ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096

The Search for the Identity of the Church of Christ

ThDr. Štefan Palo čko , PhD. University of Prešov in Prešov, Greek Catholic Theological Faculty

The secularized society offers to man the entire independence and autonomy from God, or directly denies his existence in order to prove his selfsufficiency. Secularism, as emphasized the Holy Father Benedict XVI. 17.4.2008 during his tour of the USA, is the result of the separation of faith from life. The dictatorship of secularism is the interference into the free dom of man that can mature only in fidelity to the truth. Secularization is also called "earthliness", that means the importance of the world and ser vice to the world, its autonomy and independence, as well as an obliga tion for Christians to participate in this world. Originally, the secularization was applied to the expropriation of the Church property and it is related to the concept desacralization, so the separation of secular and sacral field, mainly related to family, marriage, and so on. 1 In the secularized society 2 often happens that the true marital and parental love becomes possessive love, which brings material goods and power to the forefront. One of the fundamental Christian claims is that Jesus Christ is the only Savior of men and that his Church is not just an organization of people who believe his teachings, but it is an organism called Christ’s mystical body. Thus the salvation of man is substantially dependent on Christ, and that means in its consequences that it is dependent on the right incorpora tion of a man into his mystical body. Therefore the seeking of the true identity of the Church founded by Christ seems to be the key problem of man, who wants to be saved by Christ. After many centuries of splitting Christendom the problem of disunity of Christendom became so poignant that at the turn of the 19 th and 20 th

1 Cf.: SCANISZLÓ, V. I.: Sekularizmus vs. Sekularizácia. In: http://szaniszlo.blog.sme.sk/c/239617/Sekularizmusvssekularizacia.html (28.02.2011). 2 Cf.: SLODIČKA, A.: Medzikultúrny a medzikonfesionálny dialóg v pluralistickej spoločnos ti v kontexte postmoderny. In: Stimuly kresťanskej kultúry. Peter Liba (ed.) Nitra : Univerzi ta Konštantína Filozofa, 2010, p. 115.

107 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 century endeavors to seek and accomplish the lost unity of Christians arose. Nevertheless, the differences between individual Christian confes sions appeared too great to be overcome simply. Therefore some alterna tive attempts to reconcile the oneness of the Church and the existence of different dogmatic positions emerged. One of the attempts to solve this problem is to implement the phi losophical theory of relativism. This theory starts from the assumption, that man will never be able to know the objective reality, and so the knowing of absolute truth is impossible for man. 3 From this assumption allegedly comes the fact that no Christian can be sure, what Jesus Christ really taught, and therefore it is senseless to accuse Christians of other denomi nations of fallacy or heresy. All Christian denominations possess nothing but mere subjective opinions and in no way they can claim the possession of the absolute truth about what Jesus Christ really taught. A dialog be tween different Christian confessions is not anymore a seeking of the truth (which cannot be known anyway), but it becomes a kind of mutual en richment by different opinions on Christ’s doctrine. The problem of this theory is that if it is impossible to find the salvific doctrine of Christ with certainty, then the individual confessions become mere doubtful opinions, and it would be irresponsible to found one’s life on them. The theory of relativism of faith can secure a sort of mutual tol erance between churches in the field of interchange of their dogmatic positions, but it deprives the Church of the ability to fulfill its own mis sion, which is to free man from sinfulness and to lead him to the blissful eternal life. This makes the Church practically useless, or classifies her as a com munity, which in a way satisfies some psychological and social needs of man. In the end, that would mean that Christ brought to the world the mes sage of our salvation, but he in no way secured the spreading of this mes sage in an intact way, and so his salvific work would be in vain. It is inac ceptable that God decided to carry out the work of salvation in so un workable a way. Another attempt to defend one’s positions and at the same time to as sert that Christendom is united is an opinion that all churches have true teachings. The multitude of different churches make one Church of Christ. Their number corresponds to the multiplicity of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, which works at every church. Just like body has many members, so the Holy Spirit by his multiform action causes the diversity of churches. And just like the diversity of individual members does not destroy the unity of

