Greek Orthodox Church

After visiting Saints Peter and Paul Greek Orthodox Church, I decided it would be interesting to wrote a blog post about what I learned and some of the differences between Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholics. 

Eastern Orthodoxy or Greek Orthodoxy arose as a distinct branch of Christianity after the “Great Schism” in the 11th century. Greek Orthodoxy was centered (and is still centered) around the area of the former Byzantine Empire. With this in mind, much of the Greek Orthodox Church architecture and art are influenced from the Byzantine period. Greek Orthodox Christians believe in a single God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.    

When Father George was talking, I learned that the Orthodox Church claims to be the one true church of Christ, and it seeks to trace its origin back to the original apostles through an unbroken chain of apostolic succession. I found this very interesting. Another thing I learned was the importance of icons. Greek Orthodox Churches pay homage to icons while Roman Catholic Churches have statues.

Father George also explained the difference between the concept of original sin. For Catholics, Mary was born with no original sin. For Greek Orthodox, Mary, just like all other people, was born and will then die. In Greek Orthodox, God created man perfect with free will and specific directions to follow. Adam and Eve, however, chose to disobey God by eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. In doing this, the changed the “perfect” to the “flawed”. This idea of flawed nature and everything that comes from it is a result of original sin. 

One major discrepancy between Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic has to do with Easter. Easter is a moveable feast. Easter is linked to the Jewish feast of Passover. The First Council of Nicaea established the date of Easter as the first Sunday after the full moon following the March equinox. For Roman Catholics, the date of Easter varies between March 22nd and April 25th. This date is determined using the Gregorian calendar. Greek Orthodox uses the Julian calendar and therefore Easter varies between April 4th and May 8th. The main reason the date for Easter is different has to do with the fact that in Greek Orthodoxy Easter can not take place until after Passover is finished.   

http://www.stspeterandpaulboulder.org/Pages/Our_Faith_Introduction2.shtml