Archpriest Benjamin Joukoff [Veniamin Zhukov, +2023] | December 8, 1985
Source: Orthodox
Life, Vol. 37, No. 5, September-October 1987, pp. 16-35.
The following article, by Archpriest Benjamin Joukoff, was
published in French in the magazine Messager, an official organ of the Western
European Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, and was
translated for us by Mr. Edward Jones.
INTRODUCTION
When God came on earth in the
Person of His Son, He That is Love did not find there a reciprocal love. The
Son of God was crucified because the world did not acknowledge Him.
A delusion exists in the world
which prevents one from recognizing Divine Love.
The truth about this life of love
is contained in the teaching that has been revealed by God.
Also, “to tell the truth is
the greatest act of love” (St. Photius).
And, Saint Maximus the Confessor
says, “I do not call the act of supporting heretical error love, but hatred
of mankind.”
“Heretic” and “anathema” are
words which do not properly carry the connotation of horror that general usage
would ascribe to them. Rather, they stand for a state of choice with regard to
the truth. The Greek word hairein — to choose — has given us heretic.
As for anathema: in antiquity it meant an offering made to God, and in
early Christian times it stood for that object which later became known as an ex
voto, and “to anathematize” means to present to God someone who
willfully separates himself from the truth so that God in His mercy might
judge him, the community living according to the canons of truth being no
longer able to do anything for him.
THE SEARCH FOR
TRUTH
The Apostle Paul relates that he
had been caught up into the heavenly heights, and that he was incapable of
putting into words what he had witnessed (II Cor. 12:2ff).
This is an indication of the fact
that the heavenly world — to which the Church belongs, as a community founded
by Christ in truth and love — possesses immeasurable riches, and that there is
no man who can wholly embrace or perceive this celestial world with his spirit,
because his sinfulness holds him near to the things of the earth.
It is therefore not only through
our own endeavor, by means of our intelligence alone, that our approach to
Divine Truth will prevail. Its success will come all the more surely as we
approach these things with simplicity and humility, as we search for
enlightenment where there is light, that is to say, in the Church Herself.
The holy Martyr Cyprian of
Carthage (+258) points out that: “virtuous and simple souls can easily avoid
delusion and find truth. Because from the moment that they turn to the sources
of Divine Tradition, their delusion disappears.”
St. John Chrysostom also says in
his homilies on the First Epistle to the Corinthians, “The spirit that is
not subdued by the dogmas of the Church and the teaching of the holy Fathers
sows discord among Christians and gives rise to countless heresies and
schisms.”
In Russia, in the period
following the Revolution, simple people with little education often appeared
more perceptive than academy professors; they were able to recognize easily the
lies of the Church Renovators and, later on, the temptations which were offered
by the legal control of the Church by the persecuting authorities. They simply
opened their hearts to the Church’s precepts and walked in the narrow path of
salvation as servants of the Church.
The great Orthodox thinker,
Khomiakov, who lived in the last century, used to lay much store on the fact
that our capacity to understand the things of the Church depends directly on
our state of
moral perfection.
THE CHURCH
ONE, HOLY,
CATHOLIC, AND APOSTOLIC
The Church can be called a unity
of faithful Christians having the same faith, possessing one hierarchy, and
unique mysteries. This, at least, is how she is seen from the outside.
But her greatest worth is in her
spiritual and invisible nature, which is the Kingdom of the grace of the Holy
Spirit. She also has invisible members: first and foremost, her invisible Head,
the Lord Jesus Christ, and all the saints and the angels.
Her unity, however, is one and
indivisible.
The Church is ONE, at the same
time both terrestrial and celestial.
She is HOLY: which indicates a
condition that is undisturbed and without blemish.
She is CATHOLIC and APOSTOLIC:
these words express her compass and her succession, and characterize both her
way of life and the origin of her life.
THE BODY OF CHRIST
The hidden aspect of the life of
the Church is based on the fact that she is a Divine Organism, THE BODY OF
CHRIST. The Apostle Paul says that Christ is the “HEAD OVER ALL” of the
“Church, which is His Body” (Eph. 1:22-23).
The Church is therefore a living
organism, the Body of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and one can really belong to this
Body only by living with HIM, and according to HIM.
The Apostle Paul says, “ONE BODY
AND ONE SPIRIT” (Eph. 4:4).
An indication of the kind of life
to be had within this Body by the members of this Body is given in the words of
Christ, “I AM THE WAY, THE TRUTH AND THE LIFE” (John 14:6).
THE WAY
WAY does not only denote a
direction to follow, as in observing His commandments, but it also represents
an actual MEANS. The words, “NO MAN COMETH UNTO THE FATHER, BUT BY ME” are
indicative of the fact that Christ is not only the WAY in a symbolic sense, but
that He is the INDISPENSABLE PATH FOR THE DIVINE KINGDOM.
This is realized through
COMMUNION WITH HIM: “He that eateth My Body, and drinketh My Blood, abideth
in Me, and I in Him.”
We receive Christ, and He
takes us with Him.
THE TRUTH
The TRUTH is the RULE by which
the heavenly, divine and eternal world lives; so also, in part, does the
earthly created world.
As GOD is a SPIRIT, everything
is SPIRIT in the HEAVENLY WORLD. The TRUTH is SPIRITUAL. Truth’s reflection in
the earthly world is spiritual above all else.
The Lord said to the Samaritan
woman, “The hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at
Jerusalem, worship the Father . . . The true worshippers shall worship the
Father IN SPIRIT AND IN TRUTH: for the Father seeketh such to worship Him.”