3 Cf. RATZINGER, J.: Wiara, prawda, tolerancia, Kielce : Jedność Herder, 2005, p. 9497.

108 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 the body, so equally the diversity of churches does not destroy the unity of the Church of Christ. Each church has its own charisma and thus she completes the fullness of the Church of Christ. 4 However, the assumption that different Christian denominations mu tually complement each other into one whole, sharply contradicts the ob served reality. It is because individual confessions do not create a mosaic, but they oppose each other in many ways and so they exclude each other. Essential discrepancies in the doctrines of particular churches are not only evident at ordinary observation, but they stem from the very essence of the problem, why there are so many churches in the world. It is an indis putable historical fact, that particular churches originated in the way that a part of Christians split from the whole, because they did not agree with the doctrine presented by the rest. 5 We can say only that the theory, which claim that particular confessions form the unity of doctrine of Christ, is not based on reality. Probably the most popular theory in the protestant ecumenical movement became the theory of a doctrinal minimum. It asserts that there is a doctrinal minimum that a church must profess in order to belong to the community of churches that form the one Church of Christ. This doc trinal minimum constitutes the foundation of the unity of the Church. A declination from this minimum is an apostasy form the Church of Christ. On the opposite, if the individual churches profess a doctrinal minimum, they can differ in all other doctrinal questions, because such difference the unity of the Church is not broken. 6 However, a serious problem is the question how to determine what is a doctrinal minimum, that a man must accept from Christ. A man cannot simply define by himself what Christ wants him to believe in order to be saved. The image of Christians meeting to lay down what is necessary from the teachings of Christ is absolutely devious. It is possible to come to an agreement on anything, the voting itself is just an enforcement of the majority opinion, but if a man wants to be saved, it is of no help to be guided by opinions of men, not even if it is the opinion of a majority, be cause a majority can be also wrong. The only thing that can help a man in the question of salvation is the truth. The true doctrine of Christ obviously

4 Cf. HARNONCOURT, P.: Katolicita a katolicizmu, Nástin sebepojetí římskokatolické církve s ohledem na ekumenizmus In : Teologické texty, č.2004/1 : http://www.teologicketexty.cz/index.php?s=clanek&kod=20050801173441&nadpis=Katolicit aakatolicismu (8.11.2006). 5 Cf. PALOČKO, Š.: Katolícka Cirkev ako prostriedok záchrany ľudí. Prešov : Petra, n. o., 2007, p. 53. 6 Cf. PRUŽINSKÝ, Š.: Aby všetci jedno boli, Pravoslávie a ekumenizmus, Prešov: Metropolitná rada Pravoslávnej cirkvi na Slovensku, 1997, p. 198.

109 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 cannot be known by the way of people agreeing on one opinion, but only by the way of seeking the true and real teachings of Christ and to be guided by them. All these attempts indicate that the search for the true identity of the Church of Christ cannot be realized in such a superficial way, because we can either come to a selfcontradicting conclusions, as shown in the case of the theory, according to which individual confessions complement each other, or we come to a superficial opinion of men, which is just a ground less alternative to the true doctrine of Christ. This leads us to the essential criterion for distinguishing the true Church of Christ from the alternatives based on subjective views and opin ions of men. The authentic Church founded by Christ to spread his teach ings and to work as an organism led by him (cf. 1Cor 12:1213.27; Col 1:18), must necessarily be endowed with a tool that guarantees the integ rity of the Christ’s doctrine for all times. Otherwise the Church would be functionless and useless, and so would be the whole salvific work of Christ. To ascribe to God a senseless, unconsidered and chaotic work, would be a blasphemy against God and against good sense. If we want to find the Church of Christ among different Christian communities that claim to be the true Church of Christ, we must find out which of their respective doctrines contains an element, which guarantees an incorrupt preservation of the doctrine of Christ. Before we begin such a search, it is necessary to specify the method to be used. The first problem is that there are more than 25.000 denominations that profess Christianity. 7 Therefore, it is necessary to choose the correct system for searching for the identity of the Church of Christ among such a great number of options. An important moment is the fact that this variety of denominations share certain similarities within the frame of common doctrinal basis. We can assert that there are three fundamental Christian points of departure, from which stem other confessions. The first is Catho lic Christianity, another is Orthodox Christianity, and finally Protestant Christianity. While there are no doctrinally heterogeneous confessions coming out from the Catholic Christianity, there are many of them coming out from the Protestant ground. Hence, in the beginning it is necessary to study the very Christian bases, from which the particular confessions come from. If it would be evident that the very basis contains the teaching about the guarantee of the transmission of the doctrine of Christ, then we would be able to examine the confessions that stem from this basis. Nevertheless, if it would be obvious that the very basis does not contain the necessary

