Introduction

          The doctrine of primacy within the episcopate of the Church has been a cause of division for over a millennium, but the fact that primacy and synodality are corelative terms means that both East and West must work together to find a way in which to live out this important reality. [1]  This essay is intended to show how the Orthodox understand primacy, and what they find objectionable about the Western approach, especially as it developed in the period following the Great Schism in the 11th century.

Primacy is Not About Power Over Others

          In the Orthodox tradition primacy is not to be confused with the concept of supremacy.  So the Pope of Rome, from an Orthodox perspective, has no authority over the autocephalous Churches of the East, because any concept of supreme authority of one bishop over another bishop, undermines the true meaning of communion within the one Catholic and Apostolic Church.  Thus, primacy must never be conceived of in terms of power, but should always be understood to be a type of service, i.e., service to episcopal unity and communion within the body of Christ.  In fact, in a eucharistic ecclesiology, it is impossible for one Church to have power over another Church, because each and every local Church is the full realization of the one Catholic and Apostolic Church through its celebration of the liturgy under the guidance of a bishop.  In other words, primacy in the Church must never be thought of as "power over others," but must be understood as "service to others" within a synodal ecclesial framework.  To put it another way, the primate within the synod functions as a servant of unity among his brother bishops, and he should never be thought of as a prince lording it over the other members of the synod in a Gentile fashion. [2]

          The Western corruption of primacy turning it into a concept of supreme power and jurisdiction over the Church by the Pope is clearly expressed by the following quotation from the First Vatican Council:

Now there are two main problems with the teaching expressed in the quotation above from an Orthodox perspective:  first, the idea that the Pope, or any bishop for that matter, can have power over the many local Churches does violence to the unity of the episcopate; and second, the notion that the Pope, or any bishop for that matter, who exercises primacy can have ordinary and immediate power in each and every local Church damages the connection of the local bishop to his proper Church because it undermines his unique place within it.  Frankly, both of these ideas according to Orthodoxy are contrary to ecclesial custom as practiced by the Church Fathers and the conciliar tradition.

          Taking into account what has been said up to this point, it is clear that the Orthodox must rejected any ideology that promotes the first of the concepts listed above, i.e., the idea that primacy is a legal or jurisdictional supremacy of one bishop over another bishop rather than seeing it as a type of service to unity through sacramental communion.  In fact, Fr. Schmemann highlighted this truth in his article on the Eucharistic nature of Orthodox ecclesiology when he said, "The essential corollary of this eucharistic ecclesiology is that it excludes the idea of a supreme power, understood as power over the local Church and her bishop," because ". . . a supreme power would mean power over the Church, over the Body of Christ, over Christ Himself," and this approach to primacy is quite simply false. [4]  To put it another way, every diocese is the whole Church, because every diocese is the Catholic Church in a specific place.  There is no Church over the local Church; instead, when speaking about local communities there is a communion of Churches all of which are — taken individually — fully and completely the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, for it is impossible to break the Catholic Church into pieces.

          Moreover, the truth that one local Church cannot have power over another local Church is connected to the doctrine of the Eucharistic memorial (anamnesis), for it is a theological reality that the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church is instantiated, whole and entire, in all of the many local Churches, and this doctrine also applies to the celebration of the Eucharist.  For there is no single worldwide Eucharistic celebration just as there is no single worldwide Church apart from the many local Churches; instead, there are only local Eucharistic celebrations within the many local Churches and yet these many Eucharistic celebrations — as it concerns their essential nature — are one and the same, because Christ is their source and He is present whole and entire in them all.  Christ is not more present in one Eucharistic celebration than in another, and so too there is no Church that is more of a Church than any other Church, nor is there one bishop who is more of a bishop than any other bishop.  That said, it is self-evident that the primacy of popes and patriarchs — which is founded upon the sacramental unity of the episcopate and the canons of the various regional and ecumenical councils — is one of service to unity, and so it must not be viewed in monarchical, legalistic, or jurisdictional terms.  That said, the "sacred authority" of the local bishop is possessed equally by all who have received the grace of consecration to the episcopate, because according to Orthodox tradition all of the bishops are the successors of all of the apostles, which necessarily includes St. Peter. [5]  Ultimately, the eucharistic ecclesiology of the first millennium is opposed to the universalist ecclesiology of the Latin Church of the middle ages, which only developed due to the Scholastic isolation of the Latin Church from the great patristic tradition of the earliest centuries of the Christian era that is the common patrimony of both East and West.

