A girl i spoke to from russia said "I'm not Catholic. I'm in orthodox" What does this mean?

Answer 1

The Eastern Orthodox split from the Roman Catholic church back in the...well, a long time ago. I can't remember the differences though.

Answer 2

The Eastern Orthodox Churches and the Roman Catholic Church officially split and ex communicated each other in 1054 (long before Luther's split which was mentioned above.). The split had far more to do with the empire lines of the Byzantine and Roman empires at the time then any real theological differences. Because of the split the Orthodox Churches and the Roman Churches officailly broke communion with each other, this has been partially restored since there were no basic doctrinal differences. However not being in full communion they are not considered one Church. Not being in full communion the Orthodox Churches do not fall under the Moral authority of the Pope. Because of more political differences within the former USSR the Russian Orthodox has not come back into even partially communion with Rome yet like the Greek and Syrian Orthodox Churches.

Answer 3

Russians are Orthodox, not Roman Catholic. Western Catholicism has its base in Rome and the rites are different from the Orthodox Church, which instead of a single Pope has several "primates" (like archbishops.) I think the top man is the Primate of Jerusalem. Their rites and mass are more similar to the ancient Coptic church which is really where it all started after the Apostles spread the Gospel into the Greco-Roman world outside Israel.
Side note: In Iraq and that area, Christians still worship in Aramaic, which is the language the Apostles spoke. After 2000 yrs I think that's pretty cool.

Answer 4

She's referring to the Eastern Orthodox Church or the Greek Orthodox Church. Very similar to Roman Catholic and many are in communion with the Roman Catholics, but the Pope is not the supreme leaders of those groups. You have have seen the men all dressed in black, with shawl types things on their heads, and often long white beards, those often are members of the orthodox clergy

Answer 5

There are approximately 1.1 to 1.3 million Roman Catholics. This is referred to as the Western Church. There are approximately 250 to 300 million Greek or Easter Orthodox Christians. This is referred to as the Eastern Church. They were one denomination until around a thousand years ago when they split for political and doctrinal issues. They recognize and love each other being Christian but have a few different rules when it comes to the everyday business of the Church.

Answer 6

Catholic generally refers to Roman Catholic. Orthodox can either refer to the spin that Russians and Greeks put on Catholicism OR can refer to Judaism, i.e. an Orthodox Jew.

There, that was helpful wasn't it?

Answer 7

The Church split in the 10th.ct. over the definition of The Trinity. The Eastern Orthodox Church believed that Jesus the second person of the Trinity was subservient to God the Father.

Answer 8

Catholics have a pope, and most of them pretty much worship the pope.
Orthodox, worship Jesus Christ, and respect the Virgin Mary a lot, sometimes too much.
Pretty much these are very different religions, only the Orthodox one is much closer to the original Bible, and the Catholics got lost long time ago.

Answer 9

As mentioned in the above answers, they are a split
from the Roman Catholic Church. However they are
Catholics, in the same way as Anglicans whose head
of church is the Queen, Presbyterians, Baptists etc.
who have their own Head of Church, but all stem from
Luther‘s split which was a revolt against Rome‘s abusive
ways, which I will not go into since I was not around at
the time.

Answer 10

Eastern Orthodox church.

It split from Western church in like 10th century, way before the split between Catholics and Protestants.

Do not ask me what theological differences are, all those church splits are really about money and power.