The Orthodox criterion of the faith

[M. Partyka]

I don't want to bias any responses by giving the author's name, so I'll just give the quotation itself and ask whether you agree:

We shall never get forward in discussion with people on any one dogma till we agree about this: that the authority of the Church today is the criterion for all dogmas. That is, the Orthodox criterion of the true faith is what the living Church, guided always by God, teaches today. This, and this alone, is a real, objective standard of belief, about which there neither is nor can be any doubt, once you know what the Church is.

The Church is a living authority, an authority alive in the world at this moment, that can answer your difficulties, reject a false theory as it arises, and say who is right in disputed interpretations of ancient documents. Christ has given to his Church his own authority, so that we can trust the Church as we trust Christ himself. Therefore, the main proof for any dogma, the most efficient in every way, the proof that should be the real motive for every Orthodox, is simply that this dogma is taught now by the Church.

There is also another kind of argument for each dogma, taking each separately and proving that this was taught by Christ and has been believed from the beginning. This direct proof of each dogma can only be confirmation of the general argument for all, taken from the present teaching of the Church. But it is a most valuable confirmation, which we are always ready to offer, as long as it is understood that it is not the main reason of our belief. Even the most fundamental dogmas rest ultimately on the teaching of the Church today, even, for instance, that of the Holy Trinity. I am quite certain that the Church Fathers all say what I believe about the Trinity. But I do not base my faith on what they say. I base my faith on what the Orthodox Church of today says.

We believe that, whatever may happen, the Church still lives and will live to the end of the world. Christ said so. She remains always what he founded –- one united society. Her rebel children may leave her and set up rival churches of their own. This is tragic; it is the great tragedy of Christendom; but it does not affect the unity of the Church, for unity is of her essence. Nothing can destroy that, because her Founder is almighty and promised that she should last always, till the end of the world. It is a fact that there are many Christians who have left her, that Christendom is divided; it is not a fact that the Church is divided. If ever it were so, then the Church would no longer exist; the gates of hell would have prevailed. So we Orthodox believe in Christ's one Church, and we look to this Church for guidance, as she is now, as she teaches this year.

[Herman Blaydoe]

I don't know, but this does not ring "Orthodox" in the mind of this bear of little brain. The emphasis on "Church today" sounds vaguely Roman Catholic.

We hear from Catholicism about the development of dogma and this seems to echo that sentiment, or could certainly lead to a justification of it since it seems to make the case that what the Church "today" teaches trumps what it taught "yesterday". Orthodox makes no such distinction that I am aware of. It seems to give the Church more authority than it gives itself, with our emphasis on Ecumenical Councils and ancient Fathers, there is an emphasis to ensure that the Church today is faithful to the Church before. What the Church teaches today cannot be different from what it taught in the past. This quotation seems to break that connection, at least to me.

This sounds vaguely like something that was written by Fr. Adrian Fortescue, a Roman Catholic Priest.

But hey, I could be wrong.

Herman the Pooh

[M. Partyka]

This sounds vaguely like something that was written by Fr. Adrian Fortescue, a Roman Catholic Priest. But hey, I could be wrong.Well, so much for keeping the author anonymous. I had no idea his writings (apart from the liberties I took to call them "Orthodox") would be that well-known. Oh, well. Anybody else who'd like to chime in still can.

[Michael Stickles]

The Church is a living authority, an authority alive in the world at this moment, that can answer your difficulties, reject a false theory as it arises, and say who is right in disputed interpretations of ancient documents. ...

... Even the most fundamental dogmas rest ultimately on the teaching of the Church today, even, for instance, that of the Holy Trinity. I am quite certain that the Church Fathers all say what I believe about the Trinity. But I do not base my faith on what they say. I base my faith on what the Orthodox Church of today says.


I don't know. If this means that we do not trust our own interpretation of the Fathers or the Scriptures, but submit to the understanding of the Church as we are taught it by those in authority over us, that's one thing. But if it means that the Church now has the authority to supersede and overrule what the Church has said in earlier times, that's something altogether different.

In Christ,
Mike

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear Ken and others,

My main issue with this text is that it seems wholly to divorce 'the Church' and her dogmas from the realm of experience, so that what is accepted is essentially a collection of assertive statements -- about Trinity, about salvation, or whatever other topic. This abstraction of dogma from experience seems fundamentally to go against the notion of Orthodox ecclesiology as ascetical in nature, which means that it is precisely because the Church engages me in the authentic ascetical encounter with Truth, that I accept her and receive her as true. It is not an unquestioning submission to a set of statements issued forth in the present (or in any other generation), as the author seems to assert; rather, it is the present engagement of experience.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

[Owen Jones]

The context of this statement is the decline in respect for authority. And so the knee jerk reaction is to bolster the case for obedience to authority, when in fact the problem of widespread decline in authority is much more complicated than that. In the Episcopal Church, I heard for years from the Anglo-Catholics that the Church suffered from a problem of authority. That argument went nowhere. And in fact, the heretics who have taken over the Episcopal Church (and the Anglican Communion) have been insistent and consistent on one point: their authority as Bishops to decide and to compel others to agree. I once had an Episcopal Bishop tell me that unless and until the diocese, meaning all of the clergy, submitted to his authority, there was no unity in the diocese. But he was a blatant heretic. Ironically, he ended up putting a bullet to his head because he got exposed as having had a sexual affair with the female treasurer of the diocese who had stolen $3 million.

Before we can recognize, discern, and submit to the true authority of a Bishop, we have to find the Bishop within. Anything less leads to disastrous consequences.

[Aidan Kimel]

I do not think that many Catholic theologians today would formulate the dogmatic authority of the Church in the way that Fortescue does in this citation. One need only read Lumen gentium and Dei verbum to see the difference.

May I ask where this citation comes from (title and page). It would be interesting to know the context of the citation.

This Fortescue citation reminds me of a citation from Henry Cardinal Manning:

"It was the charge of the Reformers that the Catholic doctrines were not primitive, and their pretension was to revert to antiquity. But the appeal to antiquity is both a treason and a heresy. It is a treason because it rejects the Divine voice of the Church at this hour, and a heresy because it denies that voice to be Divine.

"As soon as I perceived … that the Holy Spirit … has united himself indissolubly to the … Church of Jesus Christ, I saw at once that the interpretations or doctrines of the living Church are true because Divine…. I then saw that all appeals to … Scripture and antiquity, whether by individuals or by local churches, are no more than appeals from the Divine voice of the living Church, and therefore essentially rationalistic.

"The appeal from the living voice of the Church to any tribunal whatsoever, human history included, is an act of private judgment and a treason because that living voice is supreme; and to appeal from that supreme voice is also a heresy because that voice by divine assistance is infallible."

Again, I don't think that many Catholic theologians today would state matters so starkly. Manning's formulation would seem to encourage the stance "The Church says _____, therefore shuddap and submit." But it does have the value of challenging the kind of individualistic religion so popular in our culture. Against this individualism, Manning posits the present reality of the Church united to and possessed by the Holy Spirit.

[M. Partyka]

May I ask where this citation comes from (title and page). It would be interesting to know the context of the citation.The quotes are assembled from statements in Fr. Fortescue's book The Early Papacy, pp. 23-27.