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(Orthodox Times) - In his letter in English in which he avoided using words such as “synaxis” or “synod,” something that would confront him with the holy canons of the Church, the Patriarch of Jerusalem invited Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and the other primates of the Orthodox Churches in Jordan for a “fraternal gathering in love,” a term coined by him.
Following what he stated in Moscow after his meeting with the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem proceeds with his initiative to “find peace among the Churches,” as he claimed, by sending an invitation to the Orthodox primates for this “fraternal gathering in love” to be held by the end of February.
In his letter brought to light today by orthodoxia.info, after having explained the prominent place of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem in the Holy Land and its historic interventions to maintain peace in the region, Patriarch Theophilos announced that he had decided to build a bridge among the Orthodox Sister Churches so that they can stand together against the trials of our times.
“As it had always played similar roles in the past, and during different tenures through the Church’s history, the Patriarchate of Jerusalem, guardian of the Church of the Resurrection and the Tomb of Our Lord Jesus Christ, is laying a bridge for its sisters Orthodox Churches to walk and stand together in these most testing of times,” wrote in his letter Patriarch Theophilos.
While he bypassed de facto the Ecumenical Patriarchate by calling himself a synaxis of the Orthodox primates, the Patriarch of Jerusalem addressed the Ecumenical Patriarch saying, “Abiding by the Holy Canons of the Church, We respect and uphold the role, the position and status of the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the privilege of seniority of Your All Holiness, dear Brother in Christ.”
The Patriarch’s attempt is evident in the text, that is, to avoid using words and phrases in respect of which he might be accused of violating the holy canons. For that reason, he used words and phrases which could have led to at least two or more interpretations.
The acts of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem on this issue have so far remained a closely guarded secret. Despite the importance of his initiative, as Patriarch Theophilos himself described it, he has not made any public statements or press release, and when he was asked more the acts of Jerusalem Patriarchate, the Chief Secretary of the Holy Synod, Archbishop Aristarchos of Constantina, said that he could not make further statements without the blessing of his Patriarch.
It is noteworthy for historical reasons that the Patriarch of Jerusalem, who cited unity and love to justify his intervention in the powers of the Ecumenical Throne, has ceased communion with the Patriarch of Antioch over the last six years due to a disagreement over jurisdiction in Qatar where only one parish exists!
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Could someone please referene exactly which "holy canons" his Beatitude of Jerusalem was in danger of breaking? How about a single holy Canon that refers to Synaxes of primates?
ReplyDeleteThere has been and is discussion of whether certain canons are anachronistic today. These discussions are useless before one establishes what the canons actually say, and what they were trying to say.
In the past two months I have been reviewing the canons of the Ecumenical councils and the Apostolic canons, with the following methodology:
1 what does the text say?
2 what did that mean at the time?
3 what was the intent?
This last question is sometimes easier than one might suspect as canons sometimes state their intention, or are written in way that the intention is clear enough.
So far I can see no canons that define who can call an ecumenical council. No canons that speak of the Synaxis of primates at all, or who may call such a synaxis. Nor can I find canons that define or speak of the primacy of Rome or Constantinople in relationship to or as expressing the unity of the Church on earth.
If anyone can point to text that clearly proves what I just wrote is wrong I would be most grateful to see the text I have missed so far.
"....Nor can I find canons that define or speak of the primacy of Rome or Constantinople in relationship to or as expressing the unity of the Church on earth..."
DeleteCanons 9,17, and 28(36 of "in Trullo") of Chalcedon. What these canons meant at the time and how they were applied through history is of course the subject. Erickson's chapter "Collegiality and Primacy in Orthodox Ecclesiology" in "The Challenge of our Past" is a place to start...
Oh and no canons giving anyone the exclusive right to declare, bestow, or be the sole arbiter of Autocephaly.
ReplyDeleteSee Erickson's chapter "The 'Autocephalous Church' in the same book for a definition/historical survey.
DeleteTLDR: Autocephaly as an idea and practice is quite varied and basically made up as history went along...
It's amazing how bad Orthodox Times is.
ReplyDeleteIt's about the same as Orthochristian.com.... well, no, actually Orthochristian.com is probably worse.
DeleteYou're deluded.
