Man! This is the week for historic stuff!

March 15, 2013 By 13 Comments

For the first time since the Great Schism, the Patriarch of Constantinople will attend the Mass installing the Pope.

We are living in amazing times.  Ironic that it is a Pope with one lung who heralds the day when, God willing, the Church will again be breathing with both lungs.

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  • http://decentfilms.com SDG

    ” Ironic that it is a Pope with one lung who heralds the day when, God willing, the Church will against be breathing with both lungs.”

    This made me cry.

  • Scott W.

    I thought the one lung thing was rumor. Is it confirmed?

    • http://decentfilms.com SDG

      Multiples sources confirm it. It was removed when he was a teenager due to an infection.

  • ivan_the_mad

    Wonderful! Picking right up where BXVI left off as the Pope of Christian Unity :)

    • Peggy R

      Exactly. We have B16 to thank for this. Fruit of his labor. God bless B16 and God bless Francis!

  • TheRealAaron

    Will the Patriarch receive communion?
    I’ve heard that the Orthodox typically don’t receive at a Catholic mass, but I’m not sure at how strongly that’s defined. Is it just a “generally don’t prefer to” kind of thing or more of a “do not ever do that”?

    Sorry for the lax terminology, I’m not sure how else to express it.

    • Cutter

      Well, we both practise closed communion, so it’s a general “do not do that”. We did excommunicate each other after all. The Orthodox are more strict about it though. However, we mutually recognize the validity of each-others orders, so it can be done. I think this can be easily done under V2 rules, but the Orthodox do have serious misgivings about the new liturgy, so I don’t know if the Patriarch would agree to it. Hopefully they can think of something and I would beam with happiness if they then together celebrated the Liturgy of John Chrysostom. And I should stop here, because I might start day-dreaming that the Great Schism will get healed… whenever I do that I want to run to the nearest Orthodox parish and hug them all. Well, I should get off my lazy ass and do that sometime anyway.

      • Cutter

        Just to add a correction here, the Orthodox actually do not recognize our orders as true. On their take, only orders functioning within the Orthodox community are valid. Which is fair enough, since ordinations outside the One True Church are indeed dubious. I love it when either we Latins or the Orthodox say stuff that bewilders a modern PC-adherent.

    • B.E. Ward

      Along with what Cutter said, I suspect his communing at the event (if it were theoretically possible) would be scandalous among many Orthodox. I think it’s good enough that he’s just there.

  • Stu

    This is outstanding.

  • dmd53

    At the end of a lengthy paper published in 2010 by the North American Orthodox-Catholic Theological Consultation regarding unity and communion, the Consultation members clearly stated:
    “Conscience holds us back from celebrating our unity as complete in sacramental terms, until it is complete in faith, Church structure, and common action; but conscience also calls us to move beyond complacency in our divisions, in the power of the Spirit and in a longing for the fullness of Christ’s life-giving presence in our midst. The challenge and the invitation to Orthodox and Catholic Christians, who understand themselves to be members of Christ’s Body precisely by sharing in the Eucharistic gifts and participating in the transforming life of the Holy Spirit, is now to see Christ authentically present in each other, and to find in those structures of leadership that have shaped our communities through the centuries a force to move us beyond disunity, mistrust, and competition, and towards that oneness in his Body, that obedience to his Spirit, that will reveal us as his disciples before the world. ” http://www.scoba.us/articles/towards-a-unified-church.html

  • B.E. Ward

    In addition, the Metropolitan of the Orthodox Church in America (Tikhon) will represent the OCA at the inauguration. Normally the OCA is represented by a bishop and priest, but this might be the first time the Metropolitan attends himself.

  • http://chipawalt.com Chip Awalt

    Ironic that it is a Pope with one lung who heralds the day when, God willing, the Church will again be breathing with both lungs.

    Possibly one of the greatest insights and quotes…ever!