Deborah Gyapong wrote a thoughtful article in her blog – Happy New Year and Happy Solemnity of Mary the Mother of God. Actually, some priests and their communities in union with Rome still celebrate the Circumcision when they use the 1962 missal. But, that’s beside the point.
She asked our reflections for the question of knowing whether schism or heresy was a worse sin, those two sins being grouped with apostasy as the three capital crimes of canon law. Schism, in common language, is breaking away from the institutional Church to join another Church or to found a new Christian community. Heresy is denying official Church doctrines or teaching something that contradicts them, thus perverting the content of what priests teach and what common people in the pews accept as the truth. Apostasy is packing in religion altogether, typically to become an atheist or a Satanist. Sometimes, the distinction between schism and apostasy is conveniently blurred, so that someone who has gone off to join another Church is branded an apostate.
Deborah’s thinking is little different from my own when I was a young convert of 22. It is sometimes said that heresy is more tolerable than schism. Schism is a real threat to the Church when it happens at any significant scale, and the owners begin to lose their property and sources of income – to put it at the most cynical level. This explains why Hans Küng was merely silenced, and Archbishop Lefebvre was excommunicated for consecrating bishops illicitly.
Some of us have noticed that when it came to Anglicans leaving either the official Anglican Communion or the TAC, they might as well have been converting at the time of Pius IX and the years following Vatican I! If, however, they are important brass in the official Anglican Communion, they are welcome to appear to the Roman Catholic faithful as real bishops with authority and partners in the ecumenical dialogue. Indeed, we are dealing with double standards. This is the world of diplomacy and politics, not the little flocks of Jesus, the Apostles and the wandering bishops of the first centuries. The Church doesn’t seem to be able to make up its mind about whether it is a community of Christians or some flaky mini-state playing at politics and diplomacy.
This is why I have sometime been critical of Deborah, but without wanting to show any disrespect to her person. She is fighting with ideas, and many of her inner conflicts are my own of thirty or twenty years ago. This is why, to some, sedevacantism can seem to be an attractive intellectual solution. It is a step further (or less far depending of the way you look at it) than the typical Continuing Anglican line: the official establishment is no longer the Church because or x, y and z, so a new organisation is founded to replace what is seen to have failed. Something is more important than the institution – the reason why it exists. We used to say finis operis at seminary. If that reason is altered or annihilated, then the institution is no longer what it says it is. If a golf club gives up golf to turn its interest to football, it is no longer a golf club.
The trouble with sedevacantism is that you have to go all the way and find an alternative way of making a “true Pope” or conclude that the Church doesn’t need a Pope. Most sedevacantists will wring their hands and say that God will provide. They may have a very long wait!
Outside of sedevacantism, it is all very difficult intellectually. I personally could no longer live with the conflicts of either official Catholicism or sedevacantism, and my choice would have been Orthodoxy, Anglicanism or Continuing Anglicanism. Another difficulty with the present situation is that Rome reformed / recast its sacramental rites in 1968-70, notably the rite of episcopal consecration. If anyone else had produced that rite sometime before 1896, the year of Apostolicae Curae, this document saying that Anglican orders are absolutely null and utterly void would have been applied to that rite. Following that logic, the argument has been made. It is flattering to see that the TAC, from the time when we were all getting excited about the run-up to Anglicanorum coetibus, had been cited as part of the diabolical “great conspiracy” to make all holy orders and sacraments invalid! Very often, the only argument many can produce for the validity of the new rite is that it was issued or promulgated by an infallible Pope!
One question we can already ask ourselves is why so many people are leaving Catholicism. Right, some may have lost the faith and become agnostics and atheists. Others want unrestricted sex without any responsibility or consequences – babies or family obligations. But I don’t think those two categories account for more than a minority. For most, the institutional Church has nothing to say to them that they do not suspect to be some kind of agenda that has nothing to do with the Gospel or Christ.
Those are my frank reflections. To be fair, I wouldn’t pin all the blame on Rome. What do we TACers or ACCers or whatever have to say to modern and post-modern humanity? Monasteries have, by not saying anything but rather creating the circumstances in which people can experience God for themselves. Can we do something like that? We all have a long way to go, and I would be the first to criticise my own camp.
One thing is for sure, we’re not getting anywhere if we start by telling people that they are our property and that they have to obey like the mesmerised German people obeyed Hitler in the 1930’s. The notion of schism needs to be dismantled. God cannot be contained is such patently inadequate vessels as are all our Churches, big or small, old or new. The Church needs to be Catholic!
