Intercommunion Between the Greek Old Calendarists and the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (1987)

An Official Statement from the Deputy Secretary of the Russian Synod

 

The readers of Orthodox Tradition are familiar with the long years of cooperation between the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad and the Old Calendar zealots of Greece. When, in the mid-'50s, the last Old Calendar Bishop died in Greece, a number of courageous and far-sighted Bishops of the ROCA consecrated Bishops for the movement. These consecrations, initially undertaken without the full consent of the Synod of Bishops, were finally recognized in an official encyclical from the Russian Synod in 1969. The traditionalism of the Russian Church Abroad was joined to that of the Old Calendarist strugglers in Greece —as Sister Churches.

In subsequent years, not wholly independent of unfortunate actions by extremist circles within the Russian Church itself —who have now separated from that Church [i.e., the Panteleimonites]—, the Old Calendar movement broke into several factions, separated between the moderates (now aligned with Bishop Cyprian of Oropos and Fili), who refuse to deny Grace in the ailing Mother Church of Greece and who have walled themselves off, calling for a general synod of the Church to overturn the calendar innovation and to disavow the excesses of political ecumenism; and the extremists, who deny the existence of Grace in the Mother Church and who have embraced a largely sectarian ecclesiology. In view of this, the Russian Synod has not taken a direct stand favoring any one Old Calendarist group, though its own ecclesiology is essentially that of the Synod of Metropolitan Cyprian of Oropos and Fili.

Though we moderate Old Calendarists acknowledge a debt to the Russian Synod and highly revere many of her clergy and Hierarchs, the integrity and authenticity of our movement rests not on relations with the ROCA, but on the Patristic grounding of our resistance to innovation and compromise within our Mother Church. We have never, therefore, based our legitimacy on recognition or a lack of recognition by the Russian Church Abroad.

Recently, however, some divisive forces have begun to misrepresent the official stand of the Russian Church Abroad, suggesting that the present circumstances of non-concelebration (though this, too, at times takes place, as our readers have seen in photographs) are evidence that the ROCA and the Greek Old Calendarists are not in communion. Particularly misleading statements have been made about our own Synod, suggesting that our moderate ecclesiology has separated us from the Russian Bishops. Since many of our Faithful attend Churches of the ROCA and regularly commune, we feel obliged to correct this misapprehension and to point out that it is precisely the Synod of Metropolitan Cyprian which most closely adheres to the ecclesiology of the ROCA —a point, once again, intentionally and openly misrepresented by extremists now in schism from the ROCA.

We print on the foregoing page a clarification by Bishop Hilarion, provided expressly for publication here, explaining the circumstances of relations between our Churches and clearly stating that, indeed, intercommunion has not been broken, except in cases, of course, where communicants are canonically excluded from the Mysteries. Given the very difficult problems which face the ROCA at this moment, we can understand the reticence of its Bishops to side with any Old Calendarist group in Greece. The situation in Greece is confusing, just as present circumstances in the ROCA occasion great confusion for us Old Calendarists. Nonetheless, it is quite obvious that the ecclesiological ties between our own moderate Synod and that of the ROCA bespeak a very favorable future. It is the firm belief of our Bishops that, with an end to the misrepresentation of the official ecclesiology of the Russian Church Abroad by extremists in its midst who have now entered into schism, full ties between the Greek Old Calendarist moderates and the ROCA will be renewed. This will benefit both Churches, the huge number of Greek Old Calendarists adding to the small and dwindling Faithful of the ROCA, the history of courageous resistance to innovation and modernism in world Orthodoxy of the ROCA serving, in turn, to inspire the Greek Old Calendarists.

In the meantime, however, let us put an end to untrue and harmful rumors that communion no longer exists between the ROCA and the Old Calendarists. These self-serving claims, advocated by those who see the Church in a sectarian and limited way, violate the very catholicity which the triumphant traditionalism of both us Greek Old Calendarists and the Russian Synod Abroad aims ultimately to preserve.

 

Source: Orthodox Tradition, Vol. IV (1987), No. 3, pp. 9-11.