The Members of the Church: A Problem Weighing upon the Anti-Ecumenist Resistance

Andrei Mitocaru

 

 

Contents

• Radicalist Deviations in the Defense of the Faith: Who Are the Members of the Church?

• The Principle of Belonging to the Church in the Confessions of the Church

• The Establishment of Guilt vs. Automatic Exclusion

• The Teaching of Saint Nikodemos the Hagiorite and the Non-Automatic Applicability of the Canons

• Conclusion: The Guarding of Orthodoxy Is Carried Out in the Spirit of the Holy Fathers

 

Radicalist Deviations in the Defense of the Faith: Who Are the Members of the Church?

In the context of the disturbances caused by the contemporary ecumenist movement, the confession of the unity and holiness of the Church has become a foremost duty for every vigilant Orthodox conscience. Yet, in the legitimate desire to guard the “rule of faith,” the risk has arisen of falling into the opposite extreme: a Matthewite-type view of belonging to the Body of Christ. This interpretation maintains that any dogmatic deviation entails automatic and de facto exclusion from the Church, without a synodal sentence being further necessary. However, a careful analysis of dogmatics and the canons shows us that such a position is foreign to the spirit of Orthodoxy.

The Principle of Belonging to the Church in the Confessions of the Church

According to the Encyclical of the Eastern Patriarchs of 1723 and the Confession of Dositheos of 1672, [1] the members of the Church are all those faithful who preserve the spotless faith of the Savior, proclaimed by the Apostles and confirmed by the Ecumenical Councils. It is essential to note that the Church recognizes as members even those who “are liable to various sins”: [2]

“We believe that the members of the Catholic Church are all the faithful, and only they, of course, are those who preserve in holiness and truth the spotless faith of Christ the Savior, handed down, proclaimed, and examined by Christ Himself, by the Apostles, and by the Ecumenical Councils, although some of these may be liable to various sins. For if the faithful were not members of the Church and lived in sins, they would not be judged by the Church. But now, being judged by her, being called to repentance and guided on the path of the saving commandments, even if they are defiled by sins, yet only and precisely because they have not fallen into despair and because they persist in the Catholic [universal] and pious faith, they are and are recognized as members of the Catholic Church.”

The heretic, by the very nature of his error, is in a state of grave spiritual illness, but his cutting off from the ecclesial body is not a “mechanical” process. The Church, like a living organism, acts through her competent organs in order to establish the spiritual death of the member and to carry out his separation through deposition/excommunication/anathema. In this sense, Father Michael Pomazansky confirms these things:

“There is, however, a boundary beyond which, if sinners pass, they are cut off from the body of the Church, either by a visible act of ecclesiastical authority, or by the invisible act of God’s judgment.” [3]

The Establishment of Guilt vs. Automatic Exclusion

A fundamental error of Matthewite-derived thinking is the confusion between the sin of heresy, which separates the soul from interior grace, and the penalty of excommunication, which separates the person from the visible communion of the Church. The dogmatic sources teach us that heretics are those who “have corrupted the fundamental dogmas,” [4] but their exclusion is a “visible act of the authority of the Church.” [5] Moreover, Fr. Pomazansky also concludes,

“Therefore, the Church strictly guards the purity of the truth and excludes heretics from her bosom.” [6]

Saint Basil the Great explains that the hierarchy has the duty to remove the disobedient “as heathens and publicans,” [7] subjecting them to excommunication and anathema. This action presupposes a deliberative process: the Church judges, calls to repentance, and only after the conscious obstinacy of the heretic/heretics does she apply the definitive severance. Without this judicial act, we would arrive at the paradox in which the Church can no longer judge anyone, since the guilty person would be “automatically” outside her, and therefore beyond her jurisdiction.

