A Parochial Anti-Ecumenist Statement: “We Will Not Permit Orthodoxy to be Profaned by Ecumenism” (1999)

—A document distributed at a Pan-Orthodox Vespers in Canada—

 

During the celebration of a Pan-Orthodox Vespers service on the Sunday of Orthodoxy this year at the Serbian Orthodox Church of the Holy Trinity in Montreal, Quebec, a pamphlet entitled Voice of the Orthodox was distributed to the congregation. The text of the pamphlet—which dealt with the immutability of the Orthodox Christian Faith—was written in Greek, English, and French, and said the following:

 

Today, on this day of Orthodoxy, we are found in this holy temple in order to celebrate together the triumph of Orthodoxy over heresies. With one accord [let us proclaim]: “Behold now, what is so good or so joyous as for brethren to dwell together in unity” (Ps. 132:1). With one accord: Let us remember the blood shed by the Saints of our Faith so that “the Faith which was once delivered unto the Saints” (Jude 3) might be preserved inviolate eternally.

With one accord: Clergy and laity, let us declare that we preserve our Orthodoxy, “even as they which were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word delivered it unto us” (Cf. Luke 1:2).

But Your Eminence, revered fathers, what Orthodoxy do we celebrate today? The Orthodoxy of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church of the Symbol of our Faith [the Creed], or the “Orthodoxy” which you have introduced into the Canadian Council of “Churches” as a member on equal terms with heterodoxy—i.e., the Branch Theory?

Do we celebrate today the Orthodoxy of the Seven Holy Ecumenical Councils, or the “Orthodoxy” of Balamand (June 17-24, 1993), of the “Sister Churches”, in which the heretical Papal “Church” is considered equal with the Orthodox Church?

Do we celebrate today the Orthodoxy of the Fourth Ecumenical Council, or the “Orthodoxy” of Chambesy—Geneva (Agreed Statement, November, 1990), wherein the Orthodox and Monophysites, after fifteen centuries, have discovered that there is no difference between Orthodoxy and Monophysitism?

As a result of all this, we the faithful people of the Lord, condemn the mistaken path taken by our Orthodox shepherds, and we proclaim our faith in the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. With sacred emotion we proclaim that we shall keep our most holy Church of Christ unshaken and our Orthodox Faith inviolate, even as our Lord and the Apostles delivered it unto us. Even unto death, we shall remain steadfast in the Church of Christ, against which “the gates of Hades shall not prevail” (Matt. 16:18). We will not permit Orthodoxy to be profaned by accursed Ecumenism.

 

(Translated from the newspaper Orthodoxos Typos, March 5, 1999)

English source (slightly corrected): Orthodox Christian Witness, Vol. XXXIII, No. 13 (1486), February 28/March 12, 2000, pp. 4-5.