The Fourth Council of Constantinople and its Acts

I have previously and regularly hailed the efforts of Liverpool University Press to bring out volumes in their series Translated Texts for Historians. The beginning of May of this year will give us another: The Acts of the Council of Constantinople of 869-70, trans. Richard Price and Federico Montinaro (LUP, 2022), 520pp.

Readers with better memories than mine will recall, as I seem vaguely to do, that the late John Meyendorff once pleaded with Christians, Catholics especially, to bring this council in from the cold and see it as an important tool to resolving the impasse over papal primacy. I'm sure Meyendorff's views are cited at greatly revealing length in this loser's book.

Anyway, about this new translation we are told this:

The Council of Constantinople of 869-70 was highly dramatic, with its trial and condemnation of Patriarch Photius, a towering figure in the Byzantium of his day, and the tussle of wills at the council between the papal legates, the imperial representatives and the bishops. It was church politics and personalities rather than issues of doctrine, such as icon veneration, that dominated the debates. Out of all the acts of the great early councils, the acts of this council, of which this edition is the first modern translation, are the nearest to an accurate and complete record. Its protest against secular interference in ecclesiastical elections was taken up later in the West and led to this council's being accorded full ecumenical status, although it had been repudiated in Byzantium soon after it was held. No early council expresses so vividly the tension between Rome's claim to supreme authority and the Byzantine reduction of this to a primacy of honour.

Primacy in the Church, vol. II

In the very early days of 2015, I was honoured and humbled to get a call from the Archdeacon to the Ecumenical Throne John Chryssavgis, inviting my participation in an international collection on the themes of primacy and authority in the Church. I noted here the details of the first volume, and hope to return to commenting in more detail on some of its riches.

The second volume, Primacy in the Church: The Office of Primate and the Authority of Councils (Volume 2), released this summer, features another distinguished cast of scholars including, mirabile dictu, an essay from me. I have myself only read about a third of the essays, which are very rich, and look forward to reading the rest of them soon and having more to say about them in the coming days.

In the meantime, the description from the publisher, St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, gives you a good overview, along with the table of contents:

Primacy in the Church is a careful and critical selection of historical and theological essays, canonical and liturgical articles, as well as contemporary and contextual reflections on what is arguably the most significant and sensitive issue in both inter-Orthodox debate and inter-Christian dialogue—namely, the authority of the primate and the role of councils in the thought and tradition of the Church.

Volume One examines the development and application of a theology of primacy and synodality through the centuries. Volume Two explores how such a theology can inform contemporary ecclesiology and reconcile current practices. Chryssavgis draws together original contributions from prominent scholars today, complemented by formative selections from theologians in the recent past, as well as relevant ecumenical documents.

Contents:

• Foreword , John [Zizioulas], Senior Metropolitan of Pergamon
• Introduction: Reflecting on the Future, John Chryssavgis
• The Principles of Accommodation and Forgetting in the Twenty-first Century,
   Adam A.J. DeVille
• Primacy and Apostolic Legend: The Challenge to Christian Unity,
  George E. Demacopoulos
• Does Primacy Belong to the Nature of the Church?, Cyril Hovorun
• Reflections on Authority and Synodality: A Eucharistic, Relational,
  and Eschatological Perspective, Bishop Maxim [Vasiljević]
• The Canonical Tradition: Universal Primacy in the Orthodox Church,
   Alexander Rentel
• The Ministry of the Bishop of Rome: From Doctrine to Modes of Exercise
   Bishop Dimitrios [Salachas] of Gratianopolis
• The Ravenna Document and Canon 34 of the Apostles: The Position of the Patriarchate     of Moscow on Primacy
   Bishop Kyrillos [Katerelos] of Abydos
• Vatican I: Papal Primacy within a Juridical Model of Church
   Bernard P. Prusak
• Collegiality and Primacy in John Henry Newman,
   Mark Reasoner
• Sentinel of Unity: Jean-Marie Tillard on Primacy and Collegiality
   Brian P. Flanagan
• Primacy and Synodality: An Essay Review of Official Statements,
   with Special Focus on the Ravenna Document, Nikolaos Asproulis
• The Synodal Institution: Reduction and Compromise,
   Stylianos [Harkianakis], Archbishop of Australia
• The Place of the Papacy in a Historically Conscious Ecclesiology
   Neil Ormerod
• Sister Churches and Problematic Structures, Robert F. Taft, SJ
• A Tale of Two Speeches: Secularism and Primacy
   in Contemporary Roman Catholicism and Russian Orthodoxy
   Brandon Gallaher
• Recent Trends and Tensions: Intra-Orthodox and Intra-Catholic Thinking
   on Primacy and Synodality, Will Cohen
• The Orthodox Church and the Primacy of Peter: Are We Any Closer to a Solution?              Metropolitan Kallistos [Ware] of Diokleia
• Reflections on the Catholic-Orthodox Dialogue Concerning Primacy,
  Walter Cardinal Kasper
• Afterword - Contemporary Ecclesiology and Kenotic Leadership:
  The Orthodox Church and the Great Council,
  John Behr and John Chryssavgis
• Index of Names and Subjects

