2013 Letter of Metropolitan Cyprian II (Holy Synod in
Resistance) to Metropolitan Agafangel (ROCOR-A)
(Letter of Metropolitan Cyprian
II of Oropos and Fili, sent in response to the greeting of the Synod of the
Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia regarding his election as Primate of
the Synod in Resistance. In this letter, it is specifically stated that the
Synod in Resistance fully adheres to the ecclesiology outlined by the Old
Calendar Bulgarian Church, which is included in the appendix.)
* * *
To His Eminence, the Most
Reverend Agafangel, First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of
Russia, Odessa, Ukraine.
October 11, 2013 (Ecclesiastical Calendar) Fili, Attica.
Holy Apostle and Deacon Philip
MESSAGE OF PEACE
Your Eminence, beloved brother in
Christ and our concelebrant, Metropolitan Agafangel, First Hierarch of the
Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, we greet you with joy, firmly
believing that Christ is in our midst, and He is and will be forever. Amen!
Following our elevation, by the
Grace of God, through the vote and insistence of the Members of the Hierarchy
of our Holy Synod, during its recent 40th Session (October 4/17, 2013), to the
position of Metropolitan of Oropos and Fili and President of the Synod, we
hasten to officially inform Your Eminence with this Message of Peace, as well
as the Sister Russian Orthodox Church Abroad under your leadership. We address
you with a heartfelt greeting and a kiss of Love, Peace, and Unity, with deep
gratitude for the Synodal congratulations we received from you, requesting your
Holy prayers.
The sanctity of the person of our
Most Reverend Metropolitan and Father Cyprian, who reposed in Christ five
months ago, and the highly significant legacy he left, make our ministry
exceptionally responsible and difficult.
Considering our own weakness, we
rely on the help and support of God, through the intercession of the Most Holy
Lady Theotokos and all the Saints, and especially on the love in Christ and the
brotherly prayers of Your Eminence.
We consider it our duty,
venerable and Most Reverend Brother in Christ, to assure you that we stand
firmly and unwaveringly in the Orthodox Faith, by the Grace of God, believing
as our Spirit-bearing Fathers decreed at the Seven Ecumenical Councils, neither
adding nor subtracting anything, striving to observe unalterably the
prescriptions of the Sacred Canons and Holy Traditions. Under their guidance,
we proclaim that ecumenism is an ecclesiological heresy, and the reform of the
Church calendar is an innovation subject to condemnation.
The Lord did not grant us the joy
of seeing you here at the Patronal Feast of our Metropolitan Center last week,
but we hope that the grace of our Lord will inspire within you noble zeal, so
that we may soon be deemed worthy of the blessing to proclaim our unity
together—in the unity of our hearts through the common Confession of Faith, by
the joint celebration of the Mystery of the Divine Eucharist, for the
edification in Christ of ourselves and all.
We also take this opportunity
to inform Your Eminence that our Holy Synod, sincerely wishing to put an end to
the confusion regarding the misunderstanding of certain expressions of its
ecclesiology—expressions which it certainly does not insist upon dogmatically
or unyieldingly—hereby declares that it fundamentally (in principio)
agrees with the "Ecclesiological Position" of its Sister Old Calendar
Orthodox Church of Bulgaria, headed by His Grace Bishop Photii of Triaditsa. As
is known, this document has been available online for almost a year in its
Russian translation, a copy of which we are attaching to this letter. These
positions could serve as a satisfactory basis for a meeting and union of
Orthodox Old Calendarist Anti-Ecumenists worldwide. [Emphasis added.]
We also assure you that our
official dialogue with the Church of the G.O.C. (Genuine Orthodox Christians)
of Greece under Archbishop Kallinikos continues, by the grace of God,
responsibly and seriously, in a spirit of mutual respect and with well-founded
hopes for positive results.
Hoping and fervently praying that
the Divine Steward of the Church, our Lord Jesus Christ, may grant us the
richness of His saving Truth, so that we may proclaim it to the whole world in
peace and harmony, we once again embrace Your Eminence, and in your honorable
person, all the faithful with you—clergy and laity—in the Holy Spirit, to the
glory of God the Father, remaining with respect and sincere love.
