Chapter 63 from Father Seraphim Rose: His Life and
Works, by Hieromonk Damascene.
“Traditionalism”
is not the same thing as the real traditional outlook.
René
Guénon [1]
Fanaticism
hinders a man’s understanding, but true faith gives it freedom.
St.
Macarius of Optina [2]
Of all the modern philosophies
which Alexey Young, as a school teacher and later as a principal, was
confronted with, perhaps the most powerful was that of evolution. He could see
that most parents were ignorant of the very formidable scientific evidence against
evolution, and also of the fact that evolution was being used (often quite
deliberately) to undermine the very foundations of the Christian worldview. He
decided to write an article for the sake of these parents, to make them more
aware of what their children were being fed intellectually. Sending it to Fr.
Seraphim for review, he received it back with a few suggestions and
encouragement to print it in Nikodemos.
Some time thereafter, Fathers
Herman and Seraphim were surprised to receive a letter expressing displeasure
over the article, written by a priest of the Russian Church Abroad who was
under the spiritual direction of Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Boston.
According to the fathers of the Boston monastery, evolution was a “forbidden
subject”; and it hurt this priest to see that Alexey was not agreeing with
these authorities. Amazed to read in Nikodemos an article against such
an established “fact” as evolution, the priest wrote that Alexey, as a convert
who had retained his “Roman perspective,” should not be allowed the “privilege
of publication,” and he stated that he was “withdrawing all support from Nikodemos.”
While working on The Kingdom
of Man and the Kingdom of God, Fr. Seraphim had made an investigation into
the social, philosophical, and spiritual roots of evolutionism. Later, when
attending the theological courses instituted by Archbishop John, he had studied
the teaching of the Orthodox Church regarding the creation of the universe, as
passed on through the Scriptures and the writings of the Holy Fathers. Thus,
having understood for a long time that evolutionism was antithetical to the
Orthodox worldview, he concluded that the Orthodox critics of Alexey’s article were
“just not aware of the whole issue of evolution, whether in its scientific side
or in its religious-theological implications.” To Alexey he wrote: “Obviously
your article has touched something very deep (frankly we are astonished that
people so keen on ecclesiastical matters, ecumenism, etc., should seem never to
have given much thought to such an important thing as evolution; apparently it
is because it seems to be outside the Church sphere).” [3]
Fr. Seraphim counseled Alexey not
to consider his critics so much “in error” as simply unaware. He said he
should not argue at all, but that together they should “prepare a more thorough
presentation of the whole subject.” “Your article,” he wrote, “beyond any doubt
is going to make you ‘unpopular’ in places. Do not let this discourage you, or
force you into a ‘defensive’ posture.” [4]
But there was more to come.
Alexey wanted to print an article he had been given on the Shroud of Turin.
When he sent it for Fr. Seraphim to check, Fr. Seraphim wrote back suggesting
that it not be printed in its present form since it was full of Roman Catholic
expressions which would immediately close the minds of some Orthodox.
Unfortunately, this reply came too late: before Alexey could communicate Fr.
Seraphim’s objections to the author of the article, the latter had the article
printed and sent it out to everyone on the mailing list of Nikodemos. “When
I discovered this I was distraught,” Alexey noted later, “for Fr. Seraphim’s
objections were good and thoughtful ones, and could have been incorporated into
the article without difficulty.” [5]
The Shroud article made Alexey’s
critics even more convinced that he was an unrepentant Catholic. As Fr.
Seraphim recalled: “We sent two long letters to Fr. ——— in defense of Alexey
(while admitting his mistakes) and begging him to apply Vladika John’s principle
of trusting and encouraging missionary laborers and not trying to make them fit
into a preconceived pattern or forcing them to submit to some standard
‘authority.’ To our grief Fr. ——— replied that on this point Vladika John was
wrong, and converts must at times be ‘stomped on.’” [6]
Fr. Seraphim had noticed other
signs of this same mentality. “We were frankly horrified,” he wrote, “when we
heard that Fr. ——— had suggested a year or so ago that Vladika Vitaly [of
Canada] be somehow placed ‘in charge’ of converts or convert priests, to avoid
the ‘mistakes’ of the past. Well, yes, that might mean the end of the
‘mistakes’ of the past (but somehow we doubt even that), but it would also mean
the end of the Orthodox missionary movement in the Church Abroad, period. (And
it wouldn’t help to have someone better in charge—the principle itself is the
dangerous thing.)” [7]
Alexey soon received a 21-page
“Open Letter” from the Boston monastery against the articles he printed. “Its
author,” wrote Fr. Seraphim to Alexey, “has obviously taken unfair advantage of
you in order thoroughly to discredit you, based on the reputation of the
monastery as against you, a ‘nobody.’ He is riding on a current of intellectual
fashion, and this will pass, and it will not be for the good of the monastery
that it has allowed itself to do this and not faced the real
intellectual problems of the day. Pray to Vladika John for guidance. Know that
not everything depends on what some people ‘think’ of you, and also that at a
proper time others will speak up for you.” [8]
The “Open Letter” was published
in a newsletter and sent all over the country. Years later, recalling this and
other actions of the Boston monastery and its followers, Fr. Seraphim wrote:
“The fact itself that they objected to the articles did not upset us ... it was
rather the way in which they objected. Through our extensive
correspondence with [them], it became clear that they believed that on such
subjects it is not possible to have different opinions or interpretations: the
‘Orthodox view’ must be one in favor of evolution (!) and against
the Shroud. We had thought that Orthodox Christians could at least discuss
these subjects together in a friendly way; but according to them one cannot
discuss these questions, but must accept the opinion of the ‘Orthodox experts’
on them.... After this, they began to tell people to ‘stay away from Etna’
because Alexey Young was ‘just a Roman Catholic,’ and we know people who
followed this advice....
