Bonovox

My freind Jim wrote this Open Letter to the Media.  He expresses something that bugs me as well.  The Patriarch of Constantinople is not the "Orthodox Pope."  Read his whole letter, bu I particularly like this passage:

But there are other Sees as well, Antioch and Alexandria for example, and they too have Patriarchs. Patriarch Bartholomew I is simply given the title of ‘first among equals’ since Rome broke communion with the other Sees over a millennium ago.

Is it really so difficult for you to comprehend that a group of people can have the same faith, the same worship, etc for over 2,000 years without a single human figure-head directing their steps? Does this not speak to an incomprehensible act by a God in Whom you may or may not believe who has held together His Church through the ages? Is that so tough to ‘get’?

My Bishop’s name is THOMAS. He is the representative of Christ to me, he declares the will of God to me, as any other Bishop would/should do for his own flock of Christians. Because he comes from a long line of Bishops that have been given the authority of the Apostles by the Apostles, he can say along with the Apostles: ‘On behalf of Christ, we are ambassadors, as though God were beseeching you by us…’ (2 Cor. 5:20).