7 Cf. HAHN, P. a K.: Naše cesta do katolícké Církve, Ronov nad Doubravou : Triality, 2000, p. 76.

110 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 criterion of securing an intact handover of Christ’s doctrine, it would be worthless to consider the confessions coming from such an unacceptable basis. Another important methodical point of departure is a determination of basic characteristics that a true guarantee ensuring an intact transmission of Christ’s doctrine must meet. First of all, it must come from God. It can not be established by an agreement of men, independently from a Divine institution. Without such a Divine institution it would be untrustworthy. Men could agree on anything. The guarantee must be also known by pub lic. An unknown guarantee that could not be find, would be practically useless. And finally, the guarantee must be functional. It must dispose of a working means of an intact handing over of Christ’s doctrine from genera tion to generation. The first Christian confession that we mentioned is the Catholic con fession. This confession agrees with the assertion that Christ must have secured his doctrine by an element that guarantees an intact spreading of his doctrine. According to this confession the guarantee is the Bishop of Rome. The doctrine of the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome is the most accu rately summarized in the four dogmata First Vatican Council, which in the Catholic Church have the status of the truth revealed by God. The first of the dogmata says: “Therefore, if anyone says that blessed Peter the apostle was not appointed by Christ the Lord as prince of all the apostles and visible head of the whole Church militant; or that it was a primacy of ho nor only and not one of true and proper jurisdiction that he directly and immediately received from our lord Jesus Christ himself: let him be anat hema.”. 8 This dogma is at the same time a Catholic interpretation of the biblical texts, where Christ calls Peter the Rock upon which he will build his Church (cf. Mt 16:1619), he says that after his conversion he will strengthen his brethren (cf. Lk 22:3132), and he entrusts him his sheep to pasture (cf. Jn 21:1517). An important point is the refusal of a mere hon orable primacy of Peter. 9 A primacy of honor would not have any practical

8 PASTOR AETERNUS 10, Dogmatic Constitution of the First Vatican Council on the Church of Christi, in: BARON, A. PIETRAS, H.: Dokumenty soborów powszechnych, tom IV, Kra ków : Wydawnictwo WAM, Księża Jezuici, 2005, p. 916, (DS 3055). English text from http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/papae1.htm 9 Such primacy of honor, not so much of the apostle Peter, but of his successors, the bish ops of Rome, is recognized in certain historical period by the Orthodox Christians. How ever, they do not derive this primacy form the apostle Peter, but from the political organi zation of the Roman Empire, that is from the fact that bishops of Rome had their seat in the capital of the Empire. Cf. BELEJKANIČ, I.: Unionizmus ako ekleziologický problém, Prešov: Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta PU v Prešove,1999, p. 13.

111 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 effect and so it could not be considered to be a binding guarantee of an intact transmission of Christ’s doctrine. Another dogma proclaims that this primacy of Peter passes on to his successors, the bishops of Rome: “Therefore, if anyone says that it is not by the institution of Christ the Lord himself (that is to say, by divine law) that blessed Peter should have perpetual successors in the primacy over the whole Church; or that the Roman Pontiff is not the successor of bles sed Peter in this primacy: let him be anathema.“ 10 Without the passing on of Peter’s primacy to his successors, the utility of the guarantee of the transmission of Christ’s doctrine would be lost with the death of the apostle Peter. As mentioned above, the guarantee of the transmission of an intact doctrine of Christ needs must be able to hand over this doctrine from generation to generation. The third dogma defines the extent of papal power, which obliges every Christian to obey: “So, then, if anyone says that the Roman Pontiff has merely an office of supervision and guidance, and not the full and supreme power of jurisdiction over the whole Church, and this not only in matters of faith and morals, but also in those which concern the discipline and government of the Church dispersed throughout the whole world; or that he has only the principal part, but not the absolute fullness, of this supreme power; or that this power of his is not ordinary and immediate both over all and each of the Churches and over all and each of the pas tors and faithful: let him be anathema.”11 Finally, the fourth dogma concentrates on the substance of our prob lem. It defines when and under what circumstances the Bishop of Rome interpretes the doctrine of Christ free from any possibility of error: “There fore, faithfully adhering to the tradition received from the beginning of the Christian faith, to the glory of God our savior, for the exaltation of the Catholic religion and for the salvation of the Christian people, with the approval of the Sacred Council, we teach and define as a divinely revealed dogma that when the Roman Pontiff speaks ex cathedra, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in vir tue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church, he possesses, by the divi