Primacy in the Church (I)

I was greatly delighted, almost exactly a year ago, to get a call from John Chryssavgis, archdeacon to the Ecumenical Throne and a well published scholar in his own right, asking me to be part of this two-volume collection he was editing on the theme of primacy in the Church. I was flattered to be sharing the page with such august company as the metropolitans of Pergamon and Diokleia, scholars such as Brian Daley and Christiaan Kappes, and my friend Nick Denysenko, inter alia.

The first volume has just come out from St. Vladimir's Seminary Press: Primacy in the Church: The Office of Primate and the Authority of Councils (Volume 1). The details are below.

A second volume will follow, and that volume will include my own essay--an update, as it were, on Dvornik's Byzantium and the Roman Primacy that looks in part at the fate of the principles of accommodation and apostolicity in the twenty-first century.

But for now, look at the riches in the first volume. Both volumes will be absolute must-haves for any library, public or private, that is serious about its collections in ecclesiology, Orthodoxy, and ecumenism.

The publisher tells us the following about volume I:

PRIMACY IN THE CHURCH is a careful and critical selection of historical and theological essays, canonical and liturgical articles, as well as contemporary and contextual reflections on what is arguably the most significant and sensitive issue in both inter-Orthodox debate and inter-Christian dialogue—namely, the authority of the primate and the role of councils in the thought and tradition of the Church.

Volume One examines the development and application of a theology of primacy and synodality through the centuries. Volume Two explores how such a theology can inform contemporary ecclesiology and reconcile current practices. Chryssavgis draws together original contributions from prominent scholars today, complemented by formative selections from theologians in the recent past, as well as relevant ecumenical documents.

The publisher also gives us the contents of the first volume:

Foreword, Metropolitan Kallistos [Ware] of Diokleia

Introduction, John Chryssavgis

The Meaning and Exercise of “Primacies of Honor” in the Early Church, Brian E. Daley,SJ

The Apostolic Tradition: Historical and Theological Principles, John Chryssavgis

St Irenaeus of Lyons and the Church of Rome, John Behr

Primacy, Collegiality, and the People of God, Metropolitan Kallistos of Diokleia

Mark of Ephesus, the Council of Florence, and the Roman Papacy, Christiaan Kappes

The Ethical Reality of Councils: An Anglican Perspective, Paul Valliere

Primacy and the Holy Trinity: Ecclesiology and Theology in Dialogue, John Panteleimon Manoussakis

A Liturgical Theology of Primacy in Orthodoxy, Nicholas Denysenko

Primacy and Eucharist: Recent Catholic Perspectives, Paul McPartlan

Primacy in Orthodox Theology: Past and Present, Metropolitan Maximos [Vgenopoulos] of Selyvria

Primacy in the Thought of John [Zizioulas], Metropolitan of Pergamon, Aristotle Papanikolaou

Primacy in the Thought of Stylianos [Harkianakis],Archbishop of Australia, Philip Kariatlis

Primacy, Ecclesiology, and Nationalism, Metropolitan John [Zizioulas] of Pergamon

Primacy and Synodality: An Essay Review of Contemporary Theological Literature, Nikolaos Asproulis

The Petrine Office: An Orthodox Commentary, Paul Evdokimov

The Idea of Primacy in Orthodox Ecclesiology, Alexander Schmemann

The Primacy of the Ecumenical Patriarchate: Developments since the Nineteenth Century,
Metropolitan Maximos [Christopoulos] of Sardis

The Ecumenical Patriarchate in the Twentieth Century, John Meyendorff

Ecclesial Communion, Conciliarity, and Authority:The Ravenna Document

Position of the Moscow Patriarchate on the Problem of Primacy in the Universal Church.


