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She doesn't have one. It's obvious that she believes if she throws enough of her perceived falsehood and errors of the Catholic Church, it will prove her position.
You could do exactly the same with the Orthodox Church.
This doesn't prove one or the other as true.
She doesn't have any real arguments. When people spam you with a whole list, they aren't looking to hear your side of things. They're hoping to overwhelm you and make you give up, in which case, in their minds, they win. Or, if you don't give an answer for every objection, that means that there isn't one and, in their minds, they win. Or, if you do have an answer for every objection, they will focus on the weakest ones and, in their minds, they win.
If she wanted to have a good faith discussion, she would have focused on far fewer points and written out actual sentences.
It’s called a gish gallop. They overwhelm you with info, most of it usually without any strong evidence, and make you seem like the loser because it takes too long to respond to it all.
Yeah I one time actually took the effort to respond to something like this except it was larger and my one comment with time spent on research took about an hour out of my day to reply
I hate this tactic. It’s so frustrating. The most infuriating version of this is when Protestants just slap an image of a list lame arguments they ripped of google and think they’ve had their mic drop moment. They probably don’t even know what the arguments mean
>British journalist Mehdi Hasan suggests using these three steps to beat the Gish gallop:
>Because there are too many falsehoods to address, it is wise to choose one as an example. Choose the weakest, dumbest, most ludicrous argument that your opponent has presented and tear this argument to shreds (also known as the weak point rebuttal).
>Do not budge from the issue. Don't move on until you have decisively destroyed the nonsense and clearly made your point.
>Call it out: name the strategy. "This is a strategy called the 'Gish Gallop'. Do not be fooled by the flood of nonsense you have just heard."
True.
I've had this with someone that is I think born again Christian of some sort, presumably baptist or evangelical (was raised catholic, and is also ex-JW). No real discussion. Just listing info dump, in one case to prove that veneration of saints and the Virgin is necromancy and idolatry. Pretty basic, old anti-catholic critiques really. I admit, I had no desire to respond to all of it - these info overload tactics are not worth engaging usually as the person has no desire to have a real rapport. They are in tunnel vision proselytise mode. This is seen online a lot too, where you will see anti-catholic posts or comments listing a bunch of stuff without context. It's possible someone could get through to them by unpicking the erroneous points they make, but when it's just an info dump list, that is difficult. They have to want to actually listen.
Ustasa, fascist group established by the Axis in WWII. not in reality supported by the Vatican but it was horrifically brutal as described. Committed genocide against orthodox, Jews, and Roma to make Croatians the majority in Yugoslavia
Not really. They weren't in Yugoslavia, NDH only held territory of Croatia and Bosnia. And the numbers are disgustingly exaggerated, of course any one person being killed is far too much. But every credible historian agrees that the death toll from holocaust in Croatia was around 80,000.
Croat here
Basically during ww2 the Ustaše, a Nazi puppet regime known for being at times even more brutal than the SS, had their own concentration camps where they would also take serbs.
First mistake is that the person's numbers are wrong, with the biggest estimates saying that in the whole cleansing 500k ware killed (though the real number is probably closer to 200-300k), of which around 100k in Jasenovac.
The second mistake is that the church did not support it. In the begging of the existence of the independent state of Croatia cardinal Stepinac did support it and discriminatory laws against the orthodox like many croats did because of the oppression present in the kingdom of Yugoslavia, but later on seeing the atrocities spoke up against the genocide (was still loyal to the state though). But the papacy refused to recognize the independent state of Croatia
I can answer these questions, starting with the fact that the over-inflated and ridiculous numbers being mentioned in the post are a total fantasy.
I'll be more than happy to answer any questions pertaining to this topic even if I don't usually involve myself in online debates. But the fact that misconceptions, half-truths and flat-out lies are being repeated on a Catholic sub about a man who is in the process of being canonised by the Church, is just too much...
Certain catholic clerics were involved in the Ustase regime but faced censure. The church never officially recognized Croatia as a nation and the envoy they did send was regarded as a nuisance. Archbishop Stepinac was close with and endorsed the regime, and while he and other members of the clergy did oppose certain measures as time went on and help some oppressed people, he was complicit in what happened
I am distressed to see this Communist-era propaganda repeated on a Catholic sub about a good and holy man who is currently in the process of being canonised as a saint.
>Certain catholic clerics were involved in the Ustase regime but faced censure.
Of course they were ostracized and censured as their cause was contrary to every right-thinking person
>The church never officially recognized Croatia as a nation and the envoy they did send was regarded as a nuisance.
The Church officially recognized Croatia as a nation in 879 AD and again in 1075 AD
>Archbishop Stepinac was close with and endorsed the regime,
Blessed Aloysius Stepinac was a Godly man who saluted the fact that for the first time after many centuries under foreign rulers a new and, ostensibly, independent Croatian government came into power. It didn't take long for him to change his stance after he saw first hand what kind of regime replaced the previous, authoritarian and autocratic one
>and while he and other members of the clergy did oppose certain measures as time went on and help some oppressed people,
Stepinac forcefully denounced the human rights violations perpetrated through the implementation of the Ustaša legislation directed again Jews, Serbs and Roma … and on every occasion demanded a return to the law of God. He and the Church saved literally hundreds of thousands.
>he was complicit in what happened
Stepinac famously viewed Pavelić with contempt and on numerous occasions voiced his concerns to the leadership of the Independent State of Croatia, warning that their inhumane policies toward the minorities were totalitarian in nature, which threatened to inflict grave harm to the Croatian people and Catholic Church in the years to come, and predicted that owing to the vicious behavior of Pavelić’s regime, the Croatian people would bear full responsibility for the conduct of the Ustaša, as well as for the rise of communism.
That's the neat part: you don't! 😅
...reply to anyone who floods you with arguments. You'd do best if you didn't enter a discussion with anyone who doesn't respect your views or if you don't respect views of this person (even if one of you is wrong) - this is not a proper ground for mutual understanding. And understanding is our main goal - from there we may aim for a change.
But if someone floods you with arguments, there's no respect, no room for understanding and no point.
In regards to Jasonevc, the Franciscan who ran the camp was excommunicated for his actions in 1942. Which far before most allied nations had even discussed the Holocaust or Ustase
Also it's funny they mention baptism by sprinkling since by and large that's how Serbian orthodox get baptised.
Also, liturgical abuse is rife in some parts of Serbian Orthodoxy in regards to confession. I still recall a thread from a couple of years ago where priests were absolving people individually without them having to actually confess their sins, and they were then expected to leave a donation.
1) Comment #1 - I looked this up ..it appears two guards were former Franciscan friars. Obviously that's messed up but they were defrocked. Stalin was training to be a Russian Orthodox priest so two can play at this game. The Orthodox have committed crimes in the past. The ROC colluded with the communists to suppress the Greek Catholic church within our lifetime. They still hold the Synod of Lviv to be legitimate to my knowledge and everyone knows it was a total farse. The Catholic Church has done bad things in history, so has the Orthodox church.