10 PASTOR AETERNUS 15, Dogmatic Constitution of the First Vatican Council on the Church of Christ, in: BARON, A. PIETRAS, H.: Dokumenty soborów powszechnych, tom IV, Kraków : Wydawnictwo WAM, Księża Jezuici, 2005, p. 916 918, (DS 3058). English text from http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/papae1.htm 11 PASTOR AETERNUS 24, Dogmatic Constitution of the First Vatican Council on the Church of Christ, in: BARON, A. PIETRAS, H.: Dokumenty soborów powszechnych, tom IV, Kraków: Wydawnictwo WAM, Księża Jezuici, 2005, p. 920, (DS 3064). English text from http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/papae1.htm

112 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 ne assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer willed his Church to enjoy in defining doctrine concer ning faith or morals. Therefore, such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are of themselves, and not by the consent of the Church, irreformable. So then, should anyone, which God forbid, have the temerity to reject this definition of ours: let him be anathema.“ 12 An important reference in the third dogma mentioned above is the as sertion that the Roman Pontiff has the supreme power in matters of faith, morals, discipline, and government of the whole Church, and, that it is not only a part of this supreme power, but absolute fullness of this power, whereby, when a pope speaks in virtue of his supreme teaching power in matters of faith and morals, that is, when he defines a doctrine to be held by the whole Church in virtue of his role of the teacher of all Christians, then this power is endowed with infallibility. The proclamation about the whole fullness of the supreme power that the pope commands, excludes the assertion that the Roman Pontiff is obliged to take counsel from some body, or to ask somebody for permission to do something concerning faith, morals, discipline, or government of the Church, as if the pope had only a share on the supreme power, and as if he had the fullness of the power together with another subject, whether with a community of bish ops, general council, or a community of the faithful. The proclamation that the pope has the whole fullness of supreme power over the Church con firms that if he ordered something to the Church without a previous coun sel, recommendation, or permission of anyone, or without reference to anyone, his order is valid and binding. 13 Therefore, the Catholic confession explicitly contains the doctrine about an element of a guarantee of infallible transmission of Christ’s doc trine to all generations. According to this confession this element is insti tuted by Christ himself, it is publicly accessible and known, and it works by means of proclamations of the Bishop of Rome according to the fourth dogma mentioned above. When we are looking for a doctrine about an element that guarantees an infallible handover of Christ’s doctrine in the Orthodox confession, we do not find a systematic teaching about this question, nevertheless, we can observe that Orthodox Christians are aware of the need of such element.

12 PASTOR AETERNUS 3637, Dogmatic Constitution of the First Vatican Council on the Church of Christ, in : BARON, A. PIETRAS, H.: Dokumenty soborów powszechnych, tom IV, Kraków : Wydawnictwo WAM, Księża Jezuici, 2005, p. 924 926, (DS 3073 3074). English text from http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/papae1.htm 13 Cf. LUMEN GENTIUM 25, Dogmatic Constitution of the Second Vatican Council: POLČIN, P.: Dokumenty Druhého vatikánskeho koncilu I., Rím : Slovenský ústav svätého Cyrila a Metoda, 1968.

113 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096

We can see that the first answer to the question about a guarantee of the true teaching of Christ is the statement, that the purity of Christ’s teaching in the Church is guaranteed by the Holy Spirit always present in the Church. 14 We can say here that even Catholic Christians can agree with this statement, because the infallibility of the proclamations of the Bishop of Rome according to the fourth dogma of the First Vatican Council is guaranteed quite by the assistance of God himself. However, the Ortho dox Christians do not admit that the Bishop of Rome possesses such infal libility, and so the question arises, by what means this guarantee of the Holy Spirit of the integrity of Christ’s doctrine becomes manifest in prac tice. In the Orthodox theology we find a statement that the Holy Spirit acts in the Church as in the whole. It is therefore the Church as a whole that preserves and interpretes the doctrine of Christ infallibly. 15 Nevertheless, the experience inevitably calls for answer to the question, how can the Church express itself as a whole. When two contradicting opinions about what Christ taught concerning particular matter arise, how can we obtain a univocal answer from the Church as a whole? According to the Orthodox Christians, the voice of the Church is her supreme body – General Coun cil, where the Church community is represented through their bishops. 16 Thus, the expressions of “the Church as a whole” we can know from the proclamations of General Councils, made by bishops, the delegates of all Christians. 17 The Orthodox Christians recognize the teaching of seven General Councils held in the first millennium. When considering the criterion, ac cording to which the guarantee of the infallible transmission of Christ’s doctrine needs must be instituted by God, we could acknowledge the General Councils to be the way instituted by God. When in the apostolic times a quarrel arose, whether Christians of pagan origin should observe the Mosaic law or not, the apostles gathered in Jerusalem, where they discussed the problem. In the end they proclaimed that they came to the conclusion assisted by the Holy Spirit (cf. Acts 15:28). If the apostles are

