Constantinople of the Ecumenists Creates Schisms: After the Calendar Issue comes the Ukrainian One

Protopresbyter Theodoros Zisis

Emeritus Professor of the Theological School of A.U.Th.

 

1. Constantinople captive to Ecumenism

The Church of Constantinople, the Holy Great Church of Christ, the fountain of pious doctrines and canonical order, which for sixteen centuries (4th–19th century) held a leading role in the course and development of all areas of life and action of the Church, from the beginning of the 20th century gradually and with increasing pace is losing these characteristics. Internally corroded, at the level of leadership and theology, by the principles and values of the "New Age" and the "New World Order," namely of Freemasonry, Occultism, and Theosophy, it has abandoned the secure, luminous, and salvific path of the Holy Apostles and the Holy Fathers and now walks the dark tracks of innovations and novelties, held captive by the pan-heresy of Ecumenism, that is, of syncretism—both inter-Christian and inter-religious.

We shall not here analyze how and when this change, this distortion, took place, because we have done so many times in the past, especially during the recent period, before and after the convocation of the pseudo-council of Crete (June 2016). [1] For this reason, moreover, we also reaped the wrath of the chief instigator of innovations and distortions, Patriarch Bartholomew, who surpassed in his destructive work against Orthodoxy his Masonic predecessors Meletios Metaxakis and Athenagoras. Both by name and with a tone of honor, he pointed us out as an obstacle to his innovative, unorthodox agenda and demanded our punishment, finding a willing subordinate—or rather, a like-minded secret sympathizer—in the Metropolitan of Thessaloniki, Anthimos, who filed legal action against us.

2. The Change of the Calendar Was Unilateral and Anti-Synodical

In the present brief article, we wish to point out that among the bitter fruits of this apostatic course of Constantinople was the calendar reform of 1924, which irreparably wounded the unity of the Church and continues to wound it to this day, for nearly a century. At that time, it was an unnecessary action, without pastoral necessity, erroneous, unilateral, and coup-like, carried out without a pan-Orthodox synodical decision, by the modernist Freemason Patriarch Meletios Metaxakis, who also led astray the otherwise prudent and great ecclesiastical historian, the professor of the Theological School of the University of Athens, Archbishop of Athens Chrysostomos Papadopoulos. The latter, justifying to the holy Elder Philotheos Zervakos his collaboration and complicity in that anti-synodical and coup-like imposition of the New Calendar, said to the holy Elder—as the latter himself testifies: "May I never have survived, may I never have survived! That perverted Metaxakis dragged me down with him." In a letter to Patriarch Athenagoras, Saint Philotheos of Paros also writes: "The division and schism was brought about by the unconsidered, pointless, untimely, and diabolical innovation, that is, the introduction of the Gregorian (Papist) calendar by your Masonic predecessor Meletios Metaxakis, who led astray the then Archbishop of Athens Chrysostomos Papadopoulos." [2] That unilateral, divisive, and erroneous decision to change the calendar is also criticized by the ever-memorable Elder Gabriel Dionysiatis, a great Athonite figure of the 20th century, who said among other things: "Thus, the Church erred, according to the opinion of reliable circles, in deciding unilaterally the change of the calendar and festal cycle, as a result of which we Orthodox appear today ecclesiastically divided—to the scandal of the more devout faithful and the mockery of non-believers." [3]

3. Unity Was Wounded on a Pan-Orthodox and Local Level

The unilateral and anti-synodical—that is, coup-like—act of imposing the New Calendar is also evident from the fact that, out of the total of the autocephalous local Churches, only two—unfortunately Greek-speaking—initially accepted the reform: the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Church of Greece. Many others criticized the decision and continue to this day to observe the Old Calendar. Thus, unity was fractured both on a pan-Orthodox and on a local level. On the pan-Orthodox level, because the Churches that rejected the reform celebrate the major feasts of the Lord and of the Theotokos, as well as the commemorations of the Saints, on different dates—resulting in the weakening of the common, simultaneous, unanimous, and united, with one voice and one heart, worship and glorification of God. From the time of the First Ecumenical Council in Nicaea, which established the common celebration of Pascha, no one had dared to offend the liturgical unity—until Constantinople dared and imposed it, resulting in an even worse division than that which existed before the First Ecumenical Council, when only Pascha was celebrated on different dates. Now, all the immovable feasts—of the Lord, of the Theotokos, and of the Saints—are celebrated in a divisive and fragmentary manner.

