Papism-Ecumenism and the Duty of the Orthodox Christian

Aristeidis Daskalakis | March 10, 2026

 

 

“As the Church has received… so we proclaim” (Synodikon of the Seventh Ecumenical Council).

Words which no longer find wide application within the ranks of the Orthodox Church. We live in the age of concessions, of deviations, of insult toward the Divine, of the legalization of sin: “Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world shall be cast out” (Jn. 12:31). The ruler of this world shall be cast down from his authority. Yet the adversary, until the fulfillment of the prophecy, uses his instruments—rulers and shepherds—in order to harm humanity.

The state legislates—against God and against man. The governing Church often ratifies this or keeps a fish-like silence. The people are ignorant of the obligations that proceed from the Holy Tradition of the Church and from the Gospel. One drags another into a free fall toward the abyss of perdition.

The instigators are the various centers of power, whether political or religious. The great center of religious authority, the “Holy See (Sancta Sedes),” echoes and accelerates the plan of Zionism against humanity. The Vatican, synonymous with heresy, now resembles a supervising authority over the official Orthodox Church. It has already drawn it, through the dark movement of Ecumenism, into a whirlpool of disobedience to the will of God.

The Body of Christ, the Church, is being attacked. It is being attacked by dark forces, foreign centers of interests that pull the strings of humanity.

This demonic authority and the accompanying evils are permitted by God as a consequence of the fall and the alienation of humanity. The people of God are under persecution. They have sinned and are paying the price. An image of the fallen Greek-Orthodox people is constituted by the hierarchy of the Church.

We have become listeners to a new rhetoric about social responsibility, love for one’s neighbor, indiscriminate obedience, and economy. An “economy” that has ended up as lawlessness. Of a deluded episcopolatry and an absolute submission to the commands of authority.

We have seen sacraments being recognized among heretics. We have observed bishops presenting the Qur’an as a sacred book. Primates hiding their pectoral crosses before illegal migrants so as not to cause offense. We have been astonished by joint prayers, common prayers, and concelebrations of bishops of the Church of Greece with heretics, Muslims, and schismatics.

The pulpits have fallen silent. They have ceased to resound with the word of Truth. They no longer constitute launching points for the Orthodox struggle.

Instead, they have become echoes of governmental decisions and medical ultimatums.

And obedience to the Church is demanded. What is the Church? The hierarchy and the clergy? Is it not the people as well? What does Tradition teach us? Who was the Church?

Was it Saint Gregory Palamas or John XIV Kalekas, the Latin-minded one? Was it Saint Mark of Ephesus or Metrophanes II of Constantinople and the rest of the hierarchy? Was it Saint Maximus the Confessor or all the Patriarchates of his time? Was it Saint Cyril of Alexandria or Nestorius? Are not the saints models of conduct and imitation? Is not the Church also the triumphant one—the saints and Fathers who defined the dogmas?

What happens if the “church” (the official/governing one) becomes a fighter against Christ? What happens when it cooperates with, applauds, and promotes anti-Orthodox laws and practices?

The administration of the Orthodox Church, being secularized, often obeys indiscriminately the commands of the West. Of course, with notable exceptions.

We observe gatherings, conferences, common prayers, joint prayers, and finally concelebrations.

Papism, the offspring of schism, became the root of Enlightenment Europe, the principles of which constitute the negation of Byzantine civilization—of the East. It was based on myths and naïve forgeries, innovations originating from the childish ambitions of the barbarian tribes of the West to dominate the Christian world. It was a transaction between power and the church of the West—between Charlemagne and Pope Leo III. The pope suddenly and unlawfully crowned Charlemagne as emperor, and the latter strengthened the former, serving him in ambitions of power and privileges against New Rome—Constantinople. This same pope had initially refused the invention of the Filioque, which came from Toledo in Spain. Nevertheless, the divergence had already begun, since a new empire in the West required a strong religious foundation in order to be established. And this was a differentiated Christianity, a heresy founded upon a multitude of forgeries: the Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals, the doctrine of infallibility, a different sign of the cross, the Eucharist with unleavened bread, the separation of Baptism and Chrismation, and many other innovations. There was a distortion and misunderstanding of the formulations of the Church’s experience, falsifications of history—things easily accepted by the illiterate people of the West—so that the consciousness of a different religion might be universally established, one that would support a new empire: the rival power of the Byzantine Empire.

