In chapter 99 of Fr. Seraphim Rose Life & Works, there are some quotes which in themselves, and in the way presented, suggest a criticism of a so-called "zealot movement", by which I think we are meant to understand 'groups trying to do things correctly without being in full communion or at least while voicing heavy criticism'. I will quote and comment:
Fr. Seraphim Rose Life & Works, chapter 99 wrote:"The sanctity of the Church is not darkened by the intrusion of the world into the Church, or by the sinfulness of men. Everything sinful and worldly which intrudes into the Church's sphere remains foreign to it and is destined to be sifted out and destroyed...." (Fr. Michael Pomazansky, in Orthodox Dogmatic Theology)
I believe that Catholics will say the same. When one looks askance at the shenanigans of the Novus Ordo, one hears, "Oh don't worry the Church is still the Church." Sure, except that it is painful to attend! But, I hasten to observe, that the Orthodox Church is comprised of a much larger percentage of the original bishops. The Romans have been drifting alone for a very long time, and indeed Vatican II seems consistent with that sifting out.
Fr. Seraphim Rose Life & Works, chapter 99 wrote:In Russia's Catacomb Saints, Fr. Seraphim predicted that when the godless regime in Russia falls, "The Sergianist church organization and its whole philosophy of being will crumble to dust." This is indeed happening at the present time in Russian history. For those who view the Church as an invincible theandric [i.e. Divine-human] organism as did Bishop Damascene and Fr. Seraphim, it is clear that Sergianism as an organizational model and a "whole philosophy of being" is indeed being replaced by something else, as the Church organism is healed and corrected by Christ with the cooperation of its members.
This spares us the need to endlessly argue about whether the poor Orthodox suffering under Bolshevism are traitors for not being martyrs in the sense of being killed, and whether the Church there and then enjoyed sacramental grace. But this debate did rage for quite a time, and one can find vestiges of it today. For example it crops up in the assertion that we have today a kind of expanded and ongoing Sergianism.
Fr. Seraphim Rose Life & Works, chapter 99 wrote:We have spoken earlier of how Fr. Seraphim never altered his basic stance against ecumenism and reform in the Church. In his later years, however, when he saw people calling those of other jurisdictions "heretics" because they went to ecumenical gatherings, he took pains to define this stance more clearly. In his "Defense of Fr. Dimitry Dudko," he wrote: "Some would-be zealots of Orthodoxy use the term [ecumenism] in entirely too imprecise a fashion, as though the very use of the term or contact with an 'ecumenical' organization is itself a 'heresy'. Such views are clearly exaggerations. 'Ecumenism' is a heresy only if it actually involves the denial that Orthodoxy is the true Church of Christ. A few of the Orthodox leaders of the ecumenical movement have gone this far, but most Orthodox participants in the ecumenical movement have not said this much...." ... In another place ["Orthodox Christians Facing the 1980s" (here?)] Fr. Seraphim said: "The excessive reaction against the ecumenical movement has the same worldly spirit that is present in the ecumenical movement itself."
This passage clearly requires an answer from those who talk of ecumenism and heresy. Maybe things are worse and clearer now than they were in 1979 or 1982.
Fr. Seraphim Rose Life & Works, chapter 99 wrote:Likewise, while not altering his position on the Church Calendar question, Fr. Seraphim warned against exaggerating the importance of the issue and thereby causing needless fighting and division. ... "Those who introduced the New Calendar into the Orthodox Church in the 1920s and later, and who thereby brought division and modernism into the Church, will have much to answer for. But the simple people of Africa understand nothing of all this, and to preach the correct Old Calendar to them could produce nothing more than a squabble over theoretical points that would only interfere with their simple reception of the Orthodox Faith. Western converts are often skilled in debating such theoretical points, even to the extent of writing whole tomes and treatises on the canons and their interpretation. But this is an Orthodoxy of the head, full of the spirit of calculation and self-justification."
I have seen the expression "new-Platina", by which it is implied that the monastery now there is not to be trusted with Fr. Seraphim's work. However, the passage above does seem to argue against making an issue of the Calendar (and he was aware of its associations with modernism) as well as offering a characterization of Western converts of being too much in the head and, therefore, not having sufficient pain of heart.
Comments?