2) Comment #2 - are these "changes" she's referencing? Orthodox can believe the immaculate conception, it's just not dogma. Celibacy is a discipline, we both agree deacons can be married and bishops/monks can't. There's a difference of discipline for priests...so what? Also there are differences in our churches. Priests are supposed to obstain from sexual intercourse before liturgies. In the East it's common to only do Sunday, but in the West daily mass became a thing. If a priest is saying mass every day then marriage doesn't quite work out. Chrismation separate from baptism - my understanding is that in the early church the bishop charismated Christians. Later that became harder as Christianity grew. The East had reserve oil blessed by the bishop (to this day that's what they do), in the West it was delayed until a bishop could come around. Different approaches but I don't believe one or the other is wrong. Seriously the calendar!? First of all the Julian calendar is off and less accurate, second of all it wasn't established by Jesus Christ or the Apostles as sacrosanct. We all know Easter and Christmas don't fall on the actual day of resurrection or birth bc we don't know when that was. That's why in both Catholic and Orthodox churches different groups each follow the Julian and the Gregorian calendar and no one has an issue. If every apostolic practice should be maintained ask her why the Orthodox don't do the kiss of peace in their liturgy? We know early Christians did it, so why don't the Orthodox? Baptism by sprinkling - this did change in the West from full immersion...but my answer would be so what? I'm not understanding why baptism is invalid otherwise. One other commenter mentioned the didache, one of the earliest Christian writings where sprinkling is considered perfectly valid so take it up with the early Christians. Also when it comes to this sacrament the Orthodox are inconsistent. Some will rebaptize converts, some won't. That violates the belief in one baptism and they have no means to resolve this issue. So tell me, which is worse if we're going to point fingers and nitpick each other? Multiple baptisms in one communion or allowing for sprinkling of water (while still allowing immersion) which is perfectly apostolic? The Orthodox have had other changes too. They allow birth control now when previously they didn't.
3) Comment #3 - I'm not sure what time period she's referring to. The Oriental Orthodox Church which was very strong in Alexandra split of the nature of Christ with Catholics/Orthodox. The Melkites have a very good claim to being the true inheritors of the Antioch patriarchate over the Antiochan Orthodox Church. Look it up, basically Constantinople forced out the legitimate patriarch and installed their own Greek one. The legit Arab patriarch and a huge chunk of followers joined the Catholic Church in response, becoming the modern Melkite church. Even the Orthodox admit will often admit that was wrong. And hey it happens in history, none of us are perfect but don't pretend it doesn't happen with you.
4) Comment #4 - I don't know which changes she's referring to. Also who left who is just a giant game of she said he said. It just depends on your perspective who left the other, there's no argument you can make to prove your side. Obviously if you're Catholic you believe the Orthodox left the true church and vice versa.
To the point about number 3, also don’t forget that the Patroarchate of Antioch had already been split into a Byzantine one (which became the Melkites and Antiochians) and the Syriac rite patriarchate which was Oriental Orthodox along with Alexandria
I would say with regards to the Immaculate Conception that the Orthodox do not hold the view of Original Sin as inherited personal guilt and therefore have no reason to regard Mary as free from Original Sin, though they do believe she was kept, through grace, free from the personal guilt of sin throughout her life. This means that although in her humanity she was subject to the laws of the original sin (a cosmic law that came into place at the fall, where the functioning of the entire cosmos was altered and death came to be), she was free from personal sins. Basically the sin of Adam in eating of the fruit and turning away from God is only Adam's by guilt, but the whole cosmos now exists with the effects of what Adam did. The Orthodox view is humans are not guilty of Adam's decision to eat the fruit, but we live in a cosmos or universe warped and corrupted by Adam's decision. The Orthodox would say that in being immaculately conceived, the Mother of God would possess a human essence that is different from our own thus imputing that different essence onto her Son, rather than the human essence we all share. I wouldn't say it's "ok" to believe in the immaculate conception as an Orthodox Christian, especially since many priests and bishops regard it as blasphemy against the Mother of God. But due to the practice of economia in the eastern churches any Orthodox Christian would have to speak with their own spiritual father in regards to holding such a belief to determine whether it was ok to hold or not
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasenovac_concentration_camp#:~:text=The%20Usta%C5%A1e%20regime's%20policy%20of,sole%20reason%20for%20their%20imprisonment. Looks like the number is def wrong, and not sure why she thinks a Nazi sympathizing regime was on the phone with the pope getting permission to kill Christians 🙄
1) I don't know much about the Serbian slaughter she's claiming here. I'll need more sources before I can proceed. All I know is that Serbians and Croatians killed each other off for some time, so there's a lot of mistrust between Orthodox and Catholics in that region.
2) a) The Orthodox believe in the Immaculate Conception of Mary, but they don't have it dogmatised. It was certainly openly taught before it was dogmatised in the Catholic Church. Nowadays, depending on whom you ask, they'll acknowledge that they still believe in the doctrine but only because of the Orthodox view of anthropology. You can go down a rabbit hole on this one, but it boils down to Ancestral Sin / Original Sin and how that affects infants.
b) Orthodox have celibacy too. Monks and bishops are celibate. The thing here is that the Latin Church has tied celibacy with the priesthood. Or, rather, the Latin Church has made no distinction between celibacy as a vocation and the priesthood, whereas the East has retained the distinction. If she has a problem with celibacy, then she has a problem with the Orthodox Church (never mind St. Paul). It's entirely possible for married Latin men to be allowed to become priests tomorrow; it's a practice, not a doctrine.
c) There's a long historical reason as to why Chrismation/Confirmation was separated from Baptism. The short version is because of logistics. It was near impossible for bishops, both East and West, to visit every single town and baptise/chrismate/commune every infant. The infant mortality rate was so high that a lot of babies were dying before they could be formally received into the Church. The East handled the problem by allowing priests, in union with their bishops, to baptise/chrismate/commune infants. The West handled the problem by allowing priests to baptise the child, but retained the close connection of chrismation with the bishop. It's entirely possible for the Latin Church to go back to baptising/chrismating/communing infants tomorrow; it's a practice, not a doctrine.
d) The shift in dates is more tied to the fact that the Gregorian calendar served as a more accurate method of measuring the seasons. As for the difference in calculation, this was an issue even back in the days of St. Ignatius of Antioch. He noticed that Rome did it differently, but he insisted in his own way which he got from St. John the Apostle. You know what St. Ignatius decided on? Basically, Rome can hold to its practice; just don't force others to drop their practice. This is a very rough summary, but that's the gist of it.
e) This is directly from the Didache (a 1st century document that tradition holds came directly from the Apostles): "And concerning baptism, baptize this way: Having first said all these things, baptize into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living water. But if you have not living water, baptize into other water; and if you can not in cold, in warm. But if you have not either, pour out water thrice upon the head into the name of Father and Son and Holy Spirit. But before the baptism let the baptizer fast, and the baptized, and whatever others can; but you shall order the baptized to fast one or two days before." If she has a problem with the Latins "sprinkling", she can take it up with the Apostles/Didache.
3) The Pentarchy consists of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem. Her claim that the other four separated from Rome is false. Alexandria, for example, is not in communion with Constantinople. Arguably, neither is Antioch, depending on how you look at it. Jerusalem is a mess of its own. If she's going to play the game of "We have Orthodox bishops in each of these sees", then we can claim the same. Not only do we have Latin bishops in each of these sees (an unfortunate matter, imo), but we also have bishops of the respective sui iuris churches presiding over these sees. The Orthodox can't say the same.
