“Does the Eucharist Make the Church? An Ecclesiological Comparison of Stăniloae and Zizioulas, ” St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly 51:1 (2007): 23-70. (original) (raw)
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Despite much passionate discussion of Dumitru Stăniloae’s ecclesiology or his more comprehensive view of divine-human communion, his doctrine of the Eucharist as a sacrament has received no attention in scholarship or more generally in Orthodox contemporary theology. The present study undertakes this examination, trying to chart Stăniloae’s writings on the Eucharist and follow the evolution of his thinking. After the identification of three stages of development, the following key aspects are presented: the influence of Bulgakov, the Eucharist as a sacrament and a sacrifice, the relationship between the Eucharist and the personal spiritual life (the “inner liturgy”), Stăniloae’s position vis-à-vis the frequency of the eucharistic partaking, and the significance of the Eucharist for ontology. The relevance of Stăniloae’s eucharistic doctrine for ecclesiology is left for a future occasion.
The goal of this paper is to show that an encounter of the Eucharistic ecclesiology of the Russian Orthodox theologian Nicholas Afanasiev and Catholic theology in the 1950s was a truly fruitful instance of reciprocal leaning between Orthodox and Catholic theologies. I also hope to show that this example has not only historical significance but it continues to be a source of insight for Catholic ecclesiology. Fr. Nicholas Afanasiev (1893 is known for coining the phrase "Eucharistic ecclesiology." The claim that his thought exerted certain influence on Catholic ecclesiology prior to Vatican II is confirmed by the fact that he was mentioned three times in the preparatory documents for the council's Constitution on the Church. 1 In this paper I will explore two questions arising from this fact: a historical question of how Afanasiev became known to the fathers of the council and a theological question of why his work was considered significant enough to warrant mention. This paper will conclude with a discussion about what Afanasiev's teaching can offer today to the study of the council's ecclesiology.
Integrating the ascetical and the eucharistic: current challenges in Orthodox ecclesiology
International Journal for The Study of The Christian Church, 2011
In contemporary Orthodox theology, the claim that the Church is constituted in the eucharistic assembly has the status of a first principle in ecclesiology. In this article, I hope to give a general outline of this eucharistic ecclesiology as presented by its most well-known exponent, Metropolitan John Zizioulas. In so doing, I also intend to trace briefly its history back to the Orthodox theologians George Florovsky and Nicholas Afanasiev. Although the most influential form for Orthodox understandings of the Church, eucharistic ecclesiology does not necessarily share an unchallenged consensus among Orthodox theologians, and I will show how Vladimir Lossky and Dumitru St aniloae do not endorse a strict identification of the Church with the Eucharist. I will argue that although the Eucharist should continue to shape the Orthodox understanding of what the Church is, the way forward for an Orthodox eucharistic ecclesiology is an integration of the ascetical and the sacramental through a trinitarian theology that offers an account of the eternal relation of the Son to the Holy Spirit. Finally, I wish to raise the question of the implications of a eucharistic ecclesiology for a political theology.
"Unfading Light " Conference, Oxford, 2019
The notion of eucharistic ecclesiology is one of the most definitive ideas in modern ecclesiology. Adapted by theologians such as Henri de Lubac, it was coined by Nicholas Afanasiev in his essay The Lord’s Supper to explain the notion of “concelebration”: the president presiding over the eucharist together with the entire eucharistic assembly. Afanasiev identified eucharistic ecclesiology in the life of early Christianity, and it is proper to regard John Zizioulas as building on it. However, there is evidence to suggest that the conceptual basis of eucharistic ecclesiology – the eucharist being the focus, or nexus, of unity of the Church – predates Afanasiev. Reading Sergius Bulgakov reveals this to be the case, one example being his approach to ecumenism and the other being the source of unity in ecclesial hierarchy. Afanasiev’s place in the development of eucharistic ecclesiology must therefore be reconsidered: he coined a term and identified with the early Church an idea that was present to the theologians of the Russian diaspora.