Your Eminence's loving Brother in
Christ and Concelebrant,
† Cyprian [II], Metropolitan of
Oropos and Fili,
President of the Holy Synod in
Resistance
* * *
Appendix:
The Ecclesiological Position of the
Old Calendar Orthodox Church of Bulgaria
FUNDAMENTAL
TENETS
The ecclesiological
identity of the Old Calendar Orthodox Church of Bulgaria is based upon the
following fundamental tenets of Orthodox ecclesiology:
•
The main criterion for membership in the Church of Christ is the “correct and
salvific confession of Faith” (St. Maximos the Confessor), [1] the true and
correct Faith (St. Gregory Palamas). [2]
•
This criterion, or principle, applies both to every single individual, with
regard to the Church, and to the local Churches, with regard to the Catholic
Church.
•
The Catholicity [3] of the Church of Christ is Her qualitative, not
quantitative characteristic; it is Her ontological attribute, revealing the
integrity and the completeness of the Truth preached by Her. Therefore, the
Catholicity of the Church does not depend on the number of Her members, on Her
territorial and geographic scale or on any other empirical conditions.
•
The Catholic Church cannot be identified with one particular church, nor can
She be regarded, as is the case with Roman Catholic ecclesiology, as a sum of
all the local Churches constituting the Œcumenical Church (i.e., the globally
distributed Church, from a geographic point of view). What defines the Church
as Catholic is the confession of the Orthodox Faith. Moreover, the “Catholic
Church (καθολικὴ Ἐκκλησία) Herself is the correct and salvific confession of
Faith” (St. Maximos the Confessor). [4] Consequently, “the correct and salvific
confession of Faith” in God (i.e., Orthodoxy) is the ontological foundation of
Catholicity as a characteristic of the Church, and it is exactly in this
confession that church communion, as communion with Christ and in Christ, is
achieved. Church communion attests to unity in Christ precisely through this
communion with and in the Catholic Church, and does so to the utmost extent.
However, of itself, church communion is not a condition for unity with the
Catholic Church. Communion is a manifestation of unity, and not a means for
attaining it. Unity with the Catholic Church is determined not by communion,
but by “the correct and salvific confession of Faith.”
•
Hence, abiding in the Orthodox Faith and its protection is not simply a matter
of ideological conviction and abstract dogmatic debate, but a question of
supreme existential significance. The Fathers, who fearlessly confessed and
defended the Orthodox Faith, did so on behalf of the Catholic Church and in the
name of Her real existence: “For the sake of the Catholic and Apostolic Church”
(καθολικὴν καὶ ἀποστολικὴν Ἐκκλησίαν) “the Apostles, and in their turn the Holy
Fathers, teachers, and martyrs sacrificed themselves, in deed and word, in
struggle and sweat, with suffering and blood, and finally with their remarkable
deaths” (St. Maximos the Confessor). [5]
It follows from the
aforementioned that everybody who confesses the Orthodox Faith is a member of
the Catholic Church (or joined to Her) and is in communion with Her, whereas
whosoever preaches a doctrine incompatible with Orthodox doctrine separates himself
from the Catholic Church and communion with Her. This is valid for individuals
and entire ecclesiastical organizations alike, even if they continue to
function institutionally as Churches and to call themselves Churches. “Those
who do not belong to the Truth do not belong to the Church of Christ, either;
and all the more so if they speak falsely of themselves by calling themselves,
or are called by each other, holy pastors and hierarchs; because it has been
instilled in us that Christianity is characterized not by persons, but by truth
and exactitude of Faith” (St. Gregory Palamas). [6]
THE
NAME
The name “Old
Calendar Orthodox Church of Bulgaria” does not exactly reveal its
ecclesiological nature. It follows an established tradition. The ethnic
definition “Bulgarian” reflects the historically established institutional
structuring of the local Churches according to the criteria of ethnicity
(subsequently nationality) and state, which gradually replaced the old
territorial structuring of local Churches within the multi-ethnic Roman Empire.
