On the 1969 Decision of the Moscow Patriarchate to admit Roman Catholics to Communion

 

1969: December 16. On the initiative of Metropolitan Nikodim (Rotov), the Holy Synod of the Moscow Patriarchate resolved, in extreme cases, to allow Catholics and Old Believers to receive the Mysteries of the Orthodox Church (in 1985 this resolution was revoked*):

“They deliberated on various cases when Old Believers and Catholics turn to the Orthodox Church for the performance of the Mysteries over them. They resolved—in the order of clarification—to specify that in those cases when Old Believers and Catholics turn to the Orthodox Church for the performance of the holy Mysteries over them, this is not forbidden” (Journal of the Moscow Patriarchate, 1970, no. 1, p. 5).

This resolution provoked sharp criticism, especially among the Greeks on Athos. Archbishop Vasily Krivoshein recalled:

“…I managed at Pan-Orthodox meetings (such as the Pan-Orthodox Commission for Dialogue with the Anglicans) to defend the good name and Orthodoxy of the Russian Church with the following argumentation: ‘This Synodal resolution is caused by the entirely special situation of believers and, in particular, Catholics in the Soviet Union, where, as is known, for thousands of kilometers there is not a single Catholic church or priest. In such cases they are permitted to give Communion. A similar resolution was adopted by the Constantinopolitan Synod and Patriarch Joachim II in 1878 with regard to the Armenians. [It should be noted that the concordat concluded by Emperor Nicholas I in 1847 with Pope Gregory XVI provided that the Russian Orthodox Church would perform all the Mysteries and rites for Catholics who turned to it with such requests, exiled for participation in the Polish uprisings against Russia, if they lived in places where there were no Catholic churches and Catholic clergy. According to the sense of this concordat and by the emperor’s instruction, the Synod then issued the corresponding directive, obligatory for the Orthodox Russian clergy, to satisfy the requests of exiled Catholics, if such requests were made by them. —Ed.] Theologically it is difficult for me to justify such oikonomia, but I cannot judge Russian hierarchs living in contemporary Russia, in difficult conditions. They know better than we what they are doing.’

“Such argumentation satisfied everyone, even on Athos, but everything was destroyed by the Communion of Catholics in Rome by Metropolitan Nikodim. ‘And there, what “pastoral oikonomia” compelled him to commune Catholics where there are so many Catholic churches?’—they asked me. The only answer I could give was: ‘Your hierarchs act even worse when they commune everyone indiscriminately.’ ‘Our hierarchs, such as Archbishop Iakovos of America or Athenagoras of London, are traitors to Orthodoxy—we have known this for a long time (the abbot of the Gregoriou Monastery, Archimandrite George, answered me on Athos). But that the Moscow Patriarchate, the Russian Orthodox Church, which we so respect for its steadfastness in Orthodoxy, acts in this way in the person of Metropolitan Nikodim—this strikes us and deeply grieves us.’

I told this reaction to Metropolitan Nikodim. He even became angry: ‘So what if they say things on Athos. Athos is not an autocephalous Church.’” (Archbishop Vasily Krivoshein, Memoirs).

In his recollections of the Hierarchical Council of 1971, Archbishop Vasily (Krivoshein), describing his meeting with Metropolitan Pimen, the future patriarch, says:

“We began to speak about the Roman-Catholic priest of the American embassy, Fr. Dione. Together with another visiting American he was at the liturgy and in the altar; he did not commune, but he was given antidoron with warm water to drink. Precisely in connection with this we began to speak at table about the Synod’s decision of December 16, 1969, on admitting Catholics to Communion where they have no churches or priests.

-- ‘There was no need at all to adopt this decision,’ Metropolitan Pimen remarked. ‘Where there was necessity, Catholics were admitted to Communion anyway. That is how it should have been left, and not legalized by an official Synodal decision; for before this “order,” everything was done according to pastoral considerations. And now unpleasantnesses and disturbances are occurring.’

-- ‘Everyone interprets in his own way when and in which cases one may give Communion to Catholics,’ I replied. ‘For the main deficiency of the Synodal resolution is its lack of clarity. It was pleasing for me to note that in our church Communion was not given to the Roman-Catholic priest.’

-- ‘And how is that possible!’ exclaimed Metropolitan Pimen. ‘It is not given to him anywhere, except in special cases, when a Catholic truly cannot commune anywhere.’

-- ‘Your Eminence, but allow me,’ I objected, ‘how then should one understand it when prominent Roman-Catholic figures who visited the Moscow Patriarchate were fully admitted to Communion, sometimes even according to the priestly order, in vestments?’

Saying this, I had in mind the Communion of the rector of the Russicum, Fr. Maye, and the rector of the Gregorian University in Rome in the autumn of 1969 in Kiev by Metropolitan Filaret and in Tula by Bishop Juvenaly—not to mention the Communion of Catholics in Rome by Metropolitan Nikodim at approximately the same time.

-- ‘Such facts are unknown to me,’ Metropolitan Pimen objected. ‘That could not have been!’

I could not, of course, in the presence of numerous people at the table, name names, nor did I want to ‘inform’ on my fellow hierarchs, and therefore I fell silent. But for me it remained a mystery whether Metropolitan Pimen truly did not know about these facts of ‘intercommunio.’ And if so, then he does not know what is happening in the contemporary Russian Church and much is concealed from him, or he simply diplomatically feigned ignorance, being powerless to do anything? The positions of Metropolitan Pimen with regard to intercommunio with Roman Catholics were overall firmer and more principled than those of Metropolitan Nikodim; they made an impression on me.”

(…)

1971: May 30. In the Trinity–St. Sergius Lavra, the Hierarchical Council of the Moscow Patriarchate opened. Among the 236 members of the Council there were 75 hierarchs, including 9 metropolitans, 30 archbishops, and 36 bishops; 85 clerics and 78 laypersons. Guests of the Local Council were representatives of Orthodox autocephalous Churches, heterodox Churches, and ecumenical organizations, among them: Patriarch Nicholas VI of Alexandria, Catholicos-Patriarch Ephraim II of Georgia, Romanian Patriarch Justinian; Archbishop Makarios of Cyprus, the vicar-chairman of the Holy Synod of the Bulgarian Church Metropolitan Maxim, Metropolitans Vasily of Warsaw and Dorotheos of Prague, representatives of the Patriarch of Constantinople, of the Serbian Church, of the American Metropolia; Cardinal Willebrands, and the General Secretary of the WCC J. C. Blake.

At the Council, Metropolitan Nikodim (Rotov) delivered the report “The Ecumenical Activity of the Russian Orthodox Church,” in which he explained the decision of the Holy Synod of 1969 on admitting Catholics and Old Believers to Communion in the following manner:

“I consider it necessary to note the decision of His Holiness Patriarch Alexy and the Holy Synod of December 16, 1969, dictated by the pastoral concern of our Church for its brothers in Christ, according to which the clergy of the Moscow Patriarchate received permission to impart the grace of the holy Mysteries to Catholics and Old Believers in cases of extreme spiritual necessity for the latter and in the absence locally of their priests, since we have with them a common faith with regard to the Mysteries. A similar decision took place in 1878, when the Constantinopolitan Synod imposed as an obligation on Greek Orthodox priests to perform the Mysteries for Armenians where they do not have churches and priests” (Journal of the Moscow Patriarchate, 1971, no. 7, p. 31).

This report of Metropolitan Nikodim was approved by the Council unanimously.

 * In reality, the decision was not revoked, but "postponed," "until the resolution of this question by the Orthodox plenitude," according to the September 1986 issue of the Journal of the Moscow Patriarchate. - trans. note.

Source: Летопись церковной истории [Chronicle of Ecclesiastical History], by Monk Benjamin (Gomartely) of Holy Trinity Monastery, Jordanville, NY

Online: https://hristov.narod.ru/letopis5.htm