And it is because this rule has
been disturbed by sin in the earthly world that Christ said that His KINGDOM
was not of this world. This is also why Christ said: “I came to bear witness
unto the truth: everyone that is of the truth heareth My voice.”
To a certain extent, TRUTH is
still discerned by its opposite which reigns in the world, namely FALSEHOOD.
FALSEHOOD has now become almost
universal. Not only do people lie increasingly in their personal lives, but
also in their public lives: socially, in politics and in government, and even
in their church lives. The most terrible thing of all is that nowadays many
ecclesiastics tell lies; and this, according to Archbishop Averky, is one of
the causes of contemporary atheism and unbelief.
The Apostle John says of the
devil, “. . . he is the father of falsehood” (John 8:44). And, in his
epistle, he states that “no lie is of the truth” (I John 2:21).
The Holy Scriptures assert that
in the last times there will appear all kinds of miracles, signs, and false
wonders, with all the seductions . . .
The Apostle Paul says that God
shall send “Strong delusion, . . . that they all might be damned who
believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (II Thess.
2:11-12).
In consequence, a selection based
on truth takes place in the world. The Lord has indicated this as follows: “I
have manifested Thy Name to the men which Thou gavest Me out of the world.
Thine they were . . . and they have kept Thy word . . . I pray for them. I pray
not for the world, but for them which Thou hast given Me, for they are Thine”
(John 17:6-10). “Holy Father, keep through Thine own Name those whom Thou
hast given Me, that they may be one, as We are” (John 17:11).
THE LIFE
As for the LIFE — the third
expression in Christ’s saying, I AM THE WAY, THE TRUTH AND THE LIFE — this
refers to life lived according to the rules of truth. This life is a principle
in itself: it is not a fleeting event or an accident, but a continuous natural
process.
To the Samaritan woman Christ
said that the water that He gives will quench thirst forever: “THE WATER
THAT I SHALL GIVE HIM SHALL BE IN HIM A SPRING OF WATER, WELLING UP UNTO
EVERLASTING LIFE” (John 4:14).
And from this spring of life
it is that the saints, who hardly ate at all, drew sustenance: St. Mary of
Egypt, St. Seraphim of Sarov, St. John of Kronstadt . . .
THE LIFE OF THE
CHRISTIAN IN THE CHURCH
The life of the Christian as a
member of the Body of Christ can proceed only according to the rules of that
Body. The true Christian lives in CHRIST, in the TRUTH, and in the ETERNAL
LIFE.
The malfunctioning of a member in
a physical body produces illness. In the BODY OF CHRIST the malfunctioning of a
member — that is to say, the sinning of a Christian — also produces illness: at
first spiritual, then physical. Spiritual therapy consists in repentance,
together with a return to the precepts of one’s former life.
Also, just as in a physical body
the malfunctioning of one member affects the rest of the body, so in the
SPIRITUAL BODY — the CHURCH — the other members suffer from the sinning of one
of their number.
This happens chiefly because of
love, which is this Body’s vital principle. This love unlocks for us the
meaning of divine MERCY, COMPASSION, a uniquely Christian quality, just as the
Church is a uniquely Christian entity. Now we understand why Christ wept.
As He ascended from the earth,
Christ said that He would always remain with His disciples. But He also said
that He would send the SPIRIT of TRUTH, the COMFORTER, Who will strengthen us
in all TRUTH (John 16:13). The SPIRIT, Who fills all things, is thus the BOND between
all the true members of the Church. In some degree, all these members are like
places, through which the SPIRIT of TRUTH and of LIFE may pass. And where He
finds this passage, the SPIRIT acts — that is to say, in people who are pious,
simple, and just — and He pours out His grace around them.
In this is the royal priesthood
of the people of God realized, as it says in the Scriptures (without
diminishing for one moment the importance within the Church of her priestly
hierarchy, which was itself established by the Lord).
St. John Chrysostom says, “If
I have told you all this, it is so that among ordinary people, the faithful,
each one might be watchful, so that we might learn that we are all one
single Body, in that we differ from each other only to the extent that some
parts of a physical body differ from the others; also, so that you might not
throw back all your care on the priests, but that, for your part also you might
concern yourselves with the entire Church, like as unto your common BODY”
(Homily on the Second Epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians).
Also the Church, as she is
recognized by Orthodoxy, cannot be called an authority. Authority is
something external. For the Christian, the Church is not authority, but truth,
and “at the same time, the life of a Christian, his interior life”
(Khomiakov). The Christian believes what the Church teaches, not because he
puts his trust in her representatives, but because he himself lives this life.
Heresy appears when a man moves away from this life, or when he seeks to bring
it into line with his own ideas.
In these circumstances, ANATHEMA
signifies the separation of a member, either because he transgresses the law
without repenting and being re-installed, or because he promulgates a false
doctrine, a different teaching about this rule of life. Anathemas are thus
pronounced on heretics or on sinners who do not repent.
The Apostle Paul says, “If any
man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema” (I Cor. 16:22);
again: “Though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other Gospel unto you
than that which we have preached unto you, let him be anathema.”
The way in which one should
completely avoid all relations with those who have ceased being Christians is
indicated by St. Paul: “I wrote to you . . . not to company with
fornicators: yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with
idolators, or with the covetous, or extortioners; for then must ye needs go out
of the world. But now I have written unto you not to keep company if any man
that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolator, or a
railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one, no, not to eat”
(I Cor. 5:9-11).
