed with the Filioque included.[14][78][79][80] In response, the theology of the Filioque was expressed in the 809 local Council of Aachen.[14][80][81][82]
Pope Leo III unambiguosly supported the current theological position in the West in his time: the filioque, that is that Holy Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son;[73][83][84] he stated on this position: „it is forbidden not to believe such a great mystery of the faith”. However, he refused to change the creed[73][84] which he said was the product of the „divine illumination” of the council fathers, and considered not everything needed for salvation was in the creed. Leo III „placed two silver shields in Rome with the uninterpolated creed in both Greek and Latin”.[84] The Liber Pontificalis states Leo III put those shields „in his love for and as a safeguard for the orthodox faith”.[85]
Later again around 860AD the controversy over the Filioque and the Frankish monks broke out in the course of the disputes between Photius and Patriarch Ignatius of Constantinople.[75] In 867, Photius was Patriarch of Constantinople and issued an Encyclical to the Eastern Patriarchs, and called a council in Constantinople in which he charged the Western Church with heresy and schism because of differences in practices, in particular for the Filioque and the authority of the Papacy.[86] This moved the issue from jurisdiction and custom to one of dogma. This council declared Pope Nicholas anathema, excommunicated and deposed.[87]
Photius excluded not only „and the Son” but also „through the Son” with regard to the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit: for him „through the Son” applied only to the temporal mission of the Holy Spirit (the sending in time).[m][n][o] He maintained that the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit is „from the Father alone„.[89] This phrase was verbally a novelty.[90][91] However, Orthodox theologians generally hold that in substance the phrase was only a reaffirmation of traditional teaching.[90][91]Sergei Bulgakov, on the other hand, declared that Photius’s doctrine itself „represents a sort of novelty for the Eastern church”.[92][p]
Photius’s importance endured in regard to relations between East and West. He is recognized as a Saint by the Eastern Orthodox Church and his line of criticism has often been echoed later, making reconciliation between East and West difficult.
At least three councils (867, 869, 879) were held in Constantinople over the deposition of Ignatius by Emperor Michael III and his replacement by Photius. The Council of Constantinople of 867 was convened by Photius, so to address the question of Papal Supremacy over all of the churches and their patriarchs and the use of the filioque.[94][95][96][97]
The council of 867 was followed by the Council of Constantinople 869, which reversed the previous council and was promulgated by Rome. The Council of Constantinople in 879 restored Photius to his see. It was attended by Western legates Cardinal Peter of St Chrysogonus, Paul Bishop of Ancona and Eugene Bishop of Ostia who approved its canons, but it is unclear whether it was ever promulgated by Rome.[98]
Adoption in the Roman Rite
It was only in 1014, at the request of the German King Henry II who had come to Rome to be crowned Emperor and was surprised at the different custom in force there, that Pope Benedict VIII, who owed to Henry his restoration to the papal throne after usurpation by Antipope Gregory VI, had the Creed, with the addition of Filioque, sung at Mass in Rome for the first time.[24]
Since then the Filioque phrase has been included in the Creed throughout all the Latin Rite except where Greek is used in the liturgy,[99][100] although it was agreed to not be used by those Eastern Catholic Churches that were united with Rome by the Treaty of Brest.[101]
The council of Lyons also condemned „all who presume to deny that the holy Spirit proceeds eternally from the Father and the Son, or rashly to assert that the holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son as from two principles and not as from one.”[14][103][104]
Another attempt at reunion was made at the fifteenth-century Council of Florence, to which Emperor John VIII Palaiologos, Ecumenical Patriarch Joseph II of Constantinople, and other bishops from the East had gone in the hope of getting Western military aid against the looming Ottoman Empire. Thirteen public sessions held in Ferrara from 8 October to 13 December 1438 the Filioque question was debated without agreement. The Greeks held that any addition whatever, even if doctrinally correct, to the Creed had been forbidden by the Council of Ephesus, while the Latins claimed that this prohibition concerned meaning, not words.[105]
During the council of Florence in 1439, accord continued to be elusive, until the argument prevailed among the Greeks themselves that, though the Greek and the Latin saints expressed their faith differently, they were in agreement substantially, since saints cannot err in faith; and by 8 June the Greeks accepted the Latin statement of doctrine. On 10 June Patriarch Joseph II died. A statement on the Filioque question was included in the Laetentur Caeli decree of union, which was signed on 5 July 1439 and promulgated the next day, with Mark of Ephesus being the only bishop to refuse his signature.[105]
Council of Jerusalem in 1583 AD
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The 1583 Synod of Jerusalem condemned those who do not believe the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father alone in essence, and from Father and Son in time. In addition, this synod re-affirmed adherence to the decisions of Council of Nicaea I in AD 325.
In 1672, an Eastern Orthodox council was held in Jerusalem, presided by patriarch Dositheos Notaras. Council re-affirmed procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father alone.[106]
Recent discussion
Eastern Orthodox theologian Vasily Bolotov published in 1898 his „Thesen über das Filioque„, in which he maintained that the Filioque, like Photios’s „from the Father alone„, was a permissible theological opinion (a theologoumenon, not a dogma) that cannot be an absolute impediment to reestablishment of communion.[107][108] This thesis was supported by Eastern Orthodox theologians Sergei Bulgakov, Paul Evdokimov and I. Voronov, but was rejected by Vladimir Lossky.[107]
Several Eastern Orthodox theologians have considered the Filioque anew, with a view to reconciliation of East and West.Theodore Stylianopoulos provided in 1986 an extensive, scholarly overview of the contemporary discussion.[109] Twenty years after writing the first (1975) edition of his book, The Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Kallistos of Diokleia said that he had changed his mind and had concluded that „the problem is more in the area of semantics and different emphases than in any basic doctrinal differences”: „the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father alone” and „the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son” may both have orthodox meanings if the words translated „proceeds” actually have different meanings.[110] For some Orthodox, then, the Filioque, while still a matter of conflict, would not impede full communion of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches if other issues were resolved. But many Orthodox consider that the Filioque is in flagrant contravention of the words of Christ in the Gospel,.[q] has been specifically condemned by the Orthodox Church, and remains a fundamental heretical teaching which divides East and West.
Eastern Orthodox Christians also object that, even if the teaching of the Filioque can be defended, its interpolation into the Creed is anti-canonical.[111] The Roman Catholic Church, which like the Eastern Orthodox Church considers the teaching of the Ecumenical Councils to be infallible, „acknowledges the conciliar, ecumenical, normative and irrevocable value, as expression of the one common faith of the Church and of all Christians, of the Symbol professed in Greek at Constantinople in 381 by the Second Ecumenical Council. No profession of faith peculiar to a particular liturgical tradition can contradict this expression of the faith taught and professed by the undivided Church”,[99] but considers permissible additions that elucidate the teaching without in any way contradicting it,[112] and that do not claim to have, on the basis of their insertion, the same authority that belongs to the original. It allows liturgical use of the Apostles’ Creed as well of the Nicene Creed, and sees no essential difference between the recitation in the liturgy of a creed with orthodox additions and a profession of faith outside the liturgy such that of the Patriarch of Constantinople Saint Tarasius, who developed the Nicene Creed as follows: „the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life, who proceeds from the Father through the Son„.[99]
Some theologians have even envisaged as possible acceptance of Filioque by the Eastern Orthodox Church (Vladimir Lossky) or of „from the Father alone” by the Roman Catholic Church (André de Halleux).[107]
The Roman Catholic view that the Greek and the Latin expressions of faith in this regard are not contradictory but complementary has been expressed as follows: At the outset the Eastern tradition expresses the Father’s character as first origin of the Spirit. By confessing the Spirit as he „who proceeds from the Father”, it affirms that he comes from the Father through the Son. The Western tradition expresses first the consubstantial communion between Father and Son, by saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son (Filioque). … This legitimate complementarity, provided it does not become rigid, does not affect the identity of faith in the reality of the same mystery confessed.[113]
For this reason, the Roman Catholic Church has refused the addition of καὶ τοῦ Υἱοῦ to the formula ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς ἐκπορευόμενον of the Nicene Creed in the Churches, even of Latin rite, which use it in Greek with the Greek verb „έκπορεύεσθαι”.[99]
At the same time, the Eastern Catholic Churches, although they do not use the Filioque in the Creed, are in full communion with Rome, which accepts the Filioque in both liturgy and dogma.[r]
Importance of Saint Maximus in ecumenical relations
The study published by the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity titled „The Greek and the Latin Traditions regarding the Procession of the Holy Spirit” says that, according to Maximus the Confessor, the phrase „and from the Son” does not contradict the Holy Spirit’s procession from the Father as first origin (ἐκπόρευσις), since it concerns only the Holy Spirit’s coming (in the sense of the Latin word processio and Cyril of Alexandria‘s προϊέναι) from the Son in a way that excludes any idea of subordinationism. The study says: „The Filioque does not concern the ἐκπόρευσις of the Spirit issued from the Father as source of the Trinity, but manifests his προϊέναι (processio) in the consubstantial communion of the Father and the Son, while excluding any possible subordinationist interpretation of the Father’s monarchy”.[99]
Eastern Orthodox theologian and Metropolitan of Pergamon, John Zizioulas, says: „For Saint Maximus the Filioque was not heretical because its intention was to denote not the ἐκπορεύεσθαι (ekporeuesthai) but the προϊέναι (proienai) of the Spirit.”[115]
Zizioulas added (bold removed):[115] As Saint Maximus the Confessor insisted, however, in defence of the Roman use of the Filioque, the decisive thing in this defence lies precisely in the point that in using the Filioque the Romans do not imply a „cause” other than the Father. The notion of „cause” seems to be of special significance and importance in the Greek Patristic argument concerning the Filioque. If Roman Catholic theology would be ready to admit that the Son in no way constitutes a „cause” (aition) in the procession of the Spirit, this would bring the two traditions much closer to each other with regard to the Filioque.
In this regard, the study of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity upholds the monarchy of the Father as the „sole Trinitarian Cause [aitia] or principle [principium] of the Son and the Holy Spirit” While the Council of Florence proposed the equivalency of the two terms „cause” and „principle” and therefore implied that the Son is a cause (aitia) of the subsistence of the Holy Spirit, the letter of the Pontifical Council distinguishes between what the Greeks mean by ‘procession’ in the sense of taking origin from, applicable only to the Holy Spirit relative to the Father (ek tou Patros ekporeuomenon), and what the Latins mean by ‘procession’ as the more common term applicable to both Son and Spirit (ex Patre Filioque procedit; ek tou Patros kai tou Huiou proion). This preserves the monarchy of the Father as the sole origin of the Holy Spirit while simultaneously allowing for an intratrinitarian relation between the Son and Holy Spirit that the document defines as ‘signifying the communication of the consubstantial divinity from the Father to the Son and from the Father through and with the Son to the Holy Spirit’.”[116]
Roman Catholic theologian Avery Dulles, writing of the Eastern fathers who, while aware of the currency of the Filioque in the West, did not generally regard it as heretical, said: „Some, such as Maximus the Confessor, a seventh-century Byzantine monk, defended it as a legitimate variation of the Eastern formula that the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son.”[21]
Michael Pomazansky and John Romanides[s] hold that Maximus’ position does not defend the actual way the Roman Catholic Church justifies and teaches the Filioque as dogma for the whole church. While accepting as a legitimate and complementary expression of the same faith and reality the teaching that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son.[113] Maximus held strictly to the teaching of the Eastern Church that „the Father is the only cause of the Son and the Spirit”[t] and wrote a special treatise about this dogma.[u][v][w] Later again at the Council of Florence in 1438, the West held that the two views were contradictory.[x]
In 1995 the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity published a study titled „The Greek and the Latin Traditions regarding the Procession of the Holy Spirit”, which pointed out an important difference in meaning between the Greek verb ἐκπορεύεσθαι and the Latin verb procedere, both of which are commonly translated as „proceed”. The pontifical council stated that the Greek verb ἐκπορεύεσθαι indicates that the Spirit „takes his origin from the Father … in a principal, proper and immediate manner”, while the Latin verb, which corresponds rather to the verb προϊέναι in Greek, can be applied to proceeding even from a mediate channel.[99]
Previously the 15th century, the Greek Catholic theologian Bessarion wrote: „That the Son is not the cause of the Spirit we can also say, for we understand the meaning of cause in the strictest sense, as used in the Greek idiom, whereby cause always is understood as the primordial first cause.”[122]
Metropolitan John Zizioulas, while maintaining the explicit Orthodox position of the Father as the single origin and source of the Holy Spirit, has declared that the recent document the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity shows positive signs of reconciliation. Zizioulas states „Closely related to the question of the single cause is the problem of the exact meaning of the Son’s involvement in the procession of the Spirit. Saint Gregory of Nyssa explicitly admits a ‘mediating’ role of the Son in the procession of the Spirit from the Father. Is this role to be expressed with the help of the preposition δία (through) the Son (εκ Πατρός δι’Υιού), as Saint Maximus and other Patristic sources seem to suggest?” Zizioulas continues with „The Vatican statement notes that this is ‘the basis that must serve for the continuation of the current theological dialogue between Catholic and Orthodox’. I would agree with this, adding that the discussion should take place in the light of the ‘single cause’ principle to which I have just referred.” Zizioulas continues with saying that this „constitutes an encouraging attempt to clarify the basic aspects of the ‘Filioque’ problem and show that a rapprochement between West and East on this matter is eventually possible”.[115]
John Romanides too, while personally opposing the „Filioque”, has stated that in itself, outside the Creed, the phrase is not considered to have been condemned by the 879–880 Council of Constantinople, „since it did not teach that the Son is ‘cause’ or ‘co-cause’ of the existence of the Holy Spirit”; however, it could not be added to the Creed, „where ‘procession’[y] means ‘cause’ of existence of the Holy Spirit”.[123]
Joint statement in the United States in 2003
The Filioque was the main subject discussed at the 62nd meeting of the North American Orthodox-Catholic Theological Consultation, in June 2002. In October 2003, the Consultation issued an agreed statement, The Filioque: A Church-Dividing Issue?, which provides an extensive review of Scripture, history, and theology. The statement included some mutual recommendations for the two groups.[124][125]