The volume has also attracted some high-octane praise:

"This is an important two-volume work on the issue of primacy in the Church. The subject is significant, and has attracted attention resulting in the publication of numerous studies produced in many countries and in different languages. The relevant bibliography is enormous. The present work constitutes a selection of articles and short studies, and offers a very helpful picture of the various aspects, questions, and problems related to the central topic.

The contributors to the two volumes are well-known theologians who have dealt with the issue extensively. The editor and contributor of four articles, Fr John Chryssavgis, is to be commended and congratulated because he managed—cooperating with St Vladimir’s Seminary Press—to place at the disposal of Church authorities and theologians a valuable resource on a crucial issue."

~His Eminence Archbishop Demetrios, Primate of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America

"The theology of the Church has in the last few decades become once again an area of real interest and creativity, as our attention has been drawn back to the role of the sacramental Body of Christ in our human liberation into divine communion. Yet when it comes to the details of inter-confessional dialogue, the temptation is still strong to revert to familiar and comfortable positions, with—among other things—an assumption that historic polarizations over primacy and collegiality are fixed and given quantities. These excellent essays insist on going deeper. They do not pretend to resolve the issues that still divide Christians, issues over the charism of the Petrine office or the limits of sacramental fellowship or the authority of the episcopate; instead, they represent a clear and searching exploration of fundamental matters starting from first principles. We need more reflection of this quality. This book will be a major resource for all who believe that the ecumenical encounter is still a powerfully energizing context for theological thought."

~Rowan Williams, Master of Magdalene College (Cambridge University) and former Archbishop of Canterbury

"I have eagerly looked forward to such a publication on primacy and synodality in the Church, which is the central issue between the Eastern and Western Church. These two volumes include research from a broad range of leading theologians, predominantly Orthodox and Catholic, on the present state of such discussions. I have long been convinced that there can be reconciliation between East and West if the question of primacy is properly redefined and resolved, primarily on the Roman side: on the one hand, not solely as an authoritarian primacy of jurisdiction and, on the other hand, not simply as an ineffective primacy of honor, but primarily as an inspirational and mediatory pastoral primacy at the service of the whole contemporary ecumenical Church. In the recent past, John XXIII exemplified such a primacy; and today, the same could be expected of Pope Francis. His fraternal encounters with the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew are a promising step forward in addressing these vital issues."

~Hans Küng, Professor Emeritus of Ecumenical Theology at the University of Tübingen

Orthodox Constructions of the West: I

If I were a rich man, I would immediately order at least a thousand copies of Orthodox Constructions of the West and send them to every serious Christian academic library. Then I would order another thousand copies or so and send them to various ecumenical institutions and leaders around the world. After that I'd start sending copies to anyone and everyone who has ever commented on or thought about Orthodox-Catholic relations, Christian history, the historiographical process, Byzantium, liturgical history, and much else.

Edited by Fordham's two Orthodox theologians, George Demacopoulos and Aristotle Papanikolaou, this book is the collected proceedings of a 2010 conference held there under the same title. It is a goldmine of insights and wonderfully refreshing blunt talk, making it an excellent book for the scholar and general reader alike. I thought I would dip into articles individually to give you a taste of what to expect, but only a taste because you need to buy and read this book. 

Naturally enough, even before reading the introduction, I turned immediately to the chapter by the philosopher (and Greek Orthodox priest) John Panteleimon Manoussakis, "Primacy and Ecclesiology: the State of the Question." It is a short article, and was given at a conference nearly a year before my own Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity was published so it is not (unlike my book) a comprehensive coverage of the question, but it is very valuable nonetheless. I greatly enjoyed the author's take-no-prisoners approach. He comes out swinging: "the phenomenon of antipapism, understood as the denial of a primus for the Universal Church and the elevation of such a denial to a trait that allegedly identifies the whole Orthodox Church, is, properly speaking, heretical" (229). He notes that for too many would-be defenders of Orthodoxy--Manoussakis focuses almost entirely on contemporary figures in the Greek Church--"heresy is all they see" when looking Westward.