From the Church’s beginnings
heresies have been anathematized, as well as those who confessed them. Such
were the heresies relating to the teaching on the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the
Holy Trinity…
In 1054, after Cardinal Humbert,
the representative of Pope Leo IX, had placed a bull of excommunication on the
altar of the Church of the Holy Wisdom in Constantinople, during the
celebration of the Divine Liturgy, Patriarch Michael Cerularius convened his
Synod and anathematized this “impious and foolish document.” Patriarch
Peter of Antioch ratified this decision and all the other Eastern Patriarchs
did the same.
In Russia, at Kiev, Metropolitan
Nicephorus (1104-1121) wrote concerning the Latins, after having enumerated
their various errors: “this is why the Holy Catholic Church does not receive
them in her communion, but has cut them off and rejected them like a decaying
member.”
In January 1919, Patriarch Tikhon
addressed himself as follows to those who associated themselves with the
Bolsheviks and their operations: “By the power that is given us by God, we
forbid you to approach the Holy Mysteries of Christ, and anathematize you if
you bear the name of Christian and belong to the Orthodox Church only by
birth.”
In December 1922, Patriarch
Tikhon anathematized the Living Church as follows: “When the
incorruptible robe of Christ — the Holy Orthodox Church — is torn before our
eyes by new Judas-traitors, descended from our midst, acting through our duty
as first in the hierarchic order, we call upon all the faithful sons of God to
remain firm and courageous in the sacred Faith and in defense of the Holy
Orthodox Church, which is unchanging since ancient times, even unto the loss of
liberty, blood, and death, if the circumstances of their lives demand it. We
refuse to recognize as valid the Supreme Ecclesiastical Administration, which
is an institution of Antichrist, and in which are found sons opposed to the
sacred truth and to the holy canons.
“We are writing this so that
you may all know that, by the power that God has given us, we anathematize the
Supreme Ecclesiastical Administration and all who maintain any relation
whatsoever with it.” (6 December 1922.)
Often the decision of an anathema
consists of a simple statement that such and such a person has placed himself
outside the Church.
Metropolitan Antony (Vadkovsky)
of St. Petersburg replied thus to the wife of Leo Tolstoy, who was outraged by
the anathema against her husband who was in fact the author of a blasphemous
“gospel”:
“It is not the Synod which was
cruel, when it announced the expulsion of your husband. The most cruel act is
what your spouse did of his own accord in rejecting faith in Jesus Christ, the
Son of God, our Redeemer and Saviour… Your husband has not, of course, put
himself in the way of perdition because of a piece of paper, but because he has
turned away from the source of eternal life.
“The Church is made up of
believers in Christ… This Church blesses through God’s name all the essential
moments of man’s life: birth, marriage, death, his sorrows and his joys. But
she never does so for unbelievers, neither for idolators nor for blasphemers of
God’s name, nor for those who reject her, who do not wish to secure from her
either prayers or blessings nor, generally speaking, for all those who are not her
members…
“Divine Love is unlimited. Yet
it does not forgive everyone and everything: blasphemy against the Holy Spirit
is not forgiven, neither in this world nor in the world to come (Matt. 12:32).
“So far as your husband is
concerned, so long as he is alive, no one can say that he is lost; but the
truth has been told to Her subject — that he has left the Church, that he is no
longer Her member until he be reunited to Her… By its message, the Synod has
only had a fact confirmed; and only those who do not themselves know what they
are doing express their displeasure against the Synod.”
Archbishop Anthony of Geneva
expresses himself as follows: “As Archbishop John (Maximovitch) writes, ‘the
Church on earth does not in fact pronounce final judgement on heretics. She
pronounces the anathema against them, she separates them from Her, and hands
them over to the supreme judgement — the judgement of God. The word, anathema,
means to present one who is separated to God’s tribunal. One who has been
anathematized can always repent and thus restore his unity with the Church.’” (“Explanation
to the Flock,” May 1984.)
ECUMENISM
The first interconfessional
organization was the YMCA (Young Men’s Christian Association) founded in London
in the middle of the last century, and followed fifty years later by the YWCA
(Young Women’s Christian Association). The principal objectives of these
organizations are essentially humanitarian, supported by a faith in man’s basic
goodness (in the spirit of Rousseau or Tolstoy) without any reference to sin or,
more pertinently, to the exclusiveness of Christ’s Church in the economy of
salvation. Thus, so far as the dogmas and canons are concerned, a critical
attitude appears: the people become self-assured, joking about obsolete
tradition, but are nevertheless emotionally committed to the human realization
of some philanthropic or religious plan.
The word ecumenism was
used for the first time in 1910 at the time of the World Missionary Conference.
Then the Universal Council, Life and Work, was founded. This met at Stockholm
in 1925 and at Oxford in 1937. The World Conference, Faith and Order, was
created in parallel. This met at Lausanne in 1927 and at Edinburgh in 1937.
From these two conferences (Oxford and Edinburgh), the World Council of
Churches (WCC) was born in 1937.
After the war, the WCC organized
world assemblies at Amsterdam (1948), at Evanston (1954), New Delhi (1961),
Nairobi (1975) and at Vancouver (1983).
At the start, the WCC was made up
of “Churches” born of the Reformation. Little by little, these attracted the
Orthodox Churches to them. Now almost all Orthodox Churches (except for the
Russian Orthodox Church Abroad) belong to the WCC as active members.
The WCC’s doctrine of the Church
is based on the branch theory. According to this theory, all Churches on earth
are components of the Universal Church; they all contain a portion of the
Truth, but only the so-called UNDIVIDED or INTEGRAL Church, which has not yet
been manifested, possesses the whole truth.
In conformity with this ideology,
specialist delegations have begun to employ a hitherto unknown religious
terminology, such as the RECONSTITUTION or RECONSTRUCTION of the UNDIVIDED
CHURCH.