Deletelol, Orthodox Times is paid by the U.S. State Dept. to pump out Phanar propaganda. But beyond that, it's simply very poorly written. Sources are almost never given, and even when they do give a source, it's almost always just at title, rarely ever a link to an actual article. And they invent scandals, such as when the Patriarchs of Moscow and Jerusalem concelebrated in Moscow, commemorating only one another. For them it was the worst mistake of the millennium, shocking the entire Orthodox world!!!! And yet, no one else made a peep about it.
Deletejckstraw72, look, I don't know what planet you live on, but there's a big difference between receiving a government grant to write whatever you want, as with Orthodox Times, and contrasted with the shills and hacks employed by the Moscow Patriarchate to toe the party line on Orthochristian.com. Sure, the later is much more slick and polished and "pious", but it's basically an apologetic and contribution of Moscow's ever-growing schism with Orthodoxy. I honestly feel sorry for the people who have to write that stuff. Orthochristian.com is owned and operated by the Moscow Patriarchate through their media arm, Sretensky Monastery, located right next to the Kremlin and the offices of Vladimir Putin. Don't get me wrong, I can still appreciate Orthochristian.com, but I'm sure glad that Orthodox Times exists to give a more balanced counter opinion to whatever the MP wants you to hear. I consider it my tax dollars very well spent.
DeleteBy the way, any Patriarch who is serving the Liturgy as a Hierarch is supposed to commemorate the other churches in the dipytchs. If he doesn't, then that's essentially being papist.
Actually, OrthoChristian.com is owned and operated by Vladyka Tikhon (Shevkunov), and therefore is now the English-language site of the Pskov Caves Monastery, where he is now the abbot.
DeleteWhereas Orthodox Times openly receives money from the U.S. government, ideas of OrthoChristian as a Russian gov't site or even as a site of the Moscow Patriarchate are nothing more than silly fabrications.
//By the way, any Patriarch who is serving the Liturgy as a Hierarch is supposed to commemorate the other churches in the dipytchs. If he doesn't, then that's essentially being papist.//
I didn't say it wasn't strange or abnormal, but they were certainly attempting to manufacture a scandal where none existed. And that's just one example.
The canonical question caused me to miss the crowning mendacity of the final paragraph. Antioch was the side that broke communion, not Jerusalem.
ReplyDeleteFurthermore, appeal was made to Constantinople, both sides were involved on Constantinople chaired arbitration, and Constantinople was unable to or unwilling in the years after that crisis broke out to settle the question, which as the article correctly notes, involves one parish. This failure subsequently led to the refusal of Antioch to take part in the meeting in Crete.
Fr. Yousuf, when I asked my bishop about the situation in Qatar leading to Antioch not going to the council, I was told that Antioch did not go because they were paid by Russia. I did not get to ask whether, even if that were true, it made the issue that needed to be resolved irrelevant...
ReplyDeleteAnyone who thinks Antioch needed to be bribed by Russia to withdraw from Crete is unfamiliar with Antioch's baseline attitude toward the EP..
DeleteRussian military intervention and protection of Syria began in September of 2015, about nine months before the Crete Council. If Russia didn't want Antioch to attend Crete, then their non-attendance might have been a form of quid pro quo for their continued protection.
ReplyDeleteThe longer this all goes on, the worse Orthodoxy looks when it speaks of it's supposed "unity". Looks more like a bunch of squabbling national churches that cannot decide on anything together...such a serious break in communion that has the whole Orthodox world in knots over...territory??? With all the evils plaguing the world and the fight is over that!??? Simply amazing.
ReplyDeleteRussia didn't want the Crete Council to be a success. It's really that simple. The primacy of Constantinople has long been considered a threat to Russian Orthodoxy, especially since the last century. After WWII, Moscow began asserting itself as the global leader of Orthodoxy, and this ambition for primacy was clearly evident at the Moscow Pan-Orthodox Council of July 1948.
ReplyDeleteThe close connection between Church and State in Russia cannot afford primacy coming from an outside entity. Yet this was essentially the same argument the "Kievan Patriarchate" was making against Russia. In both cases, the outside primacy is considered a direct threat to national security.
The Cretan council was not a serious endeavour. We don't need a council to remind us that abortion is a stain upon Earth, marriage is a Sacrament reserved to one man and one woman, peace is better than war and we should protect the environment. The faith was fully declared at the Seventh Council. There are two ecclesial issues remaining: autocephaly and the status of the extra-territorial Churches. We are probably a decade from even beginning to agree to discuss those matters. Antioch is not relinquishing her North and South American parishes, and her flock is not going under the Greeks or the OCA Synod much less anybody else. The OCA says they have a tomos, and they do--and they were shabbily ignored in the run-up to Crete. There was not even any agreement on how to tally the votes at a council, as the EP races to establish exarchates before the Turks finally just take over the See.