Worse divisions and strife, with schismatic outcomes, took place on the local ecclesiastical level, where ecclesiastical leaderships that followed the New Calendar sought to impose it by force, with the collaboration of state authorities. Pious clergy, monastics, and laypeople who refused to accept the calendar reform—seeing it as an affront to their ancestral and Patristic Tradition—suffered persecutions and hardships of indescribable brutality and cruelty. They were deposed, unfrocked, exiled, slandered, had their churches taken away, and were vilified; it was an ecclesiastical civil war of terrible proportions that tore apart not only the body of clergy from their bishops and from one another, and monastics from bishops and abbots, but also shattered even bonds of friendship and family, as walls were raised between friends and even members of the same household. One of the darkest pages of modern ecclesiastical history was written by a patriarchal Greek hand, at the dictation of dark, non-ecclesiastical centers.

Many were led into schismatic situations in order to be freed from the tyranny of ecclesiastical rulers, placing their salvation at risk. Most hoped in vain that the wound of the schism would be healed by a future Ecumenical Council, which would have been worth convening for that reason alone. One of the principal issues of the Ecumenical Council being prepared since the 1920s, immediately after the calendar reform, was the Calendar issue. It can even be reasonably asserted that it was the most pressing and urgent topic among all those included in the Council’s agenda, yet it was ultimately removed from the list of topics at the last moment—because the Devil keeps watch and does not desire peace, concord, and unity among the Orthodox. The pseudo-council of Kolymbari was incapable of serving the unity of the Church even for that reason alone, aside from the fact that, for many other reasons, four large and populous Churches—being dissatisfied—did not participate, while a multitude of faithful even from the Churches that did take part reject its heretical and unorthodox decisions. We analyzed in greater detail the unexpected and unjustified removal of the Calendar issue from the list of topics, as well as the reasons that led to it, at the historic Conference held in Piraeus on March 23, 2016, co-organized by the Holy Metropolises of Gortynos and Megalopolis, Glyfada, Kythera, Piraeus, and the "Assembly of Orthodox Clergy and Monastics," under the general theme: "Holy and Great Council: Great Preparation without Expectations." Our own presentation bore the title: "Old and New Calendar and the Common Celebration of Pascha. Why Did the Holy and Great Council Withdraw the Burning Issue?" [4]

A great wound, therefore, a great gash in the body of the Church—a great schism—the Calendar issue, remains unhealed for nearly a century. In the past, mistakes were also made and erroneous decisions were taken, but they were soon corrected by those who caused them, according to the axiomatic saying “He who wounded shall also heal.” Or, if healing was no longer possible due to changed historical circumstances, at the very least, the successors and descendants of those who caused historical catastrophes or made unjust decisions would ask for forgiveness. Even unrepentant Papism asks forgiveness for the Crusades and the crimes of the Inquisition, and present-day post-Hitler Germany—also unrepentant and authoritarian—asks, through its representatives, for forgiveness for the crimes of Nazism. We remind that when the Holy Great Church of Christ in Constantinople was truly holy and great, it would promptly intervene and correct errors and schisms caused by the passions and wrong judgments of patriarchs and pseudo-synods. Who is not moved by the restoration of Saint John Chrysostom and the translation of his relics, which our Church commemorates every year on January 27? The great Saint did not permit the movement of his body until the Emperor Theodosius had asked forgiveness—for the persecutions he himself and those faithful to him had suffered, who had severed all ties with the official church and were branded as “the Schism of the Johannites.” Only when, with a written letter laid upon his tomb, the Emperor humbly and peacefully asked forgiveness—at the urging also of the Patriarch, Saint Proclus—did the Saint permit the translation of his relics and his triumphant restoration to Constantinople, by which also the so-called “Schism of the Johannites” came to an end. We omit countless other corrections and healings of schisms and divisions by the then-truly Holy and Great Church of Constantinople. The same must now be done again, that she may fulfill her historical role and preserve intact the reverence and esteem of the Orthodox.

4. Instead of Healing the Calendar Schism, They Create Another: The Ukrainian One

Unfortunately, instead of healing the wounds and injuries caused—and still being caused—by the calendar reform of 1924, instead of restoring festal unity on a pan-Orthodox level and bringing back unity and peace on the local level, instead of ending the division and schism between Old Calendarists and New Calendarists, they are now provoking a new schism in Ukraine—through the arbitrary, uncanonical, unilateral, anti-synodical, and coup-like granting of autocephaly to two schismatic factions of Orthodox Christians, something which the canonical Orthodox Church neither requested nor desired. The same uncanonical and anti-synodical deviations and practices that led to the calendar divisions are now being repeated. State and political interventions, and pressure from the papal and Protestant West; unilateral decisions by Constantinople, just as back then, without pan-Orthodox consensus; and with the opposition of the majority of local Churches clearly visible—again, just as back then. And above all, there is now, as then, a well-founded danger of clashes and unrest: between bishops and patriarchs and metropolitans, between clergy and monastics on one side and bishops and abbots on the other, and of pious laypeople who are disillusioned, troubled, and unsure of their salvation. Furthermore, since the new heteronomously-headed church, with the cooperation of state authorities, will lay claim to churches, monasteries, and sacred places belonging to the canonical Orthodox Church, everyone points out that there will be conflicts between those possessing and those claiming these places—conflicts that may reach the point of bloodshed. The Ecumenists have made the unity of Christians—the slogan "that they all may be one"—their banner and watchword, and yet they cancel it in practice by dividing and scattering their very own house, the Orthodox. Do they not rightfully deserve to hear the well-known rebuke: "Physician, heal thyself"? Within the framework of the ecological movement, they want to save the animals, the trees, and creation from ecological destruction—forgetting that their task within the Church is to save man, the king of creation, from evil and sin, into which they themselves push him through scandals, heresies, schisms, secularization, a life of luxury, and collaboration with the rulers of this age. But if even a single soul is worth as much as the entire world, according to the infallible teaching of the Lord, [5] do they reflect—within the context of spiritual ecology—how many worlds they are destroying through schisms and divisions?

A short psalm, Alleluia. The altered Constantinople of the Ecumenists, in order to once again become truly the Holy and Great Church—as it was until the end of the 19th century—must be freed from the captivity of Ecumenism, from the mania for primacy, from the disastrous decisions of Kolymbari; it must heal the wounds of the Calendar, and, even at the last moment, avoid causing a new schism, which, beginning in Ukraine, will spread throughout the entire Orthodox Church. All of us who love the Constantinople of the centuries pray and supplicate fervently.

 

[1] See indicatively our study “From Orthodoxy to Ecumenism: The Great Overturning of the 20th Century,” in our book: Holy and Great Council: Should We Hope or Be Concerned? Thessaloniki 2016, pp. 15–48. Also: Monk Seraphim, “Freemasonry and the Patriarchs,” Theodromia 15 (2013) pp. 513–530, 16 (2014) pp. 127–144. By the same author: “Elements of Freemasonry’s Influence on Early Greek Ecumenism,” Theodromia 19 (2017) pp. 568–589, 20 (2018) pp. 101–116.

[2] On all these matters, see: Protopresbyter Theodoros Zisis, Saint Philotheos Zervakos as a Defender of Orthodoxy. With References to Contemporary Issues, publ. “Orthodox Kypseli,” Thessaloniki 2014, pp. 80–101.

[3] Archimandrite Gabriel Dionysiatis, “The Calendar Issue in the Church of Greece,” in The Calendar Issue (A Brief Contribution to Its Resolution), publ. “Orthodoxos Typos,” Athens 2004, pp. 18–19.

[4] Also published in Theodromia 18 (2016), pp. 264–291.

[5] Mark 8:36: “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”

 

Greek source: https://krufo-sxoleio.blogspot.com/2018/11/blog-post_93.html