Page 175 - Orthodoxy Zizioulas

D I O C E S E A N D PA R I S H
apostolic succession.
This shift affected not only the bishop, but the whole struc-
ture of the Church. Once the Eucharist could be celebrated
regularly by a presbyter without the bishop’s presence, the
place of the deacon was weakened, and even the role of the
laity was obscured. In Orthodox liturgy and canon law, private
Eucharistic celebrations conducted only by clergy are forbid-
den, because the Eucharist is always the act of the whole
Church. Yet the theological reason for this is often no longer
understood. The ancient awareness that the Eucharist requires
the gathered people of God has faded where parish life has
become detached from its original ecclesial context.
The early Church, however, did not surrender easily to this
transformation. Even after the emergence of parishes, it sought
to preserve visibly the truth that there is still only one Eucha-
rist in each place—the Eucharist of the bishop. In the West,
this was expressed through the practice of fermentum: the
bishop sent a portion of the Eucharist from his cathedral to
the parishes, where it was mingled with the Eucharist celebrat-
ed by the presbyter. This made tangible the unity of all parish
celebrations in the one Eucharist of the bishop.
In the East, the same truth survives in the practice of the
antimension. No presbyter may celebrate the Eucharist except
on this consecrated cloth bearing the bishop’s signature and
containing relics of saints. Likewise, in every Divine Liturgy,
the bishop’s name is commemorated in the Anaphora. These
are not ceremonial remnants; they are theological witnesses
to the enduring principle that the bishop remains the true
center of eucharistic unity in the local Church.
What changed historically was not the principle itself, but
the lived experience of it. As bishops became heads of increas-
ingly large dioceses, they could no longer maintain direct pas-
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