The Confession of Dositheos emphasizes that the hierarch is the one who possesses the power to subject heretics to punishment, according to the evangelical model:

“…and in general the Fathers confess them [the episcopal powers] […] the grace given to them by the Lord to bind and loose […] and he removes the disobedient from the Church, as heathens and publicans, and delivers heretics over to excommunication and anathema.”

In the Synodikon of Orthodoxy, one observes how excommunication and anathematization were the result of synodal processes in which the writings and attitude of those accused were examined, for example Prochoros Kydones:

“…this Prochoros, therefore, who was exposed synodally when his writings were brought forward and who, when asked either to refute them […] or to be cast under anathema, refused and persisted in such acts of irreverence…”. [8]

Likewise, in the Encyclical of the Eastern Patriarchs of 1848, we find that

“every improper inducement tending toward the destruction of our blameless faith received from the Fathers is rightly condemned synodally.” (Point 17)

The Teaching of Saint Nikodemos the Hagiorite and the Non-Automatic Applicability of the Canons

In the spirit of what was taught by Saint Nikodemos the Hagiorite in the Pedalion, [9] the canons do not apply by themselves. At the beginning we find the Principles of Canonical Law, and Principle 10 (p. 8) points out the necessity of a synod to put into effect the prescriptions of the canons. Reference is made to note 22 on Apostolic Canon 3 (p. 32), where it is explained in detail how the canons must be applied. The language used is quite severe, warning that the application of the canons is not automatic:

“…A tongue slanderous of the holy ones is that which foolishly babbles such words, not understanding that the commandment of the canons, without the putting into action of the second person, that is, of the synod, is incomplete, not acting directly and before judgment by itself…”

Moreover, the history of the Church, reflected in documents such as the Synodikon of Orthodoxy, shows us that synods were convened precisely in order to clarify and to condemn nominally the heresies and their authors. If exclusion had been automatic, the struggle of the holy hierarchs for the convocation of synods and the drafting of anathemas would have been superfluous.

In the same Encyclical of 1848, at point 11, we find:

“Thus our Fathers also judged and condemned in Synod Honorius, Pope of Rome, and Dioscorus, Pope of Alexandria, and Macedonius and Nestorius, Patriarchs of Constantinople, and Peter Gnapheus, Patriarch of Antioch, and the others. For if the abomination of desolation sat in the holy place, according to the testimony of the Scriptures (Daniel 9:27; Matt. 24:15), why not innovation and heresy also upon a Holy Throne?”

Conclusion: The Guarding of Orthodoxy Is Carried Out in the Spirit of the Holy Fathers

In conclusion, resistance against Ecumenism must remain anchored in patristic humility, avoiding the radicalism that wishes to usurp the judicial authority of the Church. Belonging to the Church is a mystery that cannot be reduced to an automatic juridical formalism. Let us remember that the purpose of spiritual medicine is healing, and that the application of “punishment” (epitimion) is the final measure, taken with pain by the Mother-Church in order to guard the rest of the flock. Any interpretation that excludes economia and the necessity of a synodal sentence risks being transformed into an ideology which, although it claims to defend Orthodoxy, separates itself from the mind of the Holy Fathers.

 

NOTES

1. Their text is found in the PDF version here:

https://ro.scribd.com/document/736314770/1672-Marturisirea-Patriarhului-Dositei-OCR

2. The Confession of Patriarch Dositheos, Doxologia Publishing House, Iași, 2019, Decree 11, p. 39.

3. Fr. Michael Pomazansky, Orthodox Dogmatic Theology, Sofia Publishing House, Bucharest, 2009, p. 197.

4. Idem.

5. Idem.

6. Ibid., p. 198.

7. The Confession…, p. 38. ↩︎

8. Archdeacon Prof. Dr. Ioan I. Ică Jr., The Byzantine Synodikon of Orthodoxy, p. 251.

9. The Pedalion, Dormition of the Mother of God Publishing House, Bucharest, 2015.

 

Romanian source: https://rezistentaortodoxa.org/2026/05/07/membrii-bisericii/