Prayer with the non-Orthodox?

[尼古拉前执事]

Here is a link with quotes showing what some of these saints said in their days. Please read it completely before responding again, Matthew.

http://EuphrosynosCafe.com/forum/viewto ... 7557#37557

If you do not think that Evangelical Protestants and their beliefs are heretical then:
a.) You are not fully aware of their doctrine.
b.) You do not yet understand the Orthodox Faith.
c.) Both of the above.

I suggest that you carefully look into the teachings of both.

The teachings of the Fathers and the Praxis of the Church over the last 1900+ years are the Faith. If the Father's have consitently taught throughout that history that the faithful are NOT supposed to pray with non-Orthodox then that is the way it is.

If you don't want to accept it, then that is your choice. But don't try to say that it is un-Orthodox, because history shows that it is Orthodox.

My refrain is consistent when it comes to the Church, both good and bad, to find the truth, READ THE HISTORY.

The canons clearly state that is a bishop is teaching heresy bare headed that we (laymen and clergy alike) are to break all communion with him because having communion with a heretic puts us under the same punishment as the one teaching heresy.

I'm sorry, but you are totally mistaken. Monotholetism was accepted by ALL the Orthodox patriarchs and the vast majority of its bishops. That is why St Maximos broke communion with EVERYONE and we know that he ended up being right.

In a like manner, ONLY St Athanasios stood firm against Arianism and semi-Arianism. He was exiled by what appeared at that time to be an ecumenical council.

Finally Matthew, during iconoclasm, the entire episcopacy in the East was iconoclast except for some resisting bishops.

That was my point, Matthew. It's not always the majority which is right.

[TomS]

Here is a link with quotes showing what some of these saints said in their days. Please read it completely before responding again, Matthew.

Father Nikolai still believes in miracles!

[Pensees]

On Sunday, I asked Father Michael, my spiritual father, whether it is appropriate to engage in group prayer with the non-Orthodox. He responded that it is allowable as long as nothing heretical is said during prayer.

[Jean-Serge]

On Sunday, I asked Father Michael, my spiritual father, whether it is appropriate to engage in group prayer with the non-Orthodox. He responded that it is allowable as long as nothing heretical is said during prayer.

Have your spiritual Father ever read the Canons? I remember you the Canons of the Apostles number 10 and 45. The commentary is Saint Nicodemus's one... You can find the whole canons at http://www.holytrinitymission.org/index.php. Then select text books and you will find many interesting documents in English...

10. If anyone pray in company with one who has been excommunicated, he shall be excommunicated himself.

Interpretation.

The noun akoinonetos has three significations: for, either it denotes one standing in church and praying in company with the rest of the Christians, but not communing with the divine mysteries; or it denotes one who neither communes nor stands and prays with the faithful in the church, but who has been excommunicated from them and is excluded from church and prayer; or finally it may denote any clergyman who becomes excommunicated from the clergy, as, say, a bishop from his fellow bishops, or a presbyter from his fellow presbyters, or a deacon from his fellow deacons, and so on. Accordingly, every akoinonetos is the same as saying excommunicated from the faithful who are in the church; and he is at the same time also excommunicated from the Mysteries. But not everyone that is excommunicated from the Mysteries is also excommunicated from the congregation of the faithful, as are deposed clergymen; and from the penitents those who stand together and who neither commune nor stay out of the church like catechumens, as we have said. In the present Canon the word akoinonetos is taken in the second sense of the word. That is why it says that whoever prays in company with one who has been excommunicated because of sin from the congregation and prayer of the faithful, even though he should not pray along with them in church, but in a house, whether he be in holy orders or a layman, he is to be excommunicated in the same way as he was from church and prayer with Christians: because that common engagement in prayer which he performs in conjunction with a person that has been excommunicated, wittingly and knowingly him to be such, is aimed at dishonoring and condemning the excommunicator, and traduces him as having excommunicated him wrongly and unjustly.

45. Let any Bishop, or Presbyter, or Deacon that merely joins in prayer with heretics be suspended, but if he has permitted them to perform any service as Clergymen, let him be deposed (sc.from office).

Interpretation.

The present Canon prescribes that any Bishop, or Presbyter, or Deacon that shall ONLY join in prayer, and not co-officiate in divine services, with any heretics is to be suspended, or temporarily deprived of the right to celebrate the sacraments (called "mysteries" in the Orthodox Church). For anyone that prays in company with excommunicants (as heretics are) must himself be excommunicated along with them, according to the tenth Canon of the same Apostles. But if he went so far as to allow those heretics to perform any service in church as Clergymen, he is to be deposed from office altogether. For any Clergyman that officiates at services in company with others who have been deposed (as have heretics, according to the second and fourth Canons of the Third Ecumenical Council) is himself ipso facto deposed along with them, according to the eleventh Canon of the Apostles. It behooves us to hate and shun heretics, but never to join them in prayer or to allow them to perform any ecclesiastical function, either as Clergymen or as Priests.

[Pensees]

Have your spiritual Father ever read the Canons?

He stated, more or less, that we shouldn't treat the canons with a form of fundamentalism, rather considering the current situation and their historical context. Nonetheless, I took a different job working in the cafeteria of a local Catholic college. I have to work on Sundays, but not until 4:30 pm.

Peace.