Sunday, June 1, 2025

Condolences for the death of non-Orthodox a "mistake"? Lord, have mercy on us...

Jakarta, May 2/15, 2025

Your Beatitude, Most Reverend Hierarchs, Christ is Risen!

I thank you because, thanks to your prayers, I have returned normally to my duties after about 2 months of health problems. From the beginning of Great Lent until Bright Week, I had to be frequently hospitalized in a hospital in the city of Kediri, in East Java, staying at my sister’s nearby house in order to reduce the cost of continuous hospital stay. I returned on April 30, 2025.

A few days before my return, I received a message from His Eminence Metropolitan of Demetrias, kyr Photios, concerning a condolence announcement for the repose of Pope Francis, which had been posted on the website of the Indonesian Orthodox Church. I immediately gave the order for it to be removed, which was done. Our team responsible for updating the website had posted it with a view toward public relations, taking into account the good social relations our faithful have here with our Roman Catholic compatriots. We have good social relations with nearly all our compatriots, regardless of religion, except only with our former Orthodox brethren of the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Patriarchate of Moscow, who are waging war against us.

However, this posting reveals a significant problem we are facing. While both I and my collaborators accepted the Confession of Faith and, in general, everything that the Church of the Genuine Orthodox Christians of Greece accepts—and there were no objections from our flock either (for those who may have had objections had the option of attending the local parishes of the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Patriarchate of Moscow)—there still remain deficiencies with regard to the integration of this teaching into our daily life and mindset, which, by force of habit, remains in many of us here as it was before our incorporation into the Church of the Genuine Orthodox Christians of Greece.

Already from the first visit of His Eminence Metropolitan of Demetrias, kyr Photios, here in Indonesia in 2019, we have corrected many things that we were not doing properly and which he pointed out to us. Surely, there are still other things that we must correct, and we want to do so, but we need your help.

We believe that Greece is the source of Orthodoxy, and we desire to have the opportunity to send our Indonesian youth as prospective clergy there to stay with you, in order to properly learn the Greek language, the ecclesiastical rites, but above all the Orthodox faith and life. We want these young people to live with you for a few years and to acquire the mindset of true Orthodox Christians, so that when they return to Indonesia, they may also be able to transmit to our flock here all that they will have learned from you in Greece.

We know that there are many practical difficulties in this, but we ask you to consider it, to pray for it, and if it is set as a goal, perhaps the Lord will bless it and the difficulties of the endeavor will be overcome.

We ask for your prayers and kindly beg you to forgive us for our mistakes.

Christ is Risen!
Daniel, Bishop of Nicopolis

 

Greek source: https://www.ecclesiagoc.gr/index.php?view=article&id=2359%3Aepistoli-theofil-episkopou

 

The entirety of the post in question:

Original:

Segenap Pengurus Gereja Orthodox Indonesia mengucapkan Turut Berbelasungkawa atas meninggalnya Paus Fransiskus pada hari ini, Senin tanggal 21 April 2025 di kediamannya di Casa Santa Marta, Vatikan Roma dalam usia 88 Tahun.

English translation:

All the Administrators of the Orthodox Church of Indonesia express their condolences for the death of Pope Francis today, Monday, April 21, 2025, at his residence in Casa Santa Marta, Vatican, Rome, at the age of 88.

 

Source (since deleted): https://gerejaorthodox.id/turut-berbelasungkawa-paus-fransiskus/

 


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