Should each territory have only one bishop?

Perhaps relevant to Pope Francis' recent comments on decentralization is a discussion on the ancient ideal of monepiscopacy, which is the notion that each territory - eparchy or diocese - should have only one bishop. Pope Francis writes, "It is not advisable for the Pope to take the place of local Bishops in the discernment of every issue which arises in their territory. In this sense, I am conscious of the need to promote a sound 'decentralization.'"[1] Could a sound decentralization ever include a retraction of monepiscopacy as an ideal?

Icon of Saints Peter & Paul by Athanasios Clark, 
from www.goarch.org

Though monepiscopacy is ancient and widespread,[2] it is neither apostolic nor essential to faith. Even Rome looks (or ought to look) to its dual apostolic foundation of Peter and Paul. As Michael Holmes points out, "the office of monarchial bishop..., does not appear to have existed in Rome [before the second century]. Leadership seems to have been entrusted to a group of presbyters or bishops.”[3] 

Monepiscopacy has not been the reality for a long time in East or West. But should it be the ideal? Perhaps sharing one bishop helps neighbors realize their unity in Christ. Contrariwise, perhaps separate bishops can provoke rivalry and opposition.

Insisting upon monepiscopacy, however, is insensitive to current realities, where numerous Churches coexist in relative harmony, each equal in dignity. Having one’s own bishop helps protect the full expression of a particular Church’s traditions, which were threatened, for example, in the historical case of American Eastern Catholics who were once subject to Roman bishops.

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[1] Evangelii Gaudium, 16.

[2] Ignatius, for example, promoted monepiscopacy to ensure unity. Early Christian Fathers. Ed. Cyril Richardson. Vol 1. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1953. 126.

[3] "Presbyter" and "bishop" were sometimes used as interchangeably at this time. Michael W. Holmes. The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007, 34.

Bishop Soter Ortynsky

Unfortunately, Bishop Soter Ortynsky was a Ukrainian nationalist. Consequently, he was much opposed by the Rusyn clergy in the United States after he became the first Eastern Catholic bishop in the United States in 1907. 

Despite his Ukrainian nationalism, Ortynsky fought for the Church. He manfully ignored offensive and inappropriate aspects of Ea Semper, such as its prohibition of infant chrismation and married priesthood.[1] If the Rusyn clergy knew then what we now know about the conflicts and schisms that would result over the latter issue, then they may have lessened their ethnic and political opposition to Ortynsky. Had Ortynsky not died so young (at the age of 50), he may have been able to maintain important Eastern traditions and to work for Slavic Byzantine Catholic unity. As it happened, he was replaced by two bishops - one for the Ukrainians and another for the Rusyns. In my opinion, this division along ethnic lines has not, in the long run, served well either the Rusyn or the Ukrainian Churches .

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[1] Ea Semper Articles 10, 12, 14. 

From Evangelism to Ethnic Enclaves: Early Eastern Christian Immigration to America

The Russian Orthodox missionaries worked among the Alaskan Natives, converting many thousands to the true faith by their sincere efforts to inculturate the gospel. They came to Alaska with evangelical intent. Even Fr. Juvenaly’s great detractor, Nicholas Rezanov, acknowledges this: “the monk Juvenaly went there immediately to propagate the faith.”

Unfortunately, later Eastern Christian immigrants did not always maintain this evangelical impulse to present the faith in terms comprehensible to other cultures. A difference of intention motivated subsequent immigrant communities of Eastern Christians. They came not to evangelize but primarily to escape economic hardships. Their priests also came with no particular intention to evangelize, but rather to serve their own people while they temporarily sojourned in a foreign land, already peopled with others of Western European descent. The Eastern Churches in America, perhaps also unjustly suffering from feelings of cultural inferiority, began to isolate themselves ethnically. 

Against Contemporary Iconoclasm

            I think one of the most important defenses of icons in the current culture is the psychological. The creation of images as memorials for absent departed loved ones is a nearly universal human custom. For example, even among many who object to the Catholic and Orthodox use of images in worship, there is often widespread use of photography. I have explained it this way to Protestant objections before. When asked why my church is filled with images of Jesus, his mother, and the saints, I have responded with the question, “Do you have a picture of your mother?” The answer is usually yes. Our culture unquestionably accepts images for this purpose, which is really a way of showing love and respect for those dear to our hearts. As Christians, Jesus, his mother, and the saints should be as dear to our hearts as any members of our family should be, so icons are a fitting way to remember and venerate them. It is a natural human response to look lovingly upon the image that reminds us of the one we love. This is a part of the human nature, just as is the capacity to be represented by an image.

            Furthermore, it is essential to remember that we are not purely spirit, but also body and that God created our bodies and means for us to worship him in and with our bodies as well as with our spirits. There is no better way to worship Christ with our eyes, which he blessed, than to venerate icons – unless it is to see Christ in our neighbors who are also true icons of God.

