Orthodox Belief

Recently I came across an orthodox Catholic article on the Virgin Birth of our Lord.

It reminded me of my shock, several years ago when I was taking courses at an evangelical seminary, to read Wolfhart Pannenberg’s skepticism about the Virgin Birth (in his Jesus: God and Man) and, even more, for that opinion to not seem to bother my professors at all.

Just another example that confirmed my view that one should not consider oneself a “Nicene Christian” unless agreement on everything in the Nicene Creed trumped disagreement about anything outside the Creed and hence that there was little justification in anyone in some protestant denomination claiming to be a Nicene Christian as a way of glossing over ecclesial divisions.

And that leads me to the general topic of Church and, in particular, an excerpt from

How Did the Catholic Church Get Her Name?
https://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/churb3.htm
by Kenneth D. Whitehead

The Creed which we recite on Sundays and holy days speaks of one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. As everybody knows, however, the Church referred to in this Creed is more commonly called just the Catholic Church. It is not, by the way, properly called the Roman Catholic Church, but simply the Catholic Church.

The term Roman Catholic is not used by the Church herself; it is a relatively modern term, and one, moreover, that is confined largely to the English language. The English-speaking bishops at the First Vatican Council in 1870, in fact, conducted a vigorous and successful campaign to insure that the term Roman Catholic was nowhere included in any of the Council’s official documents about the Church herself, and the term was not included.

Similarly, nowhere in the 16 documents of the Second Vatican Council will you find the term Roman Catholic. Pope Paul VI signed all the documents of the Second Vatican Council as “I, Paul. Bishop of the Catholic Church.” Simply that — Catholic Church. There are references to the Roman curia, the Roman missal, the Roman rite, etc., but when the adjective Roman is applied to the Church herself, it refers to the Diocese of Rome!

Cardinals, for example, are called cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, but that designation means that when they are named to be cardinals they have thereby become honorary clergy of the Holy Father’s home diocese, the Diocese of Rome. Each cardinal is given a titular church in Rome, and when the cardinals participate in the election of a new pope, they are participating in a process that in ancient times was carried out by the clergy of the Diocese of Rome.

Although the Diocese of Rome is central to the Catholic Church, this does not mean that the Roman rite, or, as is sometimes said, the Latin rite, is co-terminus with the Church as a whole; that would mean neglecting the Byzantine, Chaldean, Maronite or other Oriental rites which are all very much part of the Catholic Church today, as in the past.

In our day, much greater emphasis has been given to these “non-Roman” rites of the Catholic Church. The Second Vatican Council devoted a special document, Orientalium Ecclesiarum (Decree on Eastern Catholic Churches), to the Eastern rites which belong to the Catholic Church, and the new Catechism of the Catholic Church similarly gives considerable attention to the distinctive traditions and spirituality of these Eastern rites.

So the proper name for the universal Church is not the Roman Catholic Church. Far from it. That term caught on mostly in English-speaking countries; it was promoted mostly by Anglicans, supporters of the “branch theory” of the Church, namely, that the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church of the creed was supposed to consist of three major branches, the Anglican, the Orthodox and the so-called Roman Catholic. It was to avoid that kind of interpretation that the English-speaking bishops at Vatican I succeeded in warning the Church away from ever using the term officially herself: It too easily could be misunderstood.

Today in an era of widespread dissent in the Church, and of equally widespread confusion regarding what authentic Catholic identity is supposed to consist of, many loyal Catholics have recently taken to using the term Roman Catholic in order to affirm their understanding that the Catholic Church of the Sunday creed is the same Church that is united with the Vicar of Christ in Rome, the Pope. This understanding of theirs is correct, but such Catholics should nevertheless beware of using the term, not only because of its dubious origins in Anglican circles intending to suggest that there just might be some other Catholic Church around somewhere besides the Roman one: but also because it often still is used today to suggest that the Roman Catholic Church is something other and lesser than the Catholic Church of the creed. It is commonly used by some dissenting theologians, for example, who appear to be attempting to categorize the Roman Catholic Church as just another contemporary “Christian denomination”—not the body that is identical with the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church of the creed.

“But what about the Eastern Orthodox Churches,” you may ask. Good question. However, with what expression of Eastern Orthodox ecclesiology would one interact? In order to not put words in another’s mouth, having a specific text with which to interact would be essential in my opinion and while there are some online references, I’ve not yet found a useful way to address the issues.

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2 Responses to Orthodox Belief

  1. nonjuror says:

    I was taught at my state school that the term Roman Catholic was first used to denote those people,latter day ‘Donatists,’who left the ancient Anglican Church in 1570 AD, in response first to the call of the Council of Trent and then the political plea of the then pope for supporters of his not to continue worshipping at the old English altars. It was part of the popes plan to interfere in English politics by reemoving Queen Elizabeth from the throne and substituting the King of Spain as King of England.

    The walk out by a tiny minority caused a problem of identification.The Anglican Church was Catholic, the only difference in doctrine was the Anglican rejection of the Papacy. It had been known as the Anglican or English Church at least since 750 AD. In correspondence abroad this was keept up all through the middle ages. The schismatics were first known as Papists, but this was felt disrespectful and because of the Council of Trent statement that the name of what was felt to be a new church [see John Evelyn’s Diary, Jan.1686,New Church of Trent.]was Roman Catholic, that label was given to the schismatics.

  2. Seraphim says:

    Your article is very typical of Roman Catholics who see themselves as somehow removed from the “frey” due to the organizational unity of the Roman Church, by which they see themselves as superior to the Eastern Orthodox Churches. While the Roman Church is a monolith of wealth and power, papal nuncios and magisterium, they conveniently forget the history of the Church. Most of the initial wealth possessed by the Roman Church came from looting Constantinople in the fourth Crusade after which they abandoned their Christian brothers and sisters to the Turks. The Roman Church changed forever when in the political upheaval in Europe the Franks infiltrated the papacy, Charlemagne was crowned as The Holy Roman Emperor, when there was already a Holy Roman Emperor in Constantinople. It is fascinating to me that a church corrupted by a thirst for power and born into intrigue, now considers herself as somehow spiritually superior to the East and the only True Church. If the possibility for unity between the Orthodox and the Romans is even remotely possible, then these travesties of injustice, and twisting of Scripture must be dealt with honestly. https://www.reginaorthodoxpress.com/twopaths.html Here you will find a more accurate history then you will find with books that have the Nihil Obstat or Imprimatur.

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