Finally, we are not Catholics because the Pope says we are, but because we adhere to the Tradition of the Fathers and keep the sacramental Mystery through our liturgy and the Apostolic Priesthood.
It is late in the day and the light is dimming…
New Year resolution? There need to be many, if they can be kept. The first that comes into mind is that this year will not be one for fighting or seeking resolution. Many of us will need to take a step back and let the time pass and become a time spent in prayer. The hour has not yet come.
The Blue Flower 
Fr. Chadwick, happy new year. Your post above is very well conceived, as usual. The point that you make that “we are not Catholics because the Pope says we are, but because we adhere to the Tradition of the Fathers and keep the sacramental Mystery through our liturgy and the Apostolic Priesthood,” is most welcome.
(My argument will sound dualistic, but I offer it for the sake of clarity. )
I would contend that your reasoning is more characteristic of the Eastern Orthodox than of the Roman Catholics. It seems that the Romans believe that they are catholic by virtue of their fealty to the pope and their submission to the magisterium. So, to them, schism is the worse sin, since it breaks that obedience. On the other hand, the Eastern Orthodox have a visceral jealousy for the truth in doctrine, and so to them, the sin of heresy is worse than the sin of schism.
The Orthodox accuse the Catholics of the greater sin of heresy for numerous dogmatic innovations of the last millennium. The Catholics accuse the Orthodox of the greater sin of schism for not submitting to the universal jurisdiction of the papacy. The logic is parallel, without a meeting point. To make the two arguments intersect, one must endeavor to understand how the other thinks according to the other’s own frame of reference.
One cannot serve two masters at once, so if a person is intent on finding and clinging to the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church, not in some mystical form, but as a visible organization, then he must choose between the two of these great communions. That desire to find the right organization is a statement made from a more Catholic sort of logic, I admit. Is the Catholic Church authentic by virtue of its universality? Or, is the Orthodox Church more authentic by virtue of its antiquity?
To an Anglican like me, the standard Anglican communion in my country, the Episcopal Church, has the organizational size and history to make an initial show of catholicity, but it has fallen into heresy. On the other hand, the continuing Anglican denominations make a show of orthodoxy by preserving the Faith. But, they are in schism, not only from the Romans or the Anglican Communion, but also from each other. In any case, slouching back toward Anglican heresy and schism is no longer an option, at least for me. This will sound simplistic, but I am faced with a decision. Which should I choose, loyalty to the pope, or adherence to the truth?
I am faced with a decision. Which should I choose, loyalty to the pope, or adherence to the truth?
That dilemma used to depress me when I was a young “convert” full of the apologetics of the 1930’s. Ecclesiology based on the sacramental mystery and the consensus of the faith seemed that much more satisfying. Orthodoxy would seem to be the answer, except if you live hundreds or thousands of miles from the nearest Orthodox.
Or you can go to the RC Church and try to imagine it’s all as it was in the 1880’s, something like setting up the Invisible Empire of Romantia in the back bedroom with the Union Jack and joss sticks, or you can try twisting the meanings of everything like Newman with the 39 Articles. I’m sorry to sound cynical, but we have to find our own way.
We have also to remember that most people solved the dilemma by sleeping in on Sunday mornings, going fishing, washing the car, mowing the lawn, or in short forgetting all about Christianity and living as if it never existed.
In the end of the day, we’re all in a mess. Best to make do with where and what we are and stick with it.
I am not quite ready to give up yet. It seems to me that the issue is not so much about me as it is about the Church. What must matter more is where the Lord is present, not so much where I feel comfortable. Wherever He is present, if I present myself there, too, then I will feel comfortable. But, that is not the aim but a benefit.
My question is not hypothetical, but quite existential. I intend to join the ecclesial group that proves to be the most authentic by objective theological standards. We are fortunate enough here in America to have many immigrants and all sorts of options.
At the same time, I will have to admit that subjective criteria will likely make or break the final decision. My gut will have to concur with my mind. If I can find what can be identified with the requisite marks of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church, and my intuition concurs — and my wife doesn’t leave me over it! — then that should be sufficient.
It is a little like a good father with his son. The father may have the fruit of his experience of life and want to save his son a lot of heartache. But, the son will do his own thing and might make a great success of it in a way his elders could never imagine. Go where God is calling you!
I have the impression you’re a little older and wiser than I am, so the tables might be turned!
