My point wasn’t to criticize the canonization of St. Juan Diego. But, there are those who criticize the historicity (not that I do). I was just trying to think of a more recent example, but St. Philomena will do.

1. The propensity of the the likes of Barstad (and apparently yourself) to misrepresent it as an instrumentation of doctrinal dissent; and

2. The ecclesiological difficulties involved in asymmetrical communion. If Melkites are in communion with Orthodox Antiochans while remaining in communion with Rome, does this not necessitate that Orthodox Antiochans should be as well? And if they are, what then of communion between Antiochan and non-Antiochan Orthodox?

Vatican I does not present a “model” ecclesiology. It merely spells out the doctrinal basis for the Pope’s ancient universal appellate authority and for his mandate to speak authoritatively for the episcopate as its president. Before abandoning communion with Rome, I strongly suggest that you sit down with your (Melkite) bishop to see if he can make this clear to you.

I would simply point to Barstad’s take on the Initiative as demonstrating why this provisional state continues to exist.

Some of the Eastern Catholic rites are minuscule, some have suffered from internal conflict, and some have not demonstrated a fully consistent fidelity to the rest of the communion. The crisis of confidence cuts both ways.

The varying levels of tutelage the Eastern Churches are under may be irksome, but the solution does not lie in dissent from Catholic teaching, but in faithfully witnessing to Catholic teaching in such a form or way that it can be received and accepted by the separated Churches.

No one is forcing “azymes”, the filioque, baptism by aspersion, or Augustinian notions of original sin on the Eastern Churches.

Local election of bishops, rite specific canon law, and freedom to ordain married men into Eastern Catholic Orders can all be envisaged.

But repudiation of the dogmatic content of Trent, Vatican I and II, and the Marian definitions is not a “Catholic” option.

But your point applies to other Catholic saints, e.g., Philomena. It’s usually the very early saints whose lives have become heavily embroidered with legend. For saints within the past 500 years (including Juan Diego), the Church does a pretty good job of separating verifiable historical facts from legend.

But that’s just it…you are speaking here of praxis, not of dogmatic definitions or understandings of the papacy. I think we need to separate the papacy in se, the papacy’s esse, from the particular historically conditioned ways in which papal primacy has been exercised at any given time. Obviously, papal appointment of bishops is not part of the papacy’s esse. It’s a matter of praxis…it has nothing to do with our Catholic understanding of what the papacy is. I personally think papal appointment of bishops is a pretty sound idea for the WEST, but I think it would be a bad idea WRT the East in a reunited Church. In any event, it could be jettisoned even in the West without in any way affecting Catholicism’s papal claims.

The ways in which the popes have exercised their primacy have changed over the centuries. Heck, they changed within the first millennium…it’s not as if the first millennium was this static, unchanging period, frozen in time like Yeats’s Byzantium. It’s not as if there was this radical rupture, this sudden utter discontinuity between the first-millennium papacy and the second-millennium papacy. Praxis was always changing, adapting to changing circumstances.

Praxis is (to some extent) negotiable. Formal dogmatic definitions are not. But papal appointment of bishops does not fall within the purview of formal dogmatic definitions. It is a matter of praxis, and a negotiable one at that.

Both the former pope and the current one have signaled that they are willing to re-envision the precise ways in which the popes would exercise their jurisdictional primacy, esp. WRT the East in the event of reunion. IOW: No one is trying to shove the post-Tridentine Western model down Easterners’ throats. Really and truly. ;)

>I humbly suggest that it is precisely because the Orthodox are not of one mind on the subject that no such statement has been forthcoming. The substantive “primacy of honour” YOU may be willing to acknowledge may not be an empty shell, but I can assure you that I have encountered Orthodox clergy who have mockingly dismissed it in just such terms. I am sure Diane has as well.

Well, with all due respect, so what? I have encountered (recently) western Catholic clergy who are vehemently anti-Orthodox. I can cite a bestselling western Catholic author who wrote that the Sack of Constantinople should be a feast day. Of what use is it to focus on the extreme elements of either side? There are reasonable Orthodox voices you can have a dialogue with.

>As for the definitions of Vatican I, did not Sardica vest final appellate authority with the bishop of Rome (with only Arianizing bishops dissenting)?

I don’t know about the last clause, and Sardica was of course a local (and I believe predominantly, if not exclusively, a western) council, certainly not an ecumenical one, so I’m not sure why you believe it has such an overriding precedential value, but leaving all that aside, I think the key word is “appellate”. That is not at all what Vatican I dealt with. It (and Vatican II) gave universal *ordinary* jurisidiction to the Bishop of Rome, with “ordinary jurisidiction” being much, much broader than “appellate”. “Universal ordinary jurisidiction” means, for example, that the Pope, if he doesn’t like the pastor of St. Mary’s in Kalamazoo, can remove him. Period. Bishop of the diocese need not be consulted. It is not a valid response that this would never happen; it *could* canoncially, happen. This, besides reflecting a terribly flawed ecclesiology, is a far cry from any power given to the Pope in the first millenium.
And, of course, none of this touches VI’s teaching of papal infallibility, under which the Pope can, entirely on his own authority, under certain circumstances, bind the entire Church to a dogmatic statement. I do not see anything in the first millenium that approaches a recognition of such a charism.

>If one makes an effort to read Vatican I eirenically and positively, and interpret it specifically in light of the Eastern tradition, it should not be problematic for Orthodox.

Here is how I, (and, I think, most Orthodox) read the decree of Vatican I: when the Pope speaks from the chair of Peter on a matter of faith and morals with the intent to bind the entire Church, his declaration is irreformeable of itself and not from the consent of the Church. Please tell me how this reading is in error. Joe

Aren’t there those who question historicity of some details of accepted Catholic saints? St. Juan Diego comes to mind as a recent example that some have criticized.

I think what’s essential that even if the saints our Churches venerate may have been martyred by the other, we need to move beyond those days and seek forgiveness and reconciliation from the other.

“My point is that Roman communion has an impact on one’s trajectory.”

Yes, the Antiochian tradition was Hellenized, but the Melkite Greek Catholics and Antiochian Orthodox share the Byzantine tradition now. As for restoration of authentic Byzantine tradition, the direction that Rome urges is for Eastern Catholics to ‘distance themselves as little as possible from Orthodox practice’ (section 21 of the Liturgical Instruction). Text here: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/orientchurch/Istruzione/pdf/istruzione_inglese.pdf

The idea that Roman communion would affect how one would restore one’s authentic tradition is not reflected in this curial document. In fact, it was this document that helped many of the Eastern Catholic Churches begin Infant Communion, something most of them had lost when they entered Roman communion.