DeleteI mean come on, a Council?
With the failure to agree on even threshold procedures the dissenting Patriarchs did the only and proper thing their status allows: declined their brother sovereign's invitation.
It was a heavily negotiated council with pre-conciliar meetings that took place over many decades starting in 1961 in Rhodes. As flawed as the end result of those negotiations may be, it was still an earnest and dedicated attempt by Constantinople to meet together as a Church and in council. Orthodox Christians claim to be conciliar, but where's the current evidence of this?
DeleteIt would have been much better for the churches to have attended Crete, perhaps voting against the documents, than not to have attended at all. The Crete Council is the missed opportunity, and it reflects the current failure of Orthodox Christianity to agree or even just meet together on anything in a conciliar manner, no matter how mundane or wanting the addressed topics may be.
Autocephaly and the status of extra-territorial churches? It's well documented that Constantinople couldn't get the other churches to agree to meet on these highly "sensitive" topics. And yes, Moscow is not the only church with an extra-territorial problem. So the churches aren't yet ready to talk about this. It will probably take a violent shaking of the current world order before they do.
Can you explain what you mean by "extra-territorial"?
DeleteThe ethnic-based Churches in the West outside the old imperial and nation-state borders.
Delete@Joseph:
DeleteThere was nothing to discuss in pan-Orthodoxy. The only thing there is to discuss--autocephaly and the exarchates--is simply not up for discussion yet. Nothing is stopping the Patriarchs from gracious sovereign visits where they can ruminate over coffee and celebrate grand liturgies together (I am not being pejorative--that's what Patriarchs are supposed to do). Only bad things can result from unnecessary councils: see Vatican 2 (and Vatican 1, I think).
I frankly wonder if the Slavs and Arabs and whatever non-Greek Americans were allowed to participate sensed a trap: they get there, find an opaque agenda on primacy and autocephaly nobody really agreed to, and an array of Greek islands declaring a majority and pointing to their attendance as affirmation.
Joseph and Anti-Gnostic, you both essentially agree. I would only add that before a discussion and agreement (aka canonical law) on "autocephaly and the exarchates" can occur, the ecclesiastical presumptions about a more general ontology of how to "be" Church in the modern world will have to be at a minimum tacitly agreed upon...
DeleteI have no idea what you're trying to say. We don't essentially agree, and the general ontology of the Church is and will always remain unchanged: we are a hierarchical and apostolic Church. This is a conflict over primacy and territory.
DeleteI apologize I was not clear: It seems to me you both agree that a conciliar process/solution to the "sensitive" issues (i.e. primacy, autocephaly, jurisdictionalism/territory) is stagnated/broken.
DeleteHow to be "hiearchical"? That is the question. What is a bishop of a "city" (e.g. is the Dalla/Fort Worth metro area a "city"?), or a Metropolotian of an important city (whatever that is), or a "Patriarch" in a multi-cultureal, multi-state world? How are Patriarch's to relate to each other? What does the acid of Time do to the Faith in an anarchic system with several "sovereigns" (and thus de facto several or more "Primates") do to the Faith itself? History is what it is, and the soverigns have not in fact come together on anything since the fall of the Empire and the center culturally that it provided to a diverse Church, so how can these "issues remaining" ever get addressed without this center?
I am wondering out loud if conciliarity is just talk/delusion, and the Church of the East is not actually "One Holy" Church after all.
The concept of conciliarity is not just about bishops getting together and agreeing on things, but perhaps more importantly it's a fidelity to the authority of the Ecumenical Councils. In this way, any lay person can be conciliar.
DeleteHowever, for a group of bishops to meet together and have some sense of synodality, there also has to be primacy. Without respect for primacy, the disagreements of bishops tend to become stubborn and senseless, and then even their attempts at synodality are lost also. That's what we are witnessing now, a rejection of primacy which results in a loss of synodality within the Church.
"Russia didn't want the Crete Council to be a success. It's really that simple. The primacy of Constantinople has long been considered a threat to Russian Orthodoxy"
ReplyDeleteI think this is possibly the most asinine comment I've seen in quite some time.
