Historical Review of the Festal Calendar Issue

St. Chrysostomos the New, Confessor and Hierarch (+1955)

Source: Ἡ Φωνὴ τῆς Ὀρθοδοξίας [The Voice of Orthodoxy], Issue No. 7, May 20, 1946 (O.S.), pp. 1-3.

 

On the 13th of May, 1935, according to the Patristic Calendar, eleven full years were completed since we entered into the sacred and national Struggle for the Patristic and Orthodox festal calendar. We do not deem it pointless nor unprofitable, on this occasion, to proceed to a historical review of this, and to show to the Greek public, on the one hand, the reasons which impelled us into this Struggle, and on the other hand, the reasons for which it prevailed despite so many severe persecutions and reactions on the part of the Greek Hierarchy and the then Greek Government.

Exactly eleven years ago, three Hierarchs—the venerable Germanos of Demetrias, Chrysostomos of Zakynthos, and this writer, Chrysostomos, formerly of Florina—not tolerating the scandal and division which the accursed festal calendar innovation caused to the Orthodox Christian flock, and having previously in vain exhausted all peaceful means for the return of the Hierarchy to the festal calendar order handed down by tradition for the peace of the Church, were compelled, at the dictate of our Orthodox conscience, by written declaration to inform the then Governing Holy Synod that we were severing all ecclesiastical communion with it, not wishing to partake ourselves in the responsibility for the uncanonical introduction of the Gregorian calendar into the Church, as well as for the anti-ecclesiastical and medieval persecution against the faction of the Old Calendarists.

We undertook this serious action, moved by the desire to remove the scandal caused by the festal calendar reform and driven by the hope that the Governing Synod, becoming aware of the responsibility it bore before God for the division of the Orthodox flock, would deign, as it was obliged, to place our serious protest under the judgment of the entire Hierarchy, providing an occasion for it to proceed to the reconsideration of its previous relevant decision. Unfortunately, the Governing Synod at that time, instead of doing what it ought to have done, forgetting its high mission, not only did not give the due attention and the owed response to our document but also, without previously making use of the peaceful means prescribed by the Canons for mutual explanation and enlightenment, rendered us liable and condemned us in absentia to deposition and to five years of physical confinement in the more remote and inhospitable of the holy Monasteries, as if we had committed a crime of sacrilege, having defended the sacred and Orthodox institutions of the Church.

For this uncanonical, unlawful, and inhuman coup of the Governing Synod, we protested, as was fitting, to the Orthodox Churches and to the then Government, which, unfortunately, became complicit with the Governing Synod, proceeding by force through the Police to our abduction, as if we were felons and criminals, to the places of our exile, because, being faithful to the oath which we gave at our ordination, we wished to preserve inviolate the sacred Traditions of our Church.

It is indeed very grievous, because the seriousness of the festal calendar question, from an Orthodox and national point of view, was neither understood nor duly appreciated, neither by the majority of the Hierarchy, which proceeded frivolously and altogether without discernment to its uncanonical regulation, nor by the Greek Government, which uncritically adopted and recklessly executed an outrageous decision of the Synodal Court, degrading the authority not only of ecclesiastical but also of civil justice. For the calendar, however much it may be a matter of time and days for the state and for astronomy, for the Church it escapes the limits and measures of time, and enters into the framework of the ancient Tradition of the Church and of Orthodox divine Worship, insofar as it serves as a bond of unity and as a standard of liturgical precision and order throughout the long existence of the entire Orthodox Eastern Church. Therefore, its unilateral and arbitrary alteration brought disorder and confusion into Orthodox divine Worship, in violation of the divine and sacred Canons, specifically of the 56th of the Sixth Ecumenical Council, which commands the following: “…It seemed good, therefore, also to decree this: that the Church of God throughout the whole inhabited world should perform the fast with one and the same order… But if they do not observe this, if they be Clergy, let them be deposed; if laymen, let them be excommunicated.”

The utterly irrational and uncanonical introduction of the Gregorian calendar into the Orthodox Greek Church, apart from the fact that it serves the proselytizing aims of the Papal church, which traverses land and sea to make one proselyte, also divides the individual Orthodox Churches in time regarding the celebration of the feasts, and in manner regarding the observance of the fasts, the typikon order of the sacred services, and the fulfillment of the various religious observances, which also touches upon the Dogma of the unity of the Church, namely: “in One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.” And this, because the unity of the Church does not consist only in the identity of Faith and divine Worship, but also in the simultaneous and uniform manner of the expression of the Faith and divine Worship, which constitutes an essential element of ecclesiastical unity.

And this, from an Orthodox point of view and in summary, is the seriousness of the festal calendar question, whose unilateral and arbitrary alteration, apart from the fact that it touches upon the divine inspiration of the decisions of the Holy Ecumenical Councils, also diminishes the inalienable rights and the precious chrysobulls of pure Orthodoxy, which the Orthodox Greek Church acquired through the ages by means of precious struggles and sacrifices. Likewise, from a national point of view, this matter is of no lesser importance and gravity; for this festal calendar innovation not only served and continues to serve as the chief weapon of foreign religious propagandas, which covet the chrysobulls of the Greek Church, particularly in Greek Macedonia and Thrace, but also opened a festering wound in the heart of National unity, whose depth and cohesion is chiefly constituted by ecclesiastical unity. Indeed, National unity draws its strength and worth from the unity of the Church, which is the guardian and bearer of National traditions and moral values, which the Church enlivens, preserves, and transmits from generation to generation through the public feasts and festivals, in which the National dances, the patriotic songs, and the National poems—these symbols and marks of National unity—receive life and content. Thus, the Orthodox Greek Church is also an important National factor, because it constitutes the soul of the history and civilization of the Greek people, and consequently, the division of ecclesiastical unity cannot but provoke also the division of National unity, which is indispensable for the progress and civilization of the Greek Nation.