“Thus, our first cause to be
upset with them was our discovery that they had formed a political party
within our Church, and those who do not agree with the ‘party line’ are
dismissed and regarded as non-existent, and people are even warned about the
‘dangers’ of having contact with such ones.... In the Russian tradition of ‘longsuffering,’
we said little about this to anyone for a long time and did not have a similar
feeling towards them, hoping that this was somehow a ‘misunderstanding’ that
would improve with time.” [9]
By 1973 Fathers Seraphim and
Herman began to discover that, not only had a “political party” been formed,
but it also used political techniques to achieve its aims. For example,
in 1972 one of the priests in the group suggested to Alexey Young that he
‘merge’ his Nikodemos with their own newsletter, and that they would be
happy to print the combined periodical to make it “easier” for Alexey. “We
thought this a very strange thing at the time,” Fr. Seraphim recalled, “and
simply advised Alexey to continue his own independent publishing; only later
did we realize that by this means they intended to ‘take over’ Nikodemos
and ensure that it would never print anything not in accordance with the ‘party
line.’ Later they told Andrew Bond in England that they would distribute his
publication, The Old Calendarist, in America, but only on condition that
no articles be printed without their censorship. In 1973, when we had asked
them if they could help with the distribution of our proposed Russian-language
periodical (which we were never able to begin), they insisted that we
let them print it also—and we began to realize that even our
Russian-language work was to be ‘censored in Boston’—and not even by
Russian-speaking people, but by converts who had learned some Russian.
“Other ‘political techniques’
include ‘spreading the word’ that some particular publication or person is
‘outside the party line.’ For example, after the publication of the ‘Shroud’
article, Alexey received a number of letters from [the group], all canceling
their subscriptions to Nikodemos and offering, instead of the friendly
criticism one would expect from fellow Orthodox Christians, a cold cutting him
off. Alexey was so depressed and hurt by the treatment they gave him at that
time that he would have given up printing altogether if we had not supported
him and told him that the attitude of other people in our Church was not at all
cold like that.” [10]
Thus, on many occasions the
fathers received clear indications that the new party intended to make their
“party line” prevail at least over the convert wing of the Russian Church
Abroad, and if possible over the Russians also. “This whole attempt,” Fr. Seraphim
wrote, “is so foreign to the Orthodox spirit that we have found it to be
extremely distasteful, and a kind of ‘Jesuitism’ that has crept into our
Church.” [11]
Fr. Seraphim noted how the new
party had begun to practice the “Jesuit” principle of “the end justifies the
means.” “When I went to their conference in 1973,” Fr. Seraphim recalled, “[one
of their priests] told me something that I did not fully appreciate then, but
which I now see as a part of the ‘problem’ which they have become for us: He
told me that if one is working for a good church cause, it is permissible for
one to lie, cheat, etc., for the sake of the ‘good cause.’ Sadly, we’ve seen
this ‘Jesuit’ principle in operation among them in the way they spread tales
about people they do not like, misrepresent the position of people they wish to
criticize, etc.” [12] At one point the faction began quoting letters against
Alexey which the latter knew for certain he had never written! “The fact that
you are having quoted against you letters that don’t exist,” Fr. Seraphim
advised Alexey, “should make you sober and realize that against that
kind of attack you can’t fight, if you are an honest man. Therefore, don’t.
Let them do and say what they will.” [13]
More than anything else, it was
the “open letters” coming from the faction that led the fathers to conclude
that something had gone wrong. Beginning in 1973, these letters were directed
to people within the Russian Church Abroad whom the party wished to criticize
and correct, including its chief hierarch and several bishops. “Almost without
exception,” Fr. Seraphim noted, “these letters have made a bad impression on
us. In most of their individual points they are ‘correct,’ but in their tone
they are filled with self-justification, subtle mockery of others, and a tone
of cold superiority.” [14]
Many of these letters were
actually lengthy essays, filled with long theological passages which were, at
best, only loosely related to the issues at hand. One young convert in England,
on receiving such a letter about himself, was very disheartened; but Fr.