The term “Orthodox” is identical with the term “Catholic.” Its widespread use
in relation to the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church has existed since
the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries. The term “Old Calendar” denotes a
distinctive feature of the prevailing liturgical practice of the Church, which was
employed from the seventh century up until the 1920s by all local Churches
without exception, in concord with the Paschalion and the calendar
system of the Great Indiction. Although inaccurate from a strictly
ecclesiastical point of view, additional denotations of the Church have
appeared at various times in history. It is well known that the Catholic
(Orthodox) Church was first called “Eastern” in contrast to the Western Church,
i.e., the Roman Catholic Church. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries,
the Russian Orthodox Church was called “Greek Russian,” “Eastern Orthodox” and
even “The Russian Church of the Greek Rite.” Besides, depending on the
political and legal circumstances in the different countries, some local Church
structures received various additional denotations because of emerging church
issues. For example, since 1996, in Estonia two local Orthodox Churches have
existed simultaneously within so-called official Orthodoxy. One is called the
“Estonian Orthodox Church,” and is a self-governing local Church under the
Moscow Patriarchate. The other is the “Estonian Apostolic Orthodox Church,” an
autonomous local Church under the Patriarchate of Constantinople. A number of
clergy and lay people who left the Estonian Church’s jurisdiction under the
Moscow Patriarchate belong to it.
THE
ECCLESIOLOGICAL DIMENSIONS OF APOSTASY IN THE MODERN WORLD
Modern
ecclesiological heresies corrupt the very concept of the Church. Ecumenism, as
a theological concept, organized social movement and religious practice, is
such a heresy. Many Spirit-bearing Orthodox hierarchs and theologians of the
preceding twentieth century defined it as heresy in its essence. One of the
major steps in the attempt to implement the ecumenical idea of uniting “divided
Christians” and reconstructing the “undivided Church” was the church calendar
reform in a number of local Orthodox churches during the twentieth century. It
should be noted, however, that as a multi-stage, infiltrative heresy, ecumenism
defies exhaustive and accurate definition, since, unlike the ancient heresies,
it does not seek to find clear and consistent doctrinal expression by claiming
to be accepted conciliarily or pose as a truth of the Faith formulated by the
consciousness of the Church. On the one hand, for the time being, few are those
hierarchs, clerics, and theologians who simultaneously consider themselves Orthodox
and profess ecumenism in its most extreme forms of inter-religious syncretism,
or in its “pure” form of ecclesiological heresy, claiming that, owing to the
divisions among Christians, the one visible Church of Christ no longer exists
and, therefore, has to be recreated in the womb of the ecumenical movement. On
the other hand, ecumenism continues to coalesce with official Orthodoxy. The
official Orthodox episcopate is responsible for this phenomenon, demonstrating
a crafty political and diplomatic attitude towards the process, categorically
refusing to condemn ecumenism as a multi-stage, multi-faceted ecclesiological
heresy, albeit it is nonetheless indisputably so in its true nature. In this
context, the exit of the Bulgarian Patriarchate from the World Council of
Churches in 1998, unfortunately, proved to be only a tactic with a certain
ecclesio-political purpose, and not a step determined by a reëvaluation of its
attitude towards ecumenism rendered in principle.
Another phenomenon
with an ecclesiological dimension is so-called Sergianism, which in the
unprecedented circumstances of the persecution of the Church in the former
Soviet Union surrendered an outwardly proper church institution to the
Bolsheviks so that, in their hands, it could become a tool in a fierce battle
against the Church Herself, as representing the fullness of the Truth of
Christ. In fact, Sergianism is not simply a characteristically Russian
phenomenon. It also embraced the local Orthodox churches in the countries of
Eastern Europe, where, after World War II, communist régimes were established.
