SCHISM

SCHISM. The Greek word means literally “a rip or tear, as in cloth,” and thus in the language of ecclesiology (q.v.) signifies a division or break in the communion of the Church. As some have observed, Eastern Christendom lives rather more easily with such divisions than does the West. Schisms have appeared with some frequency in the East over the centuries, often for reasons more political than theological, e.g., the “Bulgarian Schism,” which saw the Church of Bulgaria out of communion with the Ecumenical Patriarch (qq.v.) for more than seventy years (1870–1945). When such a break is allied with a real or perceived difference in doctrine, and thus with a manifestation of heresy (q.v.), the break usually becomes permanent. Such was the schism between the Byzantine Church and the Church of the East (“Nestorians”), or later with the local churches objecting to Chalcedon, and with the Church of Rome over the questions of the filioque and papal primacy (qq.v.).