My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ Our Only True Lord, God, and Savior,
CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.
Our Lord JESUS CHRIST teaches, " But when the Helper comes, Whom I
shall send to you from the Father, THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH WHO
PROCEEDS FROM THE FATHER, He will testify of Me" [John 15:26].
This is the basic statement in the New Testament about the Holy Spirit "PROCEEDING," AND IT IS CLEAR: HE "PROCEEDS FROM THE FATHER." Thus, when the ancient Synod at Constantinople (A.D. 381) reaffirmed the Creed of Nicea (A.D. 325), it expanded that Creed to proclaim these familiar words: "AND IN THE HOLY SPIRIT, THE LORD AND LIFE-GIVER, WHO PROCEEDS FROM THE FATHER, WHO IS WORSHIPPED AND GLORIFIED TOGETHER WITH THE FATHER AND THE SON…"
Two hundred years later, however, at a local council in Toledo, Spain (A.D. 589), king Reccared declared, "The Holy Spirit also should be confessed by us and taught to proceed from the Father and the Son." The king may have meant well, but he was CONTRADICTING JESUS’ TEACHING, CONFESSED BY THE ENTIRE CHURCH, CONCERNING THE HOLY SPIRIT. Unfortunately, the local Spanish council agreed with his error, and, centuries later, in what was at least partially POLITICALLY MOTIVATED MOVE, the Pope of Rome UNILATERALLY CHANGED THE UNIVERSAL CREED OF THE CHURCH WITHOUT AN ECUMENICAL SYNOD. Though this change was initially REJECTED IN BOTH EAST AND WEST EVEN BY SOME OF ROME’S CLOSEST NEIGHBORING BISHOPS, the Pope managed to eventually get the West to CAPITULATE. The consequence, of course, in the Western church has been the tendency to relegate the Holy Spirit TO A LESSER PLACE THAN GOD THE FATHER AND GOD THE SON. The change may appear small, but the consequences have proven disastrously immense. This issue, with that Pope DEPARTING FROM THE ORTHODOX DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH, BECAME ANOTHER INSTRUMENTAL CAUSE SEPARATING THE ROMAN CHURCH FROM THE HISTORIC ORTHODOX CHURCH, THE NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH.
"Chrisitanity is the religion of the Holy Trinity. And faith in the Holy Trinity has a most immediate bearing on all aspects of our spiritual life. For Christians, the dogma of the Holy Trinity is not only a doctrinal formula, but a living and uninterruptedly developing Christian experience. Every addition or change to the teaching of the Holy Trinity violates the correctness of this cornerstone dogma and changes our faith."
Bishop Kallistos Ware of blessed memory, wrote: "Latin Scholastic theology, emphasizing as it does the essence at the expense of the Persons, comes near to turning God into an abstract idea. He becomes a remote and impersonal being, whose existence has to be proved by metaphysical arguments a God of the Philosophers, not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Orthodoxy, on the other hand, has been far less concerned than the Latin West to find philosophical proofs of God’s existence: what is important is not that a man should argue about the deity, but that he should have a direct and living encounter with a concrete and personal God."
"Such are some of the reasons why Orthodox regard filioque as dangerous and heretical. Filioquism CONFUSES THE PERSONS, AND DESTROYS THE PROPER BALANCE BETWEEN UNITY AND DIVERSITY IN THE GODHEAD. THE ONENESS OF THE DEITY IS EMPHASIZED AT THE EXPENSE OF HIS THREENESS; GOD IS REGARDED TOO MUCH IN TERMS OF ABSTRACT ESSENCE AND TOO LITTLE IN TERMS OF CONCRETE PERSONALITY" (The Orthodox Church, page 222).
"The Filioque PLACES THE HOLY SPIRIT IN A STATE OF SUBORDINATION TO THE FATHER AND THE SON, AND IT DISTORTED THE TEACHING OF THE CHURCH IN THE WEST. Every false teaching about the Holy Spirit is a blow against the dogma about the Church. Because the place of the Holy Spirit in the life of the Church and in God’s plan concerning man was ignored in Western theological thought, the Church gradually began to be accepted as an earthly institution , organized and administered according to the principles of worldly authority and juridical law" (V. Potapov 1996-98). Resources: Orthodox Study Bible)
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"Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!"
+ Saint John Chrysostomos
+ + +
With sincere agape in God the Holy Spirit,
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
+ Father George
The Eastern Orthodox Christian Ethos 