The aim then was to serve political expediencies and religious ambitions. The aim today is the same, but on a greater scale. The empire of the West gives its place to a world dominion of centers of power, with the Church and faith used as a Trojan horse. The pope, the ruler of heresy, is placed as the head of a conglomeration of religions into which they also wish to cast Orthodoxy. Yet Orthodoxy is not a religion, but the revelation of Truth from the Creator of all things.

The catalyst is the Ecumenical movement, another invention of Papism, within which a large part of the official Orthodox Church has also been incorporated.

How can we converse and negotiate with the enemies of the Lord? How do we tolerate the pope appearing at services in the Holy Church of Church of St. George at the Ecumenical Patriarchate [at the Phanar]?

How do we tolerate papal clerics wandering about in the holy churches of our country, invited by metropolises and parishes?

What did the saints of our Church teach us? What legacy did they leave us?

A great defender of the faith and of dogma: Saint Nicholas of Myra.

Saint Nicholas of Myra took part in the First Council of Nicaea (in Nicaea in A.D. 325), where he distinguished himself for his wisdom and moral perfection. He stood out at the First Ecumenical Council against Arius, who taught and loudly proclaimed that Christ is not God, but a creature and a creation of God. At a certain moment, when Saint Nicholas saw that Arius was attempting to silence the bishops, moved by holy indignation he rose and delivered a strong slap to Arius. The reason that Saint Nicholas struck the heretic was not hatred or the rejection of love toward a human person (Arius), but steadfastness in his love for God. “A rule of faith and an image of meekness, a teacher of temperance…” begins the apolytikion of the saint.

This was not a passionate gesture, but the result of theological exactness, accompanied, however, by an inner experience, the counterpart of which we can find only in the scriptural account of the driving out of the merchants from the temple by the Son of God.

Holy Diadochos of Photiki, in the One Hundred Practical Chapters, emphasizes: “Anger, more than the other passions, disturbs and confuses the soul; yet sometimes it also benefits it greatly. For when we use it without agitation against the impious or the licentious, so that they may be saved or put to shame, then we add meekness to our soul, because we act in accordance with the purpose of the justice and goodness of God.”

Saint Nektarios emphasizes that: “By saying that the Pope is the head of the Church, he has expelled from the Western Church the Master of all, Christ, and thus the Western Church has remained a widow deprived of Christ.”

Saint Theodore the Studite continues: “If there are any monks in these times, let them show it in their deeds. And the work of a monk is to tolerate no innovation in the Gospel.”

Saint Nicodemus the Hagiorite: “Heretics are called those whose difference immediately and directly concerns the faith in God; that is, those who are separated from the Orthodox in faith and dogmas and are entirely estranged.”

Saint Mark of Ephesus: “Flee the Papists as one flees from a serpent and from the face of fire.”

Saint John Chrysostom: “A correct life is of no benefit when the dogmas are corrupted.” (EPE 23, 492–494)

Saint John of Kronstadt: “There is no other Christian confession apart from Orthodoxy.”

Saint Ephraim of Philotheou: “He who does not believe according to the Tradition of the Church is an unbeliever.”

Saint Ephraim of Katounakia: “Ecumenism has a spirit of wickedness and is ruled by unclean spirits.”

Saint Paisios of Mount Athos: “Ecumenism, and the common market, one great state, one religion according to their measures. These are plans of devils. The Zionists are preparing someone as a messiah. There are also some who begin with a good intention. But when magicians, fire-worshippers, Protestants, and a whole crowd gather together—you cannot make sense of it—to bring peace to the world, how can they help? May God forgive me, these are the devil’s rags.”

These and many other things the saints of our Church confess concerning the pope and ecumenism.

In recent years we have become recipients or hearers of new terminology, terms, and neologisms—new words, or words with altered meaning or new interpretation: the famous dictionary of ecumenism.