What I found especially depressing was how recent some of the attitudes are. E.g., a 2010 statement of a conference in Greece at which several metropolitans of the Church were present makes the demonstrably foolish claim that there is no theological justification at all for any kind of primacy in the Church. Obviously, as I wrote sarcastically in the margins of the book, Metropolitan John Zizioulas did not get this memo--nor the dozens of other Orthodox theologians I surveyed. Zizioulas, precisely one of the finest theological minds of contemporary Greek Orthodoxy, has been arguing cogently for decades in a variety of books and articles that primacy and synodality stand or fall together, and no Church properly so called can function except with both primacy and synodality exercised together. For hierarchs trying to argue otherwise reveals an ignorance of their own tradition, which is truly intolerable. You can say whatever you want about Catholicism; but when you try telling me what Orthodoxy is or stands for when it can easily be proven otherwise, you've just revealed yourself as a completely unserious person.

The author gives other examples of what he calls the "rogue fanaticism of para-ecclesial groups" (239) before showing how they do not even understand the very Orthodoxy they purport to defend. He himself has no patience for them, and instead sets forth in a calm and lucid fashion some of the principles needed for the proper understanding of primacy. The whole essay, while short (he tells me via e-mail that he has a longer work coming out in 2014, For the Unity of All: Contributions to the Theological Dialogue between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, for which I will be eagerly watching in the new year) is a wonderfully bracing blast of the cool air of reason.

In Part II: comments on the introduction and Robert Taft's essay. Stay tuned. In the meantime, buy this book, which deserves the widest possible audience. 

Papacy and Primacy

As I have had many occasions to note, Northern Illinois University Press has been rather unique among academic presses in taking a very good, sustained, and commendable interest in Orthodoxy, especially, but not exclusively, Russian Orthodox history. Set for October release is another book from them, this one with a more clearly "theological" note than in some of their past works, which have often tended to be strongly historical in focus.

I am very pleased to see that this book is going to be in print. I was one of the manuscript reviewers commissioned by the editors to determine suitability for publication and I very warmly recommended that they do so. At once faithful to Orthodox ecclesiology and to Catholic realities, this is a cogently written, carefully thought out work that deserves a wide audience among Orthodox and Catholics alike: Maximos Vgenopoulos (with a foreword from the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew), Primacy in the Church from Vatican I to Vatican II: An Orthodox Perspective (NIL Press, 2013), 220pp.

About this book we are told:

In this timely and comprehensive work, Maximos Vgenopoulos analyzes the response of major Orthodox thinkers to the Catholic understanding of the primacy of the pope over the last two centuries. Here Vgenopoulos brings together writings by Greek and Russian Orthodox theologians and systematically compares them to demonstrate the emergence of a concordance between the canons of the Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church. Primacy in the Church from Vatican I to Vatican II is an invaluable resource on the official dialogue taking place between the Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church today. This important book will be of broad interest to historians, theologians, seminarians, and all those interested in Orthodox-Catholic relations.

Orthodox Diversity on the Problem of Primacy

Met. Hilarion Alfeyev, of whom I was recently critical, has come out with a restatement of his views--already in circulation since the fall of 2007 at least--on the issue of Orthodox understandings of primacy, correctly observing that “there are certain divergences, and there are different positions, of the Orthodox churches on the question of the primacy." He further noted that "we do not have a very clear picture as to what should be the role of the primate in the Orthodox tradition....Without having this clear and unified vision, we cannot easily discuss the issue of how we see the role of the 'primus inter pares' in the universal Church.” In other words, until Orthodoxy deals with its internal notions of primacy, external discussions about papal primacy with Catholics will probably not go very far.

I've heard this argument before, and rejected it. As I have argued in several places, most fully and with more detail than anyone else has ever done in my Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity, the problem of primacy within Orthodoxy only becomes an issue after East and West part company.

I am convinced (and here follow the suggestion of Met. John Zizioulas in his essay in The Petrine Ministry: Catholics and Orthodox in Dialogue) that Met. Hilarion's proposed method for resolving this disagreement needlessly extends the process to a superfluous second step. He says Orthodoxy must treat internal notions of primacy first and then papal primacy. On the contrary, I am convinced that Orthodoxy and Catholicism must have this discussion together: "solving" the problem of papal primacy will ipso facto solve the problem of internal Orthodox orderings of primacy. For that, and many other germane arguments, you really will want to read Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity.