Proto-ecumenism before the 1920s

[Jean-Serge]

What is historically untrue in what I wrote?

[Suaidan]

What is historically untrue in what I wrote?

 

Nothing (to be fair I haven't checked); just "a Tsar calling for a memorial service to a dead heterodox royal in defiance of the wave of liberalism in France" doesn't rise to the level of "nascent ecumenism" for me.
 

[Jean-Serge]

Indeed, the categorization and interpretation of the fact as ecumenism might be incorrect.

[Jean-Serge]

From my blog : http://orthodoxie-libre.over-blog.com/2 ... ard-3.html

It appears that the king Edward VIII had 2 orthodox godparents, contrary to orthodox canons. I could not find details of this they attend or not the baptism. Did they sponsor at distance. I guess I will have to write to the Royal House to know more. These godparents were the future Nicholas II and the queen Olga of Greece. https://www.unofficialroyalty.com/house ... istenings/

Once again, it is not sure that fits the definition of proto-ecumenism, but for sure this is really bad and favours indifferentism.

[SavaBeljovic]

From my blog : http://orthodoxie-libre.over-blog.com/2 ... ard-3.html

It appears that the king Edward VIII had 2 orthodox godparents, contrary to orthodox canons. I could not find details of this they attend or not the baptism. Did they sponsor at distance. I guess I will have to write to the Royal House to know more. These godparents were the future Nicholas II and the queen Olga of Greece. https://www.unofficialroyalty.com/house ... istenings/

Once again, it is not sure that fits the definition of proto-ecumenism, but for sure this is really bad and favours indifferentism.

 

Not to defend this, but in the 20th century there was something of an "Anglican fetishism" especially with Orthodox Christians as many people (including some Saints) thought Anglicanism was "close to Orthodoxy" theologically and there could be an attempt to bring them in. There was a big movement at that time towards Anglo-Catholicism (Anglicans attempting to look as much like the Papists as possible)... Sadly a lot of people got caught in this wave without realizing the true nature of things. Russians were very low info on the Anglicans and only saw people who were very much against Papism while not looking like most other Protestants. Not everyone was like Fr. Julius Overbeck who understood Anglicans were not trustworthy.

Also the royal family of Greece was so secular and many of its members were not even Orthodox to begin with, so them being involved is unsurprising. As for the Holy Martyred Tsar, he still had to play a part in European politics and he was related to all these people. Again, not justified, but hopefully this sheds some light and why it might've happened to begin with.

EDIT: Fr. Joseph can talk more about how the Russian Bishops viewed the Anglicans as compared to Fr. Julius, and also the Russian Church added many pre-schism British Saints even before the Revolution as a result of this "Anglican fetishism". So while it was mostly bad, it wasn't all bad. We did get a lot of Saints added to our calendar out of it at least.