Every few years it seems I hear about a friend or acquaintance in a Reformed church deciding to convert to Eastern Orthodoxy or Roman Catholicism. I have written on this topic previously a number of times with gusto and don’t need to skin this cat again to make one simple point once more.
Reformed Protestants converting to Rome or Constantinople are dividing the body of Christ. In order to convert, you must confess that Rome or Orthodoxy is the fullness of the Body of Christ and submit to its doctrines which include (among other objectionables) the requirement that you not partake of communion with the fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters with whom you have been in fellowship with.
The Orthodox Church in America’s website says this:
“Orthodox Christianity does not permit its faithful to receive Holy Communion in non-Orthodox communities, whether they be Roman Catholic, Protestant, or whatever…
For Orthodox Christians, the Eucharist is a visible sign of unity; to receive the Eucharist in a community to which one does not belong is improper. If one does not accept all that the Church believes and teaches and worships, one cannot make a visible sign of unity with it. The Eucharist is the result of unity, not the means by which unity is achieved. While many non-Orthodox see this as a sign that the Orthodox Church excludes non-Orthodox from the Eucharist, in reality the opposite is true. Because a non-Orthodox individual has chosen not to embrace all that Orthodox Christianity holds, the non-Orthodox individual makes it impossible for an Orthodox priest to offer him or her communion. It is not so much a matter of Orthodoxy excluding non-Orthodox as it is the non-Orthodox making it impossible for the Orthodox to offer the Eucharist.”
My point here isn’t to debate the merits of open or closed communion practices in general, but rather my point is that someone who converts from the Reformed tradition is actually becoming less catholic and more sectarian. A convert must leave the unity of the church that he/she is currently enjoying. The convert must cut ties and refuse to enact the central sacrament of unity with those Christians any more. A convert must sometimes be re-baptized, often confirmed/chrismated, but at the very least make a profession of faith that the new communion is the fullness of the Body of Christ and implicitly (if not explicitly) denounce the previous church as something less than a true church where the Lord is present in all His glory.
As the elders of Trinity wrote in our statement on Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy a number of years ago:
“Individuals who join communions that effectively excommunicate their Protestant brothers and sisters contradict their search for catholicity, and ironically, the goal of unity comes at the expense of further divisions in the body of Christ.”
Frequently, the people who get caught in the gears of this sectarian spirit are fellow Christian family members and dear friends: pastors and teachers, fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers, grandparents. You can’t convert and act like you aren’t making a drastic statement about them. How is going from sharing the body and blood of Christ with them to being forbidden to becoming more catholic? You are going from loving Christ in the brothers and sisters right in front of you to getting cozy with strangers. This is why Paul withstood Peter to his face in Antioch. He was eating with some brothers and then when the Judaizers showed up, he withdrew. This is against the truth of the gospel. This is high handed hypocrisy and pharisaism. You are the Levite and the Priest on the road from Jericho to Jerusalem. You have made an idol of ceremonies and traditions, and you are training to become a professional camel gulper and gnat strangler. Your neighbor is the brother right in front of you, the grandma right in front of you, the niece right in front you. You are under the authority of and in communion with Jesus now through the pastors and elders who baptized you, catechized you, and serve you the Supper.
Jesus said the Samaritan was the hero of that parable and lo, two thousand years later, people are still trying to figure out how to get into the Levite Club.
Jeff Moss says
Toby, I believe your church requires that a person receive Trinitarian Baptism in order to take Communion there. Rome and Orthodoxy each require that a person be part of a particular communion which they regard as the Church that Jesus founded.
In each case, the Lord’s Supper is not available to all who believe in Jesus, but only those who have taken a particular step of obedience—which, in each case, is seen as something commanded by Christ and required for full membership in the Church. Your church too practices closed communion with regard to unbaptized Christians, and teaches its people to take the drastic step of regarding these unbaptized believers as not being members of the Church in its fullness.
You may think Rome and Orthodoxy are wrong in the way they fence the Table, but every communion with even a modicum of Biblical faithfulness bars some who are believers in some sense from receiving. It’s not a matter of whether some will be excluded, but how you decide whom to exclude.
