Eucharistic Ecumenism
If, as the Fathers of the Church teach, we are united in the
Eucharist, what is wrong with sharing it? And if this leads to a unity of confession
between the Orthodox and other Christians, what is wrong with that? These are the
questions that I pose to you in response to your anti-ecumenical efforts. (N.A., WI)
The Fathers of the Orthodox Church teach that we are united in a common
Baptism, a common confession, and the common mind of Christ. This is a wholly Scriptural
idea (see Ephesians 4:5) and is supported by the Patristic consensus. The Holy Eucharist
is the Medicine of Immortality by which we are restored to spiritual health, deified, and
united to Christ. It is by virtue of the spiritually therapeutic efficacy of the
Church’s Mysteries, then, that we are united to others, and these express and reify
our common Baptism, confession, and mind. If Baptism were not enlightenment, if confession
were not something noumenal rather than merely intellectual, and if the attainment of the
mind of Christ were just an image and not a matter of actual deification and glorification
(theosis), then one might argue that Holy Communion might be the very tool for
uniting the heterodox to the Orthodox Faith. But this is not the case. The Medicine of
Immortality is applied to those who have entered into the Divine hospital of the Church,
who are under the care of its certified therapists (Priests and Bishops), and it
facilitates and effects their Divine cure, in which they are restored to the image of
Perfect Man which is found in Christ. It cannot be separated from the place in which it is
administered, which is, once more, defined by the one Baptism, one Faith, and one Lord of
the Orthodox Church.
Owing to the intolerance of ecumenists in the face of the notion of an
Orthodox primacy in the Christian Faith, some Orthodox have succumbed to the un-Orthodox
idea that, if we all commune together, we will belong to the same Church, as though the
Church derives from the Eucharist, rather than the Eucharist from the Church. It is for
this reason that many contemporary Orthodox theologians so vehemently oppose the
"medical" model of the Eucharist found in many Church Fathers, attributing,
rather, an essentially un-Orthodox idea—that of unity in the Eucharist independent of
a common Faith—to the Patristic consensus. And knowing that this attribution is
spurious, they bristle at anyone who calls for a broader understanding of the relationship
between the Eucharist and the very tenets and foundational elements of Orthodoxy.
Moreover, since it is impossible for an Orthodox Christian to believe that the Eucharist
is the cause, rather than the result, of unity, they avoid any discussion of this pivotal
issue in Orthodox ecclesiology. Hence the simplistic ideas that you have been taught and
about which you have asked us.
From Orthodox Tradition, Vol. XV, No. 1, 22-23.
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Consider also these comments by Bishop Kallistos Ware in the 1963 edition of
his The Orthodox Church, pp. 318-319:
Yet there is one field in which diversity cannot be permitted. Orthodoxy
insists upon unity in matters of the faith. Before there can be reunion among
Christians, there must first be full agreement in faith: this is a basic principle
for Orthodox in all their ecumenical relations. It is unity in the faith that matters, not
organizational unity; and to secure unity of organization at the price of a compromise in
dogma is like throwing away the kernel of a nut and keeping the shell. Orthodox are not
willing to take part in a 'minimal' reunion scheme, which secures agreement on a few
points and leaves everything else to private opinion. There can be only one basis for
union—the fullness of the faith; for Orthodoxy looks on the faith as a
united and organic whole. Speaking of the Anglo Russian Theological Conference at Moscow
in 1956, the present Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Michael Ramsey, expressed the Orthodox
viewpoint exactly:
The Orthodox said in effect: " ... The 'tradition is a concrete
fact. There it is, in its totality. Do you Anglicans accept it, or do you reject it?' The
Tradition is for the Orthodox one indivisible whole: the entire life of the Church in its
fullness of belief and custom down the ages, including Mariology and the veneration of
icons. Faced with this challenge, the typically Anglican reply is: 'We would not regard
veneration of icons or Mariology as inadmissible, provided that in determining what is
necessary to salvation, we confine ourselves to Holy Scripture.' But this reply only
throws into relief the contrast between the Anglican appeal to what is deemed necessary to
salvation and the Orthodox appeal to the one indivisible organism of Tradition, to tamper
with any part of which is to spoil the whole, in the sort of way that a single splodge on
a picture can mar its beauty." ['The Moscow Conference in Retrospect', in Sobornost,
series 3, no. 23, 1958, pp. 562-3.]
In the words of another Anglican writer: "It has been said that the
faith is like a network rather than an assemblage of discrete dogmas; cut one strand and
the whole pattern loses its meaning.' [T. M. Parker, 'Devotion to the Mother of God', in
The Mother of God, edited by E. L. Mascall, p. 74.] Orthodox, then, ask of other
Christians that they accept Tradition as a whole; but it must be remembered that
there is a difference between Tradition and traditions. Many beliefs held by Orthodox are
not a part of the one Tradition, but are simply theologoumena, theological
opinions; and there can be no question of imposing mere matters of opinion on other
Christians. Men can possess full unity in the faith, and yet hold divergent theological
opinions in certain fields. This basic principle—no reunion without unity in the
faith—has an important corollary: until unity in the faith has been achieved,
there can be no communion in the sacraments. Communion at the Lord's Table (most
Orthodox believe) cannot be used to secure unity in the faith, but must come as the
consequence and crown of a unity already attained. Orthodoxy rejects the whole concept of
'intercommunion' between separated Christian bodies, and admits no form of sacramental
fellowship short of full communion. Either Churches are in communion with one another, or
they are not: there can be no half-way house.
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