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If you are a Lutheran, your religion was founded by Martin Luther, an ex-monk of the Catholic Church, in the year 1517. If you belong to the Church of England, your religion was founded by King Henry VIII in the year 1534, because the Pope would not grant him a divorce with the right to re-marry. If you are a Presbyterian, your religion was founded by John Knox in Scotland in the year 1560. If you are a Congregationalist, your religion was originated by Robert Brown in Holland in 1582. If you are Protestant Episcopalian, your religion was an offshoot of the Church of England, founded by Samuel Senbury in the American colonies in the 17th century. If you are a Baptist, you owe the tenets of your religion to John Smyth, who launched it in Amsterdam in 1606. If you are of the Dutch Reformed Church, you recognize Michelis Jones as founder because he originated your religion in New York in 1628. If you are a Methodist, your religion was founded by John and Charles Wesley in England in 1774. If you are a Mormon (Latter Day Saints), Joseph Smith started your religion in Palmyra, New York, in 1829. If you worship with the Salvation Army, your sect began with William Booth in London in 1865. If you are Christian Scientist, you look to 1879 as the year in which your religion was born and to Mary Baker Eddy as its founder.
If you belong to one of the religious organizations known as “Church of the Nazarene, Pentecostal Gospel,” “Holiness Church,” or “Jehovah's Witnesses,” your religion is one of the hundreds of new sects founded by men within the past hundred years. (by )If you declare your faith as a Roman Catholic, your church originally shared the apostolic heritage of episcopal succession and continuity of the Orthodox tradition. Lamentably in 451, Pope Leo I attempted to assert the authority of his office as the Bishop of Rome as a universal authority over the whole Church. That was a departure from the tradition of his predecessors. Some assert that he did this as a good faith effort to solve a contemporary dilemma about the mystery of Jesus Christ’s nature (see below). But at the same time others took offence at the new formula that he proposed to explain that mystery. Many bishops, representing their individual diocese accepted Leo’s formula. Thus their churches continued a tenuous coalition with his Latin church, but that coalition fell apart in 1054. Those who maintained communion with the Latin (Roman) church between 451 and 1054 distinguish themselves as “Byzantine Orthodox” (this includes a set of various ethnic traditions originating in Eastern Europe, parts of the Near East, and Asia. Until 1453, their lands comprised Byzantine Roman Empire, plus various Slavic countries and Russia that received their faith from it).
Those of the Oriental Orthodox Christian communion trace their continuous relationship, as the body of Christ, to its founder Jesus of Nazareth. He commissioned His Apostles to go forth to teach and baptize all nations. The formulas, which it accepts as normative, were sealed by 431 A. D. (The Council of Ephesus). They consider doctrinal statements made since then to be unnecessary innovations. On the basis of that principle they rejected Leo’s formula and the meeting called the “Council of Chalcedon.” They recognize the same faith in each of their administratively independent national traditions. Their local cells are identified by the traditional ethnic designations Armenian, Coptic (Egyptian), Ethiopian, Malankara (Indian), and Syro Jacobite Christian Churches.
Orthodoxy is the Church of the Apostles and our Fathers (that thou mayest tell in the ears of thy son, and of thy son's son,[Exodus 10 : 2]) who succeeded them. It is the true “one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.” This is our greatest legacy that we can pass on to the young people of the new millennium.Hi Henoch,
If salvation was related to the antiquity of your tradition then you might have a point.
But we must be reborn into the Son.
The rest is human folly.You have a point there but how do you know the truth form over 25,000 different spritual belives? Everyone of them saying that there religoin is the right one. You must know the history.
Hi henoch,
If you trust in history you are trusting in blind men and following them into their pits.Rather listen to the Spirit of Christ in Peter who speaks to you too.
“37Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brethren, what shall we do?”
38Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.39″For the promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call to Himself.”
Hi henoch.
It is good that you point out the folly of belonging to a denomination, except your answer is that the Oriental Orthodox Christian communion is the true church. Did I hear your message correctly?
If so, then you make the same mistake because no denomination is the truth. We know who the truth is, so we do not have true faith by belonging to a denomination, rather by following Jesus Christ and being led by the Spirit of God.
This is true today as it was back in the first century and we also know that the original church wasn't called the “Oriental Orthodox Christian communion”. Rather the true Church is the body of Christ.
1 Corinthians 1:12-13
12 What I mean is this: One of you says, “I follow Paul”; another, “I follow Apollos”; another, “I follow Cephas”; still another, “I follow Christ.”
13 Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized into the name of Paul?Do men ever change?
hi Nick Hassan & T8,
I hope you will find this info. intersting…
Who started the Orthodox Church?
The Orthodox Church was founded by our Lord Jesus Christ, when after His Ascension, He sent down upon His Apostles the Holy Spirit who proceeds from God the Father as is written in the New Testament. The Orthodox Church of today can trace its history back to the New Testament Church in unbroken continuity. The Apostles, as per our Lord's command, preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ and founded churches in Europe, Asia and Africa. Under the direction of the Apostles and their successors, whom they appointed to carry on their mission, the Orthodox Church began to thrive. At each city and town that the Apostles traveled they would appoint a bishop to continue to minister to the faithful, before leaving on their missionary journeys. As the Church grew, the bishops in turn had to appoint priests and deacons to help them with their flock.
The Orthodox Church in the First Centuries after Christ
In the early centuries of Christianity, there appeared many so-called Christian churches which espoused false teachings (contrary to the authentic tradition: “faith which was once delivered unto the saints” [Jude 1 : 3]). Thus the Christian Church had to address these heresies (false teachings) and to begin to systematically clarify the true teachings of Christ. The Church did this through councils. Just as the Apostles in the Book of Acts, Chapter 15 asked for the guidance of the Holy Spirit in addressing issues regarding the teachings of Christ, their successors-the bishops-held councils in order to decide what is true and what is false. It was within these councils that the Orthodox Church began to articulate its doctrine; always guided by the Holy Spirit, Who inspired them to seek and witness to the truth.
It was in the early centuries of the Church's existence, (while fighting to safeguard the true doctrines of Christ), that the Christian Church officially took on the name “Orthodox.” The word Orthodox literally means “straight teaching” or “straight worship,” being derived from two Greek words: orthos, “straight,” or “correct,” and doxa, “teaching” or “worship.” It serves to be distinguish what we share from the term that denotes the opposite position of “heterodox” indicating all other contrary, “sectarian or personal interpretations.”
The Spread of Orthodox Christianity
By the fourth century A.D., under the Emperor Constantine the Great, Christianity as a religion became tolerated and legal.Remember that since apostolic times the Church had been persecuted. By the fifth century, Orthodox Christianity became so widespread that it became the only religion recognized by the Roman government. The great centers of Orthodox Christianity were Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem. The bishops of these great cities and their surrounding regions governed the entire Church for the most part. For this reason, they were given honorary titles such as: Pope, Patriarch, Archbishop or Metropolitan, depending on the size of their flock or importance of their geographic or historic domain. All bishops were/are equal whether they preside over a small region or great city. No bishop may interfere within the jurisdiction of another bishop unless it is proven by a council of bishops that he has fallen into heresy.
Further Schism: Byzanytine Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism
However, as early as the fourth century A.D., there were cultural, sociological, political and linguistic differences between the Christians which eventually led to separation in the Church. The Eastern Christians spoke Greek, whereas the Western Christians spoke Latin, Syriac, Geez/Amharic, Hebraic or Armenian in other regions!
In each of the Eastern churches (i.e., Constantinople, Alexandria, Ethiopia/Abyssinia, Antioch and Jerusalem) a group of bishops elected a first among equals to chair their administrative assemblies. Each shared a common language and cultural background, the Western Church's administration was governed by a single bishop: the bishop of Rome. All these factors led to some basic theological differences between the Orthodox Church of the East and West.
By the eleventh century A.D. the differences between East and West became great enough to cause a separation within that group which had previously excluded those who refused to accept their innovations. The Eastern (Byzantine)Church became known as the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Western Church became know as the Roman Catholic Church, for it was governed and administered by the bishop or Pope of Rome. Again it must be emphasized that there were many factors besides theological ones which led to the schisms of local cells which had once constituted the one Christian Church. However, some theological issues which were promulgated by the Western Church were never and are not to this very day accepted by the Eastern (Byzantine) Church, nor the Oriental Orthodox Church such as: the infallibility of the Pope of Rome on matters of Church doctrine, the universal jurisdictional authority of the Pope of Rome, the doctrine of Purgatory, the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary, the unauthorized addition of “and the Son” to the eighth article of the Nicene Creed, et. al.
Continuity vs Reformation
As schism which took place, surviving institutions co-existed as antagonists. Most of the players exhibited occasional episodes of cooperation, reunion, or proselytism. In the tenth century, the people of Russia and North Eastern Europe embraced the faith that they received from Constantinople (Byzantium). But by the Fifteenth century almost all Orthodox lands (Ethiopia was a conspicuous exception) fell to the Moslems (i.e., the Ottoman Turks). The Roman Catholic Church continued to grow and spread through its missionary efforts in North and South America. The Byzantine Church, due to its subjugation to the Moslem Turks, was unable to do this. This perhaps, from a theological standpoint, was a blessing in disguise; for the Orthodox Christians were quite adamant in retaining the faith, teachings and traditions of their ancestors.
This was not so in the West. The Roman Catholic Church had undergone certain theological changes due to Scholasticism, Speculation & Enlightenment, the Protestant Reformation and the Counter-Reformation which eventually led to separations within and from the Roman Catholic Church. These changes in the West, as late as the sixteenth century, gave birth to the: Lutheran, Methodist, Anglican and other Protestant churches. These “reformations” and thereby changes in church doctrine never affected the Orthodox Church; Orthodoxy maintained its unbroken historical and theological connection to the New Testament Church.
Henoch,
Faith in the one true God, YHWH, is the oldest faith of all. It predates the “Orthodox Church” as well as all the other denominations you named.
Quote (WhatIsTrue @ Dec. 15 2006,05:30) Henoch, Faith in the one true God, YHWH, is the oldest faith of all. It predates the “Orthodox Church” as well as all the other denominations you named.
Amen, WIT.Hi Henoch,
Your faith, as far as God sees faith, is certainly not older than you and likely to be a lot younger.
Faith alone is useless anyway as even demons believe.
If you have faith but have yet to respond to the message from God manifest in that grace to repent and be reborn into the Son then that investment of faith by God in you has so far been wasted on you.
It is as dead as history in a museum.
But it still today.If you hear His voice today harden not your heart.
Regarding your question How old is your faith?
I can work it out, when I figure out at what time and day you posted the question.
To Henoch.
So you say the Orthodox Church is the true Church. You are free to believe that of course, but we believe that the true Church is the Body of Christ and the bride of Christ.
Men see and judge by labels and the outward appearance, God sees the heart.
The true Church is not of this world and is made up of living stones, (those filled with God's Spirit).
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