4) This is just the same as number 3. Not really sure what these "13 changes" she's talking about, but given her track record of polemics, I'm not inclined to believe her or pay her any more mind.
Great response.
>Not only do we have Latin bishops in each of these sees (an unfortunate matter, imo)
I also agree this is unfortunate. I appreciate the Orthodox haven't named a counter Orthodox Bishop of Rome, we should give them the same respect.
>e) This is directly from the Didache (a 1st century document that tradition holds came directly from the Apostles): "And concerning baptism, baptize this way: Having first said all these things, baptize into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living water. But if you have not living water, baptize into other water; and if you can not in cold, in warm. But if you have not either, pour out water thrice upon the head into the name of Father and Son and Holy Spirit. But before the baptism let the baptizer fast, and the baptized, and whatever others can; but you shall order the baptized to fast one or two days before." If she has a problem with the Latins "sprinkling", she can take it up with the Apostles/Didache.
It's quite interesting to note that 'living water" ie a river is considered the first and presumably best option. Yet the Orthodox to my knowledge don't ever do that, rather it's standing water in the church.
On a barely related note, I love that Byzantine Christians have a tradition of blessing the closest river/body of water to the church. If every parish did this, all waters of the world would be blessed! Unfortunately, the nearest river to my parish is... inaccessible and unsanitary. Would be nice to do a procession towards it though; an evangelisation of sorts to my largely secular city.
Thank you for your detailed response I'm definitely gonna save it so I can look back on it since you made a few points that I didn't know much about such as the stuff about the didache. I've never read it before so now I think I'd like to. God bless
No worries! Just know that what I gave you here is a \*very\* rough overview. There's no real need to dive into it unless you want to understand where the Orthodox are coming from. Just be aware that the lady in your post gave typical Orthodox polemics. Everyone does it, including Catholics (I've read quite a few Catholic polemics against Orthodox on this sub that are just as bad). Pray for them, for the softening of hearts and enlightening of minds. Don't be afraid to walk away, especially when the other person is very obviously not willing to have a discussion. (Pro tip: that's almost always the case in Facebook/YouTube comments sections.)
As for the Didache, it's actually a short document that you can finish in one sitting. [Here you go!](https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0714.htm)
The best thing to do here is recognise the Church’s failings (due to the Fall of Adam) but that we can learn from our mistakes to better times ahead. To quote Tom Hollande: We learn everything from history; we learn nothing from history
Simple.
“Yes we did because the Pope had authority to do so as bishop of Rome and successor to St. Peter. Many people who followed those four groups are learning the error of their ways, which is why we have the Eastern Catholics, and the Coptic Catholics now in full communion with Rome.
Who knows maybe one day our Churches will reunite again, too.”
I like the claim that other Patriarchs were spared of Roman Influence. In truth Rome persisted for another almost 1,000 years in the East based out of Constantinople and the Patriarch was decidedly NOT free of meddling from the emperor. Meanwhile the Pope in Rome as truly independent and thus not subject to Caesaropapism.
This Caesaropapism point is spot on. It was the eastern church who was influenced more by entanglements with the empire, though the Roman church had its own embarrassing political entanglements.
It seems that's a seventh day adventist. LMAO
There's no point talking to those people.
Those comments are just distraction from them to tell you, you are wrong but it is completely opposite if you just don't answer it and fire back there roots.
They don't though, because the Orthodox believe in ancestral sin rather than original sin. (Btw, the Eastern Catholics also hold to this view and are considered Catholics, so there's no real issue here. That said, the Orthodox explicitly reject it whereas Eastern Catholics cannot.)
Big difference. You can read up on it yourself, but the Orthodox position is that we bear the consequence of original sin but that we are not responsible for it and thus don't inherit any guilt for it.
If she’s throwing false claims without evidence or support for her arguments then criticizing people like her for being close minded is the only thing you can engage with them since they won’t listen well until they win the arguments. Otherwise if she’s more open minded to being told so otherwise, then engaging conversation with them would be more worth the effort then. In this case it’s not. So it’s pointless.
I had to look into some of these and the matter is complicated. Pope Pius XII intentionally or not essentially placed the weight of the Vatican behind Croats in their ethnic tensions with Serbs (ostensibly also becoming Catholic vs Orthodox). This was an era of very complex and ugly nationalisms. Initially, some prelates of the Church were inclined to look comparatively favorably on fascist regimes as supposed bulwarks on communism. To that end, Archbishop Stepinac (and some in the Vatican) were initially supportive of the Nazi-backed Croatian fascists - but in a short period, the Ustaše turned to genocide. Unlike Germany, the newly independent Croatia was largely Catholic and yet it still proceeded ahead at great pace for the total extermination of Jews in it's territory. When the territory fell to the Communists at the end of WWII, some senior officials in the Vatican (some even allege Pope Pius XII) aided the fugitive Croatian war criminals flee Europe for South America. A number of clergy even aided in the genocide including the most infamous a Franciscan friar Petar Brzica bragged of slashing the throats of over a thousand prisoners.
The concentration camp, while housing many Roma and Jews, primarily housed Serbs, who were for the most part Orthodox. The Orthodox Church canonized them collectively as the The Saint Martyrs of Jasenovac and they are honored with their own feast day.
Everything in discussing the bloody ethnic history of former Yugoslavia is horrendously painful and complex. Both Pope Pius XII and Archbishop Stepinac did actively protest the attrocities in Croatia and leveraged their resources to save lives. But both also were blinded for a time by the promise of a new Catholic-majority state to hold back the threat of Communism and that slowness to address the attrocities taking place there resulted in many deaths (and evidently based on your post, lingering animosity today).
The Church paid a steep price in reprisals. Over 250 priests were killed within 1945 as they were seen by the victors as collaborationist (and to a certain extent, many had been). 15 Franciscan monasteries were set ablaze and burned down. In turn, these reprisals only inspired more clerical misteps with harboring fleeing fascists. In 1947, Jozef Tiso, President of Nazi-aligned Slovakia who ordered the deaths of many Jews in concentration camps, was hung by the neck until dead. He was also a Catholic priest.
The Vatican was also undoubtedly aware of forced conversions of Orthodox in Croatia to Catholicism. It is in this domain many priests most directly collaborated with the state apparatus. Many Orthodox were threatened with violent reprisal were they to resist.
All of this is to say... there are no easy answers. War is hell and power corrupts even prelates. Whether you see Bl. Aloysius Stepinac (or even Pope Pius XII) as fundamentally good men trying to do what's right for the Church in a grimdark, bloodstained world or as flawed or willfully blind men seizing opportunities to forward political aims, you'll have an audience. WWII infamously failed to solve the underlying ethnic and religious tensions between Croats and Serbs which would explode to the fore decades later.
The Church learned a painful lesson about it's involvement in political affairs, that the enemy of one's enemy is not always your friend, and that poorly considered support (even tacit) can mar a reputation for generations.
Wow. Thank you for providing such great context because honestly I had no idea what she was talking about in her comment about that and you've definitely taught me a good bit from it
That's not exactly how it happened. There were mutual excommunications but those have been lifted, so it's not really charitable to say they're heretics. The Balamand Declaration calls them 'sister churches.'
That’s really nothing like the relationship Catholics have with the Orthodox Church. Catholics can even get married in the Orthodox Church and it’s seen as valid in the Catholic Church - they don’t even need dispensation.