In the judgment of the consultation, the question of the Filioque is no longer a „Church-dividing” issue, which would impede full reconciliation and full communion.[124][125]
The two texts, Greek and Latin, are given in Nicene Creed#Ancient liturgical versions.[3] „The Holy Ghost is from the Father and the Son, neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding”. In the original Latin:”Spiritus Sanctus a Patre et Filio: non factus, nec creatus, nec genitus, sed procedens”. Saint Hilary wrote: „Concerning the Holy Spirit I ought not to be silent, and yet I have no need to speak; still, for the sake of those who are in ignorance, I cannot refrain. There is no need to speak, because we are bound to confess Him, proceeding, as He does, from Father and Son.” This English translation of De Trinitate2:29 is cited in Swete 2011[27] The passage is cited in various other sources.[28][29][30][31][32] He also said that the Holy Spirit „receives from both the Father and the Son”[33] Saint Ephrem declared: „The Father is the Begetter, the Son the Begotten from the bosom of the Father, the Holy Spirit He that proceedeth from the Father and the Son”[34] The text given in Price, 2001[35] has a misprint: „The Father is the Begotten”, in place of „The Father is the Begetter”. It is cited also in [36] Cyril of Alexandria could argue (against the Nestorians) that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. In fact, Greek fathers from Epiphanius to as late as Cyril of Alexandria referred to the Spirit’s procession from the Father and the Son (citing Barth, Church Dogmatics, vol. I, pt. 1, 477, referring to Epiphanius, Ephraim and Cyril of Alexandria).”[37] Saint Epiphanius of Salamis wrote: „Christ is believed to be from the Father, God from God, and the Spirit from Christ, from both” (Χριστὸς ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς πιστεύεται Θεὸς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, καὶ τὸ Πνεῦμα ἐκ τοῦ Χριστοῦ, ἢ παρ’ ἀμφοτέρων –Ancoratus 67 in PG 43 137B). This is quoted also by Gerald Bray,[38] Epiphanius also stated: „The Spirit breathes from Father and Son” (τὸ Πνεῦμα ἐκ Πατρὸς καὶ Υἱοῦ πνέει – Ancoratus 75 in PG 43 157A); „The Spirit is God from Father and Son” (Ἄρα Θεὸς ἐκ Πατρὸς καὶ Υἱοῦ τὸ Πνεῦμα – Ancoratus 9 in PG 32C). „Epiphanius could say that the Holy Spirit proceeds from both the Father and the Son”[39] He used the same phrase, „from Father and Son”, also in hisPanarion 62, and a similar phrase in his Ancoratus 73, both of which are quoted by Bray. Saint Ambrose stated: „When the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, He is not separated from the Father, He is not separated from the Son” (Spiritus quoque sanctus cum procedit a Patre et Filio, non separatur a Patre, non separatur a Filio – PL 16:733A[40] Saint Augustine wrote: „God the Father alone is He from whom the Word is born, and from whom the Holy Spirit principally proceeds. And therefore I have added the word ‘principally’, because we find that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Son also. But the Father gave Him this too, not as to one already existing, and not yet having it; but whatever He gave to the only-begotten Word, He gave by begetting Him. Therefore He so begat Him as that the common Gift should proceed from Him also, and the Holy Spirit should be the Spirit of both”[41] Saint Cyril of Alexandria declared: „The Spirit proceeds (πρόεισι) from the Father and the Son; clearly, he is of the divine substance (οὐσίας), proceeding (προϊόν) substantially in it and from it” (Πρόεισι δὲ καὶ ἐκ Πατρὸς καὶ Υἱοῦ. πρόδηλον ὅτι τῆς θείας ἐστιν οὐσίας, οὐσιωδῶς ἐν αὐτῇ καὶ ἐξ αὐτῆς προϊόν) in Thesaurus, PG 75, 585A).[42] Cyril made similar statements also in other passages: „Cyril In Ev. Joh. 2, p. 126 (PG 74.443B); De adoratione in spiritu et veritate 1 (PG 68.148A),[43][44] The ninth of his anathemas against Nestorius states that „it was by his own proper Spirit through whom (Jesus) worked the divine wonders”[45] Saint Leo the Great dogmatically condemned denial of the distinction between the Father, „who begot”, the Son, „who is begotten”, and the Holy Spirit, „who proceeds from both”.[46] Saint Maximus the Confessor wrote that the Romans „have produced the unanimous evidence of the Latin Fathers, and also of Cyril of Alexandria, from the study he made of the gospel of St John. On the basis of these texts, they have shown that they have not made the Son the cause of the Spirit – they know in fact that the Father is the only cause of the Son and the Spirit, the one by begetting and the other by procession”[47] For instance, Tertullian („I believe that the Spirit proceeds not otherwise than from the Father through the Son” – Against Praxeas 4:1) and John of Damascus („The Holy Spirit is the power of the Father revealing the hidden mysteries of His Divinity, proceeding from the Father through the Son”)[49] „Photius could concede that the Spirit proceeds through the Son in his temporal mission in the created order but not in his actual eternal being” [Henry Chadwick, East and West: The Making of a Rift in the Church (Oxford University Press, 2003 ISBN0-19-926457-0), p. 154] „Photius and the later Eastern controversialists dropped or rejected the per Filium, as being nearly equivalent to ex Filio or Filioque, or understood it as being applicable only to the mission of the Spirit, and emphasized the exclusiveness of the procession from the Father” (Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, volume IV, §108). „In general, and already since Photius, the Greek position consisted in distinguishing theeternal procession of the Son from the Father, and the sending of the Spirit in time through the Son and by the Son”[88] In the same book, Bulgakov writes: „The Cappadocians expressed only one idea: the monarchy of the Father and, consequently, the procession of the Holy Spirit precisely from the Father. They never imparted to this idea, however, the exclusiveness that it acquired in the epoch of the Filioque disputes after Photius, in the sense of ek monou tou Patros (from the Father alone)” (p. 48); and what he wrote on page 96 has been summarized as follows: „Bulgakov finds it amazing that with all his erudition Photius did not see that the ‘through the Spirit’ of Damascene and others constituted a different theology from his own, just as it is almost incomprehensible to find him trying to range the Western Fathers and popes on his Monopatrist side.”[93] Quoting Aleksey Khomyakov, Lossky says „The legal formalism and logical rationalism of the Roman Catholic Church have their roots in the Roman State. These features developed in it more strongly than ever when the Western Church without consent of the Eastern introduced into the Nicean Creed the filioque clause. Such arbitrary change of the creed is an expression of pride and lack of love for one’s brethren in the faith. „In order not to be regarded as a schism by the Church, Romanism was forced to ascribe to the bishop of Rome absolute infallibility.” In this way, Catholicism broke away from the Church as a whole and became an organization based upon external authority. Its unity is similar to the unity of the state: it is not super-rational but rationalistic and legally formal. Rationalism has led to the doctrine of the works of supererogation, established a balance of duties and merits between God and man, weighing in the scales sins and prayers, trespasses and deeds of expiation; it adopted the idea of transferring one person’s debts or credits to another and legalized the exchange of assumed merits; in short, it introduced into the sanctuary of faith the mechanism of a banking house.”[111] „The original form of the Nicene Creed says that the Holy Spirit proceeds ‘from the Father’. The phrase ‘and the Son’ was added, in the West, in the following centuries. Though it is quite true to say that the Spirit proceeds from both the ‘Father and the Son’, the Eastern Church, encouraged by the Holy See, has asked us to return to the original form of the Creed”[114] (emphasis added) 6. Neither the Roman papacy, nor the East Romans ever interpreted the council of 879 as a condemnation of the west Roman Filioque outside the Creed, since it did not teach that the Son is „cause” or „co-cause” of the existence of the Holy Spirit. This could not be added to the Creed where „procession” means „cause” of existence of the Holy Spirit. Neither Maximus the Confessor (7th century), nor Anastasius the Librarian (9th century) say that the west Roman Filioque „can be understood in an orthodox way,” as claimed by the DAS (45, 95). They both simply explain why it is orthodox. Also neither uses the term „EKFANSIS” in their texts (DAS 45). Maximus uses the Greek term „PROΪENAI” and, being a west Roman and Latin speaking, Anastasius uses „Missio”. Both point out that the Roman „procedere” has two meanings, „cause” and „mission”. When used as „cause”, like in the Creed, the Holy Spirit proceeds only from the Father. When used as „mission”, the Holy Spirit, proceeds from the Father and the Son as denoting the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father. All East Roman Fathers say the same, but do not use the term „EKPOREYSIS” to do so. This mission of the Holy Spirit is not servile, but free since he has the same essence and its natural will, and by nature, from the father through/and the Son. Anastasius the Librarian, who was for a time pope, played an important role in the papacy’s preparations for the council of 879 in New Rome. One would have to either conclude that the Roman papacy from the time of Leo III (795–816) had become schizophrenic, both supporting and condemning the Filioque, or else come up with some such analysis as this writer has been proposing.[117] His own words, quoted above; cf. „Adhering to the Eastern tradition, John (of Damascus) affirmed (as Maximus had a century earlier) that „the Father alone is cause [αἴτιος]” of both the Son and the Spirit, and thus „we do not say that the Son is a cause or a father, but we do say that He is from the Father and is the Son of the Father”[118] „7. Not one West Roman Father ever said that the Son is either „cause” or „co-cause” of the Holy Spirit. This appears in Latin polemics and was promulgated as dogma at the council of Florence. This Filoque is a heresy, both as a theologoumenon and as a dogma. The Uniates accept this Filioque as a condition of being united to the Latin Papacy.”[119] When the Eastern Church first noticed a distortion of the dogma of the Holy Spirit in the West and began to reproach the Western theologians for their innovations, St. Maximus the Confessor (in the 7th century), desiring to defend the Westerners, justified them precisely by saying that by the words “from the Son” they intended to indicate that the Holy Spirit is given to creatures through the Son, that He is manifested, that He is sent — but not that the Holy Spirit has His existence from Him. St. Maximus the Confessor himself held strictly to the teaching of the Eastern Church concerning the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and wrote a special treatise about this dogma.[120] This confusion is nowhere so clear than during the debates at the Council of Florence where the Franks used the terms „cause” and „caused” as identical with their generation and procession, and supported their claim that the Father and the Son are one cause of the procession of the Holy Spirit. Thus, they became completely confused over Maximos who explains that for the West of his time, the Son is not the cause of the existence of the Holy Spirit, so that in this sense the Holy Spirit does not proceed from the Father. That Anastasios the Librarian repeats this is ample evidence of the confusion of both the Franks and their spiritual and theological descendants.[121] During the ensuing centuries-long course of the controversy, the Franks not only forced the Patristic tradition into an Augustinian mold, but they confused Augustine’s Trinitarian terminology with that of the Father’s of the First and Second Ecumenical Synods. This is nowhere so evident as in the Latin handling of Maximos the Confessor’s description, composed in 650, of the West Roman Orthodox Filioque at the Council of Florence (1438–42). The East Romans hesitated to present Maximos’ letter to Marinos about this West Roman Orthodox Filioque because the letter did not survive in its complete form. They were pleasantly surprised, however, when Andrew, the Latin bishop of Rhodes, quoted the letter in Greek in order to prove that in the time of Maximos there was no objection to the Filioque being in the Creed. Of course, the Filioque was not yet in the Creed. Then Andrew proceeded to translate Maximos into Latin for the benefit of the pope. However, the official translator intervened and challenged the rendition. Once the correct translation was established, the Franks then questioned the authenticity of the text. They assumed that their own Filioque was the only one in the West, and so they rejected on this ground Maximos’ text as a basis of union.[121]
Doctrine, from the Latin word doctrina, meaning “teaching, learning” helps Christians organize and explain the beliefs that the church learns from the Bible. The core teachings of the Bible have defined Christianity for 2,000 years. Virtually all Christians who seek to have a faith that is biblical (based on the Bible) hold to some form of these basic doctrines. Christians may not always agree on how to work out the details of their faith, but they should agree on the essential doctrines, these core truths.
The essential doctrines of the Christian faith can be identified by looking at the core truth of the gospel, which is the salvation of humanity through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Salvation, as God has revealed to us through his Holy Scriptures, is defined as the forgiveness of sins and everlasting life with God by confessing that “Jesus is Lord” and believing that God raised him from the dead. (Romans 10:9)
By examining the message of the gospel, we can identify 14 doctrines that are necessary for salvation to be possible. In addition, there are a dozen or so additional non-essential doctrines that are also commonly-accepted by all Christians. These are summarized in the following creeds and then individually outlined and further explained in our “Christian Beliefs Explained” page.
Creed, comes from the Latin word credo, meaning “I believe.” The creeds of the early church—the Apostolic, Nicene, Athanasian, and Chalcedonian creeds—were very important responses to heretical (false) teachings (that contradict another teaching accepted as the norm) during the first few centuries of early Christianity. Most of the heresies in the early church were related to our understanding of God and Jesus. By understanding and affirming these creeds today it will make it easier to keep from repeating falling into the errors of false beliefs that continue to spring up. The Creeds matter because:
The creeds focus on the essential beliefs that cannot be compromised and help Christians distinguish between essential and non-essential beliefs.
Creeds help Christians to focus their faith and worship on the issues that matter the most and provide a unifying focus.
Creeds help Christians articulate clearly how their beliefs differ from other teachings.
Note: It is important to note that while the creeds were formulated in between the second and fifth centuries, they are all based on what can be learned from the earliest reliable information available—which was the ancient Hebrew scriptures and the eye-witness accounts of the apostles—which is now the Old and New Testaments of the Holy Bible—which was written, according to tradition, no later than AD 95. (and arguably earlier) For additional general information please see our article: Introduction to Biblical Christianity.
Also note that the term catholic below means “universal,” in the sense of the whole world. This has been accepted by all Christians ensuring to use a lowercase “c” to differentiate the term here from identification the Roman Catholic Church. Therefore, in terms of the universal acceptance of these creeds, it refers, then, to the catholic church meaning “Christ’s Church”, i.e. the worldwide fellowship of all believers.
Romani 10 „Dacă* mărturiseşti deci cu gura ta pe Isus ca Domn şi dacă crezi în inima ta că Dumnezeu L-a înviat din morţi, vei fi mântuit. 10 Căci prin credinţa din inimă se capătă neprihănirea şi prin mărturisirea cu gura se ajunge la mântuire, 11 după cum zice Scriptura: „Oricine* crede în El nu va fi dat de ruşine.” 12 În adevăr, nu* este nicio deosebire între iudeu şi grec, căci toţi au acelaşi** Domn, care† este bogat în îndurare pentru toţi cei ce-L cheamă. 13 Fiindcă* oricine va chema Numele** Domnului va fi mântuit.
Evrei 13:15-16 Prin Isus, prin urmare, să oferim continuu lui Dumnezeu o jertfă de laudă – rodul buzelor care mărturisesc numele Lui. Și nu uitați să faceți binele și să împărtășiți cu ceilalți, căci cu astfel de jertfe este plăcut lui Dumnezeu.