            In offering this veneration to icons, it is important to distinguish between veneration and worship. We worship God alone. We worship him through the icon, but we do not worship the icon. The icon is an aid in our worship of God and worthy of its own veneration for this reason – for the reason that it points us to God. 

Historical Theological Defense of Icons

Though questions of politics and the locus of Church authority – that is, whether or not the emperor ought to have a deciding voice on doctrinal matters – weigh heavily in the historical dispute over icons, the doctrinal questions themselves are worthy of careful consideration. Furthermore, it is worth bearing in mind that, though it is intuitive to ascribe iconoclastic tendencies among Christians to external Jewish and Muslim influences, iconoclasm historically found as much support from within the Greek Christian tradition as from without it. Nonetheless, the Jewish origin of Christianity and the consequent Christian acceptance of Jewish scriptures certainly gave the iconoclasts the opportunity to point to the all-important prohibition of images found in the Decalogue as a proof-text. Christianity had inherited from Judaism an abhorrence of idolatry – which was shared by iconoclasts and iconodules alike. Earlier iconoclasts particularly focused on their claim that the veneration of icons was idolatrous.

Iconoclasts appealed to the authority of scripture and the early church fathers, which railed always and everywhere against the worship of idols. They neglected, however, to account for the images God commanded for use in worship (for example, the golden cherubim over the ark) in the very same books – especially Exodus – that condemned idolatry. This tension between right and wrong use of images exists already in the Old Testament along with the implicit acknowledgement that not all use of images is idolatrous.

Iconoclasts appealed to a particular understanding of the nature of images. Constantine Kopronymos went so far as to call an image homoousios with its subject. Icons, therefore, he considered false images, because a true image of Christ would be God himself, just as Christ, the image of the Father, is one in essence with the Father and is God. In a sense, Constantine V is not against worshipping images, but against worshiping icons, which are not, in his view, true images. Only Christ (and Christ in the Eucharist) is a true image. This is a failure to appreciate what an icon actually is and is not. An icon, as John of Damascus would later assert, is more like a mirror reflection of the one it portrays. It is an imitation. A painting of Christ is an image of Christ, who is an image of the Father. There is more than one sense of image. An icon is like an image of an image. It is not Christ himself, but his reflection. It is obvious that paint on a board is not one in essence with the Father! Iconodules were not suggesting otherwise. They worship God and God alone – God who has become man – man, who by his very nature can be imaged with paint on a board.

Later iconoclasts focused more on the Christological implications of iconography.  They claimed that because Jesus Christ is one person with both a divine and human nature, it is impossible to make an image of him. The divine nature cannot be circumscribed. Divinity is invisible by nature. It could only be, therefore, that an icon portrays only the human nature. This much is true, but the iconoclasts went on to assert that making such an image separates the two natures of Christ. Such an assertion fails to recognize fully the reality of the incarnation. It is, as John of Damascus said, a type of Docetism. Christ was visible to the eyes of his disciples both before and after his resurrection. This visibility, characteristic of human nature, also lends itself naturally to circumscribability. If the iconoclasts were right in thinking that portraying Christ’s image separated his humanity from his divinity, then Christ himself would have made this separation every time he appeared to his disciples in visible flesh. No. Rather, as a person both fully God and fully man, he is fully circumscribable in his human nature. This is the reality of the incarnation – a reality so profound that iconoclasts had difficulty fully accepting it. To deny that an image may be made of Christ is to deny that he is fully man. To deny that this image is worthy of veneration is to deny that his humanity is one with God. 

Would it be possible to have an ideal American Rite melding features of the Byzantine tradition and American culture?

Though skeptical of all things American, I do think it evangelically important to inculturate the Gospel, which should include, for example, the use of vernaculars. Inculturation is particularly and notoriously difficult in America, which lacks any one culture. America is a place of many coexisting – but only limitedly interacting – cultures. It is also a place of rampant individualism, which is utterly contrary to the Gospel. It would certainly be possible to meld features of Byzantine tradition and American culture – which has happened historically to a small degree – but there would be nothing “ideal” about an “American Rite.” 

Is a united American Eastern Church a realistic possibility?

When first immigrating to the United States, Eastern Christians usually intended to return to their homelands and thus considered themselves as in diaspora. Despite new circumstances, the mother Churches often continue operating from this conception. Though continuing as minorities, Eastern Churches in this country now have generations of history, American cultural characteristics, and numbers enough to regard them as a particular Church. Really, it doesn't makes sense for one location to have five or more Eastern bishops representing various jurisdictions. This redundancy weakens the ability of the Eastern Churches to evangelize, to catechize, and to do all that the Church must do in the world. 

This jurisdictional unity could only happen if the Churches would seek it and would self-identify first as Eastern Christians rather than as this or that ethnic group. Until Eastern Christians in the United States stop referring to themselves primarily as Russians or Ukrainians or Rusyns or Greeks or Arabs or this or that ethnicity rather than primarily as Christians, they will poorly reflect the one Church they truly are.