Both in the Soviet Union and in these countries, the essence of Sergianism
manifested itself in the (self-)delusion that deception could be used as a means
to help Тruth “survive,” and that collaboration with the enemies of the Church
was the way to “protect” Her. In practice, the logical consequence was just the
opposite—the episcopate adopting this position became a tool in the hands of
the communist atheists, who schemed to achieve full control over the Church, to
the end of Her moral and spiritual enfeeblement and with a view to Her ultimate
annihilation, which they intended. More specifically, the ecclesiological
aspect of Sergianism comes down to distorting the concept of “canonicity.” In
the Sergianist context, canonicity is unnaturally torn away from the Spirit and
the Truth of canonical tradition and turns into formal adherence to the norm,
which can be used to vindicate any act of lawlessness committed by the
governing episcopate. Ultimately, canonicity degenerates into a managerial
technique for the subordination of the people of the Church to that episcopate,
regardless of the direction in which it leads them. In other words, as
Archpriest Michael Polsky, an eyewitness to the cruel persecutions and the
perfidious fight against the Russian Church in the 1920s, writes, “Metropolitan
Sergius and his bishops differ from the Renovationists in that they keep to the
canons at all costs and safeguard them more than anything else. They (the
Sergianists) do not disregard the canons, as do the Renovationists. But there
arises a gross discrepancy. When the Renovationists lied, slandered, or
deceived, that was bad because they were not canonical. However, when
Metropolitan Sergius slandered and lied, this was considered good, since he was
canonical. It turns out that to him who is canonical, everything is allowed.
This mocks the canons and morality alike by distorting their meaning.” [7]
After the collapse of the totalitarian régimes towards the end of the twentieth
century, under the new conditions of political freedom, Sergianism was
preserved as a legacy of the past and, at the same time, was transformed.
Having long incorporated unscrupulousness, deception and pathological servility
to those in positions of authority into its inner nature, it not only continues
to betray the Church—now no longer for fear of reprisals but for the sake of
mercenary motives—but has also started to sell Her freedom, under the guise of
“canonicity,” in exchange for gaining the friendship of the powers that be,
with the ensuing material benefits and prestigious social status. In this
modified form, today Sergianism (as neo-Sergianism or post-Sergianism) affects
a large part of the episcopate of the official local Churches around the world.
Once phenomena such
as ecumenism and Sergianism become systematic and universal, even when they do
not seek a clear doctrinal expression but penetrate and spread into the body of
the Church in a “creeping” manner—that is, once they have been actively adopted
or passively allowed by all bishops of one or more local Churches—then the
essence of the struggle against these phenomena comes down to the termination
of ecclesiastical communion with those bishops who instill heresy in the Church
in a conciliar manner, either by preaching it or by contributing to its
dissemination though their passivity and silence (see Canon 15 of the
First-Second Synod of Constantinople).
THE
CONCEPTS OF “OFFICIAL ORTHODOXY” AND “OFFICIAL LOCAL CHURCHES”
These concepts have
an idiosyncratic ecclesiological substance and reveal the specifics of the
processes of apostasy in the contemporary Orthodox world. Orthodoxy is sui
generis and does not need further clarification by any additional denotations.
The need to add one or another modifier to the term “Orthodoxy” has arisen
because of the replacement of its original and authentic substance under
pressure from ecumenist and Sergianist mentalities, from liberalism, relativism
and other apostatic phenomena. The meaning of the concept of “official
Orthodoxy” is closely connected with the meaning of the concept of “official
Church” and “official local Churches,” respectively. “Official Orthodoxy” is
the peculiar ideology of the “official local Churches.” It represents an
increasingly diluted, pluralistic Orthodoxy, which is gradually tearing itself
away from its spiritual identity and increasingly becoming a surrogate for
authentic Orthodoxy, without reforming it abruptly or defiantly. The main
distinctive feature of official Orthodoxy is its Sergianist conjuncture; i.e.,
its collaborative adjustment to the realities of our time, with a view towards
accommodating various political and ecclesiastical courses: outwardly as an
expression of the catholic consciousness of the Church, but in essence, as a
situational strategy, with terminology or behavior typical of the corporate
mentality. For example, official Orthodoxy may resound with loud ecumenical
tones; and contrariwise, at times, the prevalent tone may be that of traditionalist
rhetoric. Moreover, as already mentioned, “official Orthodoxy” never takes a
clear, principled, conciliar stand on the nature of ecumenism as the
ecclesiological heresy with which it is entwined, inasmuch as the majority of
the supporters and propagators of this heresy still avoid designating it wholly
openly and clearly as an article of their religious creed. In official
Orthodoxy, the connection between announcements and intentions, between
speaking and believing, between words and conscience fades out, becomes debased
in a Jesuitical manner, and in this sense is severed. Thus, for example, in a
private conversation a bishop might dissociate himself from some official deed
of his—from a public statement or from a document he has signed containing
views contrary to Orthodoxy, i.e., heretical views—but that same bishop chooses
not to do this publicly since it is at variance with official church policy.