Evrei 3:1 De aceea, sfinți frați, care vă împărtășiți chemarea cerească, îndreptați-vă gândurile la Iisus, apostolul și marele preot pe care îl mărturisim.
Chiar și atunci când ne gândim informal la ceea ce credem și împărtășim asta nouă celorlalți, dezvoltăm și mărturisim crezuri (afirmații care rezumă ceea ce credem). Încă de la început (încă din primele zile ale apostolului și scrierile lor), creștinii au avut întotdeauna în mare atenție conceptul de crezuri, iar asta chiar nu ar trebui să ne surprindă. La urma urmei, Biblia este plină de exemple de credincioși care au proclamat ceea ce au crezut. Scripturile conțin multe exemple de credincioși care au făcut declarații de credință scurte și concise, iar aceste afirmații sunt de fapt crezuri în miniatură. Iată doar câteva:
1 Regi 18:39 Și când tot poporul a văzut asta, s-a aruncat cu fața la pământ; și au zis: „Domnul, el este Dumnezeu; Domnul, el este Dumnezeu.”
Matei 16:16 Simon Petru a răspuns: „Tu ești Hristosul, Fiul Dumnezeului celui viu”.
Fapte 8:36-37 Și mergând pe drum, au ajuns la niște apă, iar famenul a zis: „Iată, iată apă. Ce mă împiedică să fiu botezat?” Și Filip a spus: „Dacă crezi din toată inima, poți.” Iar el a răspuns: „Cred că Isus Hristos este Fiul lui Dumnezeu”.
Credincioșii și-au proclamat credința de-a lungul secolelor și, când au făcut asta, ei proclamau crezuri ; scurte afirmații de adevăr.
Fapte 15:23-29 Și au trimis această scrisoare prin ei,
„Apostolii și frații bătrâni, fraților din Antiohia și Siria și Cilicia, care sunt din neamuri, salutări. Întrucât am auzit că unii din numărul nostru, cărora nu le-am dat nicio învățătură, v-au tulburat cu cuvintele lor, tulburând sufletele voastre, ni s-a părut bine, fiindcă am ajuns la un gând, să alegem oameni să vă trimitem împreună cu iubitul nostru Barnaba și Pavel, oameni care și-au riscat viața pentru numele Domnului nostru Isus Hristos. De aceea i-am trimis pe Iuda și pe Sila, care vor spune și ei aceleași lucruri prin cuvânt. Căci Duhului Sfânt și nouă ni s-a părut bine să nu vă punem nicio povară mai mare decât aceste lucruri esențiale: să vă abțineți de la lucrurile jertfite idolilor și de la sânge și de la cele sugrumate și de la curvie; dacă vă feriți de asemenea lucruri, veți face bine. Ramas bun.”
Representing Christianity’s earliest official, formal profession of faith. ca. AD 140 – 175
This is the earliest official creed in Christianity, likely dating to at least the middle second century, although no one knows for sure when this creed was written. References to and quotations of similar statements—known as the “Rule of Faith” appear in Against Heresies by Irenaeus (AD 175).
The noticeably-trinitarian structure was likely intended to counter the teachings of Marcion who denied that the God of the Old Testament was the same God revealed in Jesus Christ. Marcion, who was already condemned around AD 144, taught that the Old Testament God—who was angry and vengeful—had nothing to do with the God of the New Testament—who is loving and forgiving. Marcion rejected the Epistle of James and all the other books besides Luke and the Pauline epistles. He even threw out all the writings that agreed, quoted, or referenced the Old Testament!
I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, Our Lord; Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary; Suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended into hell; On the third day he rose from the dead; He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father; From thence he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, The holy catholic church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.
NICENE CREED 325 &381
Representing the essence of ecumenical (universal) Christian doctrine. ca. AD 325 & 381
Also called the Nicaeno-Constantinopolitan Creed, this creed is a statement of the orthodox (standard accepted) faith of the early Christian church in opposition to certain heresies (teachings contradicting the norm), especially Arianism. The Edict of Milan, put into effect in AD 313 by the Roman Emperor Constantine, granted full tolerance to all religions, including Christianity, marking the Roman Empire’s final abandonment of the policies of persecution of Christians.
The greatest doctrinal challenge to the church arose from within it. Arius, a priest in Alexandria, Eygpt, suggested that if God begat Jesus, then Jesus had an origin. If Jesus did not share in the same divine essence with the Father, then Jesus was a lesser god. Knowing that the Arian controversy threatened to divide Christianity and bring chaos to the Empire, Constantine called together a council of the leaders of the church throughout the Roman Empire in Nicaea in AD 325. The Council overwhelming voted against Arian teachings (nearly 300-3). The council expressed its views about God, Jesus, and the church in the Nicene Creed. After the creed of AD 325, a heresy about the Holy Spirit arouse as a follow-up to Arianism. In response, further additions were made to the creed at the Council of Constantinople in AD 381. This is the accepted later version shown below.
Note: With the exception of one small addition made by the Western Church (Catholic/Protestant), called the filoque, in AD 589, *2 (shown below in brackets) the creed is universally accepted by all Christians. The creed, in its AD 381 format, represents the essence of ecumenical (universal) Christian doctrine because it is the most complete creed that all orthodox Christians agree on.
We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of the same essence as the Father. Through him all things were made. Who for us, and for our salvation, he came down from heaven: he became incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, and was made man; He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried, and the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures; and ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory, to judge the living and the dead; His kingdom will have no end. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father [and the Son]*2, who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified, who spoke through the prophets. We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church. We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.
ATHANASIAN CREED AD 382 – 542
Representative of early Christology, elaborating the doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation. ca. AD 382 – 542
The Athanasian Creed is one of the three most important Creeds of the early Church. It is named after the well known fourth-century apologist and theologian Athanasius of Alexandria, who played an important role in defining and defending the orthodox doctrines of the Trinity and the person of Christ. The central features of this creed addressed these two doctrines, Trinity and Christology, describing the divine attributes and divinity of each person, thus avoiding a heretical view called subordinationism, and the unity of the three persons in the one Godhead, thus avoiding a heretical view called tritheism.
The creed’s official author and origin remain a mystery but it is estimated to be written between the fourth and the sixth century. The creed is commonly used in much of the Western church (Roman Catholic and Protestant traditions) but not used in Greek Orthodox traditions. We include it not as a universal or essential creed, but rather as an ancient witness of early orthodox Christianity. While the creed itself is not used and recited in all Christian churches, the central position/core meaning of the creed—which was to affirm and elaborate the doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation—are affirmed by the entire church community.
Whoever be saved, before all things it is necessary that he hold the catholic faith. Which faith except every one do keep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.
And the catholic faith is this, that we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; Neither confounding the Persons, nor dividing the Substance. For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost is all one: the glory equal, the majesty coeternal.
Such as the Father is, such is the Son, and such is the Holy Ghost. The Father uncreated, the Son uncreated, and the Holy Ghost uncreated. The Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible, and the Holy Ghost incomprehensible. The Father eternal, the Son eternal, and the Holy Ghost eternal. And yet they are not three Eternals, but one Eternal. As there are not three Uncreated nor three Incomprehensibles, but one Uncreated and one Incomprehensible. So likewise the Father is almighty, the Son almighty, and the Holy Ghost almighty. And yet they are not three Almighties, but one Almighty. So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God. And yet they are not three Gods, but one God. So likewise the Father is Lord, the Son Lord, and the Holy Ghost Lord. And yet not three Lords, but one Lord. For like as we are compelled by the Christian verity to acknowledge every Person by Himself to be God and Lord, So are we forbidden by the catholic religion to say, There be three Gods, or three Lords.
The Father is made of none: neither created nor begotten. The Son is of the Father alone; not made, nor created, but begotten. The Holy Ghost is of the Father and of the Son: neither made, nor created, nor begotten, but proceeding. So there is one Father, not three Fathers; one Son, not three Sons; one Holy Ghost, not three Holy Ghosts. And in this Trinity none is before or after other; none is greater or less than another; But the whole three Persons are coeternal together, and coequal: so that in all things, as is aforesaid, the Unity in Trinity and the Trinity in Unity is to be worshiped. He, therefore, that will be saved must thus think of the Trinity.
Furthermore, it is necessary to everlasting salvation that he also believe faithfully the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. For the right faith is, that we believe and confess that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is God and Man; God of the Substance of the Father, begotten before the worlds; and Man of the substance of His mother, born in the world; Perfect God and perfect Man, of a reasonable soul and human flesh subsisting. Equal to the Father as touching His Godhead, and inferior to the Father as touching His manhood; Who, although He be God and Man, yet He is not two, but one Christ: One, not by conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but by taking the manhood into God; One altogether; not by confusion of Substance, but by unity of Person. For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man, so God and Man is one Christ; Who suffered for our salvation; descended into hell, rose again the third day from the dead; He ascended into heaven; He sitteth on the right hand of the Father, God Almighty; from whence He shall come to judge the quick and the dead. At whose coming all men shall rise again with their bodies, and shall give an account of their own works. And they that have done good shall go into life everlasting; and they that have done evil, into everlasting fire.
This is the catholic faith; which except a man believe faithfully and firmly, he cannot be saved.
CALCEDONIAN CREED AD 451
Representative of early Christology, elaborating the Incarnation and thus the nature of Christ. ca. AD 451
The Chalcedonian Creed (also called The Chalcedonian Definition or Creed of Chalcedon) is one of the four most important Creeds of the early Church. It is named after the location it was created in, the Council of Chalcedon in Asia Minor in AD 451, which was the fourth of the first seven Ecumenical Councils. Having already determined the doctrines of the Trinity, the divine attributes of Christ, and the Incarnation, this council was called to clear up a controversy between the western and eastern churches over the exact meaning of the Incarnation of Jesus.
The creed is accepted by Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and most Protestant churches, but not by any of the Oriental Orthodox churches (Coptic, Ethiopian, Eritrean, Syriac, Malankara Syrian (Indian) and Armenian Apostolic churches). Ninety-five percent of the universal Body of Christ accepts this creed, with the remaining, which may be classified as non-Chalcedonian, do not.
We include it not as a universal or essential creed, but rather as an ancient witness of early orthodox Christianity. The central position of the creed was to affirm and elaborate that Christ had two natures (one divine and one human). The alternative position, called eutychianism or monophysitism, taught that Christ had only one nature, a mixture of human and divine. This is partly due to the eastern traditions typically content with not needing to define every belief so explicitly. Allowing this not to be defined was rejected as the orthodox position because false views fail in that they overemphasize or underemphasize Jesus’ deity or humanity.
Called the hypostatic union, this is a critical doctrine when it comes to the atonement of Christ. Had Jesus not been fully man, then He couldn’t have been our substitute, and had He not been fully God, then His death couldn’t have made atonement for the sins of all who would believe in Him. While this creed’s explanation/definition of Christ’s two natures is not agreed to by the entire church community, what we can all agree on is that Christ is BOTH divine and human!
We, then, following the holy Fathers, all with one consent, teach men to confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the same perfect in Godhead and also perfect in manhood; truly God and truly man, of a reasonable [rational] soul and body; consubstantial [co-essential] with the Father according to the Godhead, and consubstantial with us according to the Manhood; in all things like unto us, without sin; begotten before all ages of the Father according to the Godhead, and in these latter days, for us and for our salvation, born of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, according to the Manhood; one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, only begotten, to be acknowledged in two natures, inconfusedly, unchangeably, indivisibly, inseparably; the distinction of natures being by no means taken away by the union, but rather the property of each nature being preserved, and concurring in one Person and one Subsistence, not parted or divided into two persons, but one and the same Son, and only begotten, God the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ; as the prophets from the beginning [have declared] concerning Him, and the Lord Jesus Christ Himself has taught us, and the Creed of the holy Fathers has handed down to us.
CREZUL APOSTOLIC
Cred în Dumnezeu, Tatăl atotputernicul, Făcătorul cerului şi al pământului.
Şi în Isus Christos, Fiul său unic, Domnul nostru, care s‑a zămislit de la Duhul Sfânt, s‑a născut din Maria fecioara; a pătimit sub Pontiu Pilat, a fost răstignit, a murit şi a fost îngropat, s‑a coborât în locuinţa morţilor. A treia zi a înviat din morţi, s‑a înălţat la ceruri şi şade de‑a dreapta lui Dumnezeu, Tatăl atotputernicul; de unde are să vină să judece viii şi morţii.
Cred în Duhul Sfânt, sfânta Biserică universală, împărtăşirea sfinţilor, iertarea păcatelor, învierea morţilor şi viaţa veşnică. Amin!
CREZUL NICENO – CONSTANTINOPOLITAN
(Formulat la conciliul din Nicea în 325 şi modificat la conciliul din Constantinopol în 381)
Cred într-unul Dumnezeu, Tatăl atotputernicul, Făcătorul cerului şi al pământului, al tuturor văzutelor şi nevăzutelor.
Şi într-unul Domn Isus Christos, Fiul lui Dumnezeu, Unul-Născut, Care din Tatăl S‑a născut mai înainte de toţi vecii. Lumină din Lumină, Dumnezeu adevărat din Dumnezeu adevărat, Născut, nu făcut; Cel de o fiinţă cu Tatăl, prin Care toate s‑au făcut. Care pentru noi oamenii şi pentru a noastră mântuire S‑a coborât din ceruri şi S‑a întrupat de la Duhul Sfânt din Maria fecioara şi s‑a făcut om. Şi a fost răstignit pentru noi în zilele lui Pontiu Pilat şi a pătimit şi a fost îngropat. Şi a înviat a treia zi, după Scripturi. Şi S‑a înalţat la ceruri şi şade de‑a dreapta Tatălui. Şi iarăşi va veni cu slavă, să judece viii şi morţii, a Cărui împărăţie nu va avea sfârşit.
Şi în Duhul Sfânt, Domnul, de viaţă dătătorul, Care de la Tatăl purcede, cel ce împreună cu Tatăl şi cu Fiul este închinat şi slăvit, Care a grăit prin prooroci. Şi într-una, sfânta, soborniceasca [universala] si apostoleasca Biserică. Mărturisesc un Botez, spre iertarea păcatelor. Aştept învierea morţilor şi viaţa veacului ce va veni. Amin!