Seraphim identified for him what was behind it. It was, he said, “a cold and
calculating vehicle for their self-esteem, behind a mask of absolutely fake
humility and ‘spirituality’ (the Russians would call it ‘oily’).... Father
Herman, who has a thoroughly Russian approach to such things, said after
reading this letter: ‘The man who wrote this does not believe in God, ‘which is
to say: everything holy, spiritual, and canonical in it is used for some
ulterior motive, and the letter is devoid of Orthodox heart and feeling.... The
letter itself does not deserve an answer. They are experts in this tactic and
would tear any reply of yours to shreds, knowing how to make it appear
that whatever you say is wrong.” [15]
Fr. Seraphim called the attitude
that produced these letters “being spiritual while looking in a mirror.” [16] He
noticed that all the letters coming from people in the party “breathe the same
spirit, as if written by the same person—even though some of the writers we
know personally to be not like that at all.... Just recently I came across some
letters to us from Boston twelve years ago—and what a difference! They were
just strugglers then, and too bogged down in daily labors to be writing such
long-winded epistles. What has happened?” [17]
In order to have its own views
prevail in the Russian Church Abroad, the new faction did not stop at “open
letters,” but began to systematically undermine the authority of the most
respected Orthodox teachers of recent centuries. Its chief weapon in this,
noted Fr. Seraphim, “is the recent academic fashion of looking everywhere for
‘Western influence’ in our theological texts.” [18] Most of the recent
teachers, from St. Nikodemos of the Holy Mountain down to Archbishop Averky,
were accused of being under this influence, of being “scholastics.” The
theologians of the party were giving people to believe that they knew more
about Orthodox theology than St. Nektarios of Pentapolis, St. John of Kronstadt
(who talked about the “merits” of Christ), Archbishop John (who commissioned a
service to be written to the Western Holy Father, Blessed Augustine), and the
Optina Elders. “Such presumption,” wrote Fr. Seraphim, “can only do harm to the
real cause of renewing Orthodox life by drawing from the fresh springs
of Orthodox tradition.” [19]
As Fr. Seraphim realized, the
alarm over “Western influence” was based upon a half-truth. “Fr. Michael
Pomazansky,” he wrote, “and other good theologians will readily admit that
there were such ‘Western influences’ in the theological texts of the latter period
of the Russian (and Greek) history—but they also emphasize that these
influences were external ones which never touched the heart of Orthodox
doctrine. To say otherwise is to admit that Orthodoxy was lost (!) in
these last centuries, and only now are young ‘theologians’ ... ‘finding’ again
the Orthodoxy of the Fathers.... If such theological giants as Metropolitan
Philaret of Moscow, Bishop Theophan the Recluse, Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov,
Archbishop Averky of Jordanville, Fr. Michael Pomazansky, and in general the
theology taught in our seminaries for the last century and more, are not really
‘Orthodox’ at all—then we are in a very dangerous condition, and where are we
to find our theological authority by which to stand firm against all the errors
and temptations of these times? [The theologians of the new party] teach: We
will teach you what is right, we will read the Holy Fathers for you and
teach you the correct doctrine, we have excellent translators and
interpreters who are more Orthodox than Bishop Theophan, Metropolitan Philaret
of Moscow, Archbishop Averky, and all the rest. This is a terribly dangerous
game that they are playing; they are unwittingly undermining the Orthodox
ground under their feet.” [20]
Fr. Seraphim believed that what
these apparent traditionalists and zealots were doing was precisely what the
so-called liberals of the Parisian school were doing: severing the link,
cutting off the recent roots to the ancient Fathers, in order that they themselves
might be the authorities. The new theologians of the “traditionalist” school
now claimed that they had been “able to sift through the scholastic attritions
to our theology, and return to the Faith of the Fathers.” This was the claim of
the Parisian school, also. As Fr. Seraphim wrote to one priest: “This points
you in the direction of a kind of Protestantism, by placing a gap in the
Orthodox theological tradition which only your group manages to span by
skipping the interval of the ‘Latin captivity’ and getting back to the
‘original sources.’... The very notion of ‘Latin captivity’ is played up by Fr.