14 Cf. BELEJKANIČ, I.: Pravoslávne dogmatické bohoslovie II. , Prešov : Pravoslávna boho slovecká fakulta v Prešove, 1996, p. 21. 15 Cf. BELEJKANIČ, I.: Pravoslávne dogmatické bohoslovie I. , Prešov : Pravoslávna boho slovecká fakulta v Prešove, 1995, p. 8. Cf. EVDOKIMOV, P.: Môže mať úloha nástupcu Petra v Cirkvi zmysel?, in : Všeobecná Cirkev I., [p.l.] : [p.n.], [p.a.], p. 75. 16 Cf. ZOZUĽAK, J.: Filozofia, teológia, jazyk, Prešov : Prešovská univerzita v Prešove, Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta, 2005, p. 263. 17 There are some Orthodox theologians who consider the idea of delegation at the coun cils as nonchristian and nonecclesial, because nobody should be a delegate for others, everybody is there by himself. An ideal then would be a council that would gather all Christians, but this is absolutely unrealistic. – Cf. PRUŽINSKÝ, Š.: Aby všetci jedno boli, Prešov : Metropolitná rada Pravoslávnej cirkvi na Slovensku, 1997, p. 291.

114 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 direct mediators of Christ’s doctrine, we can presume that they chose and handed over to the Church the practice set by Christ. Indeed, it is just from the apostles that we know all what Christ taught. At the same time, we can point out that the General Councils are publicly known and their conclusions are publicly accessible, and that fulfils another criterion of finding an element that guarantees an infallible transmission of Christ’s doctrine. The problem of General Councils is their effectiveness in handing over the doctrine of Christ. In the course of the first millennium more than just seven councils recognized by the Orthodox Christians happened. Therefore, the question is, what is the criterion according to which we could determine, what council is general and its proclamations are an in fallible interpretation of Christ’s doctrine, and which councils are wrong in attributing the universality and infallibility to themselves. In the Orthodox literature we can find several attempts to solve this problem. The Orthodox Christians point out to the historical fact that the conclusions of the General Councils were signed and approved by Byzan tine emperors. There is a famous case of the Council of Ephesus, which condemned the teaching of Nestorius in 431. The followers of Nestorius summoned their own council, which rehabilitated him, and they waited, which of the contradicting councils will be recognized by the Emperor. 18 As a matter of fact, the Emperor Constantine V not only recognized, but he also organized of his own iniciative a council in Hieria in 754. None theless, this council which approved iconoclasm is not recognized as gen eral by the Orthodox Christians, and therefore they cannot seriously con sider a recognition of the Byzantine Emperor to be the key to discerning a general council from a heretical council. A general council can be discerned from a false one not even by number of participants. Around 500 bishops participated on the false council of Ephesus in 476. On the other hand, there were only about 150 participants on the First Council of Constantinople. Similarly, it is not the representation of the whole Church that makes a general council. On the First Council of Constantinople only the Patriarchate of Constantinople was represented. Nevertheless, it doesn’t impede the Orthodox Christians to recognize this council as general at all. It was a custom that the following council used to confirm the validity of the previous one. 19 However, this rule cannot be used in discerning

18 Cf. ALEŠ, P.: Kresťanská cirkev v období všeobecných snemov, Cirkevné dejiny II., Prešov : Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta UPJŠ v Prešove, 1996, p. 135. Cf. POSPÍŠIL, C.V.: Ježíš z Nazareta, Pán a Spasitel, Kostelní Vydří : Krystal OP, Karmelitánské nakladatelství, 2006, p. 143. 19 Cf. ALEŠ, P.: Cirkevné dejiny III., Kresťanský Východ a Západ do roku 1453, Prešov : Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta PU v Prešove, 2002, p. 61.