CREZUL ATANASIAN
(de la începutul secolului al V‑lea – scris împotriva ereziilor lui Arie)
Înainte de toate, cine vrea să fie mântuit este necesar să ţină credinţa creştină universală. Credinţă, care dacă nu este ţinută întreagă şi neştirbită, omul piere neîndoielnic pe veşnicie.
Iar credinţa creştină universală este aceasta, că noi ne închinăm unui (singur) Dumnezeu în Trinitate, iar Trinităţii în unitate; fără a confunda Persoanele si fără a diviza făptura (Dumnezeirii). Căci există o singură Persoană a Tatălui, o alta a Fiului, şi o alta a Duhului Sfânt. Însă Dumnezeirea Tatălui, a Fiului si a Duhului Sfânt este întru totul una: egală în glorie, co-eternă în mărire. La fel cum este Tatăl, este şi Fiul, şi la fel este şi Duhul Sfânt. Tatăl necreat, Fiul necreat, şi Duhul Sfânt necreat. Tatăl infinit, Fiul infinit, si Duhul Sfânt infinit. Tatăl etern, Fiul etern, şi Duhul Sfânt etern. Şi totuşi Ei nu sunt trei Eterni, ci un singur Etern. La fel cum nu sunt trei Infiniţi, nici trei Necreaţi, ci unul singur Necreat, şi unul singur Infinit. În acelaşi fel, Tatăl este atotputernic, Fiul este atotputernic, şi Duhul Sfânt, atotputernic. Totusi, nu sunt trei Atotputernici, ci Unul Singur. Cum Tatăl este Dumnezeu, Fiul este Dumnezeu, şi Duhul Sfânt este Dumnezeu. Şi totuşi nu sunt trei Dumnezei, ci Un Singur Dumnezeu. Cum Tatăl este Domn, Fiul este Domn şi Duhul Sfânt este Domn. Şi totusi nu sunt trei Domni, ci Un Singur Domn. Căci astfel suntem obligaţi de către adevărul creştin să recunoaştem fiecare Persoană ca fiind ea însăşi Dumnezeu şi Domn. Astfel ne este interzis de către credinţa creştină universală să spunem că există trei dumnezei, sau trei domni.
Tatăl nu este făcut din nimic: nici creat, nici născut. Fiul este doar al Tatălui: nu este nici făcut (conceput), nici creat, ci născut. Duhul Sfânt este al Tatălui şi al Fiului: nu este nici făcut, nici creat, nici născut, ci purcede. Astfel, există un singur Tată, nu trei taţi; un Fiu, nu trei fii, un Duh Sfânt, nu trei duhuri sfinte.
In această Trinitate nicio Persoană nu este înaintea celeilalte, sau după cealaltă; niciuna nu este mai mare sau mai mică decât cealaltă. Ci toate trei Persoanele sunt împreună co-eterne şi co-egale.
Astfel că în toate lucrurile, cum este spus mai înainte, să se aducă închinare Unităţii în treime şi Treimii în unitate.
Astfel trebuie să creadă despre Trinitate cel ce vrea sa fie mântuit.
Pe deasupra, este necesar ca pentru mântuirea veşnică omul să creadă de asemenea cu statornicie în întruparea Domnului nostru Isus Christos. Căci dreapta credinţă este că noi credem şi mărturisim că Domnul nostru Isus Christos, Fiul lui Dumnezeu este Dumnezeu şi om. Dumnezeu de natura Tatălui, născut înainte de întemeierea lumii, şi om după natura mamei Lui, născut in lume. Dumnezeu desăvârşit şi Om desăvârşit, cu suflet raţional şi carne omenească. Egal cu Tatăl, privitor la Dumnezeirea Lui şi inferior Tatălui, in ceea ce priveşte umanitatea Lui. Care deşi este Dumnezeu şi om, totuşi nu sunt doi, ci un Christos. Unul, nu prin convertirea Dumnezeirii în trup, ci prin luarea (asumarea) omenescului în Dumnezeire. Unul, pe de‑a întregul, nu prin amestecarea naturii, ci prin unitatea Persoanei. Căci aşa cum sufletul raţional şi carnea omenească alcătuiesc un singur om, tot aşa Dumnezeu şi omul sunt una în Christos.
Care a suferit pentru mântuirea noastră, a coborât în locuinţa morţilor şi a înviat a treia zi din morţi. El s‑a înălţat la cer, s‑a aşezat la dreapta Tatălui, de unde va veni pentru a judeca viii şi morţii. La a cărui venire toţi oamenii vor învia în trupurile lor şi vor da socoteală pentru faptele lor. Cei ce au făcut binele, vor intra în viaţa veşnică, iar cei ce au făcut răul, vor merge în focul veşnic.
Aceasta este credinţa creştină universală în care dacă un om nu crede cu statornicie şi neclintire, nu poate fi mântuit.
First Council of Nicaea, (325), the first ecumenical council of the Christian church, meeting in ancient Nicaea (now İznik, Turkey). It was called by the emperor Constantine I, an unbaptized catechumen, who presided over the opening session and took part in the discussions. He hoped a general council of the church would solve the problem created in the Eastern church by Arianism, a heresy first proposed by Arius of Alexandria that affirmed that Christ is not divine but a created being. Pope Sylvester I did not attend the council but was represented by legates.
The council condemned Arius and, with reluctance on the part of some, incorporated the nonscriptural word homoousios (“of one substance”) into a creed to signify the absolute equality of the Son with the Father. The emperor then exiled Arius, an act that, while manifesting a solidarity of church and state, underscored the importance of secular patronage in ecclesiastical affairs.
Prin schisma (separare, scindare), intelegem situatia de separare canonica si de intrerupere a comuniunii liturgice intre doua Biserici. Prin erezie, intelegem invatatura gresita sau conceptii particulare in materie de probleme dogmatice a unor persoane care si-au organizat crezul lor aparte, deosebit de al Bisericii pe care au parasit-o. Este necesara o astfel de clarificare a notiunilor, deoarece ele vor fi foarte des folosite in disputele dintre scaunul de Constantinopol si Roma.
Vazuta din Rasarit, schisma s-a manifestat la inceput ca rupere de raporturi oficiale intre cele doua Biserici autocefale de frunte, romana si constantinopolitana. Ruperea raporturilor formale a fost precedata de o lunga serie de cauze al caror efect a fost o instrainare reciproca si invrajbire crescanda intre Orientul si Occidentul crestin reprezentate prin capii lor bisericesti, patriarhii de Constantinopol si papi.
Vazuta din Apus, schisma este socotita o actiune unilaterala greceasca: un act de rebeliune greaca impotriva autoritatii papale, pana atunci recunoscuta si acceptata. Pentru catolici, singurii raspunzatori de acest act de sectarism sunt patriarhii: Fotie (858-867; 877-886) si Mihail Cerularie (1043-1058). Cauzele generale ale schismei Schisma nu poate fi privita si inteleasa numai in momentul conflictelor din secolele IX-XI, ca o simpla “cearta de cuvinte” intre oameni capriciosi si orgoliosi. Cauzele schismei sunt multe, vechi si adanci. Ele vin de dincolo de purtatorii de cuvant ai celor doua Biserici, care au fost la vremea lor patriarhii Fotie si Mihail Cerularie si papii Nicolae I si Leon al IX-lea. S-a zis cu drept cuvant ca schisma bisericeasca a fost precedata de una politica.
Aceasta ruptura s-a vazut mai ales in incoronarea lui Carol cel Mare ca imparat “roman” (800). Constituirea lumii romane in doua parti deosebite administrativ si politic prin crearea unei capitale noi in rasarit de catre Constantin cel Mare la anul 330 a dus la mari consecinte politice, culturale si sociale. Existenta a doua imperii crestine, unul grec-oriental si altul german-occidental, le punea in opozitie pe chestiunea legitimitatii titlului de “imperiu roman”, revendicat de fiecare din ele impotriva celuilalt. Mai rau, cele doua imperii “romane” deosebite national, isi disputau nu numai titlul ci si teritorii si drepturi. Pe de o parte era vorba de castig de teren si de putere politica, pe de alta de prestigul si de influenta in care interesele religioase au jucat un rol foarte important. Conflictul politic si religios era intretinut si de tendinta celor doua imperii de a-si intinde sfera de putere si de influenta prin misiune la popoarele necrestine asezate intre ele. Misiunea crestina a devenit astfel o chestiune politica si motiv de discordie si de frictiuni cu consecinte imediate grave. In febra conflictelor personale si a incidentelor politice, lumea crestina nu a mai vazut, simtit si judecat cu mintea si cu inima ei crestina, ci cu mintea si inima romanului si a grecului, care aveau de castigat o mare intrecere in fata popoarelor noi. Dupa conflictul iconoclast, cand Leon al III-lea (717-741) a smuls Iliricul oriental, Italia de sud, Sicilia si Creta de sub jurisdictia Romei, papa s-a reorientat politic.
De la Pepin cel Scurt, regele francilor, papa Stefan al II-lea primeste in dar teritoriile proaspat cucerite de la longobarzi. Teritoriile acestea vor constitui baza statului papal: Patrimonium Sancti Petri. In epoca premergatoare schismei, limba si cultura greaca erau superioare celor occidentale. Bizantul cunostea atunci o renastere de care Occidentul era departe si care umplea pe greci de mandrie fata de toate popoarele. Aceasta renastere trezea si cultiva sentimentul national. Nici un popor vecin, cum era cel bulgar nu se putea sustrage atractiei civilizatiei bizantine. Roma a convertit popoarele barbare germane si o parte din cele slave, carora le-a transmis odata cu crestinismul ideea geniului si superioritatii ei. Asa cum Constantinopolul elenizase Orientul crestin, Roma latinizase Occidentul. La aceste deosebiri si neintelegeri s-au adaugat si disputele religioase. In timp s-au format unele traditii locale, s-au introdus unele practici regionale, s-au manifestat unele conceptii si preferinte speciale. Cunoasterea lor n-a rupt dintr-o data legaturile obisnuite, dar cu timpul existenta lor a intrat in constiinta crestina ca un element diferential putand provoca reprosuri si controverse. Sinodul quinisext (Constantinopol 691-692) este cel dintai care a cenzurat cateva practici occidentale: celibatul clerului , postirea sambetei, consumarea de vite sugrumate si de sange, reprezentarea lui Hristos ca miel. Lucrul cel mai interesant e ca Sinodul aminteste ordinea patriarhatelor, asa cum fusese stabilita de sinoadele II si IV ecumenic, pentru a arata ca primatul papal era numai unul de onoare nu de autoritate efectiva. Cu mult mai grava decat diferentele cultice a fost disputa in jurul formulei “filioque”. Aceasta inovatie, adoptata intai in Spania prin sinoadele de la Toledo (449 si 589) s-a generalizat in tot Apusul. Unul din motivele opozitiei lui Carol cel Mare fata de sinodul VII ecumenic a fost si lipsa formulei “filioque” din marturisirea de credinta a patriarhului Tarasie al Constantinopolelui. Mai mult, la sinodul de la Aachen (809), s-a aparat si adoptat formula “filioque”. Daca papa Leon al III-lea a rezistat in fata cererilor staruitoare ale lui Carol cel Mare de a introduce “filioque” in Simbolul de credinta, peste doua veacuri, papa Benedict al VIII-lea (1012-1024) a cedat cererii imparatului german Henric al II-lea. Poate ca daca lipseau aceste interventii regale si imperiale, straine de doctrina si interesele Bisericii, chestiunea “filioque” n-ar fi ajuns sa tulbure raporturile dintre Biserici. La jumatatea secolului al XI-lea, azima era, dupa “filioque”, obiectul cel mai pasionant al polemicii. Ca si in chestiunea “filioque”, latinii nu se multumeau sa se apere ci acuzau cu sporita pasiune pe greci, considerand erezie uzul acestora. In judecarea cauzelor schismei, gravitatea cea mai mare prezenta nu atat ceea ce se prezenta in epistole sau scrierile patriarhilor greci, cat ceea ce nu se numea inca, dar se simtea: primatul papal.
Si istoricii romano-catolici recunosc importanta exceptionala a primatului papal intre cauzele schismei cand vad originea ei in refuzul grecilor de a se supune autoritatii papale si vorbesc de “sustragerea” lor de sub aceasta autoritate. Doi papi tari pe succesele lor in Apus, pe teoria primatului papal mult rotunjita pana in vremea lor si chiar pe false temeiuri, ca decretalele pseudo-isidoriene si donatia lui Constantin – Nicolae I si Leon al IX-lea – incercau supunerea Orientului. Insa acesta s-a opus prin Fotie si Mihail Cerularie. Schisma este mai ales efectul acestei opozitii, cea mai importanta din cate au invrajbit pe greci si pe latini. Schisma in secolul al IX-lea Iconoclasmul tulburase adanc situatia la Bizant si raporturile cu Occidentul. El lasase doua partide si doua conceptii care se manifestau mai ales la alegerile de patriarhi. Prezenta acestor doua curente – unul traditional si altul liberal-reformator – explica situatia creata la Constantinopol in jurul alegerii patriarhilor Ignatiu si Fotie. Ignatiu (847-858) fusese ales cu sprijinul imparatesei vaduve Teodora, care favoriza partida calugarilor studiti. Patriarhul Ignatiu si-a facut repede adversari prin atitudinea excesiv de severa. El reprezenta opozitia fata de guvernarea imparatului Mihail si a cezarului Bardas. In locul lui a fost ridicat marele invatat Fotie, contra caruia Ignatiu si partizanii lui au protestat apeland la interventia papei Nicolae I. Intr-un sinod tinut la Roma in 863, Fotie a fost lovit cu excomunicarea daca nu paraseste scaunul patriarhal in timp de o luna. In schimb, imparatul a trimis papei in 865 o regretabila scrisoare in care trata pe latini ca pe barbari iar pe papa cu dispret si cu amenintari nesabuite despre distrugerea Romei. Raspunsul protest al papei a fost o lunga apologie a primatului papal. In anul urmator (866), papa a scris opt epistole pentru cei de la Constantinopol si o enciclica adresata clerului si credinciosilor din Asia si Libia. Papa vroia o solidarizare cu sine a crestinatatii orientale in lupta contra lui Fotie. Insa problema cea mare era atunci convertirea bulgarilor. Prin botezarea lui Boris de misionarii greci (864-865), situatia se lamurise in favoarea Bizantului. Situatia s-a complicat la un an dupa crestinare cand Boris trimite papei Nicolae I o lunga scrisoare. El cerea lamuriri la o multime de intrebari practice in legatura cu noua credinta.
