k2aggie07 said:

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There is not necessarily a kind of theological rigor or list of impermissible thoughts in Orthodoxy. The mandates are pretty simple for us - don't "move ancient boundary stones," and don't add to the faith strange and novel teachings. There is no single titular authority to just draw hard black and white lines around every issue.

The nice thing, maybe, is that this kind of intellectual and spiritual freedom lends itself to a really beautiful personal expression of the common faith. I know it sounds kind of cheesy, but when I read the fathers it really does feel similar to listening to a symphony. The parts may be very different, even radically so - but it's all definitely the same song, there's definitely a commonality.

So, there's no problem with St John vs St Paul vs St James....and there's no conflict between St Gregory the Theologian or St Basil the Great. They all bring their own unique expression of the common faith through their personal lens, their own life and experiences, their own mind.

Within that framework you can see how someone may feel free to opine on a pastoral issue without presuming to "move the boundary stone". A person doesn't have to deny the Church's stance that homosexuality is a disordered state to suggest a different approach to pastoral care. And at the end of the day, if a bishop goes too far, the other bishops can and will break communion as an expression of caution - to protect their flock from dangerous teachings - until the issue can be fixed or clarified.

I don't know that I would trust any living person to be the voice of the orthodox Orthodox. We don't need that, really...the Church has selected spokesmen for herself for centuries: the fathers and the saints. And there isn't an issue I can think of where we don't have some valuable insight from that treasury.

All humans are sinners and fundamentally disordered, not the Prodigal but born into the pigpen. All of our sin affects us and others. We've been this way since the beginning. But all of us are forgiven and loved before we were even created. The right question for this and all pastoral issues (and what isn't a pastoral issue, ultimately?) then, is never focused on the sin itself. The sin is a given. The right question is how do we actualize the fact - an ontological fact for a Christian - that sin is forgiven, has been forgiven, and is being forgiven, and orient the life and the whole person to God?

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k2aggie07 said:

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Yep, exactly.

It comes back to a perhaps different way of looking at unity, universal (catholic in the true sense of the word), and oneness. The Orthodox Church isn't one in the sense of whole because comprised of many parts, and when the set is complete it becomes one. It is one because it is kata holos - according to the whole. Each Eucharistic gathering is the whole Church, the catholic Church. And each Eucharistic gathering, properly, is the bishop with his flock. So by joining in communion, we join to the Church, through participation in the sacrifice, the death and resurrection of Christ. Participation in Him, actually. So that's where the oneness comes from.

If a bishop breaks communion with another bishop over something like this you could read that as - I don't know if this separates you from the Church in Christ, but I don't feel comfortable asserting that we are united in our faith. Avoiding divisions in the Eucharistic meal is a scriptural imperative. Not the same as barring someone from the chalice, for example, or making an assertion that a belief is outright contrary to the faith.

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