Eucharist, ministry and authority in the ecclesiology of John Zizioulas
1997
The Introduction outlines Zizioulas' ecumenical career as it relates to his ecclesiology. It describes the purpose of this study and establishes the boundaries of the thesis, which aims at demonstrating that his model of communion provides a suitable basis for a Trinitarian ecclesiology. Chapter One discusses Zizioulas' description of the way in which humans relate to each other. It examines his claim that we live in a situation of profound division and explores how he uses Trinitarian theology to suggest a way in which baptism marks an overcoming of this, leading to communion. Chapter Two examines Zizioulas' perception of Christology as constituted by Pneumatology. It suggests that this synthesis can be used as a basis for an understanding of relationships and authority in the Church and is determinative for a concept of communion. Chapter Three describes how Zizioulas views the Eucharist as an eschatological event both to construct a pattern of communion in the Church and to describe how it is realized. Chapter Four discusses the role of the bishop in the structures of the Church. It demonstrates how Zizioulas' eucharistic understanding allows a relational model of authority to develop and explores the implications this has for ecclesial structures and patterns of authority. Chapter Five relates the laity to the authority structures of the Church in such a way that all people may be seen to have a place within its decision processes. It analyses the extent to which Zizioulas depends on a model of communion to construct this understanding. Chapter Six describes how Zizioulas relates authority in the local Church to that of the universal Church. It examines both how the bishops exercise authority in conciliar fashion and how the whole Church receives or rejects their teaching. Chapter Seven explores Zizioulas' use of the concept of primacy. It suggests that an ecclesiology of communion, such as that of Zizioulas, is incomplete without the concept of a universal primate. The Conclusion analyses the consistency of Zizioulas' ecclesiology and the application it can have to ecumenical debate. I argue that Zizioulas' communion-based ecclesiology is fundamentally sound, although needing some adjustments and is able to provide a stimulus to ecumenical debate. IPGS/ABST/94 Use this side only our individual happiness.' J. Zizioulas, Communion and Otherness, pp.8, 10. 36. J. Zizioulas, Being As Communion, p.43: Thus "the other" becomes a threat to the person, its "hell" and its "fall," to recall the words of Sartre. Once again the concept of the person leads human existence to an impasse: humanism proves unable to affirm personhood.' 37. J. Zizioulas, On Being a Person, p.34. 38. Zizioulas has suggested that, biologically speaking, death as an event may be necessary and even welcome, as it helps to perpetuate life in the form of the species (cf. J. Zizioulas, Being As Communion, p.47). If man as an individual is unimportant and social man all-important, then death is not meaningless, ensuring as it does the survival of the race and the survival of the parents in the faces of their children. However, Zizioulas also notes that when the human being is regarded as person, that is, as a unique, relational being, then death cannot be other than something which is tragic and unacceptable, as being the very denial of personhood, for 'what does not survive is the concrete and unique identity, the person.' (J. Zizioulas, Being As Communion, p.47). 39.
Liturgica Sacra, 2019
The issue of my theme is “The Unification Mystery of Christ in Church”. Therefore, we try to underline the Orthodox specific from the patristical and apologetical point of view. Therefore, one of our principal point of the analysis is the preparation of priests and believers for the Eucharistic moment in the Orthodox Liturgy. In the apologetic approach of our presentation, we try to offer an actual interpretation of this Holly Sacrament, together with his necessity on the actual society and to offer some theological solution in the actual context.
EUCHARISTIC ECCLESIOLOGY OF NICOLAS AFANASIEV AND ITS ECUMENICAL SIGNIFICANCE: A NEW PERSPECTIVE
This essay reintroduces the work of the Russian Orthodox theologian Fr. Nicolas Afanasiev. Reading Afanasiev's major works-The Church of the Holy Spirit and his programmatic essay on the Lord's Supper-leads one to the conclusion that the relationship of the local and universal churches was not the central concern of his eucharistie ecclesiology. Rather, Afanasiev's work was aimed at the restoration of the meaning of "gathering together as a Church"-beginning with the liturgical lives of local assemblies and extending into the relationships between various churches. Accordingly, in view of this aim, his eucharistie ecclesiology can be called and better understood as "ecclesiology of the eucharistie assembly." Afanasiev's attention to the eucharistie assembly has a rarely explored ecumenical significance. He finds that the problems of the eucharistie assembly and the problems of the divided church are of the same nature and, therefore, cannot be solved separately from each other.