Scopul lui ascuns era obtinerea unui patriarh propriu. Raspunsul diplomat al papei n-a intarziat, in Bulgaria sosind si o misiune latina ce a obtinut alungarea clericilor greci. Concurenta pentru convertirea bulgarilor il face pe Fotie sa actioneze. El raspunde printr-o enciclica adresata tuturor patriarhilor rasariteni prin care reprosa catolicilor urmatoarele: 1) faptul ca postesc sambata; 2) ca despart prima saptamana a Paresimilor de restul Postului prin consumarea de lactate; 3) incep Postul miercuri si nu luni; 4) dispretuiesc pe preotii rasariteni pentru faptul ca sunt casatoriti; 5) nu recunosc valabilitatea mirungerii savarsita de catre preot ci numai pe cea facuta de episcop; 6) falsificarea dreptei credinte prin “filioque”. In vara lui 867 se convoaca un sinod in care se condamna amestecul papei in treburile interne ale Bizantului si excomunicarea lui. Odata cu moartea lui Nicolae I (nov. 867) si asasinarea lui Mihail al III-lea (sept. 867), spiritele s-au calmat. Fotie nu impartaseste pe Vasile I Macedoneanul sub pretext ca a participat la uciderea lui Mihail si este exilat. Ignatie este reales si se reiau legaturile cu papa Adrian al II-lea. Intre schisme, raporturile intre Biserici au fost formale, fara a fi stranse. In secolul X, imoralitatea va domni la Roma. Si la Constantinopol, puterea politica va deveni foarte influenta, aservindu-si scaunul patriarhal. La inceputul secolului al XI-lea, papa a fost din nou scos din diptice, fie pentru mutilarea unui papa grec impus de Bizant (Ioan al XVI-lea), fie ca acceptase “filioque” in crez in 1014. La venirea lui Cerularie, raporturile intre cele doua Biserici erau rupte si acuzatiile reciproce se inmulteau continuu. Schisma din 1054 In imoralitatea Bisericii Occidentale din secolele X-XI, Leon al IX-lea a fost primul papa reformator. Imparatul Henric al III-lea sustinea cu zel miscarea de reforma. Pentru a indrepta Biserica, el a numit un sir de papi germani (Clement II, Damasus I, Leon IX, Victor II), care sunt de un devotament docil fata de imparat si interesele Germaniei. Leon al IX-lea a identificat rapid bolile Bisericii catolice: simonia si concubinajul clerului.
Pentru indreptarea situatiei, Leon al IX-lea a luat masuri energice, a aplicat pedepse, a facut numeroase calatorii, a tinut sinoade. In grija de a indrepta Biserica si in calitatea sa de papa imperial german, Leon al IX-lea a dat o deosebita atentie Italiei de sud. Zelul lui era in chip special stimulat de prezenta grecilor, amestecati in populatia latina. Casatoria preotilor ortodocsi era un adevarat scandal in planul de reforma al papei. Clerul lui gasea in ea o justificare pentru concubinajul sau, ale carui proportii erau ingrijoratoare. In sudul Italiei, actiunea reformatoare insemna nu numai indreptarea Bisercii latine, ci si criticarea celei grecesti. In 1050, papa va depune pe arhiepiscopul grec din orasul Siponto, oras pe care-l va subordona Beneventului. Dupa stirile date de latini, in primavara anului 1053, patriarhul Mihail Cerularie a interzis si el ritul latin la Constantinopol, ceea ce a avut ca urmare inchiderea Bisericilor latine din oras. Indemnat de patriarh, arhiepiscopul Leon al Ohridei a trimis episcopului Ioan de Trani, in Italia de sud, in anul 1053, o scrisoare in care critica practicile latine a impartasirii cu azima, a postirii sambetei precum si mancarea de sugrumate si de sange si necantarea lui aleluia in postul mare. Polemica dintre cele doua Biserici era reluata, in conditii care aveau sa o inaspreasca mult. Ca si Leon, a scris contra latinilor si un calugar studit, Nichita Stithatos, criticand nu numai uzul azimei si postirea sambetelor, ci si pe “filioque” si celibatul preotilor. Intre timp, situatia politica din Italia se inrautatise pentru papa. In iunie 1053, Leon al IX-lea a fost prins de normanzi, eliberat tocmai in februarie 1054. In interesul de a combate pe normanzi, adversari comuni, papa si imparatul Constantin al IX-lea Monomahul se aliasera prin mijlocirea ducelui Arghyros, comandantul trupelor bizantine si guvernatorul Italiei de sud. Insa Arghyros a fost infrant de normanzi inainte sa se faca unirea trupelor aliate. In aceste conditii si avandu-se in vedere situatia papei, captiv la Benevent, s-a incercat o schimbare de atitudine a Bizantului fata de papa, in interesul combaterii normanzilor.
Dupa primirea unor scrisori irenice de la imparat si patriarh si a unor promisiuni de ajutor, papa totusi le scrie obsedat de primatul sau: “daca cineva se desparte de Biserica Romana, acela nu mai formeaza Biserica, ci conciliabul de eretici, o adunare de schismatici, o sinagoga a satanei . Sa stie patriarhul ca fara aprobarea papei nici nu are drept sa existe. Imparatul insusi trebuie sa fie un fiu ce se intoarce cu umilinta la maica sa.”. Legatii papei, cardinalul Humbert, episcopul Petru de Amalfi si diaconul cancelar Friederic, trimisi cu scopul de a intari alianta politica si de a trata impacarea cu patriarhul, sosesc in Constantinopol in iunie 1054. Astazi si istoricii catolici recunosc ca delegatia nu avea sanse de succes datorita caracterului lui Humbert si ca ea nu fusese trimisa ca sa negocieze, ci sa impuna vointa latina la Constantinopol. Imparatul face front comun cu catolicii si obliga pe Nichita Stitathos, staretul de la Studion, sa-si renege doua lucrari contra practicilor romane. Propunerea patriarhului de a se discuta chestiunile bisericesti intr-un sinod cu patriarhii orientali a fost respinsa de legati, care venisera nu sa trateze, ci sa judece. Indignat de atitudinea lor, patriarhul a refuzat legaturile cu ei si le-a interzis sa savarseasca liturghia in Constantinopol, masura explicabila dar excesiva. Simtindu-se jigniti, pierzandu-si radbarea si fiind incurajati de atitudinea sovaitoare a imparatului, legatii papali au facut cel mai grav si mai nefericit pas din toata istoria schismei. In dimineata de 16 iulie 1054, au intrat in Biserica Sf. Sofia, in timpul serviciului divin, rostind – desigur cardinalul Humbert – un cuvant catre clerul si poporul adunat. Apoi au depus pe sfanta masa o excomunicare a patriarhului Mihail Cerularie si a “ partizanilor lui”.
Parasind Biserica, si-au scuturat praful de pe picioare zicand “sa vada Dumnezeu si sa judece”.
PROBLEMA ANATEMEI LATINE In actul de excomunicare, latinii acuzau pe greci pentru urmatoarele: 1) vand harul lui Dumnezeu, ca simonienii; 2) fac eunuci si-i ridica la demnitatile preotesti si la episcopat, ca valesii; 3) reboteaza pe cei botezati in numele Sfintei Treimi si mai ales pe latini, ca arienii; 4) considera ca doar in Biserica grecilor mai e Biserica lui Hristos si jertfa cea adevarata si botezul, ca donatistii; 5) admit casatoria pentru slujitorii sfantului altar, ca nicolaitii; 6) spun ca legea lui Moise e blestemata, ca severienii; 7) au taiat din Simbolul de credinta formula “filioque”, ca pnevmatomahii. Patriarhul impreuna cu Leon al Ohridei, cu sachelarul Constantin si cu toti partizanii lor, erau excomunicati: “sa fie anatema, impreuna cu ereticii numiti mai sus si cu toti ereticii, ba chiar cu diavolul si cu ingerii lui, de nu se va indrepta”. La adapostul “oficiului lor de ambasadori”, legatii au parasit rapid orasul, de mania poporului. Agitatia produsa in oras a intimidat pe imparat, care-i sustinuse continuu. El a cautat sa dea vina pe interpretii legatilor si pe Arghyros. Interpretii si ginerele lui Arghyros au fost pedepsiti. Despre sentinta, imparatul zicea sa fie arsa in public, iar cei care au scris-o, ca si cei care au fost complici cu sfatul sau cu stirea sa fie anatematizati. Patriarhul n-a ars sentinta latina si a tinut un sinod cu un numar de episcopi prezenti in capitala in 20 iulie 1054.
PROBLEMA ANATEMEI GRECESTI In edictul sinodal se arata mai intai acuzatiile pentru care legatii anatematizasera pe ortodocsi: 1) raderea barbii; 2) primirea impartasaniei de la preoti casatoriti; 3) neprezenta in Simbol a adaosului “filioque”. Apoi se prezinta argumentatia ortodoxa. In privinta barbii,textul din Levitic IX,27 este suficient: “nu taiati barbile voastre”. In privinta casatoriei preotilor, canonul 13 al sinodului quinisext precizeaza: ”Voim ca sa ramana in vigoare si de acum inainte casatoriile legitime ale barbatilor sfintiti.caci apostolul invata: cinstita este nunta intru toate”. Referitor la prolema Filioque, se spune: „.iar daca Sf.Duh purcede si de la Fiul, cum zic ei in nebunia lor, Sf.Duh se deosebeste de Tatal prin mai multe decat Fiul. Iar daca Sf.Duh s-ar distinge prin mai multe deosebiri decat Fiul, ar fi mai aproape de fiinta Tatalui Fiul decat Sf.Duh. Si astfel, ar iesi iarasi la lumina indrazneala lui Macedonie contra Duhului Sfant”….Este exprimata apoi convingerea patriarhului ca legatii au fost trimisi de Arghyros si nu de papa, iar scrisorile aduse erau false. Se reda in continuare continutul anatemei tradusa din limba latina de protospatarul Cosma Romanul, Pyrros si monahul Ioan Spaniolul. Urmeaza scrisoarea imparatului catre patriarh in care se considera ca tot raul provine de la “interpreti” si de la Arghyros. Urmeaza decizia sinodului:”.deci, prin purtarea de grija a piosului imparat, actul cel nelegiuit insusi, cei care l-au publicat si au dat fie idee pentru facerea lui, fie ca au ajutat celor care l-au facut, au fost anatematizati in marele secret.”- (tribunalul patriarhal)- In ziua de 24 iulie urma sa se faca citirea actului in auzul multimii, anatematizandu-se din nou actul nelegiuit, precum si cei care l-au publicat, scris sau si-au dat consimtamantul si sfatul la facerea lui. Originalul actului nu s-a ars sau rupt ci s-a incredintat hartofilaxului. Cu aceasta, schisma se socoteste incheiata.
Mai trebuie mentionat ca papa Leon al IX-lea murise pe 19.04.1054 si ca legatii nu aveau mandat pentru faptele savarsite. Noul papa, Victor al II-lea, a fost ales pe 16 aprilie 1055. El si papii urmatori n-au confirmat actiunea necugetata a lui Humbert dar nici n-au infirmat-o. De remarcat ca patriarhul de Constantinopol s-a mentinut pe terenul principiilor, criticand idei si fapte, nu persoane. Consecintele schismei Cu toate ca raporturile dintre crestinii rasariteni si apuseni incepura sa se raceasca inca dinainte de 1054, dezbinarea reala nu s-a facut simtita decat mai tarziu, mai ales in timpul si-n urma cruciadelor. Teofilact al Bulgariei (+1108) spunea: „Nu cred ca greselile latinilor sunt asa de multe si atat de grave, incat sa poata motiva o schisma intre Biserici”. La 1087, moastele Sfantului Nicolae erau aduse la Bari, iar papa Urban al II-lea (1088-1099) va canoniza un grec din Trani pe nume Nicolae. Pelerinii apuseni se bucurau in deplina liniste de vederea Locurilor Sfinte, iar in Athos continua sa existe inca si in secolul al XII-lea manastirea Amalfinezilor. Papa Grigore al VII-lea Hildebrand ii excomunicase pe imparatii bizantini pentru ca se opuneau planurilor lui. In 1088, papa Urban al II-lea a ridicat imparatului bizantin excomunicarea, spunandu-i lui Alexios I Comenul ca ar dori sa fie pomenit in diptice la Constantinopol. In dialogul dintre ei, imparatul pomeneste de intamplarea de la 1054 ca de o simpla cearta intre Mihail Cerularie si cardinalul Humbert, spunand ca arhiva imperiala n-a mai pastrat nimic in legatura cu schisma. In continuare, unirea Bisericilor nu s-a putut realiza in fapt deoarece papa a cerut intotdeauna bizantinilor recunoasterea primatului papal. Istoria urmatoare a raporturilor politico-bisericesti intre Bizant si Occident este ilustrarea agravarii schismei ca fapt de dusmanie reciproca. Pericolul turcilor s-a conturat rapid pentru Bizant. Pusi in inferioritate politica si constransi sa negocieze un acord religios imposibil, in conditiile impuse de papi, grecii s-au gasit intr-o situatie penibila, pe care occidentalii au speculat-o cu neomenie. Mai mult, Constantinopolul a devenit tinta atacurilor occidentale armate, obiectiv de cruciada. Grecii trebuiau combatuti, ca si necredinciosii din cauza “ereziei” si a neascultarii lor fata de papa.
Adevarata si iremediabila ruptura s-a produs abia prin cucerirea Constantinopolului in 13 aprilie 1204 de catre cruciati. Nevoia a facut pe Mihail VIII Paleologul sa incheie unirea de la Lyon (1274), pe Ioan al V-lea sa primeasca personal unirea de la papa in 1369 si pe Ioan al VIII-lea sa accepte “unirea” de la Ferrara – Florenta. Demersuri inutile, caci Occidentul a asistat impasibil la caderea Constantinopolelui in 29 mai 1453. Pe plan teologic, la vechile deosebiri s-au adaugat altele, cu mult mai multe. Credinta in purgatoriu, teoria si practica indulgentelor, importante invataturi noi, rituri, practici si obiecte introduse dupa schisma, dogmatizarea unor credinte straine Bisericii vechi si intre toate proclamarea primatului papal absolut si a infailibilitatii papale (1870-1871), au indepartat tot mai mult occidentul papal de orientul ortodox. De la calcarea unor randuieli canonice si practici traditionale, s-a ajuns la schimbarea constitutiei Bisericii. Biserica papala incepuse sa evolueze spre monarhie bisericeasca, cu lege proprie, care era vointa papei. Un demers contemporan salutar a fost ridicarea concomitenta a anatemelor pe 7 decembrie 1965 de catre papa Paul al VI-lea si patriarhul ecumenic Atenagora I.
