[ Archive for the 'Union' Category ]
Posted by Karl (December 1, 2006 at 10:50 am)
I provide you two links today: first, Patriarch Bartholomew’s wonderful homily on the feast of St. Andrew. Then see Amy Welborn’s trenchant comments, which I quote here:
The homily was on liturgy - its definition and power. The homily, whether purposefully or not, highlights a division between Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy less frequently noted than issues of papal authority and other questions of ecclesiology and theology.
Many folks, with only a superficial understanding of either or both churches, sees relatively formal liturgies, the importance of Eucharist and male priests and thinks, “So? What’s the big difference?” A lot, particularly since the Second Vatican Council. The salient question is…why would the Orthodox want to “reunite” (whatever that would mean), or more dramatically, be in any sense under the authority of a structure in which the theology of liturgy, as it’s been lived out on the ground, has turned into a free-for-all?
Posted by Karl (October 13, 2006 at 10:40 am)
It is a familiar story to anyone who runs in Eastern Catholic circles: one of the best and brightest members of the parish “‘doxes”, converts to Orthodoxy. It’s happened with Rod Dreher, the writer of “Crunchy Cons.” You can read his account of himself here.
In Rod’s case, it has a great deal to do with his courageous journalism about the clergy sex scandal, and the threats and mistreatment he received at the hands of evil Catholic clergy and bishops. Of course, as he says, none of this in itself makes the claims of Rome dubious, but when taken together with the state of current Catholic life, it brings to mind the possibility that Rome’s claims are dubious. If the spiritual, liturgical, and catechetical life at many Catholic parishes actually leads people away from Christ, then perhaps something is wrong. Add to that the general ambivalence or ignorance about the office of Peter, and something is clearly wrong!
Why be Catholic, after all? Why not move to another apostolic Church with a better sense of everyday Christian life? For Byzantine Catholics, this is an important question, for it goes to the very heart of our reason for existing. I think there are two very important tasks we need to undertake in order to be an evangelical Church: 1) Affirm and defend papal claims, and 2) fully embrace our Orthodox spiritual heritage. To do less is to die.
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Posted by Eric (September 18, 2006 at 1:19 pm)
In response to a post a couple months ago on my personal blog, Square Zero, entitled, “The Orthodox and Contraception” a Byzantine Catholic named Karen commented that the Orthodox ambiguity on the contraception issue was the one thing holder her back from converting to Orthodoxy. We had a brief exchange in the comments section of that post, but then I expanded on the issue she had raised in a longer entry entitled, “Catholic v. Orthodox”.
I thought the issues I addressed there, and the subsequent discussion in the comments to the post, might be of interest to readers of BEMA. But rather than cross-post the original article here, and split up the discussion between two different blogs, I thought it would be better to link to the article at Square Zero and invite BEMA readers to visit.
I am especially keen for more knowledgable folks to address some of the important issues Karen has raised, like:
- The Filioque
- The Immaculate Conception
- The monarchial papacy
You can read the full post here.
Posted by Eric (April 22, 2006 at 10:43 am)
Here is pictured one of the towers of Holy Trinity Cathedral in Chicago, a sight I cannot behold without some feeling of sorrow.
I took this picture a couple of weeks ago when I happened to be passing through the Chicago neighborhood that is home to several Eastern Christian churches. Only a few blocks away from this church, which is the cathedral church of the Diocese of the Midwest of the Orthodox Church in America, is St. Nicholas Church, the Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral. Same liturgy, same spirituality, two Cathedrals
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