Alexander Schmemann and his colleagues precisely with the aim of destroying the
idea of the continuity of Orthodox tradition throughout the centuries. DO NOT
FALL INTO THAT TRAP! There are great theologians of the past several centuries
who used expressions one might like to see improved; but that does not
mean that they are in ‘Latin captivity’ or should be discredited. They just do
not use these expressions in the same context as the Latins, and therefore the
issue is not a very important one.” [21]
“A well-balanced Orthodoxy,”
Fr. Seraphim wrote elsewhere, “can easily take any foreign influences that come
and straighten them out, make them Orthodox; but a one-sided ‘party-line’ cuts
itself off from the mainstream of Orthodoxy.” [22]
In the end, Fr. Seraphim
identified this neo-traditionalism as a kind of “renovationism from the right.”
“‘Boston Orthodoxy,’” he wrote, “is actually a kind of right wing of ‘Parisian
Orthodoxy’—a ‘reformed’ Orthodoxy which happens to be mostly ‘correct,’ but is
actually just as much outside the tradition of Orthodoxy as Paris, just as much
the creation of human logic. A terrible temptation for our times.” [23]
Concerning this lack of roots in
the neo-traditionalists, Fr. Seraphim wrote: “They have to ‘do it themselves,’
with no one and no stable tradition to correct them. Their ‘roots’ are rather
in twentieth-century America, which accounts for the ‘modern’ tone of their
epistles [and] their failure to understand the whole significance, religious
origin and context of ‘evolution.’ ... We’ve already seen several examples
(particularly when they try to get into the Russian sphere, in which they are
totally lost) of how they jump on some points purely on the basis of impression
and whim, owing precisely to their lack of a thorough theological background.
They do not trust their Russian elders (and we rather doubt that they have any
Greek elders to take counsel of either).... They virtually boast that they
alone are ‘great theologians’ who have just now rediscovered a lost
theological tradition; but actually their theology is remarkably crude and
simplistic, especially when put beside the writings of a truly great theologian
in the unbroken Orthodox tradition—our own Fr. Michael Pomazansky of
Jordanville, who is subtle, refined, deep—and totally overlooked by the ‘bright
young theologians.’ ... We ourselves, not being ‘theologians,’... frequently
take counsel from Fr. Michael and others, whose judgment we trust and respect,
knowing that thus we are in a good tradition and do not have to trust our own
faulty judgment for all the answers.” [24]
One point that the
neo-traditionalists took issue with was the use of the nineteenth-century
Orthodox Catechism of Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow, which the later Catechism
of Metropolitan Anthony Khrapovitsky had once been meant to replace. They
called Metropolitan Philaret’s work “Roman Catholic” and “awful” even though,
as we have seen, it had been this very catechism that Archbishop John had
always recommended to converts. [25]
Another point concerned saints
whom the neo-traditionalists said were “not Orthodox” or even heretics, and
should be thrown out of the Calendar. Fr. Seraphim was deeply disappointed when
their newsletter published a pointless attack on his beloved Blessed Augustine.
The article called those who venerated Augustine “untrained theologically” and
“Latin-leaning.” As Fr. Seraphim pointed out in a letter, however, this would
include Archbishop John, St. Nikodemos of the Holy Mountain, and the Greek and
Russian theological tradition of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, not to
mention the Fathers of the Fifth Ecumenical Council. “The universal tradition
of the Orthodox Church,” he wrote, “accepts Blessed Augustine as a Holy Father,
albeit with a [theological] flaw—very much like St. Gregory of Nyssa in the
East.” [26]
The attack on Blessed Augustine
revealed to Fr. Seraphim that the neo-traditionalist theologians were outside
the spirit of Orthodox theology: “not,” he said, “because they are not smart or
well-read enough, but because they are too passionately involved in showing
how right they always are.” [27] In another letter he wrote: “The true
Orthodox perspective is, first of all, to distrust one’s abstract
‘theological’ outlook and ask: what do our elders think; what did recent
Fathers think? And taking these opinions respectfully, one then begins to put
together the picture for oneself.... Anyone who has read Blessed Augustine’s Confessions
with sympathy will not readily want to ‘throw him out of the Calendar’—for he
will see in this book that fiery zeal and love which is precisely what
is so lacking in our Church life today!... Perhaps Blessed Augustine’s very
‘Westernness’ makes him more relevant for us today who are submerged in the
West and its way of thought.” [28]
Fr. Seraphim recalled how, when
he had once asked Archbishop John about Metropolitan Anthony’s “dogma,” the
latter had dismissed the subject and had instead begun to speak about Blessed
Augustine, as if he associated Metropolitan Anthony and Blessed Augustine in
his mind. Taking an example from this, Fr. Seraphim once said, “If one calls
Blessed Augustine a heretic, one has to call Metropolitan Anthony one, also;
but if one accepts Metropolitan Anthony as a great hierarch while forgiving him
for his error, then one has to do the same with Blessed Augustine.” [29]
This view was in marked contrast to the logic of the neo-traditionalist
theologians, who, while rejecting Blessed Augustine, asserted that Metropolitan
Anthony was virtually the only teacher of recent times who was entirely free of
“Western influence.”
