THE REUNIFICATION OF CATHOLICISM WITH ORTHODOXISM - SECOND EPISODE Humanity's clinging to the back of man

The reader's reactions to the previous episode have been encouraging, but I regretted that I began publishing this article before it was ready, because I have created an obligation for myself and I really don't like doing anything out of obligation.

But, perhaps, had I not forced myself to do it, I wouldn't have continued, because, knowing what I want to say, all that is left for me is to look for the ways to say it, so that I don't offend anybody.

I am continuing from the previous episode (see BURSA 09.12.2014/ THE REUNIFICATION OF CATHOLICISM WITH ORTHODOXISM - EPISODE I/ The religious crisis, due to the pressure of the financial crisis), which was just a preamble, intended to show the significant importance of the subject for humanity, an issue which I am only now beginning to discuss.

For continuity's sake, I will include the last paragraph of Episode I.

• UNIVERSALITY, IN TWO WAYS

The confusion between "freedom through faith" - "freedom of faith" is often involuntary, like it has happened in October, in Bucharest, in the international workshop, organized in the Parliament's Palace, by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, during the mandate of Titus Corlăţean, where, even though the list of topics mentioned "religion" and "freedom" ("Legislation, religion and freedom. An approach in the context of globalization"), none of the academic reports dared to venture into metaphysics; instead, all of them clung to the randomness and mediocrity of politics, missing out on a debate necessary at this stage in the evolution of humanity.

It is certain, however, that Pope Francis can distinguish between the two aspects, and yet he has blended them together in a confusing manner, in his memorable visit to Turkey, at the end of last month, when he broached both: on one hand, he met with significant Muslim figures and with the Islamic conservative Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in order to convey his "ecumenical" message, asking the Islamic authorities to condemn terrorism, in the context of the persecutions against Christians perpetrated by the "Islamic state" organization; but on the other hand, he met with the Bartholomew the 1st, the patriarch of Constantinople, and explicitly, officially proposed to him - as part of the same "ecumenical" message -, the reconciliation between the Catholic and Orthodox churches.

The word "ecumenical" (derived from Greek "oikumenikós", universal; "oikuméne gL", the inhabited Earth), however, has two meanings:

1. of promoting solidarity between religions - that is the meaning conveyed by the Pope in the relations with the Muslims (and Erdogan outright told him that the "Islamic State" terrorist organization is the response to "the islamophobia" of Western Christianity; it is hard to say here whether the ecumenical message is, more specific to Islam, stemming from the conception of the prophet Muhammad that "the path you take to get close to god doesn't matter");

2. of reunification of the Christian churches - that is the meaning conveyed by the Pope, in its relations with the "Ecumenical patriarch" (that is the correct title of Bartholomew the 1st).

• THE PYRAMIDAL AND THE MONASTIC ORGANIZATION

On this occasion, the pontiff has made gestures that go beyond the established protocol, which are telling for how determined he is in his desire for reunification, asking the patriarch for his blessing and that of the Catholic Church by calling him "brother", introducing himself as a "bishop" and refusing to have his hand kissed - all of these being as many signs that he is waiving his dominance (the claim of supremacy of the bishop of Rome, which was the reason why he took the name of "Pope" - parent -, was one of the political causes behind the schism).

But whereas, in the pyramidal organization of the Catholic Church, Francis, as a pontiff, is mandated to make, by himself, the decision to merge with Orthodoxism, Bartholomew the 1st is only "the first among his peers", a symbolic representative of Orthodoxism, but he can not decide in the name of the thirteen other patriarchies, which are autocephalous, which raises issues that are hard to overcome, after a thousand years of schism and lengthy adversity, which have consolidated, between Orthodoxism and Catholicism, a wall consisting of diverging rituals, separate religious conceptions, not to mention political hostility and territorial conflicts.

The differences in the manner the two churches are organized derives from different histories of the territories of Christianity: within the Roman empire, the Church of Peter created a pyramidal structure (with him at the top), subsequently imposing discipline in Western Europe (sometimes by sword), but beyond the borders of the Empire, the monastic, autocephalous organization, of Orthodoxism has endured.

Politics shares a similar alternative between centralism/polycentrism, and religion similarly displays the opposition between the Unitarian perception of God (in which, ignoring chronology and the way it was generated, modalism can count an option) and the Orthodox Trinitarianism.

The isomorphism of the three layers of the alternatives - the structuring of the church, of the politics and of the perception of divinity -, suggest constants in human thinking and the limitations in our control over the universe (a kind of "definition" of a anthropomorphization, which ultimately unites humans according to the statement of Protagoras - "Man is the measure of all of things").

The two high prelates, who have recently met, are aware of the bridges that connect them, but also of the low likelihood of the process to overcome the obstacles to the merger of the two churches being successful.

That is why Bartholomew the 1st asked Francis to send a mission of the Vatican to the first pan-orthodox Synod in history, scheduled to be held in 2016, where the willingness of each patriarchy for reunification will be prospected (the Russian and Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which together, reunite the majority of orthodox believers, are not friendly with the Vatican).

• THE TIME MACHINE

If the reunification happens, then it will probably be a lengthy process and even though Bartholomew the 1st is 74 years old, and Pope Francis is 78 years old, they have once again agreed on 2025 as the date for the planned Ecumenical Synod of Nicea (currently Iznik, in Turkey), - which would bring together all the Christian confessions - , which would mark the more than 1700 years that have passed since the Council of Nicea, which, in the year 325, established the Nicene Creed.

