The Orthodox Church

The Orthodox Church, founded in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, traces its lineage – both in doctrine (2 Thess 2:15) and in linear succession from the Apostles through ordained bishops and presbyters (1 Tim 5:22; 2 Tim 1:6) – back to the original seventy apostles of Jesus Christ (St Luke 10:1) in the first century AD.

The word "Orthodox," from the Greek word orthodoxia, means both "right belief" and "right glory" or "worship." Worship has never lost its direct continuity with the worship of the ancient Church. The central hymn of the Church's service of evening prayer was referred to by St Basil the Great in the fourth century as being so ancient that no one remembered who composed it.



Orthodoxy is not a set of rational beliefs, held more or less abstractly, but an all-encompassing way of life. According to the maxim of a fourth-century monk, Evagrius of Pontus, "a theologian is one who prays truly." Orthodoxy is by very definition an experiential faith.

The Faith of the Apostles, “One Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church,” in the East and West, has been preserved and upheld through the Seven Ecumenical Councils of the undivided Church against erroneous beliefs. These are:

1. First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (325) Condemned Arianism and adopted the original Nicene Creed, fixed Easter date; recognized primacy of the sees of Rome, Alexandria and Antioch and granted the See of Jerusalem a position of honor.

2.
Second Ecumenical Council of Constantinople (381) Condemned Arianism and Macedonianism, revised the Nicene Creed in regard to the Holy Spirit.

3.Third Ecumenical Council of Ephesus (431) Condemned Nestorianism, proclaimed the Virgin Mary as the Theotokos ("God-bearer"), condemned Pelagianism, and reaffirmed the Nicene Creed.

4.Fourth Ecumenical Council of Chalcedon (451) Condemned monophysitism, adopted the Chalcedonian Definition, which described the hypostatic union of the two natures of Christ, human and divine. Reinstated those deposed in 449 and deposed Dioscorus of Alexandria. This council also acclaimed the Bishop of Constantinople as equal in honor to the Bishop of Rome.

5.Fifth Ecumenical  Council of Constantinople (553) Condemned the Three Chapters as Nestorian, and condemned certain writings of Origen of Alexandria.

6.Sixth Ecumenical Council of Constantinople (680-681) Condemned Monothelitism.

7.Seventh Ecumenical  Council of Nicaea (787) Restored the veneration of icons and condemned iconoclasm.The Church, founded in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, traces its lineage – both in doctrine (2 Thess 2:15) and in linear succession from the Apostles through ordained bishops and presbyters (1 Tim 5:22; 2 Tim 1:6) – back to the original seventy apostles of Jesus Christ (St Luke 10:1) in the first century AD. 

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