As Fr. Seraphim once told Fr.
Herman, the real “Western influence” was to be seen in those who placed the
opinion of one man (in this case, the leader of their party) above the
testimony of living tradition. It was just such a concept of authority, he said,
that had caused the theological errors in the contemporary Roman Church. In one
letter he lamented, “Has our Orthodoxy in America become so narrow that we must
be under the dictation of a ‘pope-expert’ and we must accept a ‘party-line’ on
every conceivable subject? This is against everything Vladika John taught us
and did in missionary labors.” [30]
Father Seraphim gave this
type of narrowness the term “super-correctness,” sometimes calling it
“correctness disease.” He saw how it could have a strong pull on young people,
both converts and Western-born native Orthodox. The new “super-correct” authorities,
he observed, “offer them some ‘simple’ answers to complex questions, and that
is very attractive to those a little uncertain or shaky in their faith.... We
know many converts who grasp at ‘correctness’ like a baby’s bottle, and I think
they could save their souls better by being a little ‘incorrect’ but humbler.”
[31]
With its modern, overly logical
approach, the “super-correct” wing had set itself above the simple believing
Greeks of the “old school”; and Fr. Seraphim perceived how their mentality was
also foreign to that of long-suffering Russians. In a letter he wrote: “One
basic element seems lacking in all their ‘wisdom,’ one which the Holy Fathers
emphasize is essential for genuine Orthodox life: suffering. The
‘wisdom’ born of leisure and idle disputes is not worth having; but the wisdom
born of deep suffering (such as God has given above all to the Russians of our
day) is alone truly balanced and sound, even if it cannot give a glib answer to
every mocking question. Let us try to enter more deeply into this suffering,
God giving us His grace to do so!” [32]
One of the “simple answers”
provided by the super-correct contingent concerned the relations of the various
Orthodox Churches. These people maintained that all Churches on the New
Calendar or involved in ecumenical activities were “heretical” and “invalid,”
that they were “no churches at all,” that their bishops were “pseudo bishops,”
and that they had no grace in their sacraments.
Some of the leading priests of
the new faction, before being received into the Russian Church Abroad, had been
ordained by one of these New Calendar Churches, the Greek Archdiocese of
America. These priests had a whole theory worked out whereby the Greek
Archdiocese, due to ecumenical activities, had supposedly lost its grace
sometime after they had been ordained.
Unfortunately, one of the priests
had a brother who was still a priest in the Greek Archdiocese. During a visit
to Platina he told Fr. Herman, “I certainly don’t pray for my
brother!”—meaning that he would not pray for him when the Orthodox are
commemorated during the Divine Liturgy. Astounded, Fr. Herman went to tell Fr.
Seraphim. “Can you imagine?” he asked. “He’s talking about his own blood
brother, ordained by the same bishop as he!”
Fr. Seraphim blinked his eyes
with astonishment. “Well, it certainly is ‘correct,’” he said with a sigh.
When The Orthodox Word
published an appeal from the poverty-stricken Orthodox Church in Uganda [33]—which
was in desperate need of food, clothing, spiritual books, icons, etc.—another
of the super-correct priests wrote to the fathers inquiring whether these
African Orthodox were “indeed brethren.” This priest maintained that if they
belonged to a New Calendar, allegedly “graceless” jurisdiction (which in fact
they did), they should not be helped. “I would rather donate whatever I can to
some worthy Orthodox family or organization,” he concluded.
“How can we combat this
cold-hearted elitism?” [34] Fr. Seraphim asked on reading this
letter.
The super-correct view of
grace—or rather gracelessness—caused many problems for the Russian Church
Abroad. The faction’s leaders were representing to people—especially
impressionable converts—that the bishops of the Russian Church Abroad
considered this Church virtually the only Orthodox body left in the world, most
of the others being graceless. As Fr. Seraphim observed, however, “our bishops
refuse to ‘define’ this matter and make everything ‘black and white’; and I am
sure that, perhaps without exception, our bishops not only refuse to declare
them without grace, but positively believe (at least by giving them the benefit
of any doubt) that they do have grace.” [35] Many of these hierarchs
had spoken powerfully against ecumenism, Sergianism, etc., but they had not
formally broken communion with any Church save the Moscow Patriarchate—and even
there they had not presumed to proclaim it “without grace.” As Fr. Seraphim
wrote elsewhere, “The bishops [of the Russian Church Abroad], on various
occasions, have specifically refused to make such a proclamation; and in
their statement at the 1976 Sobor they specifically addressed the sincere and
struggling priests of the Moscow Patriarchate in terms reserved only for
priests who possess and dispense the grace of God.” [36]
Going to Greece, the
super-correct faction tried to create political ties between the Russian Church
Abroad and the most extreme of all Old Calendar groups: the “Matthewites,” who
believed that not only were all the New Calendar Churches without grace, but
any Church that had anything at all to do with them was also graceless.
