Bp Auxentios GOC-K: 1-19-2015 OS - Debate

[Maria]

http://www.dep.church/downloads/Letterf ... entios.pdf

Sunday of the Publican and Pharisee
19 January, 2015 (0ld Style) [Feb. 1 (NS)]

To the Clergy and Faithful of the Newly
Established Diocese of Etna and Portland

Dear Fellow Clergy and Faithful,
Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

… [excerpts from pages 2 and 3]

With regard to our new union, all of us come from different places. His Eminence,
Metropolitan Chrysostomos and I, though while at Princeton both affiliated with the
then independent and ever-memorable Bishop Petros of Astoria, were tonsured
monks, ordained to the Priesthood, and elevated to various ranks with in the
Ekklesia ton G.O.Ch. Hellados at a time when it was united (under Archbishop
Auxentios), before the process of division and splintering occurred. Within the Synod
in Resistance, we and the communities with us in America maintained full communion
with the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (from which our Church, now united again,
received its Episcopacy), from 1994 until 2007 and the tragedy of its reunion—
prematurely and unwisely, in the view of many—with the Moscow Patriarchate, when
we broke communion with it. At that time we received communities directly from the
ROCA, when they decided to join us, a Sister Church, rather than join with Moscow.
Many of you have come to the Church of the Genuine Orthodox Christians of Greece
(i.e., the Ekklesia ton G.O.Ch. Hellados) under Archbishop Chrysostomos
(Kiouses), the predecessor of Archbishop Kallinikos, and others through the Holy
Orthodox Church of North America and various independent traditionalist groups.
Still a handful of others are from the Sister Churches of the Synod in Resistance,
the Old Calendarist Churches of Romania and Bulgaria, which followed us into union
with the Church of the Genuine Orthodox Christians of Greece last year.

Though we come from very different circumstances and backgrounds, almost all of us,
as Metropolitan Demetrios insightfully wrote recently, have our roots in the Russian
Orthodox Church Abroad. We also have our roots in a common distrust of ecumenism
and its scion, the New Calendar innovation, and a desire to preserve the Orthodox
Faith in its purity and as a gift to those Orthodox who have deviated from it and to those
who are seeking it from outside the Church. It is thus obvious that our new union must
look at what unites us and not at what divides us. If this sounds like an ecumenical
formula, it is. It is the ecumenism of those who are united in Truth, where such a
formula is a sine qua non for Christian oneness in love and the avoidance of the
deadly sins of contention and fruitless argumentation against which St. Paul warns. If
the ecumenists have made this formula a path to betrayal and compromise in the Faith,
we must make it a hallmark of Christian reason, charity, and fellowship. What binds us
together in our Orthodox confession, despite our different experiences, in what is
essential in the Faith: that “golden thread” that holds together, if I may borrow an image
expressed by the late Father Georges Florovsky, the fabric of the Orthodox Church
community, where we hold to what our Savior gave, the Apostles preached, and the
Fathers preserved, as a patristic axiom states. In Orthodox union, we can accomplish
love, and in love all differences are reconciled, and what was separate becomes one.

… [two closing paragraphs omitted]

Asking for your prayers and good thoughts, once again, and wishing all of you a
wonderful Lent, I very much look forward to seeing and visiting you in person sometime
following my enthronement after Pascha.

Least among Monks, †Bishop Auxentios

[ for the complete letter see: http://www.dep.church/downloads/Letterf ... entios.pdf ]

[Isaakos]

I used to defend the union, but in that it has not served to STRENGTHEN the Orthodox confession, but merely to weaken it, and given that the union document nowhere declares what the majority of us believe, that the New Calendarists are schismatics who have willfully severed themselves from the Church, then I must conclude that the so-called Union is part of the agenda to destroy a truly Orthodox confession of faith.

The Synod of Kallinikos has fallen victim to Sophistries when they say, "We have put the confessions of 1935 and 1974 in their proper context."

There was only ever ONE context for the VARIOUS encyclicals of 1935: that the New Calendarists are schismatics who by the very act of implementing the New Calendar have torn themselves away from the Church.

There is no other context.

