Let's Start the Change Now - Ideas?

Unknown

I am sure many of you are aware of this, but the Antiochian Patriarch, the Alexandrian Greek Patriarch, and the Coptic Patriarch (Pope Shenouda III) have been working together for some now to reconcile and build bridges back to full communion.  Unfortunately, because of some disgruntled monks, clergy, and self-professed "theologians," unity is being prevented.  To make it worse, the heresy of Philitism is also preventing this. (Philitism is the heresy where a particular race or group says they are the pure form of Orthodoxy to the exclusion or limitation of others simply because they are Russian, Ukrainian, Greek, Coptic, Antiochian, Armenian, etc.) 
My proposal--to you and all Orthodox Christians--is to do as countless Orthodox Christians in the past have done: be the Church, not just part of it.  I dare not suggest that we overthrow anyone, take anything over, or be something we are not--we are not Muslims or Roman Catholics, and are thus not militant, but rather we need to be vigilant.  For too long we have been separated by the ignorance and pride of certain popular individuals in the Church, and for too long we have allowed ourselves to be tricked into believing the other to be wrong.  We have allowed arrogance and impatience that started just before 451 AD to separate the Byzantine and Oriental traditions of the Holy Orthodox Faith. 
Visit http://www.orthodoxunity.org/, and perhaps we may be able to find a way together to support this cause and full communion between us all. 

Any starting questions, comments, concerns, statements, queries, or outbursts?

mabsoota

yes, we need to support our leaders in their efforts to increase unity.
it would be great to see a united website with an online forum for people to discuss this.
do you know of any that is updated regularly?

Unknown

Unfortunately, it does not appear the site is updated on a consistent regular basis.  Though, I do think that when something momentuous occurs, they are careful to post it.  For example, that joint prayer service in Europe and some of the more recent documents. 

A dream that is shared by many dear Orthodox friends of mine is that a serious council with as many Bishops as possible got together and attempted to hold a council of reconciliation.  Coptic, Armenian, Syriac, Antiochian, Greek, Russian, American... all should be gathering together at one time, in one place, to formally agree that there is nothing separating us from each other, just arrogance and pride (not to mention semantics).  This has already been informally agreed upon by Antioch and Alexandria, but not the rest, and an informal document with a formal document of only partial and conditional communion is not enough--it's cheap. 

This is why I posted this topic, not just put something out there that is a nice to think about topic, but to begin living a call to action that I have been challenged to act upon, and that we have all been called to act upon as Orthodox Christians. 

Unknown

Here is something I found that provides us with some context we may not have known.  What do you all think?  Is there a way we can work around this?  Work with this?  Are we bound by this, and thus barred from reunification? 

Anyway, here is the link: http://www.svots.edu/john-erickson-beyond-dialogue/

Sorry, I know it's a little long, but it's really good and insightful. 

g2here

I read this article and I don't think we are barred from reunification if Pope Shenouda agrees with it.
If we are not compromising traditions or changing how we state our faith, it could be good.

However, using different words to express "basically" the same faith is not as light as it seems; there are many ways to express the same thing and Coptic sounds best to me. Eastern Orthodox is not as clear to people who aren't theologians. And thus may divide later on down the road, which is not good. 

I didn't understand the article completely. I like the Coptic way best (Oriental) and if the Fathers can agree we will know we do not compromise; but they know much better. Why do you think reunification is important? 

+++

coptic youth

Aha! Ecumenism?! Blame the monks of Athos, who are adamant that the oriental churches are heretical and wont agree to Constantinople on unifaction! Of course, they not the only people to blame. As you have stated, semantics is a HUGE problem in full communion. However, progress between Greek orthodox Church in Egypt and the Coptic Church have made a married couple have the sacraments of either church. So if the male is Greek, woman is a Copt, if they marry at a Coptic Church the Greek husband can share in sacraments and vice versa. Not sure if it applies abroad. reference: the unity site. Put it simply, one of the major hurdles converts to Christianity face is the problem of "Churches", each claiming to be "the only one right". I for one are eager to see full communion woth the Byzantine and Oriental Churches, there is HEAPS to gain!

mabsoota

i have read the article.
the patriarchs (including our baba shenouda III) have already agreed that we should pursue a road towards unity. this was decided by patriarchs (or their representatives) from every eastern orthodox and oriental orthodox church at a meeting in chambesy, geneva, switzerland in late 1990.
we all officially have the same faith. we cannot have communion yet together because, on each side, there are names of saints and patriarchs in the liturgy which the other side accused of heresy. so each side needs to do some work about how to say that they were mistaken and the people accused of heresy (non-Christian opinion) weren't actually heretics.

on a practical level, it is certainly safe to visit churches in the other group, and if you hear any preaching that sounds strange, check it with your own priest when you get home. you are not allowed to take communion with the other side, although this may change soon. soon after 1990, the romanian orthodox church went ahead and gave communion to several oriental (eg coptic) orthodox church members. but the byzantine church (most powerful in eastern orthodox group) basically told them to wait until everyone had sorted out the problem of labelling those people in the past as heretics.

if you don't want to attend church services of the other group, you can certainly visit them socially and help your community together (feeding the poor, caring for the old or children etc). this way you will learn about that strange church around the corner from you and find out they are a lot like you.
if you live in upper egypt or southern spain or somewhere where there are no EO churches, you can join in by discussing these things on this website!

i don't think we should rush out and all get EO husbands/wives, although i have to say that if a lot of people did that we would make progress quite quickly  ;)
but there are lots of things in common between the 2 orthodox groups. many of my coptic friends saw the american film 'my big fat greek wedding' and exclaimed 'that's my life!'

one interesting thing i saw in this article is that our hymn 'the only begotten son' (Omonogenees)
http://tasbeha.org/hymn_library/index.php?a=view&id=149

is also used in a slightly shorter form by the EO churches, and they don't know we sing it too!
"The hymn “Only-begotten Son,” generally ascribed to [emperor] Justinian and sung each time the Divine Liturgy is celebrated, testifies to the continuing importance of this council’s understanding of Christology within the Byzantine tradition.

Only-begotten Son and Word of God:  Thou art immortal,
yet for our salvation Thou didst deign to be incarnate
of the holy Theotokos and ever-virgin Mary,
and without change Thou didst become man and wast crucified, O Christ our God,
trampling down death by death;
Thou art one of the Holy Trinity,
glorified together with the Father and the Holy Spirit:
Save us!"

yes, may God save us, from our pride and from our lack of understanding.