This plan later backfired, for the Matthewites learned that, contrary to what
they had been led to believe, the Russian Church Abroad was far too “liberal”
for them.
In 1976 the English-speaking
Orthodox mission was also struck a blow when people (mostly insecure converts)
who had been baptized in other canonical Orthodox Churches were directed by the
super-correct contingent to get rebaptized in the Russian Church Abroad.
“Recently,” Fr. Seraphim wrote, “some wished to see such a ‘rebaptism’
performed in our Western American diocese, but our Archbishop Anthony wisely
refused to allow it, in which we gave him our full support—for indeed, it would
have been tantamount to an open declaration of the absence of grace in the
Greek Archdiocese.” [37]
Bishop Nektary was alarmed to
hear of this unprecedented practice. “Perhaps the second baptism,” he remarked,
“washes away the grace of the first one.”
At the height of the correctness
mania in 1976, Fr. Seraphim explained to one convert why his path could not be
with this type of “zealotry.” “Their ‘strictness,’” he wrote, “forces them to
become so involved in church politics that spiritual questions become quite
secondary. I know for myself that if I would have to sit down and think out for
myself exactly which shade of ‘zealotry’ is the ‘correct’ one today—I
will lose all peace of mind and be constantly preoccupied with questions of
breaking communion, of how this will seem to others, of ‘what will the Greeks
think’ (and which Greeks?), and ‘what will the Metropolitan think?’ And
I will not have time or inclination to become inspired by the wilderness, by
the Holy Fathers, by the marvelous saints of ancient and modern times who lived
in a higher world. In our times especially, it is not possible to be entirely
detached from these questions, but let us place first things first.” [38]
In another letter he wrote: “We
who wish to remain in the true tradition of Orthodoxy will have to be zealous
and firm in our Orthodoxy without being fanatics, and without presuming to
teach our bishops what they should do. Above all we must strive to preserve the
true fragrance of Orthodoxy, being at least a little ‘not of this world,’ detached
from all the cares and politics even of the Church, nourishing ourselves on the
otherworldly food the Church gives us in such abundance.” [39]
There were times when Fr. Herman
feared that the super-correct group was actually powerful enough to set the
tone for all the converts coming to traditional Orthodoxy in America, and
particularly to the Russian Church Abroad. But Fr. Seraphim, although it hurt
him to watch people being captured by this extremism, was not convinced.
Quoting Abraham Lincoln, he told Fr. Herman, “It is true that you may fool all
the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time;
but you can’t fool all of the people all the time.”
Judging from the way things were
going, Fr. Seraphim predicted that the super-correct group would eventually
stage a schism and end up as a narrow, isolated sect of its own. In his letters
over the years, he stated this many times:
June 15, 1976: “The ‘right wing’
of Orthodoxy will probably be divided into many small ‘jurisdictions’ in
future, most of them anathematizing and fighting with the others.... We must
keep up the living contact with the older Russian clergy, even if some of them
may seem to us a little too ‘liberal’—otherwise we will be lost in the ‘zealot’
jungle which is growing up around us!” [40]
July 8, 1980: “We ourselves have
felt for some time that Fr. ——— and others who share his attitude are heading
straight for a schism, which now seems almost inevitable if he does not change
his direction. Such a schism nobody needs; there are so many groups of
‘correct’ Orthodox in Greece now (none in communion with the others) that a new
group will only prove the devil’s power to divide Orthodox Christians.” [41]
October 27, 1980: “I look with
pain and sadness on this whole situation; ... but I am powerless to do anything
about it.... The inevitable schism which they are now preparing (if they don’t
change soon) will be the last step in a process which only they can change.”
[42]
September 17, 1981: “Judging from
the last outburst, the schism is close, and I’m afraid the ‘silent majority’ of
our priests and laymen will only heave a sigh of relief when the troublemakers
are gone—leaving behind them a bad harvest of ill will, and continuing their
name-calling and hatred in a louder tone from their new ‘jurisdiction.’
“May God preserve us from all of
this! Please forgive my frankness, but I feel the time is very late, and anyone
who can do anything had better do it now. I know God will continue to preserve
His Church and I believe He will prosper the true Orthodox mission which is
just beginning in our Church.... But the tragedy of souls caught in a
self-willed schism will be incalculable.” [43]
December 8, 1981: “How tragic
that some are now leading their flocks (albeit still very small flocks) out of
communion with the only people who can still teach them what Orthodoxy is and
help them to wake up from their fantasies of a ‘super-correct’ Orthodoxy that
exists nowhere in the world.” [44]
Not long after Fr. Seraphim’s
repose, his prediction unfortunately came true just as he had written.