Acts of reconciliation between
the different confessions are undertaken “in love and in truth”; all Churches
must “recognize their past errors” in order to overcome their differences.
This new ecclesiology has been
manifest all along in the World Conferences of the WCC.
In resolution number 2 of the
Toronto Conference (1950) it is said: “The members of the representative
Churches enter into spiritual relations, through which they come to know and
help each other so that the Body of Christ might be set up and the life
of the Churches regenerated.”
The resolution of the Evanston
Conference on Faith and Order affirms that the unity of Christ has been
accomplished in spite of “the separation of the Churches”; a contradiction that
seems to stand in no one’s way. It is not the only contradiction: “From
the Church’s beginnings, there has been an indissociated unity with Christ,
because He did not separate Himself from His faithful. But the Church has
never realized the fulness of this unity. From the start, divisions
disturbed the unity, revealed in Christ, of the people, so that we can think
of the Church as we think of an individual believer, of whom it is possible to
say that he is at the same time righteous and a sinner.”
The attitude of the Orthodox
delegations also contains its own contradiction. Right from the start, they
have refuted the Protestant conception of the Church. Their reservations were
recorded at the bottom of the resolutions. However, ecumenism did not proceed
any less intently on its path because of this, and yet the Orthodox still
remain members of the WCC, justifying their position by the necessity of bearing
witness to Orthodoxy… Fr. George Grabbe (now Bishop Gregory), an observer at
Evanston on behalf of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, wrote: “the
doctrine of interconfessionalism permeates each resolution in a lasting way… This
Protestant voice is so strong that the Orthodox delegations would have had to
intervene every minute if they had wanted to eradicate this taint from all the
resolutions.” Now these Orthodox interventions were in fact limited to
certain declarations which, while not changing the organization, demonstrate at
what point the Orthodox body is estranged from it.
An important WCC figure, the
Methodist Bishop Oxnam, revealed in 1953 the Protestant plan for the Ecumenical
Movement:
“The Protestant Churches must
pursue the existing fraternal and fruitful collaboration with the Eastern
Orthodox Churches until protestantism is inwardly united. They must then
approach the discussion with a view to union with the Eastern Church . . . When
complete union between Protestantism and Orthodoxy has been realized, and
Christians of the whole world belong only to two large Churches, on that day
their direction will have revealed a sufficiently Christian and creative
attitude to the point of kneeling down together at a common altar, asking
Christ’s forgiveness for the divisions, and uniting in the communion of the
bread and wine of the Holy Eucharist, in order to raise themselves in spirit
so as to make a reality the Holy Catholic Church, to which all Christians would
be able to belong.”
Thus, on the one hand, the
Orthodox justify their presence at the WCC by the opportunity it offers to bear
witness to their Faith before the whole world; but, on the other, the
Protestants use the Orthodox as a means to effect their own internal union.
ORTHODOX
PARTICIPATION
Ecumenism would certainly never
have known such a development, had not the Orthodox gone beyond their state of
straightforward witness to one of real participation in the Ecumenical Movement
with a view to union. Such, in essence, is the participation of the
Patriarchate of Constantinople.
Formerly, during the exchange of
correspondence between theologians of the Reformation and Constantinople in the
sixteenth century, when their dialogue had begun to founder with the appearance
of certain insurmountable difficulties, which were harmful to Orthodoxy, Patriarch
Jeremias II wrote these simple words: “We ask you in the future not to
tire us anymore by writing the same things to us again and again,
since you treat the luminaries and theologians of the Church in a different way
each time, and although you honor and exalt them in your words, you
disparage them by your attitude of wishing to demonstrate that our weapons are
useless… Therefore, so far as you are concerned, we ask you not to create
difficulties for us any longer. Follow your own way; do not write to us again
on questions of dogma but only out of friendship, if that is what you wish. I
salute you.” (6 January 1581)
After 1902, a change in
Constantinople’s attitude began to emerge. Patriarch Joachim III, in seeking
advice from all the other Orthodox Churches on their attitude towards relations
“with the two great branches of Christendom — the Western Church [i.e., the
Roman Catholic — ed.] and the Protestant Church,” proposed that they consider
how to smooth the path “leading to peace and love, that they seek to discover
points of contact and agreement and even of mutual forgiveness of our
faults, until the day arrives when all this work will, with the help of time,
be accomplished…”
In 1920, Constantinople appealed
to “the Churches of Christ all over the world” and invited them to draw
nearer together and invited them to collaborate in a spirit of trust and mutual
respect. “This encyclical of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, issued in 1920, is
the basis of the whole ecumenical movement, having prepared the ground for the
creation of the World Council of Churches,” acknowledges an eminent
representative of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, Metropolitan Chrysostomos
of Myra (Episkepsis, Number 331, 1/3/85). In particular, it proposed
the creation of a “League of Churches,” after the pattern of the “League of Nations,”
and announces nine firm proposals, based on the incontestable fact that there
exist, in parallel with Orthodoxy, other “Churches of Christ all over the
world” (Episk., idem).
PAN-ORTHODOX
REUNION
Undoubtedly in order to implement
its plan, Constantinople invited all the Orthodox Churches to a Pan-Orthodox
Council in 1923, the subject of which was a program of renewing the Orthodox
Church: the introduction of a married episcopate and of second marriage for
priests, the reduction of the services and of the fasts, simplification of
clerical dress, suppression of the wearing of beards, and the use of the
Gregorian calendar.
The opposition with which this
program was greeted in the Orthodox Churches reduced the meeting that was held
at Constantinople to the level of a simple Congress; also, the inadequate
representation of the Orthodox world at the Congress frustrated the planned
reforms except those pertaining to the Gregorian Calendar — the New Style — which
was adopted.
