Anybody? Thoughts?

[scyldscefing]

Apostolic Canon 51
If any bishop or presbyter does not perform the one initiation with three immersions, but with giving one immersion only, into the death of the Lord, let him be deposed. For the Lord said not, Baptize into my death, but, "Go, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."

7th canon of the 2nd ecumenical council,
"You have confessed the salvific confession, and having immersed yourselves thrice in water, came forth out of it,"

""In the case of the administration of Holy Baptism it is the absolute rule of the Orthodox Church that the candidate must be immersed three times (once in the name of each Person of the Holy Trinity)."
St. Raphael of Brooklyn

"economy" ... maybe it's meant for greater challanges than

• they didn't have proper water supply or bins -

[尼古拉前执事]

If you stand in a 50 gallon drum and have water poured over you from another 50 gallon drum, you will be completely emerssed I am sure. And they did do this thrice.

[Seraphim Reeves]

The fact is that there was/is a long standing disagreement between the Greek and Russian Orthodox Churches over the acceptability of Baptism by pouring. In this matter, I think the Russians in the end are correct, and when push comes to shove they are justified since the Greeks never perceived this as so serious an issue as to break communion with a Church which was increasinbly being peopled (and ministered to!) by men who were "not really baptized."

As Juvenaly indicated, Baptism by pouring has long been considered a form of Baptism in cases of emergency. The fact that it can be accepted at all, warrants that the Orthodox Church can accept it in the case of the heterodox/schismatics by the same extreme economy. None of this changes of course, the proper, canonical method of Baptism.

As for the canons cited in support of the Greek/"Gregorian" view, I noticed that none of them were addressing the topic of "baptism by pouring", but the practice of baptism by single immersion, or the alteration of the Trinitarian formula as was done by certain sects (like the Montanists.) They were comparing/contrasting the proper, canonical form, with a specific form they were condemning. Hence, they do not stand as an air-tight argument against the Church accepting people (whether they were so baptized by those without the Church, or perhaps on their deathbeds but somehow recovered by God's help) via economy, imho (and obviously that of the Russian Orthodox Church for centuries on end.)

Even ROCOR herself received western converts in this fashion until 1971 (following the guidelines in the pre-revolutionary "Book of Needs"), and that change was not because of any "conversion from" the older practice, but was a reaction to ecumenism and the false inferences that were widely being drawn in the Orthodox world from the practice of receiving converts leniently. As OOD rightly points out, if this was such a big deal for Archbishop Gregory, it's incomprehensible that he would have sided with a Russian body to begin with - I'd also submit it makes incomprehensible his relationship with ROCOR to begin with (since if memory serves, he went to ROCOR from the Antiochians after 1965 - that would be back when ROCOR was still following the Book of Needs in receiving western converts from heterodoxy.)

Seraphim

[Archimandrite Michael]

Dear Friends,
Christ is among us! (Even if we were not baptised in a pond or the sea or a baptismal pool!)
Since it appears that I am being made (at least) one of the problems connected with the protests of the former archbishop Gregory, I suppose I should answer in what some might consider a feeble attempt to defend myself. Quite honestly, my situation is/was not in the least the reason for the departure of archbishop Gregory from ROAC/AROC; it is just one situation around which he thought he might create a "cause celebre" for his ecclesiastically-incorrect actions. Gregory was not deposed for being opposed to my way of baptising; he was deposed for far more serious matters; lying for one!
As mentioned in the Didache (and pointed-out by Juvenally), there are situations in which the "desired" form of baptism can not be followed, and The Church in Her compassion provides ecclesiastical means for rectifying that inability. In our case in Haiti, there was NO OTHER WAY, and so we did the best we could at the time. (At least we didn't sprinkle or dip!) Should we have told all those converts that we were sorry, but that we could not receive them into The Church because we had no baptismal pool? This practice was an exception to the desired rule in order to bring souls to Christ. Would his former eminence have told them to "allez vous en" (for those who understand French!) and therefore stand responsible for causing them to lose their salvation? God forbid! We are here to bring salvation to souls; not to make it well-nigh impossible to attain!
I, for one, would never deny baptism to a sincere seeker of salvation, for that would surely be a serious blemish on my person. Would YOU wish to be the one to cause someone to go to hell?
And so we baptised in a big tub/drum in order to at least do what we could for the person. Maybe that's the difference between being a foreign missionary...dealing with those who have never heard of Jesus, and having all the accouterments to do things in more elaborate ways.
We have, by the way, since found an improvement for our place of baptism; we now baptise in a canal in the front of our chapel! (The water is a little dirty, but at least we can immerse!)

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                               ...........................

The REAL reason for archbishop Gregory's objection to our manner of baptism, however, was not as he stated, but becaue he scared us away and Metropolitan Valentine saved us! He wanted to come to Haiti and re-baptise all of our members so as to satisfy his understanding of the manner of baptism. I refused to allow this to happen and Metropolitan Valentine...and most others agreed with me and so our situation was satisfactorily validated through oeconomia. Thanks to God...and His Holy Church for His and Its compassion.

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         "But woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, 
          for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men......" 
                    (St.   Matthew 23:13....and more)

nb. We "played" with all these kinds of things when we were first-year
students in seminary! Questions such as
- "Was Jesus properly baptised since He was not baptised by
a Christian?"
- "Was Jesus properly baptised in the name of the Trinity, since
He is part of the Trinty?"
- "Did Jesus need to be baptised since He was sinless?"
- "Who blessed the water in the Jordan for the baptism of Jesus?"

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  .....and on and on and on!

               Archimandrite Michael

[OrthodoxyOrDeath]

Father Michael,

For the record, my comments were more about Russian practice in general. Thank you for clarifying your unique situation further, and your final remarks are taken to heart.