This is not necessarily to say that Rome and Orthodoxy are right—they can’t both be right!—but to point out that their restrictions on who may receive the Eucharist are, at some level, not so very different from those of Trinity Reformed Church. Rome and Orthodoxy simply require a higher level of obedience to Jesus, as they see it, in order to let someone eat with them.
Toby says
No Jeff, you misunderstand me. My objection is not with the right of particular churches to fence their own tables as they see fit. My objection is with the EO and RC insistence that they have the right to unchurch the sacraments of other bodies of believers. I may request that a person be baptized before coming to the table at Trinity, but I do not thereby insist that if any other church does it differently than me, they are therefore not a true church and their sacraments invalid. Rome and Orthodoxy are sectarian by their refusal to acknowledge the fullness of the Triune God in the sacraments and government of other historic Christian bodies. Cheers.
Jeff Moss says
Toby, in regard to your last sentence, I think it’s important to remember that from the perspective of either Rome or Orthodoxy, there simply are no other “historic Christian bodies.” From the point of view of the Roman Catholic Church, both Eastern Orthodoxy and Protestantism are relatively recent (last millennium) break-offs from the Roman Church itself. On the other hand, the Eastern Orthodox see Rome as a body in schism from their own communion for the last thousand years, and the hundreds of Protestant bodies as further schisms following on the original Roman departure from the fellowship of Orthodoxy.
And on the terms of your argument, I’d really like to know what difference it would make that a Christian body is “historic” in order for the fullness of the Triune God to be in its sacraments and government. Shouldn’t any dad who loves Jesus be able to commune and govern his own wife and kids as an authoritative elder in his own house church?
Thank you for the interaction! May our good Lord bless you and your ministry.
Jonathan Roberts says
Pastor Sumpter,
Thank you for writing this up. I certainly agree that many converts need to understand the kind of division they are causing.
My only question–is such division always a bad thing? It seems like we should rejoice when Roman Catholics embrace the Reformation. Such an act, however, seems to require the same kind of break within the body of Christ.
The reason I ask is simply because some converts are very much aware of the schism they are causing but that their conversions are an act of obedience to Christ and His truth.
Thanks,
Jonathan
Toby says
Jonathan,
Good questions, and yes, of course, some conversions are acts of obedience to Christ and His truth.
However, if a Roman Catholic starts reading his Bible and studying church history and decides to be come Protestant, he is leaving his former church but the historic Protestant view of Rome has been that while it is in deep sin and distorts the gospel, it is still nevertheless a Christian Church. So it doesn’t require RC’s that become Protestant to repudiate their RC upbringing. Repent of errors yes, but we are able receive their baptism as true Christian baptism and even their distorted Mass as still the Lord’s Supper. But my point in this post is that this doesn’t go the other way with the RC and EO churches. To convert to Rome or Orthodoxy one must repudiate their Protestant past and henceforth not share table fellowship with their former Christian family, effectively unchurching or excommunicating that part of the body of Christ. This is a far more drastic division.
Last, the Bible does give us cause to divide from people who call themselves Christians but who don’t act like it. So Paul says that if a man is not working and mooching off his neighbors he should not eat and if he refuses to repent, that person should be noted and avoided (2 Thess. 3:6-15). If a brother is fornicating, covetous, idolator, drunkard, extortioner — we are required not to eat with them (1 Cor. 5:9-11). This is why Christians should be leaving the liberal denominations that are condoning homosexuality. We have apostolic authority to divide those churches. But my point here is that if you have grown up in a Church that loves Jesus, preaches the gospel, baptizes, communes and disciplines, and leave to go to a church that requires you to repudiate that faithful upbringing, you are dividing the body in a sinful way.
I hope that helps!
Jeff Moss says
All Protestants are participants, via covenantal succession, in the schism created by the Bull of Pope Leo IX which cut the Orthodox off from communion with the Western Church in 1054. Despite all of the ways that we have repented of Rome’s other errors (e.g. by our rejection of indulgences, and in much of the CREC by our embrace of the Orthodox practice of paedocommunion), Protestants have never corporately repented of our Western Catholic fathers’ sin in the Great Schism. Nor have we ever really tried to make restitution for that heinous sin in the only way it can be made, which is to undo Pope Leo’s schismatic work by seeking corporate reunion with the ancient communion of Orthodox Churches. Until we bear such fruits of repentance for that schism, to which we are all covenantally bound (cf. Romans 5:12-19), it’s hypocritical to accuse the Orthodox of being the schismatic ones. Matthew 7:1-5.
