Dr. Adam DeVille is a professor at the University of St. Francis, an editor of Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies, the author of "Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy," and most recently a speaker at this year's Orientale Lumen Conference. He was kind enough to answer a few questions on his many efforts for this blog.
1. Would you speak a little on LOGOS? What sort of material is covered in the journal and how did you get involved as an editor?
Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies began publishing in 1950. After a low period in the late 1980s, it was revived in 1993 and revised again in 2005. It is the oldest scholarly journal publishing in Eastern Christianity in North America. It is published twice a year in two double volumes.
I began as a lowly copy editor in 2002, was made associate editor in 2005, and took over as full editor in 2008.
The journal tries to hold three things in tension: first, to be open to scholarship from both Catholic and Orthodox sources. Second, to be scholarly and academic, but also open to and supportive of pastoral renewal of our churches. To that end, it publishes not only leading peer-reviewed scholarship in the form of articles, but it also publishes shorter essays, notes, lectures, and book reviews that should be accessible and intelligible to the generally educated layperson or parish priest. Third, while being based in North America, the journal also has ties to the churches of Ukraine. We therefore publish articles in Ukrainian—as well as English and French.
2. This year Notre Dame Press published your book "Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy." What was the impetus behind the writing of your book? Were there any surprises along the way while you did research for it?
The
book began as my doctoral dissertation at the Sheptytsky Institute at Saint Paul University, Ottawa, Canada. But I hasten to add that it was of course edited after that, and is free of “dissertationese” which sometimes plagues some books! In fact, I’ve been told by several people that it reads like a fast-paced historical novel in some respects.
The impetus for writing came from two long-standing interests of mine: the problem of authority in general; and the problem of Christian division. I have been involved in various ecumenical organizations for over twenty years now, and the search for East-West unity remains hugely important to me.
Surprises: Yes, quite a few, particularly concerning ecclesial structures. The book demolishes, I think, what I came to regard as one of the received myths of ecclesial governance whereby, the stereotypes allege, governance in the West is always papal, monarchical, and centralized; and governance in the East is always patriarchal, decentralized, and synodal. If you know what you are talking about, you know that’s just a lot of rubbish on both sides. There is a long-standing history of synodal governance in the Western Church—real synodal governance, with legislative authority, and not the pretend synods they have now in Rome—until at least the end of the eleventh century; and there are many examples in the East of patriarchs having powers that the popes of Rome, even in their most acutely ultramontane moments, would never of dreamed of having, let alone exercising. Two examples illustrate this: Pope Gregory VII (r. 1073-1085), one of the most revolutionary popes in history, did not dare press his far-reaching and dramatic reforms without the advice and support of his synod. Patriarch Alexy I (r. 1945-1970) of Moscow was granted incredible powers (what the Orthodox theologian John Erickson has called “neo-papalist’’ powers), making him a “super-patriarch” in many ways under the 1945 statutes governing the Russian Church. If one knows 11th-century history and the Investiture Crisis, one can understand Gregory VII; and if one knows 20th-century history, one will understand why Alexy was granted those powers.