Sacred Actions In The Eastern Churches

The Eastern Orthodox churches did not develop scholastic, logic-based systematic theologies like those of late medieval and modern Catholics and Protestants in Western Europe. Many of the differences between Eastern and Western explanations of the sacraments can be traced to this historical divergence. Moreover, the sacramental life of worship in the Eastern churches retains an important role for fasting at certain times in the church year and for the veneration of icons. Bishops and theologians of the Orthodox church and the Roman Catholic church have been involved in the last decade in explaining how the two churches express the faith in continuity with the apostles. Both churches understand themselves as a communion of faith and sacraments, preeminently manifested in eucharistic celebrations presided over by an ordained bishop or priest. Catholics and Orthodox in the 1988 New Valamo consensus statement agreed that " on all essential points concerning ordination, our churches have …