We should point out that, at this
Congress, the representative of the Russian Orthodox Church, Archbishop
Anastasy (First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad from 1936 to
1964), made a very firm statement opposing the planned innovations.
In pursuit of its idea,
Constantinople renewed its proposal for summoning a Pan-Orthodox Council in the
thirties. This time it was the Serbian Church that wrecked the proposal by
objecting that no Orthodox Council could be held without the Russian Church.
THE CONQUEST OF
THE ORTHODOX BY THE WCC
The Church of Constantinople was
one of the first Orthodox Churches to join the WCC.
The Council’s first conference
after the war, at Amsterdam (1948), afforded most eminent theologians the
opportunity of relaxing the doctrine of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic
Church. Among the Orthodox theologians present was Fr. Georges Florovsky. Like
the other professors, he allowed that the Church has not yet clearly defined
Herself, and that She has not yet formulated a scholastic and theological definition
of Herself (see Archbishop [now Metropolitan] Vitaly, Paper presented in 1967
to the Council of ROCOR). This is true; but there is no need to regard it as a
deficiency, for the richness of Orthodox teaching about the Church goes far
beyond all definition.
It should be noted that an
official Church Council, which met in Moscow in the same year (1948) decided to
reject all participation in the Ecumenical Movement.
The Ecumenical Movement’s advance
upon the Orthodox Church then adopted the indirect path of politics. This was
the period of the Cold War between the East and the West. An important sector
of the Orthodox Church lay behind the Iron Curtain, under Communist domination,
and the Communists were about to discover the enormous potential for
international action that the Ecumenical Movement afforded.
In 1954, at the Evanston
Conference, in the presence of 13 Protestant delegates from the so-called
countries of the East, who had taken up the organizers’ invitation to attend,
an eminent Conference delegate, Dr. Nolde, proposed the search for some
co-existence between the “Christian and Communist countries” by avoiding
mention of the anti-Christian nature of Soviet Communism.
The general spirit of the
Evanston Conference and the overtures repeated by the WCC towards Moscow
succeeded in obtaining the admission of the Moscow Patriarchate to the WCC. It
became a member at the New Delhi World Conference in 1961.
PAN-ORTHODOX
MEETING AT RHODES
A little earlier in the same
year, an extremely significant event took place on the Island of Rhodes, the
Preconciliar Pan-Orthodox Conference, which had as its objective to prepare the
way for a future Pan-Orthodox Council. This is significant because, since that
time, we can follow in parallel the moves made on the Pan-Orthodox plan and on
the chess board of the World Council of Churches.
The organization of both
conferences — that of Rhodes and that of New Delhi — in 1961 accorded with the
WCC’s aspirations. The WCC had an interest in a Pan-Orthodox Conference being
held before the WCC conference and before the Second Vatican Council, which had
already been announced. The Rhodes Conference was to bring about the entry of
the Moscow Church and the Orthodox Churches under its influence into a dialogue
at the international level.
At Rhodes, the Patriarchate of
Constantinople had again come armed with an innovative plan (see Fr. George
Grabbe, “Rhodes and New Delhi”). But Metropolitan Nikodim of the Moscow
Patriarchate, who had been elected to an important commission on theological
and related problems, put forward a different program, one that was essentially
dictated by socio-political considerations, such as disarmament and decolonization…
There then appeared on the agenda such topics as “Orthodoxy and racial
discrimination; the realization of the Christian ideas of peace, liberty,
fraternity, and mutual love; Christian duties in regions where rapid social
changes are taking place…” But on purely ecclesiastical questions, the
delegates from Moscow showed such conservatism that, at that time, they acted
as upholders of the traditions of the Orthodox Church.
Ever since then (and
independently of the WCC, though not wholly separate from it), Preconciliar
Orthodox Conferences have been held at the offices of the Patriarchate of
Constantinople at Chambesy in Switzerland. These have sought to define the
conditions for holding a future Pan-Orthodox Council and the subjects to be
discussed there.
Generally speaking, these
subjects relate to matters of tradition and Church discipline, to questions of
jurisdiction in the Diaspora (the Orthodox dispersion), and, in particular, to
the setting up of a common date for Easter for all Christians. This Council, if
it does take place,
would clearly lack the distinguishing marks of its predecessors, which were
preoccupied principally with seeing that the true Faith triumph at a time when
it was being particularly threatened. And such is the case in the world in
which we are living.
The following point is also of
particular relevance: each Church would be represented at the Council by an
almost equal number of delegated bishops, and not by all the Orthodox bishops.
This is radically opposed not only to Orthodox Tradition, but also to the
actual ecclesiastical significance of Orthodoxy.
Against such schemes there arose
one of the greatest figures of the Orthodox world, the Serbian theologian, Fr.
Justin Popovich.
VATICAN II
This is another event which had
the effect of reinforcing ecumenism in an entirely unexpected way. The Second
Vatican Council began in 1963 and, in the aspirations of its inaugurators, it
was to be a Council of all Christians. However, in the face of the reservations
of the remainder of Christendom, it remained limited to the Roman Catholic
Church.
Vatican II was like a fireball,
descending on the Roman Catholic fortress. It breached all aspects of its
church life: both dogmatic and traditional, both spiritual and social; breaches
through which swept a wind bearing currents of good and of evil. And, since the
evil currents were the more active, dogmas were challenged, moral standards
were diminished by reducing the sense of sinfulness, the sacraments were
attacked, the meaning of the liturgy was reconsidered, man was honored and God
was made more human and J. Ploncard d’Assac: “Men of the Church began to
utter the same words as men of the world, and to listen to the world instead of
instructing it.”
