Fr. Steven Allen: ROCOR, Met. Agathangel & SiR

[Suaidan]

Dear Ekklesiastikos,

I realize the document is in Greek. But I'd like to see a scan of the deposition regardless.

[Fr. Steven Allen]

Deacon Joseph,

O Kyrios!

I believe the expression is "ecclesia suplet" - the Church will supply (what is lacking).

Let's do this: Write a letter to Met. Cyprian (the younger, of course) and ask if the Roman Catholics are outside the Church, and, if so, were they expelled by a unifying council. If they are outside the Church, and were not expelled by a unifying council, by what canonical procedure were they expelled? Since the editors at Ekklisiastikos have a long and fruitful history of corresponding with him, we can ask them to do the translation of our letter - or even a substantial re-working if needed - in a way best suited to elicit a serious response.

Regarding the effect of the 1994 union on the process of subverting the ROCOR: I do not doubt the straightness of your face , but I believe your experience would have been different if you had been the rector of an established parish, in frequent contact with hierarchs and senior clergy, and under constant pressure from the power clique to cave in and join the "new direction." The Fili "great idea" was a key weapon in their impressive array of mental torture devices. I do not hold the SiR responsible for the use made of their "great idea" - they were dupes not collaborators - but it is obvious why those in power pushed for the 1994 union. Whatever good effects the union had were superficial, and short lived by design. The ineradicable and unavoidable root of the problem lay in the "product" which had been bought: the "great idea" for whose sake Mark Inc. held their noses and bought the package that came with it - the SiR. According to the SiR, the Moscow Patriarchate is a Church, not a non-Church; this is all Mark needed, and his group - canny operators, obviously far better connected with the Russian rank and file than the SiR leadership - wielded this idea to devastating effect. The rest - the supposed "good effect" of SiR in promoting anti-ecumenism - was window dressing. Ideas have consequences.

Of course, being flooded with pro-MP Soviets was catastrophic. During this period, I was the rector of the ROCOR parish in Denver, one of the major centers for Soviet immigration, and therefore I acquired by experience, firsthand, painful clarity about what effect these people were having on our Church. I am not proposing that the 1994 union was the only factor that led to the ultimate disaster. But I maintain steadfastly that it contributed significantly to the ultimate disaster.

Fr. Steven

[Suaidan]

Deacon Joseph,

O Kyrios!

I believe the expression is "ecclesia suplet" - the Church will supply (what is lacking).

Somehow I just knew I had that wrong! Thank you. I wish to this day I had a more formal training in Latin in my youth. It was already abandoned by the time I was a child, and sadly, I picked up that grammatical error from the Papists I grew up around, having to fend for myself in my piecemeal understanding of same. My Latin is sadly about as good as my French; I can read Church Latin fairly well, and some of the time I can understand it depending on the speaker, but please, please don't ask me to translate a sentence into it.

Let's do this: Write a letter to Met. Cyprian (the younger, of course) and ask if the Roman Catholics are outside the Church, and, if so, were they expelled by a unifying council. If they are outside the Church, and were not expelled by a unifying council, by what canonical procedure were they expelled? Since the editors at Ekklisiastikos have a long and fruitful history of corresponding with him, we can ask them to do the translation of our letter - or even a substantial re-working if needed - in a way best suited to elicit a serious response.

Well, we shall see how effective this solution really is, and work from there. I would hope Ekklesiastikos could scan that deposition document as well. It's very important to this discussion.

Regarding the effect of the 1994 union on the process of subverting the ROCOR: I do not doubt the straightness of your face , but I believe your experience would have been different if you had been the rector of an established parish, in frequent contact with hierarchs and senior clergy, and under constant pressure from the power clique to cave in and join the "new direction."

Well, I can agree fully with that. I certainly was not a clergyman then. I can only imagine what it would have been like to have been one and frankly it's not something I like thinking about. On the other hand, many of the True Orthodox clergy that are around today were in fact laymen who found themselves isolated in their parochial situation as they watched their established rectors join the Soviet Church (I do not count myself among that group-- I was baptized in True Orthodoxy without the confusing question of the state Church's status hanging over my head, so I was always taught "survival methods" and spent a good part of my ecclesiastical life in isolation anyway) and in some cases found themselves making hard choices -- on their own. In fact, there are few things I despise more because of the experience I myself perceived than the ecclesiastical "cliques" that formed on either side. The only "clique" that should exist in a diocese is the Christians surrounding their Bishop, even though I know this is far from the general ecclesiastical reality.

The Fili "great idea" was a key weapon in their impressive array of mental torture devices. I do not hold the SiR responsible for the use made of their "great idea" - they were dupes not collaborators - but it is obvious why those in power pushed for the 1994 union. Whatever good effects the union had were superficial, and short lived by design. The ineradicable and unavoidable root of the problem lay in the "product" which had been bought: the "great idea" for whose sake Mark Inc. held their noses and bought the package that came with it - the SiR. According to the SiR, the Moscow Patriarchate is a Church, not a non-Church; this is all Mark needed, and his group - canny operators, obviously far better connected with the Russian rank and file than the SiR leadership - wielded this idea to devastating effect. The rest - the supposed "good effect" of SiR in promoting anti-ecumenism - was window dressing. Ideas have consequences.

Allow me to posit that the official position even in the most notorious of "Cyprianite" documents doesn't actually say that the innovators constitute "a" Church or "the" Church, but only an innovating faction within the Church; in fact, the "Ecclesiological Position Paper" specifically states that "'The Holy Synod of the Church of Greece' is not the Synod of the united Greek Church". I realize like this sounds like I am nitpicking, but my point is very simply that the often-stated (not by yourself, Father, but others) claim that "the Cyprianites believe that the MP or the State Church is the Church" is actually an inaccurate representation of their beliefs-- a straw man, if an inadvertent one.

I still cannot maintain that the use of the SiR's ecclesiology was in any way more or less useful to the unionists because even oftentimes anti-MP and anti-ecumenical literature that came out of the ROCOR well before the union expressed similar ideas. This did not start with the SiR and it's ludicrous to blame them. If we look at the article "The Catacomb Tikhonite Church 1974" that was put out by the Orthodox Word that year, back when it was an organ of the ROCOR, we find again this same thinking. It's the most glaring example I can think of: "Finally, the True-Orthodox Church of Russia, as far as we know, has made no official proclamation as to the Grace, or lack of it, of the Sacraments of the Moscow Patriarchate. Individual hierarchs of the Catacomb Church in the past have expressed different opinions on this subject, some actually allowing the reception of Holy Communion from a Sergianist priest when in danger of death, and others insisting on the new Baptism of those baptized by Sergianist clergy. This question could be decided only by a Council of Bishops. If the schism of the Moscow Patriarchate is only temporary, and if it will eventually be restored to communion with the True-Orthodox Church in a free Russia, then this question may never need to be officially decided at all. Individual cases of True-Orthodox Christians in Russia receiving or not receiving Holy Communion in Sergianist churches do not, of course, establish any general rule or decide the question. The strict rule of the Russian Church Outside of Russia forbidding her members from receiving Sacraments from clergy of the Moscow Patriarchate is not founded on any statement that these Sacraments lack Grace, but rather on the sacred testament of Metropolitan Anastassy and other great hierarchs of the Diaspora forbidding any kind of communion with the Patriarchate as long as its leaders betray the Faith and are in submission to atheists."

http://www.orthodoxinfo.com/ecumenism/cat_1974.aspx

That sure sounds like what we call "Cyprianism", with the added provision that it was permitted to receive Sergianist communion in isolated cases, which the SiR does not ever suggest. Fr Seraphim (Rose) openly supported Metropolitan Cyprian as well. And I could find other documents written well before 1994, distributed in the ROCOR and lauded by many of the anti-ecumenist clergy who left during the pro-union ROCOR period which carry within them similar ideas. The idea that the Moscow Patriarchate had grace was not an innovation the Synod in Resistance nor Archbishop Mark came up with. It was one of the anti-ecumenist positions that existed in ROCOR at the time. (This was also why Metropolitan Petros, as I pointed out, could hold the views that he did and still be in good graces with the Synod in Manhattan.) Certainly other ecclesiastical writers took a stricter view (such as I.M. Andreyev, who argued for a much stronger view in "Is the Grace of God present in the Soviet Church?") But to deny that even within the anti-ecumenical, anti-Moscow "clique" there was a divergence of views is simply historically incorrect presentation.

