Yes. We believe the Orthodox Church is the Church Christ founded, preserved through unbroken continuity in faith, worship, and apostolic succession.
That’s a bold claim, and it probably sounds arrogant if you’re hearing it for the first time. But here’s what we mean by it.
What We’re Actually Claiming
When we say the Orthodox Church is the original Christian church, we’re not saying we’re better Christians than Baptists or Catholics or anyone else. We’re not claiming moral superiority. God knows we’ve got plenty of sinners in our pews, and there are holy, faithful believers in churches all over Beaumont and beyond.
What we’re claiming is continuity. The Orthodox Church has maintained the same faith, the same worship, the same structure that the apostles established. We didn’t branch off. We didn’t reform. We didn’t start fresh with new ideas about what the Church should be.
Think of it this way. The Church of Antioch, one of the oldest Orthodox churches, was founded by the apostles Paul and Barnabas around 42 A.D. Peter served as its first bishop. That same Church of Antioch exists today, with the same liturgy, the same sacraments, the same episcopal structure. It’s not a reconstruction or a revival. It’s the same living organism.
How Do We Know?
Three things demonstrate this continuity: our worship, our doctrine, and our structure.
Our worship hasn’t changed in its essentials. The Divine Liturgy we celebrate at St. Michael’s on Sunday morning uses prayers written by St. John Chrysostom in the fourth century. Those prayers themselves developed from even earlier Eucharistic rites used by the apostles’ immediate successors. When we recite the Nicene Creed, we’re using the exact words hammered out at the ecumenical councils of 325 and 381. When we make the sign of the cross, venerate icons, and observe Great Lent, we’re doing what Christians have done for centuries.
Our doctrine comes straight from the seven ecumenical councils and the Church Fathers. We didn’t add new teachings in the Middle Ages or subtract old ones during a Reformation. The Trinity as defined at Nicaea and Constantinople. The two natures of Christ as defined at Chalcedon. The veneration of icons as affirmed by the Seventh Council. Salvation as theosis, union with God, as taught by St. Athanasius, St. Basil, St. Gregory, and the whole patristic tradition. It’s all still here, unchanged.
Our structure maintains apostolic succession. Every Orthodox bishop can trace his ordination back through an unbroken line to the apostles themselves. This isn’t just paperwork. It’s the preservation of the apostolic ministry, the prophetic, priestly, and pastoral office that Christ gave to the Twelve and they passed on to their successors.
But What About the Schism?
In 1054, the Western Church and the Eastern Church broke communion. That’s a real rupture, and it matters. But the Schism didn’t create Orthodoxy as something new. It represented the West’s departure from the faith and practice of the undivided Church. Rome added the filioque to the Creed without an ecumenical council. Rome developed the papacy into something the early Church never knew. Rome introduced doctrines like purgatory and indulgences that had no basis in the Fathers.
The Orthodox Church simply continued being what it had always been.
This isn’t triumphalism. It’s history. We’re not saying Rome has no grace or that Catholics aren’t Christians. We’re saying the Orthodox Church preserved the fullness of apostolic faith and practice when others changed it.
How Is This Different from Triumphalism?
There’s a difference between claiming identity and claiming superiority. We claim to be the Church Christ founded because we’ve maintained continuity with the apostles. That’s an ecclesiological statement, not a moral one.
Fr. Thomas Hopko, the late dean of St. Vladimir’s Seminary, modeled how to make this claim with humility. He emphasized historical continuity and sacramental life without denigrating other Christians. He acknowledged the presence of heresies and divisions even in the early Church while affirming that Orthodoxy preserved the apostolic tradition through all of it.
The Orthodox Church has sinners. We’ve had corrupt bishops, political entanglements, ethnic divisions, and all manner of human failure. But the faith itself, the deposit handed down from the apostles, remains intact. That’s what we’re claiming.
What About Other Churches That Claim Apostolic Succession?
Some do have historic episcopal orders. The Catholic Church, the Anglican Communion, and others can point to lines of bishops. But apostolic succession isn’t just about having bishops. It’s about maintaining apostolic faith and practice in communion with the whole Church.
The Orthodox position is that true apostolic succession requires both valid ordination and doctrinal faithfulness. You can’t depart from the faith of the apostles and still claim to be their successors in any meaningful sense. That’s why reunion with Rome or Canterbury would require more than just recognizing each other’s bishops. It would require doctrinal and liturgical convergence.
What This Means for You
If you’re exploring Orthodoxy, this claim probably feels strange. Most of us in Southeast Texas grew up thinking of “church” as something you choose based on preference or family tradition. The idea that one church is the Church, not just a denomination, but the actual Body of Christ in its fullness, takes some getting used to.
But it’s what we believe. And if it’s true, it changes everything.
Come to a Divine Liturgy and see for yourself. You’ll hear prayers that echo across seventeen centuries. You’ll receive teaching that the Fathers would recognize. You’ll stand in a tradition that goes back, unbroken, to the apostles themselves.
That’s not arrogance. That’s an invitation.