Yet the total Protestantization
of the Roman Catholic Church has not taken place. After Pope John XXIII’s
death, Paul VI’s actions stemmed the progress of aggiornamento.
ECUMENISM AND ROME
The WCC had always sent
invitations to the Roman Catholic Church, but without much hope of success. The
Roman Catholic Church has never had any more than observers at the WCC
Conferences.
Yet the Roman Catholic Church
initiated an ecumenism of its own. Pope Paul VI found an eager partner in the
person of the Patriarch of Constantinople, Athenagoras. Everyone remembers
their meeting in Jerusalem in 1964, the embrace and the hopes for the coming
unity of the two Patriarchs of the East and the West, as the commentators then remarked.
In 1965, in order to further the
dialogue that had been initiated, the anathemas of 1054 were mutually lifted.
However, in doing this the Pope was answerable only to himself; but the
Patriarch of Constantinople, in doing the same, was acting as though
Constantinople’s anathema of 1054 was not the concern of the whole Orthodox
Church. To date, no Pan-Orthodox Council or, failing that, no global decision
by all the Orthodox Churches (which would have the same authority as a Pan-Orthodox
Council) has ever agreed to lift the anathemas against Rome.
This is another characteristic of
the Ecumenical Movement: that the actions which nourish it are all profoundly
anti-Church.
On this occasion, the Russian
Orthodox Church Abroad raised a strong protest, dated 15th December, 1965.
Yet nothing could check the
Ecumenical Movement; it was always a step ahead of the reactions that it
provoked.
AN EXCLUSIVE
HAPPENING IN MOSCOW
In 1969, Moscow took a curious
decision, as if she wanted to steal a march on the Patriarchate of
Constantinople in her dialogue with Rome. The decision was to grant
Communion to Roman Catholics; and, as if to justify herself, she stipulated
that it was to be given only when there was no Roman Catholic priest in the
vicinity. Yet these strictures were not adhered to when Metropolitan Nikodim
gave Communion to Roman Catholics at Rome itself shortly afterwards.
The reaction to this decision in
the Orthodox world was extremely sharp. We are aware, in particular, of the
Archbishop of Greece’s reaction and, of course, that of the Russian Orthodox
Church Abroad.
We should note that, within the
Patriarchate of Constantinople, Patriarch Athenagoras’ encyclical of 1967 still
remains in force. This states that the question was examined in Synod and that
it was decided not to accept the practice of giving Communion to non-Orthodox.
However, one cannot avoid noting
also that even though this matter was considered by these two great Churches,
Moscow and Constantinople, the practice in question had already become current
here and there, “on the ground,” through the participation (in it) of an
Orthodox priesthood that was anxious to quicken the progress of the Ecumenical Movement
by circumventing the theologians, whom very many judged to be timid, and by
presenting the hierarchy, which was considered to be conservative, with a
reality which compelled recognition.
This practice has not disappeared
from the Church of Constantinople. For in 1983, the monks of Mount Athos
addressed a written document to the Patriarch of Constantinople declaring
themselves scandalized by it.
VARIOUS
DEMONSTRATIONS FROM ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS
Among other kinds of local
ecumenical activity, one could cite the practice of prayers in common, at the
time of prominent events or during the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity,
which is held in January. (at that time, for example, Orthodox are careful not
to offend Protestant sensibilities and so omit the prayer to the Mother of God
during Vigils, prayers and blessings in common, and processions behind the
Roman Catholic holy sacrament (Epiksepsis, Number 338, 6/20/85).
There also exists an entire
pedagogy: for example, the Theological Seminary at Chambesy near Geneva,
consisting in 1984 of 25 professors and specialists in ecumenism: Orthodox,
Roman Catholic and Protestant (Episkepis Number 316, 1/6/85). From time
to time, strange things are
taught. For example, there is a Roman Catholic professor who implies that a
hierarchy can be discerned among Protestants; for as he says, Vatican II “did
not exclude in certain exceptional cases ‘consecration (i.e., ordination) at
the hands of priests’ or ‘succession at the hands of priests.’”
As for the Orthodox professor,
Evangelos Theodorou, he reveals that: “the faith of the two Churches — Roman
Catholic and Orthodox — is essentially the same and the differences between
them no more than debating points (theologoumena), but not
irreconcilable opposites.” In another connection, he says: “The
reconciliation of the two Churches — in the minds of the people of God — could
be greatly facilitated by the abolition of Uniatism by the Roman Catholic
Church, and also by the introduction of a ‘liturgical ecumenism’ which would
unify the faithful of the two Churches in a single community of prayer and
piety.”
In a seminary opening address in
1984, Metropolitan Damaskinos of Switzerland, speaking about “the Orthodox
Church’s bilateral discussions,” declared that they “proceed from an
awareness that the Orthodox Church has been the bastion which succeeded in
consistently protecting the unity of the ancient Church throughout history. In
so far as this was so, Her duty now is to preside over the rebuilding of
that unity by holding a dialogue with the other Christian Churches and
confessions.”
He also declared that “bilateral
discussions must be conducted on the binding condition that the division of the
Churches into Eastern (Greek) and Western (Latin) is not an absolute
state-of-affairs, but a painful wound in the Body of the Church” and that “although
the Orthodox Church identifies herself with the Una Sancta, she must
recognize nevertheless the nature of a Church — in the full sense of the
term — in every other Christian community where the essence of the Faith and of
apostolic succession could not have been broken.” And furthermore:
“Sacramental
communion, in particular Eucharistic Communion, between Churches in dialogue
with each other, will have to be the outcome and the summation of all our steps
towards unity” (Episkepis, idem).