But do not be surprised! This is what happens when Union does not occur according to the truth, but according to compromise and concession.

Having formerly defended these documents of Union, both the new confession of faith and its
Clarification, I can tell you that nowhere do they affirm the New Calendarists to be schismatics.

They say "our Union with one another isn't based on how we view New Calendarist sacraments, but on personal Orthodoxy."
This is the exact same error made by Metropolitan Chrysostom of Florina:
For if the New Calendarists are only Potential Schismatics who retain Grace, then they are real priests and bishops! And consequently there is no excuse for separating yourselves from them! On the contrary, do the Orthodox thing and SUBMIT to their judgments against you! At least if you are deposed of the episcopacy you will still be in the Church!

But the imitators of Chrysostom of Florina choose to remain separated without affirming that WHO they are separated from are schismatics! But this MUST be asserted to justify the separation!

So bishop Auxentius:

Are you schismatic or not?

If you are, then go to the local New Calendar Hierarch and submit yourself. That would be Metropolitan Gerasimos of San Francisco.

If not, then justify your separation! You must call the schismatics by their name and the Heretics by their name!

Perhaps you will reply: "well we are on the Old Calendar, but primarily resist ecumenism."
Wonderful! Then call the Ecumenists what they are: Actual Heretics in Word and deed and spell out the consequences of such. If here you want to accept your former innovation of "Potential Heresy" (Imitating Metropolitan Chrysostom of Florina) then you are not Orthodox. For there is no such thing as potential heresy! At least not such as justifies your separation! Either they are heretics and called and treated as such, justifying separation, or not, making you AGAIN schismatic!

So no, you don't get to pass on whether the New Calendarists are ACTUAL schismatics and heretics! This is vital for you to either affirm or deny and then act appropriately!

[Maria]

Two Excerpts from Bishop Auxentios' letter dated Jan. 19, 2015 OS

• With regard to our new union, all of us come from different places. His Eminence,
  Metropolitan Chrysostomos and I, though while at Princeton both affiliated with the
  then independent and ever-memorable Bishop Petros of Astoria, were tonsured
  monks, ordained to the Priesthood, and elevated to various ranks with in the
  Ekklesia ton G.O.Ch. Hellados at a time when it was united (under Archbishop
  Auxentios), before the process of division and splintering occurred.

Under Archbishop Auxentios, schism and division could be expected because Auxentios had already left the GOC under St. Matthew, and was defrocked for his act of schism. Schism breeds schism as the "process of division and splintering occurred."

• Within the Synod in Resistance, we and the communities with us in America
  maintained full communion with the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (from which
  our Church, now united again, received its Episcopacy), from 1994 until 2007 and
  the tragedy of its reunion—prematurely and unwisely, in the view of many—with the Moscow
  Patriarchate, when we broke communion with it. At that time we received communities
  directly from the ROCA, when they decided to join us, a Sister Church, rather than join
  with Moscow. Many of you have come to the Church of the Genuine Orthodox Christians
  of Greece (i.e., the Ekklesia ton G.O.Ch. Hellados) under Archbishop Chrysostomos
  (Kiouses), the predecessor of Archbishop Kallinikos, and others through the Holy
  Orthodox Church of North America and various independent traditionalist groups.
  Still a handful of others are from the Sister Churches of the Synod in Resistance,
  the Old Calendarist Churches of Romania and Bulgaria, which followed us into union
  with the Church of the Genuine Orthodox Christians of Greece last year.

Several members of ROCOR-A have informed me that the ROCOR union with the MP was premature and that they hope to join the MP within five years. This idea of ROCOR's premature and unwise union with the MP is echoed again by the newly elected Bishop Auxentios of Etna and Portland.

The ROCOR joined the Ecumenist MP in 2007, and by so doing, became bold-faced heretics.

If Met. Agafangel broke communion with the ROCOR-MP because that union was premature and unwise, then Met. Agafangel did not break communion for the right reason. Canonically, it is very serious to break communion with one's bishops. The only canonical reason would have been a heretical act. Therefore, Met. Agafangel was in schism from the ROCOR-MP for breaking communion improperly and uncanonically.