What does the term
“official Church” mean? It is what the Russian catacomb believers called the
Church recognized by the Soviet régime (and completely dependent on it), headed
by Metropolitan (and later Patriarch) Sergius Stragorodsky (†1943). The terms “Official
Church” or “official local Churches” refer to the known, historically formed
local Churches whose hierarchical leadership officially accepts, advances, or
authorizes ecumenism as a theological concept and religious practice, uses
conciliar deception on sundry occasions, hides under the cloak of “canonicity”
as understood in the spirit of Sergianism, and adopts other forms of apostasy
from Orthodoxy. In brief, the term “official Churches” extends to the known,
historically formed local Churches which are in a state of apostasy—a process
that has been coördinated or permitted to develop conciliarily by the
episcopate.
THE
QUESTION OF GRACE IN THE MYSTERIES (SACRAMENTS) OF THE OFFICIAL LOCAL CHURCHES
The Old Calendar
Orthodox Church of Bulgaria has no communion with the official local Churches.
Walling oneself off from such communion does not require an unequivocal
affirmation that these Churches have completely fallen away from the One, Holy,
Catholic, and Apostolic Church and that the Mysteries performed in them are
deprived of Grace. Sufficient grounds for the cessation of ecclesiastical
communion is the fact that the episcopate of these churches preach heresy or
allow its dissemination through their passivity and, therefore, abide in
ecclesiastical communion with bishops preaching or tolerating heresy. Clergy,
monastics, and laity who break ecclesiastical communion with bishops “preaching
heresy publicly and openly in the Church” are worthy of “honor befitting the
Orthodox,” since not only do they not destroy the unity of the Church, but, on
the contrary, they show diligence in protecting the Church from divisions and
schisms. [8]
Currently, the Old
Calendar Orthodox Church of Bulgaria refrains from a definitive answer on the
question of whether the Mysteries performed in the official local Churches are
valid or not. Indeed, the heresy that is propagated or is being allowed to spread—mostly
by bishops—ultimately leads to a falling-away from the Orthodox Church of
individuals, groups of people, or even of entire local Churches. This can also
happen gradually, in the course of a shorter or a longer period of time. For
instance, such is the case with the Roman church. It deviated from the “correct
and salvific confession of Faith” in stages, and only after a fairly lengthy
period of time did it completely fall away from the Catholic Church.
Unfortunately, from
a theological perspective, it is precisely the question of the presence or
absence of Grace in the Mysteries of the official local Churches that came to
be the main rock on which the unity of the True Orthodox Christians crashed. In
the tense atmosphere of decades of disputes, undue theological absolutism was
reached on a question, the answer to which was not formulated dogmatically by
the conciliar consciousness of the Church. This is why it should be addressed
with special caution in the light of the theological consensus of the Fathers,
and also in the light of the conciliar pastoral experience of the Church of
Christ. This precludes debate which uses one-sided quotations gleaned from the
Holy Fathers, and also precludes the absolutism of the theological opinion of
specific persons or groups.