          Now as far as the second idea promoted by the First Vatican Council is concerned, there is no sense in which one can argue in Orthodoxy that the primate (i.e., the bishop who holds primacy) can have immediate episcopal authority within each and every local Church, because to do so creates a situation where two men simultaneously have episcopal and immediate authority in each and every local Church, i.e., the bishop of Rome and the local bishop. [6]  This idea is contrary to the ancient Church's understanding of the episcopal office, for it turns the bishop of Rome into the bishop of bishops, and has the additional effect of reducing all the bishops to vicars of the Pope, or worse it turns them all into glorified presbyters by destroying the ontological unity of the episcopate.

          Western apologists will often argue that giving the pope immediate episcopal authority within every single local Church functions as a safeguard for the authority of the local bishop, but that is simply not how the Orthodox understand the nature of episcopal authority.  According to the ancient Church Fathers there can be no bishop of bishops within the Church, who somehow is meant to safeguard the authority of the local bishops; and the whole idea that primacy functions in this way has the effect of creating a super or universal bishop, which is an idea that was explicitly condemned by Pope St. Gregory the Great in the 6th century. [7]  That said, in Orthodoxy the episcopal office is one high priesthood and all bishops possess the same ontological status, which means that there cannot be a bishop of bishops, who somehow possesses episcopal authority in every local Church throughout the world.  In fact, such a notion for the Orthodox involves turning all the other bishops — except for the primate — into glorified presbyters; while also turning them (i.e., the bishops reduced to presbyters by a false notion of primacy) into the primate's vicars who serve at his discretion rather than serving by the will of God. [8]

Primacy is Inherent to Episcopacy

          In addition, it is important to remember that primacy itself is not a distinct sacrament (mysterion); rather, by divine intention primacy is inherent to episcopacy, and so all bishops possess primacy within the Church, because all bishops are successors of all the apostles through sacramental consecration to the high priesthood of Christ.

          Now, as far as the Orthodox are concerned, how primacy works regionally and globally as an expression of communion between the Churches — as important as it is — must never be thought of as a matter of divine right given by Christ Himself to any single local Church, which is how Roman Catholics often frame the issue.  Instead, primacy is a matter of authority given by the bishops in council, all of whom possess primacy in episcopacy, to one among them who will act as primate within the body of bishops (i.e., the synod) understood regionally, or even throughout the whole oecumene in an ecumenical council.

          Now both East and West agree that during the first millennium Rome held — as a matter of custom — a primacy of honor, but Rome's position within the ecclesial order (taxis) was not accepted as a divinely revealed dogma in the East, contrary to the claim made in Dictatus Papae (circa A.D. 1075), "That the Roman Church was founded by God alone"; [9] instead, it was simply a human custom founded upon the position of that local Church within the capital of the Roman Empire, while also being based on its dual apostolic foundation.  That being said, the historical Pauline and Petrine foundation of the Roman Church, as important as that is, does not for the Orthodox establish its position as a divine dogma; moreover, as the Orthodox often point out, many other Churches were also founded by apostles (including the Petrine Sees of Antioch and Alexandria), and so one must not make more out of this Roman claim than it can support.  After all, Pope St. Gregory the Great himself held that the Churches of Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch together form one historic Petrine See in three places, [10] and so it would be wrong to think that the Roman Church somehow has a unique position by divine right, or to hold that it has supremacy over all the other Churches, which is a concept that inevitably leads to the politicization of ecclesiology as a power struggle among competing ecclesial princes.

          Primacy within the worldwide communion of Churches has a divine purpose, but for the Orthodox East admitting this to be the case is not the same thing as accepting the second millennium claims of the Roman Church as expressed in the ideas promoted at the First and Second Vatican Councils.

Primacy, Synodality, and Appellate Authority

          Finally, it is true that the Serdican canons gave the Roman Church a certain appellate authority based upon the notion of ecclesiastical primacy, but it must be borne in mind that what the Pope decided when a person appealed a case to his episcopal see — as Hamilton Hess demonstrated in his book on the Council of Serdica — was not the case itself, that is, the Pope did not issue a judgment on his own that simply reversed the original decision of the provincial synod.  Instead, the Bishop of Rome had the authority to determine if the case against the petitioner (i.e., the man seeking redress) was worthy of reconsideration at a new synod of bishops selected from the provinces neighboring the one which originally tried the case. [11]  So it is true that the Council of Serdica gave the Pope the authority to decide if a new trial was warranted, which meant that he could call a new synod to be attended by the bishops of the surrounding area, but he was not empowered to simply issue a judgment on the merits of the case itself.  Moreover, at the synod he summoned he was allowed to cast a vote, either personally or through his chosen representatives, along with the other bishops in the assembly, but his vote carried no more weight than that of the other bishops attending the council.  So it must be emphasized that the Council of Serdica did not empower the Pope by himself to simply decide the outcome of the appellate case in a non-conciliar fashion, and in fact he could even be on the losing side in the new synodal trial; rather, the Serdican canons evince a proper functioning of primacy within synodality, where the primate — as first among equals — helps to give direction to his brother bishops in the synodal governance of the Church.