CONCLUDING REMARKS
ON ECUMENICAL ACTIVITIES
Some permanent characteristics
are evidenced in the activities of Orthodox Christians engaged in the
Ecumenical Movement:
1) an enduring duplicity:
in one text one finds statements of the strictest Orthodox confession, coupled
with others which deny these statements and are biased towards the ecumenists.
2) lies by omission: One
sees Scriptural passages being deliberately truncated and quotations being
abridged and taken out of context. A particularly striking example of this is
the one which has now become an ecumenist slogan: “that all might be one.”
3) permanent misunderstanding
of the nature of the Church: as will be apparent from all the preceding.
THE LONG-TERM
OBJECTIVES
The march forward of ecumenism
allows one to foresee its distant objectives, pursued with a will to
accomplishment that one feels to be powerful.
They are more distant than those
which are commonly proposed, namely, the union of the divided Christian
Churches.
The next state, the second, is
already announced: the union of the three monotheistic religions descended from
Abraham: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
The following state, the third,
is, as yet, hardly discernable: the union of all religions.
At the time of the festivities of
St. Andrew in 1984, in the presence of representatives from Rome, Patriarch
Demetrios had some quite revealing words about what the “grand design” might
be:
“Our goal is not only to unite
all those who are Christians, but through this unity to bear witness with
conviction before the whole world, of which Jesus Christ is the Saviour.
Therefore, by this union, we shall act so that the world might be
transfigured and included in the Christian Church, so that His Kingdom might be
established on earth.”
Again the Patriarch says: “As
God the Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ united all mankind through His Son by
redemption, similarly we, in carrying on the saving work of the Lord, are
united to mankind, with every man, with all humanity living on this earth.”
Two years ago, Rabbi James Rudin,
a member of the Jewish American Committee, made the following declaration: “Something
new and important is being effected among Christian theologians.” “It is
a new theology which affirms the purity of Judaism, without compromising
faithfulness to Christianity.”
The Pope recently told
representatives of B’nai B’rith (a Jewish world-wide fraternal organization —
Transl.): “The encounter between Catholics and Jews is not the meeting of
two ancient religions, each following its own way, and which often had
difficult conflicts in the past, but it is the encounter of brothers.”
More details are given by the WCC
itself. In the official guide to the WCC’s World Conference at Vancouver (1983)
— although the theme of the Conference was Jesus Christ, the Hope of the
World — one reads:
“In the end, the great
religious communities will not disappear. No one will have the upper hand. Jews
will remain Jews; Muslims will remain Muslims; and those belonging to the great
Oriental religions will remain Hindus, Buddhists, and Taoists. Africa will
express its own view of the world; China will retain her heritage. As before,
people will continue to travel from the East to the West, from the North to the
South, and to abide in the Kingdom of God without, in consequence, having
first become Christians like us” (Christianity Today, April
1984, p. 12).
ORTHODOX REACTIONS
AGAINST ECUMENISM
Faced with this slipping away
from the Church, what might be, and what ought to be, the faithful Christian’s
attitude to the Church?
One has to concede that Orthodox
Christians’ reactions to various ecumenical happenings are tending to diminish
in strength. It is a well-known fact that the Ecumenical Movement relies on a
familiarization effect.
Be that as it may, in the Greek
Church reactions to ecumenism were still very forcible even ten years ago.
Nowadays it depends on the personal influence of hierarchs.
In the past, the Patriarch of
Alexandria protested very firmly against ecumenism and freemasonry, but then he
went to Constantinople and made an announcement appropriate to the occasion.
The current Patriarch of
Jerusalem and the Archbishop of Mount Sinai are firmly opposed to ecumenism.
The Patriarch of Antioch’s
position is ambiguous.
The Serbian Church, in spite of
its presence at the WCC, is not favorable towards it. Its life is ruled by the
theology of the Fathers of the Church.
The other Churches are all under
the influence either of Moscow or of Constantinople, and are drawn into their
maneuverings.
Against these trends, some local
Church leaders, bishops, and priests do confess both in words and deeds their
unyielding faithfulness to the Orthodox Church of all times.
This results sometimes in
confusing situations which cause what seems to be a major contradiction in the
bosom of the Church and require the adoption of Church discipline, difficult
but necessary, in the case of concelebrations, for example, so that the
confusion may be resisted through love of the Church.
The Russian Orthodox Church
Abroad has been steadfast in her actions to reveal the true nature of
ecumenism:
— in 1965, concerning the lifting
of the anathemas of 1054,
— in 1969, concerning common
prayer and the pronouncements of Archbishop Iakovos, Constantinople’s Exarch in
America,
— in 1969, the first Sorrowful
Epistle of Metropolitan Philaret to all Orthodox hierarchs,
— in 1972, the Second Sorrowful
Epistle,
— in 1975, concerning the Thyateira
Confession,
— in many different
circumstances, by means of articles, conferences, reports to the Council of
Bishops by Archbishops Vitaly, Averky, Anthony, Bishop Gregory…
— in 1984, the anathema against
ecumenism and all those who confess it.
THE RESOLUTION
CONCERNING THE ANATHEMA
“To those who attack the
Church of Christ by teaching that Christ’s Church is divided into so-called
branches which differ in doctrine and way of life, or that the Church does not
exist
visibly, but will be formed in the future when all branches or sects or
denominations, or even religions, will be united into one body, and who do not
distinguish the priesthood and mysteries of the Church from those of heretics,
but say that the baptism and eucharist of heretics is effectual for salvation; therefore
to those who knowingly have communion with these aforementioned heretics, or
advocate, disseminate, or defend their new heresy of Ecumenism under the
pretext of brotherly love or the supposed unification of separated Christians: ANATHEMA!”