115 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 which council is general and which one is false. The question, whether the first council is general, would have to be decided by the next one, the second council. But the decision would be trustworthy only if the second council was general. Yet, its generality would have to be decided by the next one, that is, the third council. But, its trustworthiness depends on its generality, which would have to be confirmed by the fourth council, of course, if generality of the fourth would be proved by the fifth council. Thus a logical chain is created, which moves the possibility of recognizing any council as general into eternity. Also, a council cannot be recognized as general, if the condition is that all participants must have agreed unanimously on everything, because this has never happened in history. 20 Finally, the most frequent position of the Orthodox Christians con cerning the discernement of the generality of a council is the rule that a council is general when the whole Church accepts its decisions. 21 Not one of the seven councils which the Orthodox Church receives as general was accepted by the whole ecclesial community. We can even say that a dis agreement of a group of Christians with the results of a council can always be expected, since a council is in its essence a promulgation that some Christians have the true faith and others don’t. Every one of the seven councils was summoned because of a breach between Christians, and with its promulgations it took side of one of the two Christian parties. It is un realistic to expect that the party of Christians designated by the council as unorthodox would instantly change their position and accept the decisions of the council. The experience was that many Christians held their posi tion despite the council decision, and so the council declared apostate those who refused to conform. The same was done by councils which the Orthodox Christians do not consider as orthodox and general. 22 The theory of accepting a council by the whole Church is not func tional. An attempt to save this theory could be a proposition that a council is general when it is accepted by all Christians of the true faith. But how can we unmistakably know who are those Christians of the true faith? Or thodox Christians do not have the answer. To say that they are those who

20 Cf. PALOČKO, Š.: Katolícka Cirkev ako prostriedok záchrany ľudí. Prešov : Petra, n. o., 2007, p. 110113. 21 „General Councils are not an authority in themselves: their recognition as the supreme ecclesial authority is dependent on the fact whether they will be in the long term generally accepted by Christian people, the guardian of Orthodoxy.“ – ALEŠ, P.: Kresťanská cirkev v období všeobecných snemov, Cirkevné dejiny II., Prešov : Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fa kulta UPJŠ v Prešove, 1996, p. 3. Cf. ZOZUĽAK, J.: Filozofia, teológia, jazyk, Prešov : Prešovská univerzita v Prešove, Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta, 2005, p. 263. 22 Cf. PALOČKO, Š.: Katolícka Cirkev ako prostriedok záchrany ľudí. Prešov : Petra, n. o., 2007, p. 118121.

116 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096 accept the decisions of the seven General Councils does not lead any where. It is a circular reasoning: Christians of the true faith are those who accept the decisions of the seven general councils 23 , and general councils are those approved by the Christians of the true faith. This kind of argu ment doesn’t lead to a valid conclusion. Hence, General Councils cannot be the guarantee of an infallible transmission of Christ’s doctrine, because they themselves need a norm, according to which it could be discerned, which council is general and which one is not. However, such norm that comes form God, it is publicly known and functional, does not exist in the Orthodox doctrine. This is the reason why the Orthodox confession does not qualify for the possibility that it could be the original a true teaching of Christ. It remains to evaluate the foundation of the confession, from which the doctrines of Protestant Christian communities come from. Of course, the Protestant Christianity also admits that there must be a means that would secure with infallible certainty the handing over of the teaching of Christ to all generations. 24 According to Protestant confessions it is the Holy Scriptures alone. 25 About the Holy Scriptures we can state that they are publicly known and accessible. Christians consider the Holy Scriptures to be inspired by God and thus we can say that they come from God. Nevertheless, a deeper look on this problem does not allow us to make such a quick statement. There is a question, on what ground we can consider the Scrip tures to be inspired by God. If it was admittable that the Scriptures were written by Christ, or even more, that they were written by the apostles as true witnesses of Christ, we could state that the Scriptures are established by God as a norm of truth. Nonetheless, it is a historical fact that the Scrip tures were set up by neither Christ nor the apostles. The apostles even did not write all the books of the Bible. Alongside with genuine apostolic writings also apocryphal or unin spired writings, demanding authority of God’s word, were spreading from the beginning of the existence of the Church. The Church gathered all known writings inspired by the Holy Spirit and established the Canon – the rule that determined the collection of genuine writings – in order to distinguish them from other writings.

23 Cf. BELEJKANIČ, I.: Pravoslávne dogmatické bohoslovie I. , Prešov : Pravoslávna boho slovecká fakulta UPJŠ v Košiciach, 1995, p. 9. 24 Cf. AUGSBURKSKÁ KONFESIA alebo Vyznanie viery niektorých kniežat a miest, odovz dané Cisárskej Jasnosti v Augsburgu roku 1530, čl. VII., in : Symbolické knihy, Liptovský Mikuláš : Tranoscius 1992, p. 46. 25 Cf. FORMULA SVORNOSTI, in : Symbolické knihy, Liptovský Mikuláš : Tranoscius 1992, p. 253.