“All this will pass, like some
horrible nightmare,” [45] Fr. Seraphim remarked in a letter. Looking back at
his support of the super-correct group in previous years, he wrote: “We feel
ourselves badly betrayed.... All these years we trusted that they were of one
mind and soul with us, giving everything they had for the cause of the
English-speaking mission. But really, it seems that all this time they were
only building for their own glory, cruelly abusing the trust of our simple
Russian bishops, priests, and laymen.... [46] We fear that all our articles
about ‘zealotry’ in the past years have helped to produce a monster!” [47]
Of course, there was
disillusionment on both sides. The leaders of the new party, having been
inspired to take up the zealot position in the first place largely thanks to
the Platina fathers, assumed that the fathers would naturally join their
movement and begin to take their directives from the Boston monastery. Some of
them were truly disappointed when it became clear that the fathers were not
going to follow their line. They had thought that Fr. Seraphim wanted absolute
strictness just like they did, but in this they were wrong. Fr. Seraphim wanted
Truth, which is on a deeper level altogether. “They have built a church career
for themselves,” Fr. Seraphim wrote, “on a false but attractive premise: that
the chief danger to the Church today is lack of strictness. No—the chief danger
is something much deeper—the loss of the savor of Orthodoxy, a movement
in which they themselves are participating, even in their ‘strictness.’...
‘Strictness’ will not save us if we don’t have any more the feeling and taste
of Orthodoxy.” [48]
During the last decade of his
life, Fr. Seraphim poured an incredible amount of time and energy into the
question of “super-correctness,” having to uphold the Orthodox consciousness
handed down from his Fathers against the many idiosyncrasies of the
neo-traditionalist “theology.” Not only were articles needed, but also
carefully thought-out answers to the many who came to him wondering about the
new tone that was being set in the Church.
Looking back on this, one might
be inclined to regard it as a waste of time. These were, in Fr. Seraphim’s
words, “college boys playing at Orthodoxy,” [49] trying to prove they were
tougher than everyone else. They were not sensitive thinkers like Fr. Seraphim,
and were not in the least interested in what he had to say if it did not accord
with the party line.
Several considerations, however,
lead one to conclude that his time was not wasted at all. First of all, as Fr.
Seraphim was acutely aware, souls were at stake in this matter, for in leading
people into schism from the Church, the super-correct faction was blocking off
their means of salvation. “A number of people,” Fr. Seraphim wrote, “have
already left our Church in anger, and I see others evidently preparing to go
the same way. Our warnings on this subject in The Orthodox Word are
meant to save as many people as possible from this suicidal step. Some
dangerous signs: Just recently the priest of the ——— church in ——— told two of
my spiritual children whom I had sent there, that our Russian bishops are
‘betraying’ him by their ‘ecumenism’; another Greek priest has told his flock
that soon they will again be without bishops because they will have to leave
the Russian Church Abroad; another clergyman openly calls some of our bishops
‘heretics.’ The perils about which we are warning are not imaginary, not at
all.” [50]
Secondly, we should consider the
effect that this matter had in rounding out Fr. Seraphim’s message to the
modern world. As we have seen, super-correctness (and not always in the obvious
forms mentioned above) is a big temptation for Orthodox people of these latter
times, when “the love of many grows cold.” Indeed, correctness is built into
the very word “Orthodox,” which means “right worship.” A key question for our
days, which Fr. Seraphim had to face, was: How does one remain a right
(Orthodox) believer without becoming self-righteous?
It was because Fr. Seraphim had a
head-on collision with “correct” extremism that he was able to help his
contemporaries out of this ditch. If he had not had it, it is likely that his
writings would have proved one-sided. Even if he had avoided this pitfall
himself, his words would not have been able to prevent less balanced
individuals from going off the deep end on the right side. As it stands now,
however, his message to people of today is full of sobering warnings against
renovationism on the right as well as on the left, against legalism and
loveless externalism under the guise of “traditionalism.” “Anything outward,”
he had said, “can become a counterfeit.” [51]
Finally, we should not neglect to
mention the value of all this on the formation of Fr. Seraphim’s own soul. He
himself had been a convert to “zealot Orthodoxy”; and it was necessary that he
go deeper into the phenomenon of zealotry, which by itself was not
the answer. By dealing with it, and even more by suffering over it
throughout many years, he had been forced to eradicate vestiges of cold elitism
from his Christian faith, even while maintaining his devotion to the cause of “true
Orthodoxy.” As he wrote in a letter, “I think in all of this, despite
appearances, God is helping us to a deeper, truer Christianity. So much of our
Orthodoxy today is so self-righteous and smug, or at least lukewarm and
comfortable, that we need to be shaken up a little. May God only grant that His
sheep not be lost!” [52] And in another letter: “Deep down I do hope
that we will ‘suffer through’ this whole problem and that the deeper heart of
our Church will make itself known in the end.” [53]
In this suffering Fr. Seraphim
was able, as we shall see, to achieve that rare combination of an
uncompromising stand for Truth and a warm, living Orthodoxy of the heart.