Toby says
Jeff,
Part of the issue here is differing visions of what unity looks like at different points in time. A young man who storms angrily out of the house at 15 is surely in sin and ought to go back to his parents right then and there, but if he comes to his senses when he’s 25 and repents, he should ask forgiveness but he should not move back in with his parents. Likewise, a man who leaves his wife for another woman. Assuming he marries the second woman and then later comes to the Lord and repents, part of his repentance should be asking forgiveness of his first wife, but he is not in a position to go back to her. Nevertheless (and imagining them all to be Christians), unity would mean being in fellowship, able to forgive and share the Lord’s Supper together. But that fellowship is not a simple return to the status quo ante. And that brings us back to the topic of this post, and the point stands that the Orthodox are doing their own part to continue the schism by not discerning Christ’s body in the Protestant churches and by requiring converts to repudiate Christ’s presence in their Protestant upbringing and to cut eucharistic fellowship with their Protestant brothers and sisters. This is like parents saying that they will not have true, full unity with their 35 year old son until he moves back in with them.
Andrea Keith says
It is unfortunate that what I see time and time again in these posts which attempt to draw those of us who have left Protestantism into a debate, is an accusation of a desire on our part to divide the body. We are accused of barring you from a table which, by your very own confessional standards, you would want no part of in the first place. Have you ever considered for a moment that our real reason for leaving was not out of a desire to cause division, but a desire to receive the true Body and Blood of Christ? Something which, by your own admission, is not possible in your communion. What are we then to do? We desire that which can unite us to Christ in a way not possible in Protestantism. The Eucharist is central to Orthodox worship. We welcome with open arms anyone who desires the same, but we will not compromise that which has been the pinnacle and practice of Christianity since its beginning. We are not being unloving by our actions, but the exact opposite. We guard the chalice in order to protect those who refuse it for what it truly is, yet we will joyfully serve it to those who come with a humble heart desiring the greatest gift of all. Our deepest desire is that all Christians could have this gift, for then and only then will we have true unity.
Toby says
Andrea,
You illustrate my point exactly. Blessings in Christ.
Jeff Moss says
Hi Toby,
Thank you for adding these further thoughts. To follow up on your analogy, if two teenage brothers stormed out of their parents’ house together, and 10 years later one of them decides to leave his brother and move back in with Mom and Dad, it may or may not be a good idea—but why would anyone say that he’s “dividing the family”?
Toby says
Jeff, people would say that he’s dividing the family if part of the parents’ prerequisite for moving back home was to promise not to eat the Lord’s Supper with the other brother anymore.
Mark says
Jeff,
A couple quick points for you to consider.
First, I’d like to know what your basis is for stating that the Orthodox Church requires converts to “repudiate their Protestant past” and “to repudiate Christ’s presence in their Protestant upbringing.” We are required to reject any heterodox beliefs we may have formerly held, but we are most certainly not told to “repudiate our past,” let alone deny Christ’s presence there. How could we? Our Protestant upbringing and the love for Christ it gave to us is what led us to Orthodoxy in the first place. My wife and I talked with our priest about this question before we began catechism and he was very explicit that not only does converting to Orthodoxy not entail a rejection of one’s Protestant past or raising, but such a thing is not allowed! In his words, that would be like climbing a flight of stairs and then turning around and cursing all the steps that got you to the top. Indeed, Met. Kallistos Ware has even written that there are “measures of the grace of God” in other Christian communions.
Second, have you considered the historical perspective of this issue? Who divided from whom? Who departed from Apostolic practice?
To be frank, it’s a bit rich to separate one’s self from a church, reject some of their beliefs, and then turn around and accuse them of being sectarian for not endorsing your innovations. Let’s be honest about who bears the agency of division, here, Jeff. It is certainly not the party who has continued believing the same things for 2,000 years.
