Editing Western Christianity (section)

== Features ==
[[File:AtlEurRelig.jpg|thumb|left|Map of Europe showing the largest religions by region. Eastern Christianity is represented in blue, Islam in green, and the other colors represent branches of Western Christianity.]]
[[File:Benozzo Gozzoli 004a.jpg|thumb|upright|200px|[[Saint Thomas Aquinas]] was one of the great Western scholars of the Medieval period.]]

=== Original sin ===
[[Original sin]], also called [[ancestral sin]],<ref name="Golitzin1995">{{cite book |last=Golitzin |first=Alexander |title=On the Mystical Life: The Ethical Discourses |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SUjKOoQsCyUC&pg=PA119 |year=1995 |publisher=St Vladimir's Seminary Press |isbn=978-0-88141-144-7 |pages=119– |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref><ref name="Tate2005">{{cite book |last=Tate |first=Adam L. |title=Conservatism and Southern Intellectuals, 1789–1861: Liberty, Tradition, and the Good Society |url=https://archive.org/details/conservatismsout00tate_0/page/190 |year=2005 |publisher=[[University of Missouri Press]] |isbn=978-0-8262-1567-3 |page=190}}</ref><ref name="Bartolo-Abela2011">{{cite book |last=Bartolo-Abela |first=Marcelle |title=God's Gift to Humanity: The Relationship Between Phinehas and Consecration to God the Father |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6ePZFD9BOB4C&pg=PA32|year=2011 |publisher=Apostolate-The Divine Heart |isbn=978-0-9833480-1-6 |pages=32– |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref><ref name="Hassan2012">{{cite book |last=Hassan |first=Ann |title=Annotations to Geoffrey Hill's Speech! Speech! |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=N0e9guRLMVEC&pg=PA62 |date=2012 |publisher=punctum |isbn=978-1-4681-2984-7 |pages=62– |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> is a [[Christianity|Christian]] belief in a [[state of sin]] in which humanity has existed since the [[fall of man]], stemming from [[Adam and Eve]]'s rebellion in the [[Garden of Eden]], namely the sin of disobedience in consuming the [[forbidden fruit]] from the [[tree of the knowledge of good and evil]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Cross|first=Frank Leslie|author-link=Frank Leslie Cross|title=The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church|url=https://archive.org/details/oxforddictionary00cros/page/994/mode/2up/|year=1966|publisher=Oxford University Press|ol=5382229M|p=994}}</ref> Theologians have characterized this condition in many ways, seeing it as ranging from something as insignificant as a slight deficiency, or a tendency toward sin yet without [[Collective accountability|collective guilt]], referred to as a "sin nature", to something as drastic as [[total depravity]] or automatic guilt of all humans through collective guilt.<ref>{{cite book |last=Brodd |first=Jeffrey |title=World Religions |publisher=[[Saint Mary's Press]] |year=2003 |location=Winona, MN |isbn=978-0-88489-725-5}}{{page needed|date=May 2025}}</ref>

=== Filioque clause ===
{{See also|Filioque}}
Most Western Christians use a version of the [[Nicene Creed]] that states that the [[Holy Spirit in Christianity|Holy Spirit]] "[[Filioque|proceeds from the Father and the Son]]", where the original text as adopted by the [[First Council of Constantinople]] had "proceeds from the Father" without the addition of either "and the Son" or "alone". This Western version also has the additional phrase "God from God" ({{langx|la|Deum de Deo}}), which was in the Creed as adopted by the [[First Council of Nicaea]], but which was dropped by the First Council of Constantinople.

=== Date of Easter ===
{{Main|Easter controversy}}
The [[Easter#Date|date of Easter]] usually differs between Eastern and Western Christianity, because the calculations are based on the [[Julian calendar]] and [[Gregorian calendar]] respectively. However, before the Council of Nicea, various dates including Jewish Passover were observed. Nicea "Romanized" the date for Easter and anathematized a "Judaized" (i.e. Passover date for) Easter. The date of observance of Easter has only differed in modern times since the promulgation of the Gregorian calendar in 1582; and further, the Western Church did not universally adopt the Gregorian calendar at once, so that for some time the dates of Easter differed between the Eastern Church and the Roman Catholic Church, but not necessarily as between the Eastern Church and the Western Protestant churches. For example, the Church of England continued to observe Easter on the same date as the Eastern Church until 1753.

Even the dates of other Christian holidays often differ between Eastern and Western Christianity.

=== Lack of essence–energies distinction ===
{{Further|Essence–energies distinction}}Eastern Christianity, and particularly the Eastern Orthodox Church, has traditionally held a distinction between God's essence, or that which He is, with God's energies, or that which He does. They hold that while God is unknowable in His essence, He can be known (i.e. experienced) in His energies. This is an extension of Eastern Christianity's [[apophatic theology]], while Western Christians tend to prefer a view of [[divine simplicity]], and claim that God's essence can be known by its attributes.