Our hierarchs are an embarrassment,,,,I cannot understand why they cannot play nicely in the sand box,,,,doesn't the Bible supercede the canons?,,,, If so, where is the christian love and harmony,,,,it looks like one needs to disregard the do into others rule if you wish to be eastern orthodox,,,,,,I bet the ecumenical patriarchs last name is shiff,,,,I am distressed and embarrassed over all of this wrangling and splitting of hairs,,,,,no wonder when the old believers split away, some formed a bed popovsty group,,,without clergy,,,we have become the laughing stock of the christian church,,,this is tragic
ReplyDeleteYou are the embarrassment, Mr. Klancko. You are an ordained Subdeacon of the church. You ought to know that the Bible as we know it, was not completed until about 270 AD. Surely, the church was already in existence before then! You ought to know that there are many books which the early church did not include in the Canon of Scripture, such as the Protoevangelion of St. James.In these books, we read about the early life of the Virgin Mary,etc.
DeleteYou also discredit yourself by defending Freemasonry. Right in the rectory of my church, there is a paper that a candidate for the deaconate must sign, before ordination in the OCA. The candidate pledges that he is not a Mason.The OCA, Church of Greece, and the Russian Church ban Masons from becoming clergy. It is a religion in it's own right, and Our Saviour said that no man can serve two masters. The fact that individual clergy, including bishops, have joined the lodge, does not make it legitimate.
Thinking like yours caused me to leave the OCA for ROCOR years ago.I'm back with the OCA for the time being, but may leave again, if the Ecumenism which you seem to espouse, becomes the rule. Outside of Orthodoxy, there is no church; there are only organisations calling themselves churches.
"...Thinking like yours caused me to leave the OCA for ROCOR years ago..."
DeleteI hear you BorisJjicj. Klancko's defense of Freemasonry is in the end a defense of "the good man" who nevertheless deny Christ.
I wonder if the 'boundaries' of the Church are ever neat and tidy in this way (e.g. going ROCOR vs. OCA)? Sr. Vassa is a very public preacher for ROCOR, and despite her being indirectly censured by ROCOR bishops to this day she continues to proclaim her unrepentant and compromised anthropology from the internet rooftops. So ROCOR is no assured refuge from the wolves within. Where does one go to find the Church pure and undefiled?
One will never find perfection in this world. There are certain factions in both the MP and ROCOR that I don't care for. The human element in the church will never be 100%. I opposed the ROCOR-MP union at first. I'm still not completely on board with everything Moscow does. It may come to a point where the church will survive only in the catacombs. But we have Our Lord's promise that the gates of hell will not prevail against HIS church. In other words,the church will exist as long as this world does, though possibly in greatly reduced numbers.
DeleteThe important issues of calendar usage, autocephaly, territory... all of these divisive issues could have been brought up at the Crete Council, and they should have been. Constantinople is not really to blame for this either. There was ample time (55 years) to bring up these important issues during the pre-conciliar meetings attended by all the recognized autocephalous churches.
ReplyDeleteThe EP's primacy is now attacked for Crete's failures, but the EP's primacy is only a reflection of the Church's synodality, or the current lack thereof. Synodality has to exist for there to be primacy, and it was a lack of synodality at the pre-conciliar meetings, and ultimately at the Crete Council itself, that are to blame for Crete's shortcomings. At least the EP carried through with having the council, a decision that was approved synodally by all the other Local Churches, even though some later decided not to attend.
The upcoming "fraternal gathering of love" scheduled in Jordan, while being well-intentioned, is unfortunately a further rejection of both the synodality and the primacy of the Orthodox Church. Can you imagine what would happen if several bishops of the Moscow Patriarchate gathered together to discuss the shortcomings of Patriarch Kyrill? That would rightly be called conspiracy.
Joseph, that is an interesting theory but the key difference is that NONE of the other Orthodox Primates are under the EP. So yes, if Patriarch Bartholemew is off the rails the other Primates have to come together to deal with it. Partriarch Bartholemew is not a Pope just like there are no canons specifying who can call a council. Oh, and Crete was a joke. In particular I remember some wealthy Greeks complaining of their disappointment that they wanted it to be our equivalent of Vatican II.
DeleteWallace, all the Orthodox Primates should respect the primacy of the Ecumenical Patriarch, unless of course there is dogmatic error.
