My Retraction of Eastern Orthodoxy

Or, Jay Refutes Jay

[Note: this post has been tweaked]

By: Jay Dyer

As some readers now know, I have decided not to become Eastern Orthodox.  Though I confessed it for the past two and a half years and was a catechumen, I chose not to be chrismated, and thus not technically becoming Orthodox.  I have, after much reflection and prayer, decided to return to Catholicism.  I was also instructed by my spiritual advisors to publish this retraction.  Let me say that also that this isn’t being posted as a subtle “challenge” to get Eastern Orthodox friends to spark a debate.  I’m just not really as interested in that as I was as a 21 year-old Calvinist.  I’m more interested in union with Christ nowadays, than debating every naysayer.

In the debate with Josh Brisby, Josh changed his position on infant baptism (not because of me), while he likewise presented me with many quotes from key Eastern theologians concerning the papacy that I simply could not answer.  He also made the key point that I believe is ultimately correct: the Orthodox are not able to adequately deal with legal categories such as expiation, propitiation, etc.  The fact that a very learned Orthodox writer had to point us to an obscure article in a seminary journal on what exactly the Orthodox view on these concepts illustrates the point.  I have likewise changed my position.  While some of the quotes can be explained as references merely to St. Peter himself, many cannot.  I also doubt that they are all forgeries, as this is very unlikely.

I have read Vladimir Guttee, who is largely regarded as the best Eastern writer against the papal arguments.  However, while Guettee nullifies many of the “papal” patristic quotes, I have come across others that he fails to account for that cannot be denied as Eastern acceptance of “papism.”  For example, we see in Session III of Ephesus the following quote from the legates of the Apostolic See ( Rome ):

“There is no doubt, and in fact it has been known in all ages, that the holy and most blessed Peter, prince and head of the apostles, pillar and foundation of the Catholic Church, received the keys of the kingdom from our Lord Jesus Christ, the Savior and Redeemer of the human race, and that to him was given the power of loosing and binding sins: who down to this day and forever lives and judges in his successors.  The holy and most blessed Pope Celestine, according to due order, is his successor and holds his place, and us he sent to supply his place in this holy synod, which the most humane and Christian Emperors have commanded to assemble, bearing in mind and continually watching over the Catholic Faith.

“Arcadius the legate of the Apostolic See said: “Nestorius hath brought us great sorrow…Celestine, most holy pope of the Apostolic See hath condescended to send us as his executors of this business, and also following the decrees of the holy synod we give this as our conclusion: Let Nestorius know that he is deprived of all Episcopal dignity, and is alien from the whole church and from the communion of all its priests” (NPNF: The Seven Ecumenical Councils, pg. 223).

It is very difficult to read this as a reference to mere “place of honor.”  In response to my aforementioned argument from Canon 6 of Nicea, where we read that the jurisdiction of Alexandria is compared to that of Rome , it may be responded that this refers to his jurisdiction as Bishop and Patriarch, and isn’t even concerned with universality, and therefore doesn’t amount to a denial.  In other words, the Bishop of Rome is the Bishop of an actual diocese and a western “Patriarch,” like that of Alexandria , but he is also the head and, when necessary, exercises universal jurisdiction.  As Vatican I says, the intention of papal supremacy is not to make the Pope the sole Bishop of all the church with all others as his assistants, but rather that, when necessary, he may exercise his office of supreme head of the Church, while others are true bishops—successors of the Apostles.  This supreme office, however, does not dissolve his duties and jurisdiction as Bishop of the diocese of Rome and “patriarch” of the West.

Also, as most opponents of the papacy do, I argued from Constantinople III and the excommunication of Pope Honorius.  However, it’s also the case that Constantinople III unanimously received Pope St. Agatho’s Letter (linked below in entirety) which undeniably claims papal infallibility:

"This is the pure expression of piety.  This is the true and immaculate profession of the Christian religion, not invented by human cunning, but which was taught by the Holy Ghost through the princes of the Apostles.  This is the firm and irreprehensible doctrine of the holy Apostles, the integrity of the sincere piety of which, so long as it is preached freely, defends the empire of your Tranquillity in the Christian commonwealth, and exults [will defend it, will render it stable; and exulting], and (as we firmly trust) will demonstrate it full of happiness.  Believe your most humble [servant], my most Christian lords and sons, that I am pouring forth these prayers with my tears, or its stability and exultation [in Greek exaltation].  And these things I (although unworthy and insignificant) dare advise through my sincere love, because your God-granted victory is our salvation, the happiness of your Tranquillity is our joy, the harmlessness of your kindness is the security of our littleness.  And therefore I beseech you with a contrite heart and rivers of tears, with prostrated mind, deign to stretch forth your most clement right hand to the Apostolic doctrine which the co-worker of your pious labours, the blessed apostle Peter, has delivered, that it be not hidden under a bushel, but that it be preached in the whole earth more shrilly than a bugle:  because the true confession thereof for which Peter was pronounced blessed by the Lord of all things, was revealed by the Father of heaven, for he received from the Redeemer of all himself, by three commendations, the duty of feeding the spiritual sheep of the Church; under whose protecting shield, this Apostolic Church of his has never turned away from the path of truth in any direction of error, whose authority, as that of the Prince of all the Apostles, the whole Catholic Church, and the Ecumenical Synods have faithfully embraced, and followed in all things; and all the venerable Fathers have embraced its Apostolic doctrine, through which they as the most approved luminaries of the Church of Christ have shone; and the holy orthodox doctors have venerated and followed it, while the heretics have pursued it with false criminations and with derogatory hatred.  This is the living tradition of the Apostles of Christ, which his Church holds everywhere, which is chiefly to be loved and fostered, and is to be preached with confidence, which conciliates with God through its truthful confession, which also renders one commendable to Christ the Lord, which keeps the Christian empire of your Clemency, which gives far-reaching victories to your most pious Fortitude from the Lord of heaven, which accompanies you in battle, and defeats your foes; which protects on every side as an impregnable wall your God-sprung empire, which throws terror into opposing nations, and smites them with the divine wrath, which also in wars celestially gives triumphal palms over the downfall and subjection of the enemy, and ever guards your most faithful sovereignty secure and joyful in peace.  For this is the rule of the true faith, which this spiritual mother of your most tranquil empire, the Apostolic Church of Christ, has both in prosperity and in adversity always held and defended with energy; which, it will be proved, by the grace of Almighty God, has never erred from the path of the apostolic tradition, nor has she been depraved by yielding to heretical innovations, but from the beginning she has received the Christian faith from her founders, the princes of the Apostles of Christ, and remains undefiled unto the end, according to the divine promise of the Lord and Saviour himself, which he uttered in the holy Gospels to the prince of his disciples:  saying, “Peter, Peter, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he might sift 332you as wheat; but I have prayed for thee, that (thy) faith fail not.  And when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren.”  Let your tranquil Clemency therefore consider, since it is the Lord and Saviour of all, whose faith it is, that promised that Peter’s faith should not fail and exhorted him to strengthen his brethren, how it is known to all that the Apostolic pontiffs, the predecessors of my littleness, have always confidently done this very thing:  of whom also our littleness, since I have received this ministry by divine designation, wishes to be the follower, although unequal to them and the least of all.  For woe is me, if I neglect to preach the truth of my Lord, which they have sincerely preached.  Woe is me, if I cover over with silence the truth which I am bidden to give to the exchangers, i.e., to teach to the Christian people and imbue it therewith.  What shall I say in the future examination by Christ himself, if I blush (which God forbid!) to preach here the truth of his words?  What satisfaction shall I be able to give for myself, what for the souls committed to me, when he demands a strict account of the office I have received?"

