The Rage of the Papists against Saint Gregory Palamas

Second Sunday of the Fast

By Mr. B. Charalambous, theologian

 

The then Archbishop of Greece, Chrysostomos I (Papadopoulos), in a text of his entitled “Saint Gregory Palamas of Thessaloniki and the Latin Church,” which was published in the old edition of the ecclesiastical periodical Gregory Palamas (Issues 26 and 27 – Thessaloniki, 1918), stated, among other things, the following:

“The Latin Church, in order to deceive the more simple, asserted in its defense—among whom were unfortunately also certain Greeks—that after the Schism, saints no longer appeared in the Orthodox Church of the East.”

The Papists do not speak of Orthodox saints after the Schism, because among them are included, first of all, Saint Mark Eugenikos and Saint Gregory Palamas, and a multitude of other Confessor Saints, who fought in an Orthodox manner against the errors of Papism.

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Referring, therefore, to Saint Gregory Palamas, Archbishop Chrysostomos I (Papadopoulos) writes the following:

“Already a short time after his death, 1359–1360, in Thessaloniki and in the Monasteries of the Holy Mountain, he was honored as a Saint,” and “the Latins, with indescribable fanaticism, not only waged war against the memory of the great Hierarch of Thessalonika and brave champion of Orthodoxy, but also attempted to abolish the Sacred Service in his memory in the Orthodox Church.”

Another proof of the rage of the heretical Papists is the destruction of the Printing House in Constantinople in the year 1627 by the Jesuits, on the occasion of the publication of the “Two Demonstrative Discourses” of Saint Gregory Palamas.

Even [Latin priest Jacques Paul] Migne himself experienced the Papal authoritarian reaction on account of the publication of works of Saint Gregory Palamas, and in the end he was compelled to ask forgiveness for their publication.

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The reason why the Papists wage war against the memory of this great Saint is obvious. The things chanted on the second Sunday of the Fast, on which we celebrate the memory of Saint Gregory Palamas, give precisely the answer to the heretical Papists.

“You utterly shattered the sword and the bows of the evil-believers, and the pride of Barlaam, and you scattered all the power of the heretics like a spider’s web, O Hierarch, as though by a very great stone” (from the 7th Ode).

The teaching of Saint Gregory Palamas concerning the uncreated Divine Grace constitutes a continuation of the dogmatic teaching of our Church, and the Synod by which this dogmatic teaching was confirmed constitutes, in the conscience of our Church, a Synod of Ecumenical authority, the Ninth. In the conscience of our Church all the dogmatic truths that have been proclaimed constitute the “in extension” Symbol of our Orthodox Faith.

“Therefore, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit together are the source of the living water, that is, of the Divine Grace” (Demonstrative Discourse 2, 65), confessed Saint Gregory Palamas, refuting the error of Barlaam the Calabrian, who held that Divine Grace is created and inferior to the intellect. The heretical anti-hesychast Barlaam, the “divinely eloquent Gregory Palamas demonstrated to be foolish and senseless.”

“If the Divine Grace is created, how will it deify man by grace?”, to use an interrogative phrase of Elder Georgios Kapsanis.

“Grace is those divine energies which the All-Holy Trinity grants to the Church for the salvation of men,” as the Holy Justin Popovich characteristically states. [1]

“We sing during the Service of the second Sunday of the Fast:

‘With the sickle of your words and with your sacred writings you cut down thorny heresies and the spurious shoots of tares, and you sowed the pious seeds of Orthodoxy, O Hierarch Gregory’ (First Canon, Ode 5).

Therefore, the rage of the Papists against Saint Gregory Palamas is a consequent one.”

 

1. Archimandrite Justin Popovich (†), Man and the God-Man, ed. Aster, 1969.

 

Source: Orthodoxos Typos, no. 2,563 / 31 October 2025.

Shared by the G.O.C. Metropolis of Oropos and Phyle:

https://www.imoph.org/pdfs/2026/03/10/20260310aManitaPapikon.pdf