Behold, in broad terms, the greatest national harm which the festal calendar innovation has brought about entirely without cause.

And these, then, are the reasons which impelled us into this Sacred and National Struggle.

As for the reasons which contributed to the fact that this Struggle not only did not succumb to the manifold persecutions and reactions which it encountered from the very beginning on the part of the Church and the State, but also that it was strengthened and fortified even more, they are the following.

The first reason for which the calendar question arose is, as I have already stated, the deep awareness that the Church of Greece, through the unilateral introduction of the Papal festal calendar, deviated from the pinnacle of Orthodoxy, having divided the unity of the entire Orthodox Church in the celebration of the feasts and in the observance of the fasts. As a consequence of this deep awareness, there was born in the hearts of the Old Calendarists the fear of conscience, lest by following the calendar innovation they too should deviate from exact and undefiled Orthodoxy, and therefore, for the appeasement of their Orthodox conscience, they severed all ecclesiastical communion with the New Calendarists and formed their own religious organization, celebrating their religious feasts in their own churches and with their own religious ministers.

To this religious organization, whose ranks were growing denser by the day, as was mentioned above, there also joined Hierarchs, being inflamed with the desire to contribute to the peace of the Church through its return to the festal calendar order handed down by Tradition, which the majority of the Orthodox Churches steadfastly uphold, so that the accursed division of the Church, which was brought about by the introduction of the festal innovation, might thus cease.

From this, it becomes entirely evident that this festal calendar Struggle, far from any religious fanaticism or self-interested motive, was prompted purely by a deep faith in Orthodoxy and by a pure ideology. And this is the principal reason why it did not yield to the manifold pressures and reactions which, from the very beginning, both Church and State raised against it, proceeding even to beatings, imprisonments, exiles, and all manner of other maltreatments, to the detriment of ecclesiastical justice and of Greek civilization. It is, moreover, an axiom confirmed by history and experience, that struggles which are driven by a deep faith in a lofty and noble idea, the more they are persecuted and fought against, the more they are strengthened and fortified in their radiance and unconquerable impetus, proving themselves superior to all their adversaries and persecutors.

This philosophical and historical axiom found its full application in the many years and harsh struggles which the Orthodox Eastern Church waged for the prevalence of Orthodoxy against every religious heresy and false teaching. An unfailing witness to this is Ecclesiastical History, whose most glorious pages are constituted by the rewards and trophies achieved by those champions and athletes who lawfully strove for the truth and for Orthodoxy, confirming the Evangelical saying: “and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against the Church.” It is truly a matter of wonder how the New Calendarist Hierarchs did not take into account this infallible lesson of Ecclesiastical History, having fiercely persecuted those who strove for the peace of the Church and the restoration of Orthodoxy, and having hoped that through depositions, imprisonments, exiles, and the defrocking of the Old Calendarist Clergy they would suppress the lofty festal calendar Struggle, which, thanks to the Orthodox and National ideology from which it is driven, under the leadership of the writer, assisted by the Most Reverend Bishops Christophoros of Megara and Polykarpos of Diavleia, and the host of devout Priests, not only did not bend in the least but was even more strengthened and fortified in its radiance and in its noble and sacred zeal for the truth and for Orthodoxy.

The Orthodox Greek Church, as one of the European historians says, on the one hand enlightened Northern and Eastern Europe and Western Asia with the light of Christianity, and on the other hand bravely struggled against all-powerful Rome, in order to preserve Orthodoxy from the various abuses and arbitrariness of Papism. Therefore, this Church, he says, even after the fall of the Byzantine Empire, is preserved unscathed and unaltered in its faith and worship, still speaking the language of the Apostle Paul and of Chrysostom, offering its prayers in the manner of ancient Christianity, preserving the Creed pure from the profane addition (filioque) of later times, and offering the New Testament for the instruction of the faithful in the original, and not in a translation into another language.

And if those who are today struggling on the ramparts of the festal calendar Struggle have not yielded, nor have in any way been daunted before the pressures and persecutions raised against them by the innovating Hierarchy and the State, this must be attributed not to their ability and courage, but to their deep faith that they are striving to save the Church and the Nation from the dreadful consequences of the Ecclesiastical Schism which the festal innovation created, and to the sweet hope that they might bring peace and unity to the entire Orthodox flock within the framework of Orthodoxy.

As a conclusion to the above, we deem it timely to set forth the following related saying of the holy Chrysostom:

“For not only do the dead, when raised, and the lepers, when cleansed, confirm the Gospel, but we also, when being bound, confirm it; how and in what manner? Because, suffering countless things and not yielding, but becoming even more eager, we provide sufficient proof that we are proclaimers of the truth and that there is some divine power within us accomplishing all these things with ease and not allowing the multitude of trials to overcome those who preach; for it is not within human power to prevail through so many hindrances. These things are a confirmation of the Gospel not only to others but also to ourselves; for faith works us to be more approved and stronger, so that we may scorn the plots of the enemies of the truth.”