If the council was opposed to infallibility, and surely this council would have been if any, it could not have accepted this letter.  Further, it’s also an interesting fact that St. Maximos the Confessor defended Pope Honorius from the charge of monothelitism (Delaney, Pocket Dictionary of Saints, 349).  If the “papal” view of itself was always wrong, then why did the East unanimously receive these undeniably papal claims at Ephesus , Chalcedon , and Constantinople III?  “Orthodox apologetics” should have immediately “kicked in,” and the “Latin heretics” been denounced.

It’s well known that Pope St. Leo made the same claim, and while Guettee attempts to deal with it, the Letter of the Council clearly calls Pope St. Leo the “chief and head of all members” and  “mouthpiece of St. Peter,” asking St. Leo to “ratify and establish” the council-keep in mind-as head of the entire body.  The Letter (linked below) of all 520 priests and bishops of Chalcedon to Pope St. Leo states:

"Our mouth was filled with joy and our tongue with exultation . This prophecy grace has fitly appropriated to us for whom the security of religion is ensured. For what is a greater incentive to cheerfulness than the Faith? what better inducement to exultation than the Divine knowledge which the Saviour Himself gave us from above for salvation, saying, go ye and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things that I have enjoined you Matthew 28:19-20 . And this golden chain leading down from the Author of the command to us, you yourself have steadfastly preserved, being set as the mouthpiece unto all of the blessed Peter, and imparting the blessedness of his Faith unto all. Whence we too, wisely taking you as our guide in all that is good, have shown to the sons of the Church their inheritance of Truth, not giving our instruction each singly and in secret, but making known our confession of the Faith in conceit, with one consent and agreement. And we were all delighted, revelling, as at an imperial banquet, in the spiritual food, which Christ supplied to us through your letter: and we seemed to see the Heavenly Bridegroom actually present with us. For if where two or three are gathered together in His name, He has said that there He is in the midst of them , must He not have been much more particularly present with 520 priests, who preferred the spread of knowledge concerning Him to their country and their ease? Of whom you were chief, as the head to the members, showing your goodwill in the person of those who represented you [the papal legates]; while our religious Emperors presided to the furtherance of due order, inviting us to restore the doctrinal fabric of the Church, even as Zerubbabel invited Joshua to rebuild Jerusalem ."

This is very difficult, I think, to construe in a "first-among equals" fashion.

Many other quotes could be given, but the question remains as to why the East for so long tolerated all this “papistry”?  A reading of the first hundred or so pages of Denzinger shows many popes making the strongest of papal statements and claims, and while we may argue that many in the East at the time did not know of these facts, why are they all regarded as “saints” and not heretics or anti-christ, as the famed 19th century Patriarchal Encyclicals call the pope?  How can St. Gregory the Diaologist (Pope St. Gregory the Great) be honored as a great saint, when he very clearly made all the papal claims as the modern papacy, in his Letters?  And I already know about the situation of him and John.  Again, everyone knows of Pope St. Victor’s attempt to excommunicate all the Eastern Quartodecimians , and while St. Irenaeus asks him not to, it must be admitted that he doesn’t deny St. Victors’ power to do so.  And everyone knows also of St. Irenaeus’ famous statement about all churches needing to be in communion with Rome :

"But since it would be too long to enumerate in such a volume as this the succession of all the churches, we shall confound all those who, in whatever manner, whether through self-satisfaction or vainglory, or through blindness and wicked opinion, assemble other than where it is proper, by pointing out here the successions of the bishops of the greatest and most ancient church known to all, founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul, that church which has the tradition and the faith which comes down to us after having been announced to men by the apostles. With that church, because of its superior origin, all the churches must agree, that is, all the faithful in the whole world, and it is in her that the faithful everywhere have maintained the apostolic tradition" (Against Heresies 3:3:2 [A.D. 189]).

Or consider the statement of Eusebius in his history of the Church concerning the Quartodecimian controversy mentioned above:

"A question of no small importance arose at that time [A.D. 190]. For the parishes of all Asia [Minor], as from an older tradition held that the fourteenth day of the moon, on which the Jews were commanded to sacrifice the lamb, should be observed as the feast of the Savior’s Passover. . . . But it was not the custom of the churches in the rest of the world . . . as they observed the practice which, from apostolic tradition, has prevailed to the present time, of terminating the fast [of Lent] on no other day than on that of the resurrection of the Savior [Sunday]. Synods and assemblies of bishops were held on this account, and all, with one consent, through mutual correspondence drew up an ecclesiastical decree that the mystery of the resurrection of the Lord should be celebrated on no other but the Lord’s day and that we should observe the close of the paschal fast on this day only. . . . Thereupon [Pope] Victor, who presided over the church at Rome, immediately attempted to cut off from the community the parishes of all Asia [Minor], with the churches that agreed with them, as heterodox. And he wrote letters and declared all the brethren there wholly excommunicate. But this did not please all the bishops, and they besought him to consider the things of peace and of neighborly unity and love. . . . [Irenaeus] fittingly admonishes Victor that he should not cut off whole churches of God which observed the tradition of an ancient custom" (Church History 5:23:1–24:11).