117 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096

It was only in AD 367 that Athanasius of Alexandria for the first time mentioned a complete list of canonical biblical writings in his 39 th Festal Letter. Although this letter was valid only for hid Diocese of Alexandria, in AD 382 also the Synod of Rome became attached to this canon, and like wise the Synod of Hyppo in AD 393 and the Synod of Carthage in AD 397. 26 It follows that in order that the Holy Scriptures could be set up cor rectly, without dogmatically erroneous writings, it was necessary to distin guish with infallible certainty the writings insipired by God. Here it be comes obvious that we need another infallible norm besides the Holy Scriptures in order to effect this infallible classification of writings. But according to the Protestant doctrine the only infallible norm is the Holy Scriptures. Here the Protestant doctrine of Sola Scriptura comes to a contradic tion. According to this doctrine the Bible is the only infallible norm. But, in order to be trustworthy, it needs another infallible norm to be set up correctly. The Protestant confession does not allow to think that those who set up the Biblical Canon were infallible, because only the Bible is infallible. But, if they were not infallible, or if there was no other infallible one keeping ward over them, they could have erred determining the Bib lical Canon, and thus the very pillar of trustworthiness of Protestant con fessions becomes doubtful and any Protestant confession based on Sola Scriptura collapses, just like a possibility that any church which holds this doctrine could be the Church founded by Jesus Christ. This leads us back to the Catholic confession, which presents a Bishop of Rome to be the means of infallible transmission of Christ’s doc trine. Objections appear against this possibility, namely that Bishops of Rome cannot be infallible because they have commited errors. It must be said here that the infallibility of the popes is not necessary in an absolute manner, but only in matters of interpreting the teaching of Christ, and that happens when the pope speaks ex cathedra, that is, “when the Roman Pontiff speaks EX CATHEDRA, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme aposto lic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church.“27 An error that the Bishop of Rome would commit in these circumstances cannot be proved with infallible certainty.

26 Cf. DUS, J.A. POKORNÝ, P.: Neznámá evangelia, Novozákonní apokryfy I. Vyšehrad : 2001, p. 29. 27 PASTOR AETERNUS 3637, Dogmatic Constitution of the First Vatican Council on the Church of Christ, in : BARON, A. PIETRAS, H.: Dokumenty soborów powszechnych, tom IV, Kraków : Wydawnictwo WAM, Księża Jezuici, 2005, p. 924 926, (DS 3073 3074). English text from http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/papae1.htm

118 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096

Another argument against the infallibility of the Bishop of Rome is the claim that the Bible quotations that the Catholic Christians use in defense of the Primacy, can be understood differently and they were interpreted in contradiction with the Catholic doctrine even by prominent Christian per sonalities. 28 Even if we admitted that a biblical text can be interpreted in a different way, we still would not know which interpretation is right. Not even the greatest personalities of the Church, unless we attribute to them a gift of infallibity, can be the ultimate authority to determine which inter pretation out of many is the correct one. We still must concede that the Catholic interpretation is possible. And if we take into consideration that a rejection of the Catholic interpretation would mean a rejection of the infal libility of the Bishop of Rome, that would mean in the end a denial of authenticity of Christianity as such. It is clear that the Bishop of Rome is the only possibility left in search of a guarantee of an infallible transmis sion of Christ’s doctrine. The Bishop of Rome seems to be an element without an alternative. Therefore, it is possible to assert that the Catholic interpretation of Biblical texts in support of the Primacy is possible. And, if we take into account that any interpretation denying the primacy of the Bishop of Rome means a negation of the whole Christianity, the Catholic interpretation seems to be the only possible. The same is true about historical objections against the primacy of the Bishop of Rome. We can hear an assertion that in history the decrees of the popes were not always respected. This fact is interpreted that the popes just usurped the power of jurisdiction over the whole Church, but many Christian communities, aware of their independence from the Bishop of Rome, ignored these influence of power of the Bishops of Rome. 29 Thanks to the historical method we can indeed know that many Christian communities in the past did not respect the orders and teachings of the Bishops of Rome. Nevertheless, the historical method can say noth ing to the question, whether those communities should have respected the Bishops of Rome or not. When it attempts to do something like this, it gets beyond its powers and possibilities. Basically, there are two possibilities of interpreting the historical cases of disobedience towards the Bishops of Rome. The first possibility is that the Bishops of Rome did not have any primacy or jurisdiction over other Christians, and therefore other Christians did not have any reason to re spect the Bishops of Rome. The second possibility is the assertion that the

28 Cf. POJEDNANIE O PÁPEŽOVEJ MOCI A PRVENSTVE 28, in : Symbolické knihy, Lip tovský Mikuláš : Tranoscius 1992, p. 176 177. 29 Cf. ALEŠ, P.: Cirkevné dejiny III., Kresťanský Východ a Západ do roku 1453, Prešov : Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta PU v Prešove, 2002, p. 5051.