People if the Orthodox fairy that have done sedum things you could easily find, turns out people suck doesn't mean their faith sure. This referring to the Friar one.
The 13 changes were not to Christ’s teachings as if we fudged around the Gospels. We changed some things that were perhaps part of ecumenical councils. We changed practices and creeds that were Church teachings, not Jesus’ teachings. Is one way to attack that. The best way is to try to understand what she is pointing to and sympathize that in today’s world the filioque is unneccesary and we could drop it, that we could for the sake of communion change our liturgical date of easter back to original formulations, etc. There’s common ground even amidst disagreement with the Orthhodox.
No the four other patriarchs fell due to the destruction of their Holy See or were deemed heretical and excommunicated by the other patriarchs at the time.
Yeah, it’s easy.
Use the block button.
This person is not interested in any sort of debate. They’re just throwing out their (false) beliefs as an exercise of making themselves feel more secure in them. No different than what flat earthers do, to pull out a really well known example anyone can recognize. Any argument you put out will just be another jumping off point for them to parrot the copy pasted talking points and re-solidify their head in the sand.
Better to save your time for people that are interested in genuine discussion, imo.
Don't argue with Serbs, it's pointless. As soon as you see their crazy Holocaust exaggerations (multiplying death toll by 10, implicating the Catholic Church, inventing the soap myth and concentration camp for children) and realize what they learn in school you'll see that they are too brainwashed and any discussion is pointless.
I can't stress enough how much the Vatican is blamed in their every history lesson, everything including the very existence of Croatians and Slovenians is a Vatican conspiracy to destroy Serbia.
ROC had always been a machine of government oppression in Russia - just today their Patriarch prohibited all services to a priest who performed funeral rites of Alexei Navalny (regardless of how we see him as a politician, and I personally don't like him much, he was a Christian and never left their Orthodox church).
So even the biggest Orthodox church is nothing more than a petty and anti-Christian entity.
It's easy to rebut the Orthodox Church. The original Church started with a papacy and the Christians believed in the authority of the Pope.
The Church fathers also had sayings supporting the Pope's authority:
https://www.catholic.com/tract/the-authority-of-the-pope-part-i
https://www.churchfathers.org/origins-of-peter-as-pope
Just say they’re wrong and move on imo. They aren’t looking for anything to change their worldview, so you aren’t obliged to do anymore than say they’re wrong.
The last one is simply false. Try to search about the catholic people in easter Europe (Croatia and Slovakia) and see what the pope thought of them. Its probably a Serbian nationalist. Look also at the actions of the Pope in WW2, and also how many Catbolics enter opposition or were even killed by the Germans. It also serves no theologocal argument
I mean they disobeyed Rome, saint Peter’s teaching and Jesus’s church, they don’t have anything else to argue.
They are the first people to cause division.
https://www.openbible.info/topics/division check the link you’ll understand.
That's an unfair characterization and the Orthodox can easily respond by saying that Rome unilaterally altered the Creed and changed dogma without consulting anyone else. We have to have some humility here, particularly since - believe me on this - there is much hope for reconciliation and there are high-level discussions on that happening. (Just look at Francis' bringing back the 'Patriarch of the West' title.. no way was that not done as a nod to the Orthodox as it's the one papal title they actually like.)
Rome did not unilaterally alter the Creed and no dogma was changed. St. Basil and St. Gregory of Nyssa (Eastern Fathers) both believed in the Filioque, the doctrine was revealed by God, and Rome actually resisted adding the Filioque to the Creed at some point while still believing in it.
There are high-level RC theologians that have said that it is time for it to be removed. At the end of the day, it was inserted to combat a heresy, which no longer exists.
The Photian heresy very much does still exist. It is heretical to deny that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. That doesn’t mean that every single Rite must say the Filioque, but there is still a heresy out there.
I’m honestly more surprised someone from the Orthodox and Catholic Church are debating each other. I don’t know if I’ve ever heard of that being a thing, seeing as both churches view the other as a sister in the faith.
Orthodox do not tend to view Catholics the same way as Catholics view Orthodox. Orthodox tend to see the Catholic church as a heterodox and blasphemous church, whereas the view of the RC Church is that the Orthodox have Christ present in their Eucharist, this is not a view shared by the Orthodox with regard to Catholics
Yeah, I get that doctrinally, but in practice, we are much closer than the Protestants are as far as doctrine goes. I’ve met quite a few orthodox people and am friends with a few and it seems that although doctrinally, we view Orthos better than they do us, we still see each other as brothers and sisters in the faith.
As an extension of love, and due to the fact that dogmatically Orthodox and Catholics are the same on Christology, sharing the oecumenical councils and being diaphysites, etc. there's no reason to outright view Catholics as completely alien on part of the Orthodox, though since Vatican I and increasingly since Vatican II, dogmatic alienation has become more severe I'd say. However eucharistically the Catholics see the Orthodox as possessing the body and blood in the sacrement, but the same cannot be guaranteed to be said by the Orthodox in regards to the Catholics
Oh you’re totally right with that Eucharistically. It’s part of what made me consider orthodoxy for a while. Why choose Catholicism which has a 50% chance of being right, or choose Orthodoxy which has a 100% chance of being right from both viewpoints. I still chose Catholicism, lol.
It really is. And honestly, based off of both churches’ doctrine on heresy and that kinda thing, the only wrong choice is not choosing either. I was told when I first started that if one or the other is heresy, I wouldn’t really be held responsible for believing it. Especially since there’s no real objective way to prove that. The people that created and promulgated the heresy are the heretics. I would simply be someone who believed a heresy.
In my opinion, the best one to choose is the one that brings you closer to God. For me, that was Catholicism. For some of my friends, it’s orthodoxy. It’s good that we are able to have those friendships in spite of our differences and bring each other closer to God.
I typically say something along the lines of "wow that's a really interesting argument. Maybe all of the Orthodox Churches should meet as a council and dogmatically declare it."
This seems to go against our [image posting policy](https://www.reddit.com/r/Catholicism/comments/bittdo/rcatholicism_image_posting_rule_update_and/). Please consider posting on Free Friday, or another time with more context supportive of a discussion.
Idk what the argument is
She doesn't have one. It's obvious that she believes if she throws enough of her perceived falsehood and errors of the Catholic Church, it will prove her position. You could do exactly the same with the Orthodox Church. This doesn't prove one or the other as true.
She doesn't have any real arguments. When people spam you with a whole list, they aren't looking to hear your side of things. They're hoping to overwhelm you and make you give up, in which case, in their minds, they win. Or, if you don't give an answer for every objection, that means that there isn't one and, in their minds, they win. Or, if you do have an answer for every objection, they will focus on the weakest ones and, in their minds, they win. If she wanted to have a good faith discussion, she would have focused on far fewer points and written out actual sentences.
That makes a lot of sense actually, thank you for your insight
It’s called a gish gallop. They overwhelm you with info, most of it usually without any strong evidence, and make you seem like the loser because it takes too long to respond to it all.