Bloody good, father! Particularly your point about Apostolicae Curae and the revision of the Roman Pontifical. Of course, Pius XII, the last true pope (!), altered the Pontifical in 1947…
Yes, either that, or you can validly ordain with just anything, including the Book of Common Prayer!
Even with a Wesley? I don’t know what Anglo-Catholics think of Methodists, but I suppose they were the first schism from Canterbury 🙂
I don’t know about other people, but I have known a few Methodists up in Yorkshire and my home town of Kendal. I have found the ones I have known to be the salt of the earth, and one has to look a long way to find more solid and morally upright folk. They have declined a lot over the years and are going the same way of all flesh. But the point remains that they are Christians and deserve our respect.
“…but I suppose they were the first schism from Canterbury”
You’ve forgotten the Nonjurors.
Readers interested in the Nonjurors could look at these Resources on the Nonjurors. Interesting stuff.
Schisms from the CofE…an interesting thought…Just look at the initial mess from about 1535-1590. In light of the subservience of Church to State, was that heresy or schism as they repeatedly were loyal to one monarch &/or parliament or another?
I would think the Puritans were the first to go into schism, leading to their attempt to subtly alter the CofE (demanding new bible leading to KJV), then destroy the monarchy (Martyr Charles), destroy the institutional CofE (Martyr Laud) and remake the CofE into a non-episcopal puritan body. The entire period from about 1640-1660).
And what to make of Scotland and its Reformed, non-Anglican Church? Same for Wales?
And of course then the Non-jurors and Wesley. So all that from just 1535-1800.
I am simply going to second Patricius’s statement! Very, very good!
I once had an enlightening conversation with a fairly modernist Roman Catholic priest who stated that when the Pope approves women clergy (which he was certain will happen), then women priests will be the Catholic faith!
Much of this can of course be traced to Newman’s own convoluted acceptance of Papal Infallibility, which he knew was not the ancient faith of the Catholic Church, by his theory of the development of doctrine. One must also add that Newman is indeed the poster-child of modernist Roman Catholicism.
Is the one church defined by an organizational structure? That’s what Rome asserts, and I think that opinion stands at the root of all the abuses of the roman church. “One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism, One God and Father of all”. That much is visible. I see nothing anywhere about a visible central organization or an earthly center.
It was said above, One cannot serve two masters at once, so if a person is intent on finding and clinging to the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church, not in some mystical form, but as a visible organization, then he must choose between the two of these great communions. Why? Merely because they both claim to be the one true church? That is circular. I cannot see schism as the mere lack of being under such visible authority or governance. Rather, I see schism as a sin of all Christians without exception. If there are those with whom we share (or claim to share) a common Lord and a single precious Faith (at least in the essentials) and we are not in mutual bonds of communion and fellowship, then we, at BOTH sides of the separation, are in schism one from the other. Until real repentance and amendment comes to both sides of the break, all parties are equally guilty of schism, and healing is imperative. We are all bound to seek earnestly for a way.
Heresy, on the other hand is the teaching of a doctrine incompatible with the Faith once delivered. The power of binding and loosing does give the visible church the right and duty to decide when this heretical teaching has reached a degree of incompatibility when fellowship must be broken. This (as Paul wrote to the Corinthians) is not an utter casting out, but a setting aside until repentance may come, with an earnest desire that this may be so. This is not schism, but discipline. There have historically been times when the larger part of the Church has erred so badly that the smaller and less ‘official’ part has found it necessary to break fellowship for a time. Athanasius, for example, certainly seems to exemplify this.
Which is worse? I don’t believe that to be an answerable question. Both are wrong. God does not ask, but demands of us that we make every effort to heal the divisions that occur. Sin is sin. We are all sinners, always called to repentance.
Any thoughts on the use of lace?
Sorry? That doesn’t have much to do with the price of fish…
Dale’s point is well made and highlights some problems in this question of authority.
But more generally, I don’t see how heresy or schism per se are sins at all. If you sincerely believe something different from an official orthodoxy proclaimed by whichever establishment, then this is a demonstration of that freedom from constraint of following one’s judgment and conscience, a good thing in itself (cf Dignitatis Humanae). And schism is a two-way status. Naturally one church will say that “the other” is a break-away. But if you look at it from the point of view of the agents, both are broken. A will say “B is in schism (i.e. abandoned the true church)”; B will say “A is in heresy (i.e. effectively abandoned the true church)”. There’s little difference between the two.