Such is what makes all the difference between experts of dead “traditionalism”
and true carriers of living tradition such as Archbishop John.
ENDNOTES
1. René Guénon, Crisis of the Modern World, p. 18.
2. Fr. Leonid Kavelin, Elder Macarius of Optina (SHB,
1995), p. 47.
3. LFSR to Alexey Young, April 18, 1973.
4. Ibid.
5. Fr. Alexey Young, Letters from Fr. Seraphim, p. 81.
6. LFSR to Fr. Ioannikios, Transfiguration of the Lord, Aug.
6/19, 1973.
7. LFSR to Fr. N., Palm Sunday, April 9/22, 1973.
8. LFSR to Alexey Young, July 12, 1973.
9. LFSR to Fr. Roman Lukianov, Nov. 14, 1979.
10. Ibid.
11. Ibid.
12. Ibid.
13. LFSR to Alexey Young, Oct. 17, 1975.
14. LFSR to Fr. Roman Lukianov, Nov. 14, 1979.
15. LFSR to A., June 4, 1976.
16. LFSR to Vanya (John), April 14, 1981.
17. LFSR to Fr. Hilarion (later Archbishop), Oct. 3, 1979.
18. LFSR to Fr. Roman Lukianov, Nov. 14, 1979.
19. LFSR to Alexey Young, week of Nov. 6, 1973.
20. LFSR to Fr. Roman Lukianov, Nov. 14, 1979.
21. LFSR to Fr. N., Sept. 1, 1973.
22. LFSR to Andrew Bond, Bright Saturday, April 18/May 1,
1976.
23. LFSR to Alexey Young, Third Day of Trinity, June 2/15,
1976.
24. LFSR to Alexey Young, week of Nov. 6, 1973; LFSR to
Alexey Young, St. Thomas Sunday, April 23/May 6, 1973; LFSR to Andrew Bond,
Bright Saturday, April 18/May 1, 1976; LFSR to Alexey Young, St. Thomas Sunday,
1973.
25. LFSR to Fr. Roman Lukianov, Nov. 14, 1979.
26. LFSR to Alexey Young, Oct. 15, 1975.
27. Ibid.
28. LFSR to Nicholas, March 30, 1976.
29. FSR, as told to Fr. Herman Podmoshensky.
30. LFSR to Fr. Igor, Oct. 12, 1975.
31. LFSR to Andrew Bond, Bright Saturday, April 18/May 1,
1976; LFSR to Fr. Alexis, June 23, 1976.
32. LFSR to Alexey Young, July 12, 1973.
33. “Help the Orthodox in Uganda!” OW, no. 92 (1980),
pp. 98, 151.
34. LFSR to Fr. Demetrios, Oct. 27, 1980.
35. LFSR to Andrew Bond, June 4, 1976.
36. LFSR to George and Margaret, Jan. 10, 1981.
37. LFSR to Andrew Bond, Bright Saturday, April 18/May 1,
1976.
38. LFSR to Daniel Olson, Apodosis of Ascension, May 29/June
11, 1976.
39. LFSR to Alexey Young, Third Day of Trinity, June 2/15,
1976.
40. Ibid.
41. LFSR to Fr. Michael, July 8, 1980.
42. LFSR to Fr. Demetrios, Oct. 27, 1980.
43. LFSR to Fr. Demetrios, Sept. 17, 1981.
44. LFSR to Fr. Demetrios, Dec. 8, 1981.
45. LFSR to Alexey Young, Oct. 17, 1975.
46. LFSR to Alexey Young, Oct. 15, 1975.
47. LFSR to Alexey Young, Third Day of Trinity, June 2/15,
1976.
48. LFSR to Andrew Bond, June 4, 1976; LFSR to Daniel Olson,
Apodosis of Ascension, May 29/June 11, 1976.
49. LFSR to Alexey Young, Oct. 15, 1975.
50. LFSR to George and Margaret, Jan. 10, 1981.
51. [FSR], “Archbishop Andrew of New Diveyevo,” OW,
no. 63 (1975), p. 137.
52. LFSR to Andrew Bond, April 4, 1978.
53. LFSR to Fr. Demetrios, Oct. 27, 1980.
Source: Father Seraphim Rose: His Life and Works
(Platina, CA: St. Herman Press, 2003), pp. 518-532.
