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THE EASTERN CHURCHES Understanding the Eastern Christian Churches By Fr Robin Gibbons All booklets are published thanks to the generous support of the members of the Catholic Truth Society
CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY PUBLISHERS TO THE HOLY SEE
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CONTENTS Introduction ....................................................................3 The Eastern Churches ...................................................5 The History of the Eastern Church ..............................9 The Eastern Church Today .........................................20 The Self Governing (Autocephalous Churches) ........23 The Oriental Orthodox Churches ..............................38 The Eastern Catholic Churches ..................................44 The Faith and Practice of the Eastern Churches ......62 Glossary .........................................................................81
Father Robert (Robin) Gibbons is the assistant priest for the Greek Catholic Melkite Community in Great Britain. He is also a theologian specialising in liturgy and works in University of Oxford and Saint Mary’s College, Twickenham.
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INTRODUCTION The story of Christianity is about two halves, East and West. It was from Jerusalem and the Middle East that the Apostles first proclaimed the Gospel that then spread throughout all of Europe and the world. Our common heritage should make those of us in the Western Christian tradition respectful of the great treasures that the Orient holds for all of the Church. The witness of Eastern Christianity has been of great importance for the life of the Church, and their continuing presence in the original homelands of the faith should be a matter of concern for all of us. It is hoped that this little work will open a small picture of these communities and encourage a deeper knowledge of them. This book is structured in seven sections, so that the tradition and diversity of the Eastern Churches can be shown in the context of Christian history. The first section deals with the importance and place of the Eastern Church in the Church of Christ and the desire of the Roman Catholic Church to bring about reunion with them. The second section examines the history of the Churches and the particular moments of division. Following this general overview the three main ‘family’ divisions of the Eastern Churches, that is the ‘Orthodox’, ‘Oriental’ and ‘Eastern
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Catholic’ are looked at in terms of the individual churches belonging to that particular branch. This also reflects the rich diversity within this ancient tradition and should help us to understand the place of the Eastern Catholic Church in relation to their Orthodox and Oriental counterparts. Section seven finally puts the life and practice of these communities into their present day context and also examines the initiatives for unity. The writer wishes to acknowledge a debt to one particular work that has been important, in compiling statistical data for these churches, Fr Ronald Roberson’s excellent book, The Eastern Christian Churches. There is also a short bibliography at the end of the work which will provide further material for reading, but perhaps the best way to understanding is to meet with them for prayer, worship and friendship. On 12th October 2002, Pope John Paul II and Patriarch Teoctist of Romania signed a common text, in which they both agreed to work towards full communion, ‘on the common path of the dialogue of truth and love’ (Address, 12th October 2002, n.4). May that be our common vision!
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THE EASTERN CHURCHES In his Apostolic Letter, ‘Orientale Lumen’ of 2nd May 1995, Pope John Paul II renewed the quest to heal the great division between the Catholic and Eastern Churches. Though his papacy did not see the end to centuries of schism, scandal and hurt, his vision for the unity of the Church of Christ remains a powerful legacy for the future. Symbols often speak louder than words, and perhaps one of the most historical moments of this movement towards unity will be a largely unreported phenomenon at his funeral Mass. Gathered in St Peter’s Square on 8th April 2005, amongst the vast crowds, were an entire body of eastern patriarchs, bishops, and other oriental clergy. There were two groups of them, firstly the Eastern Catholics in union with Rome that accept papal primacy, often in the face of hostility from both east and west. They took part in the concelebration of the Liturgy and at the commendation before the internment, incensed the Pope’s coffin, singing chants in Greek and Arabic. Secondly their sister Churches, who do not accept papal primacy, who in spite of all the historical problems, came in their full regalia and were given seats in a section in front of the cardinals. As one reporter put it, ‘the last pontifical liturgy of this
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stature, in fact, took place in Constantinople in the eighth century’. (Sr Joan Chittister, National Catholic Reporter, 7th April 2005). Working towards reconciliation The Second Vatican Council opened the door for reconciliation. Pope Paul VI with the Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras in their correspondence Tomas agapis, abrogated the reciprocal excommunications of 1054 in 1971, also calling the churches of the West and the East, ‘sister churches’. This concept was used in a papal writing for the first time by Paul VI in his apostolic brief, Anno ineunte (25th January 1967). This term has its basis in the second epistle of John (1, 3) and in the theological concept of the Church as a ‘family’ found throughout the pastoral epistles, and in the history of the Church. Conversion of Heart Pope John Paul II acknowledged this in Orientale Lumen, where he states quite explicitly that ‘conversion is also required of the Latin Church, that she may respect and fully appreciate the dignity of Eastern Christians, and accept gratefully the spiritual treasures of which the Eastern Catholic Churches are the bearers, to the benefit of the entire catholic communion: that she may show concretely, far more than in the past, how much she
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esteems and admires the Christian east and how essential she considers its contribution to the full realisation of the Church’s universality’ (OL 21). History can be an exciting route to freedom if we learn and take to heart the lessons of the past, building on them and moving forward in faith and hope. In the story of Christianity, history takes us ‘back to the future’, to the time when divisions, though existent, were not major ones and where there was a healthy ‘diversity in unity’. This desire to re-examine our common origins and shared heritage has marked the writings of recent Popes on the Eastern Church.
East and West belong together Cardinal Walter Kasper points out in his book on ecclesiology, ‘That They All May Be One’, (Burns & Oates, 2004), that there has been a growing awareness from Paul VI to John Paul II, and now Benedict XVI, that the Church needs, ‘to breathe with the two lungs of East and West’: ‘Since its separation from the East, Latin Christianity has developed unilaterally; it has, so to speak, breathed with only one lung and is impoverished. This impoverishment was one cause, among others, of the serious crisis in the Church in the late Middle Ages which led to the tragic division of the sixteenth century’. (Kasper, p.12)
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To learn from the experience of each other is a powerful tool for ecumenism and a sign of the living Spirit at work, but it has never been an easy option. John Paul II in Orientale Lumen points this out clearly; ‘Every day I have a growing desire to go over the history of the Churches in order to write, at last, a history of our unity and thus return to the time when, after the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the Gospel spread to the most varied cultures and a most fruitful exchange began which still today is evidenced in the liturgies of the Churches. Despite difficulties and differences, the letters of the Apostles (cf. 2 Cor 9:11-14) and of the Fathers, show very close fraternal links between the Churches in full communion of faith, with respect for their specific features and identity’ (OL 18).
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THE HISTORY OF THE EASTERN CHURCH The birthplace of Christianity lies in the Middle East. It is from Jerusalem that the Apostolic Mission set out to proclaim the Good News to the whole world and it was in the East that the Church first began to grow. In the Middle East of today, we can still find the most ancient churches of Christendom, often in a very reduced form and often existing in difficult and dangerous situations. All of these communities claim an historical continuity with the apostles and their foundation in apostolic times: James in Jerusalem, Peter and Paul in Antioch (as well as Rome), Thomas in the lands of ancient Babylonia, (Iran, Iraq and Syria), Mark in Alexandria and Barnabas in Cyprus. Though traditions of this kind can be hard to accurately verify and date, nevertheless the long tradition of veneration given to these founders attests to a deep and abiding sense of continuity with the original mission of the church in the first few centuries of the Christian era. The Roman Empire The political structures, communication and transportation routes of the Empire formed a ready means for Christianity to be disseminated. The division of the Churches corresponded to this political development, and also to the linguistic and
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cultural traditions of the two halves of the empire, which was, in the broadest sense, Latin in the west and Greek in the east. This has formed the vocabulary of distinctiveness ever since. Western Christianity gravitated around the old imperial capital of Rome and evangelised Europe, so that it became the tradition of the west. Its traditions of canon law, theology, patristic writings and thought and its liturgies are firmly rooted in Latin. The Eastern Church originally centered on the new imperial capital at Constantinople, which was called New Rome, but then divided into two distinctive groups, which either centered on the Patriarchate in Constantinople, or due to various schisms broke with it. Though the oldest eastern churches, the Armenians, Abyssinians and Nestorians have never used the Greek language, either in their liturgical rites or in their theological writings, they nevertheless depend on the Greek tradition. Their theology and liturgy show connections with common sources and a dependence on Greek terminology and concepts. Thus in the broadest sense the western tradition can be said to have emerged from the Roman tradition with its Latin theological and canonical traditions, whilst the east looks to Constantinople and is the inheritor of Greek concepts and ideas.