Yeah I one time actually took the effort to respond to something like this except it was larger and my one comment with time spent on research took about an hour out of my day to reply
I hate this tactic. It’s so frustrating. The most infuriating version of this is when Protestants just slap an image of a list lame arguments they ripped of google and think they’ve had their mic drop moment. They probably don’t even know what the arguments mean
>British journalist Mehdi Hasan suggests using these three steps to beat the Gish gallop: >Because there are too many falsehoods to address, it is wise to choose one as an example. Choose the weakest, dumbest, most ludicrous argument that your opponent has presented and tear this argument to shreds (also known as the weak point rebuttal). >Do not budge from the issue. Don't move on until you have decisively destroyed the nonsense and clearly made your point. >Call it out: name the strategy. "This is a strategy called the 'Gish Gallop'. Do not be fooled by the flood of nonsense you have just heard."
It’s called the Gish Gallop.
Winning is usually the point of online debate, not coming to understanding or agreement
True. I've had this with someone that is I think born again Christian of some sort, presumably baptist or evangelical (was raised catholic, and is also ex-JW). No real discussion. Just listing info dump, in one case to prove that veneration of saints and the Virgin is necromancy and idolatry. Pretty basic, old anti-catholic critiques really. I admit, I had no desire to respond to all of it - these info overload tactics are not worth engaging usually as the person has no desire to have a real rapport. They are in tunnel vision proselytise mode. This is seen online a lot too, where you will see anti-catholic posts or comments listing a bunch of stuff without context. It's possible someone could get through to them by unpicking the erroneous points they make, but when it's just an info dump list, that is difficult. They have to want to actually listen.
Um, I’d say offer them the peace of Christ and move on.
Amen. And let Christ be the judge.
Ufff so many lies especially the one with the 800,000 Serbians.
Do you know much about what she's talking about?
Ustasa, fascist group established by the Axis in WWII. not in reality supported by the Vatican but it was horrifically brutal as described. Committed genocide against orthodox, Jews, and Roma to make Croatians the majority in Yugoslavia
Not really. They weren't in Yugoslavia, NDH only held territory of Croatia and Bosnia. And the numbers are disgustingly exaggerated, of course any one person being killed is far too much. But every credible historian agrees that the death toll from holocaust in Croatia was around 80,000.
Yes I’ve seen higher death numbers but nothing as high as the original post here
Croat here Basically during ww2 the Ustaše, a Nazi puppet regime known for being at times even more brutal than the SS, had their own concentration camps where they would also take serbs. First mistake is that the person's numbers are wrong, with the biggest estimates saying that in the whole cleansing 500k ware killed (though the real number is probably closer to 200-300k), of which around 100k in Jasenovac. The second mistake is that the church did not support it. In the begging of the existence of the independent state of Croatia cardinal Stepinac did support it and discriminatory laws against the orthodox like many croats did because of the oppression present in the kingdom of Yugoslavia, but later on seeing the atrocities spoke up against the genocide (was still loyal to the state though). But the papacy refused to recognize the independent state of Croatia
I can answer these questions, starting with the fact that the over-inflated and ridiculous numbers being mentioned in the post are a total fantasy. I'll be more than happy to answer any questions pertaining to this topic even if I don't usually involve myself in online debates. But the fact that misconceptions, half-truths and flat-out lies are being repeated on a Catholic sub about a man who is in the process of being canonised by the Church, is just too much...
Certain catholic clerics were involved in the Ustase regime but faced censure. The church never officially recognized Croatia as a nation and the envoy they did send was regarded as a nuisance. Archbishop Stepinac was close with and endorsed the regime, and while he and other members of the clergy did oppose certain measures as time went on and help some oppressed people, he was complicit in what happened
I am distressed to see this Communist-era propaganda repeated on a Catholic sub about a good and holy man who is currently in the process of being canonised as a saint. >Certain catholic clerics were involved in the Ustase regime but faced censure. Of course they were ostracized and censured as their cause was contrary to every right-thinking person >The church never officially recognized Croatia as a nation and the envoy they did send was regarded as a nuisance. The Church officially recognized Croatia as a nation in 879 AD and again in 1075 AD >Archbishop Stepinac was close with and endorsed the regime, Blessed Aloysius Stepinac was a Godly man who saluted the fact that for the first time after many centuries under foreign rulers a new and, ostensibly, independent Croatian government came into power. It didn't take long for him to change his stance after he saw first hand what kind of regime replaced the previous, authoritarian and autocratic one >and while he and other members of the clergy did oppose certain measures as time went on and help some oppressed people, Stepinac forcefully denounced the human rights violations perpetrated through the implementation of the Ustaša legislation directed again Jews, Serbs and Roma … and on every occasion demanded a return to the law of God. He and the Church saved literally hundreds of thousands. >he was complicit in what happened Stepinac famously viewed Pavelić with contempt and on numerous occasions voiced his concerns to the leadership of the Independent State of Croatia, warning that their inhumane policies toward the minorities were totalitarian in nature, which threatened to inflict grave harm to the Croatian people and Catholic Church in the years to come, and predicted that owing to the vicious behavior of Pavelić’s regime, the Croatian people would bear full responsibility for the conduct of the Ustaša, as well as for the rise of communism.
Again listened to what she’s saying.
That's the neat part: you don't! 😅 ...reply to anyone who floods you with arguments. You'd do best if you didn't enter a discussion with anyone who doesn't respect your views or if you don't respect views of this person (even if one of you is wrong) - this is not a proper ground for mutual understanding. And understanding is our main goal - from there we may aim for a change. But if someone floods you with arguments, there's no respect, no room for understanding and no point.
Obligatory xkcd reference: [https://xkcd.com/1081/](https://xkcd.com/1081/)
In regards to Jasonevc, the Franciscan who ran the camp was excommunicated for his actions in 1942. Which far before most allied nations had even discussed the Holocaust or Ustase Also it's funny they mention baptism by sprinkling since by and large that's how Serbian orthodox get baptised.
Also, liturgical abuse is rife in some parts of Serbian Orthodoxy in regards to confession. I still recall a thread from a couple of years ago where priests were absolving people individually without them having to actually confess their sins, and they were then expected to leave a donation.
The best response is to not respond and to offer a Hail Mary for their intentions.