This whole domain of ecclesiological sin is very theoretical and highly dubious, if considered fairly. The bigger always get to assume the higher moral ground or write the theology books, so to speak. The term “heresy” is used as if it means “falsehood” when it strictly stands for something deliberately and separately chosen. “Schism” is used as if it means “cast out” or “illegitimised” but it strictly means simply “divided”. Thus, the Roman Catholic Church, the Protestant Churches and the Orthodox Churches are all in schism, from each other, and all hold and teach “heresies”.
“Truth” and “Integrity” are other things altogether. Perhaps that is what we should be talking about.
Perhaps all is Church and all is God. I’m not being facetious, but one seems to be more likely to find God in a boat at sea, walking in the mountains or a great pine forest than in churches of any denomination. I can accept the argument that all churches are in heresy and schism. That is why they are religio depopulata, at least in the west, where people are educated to be rational. The monastic idea may well be all that is left, that and wandering bishops like in the early Church…
Well, Father, if I may pick up on your thought and take it further: that all churches are in heresy (in the usual, not the strict, sense). Yes, I think this may be the great insight. The moment that any group proclaims its guardianship of Truth and of Revelation, the moment that any group claims to be able to guarantee such things, to be The Authority, it has committed the Great Heresy, that is, they stand between a creature, all creatures and God and that is an usurpation too far, a theft of a birth right.
I call to mind John 13:14-15.
This was my whole point in putting up the Grand Inquisitor, so beautifully played by John Gielgud. The more we think about “correcting” Christ (because he was “wrong” in giving mankind freedom), the more outrageous it is!
The more we think about “correcting” Christ (because he was “wrong” in giving mankind freedom), the more outrageous it is!
Exactly! But we ‘correct’ Him just as surely when we present freedom as providing immunity from the consequences of free will wrongly exercised. Lucifer’s free will turned him into Satan. Adam’s free will was so exercised as to bring about a radical separation from God. One’s choice not to eat can result in anorexic death. One’s choice of promiscuity can result in AIDS or other STDs or ‘merely’ in all manner of psychosocial ills. There indeed are right choices and wrong choices and we are called upon to do our very best to find the right choices, to accept responsibility when our choices lead to disaster, and to seek divine help (through the Cross and Resurrection) to set us back on the right (or workable) path.
Christ is often silent (as in the film) before those who would correct Him, because He has already planted in us the hunger for His ways — if we will only listen. Gielgud is well presenting the so common state of one who does know right and wrong, but has his reasons for choosing what is wrong. That freedom exists, but its exercise has consequences, ultimately that radical seraration from God.
The theological mess that is now Rome is clear just from the intro to the piece, the “Feast” of the Solemnity of Mary though…”some priests and their communities in union with Rome still celebrate the Circumcision when they use the 1962 missal. But, that’s beside the point.” No, it is right on point.
The ongoing (r)evoloutionary changes in the RCC over the past 1500 years have nearly always been about 2 things: increasing papal power & control, and boasting the role & scope of Mary. The destruction of the Feast of the Circumcision and its forced replacement by the papacy of the new Solemnity of Mary, is the heart of the ontological reality that is Rome. The Gospel is replaced. The road isn’t leading to Christ. We quickly notice how Christ, who is Lord and Savior undergoes circumcision and all that that entails theologically, is replaced by his mother (who is on her way to eventually becoming co-mediatrix?).
This isn’t the Gospel. That has been replaced by Rome with an all powerful pope who is personally infallible and with full worldwide jurisdiction and primacy, who sitll controls purgatory and indulgences. And Mary has transmogrified into…immaculate conception, Assumption, solemnity, special heart (both immaculate heart & sacred heart?), and now potentially approaching co-mediatrix.
As people point out here, the RCC is whatever the pope says it is and that is the end of story. So new pontificals and ordinals and liturgies and hymnals and music and eucharistic ministers and vestments and architecture and altars, and so on and so on. So WHEN there are women priests, it will be OK since the pope says so. And anyone who then dissents is either a heretic or schismatic! 😉
But Michael, let’s please remember that the Ecumenical Throne of Constantinople also claims universal jurisdiction over all “Barbarian lands.” The only reason that it seems patently foolish is that the Russians, the largest group of Byzantine Orthodox refuse to accept it; but such movements towards a universal papal authority exist in the Byzantine Church as well.