Of the movement that is the Trojan horse which will allow the army of heretics and the deluded to dominate the global religious sphere. It is one aspect, one dimension of globalization.

This Trojan horse was constructed chiefly for the impregnable fortress of Orthodoxy. Its guardians are the Holy Fathers and Confessors, the exiled bishops who suffered greatly in exile, the Martyrs, the fragrant flowers of the faith, and the Apostles throughout the centuries. And this fortress has around it a wide and deep moat, filled with blood—the blood of the holy confessors—within which all the enemies of the faith are drowned who attempt to overthrow this fortress.

According to Elder Athanasios Mitilinaios, ecumenism is the final forerunner of the Antichrist. It is the heresy that recognizes truth in all heresies. For this reason, it is called a “pan-heresy” (Saint Justin Popović).

But what is heresy? It means the selection and preference of one part of the truth at the expense of the whole truth—the catholic (universal) truth. It is the opposite of catholicity. It absolutizes one aspect of the experiential certainty of the Church and thus inevitably relativizes all the others.

The Church reacted to heresies by marking the boundaries of its truth, that is, the living experience of the early Christian times. Originally, what today we call dogma was then called a Oros (definition), that is, a boundary or frontier of the truth.

The dogmas of today are the definitions of the Ecumenical Councils of the Holy Fathers of the Church. Those doctrinal decisions which formulate the soteriological truth of the Church, thus setting a boundary between this truth and its corruption by heresy.

What we call dogma today therefore appears when the experience of the ecclesiastical truth comes to be threatened by heresy.

About these boundaries Saint Basil the Great speaks: “Every boundary of the Fathers has been moved, every foundation and every stronghold of the dogmas has been shaken. Everything totters and is shaken, hanging upon a weak base” (Basil the Great, PG 32, 212–213).

And the Fathers defined the dogmas. They spoke in the Holy Spirit and overcame the heresies.

Today, of course, spiritual decay prevails, the defenses have fallen, and the gates of the fortress stand wide open. And unfortunately, the guardians are lacking—or they are few.

Ecumenism uses verbal weapons in order to touch the emotions of the faithful:

1) It tells us that we must love our neighbor. Within the framework of this love, therefore, and since we aim at the salvation of the heretic, we must love whatever new thing he proclaims and accept it. We love sinners, not sin. Nor do we love the official representatives of sinful people who legitimize sin (associations of homosexuals, parties of pedophiles, heretical organizations, etc.). We love each human being individually and personally because he is the image of God—but not groups of sinners, heretics, or deluded people. We will not legitimize sin for the sake of such a false love, a love alien to the one preached by Christ—a love from which Christ is absent.

In the Gospel the Lord tells us: “He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37–39), and “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. This is the first commandment” (Mark 12:30).

2) It accuses those who struggle against the destroyers of the patristic faith of judging and condemning sacred things. It tells us that the sinner must be covered. However, the Fathers dealt differently with the sinner and differently with the heretic. To all these Saint John Chrysostom replies: “The ‘Judge not, that you be not judged’ concerns life, not faith” (P.G. 63, 231–232).

Saint Theodore the Studite is categorical: “It is a command of the Lord that one must not remain silent in circumstances where the Faith is in danger. For He says, ‘Speak and do not keep silent’ [Acts 18:9], and ‘If he draws back, My soul has no pleasure in him’ [Heb. 10:38], and ‘If these should keep silent, the stones will cry out’ [Luke 19:40]. Therefore, when it concerns the Faith, it is not possible for anyone to say, ‘Who am I?’”

3) It tells us that we must not harbor hatred toward heretics, since the anti-heretical struggle supposedly breathes hatred and envy.

Saint John Chrysostom replies: “With my words I persecute not the heretic, but the heresy; I do not turn away from the man, but I hate the error and wish to draw him back” (PG 50, 701).

Did Saint Nicholas of Myra hate the man when he struck Arius? Was Saint Mark of Ephesus filled with hatred when, in a letter to Bishop Theophanes, he characterized the heretics as “wretches” and “scoundrels”?

Was Saint Kosmas of Aetolia a man of hatred when he cursed the pope?

Rather, they loved Christ greatly—more than man—and they could not endure the insult against His Person.

Saint Paisios of Mount Athos tells us that “in order to pray together with someone, we must agree in the faith.”

And if we do not agree, then according to the Tradition and the canons of the Church this entails a penalty:

Canon 65 of the Holy Apostles:

“If any clergyman or layman enters into a synagogue of Jews or of heretics to pray, let him be both deposed and excommunicated.”

Canon 70 of the Holy Apostles:

“If any Christian brings oil to a temple of the pagans, or to a synagogue of the Jews during their feasts, or lights lamps there, let him be excommunicated.”

Canon 32 of the Local Council of Laodicea:

“That one must not receive blessings from heretics, which are rather absurdities than blessings.”

Canon 37 of the Local Council of Laodicea:

“That one must not receive festive gifts sent by Jews or heretics, nor celebrate together with them.”

Canon 33 of the Local Council of Laodicea:

“That one must not pray together with heretics or schismatics.”

From what we know, neither common prayer nor joint prayer is permitted, nor of course concelebration.

4) It insists that we must obey the episcopal authority, our spiritual father, the Synod, and so on. Even if this concerns immoral sin or heresy? Is indiscriminate and blind obedience characteristic of Orthodoxy?

Did not Paul the Apostle say: “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, let him be anathema” (Gal. 1:8)?

Did not Saint Athanasius of Alexandria say: “If the bishop or the presbyter, who are the eyes of the Church, conduct themselves wickedly and scandalize the people, they must be cast out. For it is better to assemble in a house of prayer without them than with them to be cast, as with Annas and Caiaphas, into the Gehenna of fire”?

The holy Elder Philotheos Zervakos emphasizes: “Respect toward bishops, priests, and elders refers to Christ Himself. But if they are heretics, then we obey only God.”

5) It maintains that we alone do not possess the truth. It would be great arrogance to think such a thing. Then we would have to reproach Saint Maximus the Confessor, who alone and deserted (without even being a bishop), standing against the entire ecclesiastical power of his time (which then also greatly influenced the political authority), raised the banner of struggle and of non-communion without being intimidated. Was the saint arrogant? Were all the martyrs arrogant who suffered martyrdom because of heresies that today are recognized as churches?

6) Ecclesiastical academies or organized seminars are beginning to arise which teach ecumenism (as something beneficial).

In the second chapter of the decree on ecumenism of the Second Vatican Council, in paragraph 10, it states:

“Theological courses, as well as the others, especially the historical ones, must be taught in an ecumenical spirit, so that they may correspond more accurately to the truth of the facts. It is indeed very important that pastors and priests possess theology developed precisely in this manner and not polemically, especially in matters concerning the relations of the brethren who are separated from the Catholic Church. For upon the training of priests depends to a very great extent the necessary education and spiritual formation of the faithful and of the monks.”

We are experiencing the transformation of theology. A new theology is being enlisted—the so-called post-patristic theology.

Academics are being enlisted in a frenzied struggle for career and distinction, and they openly preach heresy, deceiving clergy and people: “And there shall be false teachers among you, who shall secretly bring in destructive heresies” (the Apostle Peter — 2 Peter 2:1).

7)  It urges us toward economy. But what kind of economy is this which allows papists to attend services in Orthodox churches, priests to defend heresy, bishops to pray together, to participate in joint prayers, to announce the coming “common chalice,” and to permit heretics to enter the Holy Altar? Does this bring any benefit to the members or to the whole of the Church?

Characteristic in this regard is the incident that occurred during the patriarchate of Germanus II of Constantinople, when the Patriarchal Synod wished for a moment to appear lenient and to permit the Cypriot Hierarchy “by economy” to comply with certain terms imposed by the Latin conquerors. As soon as the decision became known, enraged crowds of clergy, monks, and laymen burst into the hall where the Synod was meeting and, after declaring that they considered this compliance a denial of the faith, demanded that the Patriarch revoke the decision. The Patriarchal Synod, respecting the conscience of the faithful people, withdrew the decision that had been taken by economy.

Today we have operated upon love with the scalpel of reason. Whatever is commanded to us by God passes through the sieve of reason—even love itself.

And the great evil comes when clergy—esteemed in the conscience of the flock—proclaim another “love,” one that has no place for God. A love that is subject to judgment, to dialogue, to discussion; that does not act within the world but acts together with the world; that surrenders to the spirit of the times, to the spirit of the devil; that is subject not to the control of conscience, but to that of reason.

Today the prophetic word is lacking—the cry of anguish of Saint John the Baptist, of Saint Kosmas of Aetolia, and of the blessed Augustine Kantiotes.

There is no time left for faith in God, for love toward the Lord. Priority is given to “love” for the neighbor. But this neighbor is our own self. In the person of others, we justify our own passions. Thus this false “love,” which grants forgiveness of sins to the unrepentant neighbor—and to ourselves—leads us to the precipice and to destruction, according to the saying: “If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into the pit” (Matt. 15:14).

This “love,” which accepts sin (and not the sinner in repentance) instead of casting it out, the new order of things in our Church—through popular and celebrated clerics—maintains and even increases.

A large part of the hierarchy now sleeps. Our saints have prepared us.

Saint John Maximovitch tells us: “In the last times evil and heresy will have spread so greatly that the faithful will not find a priest or shepherd to protect them from deception and to guide them toward salvation. Then the faithful will not be able to receive safe guidance from men, but their guide will be the writings of the Holy Fathers. Especially in that time each believer will be responsible for the whole fullness of the Church.”

Elder Gabriel of Dionysiou: “We owe obedience to our bishops and to our spiritual fathers when they rightly divide the word of truth. But when they do not rightly divide the word of truth and say heretical things, not only must we not obey them, but even if an angel from heaven should descend and tell us something contrary to what the Church teaches, we must not obey.”

I conclude with a saying of the holy and blessed Elder Athanasios Mitilinaios:

“Let us be vigilant people, studying the word of God, so that we may be able to protect ourselves. For today those who are appointed to protect you do not protect you.”

What is our duty, as lay people, being members of the body of the Church? Do we not all have the duty of correction, as the Gospel urges us? The Holy Fathers of Orthodoxy proclaim that even the last wheel of the cart bears responsibility.

All of us sinners? Is this correction perhaps a duty that completes the work of our repentance?

The Apostle of the nations speaks to us about correction. What kind of correction? Not condemnation, which is a sin: “And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them” (Eph. 5:11).

Of whose works does he speak? Clearly of those who cause scandal. If the one who performs dark works is an official or a recognized public figure, then we must rebuke him publicly for provocative actions that harm and lead the flock onto dangerous paths—without, of course, publicly shaming him. We censure acts and situations, especially when those acts or actions are characterized by an anti-Orthodox scent of heresy, a scent of ecumenism and pan-religion. Silence is betrayal, especially when deeds and words distort the divine commandments and the word of the Gospel.

Let us follow the counsel of the divine Paul the Apostle, who tells us:

“Therefore He says: ‘Awake, you who sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light’” (Eph. 5:14).

(The rebuke for the manifestation of evil and the correction of the sinner must be made; for this reason the Holy Spirit also reproves and cries out to every sinner: Arise, you who sleep the sleep of sin, and stand upright from among the dead of sin, and Christ will enlighten you.)

And if some do not wish to listen, then: “Reject a heretical man after the first and second admonition” (Titus 3:10).

Observing the reaction of many leaders of the Church, we remember the words of the Gospel: “For they loved the glory of men more than the glory of God” (John 12:43).

We must react. And if it is not we, others will be found, according to the words of the Lord: “I tell you that if these should keep silent, the stones will cry out” (Luke 19:40).

Let us not be influenced by the current of the age. Let us not be carried away by quantity, but by quality. Let the words of the great Fyodor Dostoevsky be engraved in our soul:

“If the whole world goes in one direction, and Christ in the other, I will go behind Christ.”

 

Greek source: https://ethnegersis.blogspot.com/2026/03/blog-post_10.html