Of course, being flooded with pro-MP Soviets was catastrophic. During this period, I was the rector of the ROCOR parish in Denver, one of the major centers for Soviet immigration, and therefore I acquired by experience, firsthand, painful clarity about what effect these people were having on our Church. I am not proposing that the 1994 union was the only factor that led to the ultimate disaster. But I maintain steadfastly that it contributed significantly to the ultimate disaster.
Fr. Steven

While I could note my disagreement up and down it wouldn't be helpful. It is sufficient to note the above and analyze all the causes and what happened. I think as we do, it will honestly be very difficult to argue that the ROCOR-A's existence is totally unjustified, including the choices Metropolitan Agafangel and his ordinands made to perpetuate their succession. Even limiting this to the circumstances surrounding Metropolitan Cyprian's deposition in absentia would be more useful. Trying to deal with the entire history of the ROCOR in the 70's-90's, while important, is a far more complex history that cannot be easily encapsulated in pro/con with a concrete result or course of action. I am not saying it isn't necessary to discuss, but after the fact of the union, we have the time now to determine the root of our divisions with the needed care to make any discussion of inter-jurisdictional unity work more effectively towards a solid result worthy of our respective predecessors.

[jgress]

If the Papists can't even do Latin anymore, then they really have come to the end.

I think the point is not that 1994 represented a kind of about-turn in ROCOR ecclesiology. There had always, as you note, been two (or more?) opinions on the presence of grace in the MP, and in World Orthodoxy in general, and throughout Met Philaret's presidency you see official synodal statements seemingly swerving back and forth between strict and lax positions, without ever really coming down on one side or the other. So in communications with the Greek Old Calendarists, ROCOR appeared strict, but the resolutions of the 1974 Sobor were lax. The 1983 anathema suggested that ROCOR was finally going to adopt the strict position, but this suggestion was eventually neutralized by Met Vitaly's Nativity Epistle in 1986. The point is that the 1994 union with the SiR represented the final victory for the pro-WO side, by which I don't mean the side that wanted communion with WO, but the side that believed WO still had grace, and therefore that communion with WO was not quite the disaster that it would be for those, like Met Philaret or Bp Gregory, who believed WO had no grace.

So a better characterization is that ROCOR was hesitating between two paths: one being the recognition that WO, including the MP, had fallen under anathema and hence were outside the Church and hence devoid of grace; the other being the refusal to recognize the force of the anathemas (against the New Calendar, against Ecumenism, against Sergianism), and therefore allowing for WO to still be in the Church and possessing sacramental grace. With the 1994 union with Met Cyprian, ROCOR had finally come down on the second, lax position. After that, any turn to a strict position WOULD have been an about-turn, rather than simply choosing one of two possible paths. Fr Steven is suggesting that this was the idea: now it was that much harder for ROCOR ever to adopt a strict position towards the MP or WO in general, but much EASIER for them to start seriously contemplating union with them.

[Mark Templet]

Let's move forward from the past!

Suffice it to say that the ROCOR-MP union is as complex as a nuclear reactor. It is that way by design of those who orchestrated it. This is the way that such things occur in the world; not overt directness, rather subtle subterfuge that takes decades to fully blossom.

I submit to everyone that how we came to this point is irrelevant now. The ROCOR-MP is up to its neck in ecumenism at the highest levels. It is in communion with those who are even deeper. It has already begun the process of preparing the way for a unified world religion that will be chaired by the Antichrist. The murky roots of this don't matter in the present.