Do not forget that the artificial Byzantine imperial creations of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchates of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, in areas that are actually part of Oriental Orthodoxy are also part of a Byzantine papalism. And not too long ago even the Patriarchate of Antioch was simply a Greek bishop appointed by the Ecumenical Patriarchate as well, and he lived in Constantinople (this existed until the 19th century when the Russians demanded an Arabic-speaking patriarch, but even that was politically motivated sine the Russian Tzars were attempting to exert political control and influence in the Middle East); the so-called Greek Orthodox Patriarchates of Alexandria and Jerusalem follow this type of Greek Orthodox cearopapism method to this day.
Dale, You’re talking about the internal workings and “politics” of our Church, not our faith, dogma, or worship. I always keep in mind de facto and de jure when thinking about the claims of patriarchs and bishops. Usually the former ends up being more important than the latter. We are a conciliar Church that has steadfastly refused to grant primacy or infallibility to any one man. Our independent jurisdictions are bound by faith and councils, not prelates. And never forget so many prelates seem to have erred over the years (e.g., Nestorius) and some have had rather…interesting…demises (e.g., Cyril Lukaris); put not your eternal trust in princes or bishops, the sons of men, but only God and the workings of the Holy Ghost in His Church.
Perhaps, but the Archbishop of the Greek bishop in America has declared that being Orthodox is part of having Greek DNA; and remember the Roman Patriarchate did not start out with full blown infallibility and universal jurisdiction either; it started out not too much differently than the present position of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Given time, and with the removal of the Russians blocking Greek aspiration, it could easily go the same path.
Meant to write “…archbishop of the Greek Church in America…” Sorry.
“Our independent jurisdictions are bound by faith and councils, not prelates.”
Perhaps in fantasy, but not in reality. Why are the Ukrainian Orthodox of Kiev not Orthodox? What about the Greek Old Calendarists? The Old Believers? They are not considered as “canonical” Orthodox because they are not in communion with the Ecumenical Throne of Constantinople; yet they have the same faith as the canonical Orthodox. So your contention, often repeated by the Orthodox, proves to not be true under closer observation.
Dale, I’d have to investigate how we treat these other groups in regard to ordination and communion. And faith and dogma include discusses about the Church, including proper behavior within it and proper respect for authority. Paul didn’t say everyone legitimately got to be his own bishop and start his own church. We, like all faith groups, have schisms. There is a recognized proper authority within jurisdictions. Being non-canonical doesn’t mean you aren’t orthodox in faith and dogma. I think ROCOR is a classic example of that. One day they were non-canonical; the next, canonical. But no one said they were heterodox. Just schismatic.
Dale, Thinking we had a discussion recently about historic confessing Reformation bodies and the issue of Mary’s perpetual virginity. I can find her perpetual virginity in Lutheranism (Smalcald Articles by Luther, 1537, the Latin). Yesterday I was looking at the Reformed Second Helvetic (Swiss) Confession (1561 by Bullinger), which is still officially used today by Presbyterian Church (USA). Chapter 11, 3rd para. “Christ is True Man, Having Real Flesh”, says, “…and born of the ever virgin Mary.” I don’t know if PCUSA has an celebration on Aug. 15 like ELCA and LCMS for Mary or it their hymnal has any songs tied to her. EOs, RCs, Lutherans, and Reformed have accepted her perpetual virginity. If Anglicanism is that unique combination of RC, Lutheran, and Reformed, then I couldn’t imagine why they’d have any issue with her perpetual virginity.
At least with the Greeks, when they received a fairly large group of Old Calendarists into their jurisdiction, not too long ago, they did not re-baptize, but did re-ordain all of the clergy.
The issues with the old calendarists are indeed odd; since the largest numbers of Orthodox are still old still attached to the old reckoning.
The situation with the Orthodox Church of Macedonia is mostly ethnic in origin, but because they are not in communion with Constantinople, they remain outside of the Church. Very much like Rome, one must be in communion with the Pope to be Catholic; with the Orthodox, it is Constantinople.
The situation with the Russian Church Outside of Russia is a special case since it preserved its canonicity because regardless of difficulties, by always remaining in union with the Serbs, and via them, with Constantinople.
“So WHEN there are women priests, it will be OK since the pope says so. And anyone who then dissents is either a heretic or schismatic!”
When this finally becomes reality, and I don’t doubt that it will, it will be the final “nail in the coffin” of the RCC and to many of Rome’s critics it will be a happy day, the day they have long awaited, the fulfillment of their dreams,…… undeniable proof that the Pope is the Anti-Christ.
I agree that we could be a little more temperate when discussing any Church.
A small suggestion for the New Year: Charity.