Conclusion

          The ongoing dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Churches at the international level has produced three documents that touch upon the nature of primacy (i.e., The Ravenna Document, The Crete Document, and The Chieti Document), but to date little progress has been made in bridging the gap between the two sides.  Ultimately, each side continues to promote its own historic position, while both sides simultaneously express openness to advancing along the path of ecumenical dialogue through a process of historical research on this topic.  Clearly, it is only by reintegrating primacy within synodality that a solution to the present theological impasse can be found, and yet I believe that Cardinal Ratzinger already provided a solution to this problem many years ago when he said that:  "Rome must not require more from the East with respect to the doctrine of primacy than had been formulated and was lived in the first millennium." [12]

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Works Cited:

Sidney Z. Ehler (Editor and Translator) and John B. Morrall (Editor).  Church and State Through the Centuries.  (London:  Burns, Oates and Washbourne, Ltd., 1954).

Hamilton Hess.  The Early Development of Canon Law and the Council of Serdica.  (New York:  Oxford University Press, 2002).

James A. Kleist, S.J. (Translator).  Ancient Christian Writers:  The Epistles of St. Clement of Rome and St. Ignatius of Antioch.  (New York:  Newman Press, 1946).  Volume 1.

John Meyendorff (Editor).  The Primacy of Peter in the Orthodox Church.  (Wing Road:  The Faith Press, Ltd., 1963).

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger.  Principles of Catholic Theology.  (San Francisco:  Ignatius Press, 1987).

Philip Schaff (Editor).  The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers.  (Peabody:  Hendrickson Publishers, 1994).  28 Volumes.

Norman P. Tanner, S.J. (Editor).  Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils.  (London:  Sheed and Ward, Ltd., 1990).  2 Volumes. 

Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity.  The Bishop of Rome:  Primacy and Synodality in the Ecumenical Dialogues and in the Responses to the Encyclical Ut Unam Sint.  (Vatican City:  Dicastero per la Comunicazione — Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2024).

The Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue Between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church.  The Crete Document:  The Role of the Bishop of Rome in the Communion of the Church in the First Millennium.  (Published:  3 October 2008).

WEB-LINK:  https://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1341814bdc4.html?eng=y

Works Consulted:

Waclaw Hryniewicz.  The Challenge of Our Hope:  Christian Faith in Dialogue. (Washington, DC:  The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy, 2007).

A. Edward Siecienski.  The Papacy and the Orthodox:  Sources and History of a Debate.  (New York:  Oxford University Press, 2017).

Biblical Translation:

The Bible:  Revised Standard Version.  (New York:  American Bible Society, 1971).

Primacy in the Church from an Orthodox Perspective

by Steven Todd Kaster

10 June 2024

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End Notes:

[1]  Nota bene:  I am not using the term "synodality" in the sense that it is presently being used in the Roman Church's "Synod on Synodality," which as far as I can tell is being employed in order to allow for alterations to the faith once for all delivered to the saints (see Jude 1:3); rather, I am using it in its ancient Christian sense, which involves an exercise of communion among the bishops of a given region in a local council, or even of all the bishops throughout the world in an ecumenical council, in order to provide good governance to the Church, and to defend her immutable faith from heretical innovations. 

[2]  Matthew 20:25-28, "But Jesus called them to Him and said, 'You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them.  It shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave; even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.'"  See also Mark 10:42-45 and Luke 22:24-27.

[3]  Norman P. Tanner, S.J. (Editor), Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, (London:  Sheed and Ward, Ltd., 1990), volume 2, pages 814-815. 

[4]  John Meyendorff (Editor), The Primacy of Peter in the Orthodox Church, pages 38-39.

