Orthodoxy and Catholicism: What are the Differences?
Digital Logos Edition
Overview
In this concise volume, a former Roman Catholic chronicles his own journey into Orthodoxy and examines the critical issues that influenced his decision—including papal authority, the filioque controversy, works salvation, and the “new” dogmas of the Roman Church.
- Explores one former Catholic’s path in converting to Orthodoxy
- Discusses the downsides of Catholicism that spurred his decision
- Compares the beliefs of Catholicism and Orthodoxy
Top Highlights
“The Orthodox, I discovered, objected to the Roman Catholic understanding of original sin as the stain of inherited guilt passed down from Adam, as a result of his sin, to the rest of the human race. The Orthodox saw this notion of original sin as skewed, drawing almost exclusively on the thought of Saint Augustine. He had virtually ignored the teachings of the Eastern Fathers, who tended to see original sin not as inherited guilt but rather as ‘the ancestral curse’ by which human beings were alienated from the divine life and thus became subject to corruption and death.” (Pages 15–16)
“In the Orthodox view, to be saved is not to be freed from a sentence imposed by God. Rather, it is to be transformed by Him, to be restored to what He meant us to be! I learned the principle on which the whole Orthodox spiritual tradition is based: God became a human being so that human beings could become divine. This process of divinization is known as theosis. To be sure, we human beings can never become God by nature, but the human being was never meant to exist in separation from God. Salvation is meant to draw us back into communion with God.” (Page 20)
“These aberrations fell into five categories: (1) the understanding of the papacy; (2) the filioque; (3) the teaching regarding purgatory and indulgences; (4) the ‘new dogmas’—the Immaculate Conception, papal infallibility, and the Assumption; and (5) various practices enforced in the Roman Church, such as Communion under one species (the laity receiving only bread and not wine), the separation of baptism and confirmation (chrismation), and compulsory clerical celibacy.” (Page 6)
Father Theodore Pulcini studied at Holy Cross Greek Orthodox Seminary and has taught as visiting faculty at St. Valdimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary. He is the priest at St. Mary Orthodox Church and teaches in the Department of Religion at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
Reviews
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MJ. Smith
3/5/2015
Fr. Pulcini presents a version of Catholicism that makes it obvious why he converted to Orthodoxy. This leads to an interesting but misleading book as the Catholicism he left is not representative of Catholicism as a whole. In fact, I laughed at his "I had always taken great pride in three distinctively Catholic teachings" followed by three beliefs that other theologians describe as the epitome of over-reaction to Protestant opposition expressed poorly and to be interpreted carefully in light of the teaching of the Church everywhere and always. However, Fr. Pulcini does an excellent job of showing why the Eastern perspective has a value that is lost in the more systematic theology of the West. And as someone uncomfortable with St. Augustine's theology, I understand why Fr. Pulcini in his erroneous equation of Augustinian=Catholic view of concepts such as "original sin" pushed the author away from Catholicism. Where Pulcini is more convincing is in viewing practices of the Orthodox Church, especially sacramental and monastic practices, as being more a continuous set of practices back to the early church. It would be amazing if that were not true of the Byzantine Church - Orthodox or Catholic. But the author ultimately does reach the most fundamental difference between the Western and the Eastern Church: "Perhaps most significantly, it became readily apparent to me that Orthodoxy viewed theology less as an exercise in reason than as an attempt to express an ineffable mystery. Theology in the Catholic West seemed to be largely a matter of precise definition and syllogistic deduction, highly philosophical and rationalistic in nature." From this observation he moves to a theology fundamental to Catholics and Orthodox alike: "I learned the principle on which the whole Orthodox spiritual tradition is based: God became a human being so that human beings could become divine. This process of divinization is known as theosis." If this book brings the reader to understand this a a foundational statement for theology of the one, true, universal, apostolic Church then the author has provided a useful service.
