Dr. DeVille has written a critical response to the MP's long awaited document on primacy. As I have said repeatedly, the document was only incidentally addressed to Rome. The real target was Constantinople, and it definitely got their attention. In all honesty I was not exactly bowled over by the Moscow document. It seems like a fairly cavalier and breathtakingly short document for such a weighty subject. And I don't think Adam is too far off the mark in his suggestion that Moscow is trying to reduce the Ecumenical Patriarch to an ecclesiastical equivalent to The Queen of England, i.e. a figurehead.
All of which lends further weight to my long held view that we have no business holding discussions aimed at ending a thousand year schism with Rome, until we have our own ducks in a row. Conversations with Rome should be limited to areas of mutual interest, such as charity and the collapse of western civilization before the twin threats of militant secularism and militant Islam while we sort out our internal issues.
I will be most interested to see what becomes of this much discussed but never quite materializing Pan-Orthodox Synod.
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All of which lends further weight to my long held view that we have no business holding discussions aimed at ending a thousand year schism with Rome, until we have our own ducks in a row.
With all due respect, our Lord desired that we all be one. Our efforts to be obedient to God's will should not be put on hold. If we wait until our "ducks are in a row" we will always have an excuse to avoid seeking unity.
Do I need to even point out that this discussion would not even be taking place but for the ecumenical dialogue?
I think John's point is not that no efforts at unity should be made, but that holding formal discussions with Rome when the Orthodox themselves are disunited and unclear about the core issues (mainly, the meaning of "primacy") will likely result in greater disunity, rather than move the Churches closer to unity.
I think that is precisely what has happened. As I have written elsewhere, the best thing that the Orthodox can do for the cause of Church unity is to articulate clearly the teaching of their own Tradition about what "primacy" means. Only then will discussions with Rome on the issue bear fruit.
I think that is what "having our own ducks in a row" means.
As I note on my blog, nobody but the Greeks seems to be discussing this. The only issue out there which might merit a pan-Orthodox council is the diaspora Churches. They'll be turned over to the EP when the sun rises in the west. So nobody is going to any Council until there's a face-saving arrangement for all sides. The council would formalize what has already been decided, which should be in another century or so.
And then, step 2: ecumenical dialogue with Rome. What then: Rome gets all the parishes in the former colonies of Britain and Europe? Or do we carve out Orthodox Rites in the Catholic Church? What Patriarch can agree to reduce the dignity of his office in such a fashion? It's not his to reduce, if our ecclesiology is correct, and the Roman pope has the same issue.
More fundamentally, Rome, the EP, and everybody else are simply unable to come to terms with a multi-polar world that no longer includes the Roman Empire, and the fact that people can pick up and leave when the jobs disappear or the bullets start flying.
Moscow isn't trying to reduce Constantinople to Queen Liz status. It has done that to itself. At least Elizabeth gets to fix the roof if it leaks without begging the Turks for permission and wouldn't be stoned if she waked in the streets of London. Also she doesn't wear everyday clothes that proclaim her subservience to her oppressors as the patriarch (and incidentally every Orthodox monastic and bishop on earth ) does. There's many more ducks to line u1p than we think.
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