Insightful, compelling, salutary. Thank you for writing this. But if I was an Anglo Catholic, I'd be saying something like, "Well, this is what we've been saying all along. Through various historical contingencies, none of which have necessarily been the Pope's fault, the role and status of the Holy See has become inflated and quite far removed from what it was in the first millenium and prior to the Reformation/Counter Reformation. We respect and revere the Petrine Office, but we long to return to a time when there was a wider spread of powers and things weren't such a 'one man show.'"
Something like that. I'm not an Anglo Catholic btw. I'm a Roman Catholic like yourself, but this history does seem (to me at least) to lend weight to their claims.
This is also essentially one of the main arguments the Orthodox have.
The other Orthodox arguments are related, however, in that they boil down to noting that the Papacy, in responding to very real and serious crises often not of their own making, unilaterally altered what had been previously universally accepted theology in ways that were expedient, but with long-term deleterious ramifications for church unity, and whose ripples necessitated yet more unilateral changes later on.
Insightful, compelling, salutary. Thank you for writing this. But if I was an Anglo Catholic, I'd be saying something like, "Well, this is what we've been saying all along. Through various historical contingencies, none of which have necessarily been the Pope's fault, the role and status of the Holy See has become inflated and quite far removed from what it was in the first millenium and prior to the Reformation/Counter Reformation. We respect and revere the Petrine Office, but we long to return to a time when there was a wider spread of powers and things weren't such a 'one man show.'"
Something like that. I'm not an Anglo Catholic btw. I'm a Roman Catholic like yourself, but this history does seem (to me at least) to lend weight to their claims.
Looking forward to Part 3.
This is also essentially one of the main arguments the Orthodox have.
The other Orthodox arguments are related, however, in that they boil down to noting that the Papacy, in responding to very real and serious crises often not of their own making, unilaterally altered what had been previously universally accepted theology in ways that were expedient, but with long-term deleterious ramifications for church unity, and whose ripples necessitated yet more unilateral changes later on.