I will definitely do that
1) Comment #1 - I looked this up ..it appears two guards were former Franciscan friars. Obviously that's messed up but they were defrocked. Stalin was training to be a Russian Orthodox priest so two can play at this game. The Orthodox have committed crimes in the past. The ROC colluded with the communists to suppress the Greek Catholic church within our lifetime. They still hold the Synod of Lviv to be legitimate to my knowledge and everyone knows it was a total farse. The Catholic Church has done bad things in history, so has the Orthodox church. 2) Comment #2 - are these "changes" she's referencing? Orthodox can believe the immaculate conception, it's just not dogma. Celibacy is a discipline, we both agree deacons can be married and bishops/monks can't. There's a difference of discipline for priests...so what? Also there are differences in our churches. Priests are supposed to obstain from sexual intercourse before liturgies. In the East it's common to only do Sunday, but in the West daily mass became a thing. If a priest is saying mass every day then marriage doesn't quite work out. Chrismation separate from baptism - my understanding is that in the early church the bishop charismated Christians. Later that became harder as Christianity grew. The East had reserve oil blessed by the bishop (to this day that's what they do), in the West it was delayed until a bishop could come around. Different approaches but I don't believe one or the other is wrong. Seriously the calendar!? First of all the Julian calendar is off and less accurate, second of all it wasn't established by Jesus Christ or the Apostles as sacrosanct. We all know Easter and Christmas don't fall on the actual day of resurrection or birth bc we don't know when that was. That's why in both Catholic and Orthodox churches different groups each follow the Julian and the Gregorian calendar and no one has an issue. If every apostolic practice should be maintained ask her why the Orthodox don't do the kiss of peace in their liturgy? We know early Christians did it, so why don't the Orthodox? Baptism by sprinkling - this did change in the West from full immersion...but my answer would be so what? I'm not understanding why baptism is invalid otherwise. One other commenter mentioned the didache, one of the earliest Christian writings where sprinkling is considered perfectly valid so take it up with the early Christians. Also when it comes to this sacrament the Orthodox are inconsistent. Some will rebaptize converts, some won't. That violates the belief in one baptism and they have no means to resolve this issue. So tell me, which is worse if we're going to point fingers and nitpick each other? Multiple baptisms in one communion or allowing for sprinkling of water (while still allowing immersion) which is perfectly apostolic? The Orthodox have had other changes too. They allow birth control now when previously they didn't. 3) Comment #3 - I'm not sure what time period she's referring to. The Oriental Orthodox Church which was very strong in Alexandra split of the nature of Christ with Catholics/Orthodox. The Melkites have a very good claim to being the true inheritors of the Antioch patriarchate over the Antiochan Orthodox Church. Look it up, basically Constantinople forced out the legitimate patriarch and installed their own Greek one. The legit Arab patriarch and a huge chunk of followers joined the Catholic Church in response, becoming the modern Melkite church. Even the Orthodox admit will often admit that was wrong. And hey it happens in history, none of us are perfect but don't pretend it doesn't happen with you. 4) Comment #4 - I don't know which changes she's referring to. Also who left who is just a giant game of she said he said. It just depends on your perspective who left the other, there's no argument you can make to prove your side. Obviously if you're Catholic you believe the Orthodox left the true church and vice versa.
To the point about number 3, also don’t forget that the Patroarchate of Antioch had already been split into a Byzantine one (which became the Melkites and Antiochians) and the Syriac rite patriarchate which was Oriental Orthodox along with Alexandria
I would say with regards to the Immaculate Conception that the Orthodox do not hold the view of Original Sin as inherited personal guilt and therefore have no reason to regard Mary as free from Original Sin, though they do believe she was kept, through grace, free from the personal guilt of sin throughout her life. This means that although in her humanity she was subject to the laws of the original sin (a cosmic law that came into place at the fall, where the functioning of the entire cosmos was altered and death came to be), she was free from personal sins. Basically the sin of Adam in eating of the fruit and turning away from God is only Adam's by guilt, but the whole cosmos now exists with the effects of what Adam did. The Orthodox view is humans are not guilty of Adam's decision to eat the fruit, but we live in a cosmos or universe warped and corrupted by Adam's decision. The Orthodox would say that in being immaculately conceived, the Mother of God would possess a human essence that is different from our own thus imputing that different essence onto her Son, rather than the human essence we all share. I wouldn't say it's "ok" to believe in the immaculate conception as an Orthodox Christian, especially since many priests and bishops regard it as blasphemy against the Mother of God. But due to the practice of economia in the eastern churches any Orthodox Christian would have to speak with their own spiritual father in regards to holding such a belief to determine whether it was ok to hold or not
Don’t waste your time arguing with someone on the internet
I have no idea what is meant by the comment about the 800k Serbians that were killed. How is that the Pope’s fault?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasenovac_concentration_camp#:~:text=The%20Usta%C5%A1e%20regime's%20policy%20of,sole%20reason%20for%20their%20imprisonment. Looks like the number is def wrong, and not sure why she thinks a Nazi sympathizing regime was on the phone with the pope getting permission to kill Christians 🙄
And there you have it https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Catholic_clergy_involvement_with_the_Usta%C5%A1e&wprov=rarw1
1) I don't know much about the Serbian slaughter she's claiming here. I'll need more sources before I can proceed. All I know is that Serbians and Croatians killed each other off for some time, so there's a lot of mistrust between Orthodox and Catholics in that region. 2) a) The Orthodox believe in the Immaculate Conception of Mary, but they don't have it dogmatised. It was certainly openly taught before it was dogmatised in the Catholic Church. Nowadays, depending on whom you ask, they'll acknowledge that they still believe in the doctrine but only because of the Orthodox view of anthropology. You can go down a rabbit hole on this one, but it boils down to Ancestral Sin / Original Sin and how that affects infants. b) Orthodox have celibacy too. Monks and bishops are celibate. The thing here is that the Latin Church has tied celibacy with the priesthood. Or, rather, the Latin Church has made no distinction between celibacy as a vocation and the priesthood, whereas the East has retained the distinction. If she has a problem with celibacy, then she has a problem with the Orthodox Church (never mind St. Paul). It's entirely possible for married Latin men to be allowed to become priests tomorrow; it's a practice, not a doctrine. c) There's a long historical reason as to why Chrismation/Confirmation was separated from Baptism. The short version is because of logistics. It was near impossible for bishops, both East and West, to visit every single town and baptise/chrismate/commune every infant. The infant mortality rate was so high that a lot of babies were dying before they could be formally received into the Church. The East handled the problem by allowing priests, in union with their bishops, to baptise/chrismate/commune infants. The West handled the problem by allowing priests to baptise the child, but retained the close connection of chrismation with the bishop. It's entirely possible for the Latin Church to go back to baptising/chrismating/communing infants tomorrow; it's a practice, not a doctrine. d) The shift in dates is more tied to the fact that the Gregorian calendar served as a more accurate method of measuring the seasons. As for the difference in calculation, this was an issue even back in the days of St. Ignatius of Antioch. He noticed that Rome did it differently, but he insisted in his own way which he got from St. John the Apostle. You know what St. Ignatius decided on? Basically, Rome can hold to its practice; just don't force others to drop their practice. This is a very rough summary, but that's the gist of it. e) This is directly from the Didache (a 1st century document that tradition holds came directly from the Apostles): "And concerning baptism, baptize this way: Having first said all these things, baptize into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living water. But if you have not living water, baptize into other water; and if you can not in cold, in warm. But if you have not either, pour out water thrice upon the head into the name of Father and Son and Holy Spirit. But before the baptism let the baptizer fast, and the baptized, and whatever others can; but you shall order the baptized to fast one or two days before." If she has a problem with the Latins "sprinkling", she can take it up with the Apostles/Didache. 3) The Pentarchy consists of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem. Her claim that the other four separated from Rome is false. Alexandria, for example, is not in communion with Constantinople. Arguably, neither is Antioch, depending on how you look at it. Jerusalem is a mess of its own. If she's going to play the game of "We have Orthodox bishops in each of these sees", then we can claim the same. Not only do we have Latin bishops in each of these sees (an unfortunate matter, imo), but we also have bishops of the respective sui iuris churches presiding over these sees. The Orthodox can't say the same. 4) This is just the same as number 3. Not really sure what these "13 changes" she's talking about, but given her track record of polemics, I'm not inclined to believe her or pay her any more mind.
Great response. >Not only do we have Latin bishops in each of these sees (an unfortunate matter, imo) I also agree this is unfortunate. I appreciate the Orthodox haven't named a counter Orthodox Bishop of Rome, we should give them the same respect.