DeleteIf the Orthodox Primates aren't respecting the primacy of the Ecumenical Patriarch, and there is no dogmatic error, then perhaps it's them who are "off the rails."
"...all the Orthodox Primates should respect the primacy of the Ecumenical Patriarch, unless of course there is dogmatic error..."
DeleteTotally agree. Prove that the accusation the OCU schismatics are not ordained is false. Show me the list of valid succession ordinations and that a dead hand was not used for some of them and a defrocked deacon posing as a bishop for others. Refute the evidence that clergy who were defrocked and recognized by the EP as being defrocked who went on to further ordinations and sudden acceptance as legitimate by the EP is false.
Until then your arguments ring hollow. Until then you can make all the accusations of Russian Aggression you want but it wont mean squat.
There is no way the EP will call a council while promoting uncannonical actions. In some ways this is similar to the novelties introduced by the Pope of Rome and there is no disagreement that Rome does not have any jurisdiction within The Church today. The remaining Orthodox hierarchs have no choice but to deal with the situation even if it means calling a council that the EP will not show up at.
That is not disrespect but necessity.
In terms of faith and praxis, the OCU has been a mirror image of the Moscow Patriarchate. It's only recently that the OCU has considered adopting some of the liturgical practices of Constantinople. Otherwise, we don't hear about any real differences.
DeleteHowever, yes, some of the OCU bishops were formerly deposed and/or anathematized by the Moscow Patriarchate. Some of their bishops were reportedly "ordained" by self-ordained charlatans or someone's dead hand. Obviously this isn't apostolic succession and ordination.
Yet what does ordination and apostolic succession actually mean outside of the Orthodox Church? Can a person leave the Church and take apostolic succession and ordination with them? I don't believe so. Someone who aposticizes or is anathematized is no longer properly apostolic and ordained.
Yet there's always the possibility of being reconciled with the Church, and that's what the OCU did with the Ecumenical Patriarchate. In the OCU's case, the reconciliation and mass reception of bishops, clergy, and laity was granted by a decision of the Ecumenical Patriarchate's Holy Synod. It was granted by economia without the application of baptism and/or ordination. Is there a precedent for this? Patriarch Bartholomew noted that the EP Holy Synod was following the standard Russian practice of receiving Uniate and Catholic clergy into the Orthodox Church.
Indeed, we can look at the example of St. Alexis Toth, formerly an Eastern-Rite Catholic priest. He was received as an Orthodox Christian, and as an Orthodox priest, by merely being vested in the altar of the Russian Cathedral in San Francisco. So his apostolic succession came from the moment of his reception into Orthodoxy by the Russian bishop and by economia. He was received as a priest despite the fact that he never received baptism and ordination within the Orthodox Church. Thus the Russian Orthodox Church has precedent for this with the schismatic Uniates and Catholics.
The Orthodox schism with the Catholics was justifiably dogmatic, condemning the Pope's addition of "filioque" to the Nicene Creed as false dogma. Yet Moscow has still not provided any dogmatic reason for it's schism with Constantinople, Alexandria, Greece, and the newly created OCU.
"...However, yes, some of the OCU bishops were formerly deposed and/or anathematized by the Moscow Patriarchate. Some of their bishops were reportedly "ordained" by self-ordained charlatans or someone's dead hand. Obviously this isn't apostolic succession and ordination...."
DeleteSounds like you answered your own question. The OCU has pretend bishops. I'm glad Russia held the line even though there is pain. We do not practice open communion with the schismatics, heretics, and heterodox. You don't seem to agree and you reveal that all of you attempts to defend the EP's actions and promotion of the myth of Russian aggression are built on sand.
Wallace, St. Alexis Toth was "ordained" and "baptized" outside of the Church by the self-ordained dead hand of Uniatism. Yet we no longer call St. Alexis a pretend priest, neither do we call him pretend Orthodox, even though he was received into the Church without the application of Orthodox baptism and ordination.
DeleteAs long as you keep spewing the same nonsense as you did on the Monomakhos site, Joseph, I'm going to call you out on it.
DeleteFirst of all, the Uniates and Roman Catholics are heretics, not schismatics. Before you would instruct others, you need to get your terminology straight.