It is that Creed itself that lies at the center of the Schism of 1054.

The Synod that happened then was meant to condemn the heresy of Arius, a priest from Alexandria, who, wishing to emphasize the uniqueness and transcendent nature of god, placed the son in an inferior position, of created being, thus implying the inability for men to go to heaven, as they are themselves inferior to the son; the answer involved in the Nicene Creed, is that only if the son is god himself, (as opposed to a creation of the latter), can he unite us with god.

The meeting of the heads of Orthodoxism and Catholicism at Nicea, scheduled to take place in 2025, wants to start a kind of "time machine", for a return to origins.

It intends to symbolize the resumption of the original unity of the Churches, the one which existed before the separation operated through the unilateral modification by the church of Rome (starting around the year 700) of the Nicene Creed, by adding to "I believe [...] in the Holy Ghost, who proceeds from the Father", of the phrase which was later named "Filioque" (i.e. "and from the son"}, which led to the Catholic version of the Creed: "I believe [...] in the holy ghost, who from the father and the son proceeds".

• "FILIOQUE" - FOUR WORDS THAT SPLIT CHRISTIANITY APART

Those four additional words have changed the conception about the relations between the beings of the Holy Trinity, shaping the relationship between them and leading to the Catholic view on the Trinity, in which the father, the son and the holy ghost are manifestations of the one god, a logic that is specific to Western Christianity, open to reasoning and science, tempted to explain even the inexplicable, (hence the initiative of the Vatican to set up its own institutes for social, economic, financial and philosophical studies, taking neotomism, the contemporary fideism, the conception which gives absolute precedence to faith over reason, to levels of complexity that secular philosophers have difficulty coping with, a fact which Marxists acknowledged, forty years ago, during communism - see Ludwig Grünberg).

Such a rationalist-explicative "temptation" of Catholicism also illustrates the Western Diagram called "The Trinity Shield", which made the rounds in the 13th century.

• "The Trinity Shield" Western medieval diagram (see attached figure)

Orthodoxism would rather not explain things, Orthodoxism prefers mystery, which it considers a characteristic of divinity: The father, the son and the holy ghost are distinct entities, each one is god as a whole and all of them together are god.

Orthodoxism defies logic, at the level of the supreme symbol.

And it does so deliberately, as it considers that man's claim to explain god shows conceit, because man can only project the limitations of his reason on divinity, but without the ability to gain insight into it.

It is a subtlety that is knowingly practiced by Orthodoxism.

The word "knowingly" is the most appropriate in that regard.

In the third episode of the article, we will see how, in spite of the fact that catholic religion, driven by rationalism, discipline and pyramidal structure, favors the development of science, the development of the economy and the development of statal structures, in a completely paradoxical manner, it is the orthodox confession that promotes the correct attitude towards them, as it is closer to humanism, to the authentic "nature of man", in consonance with the limits of human reason which have been proven even theoretically, beyond any reasonable deniability.

Reason itself has set its own boundary, theoretically.

Orthodoxy is in consonance with metalogic, having an application over any theory.

• THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE ORTHODOX AND THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

The differences between Catholicism and Orthodoxy manifest themselves in theology, doctrine, liturgy, ethics and spirituality, but the ones that get mentioned the most often are the following:

1 - Filioque. Catholics claim that the holy ghost proceeds from the son and the father; the orthodox claim that the holy ghost proceeds from the father and is sent into the world through the son.

2 - The supremacy of the Pope .Catholics consider that as Peter's successor, the Pope is the supreme head of the Christian Church, (perhaps even the replacement of Christ on Earth), standing above the other patriarchs, a fact which the Orthodox do not accept, nor acknowledge.

3 - The pope's infallibility. The Pope's interpretations in matters of faith are mandatory for the entire pyramidal hierarchy, all the way down to the foundation of the Catholic Church, a dogma which the Orthodox Church rejects.

4 - Purgatory. Catholics say that between heaven and hell lies purgatory, as an antechamber for the cleansing of the soul, on its way to heaven; the Orthodox consider that the notion of purgatory is a human addition to the holy scripture.

5 - the Bread.Catholics holds mass with unleavened bread (like the Jews), while the Orthodox hold the mass with leavened bread.

6 - The immaculate conception .Catholics claim that Virgin Mary was born from the Holy Ghost, while the Orthodox claim that she was born naturally.

7 - Substantiality. Upon the blessing of the Holy Gifts (bread and wine), Catholics do not pray to the holy ghost; orthodox do.

8 - The priests' celibacy. Catholic priests don't get married, orthodox priests have families.

9 - Papal indulgences . For a price, the Pope can transfer the extra merits that saints have, towards forgiving the sins of people that do not have sufficient good deeds, a practice which the orthodox condemn.

10 - The anointment.Catholics don't anoint children immediately after the baptism, instead they do that when they are seven or eight years old; the Orthodox do it right away.

Catholics follow the Roman and Ambrosian rites, the Orthodox follow the Constantinopolitan liturgies of Saint Vassily the Great, Saint Gregory the Dialogist and Saint John Chrysostomos; there are differences in gestures and in the details of rituals.