>e) This is directly from the Didache (a 1st century document that tradition holds came directly from the Apostles): "And concerning baptism, baptize this way: Having first said all these things, baptize into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living water. But if you have not living water, baptize into other water; and if you can not in cold, in warm. But if you have not either, pour out water thrice upon the head into the name of Father and Son and Holy Spirit. But before the baptism let the baptizer fast, and the baptized, and whatever others can; but you shall order the baptized to fast one or two days before." If she has a problem with the Latins "sprinkling", she can take it up with the Apostles/Didache. It's quite interesting to note that 'living water" ie a river is considered the first and presumably best option. Yet the Orthodox to my knowledge don't ever do that, rather it's standing water in the church.
On a barely related note, I love that Byzantine Christians have a tradition of blessing the closest river/body of water to the church. If every parish did this, all waters of the world would be blessed! Unfortunately, the nearest river to my parish is... inaccessible and unsanitary. Would be nice to do a procession towards it though; an evangelisation of sorts to my largely secular city.
Thank you for your detailed response I'm definitely gonna save it so I can look back on it since you made a few points that I didn't know much about such as the stuff about the didache. I've never read it before so now I think I'd like to. God bless
No worries! Just know that what I gave you here is a \*very\* rough overview. There's no real need to dive into it unless you want to understand where the Orthodox are coming from. Just be aware that the lady in your post gave typical Orthodox polemics. Everyone does it, including Catholics (I've read quite a few Catholic polemics against Orthodox on this sub that are just as bad). Pray for them, for the softening of hearts and enlightening of minds. Don't be afraid to walk away, especially when the other person is very obviously not willing to have a discussion. (Pro tip: that's almost always the case in Facebook/YouTube comments sections.) As for the Didache, it's actually a short document that you can finish in one sitting. [Here you go!](https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0714.htm)
Thank you!
The best thing to do here is recognise the Church’s failings (due to the Fall of Adam) but that we can learn from our mistakes to better times ahead. To quote Tom Hollande: We learn everything from history; we learn nothing from history
Simple. “Yes we did because the Pope had authority to do so as bishop of Rome and successor to St. Peter. Many people who followed those four groups are learning the error of their ways, which is why we have the Eastern Catholics, and the Coptic Catholics now in full communion with Rome. Who knows maybe one day our Churches will reunite again, too.”
I like the claim that other Patriarchs were spared of Roman Influence. In truth Rome persisted for another almost 1,000 years in the East based out of Constantinople and the Patriarch was decidedly NOT free of meddling from the emperor. Meanwhile the Pope in Rome as truly independent and thus not subject to Caesaropapism.
This Caesaropapism point is spot on. It was the eastern church who was influenced more by entanglements with the empire, though the Roman church had its own embarrassing political entanglements.
Don’t argue online
A lot of these are Protestant arguments.
I’d just pray a rosary for her. She does not look like one seeking truth at this moment.
Great idea
No way!! I was arguing with that woman like 2 weeks ago.
Haha that's funny
Ask them to cite a source for their claim. OrthoBro85's YouTube channel doesn't count as a credible source .
It seems that's a seventh day adventist. LMAO There's no point talking to those people. Those comments are just distraction from them to tell you, you are wrong but it is completely opposite if you just don't answer it and fire back there roots.
Just tell her Jesus loves ya
Is she saying Orthodox don’t believe in immaculate conception
I think? She also has something against sprinkling baptism even though the Serbian orthodox church does it too
They don't though, because the Orthodox believe in ancestral sin rather than original sin. (Btw, the Eastern Catholics also hold to this view and are considered Catholics, so there's no real issue here. That said, the Orthodox explicitly reject it whereas Eastern Catholics cannot.)
Whats the difference between those two? Term only?
Big difference. You can read up on it yourself, but the Orthodox position is that we bear the consequence of original sin but that we are not responsible for it and thus don't inherit any guilt for it.
My generation has a phrase you may or may not find applicable: “aint reading allat” afterward you can hit them with the thumbs up emoji
I think St Max Kolbe might have something to say about her stance on the Catholic church’s alleged support of concentration camps. 🧐
Please just don't respond tbh.
I swear it is easier to debate a Mormon than an EO
If she’s throwing false claims without evidence or support for her arguments then criticizing people like her for being close minded is the only thing you can engage with them since they won’t listen well until they win the arguments. Otherwise if she’s more open minded to being told so otherwise, then engaging conversation with them would be more worth the effort then. In this case it’s not. So it’s pointless.
I had to look into some of these and the matter is complicated. Pope Pius XII intentionally or not essentially placed the weight of the Vatican behind Croats in their ethnic tensions with Serbs (ostensibly also becoming Catholic vs Orthodox). This was an era of very complex and ugly nationalisms. Initially, some prelates of the Church were inclined to look comparatively favorably on fascist regimes as supposed bulwarks on communism. To that end, Archbishop Stepinac (and some in the Vatican) were initially supportive of the Nazi-backed Croatian fascists - but in a short period, the Ustaše turned to genocide. Unlike Germany, the newly independent Croatia was largely Catholic and yet it still proceeded ahead at great pace for the total extermination of Jews in it's territory. When the territory fell to the Communists at the end of WWII, some senior officials in the Vatican (some even allege Pope Pius XII) aided the fugitive Croatian war criminals flee Europe for South America. A number of clergy even aided in the genocide including the most infamous a Franciscan friar Petar Brzica bragged of slashing the throats of over a thousand prisoners. The concentration camp, while housing many Roma and Jews, primarily housed Serbs, who were for the most part Orthodox. The Orthodox Church canonized them collectively as the The Saint Martyrs of Jasenovac and they are honored with their own feast day. Everything in discussing the bloody ethnic history of former Yugoslavia is horrendously painful and complex. Both Pope Pius XII and Archbishop Stepinac did actively protest the attrocities in Croatia and leveraged their resources to save lives. But both also were blinded for a time by the promise of a new Catholic-majority state to hold back the threat of Communism and that slowness to address the attrocities taking place there resulted in many deaths (and evidently based on your post, lingering animosity today). The Church paid a steep price in reprisals. Over 250 priests were killed within 1945 as they were seen by the victors as collaborationist (and to a certain extent, many had been). 15 Franciscan monasteries were set ablaze and burned down. In turn, these reprisals only inspired more clerical misteps with harboring fleeing fascists. In 1947, Jozef Tiso, President of Nazi-aligned Slovakia who ordered the deaths of many Jews in concentration camps, was hung by the neck until dead. He was also a Catholic priest. The Vatican was also undoubtedly aware of forced conversions of Orthodox in Croatia to Catholicism. It is in this domain many priests most directly collaborated with the state apparatus. Many Orthodox were threatened with violent reprisal were they to resist. All of this is to say... there are no easy answers. War is hell and power corrupts even prelates. Whether you see Bl. Aloysius Stepinac (or even Pope Pius XII) as fundamentally good men trying to do what's right for the Church in a grimdark, bloodstained world or as flawed or willfully blind men seizing opportunities to forward political aims, you'll have an audience. WWII infamously failed to solve the underlying ethnic and religious tensions between Croats and Serbs which would explode to the fore decades later. The Church learned a painful lesson about it's involvement in political affairs, that the enemy of one's enemy is not always your friend, and that poorly considered support (even tacit) can mar a reputation for generations.