Secondly, in no way can St. Alexis be compared to the Ukrainian schismatics. Why is this? Because when St. Alexis was united to the Orthodox church, no ORTHODOX bishop or Synod of bishops had deposed him. Get it? If Rome anathematised, deposed, or defrocked St. Alexis, it wouldn't have made any difference, because St. Alexis was renouncing the heresy of Papism by joining the Orthodox church. A legitimate Orthodox bishop received St. Alexis into the church, using a formula accepted by the Russian Orthodox church, of which said bishop was a hierarch of.
In Ukraine, you had a group of "bishops" who were ordained by those who had been deposed by the Canonical church of Ukraine, headed by Metropolitan Onufry.What's more, your own Patriarch, that is, Bartholomew of Constantinople,recognized Metropolitan Onufry as the legitimate primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, and therefore, the illegitimate status of those deposed by said church, up until a few years ago.He cannot suddenly go back on everything and instantly proclaim "Metropolitan" Epiphany as legit.
I could show up in Constantinople with a suitcase full of American money, and maybe buy myself an Episcopal consecration. But it would worthless, because I would not have been released by my own bishop . Contrary to what you, Jake, and David believe, the Patriarch has no such magical powers. We have no pope. My bishop became the Patriarch's equal the moment three bishops laid their hands on him almost seventeen years ago. That's that.
BorisJojicj,
DeleteAll heretics are schismatic, but not all schismatics are heretics. I greatly appreciate your implied point that the OCU are not heretics. If they were heretics, then the MP's schism would undoubtedly be justified. Yet as it stands, the MP offers no valid dogmatic reason for their schism with the churches of Constantinople, Alexandria, Greece, and the OCU.
Yes, the sin of unjustified schism is often held to be be a worse sin than heresy. So who is it that's being schismatic?
You are dead wrong. The organization headed by Epiphany is guilty of the heresy of phyliatism. Your Patriarch pretending otherwise changes nothing. Note that during the Soviet era, the EP never asserted his right as primate over all. Unfortunately for the EP, they are no longer dealing with illiterate peasants. The average Orthodox Joe has a computer and/or a smartphone. I know Ukrainian. It is one of my four languages. I know the Ukrainian diaspora. My kids went to a Ukrainian Catholic school. I attended church on January 7th where both the deacon and priest are ex-members of the Ukrainian church. One is Canadian born. The other comes from Eastern Ukraine, where the majority of Orthodox supp2 the legitimate church. I don't suppose, however, that anything short of a miracle will shake your faith in the EP. Maybe Jake can over some more brilliant remarks about flatulence. I'm done here.
Delete"...the organization headed by Epiphany is guilty of the heresy of phyliatism..."
DeleteSo the MP's answer is to impose its own phyliatism from the outside.
Ukrainian (or Greek) phyliatism = bad
Russian (or 'Pan-slavic) phyliatism = good
This is an interesting moral/ecclesiastical calculus, though it is not quite fart can worthy... ;)
Yes Wallace. Crete was a complete joke. It was a modern day robber council.
ReplyDeleteJoseph,
ReplyDeleteThe process that yes the various local churches agreed to and participated in for 55 years leading up to Crete was itself a very modern process. While the various local churches had life, and at times survival, to attend to they sent "theologians" - academics and bureaucrats - to this "process" essentially just to show up and manage it. Its all a form of modern institutional behavior that is deeply dysfunctional and rarely leads to fruit worth eating. It does lead to vague "positional papers" that leave more questions than they answer - certainly not to Dogma or Ecclesiology. Heck, it does not even lead to "collegiality" usually.
In the end, to have a meeting for meetings sake is worse than not having a meeting at all. I don't say any of this to assign blame necessarily, though the modern EPatriarchate does display its share of this sort of institutional behavior..
Joseph,
DeleteAnother thought: this 55 year process did not lead to even a basic agreement on what a "conciliar" process and outcome even is as is shown by how they came to the "voting" process in Crete. In other words, the essential divide and Greek vs. Slav differences remained even in the very process itself, and the essential outlines of the primacy problematic remained.
Jake, I appreciate your excellent points about the dysfunctional modern approach to meeting for meeting's sake. Yet I still hold out that Crete was valuable, even with all it's shortcomings and failures. Hopefully we learn from our mistakes. I think many, if not all, of the Orthodox Primates are now regretting their negligent and casual attitude towards the pre-conciliar meetings and the Crete Council itself. It's now a lost opportunity.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete