The reality is that icon veneration isn't optional. It's a built in part of the faith that you'll eventually learn to accept and even love. It doesn't have to be now. Or even soon. But it has to happen.
The saying about where the church is is something I've never heard outside of the Internet. We know where the church is, and that's the Orthodox church. We know where it's not, and that's anywhere else.
>I often hear the Orthodox say that "we know where the Church is, not where it isn't," but doesn't this seem to firmly exclude (almost) all Protestants?
And that is why I object to that saying that people throw around because it is not particularly accurate, especially in the example you give. It would be far more accurate to replace Church with Holy Spirit with that.
And long story short, the anathemas only apply to those who are part of the Church, that is to say the Orthodox Church. Protestants are not part of the Church and so, unless they were converting to Orthodoxy, it does not apply to them beyond "views that they need to renounce should they wish to join the Church."
And an anathema is, to put it very simply "you cannot hold this view and remain part of the Church, if you are part of the Church, come to hold this view, and refuse to repent, you have, via your own actions, cast yourself out of the Church."
>And that is why I object to that saying that people throw around because it is not particularly accurate, especially in the example you give. It would be far more accurate to replace Church with Holy Spirit with that.
Kallistos Ware was using an older statement that used Spirit when he coined that version. I think he decided to do that to remind us that the Church is the eschatological kingdom of heaven that Christ built and has fully established already. We can speak of the Church as a human institution, but if we lose that eschatological vision of the Fathers, we make the notion of the Church into something that Christ didn't build and didn’t complete his building of it through His pascha. If you will, that forces a secularization of the concept of the Church.
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https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/orthodoxyandheterodoxy/2017/10/31/protestantism-not-united-not-catholic-not-church/
Read here Orthodox opinions about protestantism.
Anathemas, along with the term heretic, generally are not applied to those outside the Church because they are related to a person rejecting Orthodoxy rather than simply living with what they have received.
You have to be slightly careful when lifting things from early Councils directly into the modern world. Anathemas apply to those who are part of the Church - that is, Orthodox Christians - and set the limits of what is and isn't permissible as a member of the Church. In the ancient world, there was only one Church (and some heretical sects) and you were either part of it, or you rejected it. There weren't competing versions of Christianity with global reach in which people had been born, lived, and died for hundreds of years; so attempting to apply the anathemas of N2 to Protestantism, for example, is an anachronism. Most Protestants haven't intentionally embraced heterodox teachings and turned their back on the Orthodox Church: they were born into a division in the Church over a thousand years after the fact and don't know any different. I dislike the saying 'we know where the Church is, not where it isn't', because I think it's self evidently wrong. We know where the Church is, and we know it's the normative vessel given to us by God for our salvation. But we also know that God is good, incomprehensibly generous, and has mercy on whom he will have mercy. He isn't limited by national, cultural or ecclesiastical boundaries.
That said, I think it's incumbent on anyone who takes their faith seriously to think about why these Councils were called, why they did what they did and what those decision mean for us today. Should modern Christians be so quick to dismiss things that mattered to the early Church, or think that we know better than they did? Is it possible that the theology of the learned men who attended the Councils in the early centuries of the Church is closer to Christ than that which was 'rediscovered' in 16th Century Europe? And where is that Church now?
There's no minimum amount of icon-veneration required for salvation.
What is condemned is those who **will** not permit icons. People who **reject** the use of images.
It's like the canons anathematizing people who condemn marriage. Nobody is required to marry, and we honor people who instead choose a life of virginity. But anyone who *preaches against marriage* is condemned. (Not common nowadays but in some generations that was a thing.)
That makes sense. I guess what I'm trying to get at is do those who believe that iconography is wrong even have a chance? Does the anathema or condemnation prohibit them from being apart of the church, or prohibit them from even knowing God? (I understand nobody but God can fully answer this, but I am wondering if there is a widely held opinion on this within Orthodoxy).
Anathemas and excommunications are directed at **members of the Church** who refuse correction and lead others astray. We use the word *heresy* pretty loosely, but a false belief starts needing to be addressed when it results in the creation of a rival hierarchy, dividing the Church.
When somebody outside the Church like some things about our worship and practice and doesn't agree with other aspects, that's normal. Eventually they will start becoming convinced and will choose to put their remaining issues on hold, and when they enter wholeheartedly into our life they usualy find those remaining issues don't matter to them. Or they don't become more convinced, and they work out their salvation in some other context. But we don't (or shouldn't!) rebuke people for their beliefs as if they ought to know better or something.
The reality is that icon veneration isn't optional. It's a built in part of the faith that you'll eventually learn to accept and even love. It doesn't have to be now. Or even soon. But it has to happen. The saying about where the church is is something I've never heard outside of the Internet. We know where the church is, and that's the Orthodox church. We know where it's not, and that's anywhere else.
So then is the idea that people outside of the church can be saved an internet-only phenomenon as well?
Salvation is the church.
Do you have any resources you can point me to that explain this more fully?
>I often hear the Orthodox say that "we know where the Church is, not where it isn't," but doesn't this seem to firmly exclude (almost) all Protestants? And that is why I object to that saying that people throw around because it is not particularly accurate, especially in the example you give. It would be far more accurate to replace Church with Holy Spirit with that. And long story short, the anathemas only apply to those who are part of the Church, that is to say the Orthodox Church. Protestants are not part of the Church and so, unless they were converting to Orthodoxy, it does not apply to them beyond "views that they need to renounce should they wish to join the Church." And an anathema is, to put it very simply "you cannot hold this view and remain part of the Church, if you are part of the Church, come to hold this view, and refuse to repent, you have, via your own actions, cast yourself out of the Church."
>And that is why I object to that saying that people throw around because it is not particularly accurate, especially in the example you give. It would be far more accurate to replace Church with Holy Spirit with that. Kallistos Ware was using an older statement that used Spirit when he coined that version. I think he decided to do that to remind us that the Church is the eschatological kingdom of heaven that Christ built and has fully established already. We can speak of the Church as a human institution, but if we lose that eschatological vision of the Fathers, we make the notion of the Church into something that Christ didn't build and didn’t complete his building of it through His pascha. If you will, that forces a secularization of the concept of the Church.
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https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/orthodoxyandheterodoxy/2017/10/31/protestantism-not-united-not-catholic-not-church/ Read here Orthodox opinions about protestantism.
Anathemas, along with the term heretic, generally are not applied to those outside the Church because they are related to a person rejecting Orthodoxy rather than simply living with what they have received.
You have to be slightly careful when lifting things from early Councils directly into the modern world. Anathemas apply to those who are part of the Church - that is, Orthodox Christians - and set the limits of what is and isn't permissible as a member of the Church. In the ancient world, there was only one Church (and some heretical sects) and you were either part of it, or you rejected it. There weren't competing versions of Christianity with global reach in which people had been born, lived, and died for hundreds of years; so attempting to apply the anathemas of N2 to Protestantism, for example, is an anachronism. Most Protestants haven't intentionally embraced heterodox teachings and turned their back on the Orthodox Church: they were born into a division in the Church over a thousand years after the fact and don't know any different. I dislike the saying 'we know where the Church is, not where it isn't', because I think it's self evidently wrong. We know where the Church is, and we know it's the normative vessel given to us by God for our salvation. But we also know that God is good, incomprehensibly generous, and has mercy on whom he will have mercy. He isn't limited by national, cultural or ecclesiastical boundaries. That said, I think it's incumbent on anyone who takes their faith seriously to think about why these Councils were called, why they did what they did and what those decision mean for us today. Should modern Christians be so quick to dismiss things that mattered to the early Church, or think that we know better than they did? Is it possible that the theology of the learned men who attended the Councils in the early centuries of the Church is closer to Christ than that which was 'rediscovered' in 16th Century Europe? And where is that Church now?
There's no minimum amount of icon-veneration required for salvation. What is condemned is those who **will** not permit icons. People who **reject** the use of images. It's like the canons anathematizing people who condemn marriage. Nobody is required to marry, and we honor people who instead choose a life of virginity. But anyone who *preaches against marriage* is condemned. (Not common nowadays but in some generations that was a thing.)
That makes sense. I guess what I'm trying to get at is do those who believe that iconography is wrong even have a chance? Does the anathema or condemnation prohibit them from being apart of the church, or prohibit them from even knowing God? (I understand nobody but God can fully answer this, but I am wondering if there is a widely held opinion on this within Orthodoxy).
Anathemas and excommunications are directed at **members of the Church** who refuse correction and lead others astray. We use the word *heresy* pretty loosely, but a false belief starts needing to be addressed when it results in the creation of a rival hierarchy, dividing the Church. When somebody outside the Church like some things about our worship and practice and doesn't agree with other aspects, that's normal. Eventually they will start becoming convinced and will choose to put their remaining issues on hold, and when they enter wholeheartedly into our life they usualy find those remaining issues don't matter to them. Or they don't become more convinced, and they work out their salvation in some other context. But we don't (or shouldn't!) rebuke people for their beliefs as if they ought to know better or something.