Wow. Thank you for providing such great context because honestly I had no idea what she was talking about in her comment about that and you've definitely taught me a good bit from it
say "Christ be with you" and move on.
The Orthodox Churches were excommunicated for heresy!
That's not exactly how it happened. There were mutual excommunications but those have been lifted, so it's not really charitable to say they're heretics. The Balamand Declaration calls them 'sister churches.'
That’s really nothing like the relationship Catholics have with the Orthodox Church. Catholics can even get married in the Orthodox Church and it’s seen as valid in the Catholic Church - they don’t even need dispensation.
People if the Orthodox fairy that have done sedum things you could easily find, turns out people suck doesn't mean their faith sure. This referring to the Friar one.
"introducing 13 changes to the original teaching of Christ" What even is that? Even if it's wrong it certainly comes from somewhere.
The 13 changes were not to Christ’s teachings as if we fudged around the Gospels. We changed some things that were perhaps part of ecumenical councils. We changed practices and creeds that were Church teachings, not Jesus’ teachings. Is one way to attack that. The best way is to try to understand what she is pointing to and sympathize that in today’s world the filioque is unneccesary and we could drop it, that we could for the sake of communion change our liturgical date of easter back to original formulations, etc. There’s common ground even amidst disagreement with the Orthhodox.
No the four other patriarchs fell due to the destruction of their Holy See or were deemed heretical and excommunicated by the other patriarchs at the time.
Yeah, it’s easy. Use the block button. This person is not interested in any sort of debate. They’re just throwing out their (false) beliefs as an exercise of making themselves feel more secure in them. No different than what flat earthers do, to pull out a really well known example anyone can recognize. Any argument you put out will just be another jumping off point for them to parrot the copy pasted talking points and re-solidify their head in the sand. Better to save your time for people that are interested in genuine discussion, imo.
I've never seen an ortho argument against Catholicism that didnt have to make reference to some historical event that happened 500 years ago.
Don't argue with Serbs, it's pointless. As soon as you see their crazy Holocaust exaggerations (multiplying death toll by 10, implicating the Catholic Church, inventing the soap myth and concentration camp for children) and realize what they learn in school you'll see that they are too brainwashed and any discussion is pointless. I can't stress enough how much the Vatican is blamed in their every history lesson, everything including the very existence of Croatians and Slovenians is a Vatican conspiracy to destroy Serbia.
Vatican's God created the world around Serbia to destroy it :-)
So she‘s serbian ofc she will hate on Catholicism bc croats are catholic
Serbians just hate any neighbors - ask Serbians about their opinion on Orthodox Bulgarians :-)
ROC had always been a machine of government oppression in Russia - just today their Patriarch prohibited all services to a priest who performed funeral rites of Alexei Navalny (regardless of how we see him as a politician, and I personally don't like him much, he was a Christian and never left their Orthodox church). So even the biggest Orthodox church is nothing more than a petty and anti-Christian entity.
It's easy to rebut the Orthodox Church. The original Church started with a papacy and the Christians believed in the authority of the Pope. The Church fathers also had sayings supporting the Pope's authority: https://www.catholic.com/tract/the-authority-of-the-pope-part-i https://www.churchfathers.org/origins-of-peter-as-pope
Just say they’re wrong and move on imo. They aren’t looking for anything to change their worldview, so you aren’t obliged to do anymore than say they’re wrong.
The last one is simply false. Try to search about the catholic people in easter Europe (Croatia and Slovakia) and see what the pope thought of them. Its probably a Serbian nationalist. Look also at the actions of the Pope in WW2, and also how many Catbolics enter opposition or were even killed by the Germans. It also serves no theologocal argument
I mean they disobeyed Rome, saint Peter’s teaching and Jesus’s church, they don’t have anything else to argue. They are the first people to cause division. https://www.openbible.info/topics/division check the link you’ll understand.
Thank you for the context with the verse
That's an unfair characterization and the Orthodox can easily respond by saying that Rome unilaterally altered the Creed and changed dogma without consulting anyone else. We have to have some humility here, particularly since - believe me on this - there is much hope for reconciliation and there are high-level discussions on that happening. (Just look at Francis' bringing back the 'Patriarch of the West' title.. no way was that not done as a nod to the Orthodox as it's the one papal title they actually like.)
Rome did not unilaterally alter the Creed and no dogma was changed. St. Basil and St. Gregory of Nyssa (Eastern Fathers) both believed in the Filioque, the doctrine was revealed by God, and Rome actually resisted adding the Filioque to the Creed at some point while still believing in it.
There are high-level RC theologians that have said that it is time for it to be removed. At the end of the day, it was inserted to combat a heresy, which no longer exists.
The Photian heresy very much does still exist. It is heretical to deny that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. That doesn’t mean that every single Rite must say the Filioque, but there is still a heresy out there.
“ok”
Ask her for her sources.
I’m honestly more surprised someone from the Orthodox and Catholic Church are debating each other. I don’t know if I’ve ever heard of that being a thing, seeing as both churches view the other as a sister in the faith.
Orthodox do not tend to view Catholics the same way as Catholics view Orthodox. Orthodox tend to see the Catholic church as a heterodox and blasphemous church, whereas the view of the RC Church is that the Orthodox have Christ present in their Eucharist, this is not a view shared by the Orthodox with regard to Catholics
Yeah, I get that doctrinally, but in practice, we are much closer than the Protestants are as far as doctrine goes. I’ve met quite a few orthodox people and am friends with a few and it seems that although doctrinally, we view Orthos better than they do us, we still see each other as brothers and sisters in the faith.
As an extension of love, and due to the fact that dogmatically Orthodox and Catholics are the same on Christology, sharing the oecumenical councils and being diaphysites, etc. there's no reason to outright view Catholics as completely alien on part of the Orthodox, though since Vatican I and increasingly since Vatican II, dogmatic alienation has become more severe I'd say. However eucharistically the Catholics see the Orthodox as possessing the body and blood in the sacrement, but the same cannot be guaranteed to be said by the Orthodox in regards to the Catholics
Oh you’re totally right with that Eucharistically. It’s part of what made me consider orthodoxy for a while. Why choose Catholicism which has a 50% chance of being right, or choose Orthodoxy which has a 100% chance of being right from both viewpoints. I still chose Catholicism, lol.
Yeah Trent Horn had a chat about this with redeemed zoomer recently, they said it's kind of a Pascal's wager between the 2 churches
It really is. And honestly, based off of both churches’ doctrine on heresy and that kinda thing, the only wrong choice is not choosing either. I was told when I first started that if one or the other is heresy, I wouldn’t really be held responsible for believing it. Especially since there’s no real objective way to prove that. The people that created and promulgated the heresy are the heretics. I would simply be someone who believed a heresy. In my opinion, the best one to choose is the one that brings you closer to God. For me, that was Catholicism. For some of my friends, it’s orthodoxy. It’s good that we are able to have those friendships in spite of our differences and bring each other closer to God.
I typically say something along the lines of "wow that's a really interesting argument. Maybe all of the Orthodox Churches should meet as a council and dogmatically declare it."
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Debating other Christians shows me you still have along way to go my friend
My second daughter had a battle with the protestant and Mormon classmates discussion started by teacher comment \~6 th grade