[5]  The Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue Between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church, The Crete Document:  The Role of the Bishop of Rome in the Communion of the Church in the First Millennium, published 3 October 2008, no. 20.  The following is taken from paragrage twenty of the text:  "In the East, this evolution in the interpretation of the ministry of the bishop of Rome did not occur. Such an interpretation was never explicitly rejected in the East in the first millennium, but the East tended rather to understand each bishop as the successor of all of the apostles, including Peter (cf. Cyprian, De unit. ecc., 4-5; Origen, Comm. in Matt.)."  See also the study document of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, which stated the following about apostolic and petrine succession:  "The Orthodox–Catholic dialogue underlines the importance of apostolic succession in understanding primacy and synodality. The North American Orthodox–Catholic Theological Consultation addressed for the first time the question of primacy in its 1986 document entitled Apostolicity as God’s Gift in the Life of the Church, which underlined the different Orthodox and Catholic approaches to the relationship between apostolicity and petrinity: 'In the Eastern churches there has frequently been an emphasis on the fullness of each church’s apostolicity and, indeed, petrinity, and there has been criticism of the Roman Church for tending to localize these qualities in a single see.'  The same commission however notes that 'the image of Peter within the apostolic college is reflected in the life of each local church; it is also reflected in the visible communion of all the local churches. There is no intrinsic opposition between these two approaches' (O–C US 1986, 12)." [Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, The Bishop of Rome:  Primacy and Synodality in the Ecumenical Dialogues and in the Responses to the Encyclical Ut Unam Sint, (Vatican City:  Dicastero per la Comunicazione — Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2024), no. 83, pages 61-62]. 

[6]  See Norman P. Tanner, S.J. (Editor), Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, (London:  Sheed and Ward, Ltd., 1990), volume 2, pages 813-814.  The bishops at Vatican I decreed the following:  ". . . we teach and declare that, by divine ordinance, the Roman Church possesses a pre-eminence of ordinary power over every other Church, and that this jurisdictional power of the Roman Pontiff is both episcopal and immediate."  Now, as a consequence of this teaching, an Orthodox Christian would feel compelled to say that the Western position creates a situation in which there are in fact two bishops, i.e., two men, both possessing full episcopal and immediate authority over a single local Church, and this idea is quite simply contrary to the patristic understanding of the nature of the Church.

[7]  See Philip Schaff (Editor), The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, (Peabody:  Hendrickson Publishers, 1994), series 2, volume 13, pages 18-19.  Pope St. Gregory condemned the idea that there could be a "universal bishop" within the Church, for as he explained in his Letter to Eusebius of Thessalonica:  "Be it known then to your Fraternity that John, formerly bishop of the city of Constantinople, against God, against the peace of the Church, to the contempt and injury of all priests, exceeded the bounds of modesty and of his own measure, and unlawfully usurped in synod the proud and pestiferous title of œcumenical, that is to say, universal.  When our predecessor, Pelagius, of blessed memory became aware of this, he annulled by a fully valid censure all the proceedings of that same synod.  . . . For if one, as he [i.e., John] supposes, is universal bishop, it remains that you are not bishops."

[8]  See James A. Kleist, S.J. (Translator), Ancient Christian Writers:  The Epistles of St. Clement of Rome and St. Ignatius of Antioch, (New York:  Newman Press, 1946), volume 1.  St. Ignatius, in writing to the Church of Philadelphia, speaks of the authority of the Bishop, and those who assist him, as coming from God, for as he put it:  "This Church [i.e., in Philadelphia] I salute in the Blood of Jesus Christ. She is a source of everlasting joy, especially when the members are at one with the bishop and his assistants, the presbyters and deacons, that have been appointed in accordance with the wish of Jesus Christ, and whom He has, by His own will, through the operation of His Holy Spirit, confirmed in loyalty" [The Letter to the Philadelphians, page 85, epistolary preface].  See also The Letter to the Ephesians, page 62, no. 6; and The Letter to the Magnesians, page 69-70, no. 3.

[9]  Sidney Z. Ehler and John B. Morrall (Editors), Church and State Through the Centuries, (London:  Burns, Oates and Washbourne, Ltd., 1954), pages 43-44.

[10]  Philip Schaff (Editor), The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, (Peabody:  Hendrickson Publishers, 1994), series 2, volume 12, page 229.  Pope St. Gregory, when speaking about the historical petrine succession, said the following:  "Wherefore though there are many apostles, yet with regard to the principality itself the See of the Prince of the apostles alone has grown strong in authority, which in three places is the See of one [i.e., Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch].  For he himself exalted the See in which he deigned even to rest and end the present life.  He himself adorned the See to which he sent his disciple as evangelist.  He himself established the See in which, though he was to leave it, he sat for seven years.  Since then it is the See of one, and one See, over which by Divine authority three bishops now preside, whatever good I hear of you, this I impute to myself.  If you believe anything good of me, impute this to your merits, since we are one in Him Who says, 'That they all may be one, as You, Father, art in me, and I in you that they also may be one in us' (John 17:21)."

[11]  See Hamilton Hess, The Early Development of Canon Law and the Council of Serdica, pages 179-200.

[12]  Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Principles of Catholic Theology, (San Francisco:  Ignatius Press, 1987), page 199.

Copyright © 2024 Steven Todd Kaster