THE
PROSPECT OF A CONCILIAR CONDEMNATION OF ECUMENISM
It is well known
that only the conciliar mind of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church
can ascertain and proclaim the final falling-away from Orthodoxy (from
Catholicity) of a local Church (or Churches) which was Orthodox but has ceased
to be so in essence, regardless of the fact that it continues to call itself
Orthodox (i.e. Catholic). For example, with regard to the Roman Catholic
Church, the voice of this conciliar mind was manifested in the testimonies of
many of the Holy Fathers: from St. Photios of Constantinople, St. Gregory
Palamas, and St. Mark of Ephesos to the Venerable Nicodemos of the Holy
Mountain, St. John of Kronstadt, St. Nectarios of Aegina, and the Venerable
Justin of Serbia, as well as in the decrees of several Councils of Constantinople
(1170, 1450, 1722, and 1838) and in the Encyclical of the Eastern Patriarchs of
1848.
The realities of
the modern Orthodox world do not provide sufficient grounds to assume that the
example of the Seventh Œcumenical Council is applicable to our epoch. In
keeping with this example, we should be seeking the testimony of the Orthodox
Church in the hope that the way out of the crisis of apostasy would be a
“Council of Unity,” which will condemn ecumenism (and probably other
contemporary manifestations of apostasy as well), will unite all Orthodox
Christians in the “correct and salvific confession of Faith,” and will declare
the excommunication from the body of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic
Church of all those who continue to confess the heresies and misbeliefs
condemned by the Council. Unfortunately, comparatively recently just the opposite
event occurred. Through the union of the larger part of the Russian Orthodox
Church Outside Russia with the Moscow Patriarchate in 2007, those who had
abandoned Truth did not join the Orthodox; on the contrary, the Orthodox
renounced their long-standing witness of Faith and united with the ecumenists
and Sergianists whom they used to denounce.
Taking into account
the current trends in the development of Church life (in its broadest sense),
it can be assumed that in the future, favorable conditions for holding a
Unifying Orthodox Council will be even less likely to arise. Moreover, it is
not impossible that the present crisis in the Orthodox world will sink even
further into apostasy. This, in turn, could lead to emendations of our
ecclesiological assessment of the developments within the official local
Churches, such an assessment being determined by an analysis of variables, not
constants. Ultimately, the road of apostasy that official Orthodoxy continues
to follow leads outside the Church of Christ.
No less disturbing
is another fact: the lack of agreement and coöperation among the True Orthodox
Churches. What is needed are goodwill and patient, long-lasting labor, in order
to overcome the tragic divisions among us and to create conditions for convening
a Pan-Orthodox Council, which would condemn ecumenism and provide an assessment
of the entire spectrum of the apostate processes of our times.
THE
VALUE OF THE CONCILIAR PASTORAL EXPERIENCE OF THE CHURCH
The conciliar
pastoral experience of the Church of Christ regarding the manner (rite) by
which penitent heretics and schismatics were received into Her bosom is
reflected in the works of various of the Holy Fathers and, above all, in the
acts and decisions of a number of Œcumenical and Local Church Councils. The
variety of ways of accepting various repentant heretics or schismatics does not
in the least signify relativism or ecclesio-political pliancy in this practice
of the Catholic Church, but reveals the spiritual depth of Her conciliar
pastoral experience. In receiving penitent heretics and schismatics, the
Œcumenical and Local Councils very often apply the principle of oikonomia.
The pastoral canonical principle of oikonomia does not imply a
compromise determined by conjuncture, neither does it represent ordinary
leniency, but reflects in large measure a responsible pastoral action in
extremely difficult circumstances, with the nature of this action being
determined exclusively by its desired beneficial consequences (religious,
spiritual, and moral). Oikonomia is a canonical and pastoral act in
which the letter of the canon can be broken without, however, contradicting its
spirit. Yet, oikonomia can never, under any circumstance, allow the
exoneration of any sin or of any compromise whatsoever in the “correct and
salvific confession of Faith.”
The application of
the principle of oikonomia in receiving heretics or schismatics into
ecclesiastical communion does not mean at all that the Church recognizes the
validity of their Mysteries. A classic example of this is the 95th Canon of the
Quinisext Council, according to which the followers of heresies condemned by
the Church—Nestorians and Monophysites— were received in ecclesiastical
communion only through the renunciation of their heresy and their confession of
the Orthodox Faith.