BIBLIOGRAFIE: POPESCU, Prof. Teodor M., Sentinta de excomunicare de la 16 iulie 1054, in „Studii Teologice”, an II (1931), nr. 1, p. 49-68; II (1931), nr. 2, p. 35-46. Idem, Geneza si evolutia schismei, in „Ortodoxia”, an XI (1954), nr. 2-3, p. 163-217. RAMUREANU, Pr. Prof. Ioan I., SESAN, Pr. Prof. Milan, BOGODAE, Pr. Prof. Teodor, Istoria bisericeasca universala, vol.
Marea schismă din 1054 nu a fost un eveniment surprinzător. Relaţiile dintre Est şi Vest, dintre cele două mari centre religioase – Constantinopol şi Roma – erau complicate de foarte multă vreme. Deşi implicaţiile schismei în istorie sunt semnificative, contemporanii nu au perceput-o ca fiind ceva ieşit din comun. Sursele contemporane vorbesc prea puţin despre conştientizarea efectelor separării celor două biserici. Dar cum s-a ajuns acolo?
Cauzele materiale – competiţia pentru influenţă
Marea Schismă a fost o consecinţă a înstrăinării treptate dintre Roma şi Constantinopol. Putem vorbi, pe de o parte, de cauze de ordin politico-religios şi, pe de altă parte, de cauze dogmatice. În primul rând, Europa creştină devine, din punct de vedere politic, bicefală începând cu anul 800, odată cu încoronarea ca împărat roman a lui Carol cel Mare. Atât acesta, cât şi împăratul de la Constantinopol pretindeau că sunt succesorii vechilor împăraţi romani, având astfel dreptul la moştenirea (teritorială) romană.
Patriarhii celor două oraşe se aflau şi ei în conflict. Ambii lideri religiosi se considerau conducătorii întregii lumi creştine. Patriarhiul de la Constantinopol îşi ia, încă din secolul al VI-lea, titlul de patriarh ecumenic (adică universal), titlu care până atunci aparţinuse exclusiv Papalităţii. Au existat însă situaţii în care, pentru a obţine sprijin în Italia, unde bizantinii doreau să-şi păstreze teritoriile stăpânite, unii împăraţi, precum Vasile I Macedoneanul (867-886), au acceptat să facă unele concesii bisericii romane, susţinând chiar universalismul acesteia.
În secolele IX-X cele două centre religioase s-au aflat într-o competiţie acerbă pentru evanghelizarea lumii slave din Europa de Est şi Sud-Est. După ce slavii din zona Bulgariei, Serbiei şi Rusiei au intrat în sfera Constantinopolului, biserica orientală, mai puternică, nu a mai acceptat supremaţia Romei. Apoi, în secolul al XI-lea, Vasile al II-lea Macedoneanul s-a îndepărtat tot mai mult de Roma. În 1024, Papalitatea s-a arătat dispusă la un compromis, gata să recunoască Biserica din Est ca fiind „universală în sfera sa”, dar împăratul bizantin nu a acceptat propunerea. Totuşi, în aceeaşi perioadă, situaţia tot mai complicată din Italia cerea o apropiere de Roma. Normanzii încep să atace provinciile bizantine din peninsula italică, astfel că în 1052-1053 Bizanţul încheie o alianţă cu Papalitatea direcţionată împotriva normanzilor.
Cauzele dogmatice – diferenţele de ritual
Dincolo de aceste neînţelgeri privind lumea materială şi interesele politice, cauzele dogmatice au jucat şi ele un rol important. Existau trei probleme majore. În primul rând, cea legată de Filioque, un adaos la formula Crezului din 381. În secolele V-VI, două concilii ţinute la Toledo marchează modificarea Crezului în Apus prin adăugarea formulei „Duhul Sfânt care de la Tată şi fiulpurcede”. Aceasta e preluată în Franţa, Italia şi Germania, iar la începutul secolului al XI-lea, Henric al II-lea e încoronat împărat de către Papă, ocazie cu care se cântă Crezul modificat. Acest fapt a statuat recunoaşterea de către Papalitate a noii formule. Cea de-a doua diferenţă stă în ritualul împărtăşaniei:folosirea azimei în vest şi a pâinii dospite în est. Apoi, celibatul preoţilor era obligatoriu în occident, în timp ce preoţii bisericii orientale se puteau căsători (o singură dată). În secolele XII-XIII, se va adăuga şi problema purgatoriului, concept pe care ortodocşii nu îl acceptă.
Disputa dintre cele două biserici escaladează în momentul în care în 1050, bizantinii din Sudul Italiei sunt forţaţi de normanzi să se conformeze practicilor latine. Patriarhul de la Constantinopol, Mihail Cerularios, răspunde prin a cere bisericilor latine din oraş să adopte practicile bizantine, renunţând la filioque şi la folosirea azimei. În faţa refuzului acestora, în 1053 închide toate bisericile latine din capitala imperiului. Ulterior va trece la o atitudine mai conciliantă şi acceptă o discuţie cu Papa Leo al IX-lea care, în 1054, trimite pentru negocieri o delegaţie la Constantinopol, condusă de Cardinalul Humbert.
Pe lângă toate tensiunile deja existente, şi personalitatea celor trei personaje implicate a creat o conjunctură favorabilă rupturii. Papalitatea era puternică deoarece îşi recuperase forţele şi autoritatea după reforma generată de mişcarea de la Cluny;patriarhul Cerularios era un om ambiţios şi foarte influent, iar împăratul bizantin Constantin al IX-lea Monomahul era un lider slab, şovăitor, lipsit de fermitate. În această situaţie, existau puţine şanse ca întâlnirea să ducă la înţelegerea celor două biserici.
După prima întâlnire cu delegaţia papală, Cerularios refuză să mai negocieze, fiind afectat de comportamentul neceremonios al membrilor delegaţiei, care nu respectaseră saluturile uzuale. Cardinalul Humbert răspunde prin obţinerea unei bule de excomunicare împotriva lui Cerularios, bulă depusă la Sf. Sofia în data de 16 iulie 1054. Patriarhul bizantin şi biserica orientală sunt acuzaţi, printre altele, şi de omiterea filioquedin crez. Beneficiind de sprijinul Împăratului şi al populaţiei constantinopolitane, Mihail Cerularios convoacă un Sinod pentru data de 24 iulie prin care Humbert este la rândul său excomunicat.
Aceasta a fost practic Marea Schismă. Ruptura nu a fost conştientizată imediat. Relaţiile de încordare paralele cu cele de colaborare continuă. Însă unul din efectele imediate a fost că, ca urmare a rupturii cu Bizanţul, noul Papă, Nicolae al II-lea, singur în faţa normanzilor, îi acordă lui Robert Guiscard, în 1059, ducatul Calabriei şi Aculiei. A început astfel alianţa dintre Papalitate şi normanzi:papa obţinea sprijinul unui aliat puternic, iar normanzii recunoaşterea puterii lor în Italia. Ulterior, organizarea cruciadelor aduce cele două lumi în contact direct, ceea ce face ca diferenţele să fie percepute nu doar la nivel înalt, ci şi în rândul populaţiei. În cele din urmă, anul 1204 – cucerirea Constantinopolului de către latini – a dus la ruptura definitivă dintre Occident şi Orient şi la naşterea unui sentiment general de ură faţă de latini în rândul bizantinilor.
„El, satana, poate produce mare haos în mintea voastră. Totuși atunci când face asta, nu dispune de puterea de a vă cunoaște gândurile; el poate doar să implanteze gânduri și îndoieli în mintea voastră.
Când la început vă opuneți lui, rugându-vă pentru harurile necesare apărării voastre, el își intensifică acțiunile. Satana îi trimite pe demonii săi la credincioși, ca să-i chinuie. Dacă i-ați putea vedea, v-ați îngrozi. Puteți fi înconjurați de doi sau trei și vă pot sminti ca să deveniți confuzi, triști și mintea voastră să fie plină de gânduri nemiloase față de ceilalți.
Tot ceea ce este legat de Dumnezeu: Biserica Sa, copii Săi sau aceia care Îl reprezintă pe Dumnezeu, sunt țintele sale principale.” (MDM 07.06.2012)”
Pentru toți cei care vor să scape de gândurile și sentimentele negative din viața lor, tot ceea ce este necesar, este devotamentul față de Mine, iubitul lor Isus Cristos.
Rugăciunea, o simplă conversație cu Mine, sunt de ajuns. Rugați-Mă cu cuvintele voastre să vă ajut.
Dacă le spuneți din inimă, vă voi răspunde neîntârziat și vă voi ajuta să vă apropiați de Inima Mea Sfântă.Vă rog, copiii Mei, lăsați-Mă să vă țin aproape de Mine, și să vă ofer acea consolare la care tânjiți în această lume plină de nefericire, nedreptate, cruzime și ură.Eu sunt colacul vostru de salvare. Doar Eu pot să vă ajut.
Vă rog chemați-Mă prin rugăciunea (45) a Cruciadei de Rugăciune.
Rugăciunea (45) a Cruciadei de Rugăciune: Pentru a învinge gândurile negative
„O, Isuse, eu știu foarte puțin despre Tine, dar Te rog ajută-mă să-mi deschid inima, pentru a-Ți permite să intri în sufletul meu, să mă vindeci, să mă consolezi și să mă umpli cu pacea Ta. Ajută-mă să simt bucuria, să înving toate gândurile negative și să învăț calea prin care pot înțelege cum să fac Voia Ta, așa încât să intru în Noul Tău Paradis unde să pot trăi cu Tine o viață a dragostei, a bucuriei și a minunilor, în vecii vecilor. Amin.”
Vă iubesc pe toți, dragi copii, indiferent de religia voastră, indiferent cât de mult ați păcătuit sau dacă ați provocat altora suferințe și răni. Numai Eu pot schimba felul în care trăiți. Singura cale de a vă elibera de viața grea pe care o duceți este să Mă chemați pentru a vă putea ajuta. Iubitul vostru Isus”(MDM 17.04.2012)
Comentarii închise la Pentru toți cei care vor să scape de gândurile și sentimentele negative din viața lor, tot ceea ce este necesar, este devotamentul față de Mine, iubitul lor Isus Cristos.
„Cand faceti rugaciunea sunt mii de ganduri care va asalteaza. Cand stai la televizor in fata unui film, doua ceasuri nu te misti de acolo si mintea ta nu mai fuge. Stai acolo si te uiti la ce se intampla.
Încearcă să spui Tatăl nostru…
Dar incearca sa spui Tatal nostru si ai sa vezi ca o mie de ganduri o sa iti treaca prin minte. Tatal nostru il spui intr-un minut si-ti trec o mie de ganduri prin minte… Zici ca nu sunt ganduri pacatoase? Este adevarat, unele ganduri nu sunt pacatoase, pentru ca demonul vrea sa faca orice din tine, numai sa nu spui rugaciunea. (altarulcredintei.md)In timp ce spui „painea noastra cea de toate zilele”, iti vine in minte ca nu ai luat paine de la magazin, sau te intrebi cat o fi ceasul, sau daca afara ploua, sau ninge, sau e soare. O mie de ganduri inocente, dar ele toate au rolul satanic de a te indeparta de la atentia rugaciunii.Asa ca nu spuneti: „gandurile mele au fost ganduri simple, copilaresti”. Sunt copilaresti, dar substratul lor este foarte adanc. Cele mai multe fapte pe care le facem noi sunt fapte rele. Mai putine sunt cele bune, pentru ca raul este foarte imaginativ. Uita-te la un om rau cate nascoceste ca sa faca rau, cata elaborare mintala iroseste ca sa-si inchipuie raul, cate mijloace are prin care face pacatul, prin care loveste… Pe cand omul bun este foarte simplu. El stie ca face binele si il face. Nu se omoara ca sa inventeze tot felul de sisteme ascunse si subterane.
Intoarce-te la Dumnezeu, caci Dumnezeu te asteapta.
De Adrian Pătrușcă / Publicat: Vineri, 17 decembrie 2021, 19:10
Biserica deranjează tot mai mult. Hristos nu se împacă cu Marea Resetare și cu Noua Ordine Mondială. Atât în Estul Ortodox cât și în Vestul Catolic, tot mai multe și mai puternice voci de prelați se ridică împotriva distrugerii civilizației creștine și cheamă credincioșii la trezire și la rezistență. Cum chemarea pare să aibă ecou și lumea dă semne de deșteptare, arhitecții globalizării au lansat contraatacul. Lupta diferă în funcție de specificul social: în Estul ieșit mai îmbisericit după experiența comunistă, ofensiva se dă cu mijloace mai insidioase: acțiuni de diversiune pentru a semăna dezbinare în sânul Bisericii. În Vest, lucrurile se desfășoară mai brutal. S-a dat ordin de zi pe unitate: să li se pună cu orice preț pumnul în gură înalților prelați catolici care denunță actuala linie progresistă a Vaticanului și înhămarea Papei Francisc la căruța Marii Resetări. Însă, și într-o parte și în alta, campania pentru obligativitatea vaccinării și restrângerea drepturilor și libertăților merge mână în mână, tovărășește, cu Marea Resetare După ce cardinalul german Gerhard Müller a fost supus unui linșaj mediatic în presa din țara sa, camaradul său de luptă, Arhiepiscopul Carlo Maria Viganò, este victima unui tratament similar din partea presei italiene. La începutul lui decembrie, Viganò, care a lansat un răsunător apel pentru formarea unei mari alianțe internaționale anti-globalizare, a acordat un amplu interviu ziaristului catolic Cesare Saccheti, pentru blogul acestuia, The Eye of the Needle (Ochiul acului). După ce s-a referit la atacurile împotriva sa declanșate de cei pe care i-a numit „Înalții prelați ai COVID-ului”, monseniorul a vorbit din nou despre „infiltrarea” Bisericii Catolice de către o „Biserică Subterană” – „Deep Church” (echivalentul ecleziastic al „Statului Subteran” sau Paralel). Viganò face legătura dintre acest „plan de infiltrare” și Conciliul Vatican II (1962-1965). El observă că, „de la Vatican II încoace, Biserica a îmbrățișat principiile revoluției (franceze, ideologia liberală, colectivismul comunist și, în general, «duhul acestei lumi», teoria genului și disoluția Creștinătății), nu doar în plan doctrinar ci și în cel moral și cultural, care sunt elementele vitale ale civilizației creștine”. Viganò îl numește pe Papa Francisc „profetul Noii Ordini Mondiale”, care nu este altceva decât un Eden răsturnat și fără Dumnezu. Pandemia seamănă foarte mult cu o „operațiune teroristă” (și există indicii în acest sens), iar vaccinarea este prima etapă pentru controlul total asupra Omului și transformarea lui într-un robot, prin utilizarea Transumanismului. „Certificatul Verde” pare să fi fost conceput după modelul Semului Fiarei din Apocalipsă. În acest context, orice preot are nu doar dreptul, ci și datoria de a-și avertiza credincioșii despre pericolele vaccinării și ale dictaturii care se instaurează. Reproducem mai jos interviul oferit de Carlo Maria Viganò lui Cesare Saccheti, în varianta sa integrală. O facem în ciuda unor poziții „catolico-centriste” care ar putea deranja cititorul ortodox. O facem în spiritul adevărului, dar și pentru că, dincolo de aceste „fisuri” dogmatice, expunerea monseniorului Viganò reprezintă, în totul său, deopotrivă o sinteză și o analiză a realității zilelor noastre pe care îndrăznesc să le apreciez ca fiind fără egal. Titlul și intertitlurile îmi aparțin.