Many, many more quotes could be given, but the point is, I think, clear.  Kelly remarks that Photios never intended to deny the Roman primacy, and he, in fact, died in communion with Rome in the Oxford Dictionary of the Popes.  There are, in Pelikan’s Volume II of his history of the Christian Tradition, dozens of undeniably strong papal admissions on the part of many of the Easterns.  And, as Fr. Dvornik shows in his learned Byzantium and the Roman Primacy, the schism of Acacius is a strong admission of papal supremacy by the Easterns. What are we to make of the famous statement of St. Maximos the Confessor?:

"How much more in the case of the clergy and Church of the Romans, which from old until now presides over all the churches which are under the sun? Having surely received this canonically, as well as from councils and the apostles, as from the princes of the latter (Peter and Paul), and being numbered in their company, she is subject to no writings or issues in synodical documents, on account of the eminence of her pontificate .....even as in all these things all are equally subject to her (the Church of Rome) according to sacerodotal law. And so when, without fear, but with all holy and becoming confidence, those ministers (the popes) are of the truly firmand immovable rock, that is of the most great and Apostolic Church of Rome." (in J.B. Mansi, ed. Amplissima Collectio Conciliorum, vol. 10)

I also recommend on this issue Vladimir Solovyev’s The Russian Church and the Papacy, which provides other supplementary arguments along the same lines I listed above, along with Butler, Dahlgren and Hess’ Jesus, Peter and the Keys, which, although some of the quotes are do not go as far to prove the papacy as they would like (a la William Webster’s Matthew 16), overall, the evidence is hard to deny.  What is the Orthodox person to think of Fr. Schmemann’s admission of the need for the office of the papacy?

In terms of “Augustinianism,” I confess that, by God’s grace, I can never leave this basic theological milieu of my master and patron.  I am well aware of the Eastern case against St. Augustine and the “west.”  I have tried to immerse myself in all their polemicists as well as I can.  I fully admit his failings in aspects of his Trinitarian theology.  However, his own attitude was one of humility before the Catholic Church, as he says in the beginning of Book III.  It’s a fact that many Easterns are now willing to deal with the possibility of a genuine reconciliation, with some, such as Metropolitan Zizioulas, admitting even the possibility of a kind of filioque at the level of ousia, but not of hypostasis.  These thinkers have also corrected Lossky’s error that the Spirit lacks an eternal relation to the Son, as Fr. Behr explains in his The Trinitarian Being of the Church article.  If that’s the case, then its true that the Father remains the sole source of the godhead, while the Son becomes a kind of mediating principle (St. Gregory of Nyssa), communicating to the Spirit the common essence.  According to Zizioulas, this was St. Maximus’ view.  Zizioulas writes in his article, One Single Source:

“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? 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.

Another important point in the Vatican document is the emphasis it lays on the distinction between ἐκπόρευσις and processio. It is historically true that in the Greek tradition a clear distinction was always made between ἐκπορεύσθαι and προϊέναι, the first of these two terms denoting exclusively the Spirit's derivation from the Father alone, whereas προϊέναι was used to denote the Holy Spirit's dependence on the Son owing to the common essence or ουσία which the Spirit in deriving from the Father alone as Person or υπόστασις receives from the Son, too, as ουσιωδώς that is, with regard to the one ουσία common to all three persons (Cyril of Alexandria, Maximus the Confessor et al). On the basis of this distinction one might argue that there is a kind of Filioque on the level of ουσία, but not of υπόστασις.

However, as the document points out, the distinction between ἐκπορεύσθαι and προϊέναι was not made in Latin theology,which used the same term, procedere to denote both realities. Is this enough to explain the insistence of the Latin tradition on the Filioque? Saint Maximus the Confessor seems to think so. For him the Filioque was not heretical because its intention was to denote not the ἐκπορεύσθαι but the προϊέναι of the Spirit.”

Thus, the eternal procession from a “single principle” as stated by the councils of Lyons and Florence , can be read in this manner.  This appears to be the direction the Vatican Clarification on the Filioque takes.  In short, as well as I can understand, I find this Vatican statement to be good enough.  Besides, Bulgakov and others admit that the Spirit can be understood as the love of the Father and the Son (The Orthodox Church, pg. 2).  But apart from several books and tons of articles, its evident that this cannot be the determining factor between East and West, since it becomes so obscure and drowned in questions of Liturgy, Greek and Latin, biblical texts, dogmatic decrees of councils and the writings of the Church Fathers only the best of theologians are able to sift through the masses of data (and I don’t mean myself).  Fr. Stylianopoulos admits this.

In terms of grace and nature, I don’t get Fr. Meyendorff and others’ rejection of the “Western” idea of the so-called nature/grace “dialectic.”  Even in St. Augustine they are not in “tension.”  It’s from the wellspring of Augustinianism that the classical Catholic idea of grace building on nature originates.  Is this entirely a western phenomenon?  No, inasmuch as St. Maximos clearly speaks of grace building on nature in Ambiguum 42.  We are told by the SVS Press editor in the footnote that “this is not to be confused with the western dialectic,” who is, I suppose, Fr. John Behr.  Well, how is this so different?  For example, we see the same imagery and usage in St. Cyril’s On the Unity of Christ (SVS Press edition), where over and over (pgs. 81-96 or so) he speaks of “nature” and “grace” in reference to both the Incarnation and soteriology, which are obviously linked.  In other words, if you hold to “two natures,” it follows that in salvation/deification there remain two natures, or, grace raising nature, as St. Cyril argues.  Further, Pelikan’s Christianity and Classical Culture is all about the idea of grace and natural law in the Cappadocians.  Yes, I’m sure there are subtle distinctions, but what exactly does the Eastern statement that “all nature is graced” mean?

For that matter, what is “Ancestral Sin”?  I just don’t get it.  I know what original sin is.  And, I know what Fr. Romanides says, and his book has been one of the major hang ups for me in not becoming Orthodox.  While I agree with some of his criticisms of overly-Latin thinking, some of my problems with his ‘seminal’ The Ancestral Sin are as follows:

1. Augustine is not a saint (pg. 11).

2. Romanides says many times that the parasite of death is the cause of our sins.  What is more correct is that there is a sense in which we sin because of death and that death is also the result of sin.

3. Romanides accuses all the west of teaching that man is by nature “immortal,” yet this is not true.  The Catechism of the Church states that “man is by nature mortal,” Par. 1008.

4. Romanides says that human free will is outside God’s jurisdiction (pg. 33).  But the Holy Spirit says otherwise in Prov. 21:1.  How can anything be outside God’s sovereignty?  Romanides says God willed it to be so.  Now I’m reminded of my former Orthodox priest’s statement in agreement with his former Bishop: “God has chosen not to know all things.”  Supposedly this is a paradox.  No, this is a contradiction.  Scripture says that God knows the number of the hairs on our head.  Androutsos proposes this same silly idea of God knowing all things only in a general sense.  All of this to get away from sovereignty!

5. Romanides claims that the westerns fail in explaining evil as “lack of being,” yet this same idea is frequent in Eastern Fathers (pg. 34, fn. 65)!

6. Romanides follows the Synodikon of Orthodoxy in reference to condemning the analogia entis and the analogia fide, since “there is no similarity between the created and the Uncreated” in reference to God and Scripture.  Then we have no true knowledge of God and Scripture does not truly reveal Him.  If there is no true union or connection, then we fail to know Christ as truly divine.  Romanides even says sarcastically that it is “supposed that God is revealed there [in Scripture].”  How can we then have any knowledge of the ontological Trinity, since this comes only through Scripture?  It follows that we do not.  The energies that reveal God must then also be disconnected from the “hidden energies,” and even negative knowledge fails to obtain.  For example, that I know that the Son is eternally generated from the Father comes to me through the words and images of Scripture.   If there is no similarity, then I do not know that fact to be true of God, in terms of theology.  How does economy teach anything about God, theologically?

7. Romanides claims that evil is not non-being and that this is nonsense, yet this is what St. Athanasius teaches very clearly in “Contra Gentes,” along with using many juridical concepts in “On the Incarnation of the Logos,” which Romanides hates so much.

8. Romanides says that God can never remove the “freedom of evil” (pg. 75),

and that Satan’s will is completely free and outside God’s jurisdiction (pg. 74)!  If this is true, then it follows that Satan and Redeemed men in the eternal state can be saved and fall again, ad infinitum.  This is pure Origenism.          

9. Romanides derides the idea that angels govern men and nations and that fallen angels desired women as mates.  If he were merely rejecting the idea of angels mating, it would be one thing, but Romanides implies that this is an error in Old Testament Scripture, quoting the liberal Abingdon Bible Commentary.

Romanides comes close to open theism in his chapter on the war between God and the Devil, since Satan’s fall really did mess up God’s plans in a sense, and as we said, God cannot touch the wills of men and angels (pg. 86).  In this he sounds like “open theist” Greg Boyd.

10. Romanides engages in a zealous attempt to eradicate the idea that death is a punishment from God, and he says this ad nauseam.  Romanides should have read more St. John Chrysostom, or been more honest with him.  But worse, he quotes Romans 8:20 , arguing that God didn’t subject the creation to death and futility, when St. Paul ’s text itself says the very opposite!  Using the flood or Sodom as examples of God’s punishment don’t work, since Romanides probably believed it never happened.

11.  Romanides seriously tries to argue that God doesn’t curse Adam and Eve, but only the ground and the serpent (pg. 95), quoting St. Irenaeus.  This is because, he imagines, God has no wrath or desire for vengeance or need for propitiation.  All of these concepts are western heresies.  Yet they are undoubtedly Pauline!  This just goes to show that the Orthodox writers can’t deal with St. Paul .  The one’s who do, like those summarized in Gavin’s Greek Orthodox Thought must apparently be castigated as “Latinized” Greeks, since so much in their writings is “western” and juridical!

12. He claims that the fall was “not at all juridical” for the New Testament writers (pg. 112).  Can he be serious?          

13.  Romanides argues that we should not be motivated by pleasures to be saved or by fear of hell, but rather that we should obtain apatheia.  How stoic. Scripture says that in God’s hands and pleasures evermore (Ps.16).  He admits on pg. 123 that he wants to return to Jewish conceptions as opposed to Augustinian ones, since “Jews didn’t believe in God’s retributive justice.”  The prophets certainly did, and they were true Jews.  Who does he think brought about AD 70?

14. Romanides claims that monasticism declined in the west when Augustinianism prevailed (pg. 174).   Is this for real?  Is he not aware that monasticism prevailed in the medieval Augustinian West?            

What is the point of all this railing against St. Augustine and the western errors?  It’s that Romanides hates the idea of a God who punishes sin: the God revealed in Scripture.  So he was forced to run to the post-Apostolic fathers as a supposedly more faithful presentation of the Apostolic Faith.  These facts are all related to the strands in all the Orthodox: there is no predestination or unconditional election, God is not fully sovereign—maybe not even omniscient, and doesn’t eternally damn people as a punishment.  And of course, this goes hand in hand with the numerous Orthodox writers and priests I’ve met who refuse to take Scripture seriously on these points, and often impute errors to it, rather than impute errors to their own intellect!  In this regard, I feel just like St. Augustine combating the very same errors of his day (not that I am a great saint).  Why the zeal for errors in Scripture?  Because, if Scripture has manifest errors, one need not take its threats of damnation seriously, of course.  This stuff clearly borders on Origenism and in some cases is Origenism (think Kalomiros’ awful River of Fire article), and I just can’t confess this semi-pelagian nonsense, which appears to be the “mind of Orthodoxy,” since most all of them hold this, or tend in this direction.

Concerning predestination, I have never doubted its absolute gratuity.  I have always affirmed unconditional election, and remained within this Augustinian/Thomistic framework.  I believe this to be biblical, and my conscience is bound to it.  I could not bring myself to explicitly repudiate unconditional election as the older Greek Rite of Reception of Converts, based on the Confession of Dositheos mandates.  Since no Orthodox theologian has ever affirmed any election other than that based on foreknowledge of human actions, I would obviously be out of step with the “mind of Orthodoxy.”  And I’ve read the Eastern Fathers, Symeon the New Theologian, St. John of Damascus, John Cassian, Nicholas of Cabasilas, the elders, and others on the issue, and I do not believe them to be in line with St. Paul ’s teaching in Romans 9 of election’s pure gratuity.

I also find St. Thomas ’ teaching on predilection as an equally convincing case for predestination in this sense.  In short, the best text on this is the great Dominican theologian Fr. Reginald Lagrange’s book Predestination, available from TAN Books.  I would also recommend reading St. Augustine ’s works on predestination that will be linked below.  In fact, I stayed up all night last night reviewing much of this Augustinian material in the Fathers Set and feel ever more convinced of its truth.  When one compares St. Augustine with the responses of John Cassian (so admired in the East, and the well-known exponent of semi-pelagianism), it’s like comparing a mountains and mole-hills.  Imagine Benny Hinn debating Jaroslav Pelikan (though certainly Cassian wasn’t as bad as Benny Hinn.

 

Much more could be said about the problems of national churches and “catholicity,” as well as widespread Orthodox ambiguity on numerous points, but this is sufficient for the present.  As I said above, please don’t waste my time with emails of “heresy” and “apostasy” attacks.  I already know many of you will think this, so it’s really quite unnecessary to blast me.  I am doing what my (hopefully) informed conscience leads me to.  St. Thomas teaches that even erring reason, if not attended with an evil will, still binds (http://www.newadvent.org/summa/2019.htm#article5).

Many of my friends have opined (rightly) to me that eventually, one must rest.  Christianity is practical, and a lifetime of changing positions is very distressing and impractical, often leading to despair.  I have explored the world outside Catholicism in both Protestantism and Orthodoxy and have tasted enough different flavors.  Many of my objections to Vatican II could have been cleared up earlier, had I read more of the Eastern Fathers and councils. Are there problems?  Sure, there will always be another book, another debate, another challenge, another issue, etc.  It will never end, because, as the Eastern Fathers teach, we will be forever learning God (not that there will be difficulties in heaven, but we will always be coming to know God more and more, inasmuch as He is infinite).  I am not at all convinced of the Apocalypticism that the trads in both Orthodoxy and Catholicism fall into. All too often this is the excuse of radical groups to hole up in some obscure basement somewhere, certain that they are the last 5 Catholics left in the world.  Usually this leads to ridiculous, half-mad wandering bishops, "election" of numerous home-made "popes," false visionaries, or the ultra-splintering of traditional Orthodox groups, such as Cyprianites, Matthewites, etc.  And, all of these sects are rabid with wild apocalypticism.  All groups have their masonic infiltrators, gays, and liberals.  It is, in this fallen world, inescapable.  I don't know if we are in the last days, but I know that all the little sects that are grounded on this are also the most dubious.  Honestly, how different is this than the Montanists or the Donatists or the Circumcelliones?  Rad Trads of every flavor would do well to consider that Christ visited with the Samaritan woman at the well--a jewish schismatic of that day, along with telling the "scandalous" parable of the "good Samaritan."  Rad Trads would do well to consider whether they might be more like Christ or the Pharisees & Essenes.

If Catholicism was good enough for St. Augustine , its good enough for me, and consequently, if St. Augustine didn’t make the cut, who of us will?!  I’ve learned that the act of faith in the Scriptures is the same as the act of faith in the Church herself: I don’t know the answer to every apparent textual problem, nor do I know the answer to every “problem” of liturgics, Church History, canon law, dogma, etc.  Who can?  So, I’ll rest in communion with Rome.  I trust that in God's providence it will work out.  As St. Augustine says in the beginning of On the Predestination of the Saints, to the degree that we have attained, we must walk therein, and if I am wrong, may God correct me (Phil. 3:15-16).

Links to important articles and documents referenced:

Vatican Clarification on the Filioque: http://www.nicenetruth.com/home/2008/06/the-vatican-cla.html

Metropolitan Zisioulas' article One Single Source: http://www.geocities.com/trvalentine/orthodox/zizioulis_onesource.html

Pope St. Agatho's Letter to the Sixth Council: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.xiii.v.html

The Letter of Chalcedon to Pope St. Leo: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3604098.htm

Session III of Ephesus: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.x.xv.html

The Catechism of the Catholic Church: http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm

St. Augustine's works against the Pelagians & on predestination: http://newadvent.org/fathers/1510.htm, http://newadvent.org/fathers/1509.htm, http://newadvent.org/fathers/1512.htm, http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1513.htm, http://newadvent.org/fathers/1503.htm, http://newadvent.org/fathers/1502.htm

Questions 23 and 24 of Part 1 of the Summa on predestination and the Book of Life: http://newadvent.org/summa/1023.htm, http://newadvent.org/summa/1024.htm

A Catholic-Thomist Vs. Calvinist Debate on predestination: http://www.ewtn.com/library/ANSWERS/LOSS.htm

See also Jimmy Akin's article on the issue of predestination: http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/1993/9309fea1.asp

And Akin's The Salvaion Controversy on a Thomistic version of the "five points": http://www.amazon.com/Salvation-Controversy-James-Akin/dp/1888992182/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1214424973&sr=8-1

Comments

[Dave Hodges]

Gloria in excelsis Deo! Great post. I'll have to read it in more detail later on after I get the kids under control.

[Hieromonk Ambrose]

Regarding Pope Agatho's letter... Even the staunchly pro-papal Catholic Encyclopedia admits that Pope Agatho's letter was not accepted by the Council until the Bishops had examined it, tested it and accepted it as true teaching. The Bishops at the Council saw themselves as having, in Council, a higher authority than Rome.

Read it here
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3813.htm

(Bossuet, Defensio Cler. Gal. Lib. VII., cap. xxiv.)

All the fathers spoke one by one, and only after examination were the letters of St. Agatho and the whole Western Council approved. Agatho, indeed, and the Western Bishops put forth their decrees thus ['We have directed persons from our humility to your valour protected of God, which shall offer to you the report of us all, that is, of all the Bishops in the Northern or Western Regions, in which too we have summed up the confession of our Apostolic Faith, yet ] not as those who wished to contend about these things as being uncertain, but, being certain and unchangeable to see them forth in a brief definition, [suppliantly beseeching you that, by the favour of your sacred majesty, you would command these same things to be preached to all, and to have force with all.'] Undoubtedly, therefore, so far as in them lay, they defined the matter. The question was, whether the other Churches throughout the world would agree, and a matter so great was only made clear after Episcopal examination. But the high, magnificent, yet true expressions, which St. Agatho had used of his See, namely, that resting on the promise of the Lord it had never turned aside from the path of truth, and that its Pontiffs, the predecessors of Agatho, who were charged in the person of Peter to strengthen their brethren, had ever discharged that office, this the Fathers of the Council hear and receive. But not the less they examine the matter, they inquire into the decrees of Roman Pontiffs, and, after inquiry held, approve Agatho's decrees, condemn those of Honorius: a certain proof that they did not understand Agatho's expressions as if it were necessary to receive without discussion every decree of Roman Pontiffs even de fide, inasmuch as they are subjected to the supreme and final examination of a General Council: but as if these expressions taken as a whole, in their total, hold good in the full and complete succession of Peter, as we have often said, and in its proper place shall say at greater length.

[JayDyer]

Perhaps, but Rome clearly claimed this for centuries as the other quotes above, along with those in Denzinger demonstrate, and the East didn't start their apologetics on this until after the schism.

jay

[Josh Brisby]

Jay,

Thanks for the retraction. You have guts to do it.

As far as triadology is concerned, I read somewhere something that I thought was very helpful. One could uphold the filioque as well as make more clear that it does not compromise the Father as the Single Source, yet still speak of "as from one principle." There is a difference between "as from one principle" (which I believe to be biblical) and "as from one source" (which I would say is unbiblical). The analogy is as follows:

A lake proceeds from a brook and a river. Another way of saying this is that the lake proceeds from the brook through the river. The brook is the single source of the lake, but the lake proceeds from the brook and/through the river "as from one principle." When we look at it this way, we uphold the fact that there is truly only one source of the lake's being: the brook (also called the spring). Yet, the lake also proceeds through the river. In fact, it would not even be able to proceed through the river if it were not for the fact that the spring/brook gave being to the river.

So, the lake proceeds from the Spring through/and the River "as from one principle," but the ultimate Source of the Lake is the Spring/Brook.

Likewise, the Spirit proceeds from the Father through/and the Son "as from one principle," but the eternal Source of *both* the Son *and* the Spirit is the Father alone.

I hope this helps as well. Let me know what you think.

[Jay Dyer]

Josh,

This is the line that St. Thomas goes, and those that are so virulent about my changing positions should note that both Aquinas and Augustine changed their views over time on many issues, as they grew in grace and knowledge. Thus St. Augustine's "Retractions." I *highly* recommend the Vatican Clarification. It makes it clear that they know what they are talking about, whatever you think of the Vatican. Its still on the front page of Nicenetruth. I would wish that the Triablogue writers were at least glad that one of the key issues for me was unconditional election, predilection and sovereignty, which I cannot give up.

Jay

[d.f.nathaniel]

I've posted on this site just a few times... but I've read much here. As I've made the challenging journey from my Baptist heritage to Catholicism, despite our obvious differences, I've been encouraged by you, Jay, to continue pursuing historical Christianity. I am happy to see that you have come to "rest in communion with Rome." Though my decision to do so was far less intellectual, I like to think the same Holy Spirit has been at work in the both of us. Congratulations and welcome home.

[Fr. Robert (Anglican)]

Thank you to share your most profound journey! I am in deep sympathy with much with my Orthodox brethren, that the Father is the regal of the Godhead is sweet and profound. But that God is HIS own sovereign, and both transcendent and immanent is also always profound, and always Pauline!

God Bless,
Fr. Robert

[Sophocles]

Jay,

It's taken me a little time to formulate my thoughts a bit, but I put down some thoughts about your new direction at:

http://molonlabe70.blogspot.com/

Take care,

Sophocles

[random Orthodox chick]

If St. Augustine isn't a saint, my prayers to him have been in vain.

May God bless you and keep you.

[ASimpleSinner]

A friend of mine penned the following in corresponding with me...

"history certainly teaches us there there was (and is) far more cross-fertilization than some like to acknowledge. Not only that, is not the "East/West" nomenclature more of a holdover from the Imperium? Without discounting the incredible role the Empire played in salvation history, we cannot simply allow ourselves to use it as our single point of reference. That place is for Christ and Him alone.

"A rigorist Byzantium is at a loss without its Emperor, in part because the Byzantines were taught to place him at the center of unity with the Empire as the body and the Church as the soul. Monasticism and apophatacism became something of an overused strength, and this spiritualizing tendency with the state as the center became problematic once Bibles were exchanged for Korans. For all the idealistic talk of the Byzantine synthesis, it really was the cause for the beauty of the Lord's House on the Bosphorus to collapse in on itself with its leadership becoming the pawns of the anti-Western Ottoman Turks. (It is no wonder that so many fell away...) The Patriarchal throne was on sale - and sometimes annually - for the right price and in all this chaos, the seeds of the Union of Brest were being planted. This is the fruit of Eusebius' Imperial Ecclesiology - a true heresy if ever there was one. It is the unspoken, unwritten (although not always) premise for much of Orthodox ecclesiology. Orthodoxy is without a visible center because it exchanged the unity of the Apostolic See of Rome for the "goods" (wealth, pleasure, power, prestige) of the Imperium. Orthodoxy can never be its true self until it finds its center, who is NOT Vladimir Putin for goodness sake! This is why, IMHO, the most Catholic minded Orthodox are usually the most spiritually fruitful and apostolic.

"Anyway, enough of my rant. I'm so grateful for the Orthodox priest who helped me see the "light" on Orthodox ecclesiology as I presented myself for chrismation. I will remember him always in my prayers. "

[Eamonn]

Just a small point, Jay. St Augustine wrote the RetracTATiones not the Retractiones. It means to treat of again, rather than to retract or take back. Your basic point about growing in grace and knowledge is still valid, of course.