119 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096

Bishops of Rome have always had the primacy and therefore those who did not respect them were simply disobedient. When we realize that the first interpretation would mean a denial of any possibility of existence of a guarantee of an infallible transmission of Christ’s doctrine in Christendom, and thus also a liquidation of very Chris tendom (because there is no alternative to the Roman Bishop), the second interpretation seems to be the only possible. This leads us to the conclusion that the Church founded by Christ, which is the bearer of the true and intact teaching of Christ, is the only one whose doctrine says that the element that guarantees an infallible transmission of Christ’s doctrine is the Bishop of Rome.

References

ALEŠ, P.: Cirkevné dejiny III., Kresťanský Východ a Západ do roku 1453, Prešov : Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta PU v Prešove, 2002. ALEŠ, P.: Kresťanská cirkev v období všeobecných snemov, Cirkevné dejiny II., Prešov : Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta UPJŠ v Prešove, 1996. AUGSBURKSKÁ KONFESIA alebo Vyznanie viery niektorých kniežat a miest, odovzdané Cisárskej Jasnosti v Augsburgu roku 1530, čl. VII., in : Symbolické knihy, Liptovský Mikuláš : Tranoscius 1992. BELEJKANIČ, I.: Pravoslávne dogmatické bohoslovie I. , Prešov : Pra voslávna bohoslovecká fakulta v Prešove, 1995. BELEJKANIČ, I.: Pravoslávne dogmatické bohoslovie II. , Prešov : Pra voslávna bohoslovecká fakulta v Prešove, 1996. BELEJKANIČ, I.: Unionizmus ako ekleziologický problém, Prešov: Pra voslávna bohoslovecká fakulta PU v Prešove,1999. DENZINGER, H. SCHÖNMETZER, A.: Enchiridion Symbolorum, Defini tionum et Declarationum, Freiburg Br. 1965. DUS, J.A. POKORNÝ, P.: Neznámá evangelia, Novozákonní apokryfy I. Vyšehrad : 2001. EVDOKIMOV, P.: Môže mať úloha nástupcu Petra v Cirkvi zmysel?, in : Všeobecná Cirkev I., [s.l.] : [s.n.], [s.a.] FORMULA SVORNOSTI, in : Symbolické knihy, Liptovský Mikuláš : Tranoscius 1992. HAHN, S. a K.: Naše cesta do katolícké Církve, Ronov nad Doubravou : Triality, 2000. HARNONCOURT, P.: Katolicita a katolicizmus, Nástin sebepojetí ŕímskoka tolické církve s ohledem na ekumenizmus In : Teologické texty, č.2004/1 : http://www.teologicketexty.cz/index.php?s=clanek&kod=20050801173 441&nadpis=Katolicitaakatolicismu (8.11.2006).

120 ETheologos, Vol. 3, No. 1 DOI 10.2478/v1015401200096

LUMEN GENTIUM, vieroučná konštitúcia Druhého vatikánskeho koncilu, in : POLČIN, S.: Dokumenty Druhého vatikánskeho koncilu I., Rím : Slovenský ústav svätého Cyrila a Metoda, 1968. PALOČKO, Š.: Katolícka Cirkev ako prostriedok záchrany ľudí. Prešov : Petra, n. o., 2007. PASTOR AETERNUS, Dogmatic Constitution of the First Vatican Council on the Church of Christ, in: BARON, A. PIETRAS, H.: Dokumenty soborów powszechnych, tom IV, Kraków : Wydawnictwo WAM, Księża Jezuici, 2005. English text from http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/papae1.htm POJEDNANIE O PÁPEŽOVEJ MOCI A PRVENSTVE 28, in : Symbolické knihy, Liptovský Mikuláš : Tranoscius 1992. POSPÍŠIL, C.V.: Ježíš z Nazareta, Pán a Spasitel, Kostelní Vydří : Krystal OP, Karmelitánské nakladatelství, 2006. PRUŽINSKÝ, Š.: Aby všetci jedno boli, Pravoslávie a ekumenizmus, Prešov : Metropolitná rada Pravoslávnej cirkvi na Slovensku, 1997. RATZINGER, J.: Wiara, prawda, tolerancia, Kielce : Jedność Herder, 2005. ZOZUĽAK, J.: Filozofia, teológia, jazyk, Prešov : Prešovská univerzita v Prešove, Pravoslávna bohoslovecká fakulta, 2005.

121