Immediately after leaving the ROCOR-MP, Met. Agafangel turned to the schismatic Cyprianites (SiR) who had schismatically broken communion with Archbishop Auxentios and the GOC-K. Met. Agafangel asked these schismatic SiR bishops to ordain new bishops in order to form a new Synod for the ROCOR-A.

Again, Schism breeds more schism as Met. Agafangel left the ROCOR in schism only to form a New Schismatic ROCOR-A Synod with the help of Schismatic bishops from the SiR.

More frightfully, when the ROCOR-A joins the MP, then the GOC-K will be in communion with the Sergianistic and Ecumenist MP.

[Maria]

Vladimir Moss in his Feb. 12, 2015 article fails to mention that HOTCA in the USA by its very union with HOCNA parishes in 2012 already had a very uncanonical mess in its territorial division of dioceses and parishes. The Spring 2014 union with the SiR further complicated a jurisdictional mess.

See: http://www.orthodoxchristianbooks.com/a ... -marching/

[Barbara]

I am admiring both of your sharp minds ! GOOD points.

That irritated me too : "premature and unwise". Why couldn't Bp-Elect Auxentios have made a strong statement rather than this vacillating one, which gives an opening for that union 5 with the MP 5 years in the future, as Maria mentioned?
This is worrisome that former SiR, ROCOR-A [ROCA, non-Almond !] and probably GOC-K will offer themselves so willingly and calmly as figurative sacrifices to be burnt on the MP altar.

Philaret is right about the inadvisability of a union of Churches based on compromise : after all, that is what happened re the Rocor union with the MP. Rocor compromised ALL, MP didn't budge an inch on anything of any importance, as far as outsiders can see. Anyway, it didn't work because as our member opines, the absorption of Rocor by MP was an aggressive property grab. Not a pinch of truth to be found as a consideration anywhere in their maneuverings !

[Isaakos]

What really strike me is his idea of the proactive use of the ecumenical formula: "What unites us is greater than what divides us."

Anybody can make that argument. What united 11th Century Rome and Constantinople was greater than what divided them right? Just one little word in the creed, maybe a growing penchant for unleavened bread and a desire to practice baptism by aspersion...That's ALL though right?!

Wrong.

The Cyprianites were united in their confession of a heretical theory, That heresy can be "potential" and that these "potential" heretics could be inside the church, yet the Cyprianites were somehow justified in separating from them! This is completely false of course, because if "Potential" heretics (which we all are...potentially!) are indeed within the Church, then there is no justification in separation from them! In fact, such separation is not God-Pleasing resistance or Orthodox confession, it is simply just schism, since the schismatics cannot adduce a single reason to separate! For after all, if those they "resist" are not ACTUAL heretics or Schismatics, but only "potentially" so, then the acts of separation are acts of rebellion!

Now the Florinite Synod from the Time of "Archbishop" Akakios to the present have consistently held to the Matthewite profession of faith (Seeing that all these "Archbishops" are FORMER Matthewites...another topic), that the Schism of the New calendarists is ACTUAL and real, and that the ecumenists are REALLY heretics. Therefore it is completely legitimate to separate from them. And this is true, this is the Line St. Matthew Consistently held for 26 years. And it is the line adopted by the Florinite Synod.

BUT NOW we have this strange union, where the things formerly proclaimed are set aside in favor, once again, as from 1937-1950 for the Florinites, of a union, not in the truth and confession of faith, but in everything EXCEPT this confession of faith.

For Example, in 1935 the GOC, as a single and united Synod proclaimed on three separate occasions:

1. TO the State Church of Greece:
http://orthodoxy1982.blogspot.com/2014/ ... ch-of.html

"Because, last of all among the above listed reasons, the Ruling Hierarchy of Greece cut and walled itself off from the catholic body of Orthodoxy, according to the spirit of the Holy Canons, effectively declaring itself schismatic, as argued the special committee of National University legal scholars and theologians appointed to examine the calendar question, a member of which His Beatitude happened to be, serving then as a university professor"

1. In the confession of faith before the GOC people in 1935:
   http://orthodoxy1982.blogspot.com/2014/ ... efore.html

"Thus, the current administrators of the Church of Greece, by their unilateral, uncanonical, and irresponsible introduction of the Gregorian calendar, tore themselves off from the entire body of Orthodoxy, and declared themselves in essence [κατ’ οὐσίαν] schismatics compared to the other Orthodox Churches, which stand upon the ground of the Seven Ecumenical Councils and the Orthodox institutions and traditions, and upon the Churches of Jerusalem, Antioch, Serbia, Poland, the Holy Mountain [of Athos], the God‐trodden Mt. Sinai, etc."

1. On the occasion of the false condemnation of Metropolitan Chrysostom of Florina, Germanos of Demetrias and Chrysostom of Zakynthos:
   http://orthodoxy1982.blogspot.com/2014/ ... after.html

"By the judgments which the Lord knows, the majority of the hierarchy of the Greek Church, under the influence and initiative of its president, has placed the blot of schism upon what up until now had been its pure and truly Orthodox countenance, when it rejected the Orthodox festal calendar — which has been consecrated by the Seven Ecumenical Councils and ratified by the age-long practice of the Orthodox Eastern Church — and replaced it with the Papal Calendar."

And thus we read in this CLARIFICATION of the union between the Cyprianites (So-called) and the Florinites:

http://hsir.org/pdfs/2014/10/01/E201410 ... rontes.pdf

"Although the phrase in the Union document that “the True Orthodox
Church does not provide assurance concerning [the] validity” of Mysteries
celebrated by the New Calendarists (ch. VI, §6) has been sufficiently
clarified in the relevant footnotes of the version of the document in simpler
Greek, it should be stated here that this is certainly not an innovation,
nor does it abrogate the past, since the Encyclicals of 1935, 1950, and
1974, which were local in nature, are now placed in the context of our
common inter-Orthodox Confession and interpreted correctly."

Really? And what interpretation is that? We see in part further down...

http://hsir.org/pdfs/2014/10/01/E201410 ... rontes.pdf

"In the end, we need to realize that the True Orthodox Church ought
not to cultivate the mistaken impression that Her unity is founded on our
view of the Mysteries of the New Calendarists; on the contrary, Her fidelity
to Apostolic teaching and Succession should be the focus of Her unity.
It is fidelity to our Confession that unites us, and not our view of the
Mysteries of the New Calendarists, who are, in any case, fallen away in
the Faith and “not in communion [with our Church].”"

This is utterly false. Utterly. What ARE the New Calendarists? Schismatics or Not?

If we say they are not ACTUALLY schismatics, everything we affirmed in 1935 is bogus, and there is no justification for separation and we are schismatics! But if they are ACTUALLY schismatic, they are graceless, as St. Basil writes, and which MUST be confessed in order to drive this point home!

But now is the latter times of the confession of non-confession!!!

I think it fitting at this time in light of these events to consider what the GOC, the Matthewite Synod wrote of these kinds of things in the 80's:

http://orthodoxy1982.blogspot.com/2015/ ... enism.html

"Encyclical of 1983 Against "Old Calendarist Ecumenism"

ACT OF THE HOLY AND SACRED COUNCIL OF THE GENUINE ORTHODOX CHURCH OF GREECE

Protocol Number: 6/13-7-1983

Theme: Condemnation of the so-called "Old Calendarist Ecumenism."

The Holy Synod of Bishops of the Genuine Orthodox Church of Greece in its session of July 13, 1983, addressed the theme of the so-called "Old Calendarist Ecumenism", and took into account:

a) That the so-called "Old Calendarist Ecumenism" teaches an entirely heretical teaching, to wit, that all the groups and factions that follow the old calendar together consist and belong to the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church of Christ, and it proposes a union of these [factions] according to an ecumenistic perception and not according to the Orthodox Confession and Ecclesiology.

b) That "Old Calendarist Ecumenism" is a fruit and product of antichristian Ecumenism, the pan-heresy of our age, which seeks, through the fractions and divisions and the ecclesiological confusion, to distort the Orthodox Confession – Ecclesiology and to introduce this heretical teaching into the Uninnovated Church, in order to thereby suffocate it.

c) That the age, in which we are going through, is an age of general apostasy and ecclesiological confusion, which was caused by antichristian Ecumenism. Thus, the criticality of these times requires [from us] especially, a continuous way of life in the pure Confession of the Orthodox Faith and in the teachings of the Church of Christ.

d) That "the chosen vessel," the divine Apostle Paul, commands us all: "Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Spirit hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood," and continues: "grievous wolves shall enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them." (Acts 20:28-30)

e) That many have arisen, speaking perversely, for the purpose of setting aside the Confession and Ecclesiology of the Holy Church of Christ, and turn against the divine and Sacred Canons and generally against the Holy and Sacred Tradition, by preaching "Old Calendarist Ecumenism" with bared head, and disturbing the assembly of the faithful.

Since "Old Calendarist Ecumenism" is condemned by the consensus of the divine and Sacred Canons and is something foreign and polemical against the Orthodox Confession and Ecclesiology of the Church of Christ, for this reason, together with our Holy and God-bearing Fathers, holding the divine and Sacred Canons in embrace, in the Holy Spirit we decide:

1. We judge and condemn the so-called “Old Calendarist Ecumenism,” as something foreign to, and incompatible with, the Orthodox Confession and Ecclesiology of the Holy Church of Christ.

2. With one mouth and one heart we confess and preach that the Genuine Orthodox Church, which for reasons of discernment is called "uninnovated" or "Church of the Genuine Orthodox Christians," is the continuation of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church of Christ, from which [the following] were torn off: firstly, the innovated new calendarist church, through the introduction of the condemned papist innovation [of the calendar], by which Ecumenism entered in 1924; and secondly, the various old calendarist schisms, which were created by their distortion of the Confession – Ecclesiology of the uninnovated Holy Church of Christ.

3. This Orthodox Confession – Ecclesiology was printed and preached since 1924, and was Synodically preached in the historic year of 1935. We also keep it, preach it and confess it.

4. With one voice we disapprove and remove any expressions or publications which, regardless of what context or by whom they were written, are unacceptable from an Orthodox perspective and are foreign to the Orthodox Confession and Ecclesiology, and we order that from now on, anything contradictory, whether it be due to carelessness or through human weakness, we regard it as having not been written.

In the year of salvation 1983, on July the 13th (old calendar).

The President:

• ANDREW of Athens and all Greece

The Members:

• GREGORY of Messenia
• MATTHEW of Megaris
• LAZARUS of Bresthena
• PACHOMIUS of Argolis
• THEODOSIUS of Phthiotis
• TITUS of Kozane

The Chief Secretary

• Hieromonk Kirykos (Kontogiannis)"

Isn't this what we have always said will happen?

But I will leave the last word to St. Mark of Ephesus:

http://stnektariosroc.org/2014/12/st-ma ... ty-latins/

“‘But if,’ they say, ‘we had devised some middle ground between the dogmas (of the Papists and the Orthodox), then thanks to this we would have united with them and accomplished our business superbly, without at all having been forced to say anything except what corresponds to custom and has been handed down (by the Fathers).’ This is precisely the means by which many, from of old, have been deceived and persuaded to follow those who have led them off the steep precipice of impiety; believing that there is some middle ground between the two teachings that can reconcile obvious contradictions, they have been exposed to peril.”

• St. Mark of Ephesus, “Encyclical Letter, July 1440”

[Barbara]

Great letter by Vladimir Moss. He cuts right to the truth.
Refreshing ...and fresh off the press, too ! Thank you, Maria, for alerting us to this new post on the same day it was released so we could gain some useful perspective.

Interesting story of St Wilfrid of York. I never heard any of that. Nice how he connects Old York and New York
in the context of the 'strange' arrangements at the GOC-K.

I am not even clear, though : why is Met Demetrios NOT the Metropolitan of All North America ?
I missed that somehow. Is Vladimir saying that Bp Auxentios is actually usurping much of the power ??

Also : is Bp Auxentios American by descent ? I didn't know that he was at Princeton with Met Chrysostomos ; that was news to me from the former hierarch's address to his flock. I somehow pictured he had joined the monastery at Etna much later.

Vladimir Moss's points are excellent about the lack of resolution of the Cyprianite problem.