Considering the
specifics of the ecclesiastical situation in Bulgaria, the Old Calendar
Orthodox Church of Bulgarian strives to approach with careful attention those
clergy and laity willing to join Her. What is most essential in pastoral work
with them is to help them make their choice freely, consciously, and
responsibly. To date, the laity who have faith and ecclesiastical awareness,
and have been participating in the church life of the Bulgarian Patriarchate,
are received into communion during the Mystery of Confession. Monastics and
clerics submit a written request and are received into communion by following a
brief repentance rite, composed especially for such cases.
According to the
Old Calendar Orthodox Church of Bulgaria, every single True Orthodox Church has
the pastoral freedom to determine—based on the specific nature of the church
life in the respective country or region—the manner of receiving bishops,
clergy, and laity from the official local Churches who wish to join Her. The
Old Calendar Orthodox Church of Bulgaria does not insist on а standardization
of the practices of reception into ecclesiastical communion, and in doing so is
guided by the words of St. Cyprian of Carthage: “In this matter we do not co-
erce or impose a law on anyone, since every prelate has freedom of will in the
administration of the Church and will have to account for his actions before
the Lord.” [9]
† Bishop Photii
of Triaditza
Notes
1. See “The Life and Struggle of Оur Venerable Father
Maximus the Confessor,” Patrologia Græca, XC, col. 93D. Cf. “Letter to
John the Chamberlain,” PG, XCI, col. 461BC.
2. “Refutation of the Letter of Patriarch Ignatios of
Antioch,” Codex Coislianianus, 99, f. 144a, cited by George Mantzarides, “Περὶ
θεώσεως τοῦ ἀνθρώπου: Μυστηριακὸς καὶ ἐκκλησιολογικὸς χαρακτὴρ τῆς θεώσεως”
(Concerning the deification of man: The mysteriological and ecclesiological
nature of deification), in Παλαµικά (Thessalonike: Ekdoseis P. Pournara,
1998), pp. 197-198.
3. From the ancient Greek adjective
καθολικός—“universal”; since the third century, the word has been used to mean
“all-embracing,” “comprehensive,” “global.” As far back as the end of the first
century, καθολικός was used in the language of Christians with a specific
meaning, denoting a fundamental feature of the Church of Christ.
4. See “The Life and Struggle of Оur Venerable Father
Maximus the Confessor,” PG, XC, col. 93D.
5. “From a Letter Written in Rome,” PG, XCI,
col. 140AB.
6. “Refutation of the Letter of Patriarch Ignatios of
Antioch,” Codex Coislianianus 99, f. 144a, cited by Mantzarides, “Περὶ θεώσεως
τοῦ ἀνθρώπου: Μυστηριακὸς καὶ ἐκκλησιολογικὸς χαρακτὴρ τῆς θεώσεως,” pp.
197-198.
7. Польский, Михаил протопресвитер. Положение Церкви в
Советской России, очерк бежавшего из России священника. Параклит, 2004, с. 83.
Available from:
http://paraklit.org/knigi/Ispovednicheskye/Polskoj.pdf. [Deleted and unarchived]
[See: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Mihail_Polskij/polozhenie-tserkvi-v-sovetskoj-rossii/]
8. Canon 15 of the First-Second Synod in
Constantinople.
9. “Letter to Pope Stephen,” in Concilia ad regiam
exacta, Vol. I (Lutetiae Parisiorum: Impensis Societatis Typographicae
Librorum Ecclesiasticorum iussu Regis constitutae, 1671), col. 741.
Translated from the original Bulgarian by the Center
for Traditionalist Orthodox Studies, Etna, CA.
Russian source:
http://internetsobor.org/index.php/novosti/starostilnye-tserkvi/sinod-protivostoyashchikh/otvetnoe-poslanie-grecheskogo-sinoda-protivostoyashchikh