[diane]

Simple Sinner--context for your quote, please. :-) It is beautiful, and yes, I appreciate that you cannot name names...but is this person an ex-Orthodox who has subsequently beome Catholic or is on the process of doping so? I assure you that I do not know the person from Adam, so, if you tell us this much, you will not be violating a confidence. Anyway...thanks for the beautiful, insightful quotation. :-)

[Fr. Robert (Anglican)]

I wonder if Augustine's teaching on Concupiscence had anything to do with Jay's decision to stay with Rome? This does appear to be a doctrine of St. Paul, and part of the doctrine of sin, etc.

Fr. Robert

[JNORM888]

I followed the debate you had with Josh, and I wasn't moved by those quotes he gave. I saw many of those quotes when I was a protestant. If you came from Roman Catholicism then you should of already knew about those things. but then again, you could of been part of a Traditional Latin group that wasn't in communion with Rome.

Everyone who followed the debate knows that Josh didn't change his mind about infant baptism because of you. He changed because he was influenced by Paul Manata.

I respect your convictions, even if I disagree with them. I disagree with them, because it's not about how you can make an ancient christian fit into your worldview. Instead, it's about their worldview, what they thought, and how they acted. The monarchy of the Father is what most of the signers of the Nicen creed believed in. To add the filioque is to add a foreign theology. If you read the Prenicene fathers, you would know that most of them held to a form of the Father being the Monarch of the Trinity.

Also the Orthodox view of the Pope is sober, because we hold on to the ancient doctrine of "all Bishops being equal". I maybe wrong, but I think you can see it in the "Apostolic Constitution" as well as from some of the pre-nicene fathers, and nonfathers. The development of the western doctrine of the Roman Bishop has caused modern Rome to say something totaly differant than what the early Eastern Fathers and maybe nonfathers were saying.

What is going on now is an anachronistic reading of the past. Rome just rejected (not to long ago) the ancient term "Patriarch of the West".

The form of papal doctrine that you are now holding on to is something totally "foreign".

But anyway, I think you should of takin the advice of Other Orthodox bloggers (back when you were debating with Jay)

It takes time to form an Eastern Christian "phronema". And now looking back, I think they were right. You should of held back from debating people. Especially if you were still a catechumen.

I know you are writting this blog post to please your new Roman Catholic spiritual directer. So you may not really be feeling everything you are saying.

Hopefully you will refrain from debates until your worldview is more stable.

But this goes for all of us. Myself included. For I am still forming my phronema.

I hope I didn't offend you, and I will be praying.

JNORM888

[miki]

All I know is that Christ is the head of the Church, as for any other claims, each to his own.

Concerning the east west divide, I think this has more to do with sociology, superiority complexes and the Dunbar Number than theology.

The divide existed in the ancient world, Egypt-Babylon, Greece-Persia, Rome-Islamic Caliphates, Arians-Rome, Latin Rome-Byzantium etc. and will continue to exist as long as anyone tries to assert themselves over others.

[evagrius]

You should at least rethink your position on Origen. Read Crouzel and von Baltasar on Origen.

Origenism is not the same as Origen just as Thomism isn't Aquinas nor Augustianism Augustine or Palamism Palamas.

[Jay Dyer]

Friendly critics,

JNORM, I said above in the post that Josh Brisby didn't change his position because of me in the second paragraph. Eamonn, I was citing someone else, and though I haven't read them all, I have read some of the Retractions. In terms of Von Balthasar, I have read some of his book on the salvation of all. Still don't buy it: for example, I am well aware of St. Gregory of Nyssa as the father of fathers, and that he believed in some sense of the apocatastasis, and I have read enough of his treatises in his volume in the Schaff set to know that his view is not straight up Origenism. This is St. Maximos' point agains the Origenists of his day who cited St. Gregory. But so what? All of that is really secondary to what I believe to be biblical and Catholic. Everyone knows, Orthodox included, that one doctor's opinions, or even a few doctor's opinions do not suffice as a normative guide, and this is why there is a magisterium. Do I think everyone who holds this position is a formal heretic? No, but I believe it to be erroneous.

In terms of being "catechized" by energetic processions, I went to the laborious task of printing out dozens of their materials as Perry requested and still wasn't convinced, so, what can I say? I'm still Augustinian for the most part, and identify much better with the Western synthesis than the Eastern spirit.

As for the other issues, I find the Vatican clarification on the filioque to be good enough for me.

But, I appreciate you guys' concerns.

in Christ,

Jay

[FJB]

In your post you mention: "The fact that a very learned Orthodox writer had to point us to an obscure article in a seminary journal on what exactly the Orthodox view on these concepts illustrates the point." Could you please let us know that title/author/publication/ etc. so that we can follow up by reading it? Thanks.

[Lucian]

There is no "semi"Pelagianism (nor can it be). "Semi"Pelagianism is Orthodoxy: John Chrysostom, and the Scythian Monks (which condemned St. Augustine in Synod -- but the Church as a whole didn't -- partly because of his sane and wise discernment between public dogma and private speculation). The reason I mentioned the Scythian monks is because I'm Romanian, and You know us crazy Orth. people and our rampant nationalism. :-)

As Moses lead the People of Israel through two oposing walls of water, one to the right, and the other to the left, so does Jesus lead His people, the New Israel, through two opsing yet equally harmful waves of oposing heresies: Judaizers & Gnosticism; Monarchists and Tritheists; Nestorians and Monophysites; idolaters and Iconoclasts; Pellagians and Augustinians; etc. --> BTW, if You wanna have a good laugh, just consult Philip Schaff's articles "142) The Orthodox Christology-Analysis and Criticism"; and "159) Semi-Pelagianism", from the 9th chapter of his 3rd volume of "History of the Christian Church" -- I think You'll find them pretty ironically and self-contradictory. :-)

On a personal note, You kinda remind me of Nestorius and Tertullian (though on a much smaller scale), very fiery, very fervent, set out to blot out all heresies and heretics ... only to later on become one Yourself. (though on a much smaller scale, as I've already said). --> Now, please don't take this the wrong way; I mean it on a friendly tone, no puns intended. :-) OK?

And I also don't expect people to be able to superficially and instantaneously discern between Cath., Orth., and Monophysites from the first glimpse. (Prot. kinda loses the battle with history from the beginning; but the remaining rest *DO* have good claims). Glad to see You still swimming soemwhere in Cath./Orth. waters, not relapsing into Prot. :-)

And NO, we definitelly do NOT believe that God is powerless or unknowing. (He *CAN* do all sorts of things; but He knows better). He is primarily Love (the NT definition of God), and everything else is secondary to that. As to the Bible, we interpret it through the lens called Christ, the ultimate Revelation of God TO man and IN man: He reveals God in Himself as being first and foremost, and ultimately, a God of Love; that's why the verses that on a surface level appear to speak otherwise are filtered through it. We do not believe that all verses of Scripture are created equal (that's an American political concept, dating no more than 300 yrs back); nor do we believe that Christ rose literaly from the grave BECAUSE of a 500 yr old Prot. belief in the GHL method, but rather because of the fact that Chr. is a creedal belief, based on the lex orandi, lex credendi. (and You don't have to have a literal type [such as Adam] in order for the anti-type [Christ] to be as literally true as can be). --> And sorry for the haste. (And if You didn't understand that the Lord is Lord, and not a slave [to passions], then I'm affraid I can't help You out there). (And If You also don't understand that God says in both Testaments: "Be holy even as I AM holy" and "Be holy even as your Heavenly Father holy is", then I can't help You out either: and bear in mind that this holiness that He wants to share with us means "bless those that curse you, do good to those that do you harm, pray for those that hurt you, love those that hate you", or "watch, brothers, so that no-one may repay to another one evil with evil"). --> Don't mean to sound disrespectful, it's just that I'm in a rush.

Good bye, and God bless You. :-)

[Jay Dyer]

Thank you for your comments. I tried as best as I could to immerse myself in Orthodoxy. I do not feel that its exegetes deal adequately with Romans 9, for example, and this has kept me "western." I know that the Orthodox do not believe that there is a heresy of semi-pelagianism, but I believe there is. In fact, even the Confession of Dositheos, one of your "dogmatic" confessions proclaims the necessity of prevenient grace for the beginning of faith, and yet commands its subscriber to explicitly reject unconditional election. In fact, Metropolitan Philaret edited and reworded this confession because of its "Latin" tendencies.

As for being like Nestorius and Tertullian, I don't know what you are talking about. I have posted article after article arguing against Nestorianism. I even like the mia physis formula of St. Cyril as clearer than the Tome alone. I'm writing an article right now about Christ the Universal man, a concept which is developed in the Eastern Fathers in direct opposition to Nestorianism.

The last paragraph of your comments don't make sense to me. I believe in theosis, as the Catholic Catechism teaches it in probably a dozen places. I believe Christ is the Last Adam and I accept what St. Maximos the Confessor teaches about His assumption of our fallen nature. In my article, I tried to be very accepting to Eastern writers, and I even recommend Lossky as a great theologian.

In Christ,

Jay Dyer

[Lucian]

Orthodoxy views itself as the Middle Way or the Golden Way or the Way of Christ. The fact that the heresies came in pairs of two conflicting and diametrically opposed, yet equally deadly and false doctrines is not something that happened without reason. [And Augustinianism and Pellagianism form such a pair].

My comparison between You and Tertullian and Nestorius was based solely on the fact that all three of Your showed a pretty fervent and intransigent (if not even outright hostile) attitude towards all sorts and manners of deviations ... only to later on leave the Church yourselves. (And, again, I really mean no harm by this simple observation). I surely did not mean to say that You share in either Nestorian or Montanist opinions, obviously. :-)

As to the last part, I meant to say that God cannot demand from us to be forgiving, while on the other hand not being forgiving Himself. He did not teach us to rise up from the Law of the Talion to the Law of Grace, while He Himself does still "demand" punishment.
[I was hinting at what You seem to think that constitute proofs for Anselmian Penal Substitution in the writings of St. Paul].

[Jay Dyer]

Lucian,

I do think there are over-exaggerations in the west, but overall, I agree with the reality of the penal categories, propitation, death as a punishment, etc., and the East, at least many modern anti-Romanists such as Romanides and Kalomiros do not. Simply saying something is the middle-way is still relative to what is true. In my estimation, the Augustinian/Thomistic view of election and predestination is the "middle-way" between Pelagius and Calvin. Lagrange has, I believe, demonstrated this. Everyone thinks their position is this the true golden mean.

Jay

[Lucian]

What is the Augustinian/Thomistic view of election and predestination ?

Everyone thinks their position is this the true golden mean.

Not quite: Prot. is known for its tendency to jump from water into fire and viceversa. (Luther himself was pretty temperamental, never being able to find a balance; think of his shifting attitude towards the peasant rebellions for instance).

[Jay Dyer]

The predestination articles and books listed above contain descriptions of the position. I recommend especially Lagranges book found here;

https://www.tanbooks.com/index.php/page/shop:flypage/product_id/535/keywords/predestination/

I've read a lot of Luther. Luther is all over the place. Let me illustrate the point: an atheist says there is no God. A theist says there is. The agnostic would say this position is the golden mean. But this is false, and so we see that the golden mean is still ultimately relative to the truth.

[Lucian]

The predestination of man is to be God's image: that's what he was meant to be from the very beginning. Grace and free will are tied up to Maxim Martyr's synergy at the Sixth Synod. The teaching of the entire corpus of Eastern Fathers on these issues is quite constant, clear and and straightforward. And the West was also influenced by the Scythian Monks, who founded there the first Monasteries. I really doubt that the [rather original] Augustinian approach, highly influenced by his pre-Christian Gnostic Manicheism is (or can be) source of pure teaching; purer than that of the other Fathers that predate and succed him in both East and West. (Does Ireneus of Lyons teach the same things as St. Augustin regarding free will, grace and predestination ? Does St. Ambrose ?). The constant policy of the Church has been to extinguish erruptions of Hellenism whenever and where-ever possible, be it Origenism, Arianism,... or even Augustinianism. Nestorianism and Monophysism are on a Christological level what Pellagianism and Augustinianism are on a soteriological level. (Am I missing something ? )