The branch of Christianity that formed from the gradual estrangement among Church authorities in the early centuries of Christianity and from the political upheavals between the Eastern Roman, or Byzantine, Empire and the Holy Roman Empire. The schism intensified in 1054 between Rome and Constantinople, and while Western theology remained under the influence of Augustinian ideas, Eastern theology continued to be shaped by the Greek Fathers. Orthodox theology values the authority of local church centers like Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, and Constantinople that are governed by head bishops, rather than the authoritarian, apostolic centrality honored in Western theology. It also contends that the individual is not an autonomous being but rather human nature is defined by a relationship to God; thus, sin implies separation from God, and the aim of good Christians, according to Orthodox ideology, is communion with God.