It’s quite simple. We (the Orthodox) believe what Christ taught the Apostles, that which they handed down to the first churches and which is testified to in the Scriptures, the ecumenical councils, and the other vehicles of Apostolic Tradition. From the first days of the Church, this has included that only those are to be admitted to communion who have been baptized, chrismated, and accept and are living in accordance with church teaching. Here’s St. Justin Martyr (100-165AD):
“And this food is called among us ?????????? [the Eucharist], of which no one is allowed to partake but the man who believes that the things which we teach are true, and who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration, and who is so living as Christ has enjoined. For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Saviour, having been made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of His word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh. For the apostles, in the memoirs composed by them, which are called Gospels, have thus delivered unto us what was enjoined upon them; that Jesus took bread, and when He had given thanks, said, This do in remembrance of Me, this is My body; and that, after the same manner, having taken the cup and given thanks, He said, This is My blood; and gave it to them alone.”
And here’s St. Ignatius, a disciple of the Apostle John and made bishop of Antioch in 98AD by the Apostle Peter, in his letter to the Philadelphians (in which he was dealing with actual Judaizers):
“Keep yourselves from those evil plants which Jesus Christ does not tend, because they are not the planting of the Father…For as many as are of God and of Jesus Christ are also with the bishop. And as many as shall, in the exercise of repentance, return into the unity of the Church, these, too, shall belong to God, that they may live according to Jesus Christ. Do not err, my brethren. If any man follows him that makes a schism in the Church, he shall not inherit the kingdom of God. If anyone walks according to a strange opinion, he agrees not with the passion [of Christ].
Take heed, then, to have but one Eucharist. For there is one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup to [show forth ] the unity of His blood; one altar; as there is one bishop, along with the presbytery and deacons, my fellow-servants: that so, whatsoever you do, you may do it according to [the will of] God.”
From the very beginning, the Apostolic faith and practice of the Church was to admit to communion only those who had been baptized and confirmed in the church and who accepted the Apostolic Faith through submission to an Apostolic bishop.
You may disagree with this approach and these doctrines, but you really have no basis to contend that they are not the ancient and Apostolic practice of the church. It’s fine if you want to reject these views, but that makes you the cause of division, not the churches that have continued believing and doing the same things the Apostles taught since Pentecost. Again, you can’t deviate from the longstanding beliefs of a church and then accuse that same church of being sectarian for not endorsing your deviations. That’s not just heterodoxy, that’s intellectually dishonest.
The real analogy here would be a child that runs away from home because his parents won’t let him have premarital sex in his bedroom. Later, he wants to return home and restore his relationship with his parents, but he still wants to have premarital sex in his bedroom. Are those parents being divisive if they require him to disavow premarital sex before letting him move back in?
The Orthodox want unity amongst all Christians just as much as you and all other Protestants do. But that unity must be a unity of the faith—we must, per Ephesians 4:3-6, “maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” The Eucharist is not an instrument of unity, but a manifestation of unity. And that unity requires a unity of faith, as has been taught by the Apostles and their successors for 2,000 years. That the Orthodox continue to affirm this does make us sectarian, it makes us Christians.
Your brother in Christ,
Mark
Toby says
Mark,
Thanks for the comment and interaction. Just a quick reply for now. My point is not an objection to apostolic practice. My objection is to the romanticism of Orthodoxy (frequently) and Romanism (sometimes) that reads back into history a pristine, idyllic picture like one of those supermodels on the front of the magazines who’s been photoshopped into the next century. I agree with the quotations from Justin Martyr and Ignatius, and that’s why I’m a Protestant and why I’m objecting to EO sectarianism. Orthodox have to read back into those quotations assumptions about the organization of the early church that simply weren’t yet developed. It’s like assuming that George Washington must have sent Martha a text since he said he sent her a message. Cheers!
Mark says
Does *not* make us sectarian… 🙂
Mark says
And by Jeff, I obviously meant Toby. Durrr. Being competent at the internet is clearly not a requirement for becoming Orthodox.
Ignatius says
Would your logic apply to members of your own church? That is, if someone left the Orthodox church in order to join your church would they be dividing the body of Christ? Would you recommend they go back to the Orthodox church?
Ken Griffith says
Pastor Sumpter,
While conceptually agreeing with you, have you considered the practical difficulty of what you are asking of the Orthodox Church? The Anabaptist wing of the Protestant branch has fragmented into so many sects, micro-sects and heretical cults that for the Orthodox to make a list of which ones are catholic and which ones are not would be akin to making a list of the grains of sand on the seashore. It seems like the burden of catholicity rests upon the newer sects to make the effort to come into communion with the larger and older ones.