Tactici bolșevice de compromitere a adversarilor
Excelență, în ultimele zile ați fost victima unor atacuri dure în presa italiană, iar aceste atacuri par să crească în intensitate. Massimo Gianini, editor la La Stampa din Torino, a mers până acolo încât v-a numit „scelerat”. Un alt ziarist italian de prim plan, Bruno Vespa, a afirmat că Dumnezeu ar trebui „să vă ierte” pentru declarațiile dumneavoastră privind vaccinurile și așa-zisa pandemie. Ați putea explica de ce presa corporatistă italiană vă privește ca pe un fel de „inamic public”? De ce par să se teamă atât de tare de dumneavoastră? Cum am spus și cu alte ocazii, este tipic pentru orice regim totalitar să încerce să delegitimeze orice formă de disidență. Într-o primă etapă prin ridiculizarea adversarului, făcându-l țintă a ironiilor pentru a-l discredita în ochii opiniei publice. Apoi, după ce l-au delegitimat atribuindu-i aspecte patologice sau ca având nevoie de îngrijire psihiatrice, sugerând că este instabil mintal și deci trebuie internat la o clinică de boli psihice. Etapa finală a procesului este incriminarea tuturor punctelor de vedere diferite ale adversarului. În acest mod, regimul creează premisele necesare pentru a-și separa toți adversarii de societatea civilă. Minciuni, insulte și atacuri la persoană – așa cum este și cel mai recent împotriva mea din partea revistei Venerdi (al cărei editor este La Repubblica) – toate fac parte din strategie, un fel de producție teatrală în care „înalții preoți ai COVID” își sfâșie hainele de pe ei, urlând la fiecare obiecție ce se opune minciunilor lor. Ar trebui să ne reamintim că La Stampa și La Repubblica aparțin familiei Elkann, o familie înrudită cu Rothschild din anii 1500. De fapt, John Elkann a scris prefața la cartea lui Klaus Schwab, „A patra revoluție industrială”, în care președintele Forumului Economic Mondial descrie Marea Resetare în cele mai mici amănunte. În manifestările lor de adeziune la discursul public oficial, purtătorii de cuvânt ai elitei ajung să întrebuințeze tactica discreditării și calomnierii celor care li se opun, o practică tipică grupurilor conspiratoare. Evident, dată fiind tăcerea asurzitoare a episcopilor și a mașinăriei de propagandă de la Santa Marta (reședința Papei Francisc), este limpede că o voce discordantă, care denunță lovitura de forță aflată în desfășurare, dată de elita globalistă, irită și pare intolerabilă pentru cei care pretind o aprobare irațională a declarațiilor lor contradictorii.
Care este datoria preoților
În acest context, presa italiană a mers până acolo încât a trimis spioni care să asiste la slujbele săvârșite de acești prelați, cum ar fi Pr. Giorgio Ghio, care denunță efectele adverse ale vaccinurilor și în general duhul anticreștin ce pare să domine din ce în ce mai mult societatea occidentală. Se pare totuși că duhul adevăratei Biserici tradiționale nu s-a stins, dimpotrivă, chiar se întețește. Credeți că puterea globalistă se teme în mod deosebit de această revigorare a credinței catolice tradiționale? Aș dori să semnalez mai întâi că amestecul autorităților laice în treburile Bisericii constituie o violare directă a Concordatului dintre Sfântul Scaun și Republica italiană. Mai mult, Conferința Episcopală a Italiei nu are nici o autoritate de a negocia cu guvernul protocoale și acorduri. Așadar, astfel de acorduri, în măsura în care sunt acceptate, nu au oricum nici o validitate. De aceea, consider că orice preot are dreptul, sau mai degrabă datoria, de a-i avertiza pe credincioși despre pericolul real – nu doar ipotetic – pe care îl reprezintă inocularea cu acest produs medical experimental. Cu atât mai mult este nevoie de acest lucru în condițiile în care întreaga farsă psiho-pandemică urmărește în mod clar instaurarea unei dictaturi.
Complicitatea dintre Statul Subteran și Biserica Subterană
Supunerea ierarhiei catolice, a conferințelor episcopale, a episcopilor și preoților în fața acestui discurs oficial este atât de grosolană și de servilă încât demonstrează în mod clar infiltrarea de către Biserica Subterană („Deep Church” sau Biserica Paralelă) pe care am denunțat-o de nenumărate ori. Această infiltrare a început în urmă cu 70 de ani, iar astăzi a devenit evidentă din cauza aroganței sale și a persecutării tuturor vocilor de opozanți care contrazic discursul oficial în legătură cu presupusa urgență pandemică și cu încă și mai gravele abateri doctrinare, morale și disciplinare ale actualei conduceri a Bisericii și tulburătoarele complicități ale acestei conduceri cu Statul Subteran („Deep State” sau Statul Paralel). Această trădare flagrantă a păstorilor Bisericii a suscitat – la fel ca și în domeniul guvernării laice – o opoziție spontană a „bazei”, a poporului, deopotrivă oameni de rând și preoți de rând, iar această opoziția privește atât reacția la pandemie cât și criza ierarhiei Bisericii. Pe de o parte, îi avem pe promotorii Marii Resetări, cu ideologia lor anticatolică și anticreștină, sprijinită de Biserica bergogliană. De cealaltă parte, îi avem pe cei care se opun Noii Ordini Mondiale și care cred în împlinirea valorilor morale și a aspirațiilor lor în veșnicul magisteriu (învățătură) catolic și în liturghia catolică tradițională. Cele două cetăți: Cetatea Diavolului și Cetatea lui Dumnezeu: separarea este mereu aceeași, deoarece forțele care se înfruntă sunt plasate fundamental pe poziții care sunt ontologic opuse și inamice.
Rockefeller și Operațiunea Lockstep
Un colonel rus, care a lucrat cândva în serviciile secrete sovietice, Vladimir Kvaciov, a numit pandemia un fel de „operațiune teroristă”, concepută în mod expres pentru a provoca o reducere a populației lumii și instituirea unei dictaturi mondiale. Într-un articol publicat de Fundația Rockefeller în 2010, al cărui titlu este „Operațiunea Lockstep” („lockstep” = aderare la o mișcare care provoacă mare emulație), se pomenește în mod explicit despre declanșarea unei pandemii. Această pandemie ar permite guvernelor din lumea întreagă să aplice măsuri autoritare și represive la adresa libertății individuale, măsuri considerate esențiale pentru a se aunge la un guvern mondial unic. Aceste măsuri sunt practic aceleași cu cele la care am asistat în cursul ultimului an și jumătate, cum ar fi măștile faciale și distanțarea socială, care au provocat psihoză în masă și ură la niște dimensiuni nemaivăzute în societatea occidentală. Credeți că toată această situație este o criză provocată, concepută de forțele globaliste pentru a târî omenirea într-o stare de frică permanentă și a deschide calea spre Leviathanul global? Într-adevăr, asta cred, și o tot spun de la începutul psiho-pandemiei, când, în mai 2020, am expus primejdiile și absurditățile acestei farse grotești. Sunt destul de bine familiarizat cu scenariile Fundației Rockfeller, precum și cu cele descrise de „Marea Resetare” a Forumului Economic Mondial, al cărui președinte s-a întâlnit cu fostul premier italian, Giuseppe Conte, în noiembrie 2019, și cu actualul premier, Mario Draghi, acum doar câteva zile. De asemenea, sunt la curent și cu planul ONU numit Agenda 2030.
Ce vrea Noua Ordine Mondială
Acestă operațiune a necesitat o pregătire minuțioasă și participarea unei mari părți a instituțiilor publice și din sectorul privat, inclusiv complicitatea magistraturii, a forțelor de ordine și a presei. Aceste eforturi conjugate constituie o veritabilă Lovitură de Forță, iar pandemia nu este decât un pretext – „profasis” – prin care s-a impus aparenta inevitabilitate a încălcării drepturilor fundamentale și instaurarea în consecință a unui regim totalitar al Noii Ordinal. În această Nouă Ordine domnesc superstiția pandemică, împreună cu magicienii ei, cu era sa vaccinală, cu ritualurile sale iraționale și cu excomunicările păcătoșilor „vitandi” („de ocolit” sau „de evitat”) – cei care nu acceptă să renunțe la rațiunea lor și cu atât mai puțin sunt dispuși la apostazia de la Credința lor, pentru a îmbrățișa această demență ideologică lipsită de sens.
Omul viitorului este Omul-Robot
În societatea Marii Resetări, pe care Excelența Voastră ați denunțat-o în numeroase ocazii, ideologia „transumanistă” joacă un rol fundamental. Tehnologia modernă avansează într-un ritm rapid și am ajuns astăzi să vorbim deschis despre posibilitatea controlării comportamentului uman prin microcipuri implantate. Unul dintre cei care propovăduiește acest soi de „om-robot” este Klaus Schwab, un personaj cu care ne-am mai întâlnit cu ocazia întrebărilor anterioare, șeful Forumului Economic Mondial. Credeți că scopul final al transumanismului este de a-l lipsi pe Om de libertatatea pe care i-a dăruit-o Dumnezeu? Transumanismul este un proiect infernal prin care Diavolul batjocorește Creația lui Dumnezeu, pervertind-o și corupând-o. „Jugul ușor” al Legii lui Dumnezeu este înlocuit de robia și supunerea în fața tiraniei Satanei, în care Binele nu este tolerat și toți sunt obligați să facă Răul, să accepte Răul și să legitimeze Răul. Și, în ciuda faptului că numai Dumnezeu ne poate citi conștiințele, Satana încearcă să violeze sanctuarul sinelui nostru spiritual pentru a-l controla și a ne determina să facem Răul împotriva propriei noastre voințe. În recenta sa carte, Marea Resetare, Klaus Schwab scrie următoarele:
„Studiem de asemenea noi mijloace de a utiliza și implanta dispozitive interne care să supravegheze nivelurile noastre de activitate, valorile hematochimice și căile prin care acestea pot fi asociate cu starea noastră de bine, cu sănătatea mintală și cu productivitatea acasă și la muncă. De asemenea, studiem pentru a înțelege mai bine funcționarea creierului și asistăm la evoluții excepționale în domeniul neurotehnologiilor.”
Este un delir pe care numai Lucifer îl poate concepe și este menit eșecului total din cauza matricei sale antihristice, a sfidării sale la adresa stăpânirii divine a lui Iisus Hristos. Este un delir în care creatura, revoltându-se împotriva legilor divine, pretinde să ocupe locul Celui Preaînalt și repetă cu aceeași hotărâre rușinoasă cuvintele „Non serviam” („Nu mă supun”) ale lui Lucifer. Satana este un „simia Dei” („maimuțărire a lui Dumnezeu”): în tot ce face pentru a ne îndepărta de Dumnezeu și a ne târî spre Iad, este mereu vizibilă încercarea batjocoritoare de a-L imita pe Mântuitor, de a-I uzurpa suveranitatea, de a-I perverti învățăturile și de a-I fura suflete. Diavolul vrea să fie venerat în locul lui Dumnezeu. Vrea ca Antihrist să domnească peste lume, înlocuind Biserica lui Hristos cu Biserica lui Satan, care este Religia Umanismului, o religie ecumenică și ecologică.
Raiul răsturnat al lui Satan
În înregistrările video și articolele dumneavoastră ați vorbit despre amenințarea reprezentată de Noua Ordine Mondială. Mai mulți oameni de stat sau prim-miniștri, cum ar fi George H. Bush, Henry Kissinger, Nicolas Sarkozy și David Rockefeller – pentru a numi doar câțiva – au folosit această expresie în declarațiile lor publice. Acești politicieni descriu Noua Ordine Mondială ca pe un fel de „Eden” către care ar trebui să năzuim. În timpul crizei COVID, am auzit adesea astfel de cuvinte. Puteți explica ideea care stă în spatele Noii Ordini Mondiale și de ce vaccinurile joacă un rol foarte important în realizarea acestui țel? Noua Ordine Mondială nu este nici „nouă”, nici „ordine”: ea reprezintă ambiția nebunească a Satanei de a răsturna planul providențial al lui Dumnezeu, de a distruge adevărata Religie care duce la Mântuirea veșnică și în final să înlocuiască „ordo christianus” („ordinea creștină”) cu haosul infernal. În această dez-ordine, Minciuna ia locul Adevărului, Nedreptatea și Abuzul puterii înlocuiesc Dreptatea, Poftele iau locul Ascultării de Legea lui Dumnezeu, Moartea ia locul Vieții, Boala ia locul Sănătății. Se produce legitimarea Răului și condamnarea Binelui, persecutarea oamenilor buni și elogierea celor răi. Ignoranța ia locul Culturii și Înțelepciunii, Dezbinarea și Ura iau locul Armoniei și Iubirii. Satana nu vrea să fie venerat asumând calitățile lui Dumnezeu, ci cerând să fie obiectul adorării prin orice este rău, obscen, fals, absurd și monstruos. El dorește distrugerea totală, o distrugere ontologic diavolească și antihristică: o Nouă Ordine realizată cu mijloacele unei Lovituri de Stat deghizate sub forma unei stări de urgență artificiale.