The outcome of a long series of
explanations and warnings, the present resolution has assumed above all else a
prophetic character. It will serve as a yardstick, like so many other canons,
when, in a future which promises to become increasingly difficult, a choice
will have to be made in order to get away from the confusion which is adversely
affecting all aspects of Church life. This is certainly an important Church
CANON which has emerged.
However, as in the case of a
surgical instrument which is in contact with living flesh, this canon must be
used prudently and proficiently and with the concern of one bestowing care, by
subscribing to the Church’s economy of salvation.
In the history of the Church,
there have been numerous occasions on which Christians, animated by zeal, have
passed judgement on people by having recourse to such and such a canon. This
practice was so widespread in Christian society in his day that St. John
Chrysostom was alarmed by it: “But who do you think that you are? What power
or authority do you possess? Is the Son of God about to sit in judgement, to allow
His sheep to be separated, on your orders, putting some on His right and
thrusting others away on His left? Why do you usurp this eminent dignity, in
which only the college of the Apostles has a share, together with those who,
through the strict perfection of their lives, have shown themselves to be their
successors, filled with grace and virtues?
“Teach,” says St. Paul, “by
correcting with meekness those who hold out against the truth, in the hope that
God will one day give them the spirit of repentance so as to bring them to a
knowledge of the truth”…“Correct, as being opposed to apostolic tradition, that
which prejudice or ignorance passes off as being true. And if the unfortunate
man, who adopted the error, wishes to accept your teaching he will live in true
life; you will have saved his soul” (cf. Ezekiel 3:21). If he refuses,
if he resists and remains stubborn, be content to safeguard your responsibility
to “bear witness to the truth in meekness and patience; from that time on the
Sovereign Judge will no longer require you to claim back your brother’s soul.”
St. John Chrysostom, That One is not Required to Anathematize the Living or
the Dead.
By drawing our inspiration from
these words, our attitude will in all things be directed by discernment, being
firm with regard to ourselves, and showing a pastoral attitude towards others.
We shall avoid associating with ecumenists and with ecumenically-minded
Orthodox by keeping away from their meetings, so that we do not implicitly avow
that they are right. We shall not pass individual judgements on their adherence
to the Church, leaving that to those who have the authority to do so, and
concentrating our attention on keeping ourselves within the Church, and
welcoming those who come to us in the love of the Church, helping people
without condemning them, for they risk an existence separate from us if they
stray further away.
ARCHBISHOP
ANTHONY’S COMMENTS ON THE ANATHEMA
The right to condemn false
doctrines and to anathematize on a universal scale belongs to Pan-Orthodox
Ecumenical Councils that have been properly convened and which are recognized
by the whole Church. Alas, in our times the summoning of an Ecumenical Council
is unrealizable, because most of the autocephalous Churches, so far as
their official representatives are concerned, are deprived of freedom of opinion
and of action.
But as some false doctrines which
trouble the faithful can appear within each local Church’s jurisdictional area,
it is the duty of each Church’s episcopate to ascertain collectively whether
this doctrine is inconsistent with the truth of Christ. The episcopate
then has to say why this doctrine is false and to advise the faithful not to
adhere to it. An injudicious interest in a false doctrine, which appears to be
a novelty, can lead someone who has become interested in it, and whose interest
in it has become established, to find himself outside the Church, without his
being aware of it. It is possible for him to part company from the Church, and
to make himself liable to anathema.
The authority and right of each
local Church’s episcopate to instruct extends solely to her own faithful.
Thus, in keeping with the canons,
the episcopate of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, noticing that some of her
members were becoming too interested in contemporary ecumenism, and accepting the
belief that ecumenism is a heresy which contradicts the dogma of the One, Holy,
Catholic, and Apostolic Church, deemed it necessary to guard her flock from
danger. On the first Sunday of Great Lent, during the Rite of Orthodoxy,
condemnation of the ecumenists has been added to the long list of heresiarchs.
Nevertheless, the text of this anathema does not mention anyone by name. It is
difficult, even impossible, to estimate to what degree an individual has
rejected the dogma of the One and indivisible Church, against
which the gates of hell shall not prevail. How can one judge to what extent a
person accepts ecumenical doctrine, which says that the Church has broken up
and has divided Herself and no longer exists, so that in order for Her to be
restored the fragments must be collected together and assembled, and one must await
a new Pentecost, a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit onto this ecumenical
“Church.”
Let us hope that, if there are
such blasphemers of the Truth among our flock, who are acting consciously, they
are not numerous. By the anathema the Church is saying to believers: “Beware
of them. They used to belong to us, but they have since left us; they are not
part of us any longer. The Church, ‘the pillar and bulwark of the Truth!’
according to the Apostle’s testimony, commits them to the highest tribunal —
the tribunal of God.”
But among our flock there are
certainly some who are sympathetic to ecumenism, who consider it to be a
novelty worth their interest, and who justify themselves in a hypocritical way,
under the pretext of mutual love between “Christians” of different confessions.
They say that love covers all things, even disobedience to the Church’s
teaching. Among them there are those who uphold ecumenism for idealistic reasons,
who spread their false teachings in the world without understanding the evil
which they are doing to their neighbor.
The episcopate of our Church has
done its duty in warning its faithful of the danger. “They that have ears to
hear, let them hear.”
“Christians must live in mutual
love, but for that reason they must not sacrifice the Truth.”
(Geneva, May 1984)
A Statement on the anathema
against ecumenism, prepared at Villemoisson on December 8, 1985, by the priest
Benjamin Joukoff.