What SiR, ROCOR, ROCOR-A, or anyone else knew or didn't know and when they knew it is less important to me than the fact that it is clearly evident now where things are. I don't blame anyone for confusion in the past; misinformation and misdirection abounded. But what about now? How can anyone, clergy or laity, look our parishioners in the eye and say that we are still stumped about what the WO agenda is? What shred of evidence is there that the MP has Grace? And if you find it please present it to our brothers and sisters in Suzdal that are having their churches taken by force and given to the MP, at "Patriarch" Kyril's request.

The ROCOR-MP union is water under the bridge. Why can't SiR and ROCOR-A make a definitive statement about the WO like my namesake St. Mark of Ephesus did about the Roman Catholics. If SiR wants to be a Pillar of Orthodoxy then make this statement: "The World Orthodox are not only schismatics but heretics... we did not separate from them for any other reason other than the fact that they are heretics. This is precisely why we must not unite with them unless they dismiss their participation in ecumenism."

[Fr. Steven Allen]

Fr. Joseph: Your accurate historical research confirms one of the main points of my essay: ecclesiological haziness was endemic in ROCOR and led to their downfall. I still maintain the 1994 union was a critical, and negative, event, because it rendered a definitive synodal decision positively proclaiming that grace was present in WO. I do not claim that the pro-MP party accurately conveyed the Cyprian position to their audience (if such a thing is possible, the Cyprian position being so confusing). But they certainly used it.

Fr. Mark: Yes, the important thing is to move on, to establish a formula and a mechanism of union among the True Orthodox.

Leonidas Pittos (of Chicago, not his cousin in Greece who works on Ekklisiastikos) suggested to me recently that there should be a pan-True Orthodox council whose purpose should be the acceptance by all parties of the 1983 Anathema, AND the fact that it does indeed apply to WO - that they are in fact outside the Church. The SiR needs to stop insisting on this "unifying council" business with the ecumenists physically present, which will never occur. The real unifying council will be this one, among the True Orthodox, who will invite the ecumenists, who will disdain to show up. The GOC-Kiousis synod (my jurisdiction) and other "hardliners" should not "guilt load" the "Resisters" for failing to get on board sooner. But they must get on board. The time for dilly-dallying is over.

Once this is established, there will be an ecclesiological basis for healing the various divisions.

[Mark Templet]

Christ is in our midst!

Fr. Mark: Yes, the important thing is to move on, to establish a formula and a mechanism of union among the True Orthodox.

Leonidas Pittos (of Chicago, not his cousin in Greece who works on Ekklisiastikos) suggested to me recently that there should be a pan-True Orthodox council whose purpose should be the acceptance by all parties of the 1983 Anathema, AND the fact that it does indeed apply to WO - that they are in fact outside the Church. The SiR needs to stop insisting on this "unifying council" business with the ecumenists physically present, which will never occur. The real unifying council will be this one, among the True Orthodox, who will invite the ecumenists, who will disdain to show up. The GOC-Kiousis synod (my jurisdiction) and other "hardliners" should not "guilt load" the "Resisters" for failing to get on board sooner. But they must get on board. The time for dilly-dallying is over.

I would LOVE to see that happen! I pray for the souls of those who would undertake the task of organizing such an event, and those who would put up the money to make such a thin feasible. THIS NEEDS TO HAPPEN!

I hope no one gets me wrong on this tread, I don't want to "beat up" on SiR or ROCOR-A. The few of their people I have had contact with seem very pious and nice to me. Such a Pan-True Orthodox meeting would be an opportunity to air out all this stuff and let everyone have a say. This would allow each hierarch to hear things directly from "the horse's mouth" so to speak; no more hearsay (which I hate).

Well, let's stop talking about it and get started! Where would the best place be to hold such a meeting? Who is available to accurately translate Greek to Russian to English? Who's got some money to front for the travel? How many folks from each jurisdiction should come?

I can't speak officially for ROAC, but I'm 99.9% sure we would come. I'm serious let's get the wheels turning on this thing today!