Vaccinul ca armă
Campania de vaccinare, lipsită de orice suport științific, folosește înainte de toate ca legitimare aparentă pentru instaurarea urmăririi și controlului global. Astăzi, sub pretextul limitării răspândirii COVID (un pretext fals, deoarece, între altele, vaccinatul se poate în continuare infecta și fi contagios). Însă mâine această campanie dorește să își mărească raza de acțiune, extinzând „certificatul verde” pentru a include informații utilizate într-un „sistem de credit social” pentru a face față unei „urgențe verzi”, care de asemenea va fi falsă și înșelătoare. „Certificatul verde” este conceput asemănător Semnului Fiarei, pomenit în Apocalipsa după Ioan, pentru a permite sau interzice oamenilor să cumpere, să vândă, să călătorească, să chetuiască, să se hrănească și să trăiască. În al doilea rând, inocularea oamenilor cu un ser genetic experimental care provoacă o slăbire a sistemului imunitar natural, reprezintă o crimă gravă, deoarece îi transformă pe oamenii sănătoși în bolnavi cronici și, în consecință, în clienți permanenți ai instituțiilor de sănptate publice și private. Această situație umflă enorm profiturile elitei globaliste și provoacă o sărăcire generalizată a populației. Chiar și acest aspect, aparent secundar, dezvăluie caracterul subversiv al Marii Resetări. Deoarece Marea Resetare nu reprezintă doar un atac la adresa sănătății individului, ci și un atac la adresa securității naționale a statelor, deoarece forțele lor armate sunt afectate de efectele adverse ale vaccinurilor, iar soldații nevaccinați sunt excluși din serviciul activ. Cred că acesta este un aspect insuficient luat în considerare de cei care analizează această criză și demonstrează abjecția celor care, odată ajunși la putere, devin complici la distrugerea țărilor lor pentru a le subjuga Noii Ordini.
Vatican II este Revoluția Franceză a Bisericii Catolice
Vorbind despre Noua Ordine Mondială, Excelența Voastră a afirmat într-una din înregistrările video că (Conciliul) Vatican II a jucat un rol fundamental, în anii 1960, în acest plan. Din acest punct de vedere, Conciliul poate fi considerat drept un eveniment care a construit o „nouă Biserică liberală”, desprinsă de tradiția catolică. Această „Biserică liberală” a adoptat duhul lumii moderne, în loc să încerce să-l stăvilească. Practic, instituția care ar fi trebuit să fie „katechon”-ul, forța care se opune manifestării Antihristului, a devenit în schimb purtătoarea de cuvânt și promotoarea Antihristului. Se poate spune că forțele masonice care au infiltrat Biserica au pus la cale această schimbare? Credeți că Biserica de astăzi trăiește apostazia prorocită de Leon XIII în 1884 și de alte profeții importante, cum ar fi cele de la Fatima, în 1917, sau de la Akita, în 1973? În calitate de protagonist al Vatican II (1962-1965), cardinalul Leo Joseph Suenens a afirmat că revoluția adusă de Conciliu a reprezentat „anul 1789 (Revoluția Franceză) al Bisericii Catolice. Din acest punct de vedere, de la Vatican II încoace, Biserica a îmbrățișat principiile revoluționarilor, ideologia liberală, comunismul, colectivismul și, în general, „duhul lumii”: teoria genului și disoluția creștinismului, nu doar în domeniul doctrinar, ci și în domeniul moral și cultural, adică elementul vital al civilizației creștine. Această trădare a fost realizată într-un mod asemănător celui folosit de lojele masonice împotriva monarhiilor catolice și pusă în practică grație unui plan de infiltrare care s-a desfășurat pe două fronturi: unul ideologic și altul practic. Pe plan ideologic, am asistat la coruperea ortodoxiei prin erezii și erori filosofice, ale căror consecințe nefaste continuăm să le suferim până astăzi. Pe plan practic, am asistat la coruperea moralității oamenilor, supunerea indivizilor în fața patimilor, permițându-le să îi domine, aservirea la propriile lor vicii pentru a-i șantaja, promovarea celor mai corupți în cele mai înalte posturi și care, prin comportamentul lor scandalos, au delegitimat și desacrazilizat instituțiile pe care le conduceau. Ce credibilitate mai poate să pretindă Biserica în materie de moralitate sexuală, când cei mai înalți prelați ai săi sunt niște perverși corupți? Ce credibilitate mai poate să pretindă Biserica, când oficiali ai Sfântului Scaun sunt implicați în scandaluri financiare și speculații bursiere obscure? De aceea, este necesară o reîntoarcere la Tradiție și la acele valori care au fost abandonate și uitate astăzi, cum ar fi cinstea, sentimentul datoriei, fidelitatea, dragostea de țară, onoarea, disciplina. Ar fi o întoarcere la „ordo christianus” în sfera laică, ceea ce ar presupune o reformă radicală a statelor. Același lucru ar trebui să se producă în sfera eclezială, prin îndepărtarea falșilor păstori și restaurarea a tot ce a fost distrus de furia Conciliului Vatican II. Dacă dorim să trecem cu bine greaua încercare la care Providența ne supune, trebuie să eliminăm cauza pedepselor pe care Domnul ni le aplică. Iar cauza internă o reprezintă tot acest sistem antihristic conceput de principiile masonice și de Revoluție. Trebuie să restaurăm autoritatea ca expresie a puterii lui Hristos și trebuie să le dăm o educație morală și spirituală celor care ne guvernează. Cu certitudine, este o sarcină dificilă, însă pe care trebuie să o îndeplinim dacă dorim cu adevărat să le transmitem copiilor noștri valorile care fac din ei niște buni creștini și niște buni cetățeni, responsabili în fața lui Dumnezeu și dornici să Îl asculte, să Îl proclame Împărat și să Îi aducă onoruri publice. Odată ce Îl vom fi recunoscut din nou ca Împărat, Domnul nostru nu va mai îngădui ca fiii lui să piară în luptă și îi va răsplăti cu o mare victorie. Totuși, până ce vom fi înțeles greșeala care se găsește la baza ororilor de astăzi, nu putem spera într-o intervenție a lui Dumnezeu. Recent, Bergoglio a spus limpede că va fi necesară crearea unei Mari Resetări și a subliniat de asemenea că nu va mai exista o revenire la normalitate. Bergoglio s-a făcut un apostol al religiei seculare dorite de lojile masonice, al căror scop final este suprimarea completă a creștinismului. Se poate afirma că Bergoglio este rezultatul firesc al Vatican II? Credeți că apostazia Bisericii, care a fost menționată în mai multe profeții și în viziunile Venerabilului Holzhauser, a ajuns deja la apogeu și se află aproape de sfârșit?
Ce este „Primăvara Bisericii” pe care o propovăduiește Stânga
Bergoglio este unul dintre cei mai fideli adepți ai religiei globaliste: a îmbrățișat toate țelurile sale, îi promovează proiectele, îi propovăduiește doctrinele, îi combate inamicii. Dacă nu ar avea rolul pe care îl are în ierarhia ecleziastică, el ar putea fi considerat profetul Noii Ordini Mondiale și principalul dușman al Bisericii lui Hristos. Faptul că este universal considerat drept capul Bisericii ne arată o evidentă contradicție, un conflict extrem de grav de interese, o trădare flagrantă a autorității pe care o are. Metodele care i-au permis înlocuirea lui Benedict XVI dezvăluie intervenția forțelor ostile Bisericii. Manevrele așa-zisei Mafii de la Saint Gallen (un grup informal de înalți prelați ultraliberali) reprezintă o dovadă directă a acestei intervenții ostile, planificată dinainte și de Statul Paralel, după cum reiese din e-mail-urile lui John Podesta (fostul șef de cabinet al lui Bill Clinton și șeful de campanie al lui Hillary Clinton), care vorbea despre o „primăvară a Bisericii”, în care Biserica să adopte duhul lumii și să renunțe la predicarea Evangheliei. Acest „pontificat” reprezintă aplicarea coerentă a principiilor Vatican II, după cum a afirmat cu mândrie Bergoglio însuși. Tot ce a spus și a făcut din 2013 încoace este la unison cu erorile introduse în diverse pasaje ambigue din textele conciliare, de la tăcerile sale intransigente la ambiguitățile sale înșelătoare. Însă, ca tot ce vine de la Diavol, acest proiect nu are nici o speranță de reușită și nu face altceva decât să ne determine să înțelegem un adevăr foarte clar, pe care încă suntem incapabili să îl recunoaștem: singura nădejde de Mântuire constă în acceptarea completă a Legii, așa cum Iisus Hristos a predat-o Apostolilor și așa cum Sfânta Biserică a propovăduit-o de 2000 de ani. Toate greșelile, toate încercările de a adapta Credința la mentalitatea acestei epoci, toate compromisurile pentru a face un loc Bisericii în treburile lumii și toate trădările săvârșite în schimbul dobândirii puterii vin de la Satana, și prin urmare sunt condamnate la eșec. Când Hristos Se va întoarce pentru a domni în Biserică, chiar înainte de a reveni în societatea laică, El va hărăzi Bisericii păstori buni și sfinți, un pontif curajos care va denunța apostazia, va combate greșelile, îi va strânge în jurul Crucii pe cei buni. Deoarece Biserica, Corpul Mistic al lui Hristos, este menită să sufere propriile Patimi, însă în demnitatea și plenitudinea ființei sale, Mireasa Mielului Nevinovat, nu concubina eternului învins. De aceea nădăjduiesc și mă rog Proniei să acorde lumii un răgaz de pace și de convertire, pentru a-i întoarce pe păstori și turma lor la litera și spiritul Evangheliei, astfel încât să poată face față cu demnitate persecuției finale dinainte de Judecata de Apoi. Dacă acest timp propice va fi inaugurat de Consacrarea Rusiei Inimii Preacurate a Maicii Domnului (profețită la Fatima, în 1917, anul revoluției bolșevice), atunci cred că putem descifra cu adevărat faptele prezente prin această viziune eshatologică, care își găsește împlinirea în victoria lui Hristos asupra Diavolului.
Cum trebuie organizată Alianța Anti-Globalistă
Excelența Voastră a lansat recent un apel public prin care chemați la formarea unei „Alianțe Anti-Globaliste”. Credeți că sediul acestei Alianțe ar trebui să fie în Italia, o țară față de care francmasoneria și forțele globaliste manifestă o ură istorică? Italia este o țară binecuvântată de Dumnezeu și de prezența Papalității. Civilizația sa – reprezentată de moștenirea istorică, culturală și artistică a orașelor sale, dar și unită de legătura credinței catolice – a fost dintotdeauna ținta acțiunii destrămătoare a Satanei și a slugilor lui. Francmasoneria urăște Italia, urăște istoria ei glorioasă, care este legată lăuntric de nașterea Creștinătății și apoi de răspândirea ei. Francmasoneria mai urăște și tradiția acestei țări, care este impregnată de creștinism, îi urăște arta, profund creștină, îi urăște cultura și civilizația, care reprezintă o voce elocventă a puterii Credinței în influențarea fiecărui aspect al vieții. Îi urăște pe sfinții ei, care, prin propovăduirea și exemplul lor, au salvat de la iad milioane de suflete. Îi urăște pe locuitorii ei, al căror caracter continuă până astăzi să aibă o autenticitate și o pasiune care sunt profund catolice, exprimate prin gesturi mărunte, prin generozitate, printr-un simț moral care sunt profund creștine. De aceea, consider că Italia ar trebui să joace un rol cheie în opoziția la tirania Noii Ordini, propunându-se pe sine ca reședință pentru această Alianță mondială Anti-Globalistă. Și, dat fiind că posibilitatea revenirii unui monarh catolic pare greu de imaginat în acest moment, cred că forma de guvernare a pre-Uniunii Comunelor și Statelor (forma de guvernământ a cetăților-state italiene înainte de unificarea Italiei, în 1870), ar putea fi o sursă importantă de inspirație, favorizând o reformă a societății laice italiene în conformitate cu principiile creștine și, în același timp, compatibilă cu necesitățile unei societăți moderne. Din acest punct de vedere, mă gândesc mai cu seamă la „Alegoria unei bune guvernări”, fresca din primăria de la Siena, în care virtuțile teologice îi luminează pe cardinal și virtuțile laice.
Șansa muceniciei
Mulți oameni au grave probleme personale din cauza discriminării provocate de „certificatul verde” impus de guvernul Draghi. Mulți renunță la slujbele și salariile lor pentru a evita vaccinarea, iar mulți alții protestează în stradă împotriva acestei societăți de un autoritarism fără precedent. Ce ați vrea să le spuneți celor care suferă consecințele acestei societăți distopice și celor care cedează pierzându-și nădejdea? Aș vrea să le răspund cu cuvintele Domnului Nostru Iisus Hristos:
„Acestea vi le-am grăit, ca întru Mine pace să aveți. În lume, necazuri veți avea; dar îndrăzniți, Eu am biruit lumea.” (Ioan 16, 33).
Celor care suferă de pe urma propriei discriminări sau a apropiaților lor; celor care au fost constrânși să se vaccineze pentru că autoritatea laică i-a supus în mod rușinos unui șantaj cu complicitatea scandaloasă a autorității bisericești; celor care, cu curaj, refuză să se supună unor legi ilegitime și tiranice; celor care au fost lipsiți de mijloace de subsistență pentru atitudinea lor, le zic acestea: voi sunteți dovada că forța și brutalitatea Răului vă pot lovi în bunurile voastre, în trupul vostru, în familia voastră; dar nu vor putea niciodată să vă ia pacea de a-I fi rămas credincioși lui Hristos. Credeți că mucenicii erau niște persoane dotate cu puteri speciale? Adevărații martiri au fost, sunt și vor fi oameni ca voi și ca mine, oameni cu mii de defecte, poate, dar însuflețiți de iubirea pentru Hristos. Sunt gata să își sacrifice viața pentru a nu renunța la această iubire supranaturală, divină. Și dacă au fost capabili, cu ajutorul lui Dumnezeu, să privească moartea în față însoțită de dureri groaznice, credeți că voi astăzi nu sunteți în stare, cu acoperirea Maicii Domnului, să vă opuneți acestor tirani, oricât de cruzi ar fi în lașitatea lor? Simțiți-vă onorați de privilegiul care vă este oferit de a merita Raiul: credincioșia voastră, puterea voastră împotriva impunerilor unei puteri vrăjmașe vă vor face să meritați ajutorul și protecția Cerului chiar și în cele mai mărunte lucruri. Rămâneți în harul lui Dumnezeu, care este singurul bun pe care nimeni nu îl va putea lua de la voi: toate celelalte sunt în mâiniile Celei pe care o chemăm ca Apărătoare și Mijlocitoare a creștinilor. Și, când Maica Domnului intervine, Iadul se cutremură.
Informatii si mesaje 