In the spirit of charity, I will say this: People ought to be encouraged to go to where they find God. Wherever that is, That is where you are suppose to be. God doesn’t call each of us individually to the same place, which is all for the good. The alternative would be a Church filled with only Benedictines or Franciscans or charismatics or tradies or Byzantine imperialists or God-alone-knows-what. So just chill out. For all we know, liberal bishops in the Eastern Orthodox Churches (and there are many) may approve of female clergy before Rome does. And if that happens, what will Rome’s critics say then? I trust you’ll eat your humble pie and join me at the Novus Ordo Missae.
And please spare me this nonsense about how the Holy Ghost would never allow this or that Synod to go into error. That’s the sort of infallible talk you accuse Rome of. And when it comes to blaming Rome for defining “new” dogmas and treating them as if they were absolutely essential aspects of the Faith, let’s remember that Constantinople and Moscow also have their novel doctrines, e.g. the uncreated Light of Mount Tabor and the energy vs. essence distinction which has as much (and as little) basis in Tradition and Scripture as the Immaculate Conception does. Different dogmas. Different popes. Same claim to “infallibility.” Same but different idols needing to be subverted to clean house and make room for the Crucified Rabbi.
Maximilian, As you know, we aren’t talking about any old “this or that Synod”. Ecumenical Councils are not mere Synods. Only 7 have been officially recognized and we haven’t had one for about 1200 years. We take God’s promise about His Church seriously and we believe the Holy Ghost is active in the life of the Church both liturgically and conciliarly. Yes, Orthodoxy does allow for a lot of speculative theology, but that isn’t promulgated dogma. So much of what ended up in the West (e.g., Limbo, purgatory, etc.) arose from the speculative theology of the East (Origin, Gregory of Nyssa, etc.).
You might check out the recent year-end issue of The Economist (London), Dec. 22nd. A fascinating 3-page article, “In the Name of the Name”, about the Czarist Russian Orthodox Church and Russian monks on Mt. Athos in regard to the name controversy (1907-1913): name-deifiers vs. name-glorifiers. Author claims, “Metropolitan Hilarion, the Oxford-trained prelate who heads the Russian church’s external arm, has studied the name-glorifying dispute and concluded that it is still an open question who was right.” So monks then and now get caught up in some speculative theology that pertains mainly to them, monasticism, and their ascetic way of life. It wasn’t dogma then and it isn’t now.
The Oriental Orthodox only accept three ecumenical councils. Perhaps these are the only infallible ones?
Dale, you said:
Why are the Ukrainian Orthodox of Kiev not Orthodox? What about the Greek Old Calendarists? The Old Believers? They are not considered as “canonical” Orthodox because they are not in communion with the Ecumenical Throne of Constantinople; yet they have the same faith as the canonical Orthodox. So your contention, often repeated by the Orthodox, proves to not be true under closer observation.
Do all these separated groups indeed have the same faith as the canonical Orthodox? Are at least some of them perhaps not in communion with Constantinople as a result of strong differences of belief? Old Believers and Old Calendarists themselves think they have significant differences with “canonical” Orthodox – and they do – to the extent of calling their opponents heretics. There are other groups such as the Synod of Milan with very similar attitudes. Yes, there are some divisions of merely ethnic cause – but these tend to be solved over time – unless the faith of the divided brethren has diverged enough to solidify these unfortunate divisions.
I think that we need to make certain distinctions. There are Greek Old Calendarists who will say that the state Church of Greece is heretical, but when one tries to pin them down, they simply fall into the blather about westernization and ecumenism, the faith is still the same. But not all Old Calendarists, such as the official Church of Russia believes that the new calendar is heretical (Even the Orthodox have their dirty little secret concerning both the Finnish and the Estonia Church, they even celebrate Easter according to the new calendar!).
The Ukrainian Orthodox of the Kievian Patriarchate, and the Orthodox Church of Macedonia (the state Church of that former province of Yugoslavia), which are both in communion with each other, are in complete theological agreement with Constantinople, their exclusion tends to be ethnic and political. But since they are not in communion with Constantinople, they are not considered as canonical.
The Faith of the Old Believers is exactly the same as that of the Russian Church, they left both the state Russian Church as well as Constantinople over the issue of a Russian novus ordo liturgy being forced upon them in the 17th century. They preserve a Byzantine liturgy of about the 8th century; including prostrations on Sundays. And many other things nowadays considered as “western” by those Byzantines using the new liturgy.