On Comments from Dr.

Vladimir Moss:
Excerpts from an Exchange in 2009 between Archbishop Chrysostomos of Etna
and Bishop Ambrose of Methone

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Bishop Ambrose:

2) World Orthodoxy is heretical because it is "clear" to the writer. He has no need for a Synod
to declare this. Had such views prevailed in the Oecumenical Synods, the spirit of love and
forgiveness, as well as extreme economy in some cases, would have impeded the unity that the
Fathers of these Synods, guided by the Holy Spirit, sought to restore.

But his Synod has declared this - otherwise he would not be with them.

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Archbishop Chrysostomos:

Yes, you are quite correct. This is true (even if his present affiliation is one of many over the
years). However, I am speaking of a General Synod, not an administrative body of a local kind,
the authority of which to declare the majority of Orthodox in the world heretical is at the very
least open to serious theological question.

But then, if a such a local synod of Bishops considers itself to constitute THE CHURCH and
the only competent body to judge the Orthodox world, as his apparently does, perhaps it and
its few tens of thousands of followers also consider themselves to constitute a Standing
Oecumenical Synod Urbi et Orbi (for Athens and the Whole World): a kind of collegial
papacy. If so, they have clearly deviated from collegiality as it has always typified by Orthodox
ecclesiology.

I may indeed be in error. However, my view is obviously shared by others, as this kind of
sectarian extremism loses ground daily among balanced individuals. Of course, the extremists
would claim some eschatological explanation for this, and I would respond again with my fears
of their sectarianism.

God, the grave, and history, I suspect, will settle these matters.

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3) The claim is made that ecumenism is a heresy and is a hundred years old. Thus we do not
need the judgment of the Church against it. This is a dangerous view, and especially since
ecumenism, which is in fact older than that, was nonetheless not always as deviant as it is

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today. In its virulent form, it is still developing. We should not look at it as a monolithic thing,
even in opposing it.

This is a valuable point.

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I think that it is very important. Imagine if, considering ecumenism a monolithic thing, we
were to go back in history and begin condemning anyone who associated with it either naively
or in its more innocent and mild form, when it was not claiming an ecclesial character (a very
significant point). We would have to condemn, among others, St. Nikolai (Velimirovich), a
good deal of the pre-Soviet Russian Hierarchy, Father Georges Florovsky, et alii. Of course,
while the thought shocks me (condemning Saints and eminent theological voices), perhaps the
extremists would find no difficulty in doing that. If so, extremism is not their only problem.

When I mention this, I am always told, "Well, can heresy be half-heresy or can error be less
than error?" I always smile, thinking that there really is some great value in reading the Fathers
and history and in listening to those enlightened by God and not their personal opinions and
mere logic (indeed, logic that is not always logic, in fact). I wonder what the extremists would
do with "semi-Arianism"? And what about St. Basil's nuanced First Canon and its attention to
degrees of heresy, applying economy in less severe cases of heresy and not in more severe
instances? And how about St. Nicodemos who suggests using exactitude in applying the
Canons in one case and economy in another, i.e., to those ailing in heresy and those dead in
heresy?

As for error, do not the Canons themselves make very acute distinctions between the forms
that certain sins take, some leading to dire consequences, others considered less debilitating?
(In the case of sins of the flesh, the distinctions are VERY literal and very precise!) And does
not the First-Second Synod use medical terminology to point out that even serious offenses
"that have brought blasphemy on the name of Christ" should be subjected to "proper medical
treatment," giving whatever strength we can to those who have gone astray by their
rehabilitation? In other words, is it not the case that some errors can be treated and that we
leave the errant to judgment only after trying to correct them?

The extremists would tell me that ecumenists are all willful heretics. I beg to differ. I know
some very fine Christians who have fallen to the error of ecumenism simply because they are
outraged at the religious intolerance and hatred of those who defend sectarian views with a
vehemence that vitiates the Church's teaching on love and forgiveness. Is their ecumenism the
same as that of a Church Hierarch, sworn at his Consecration to pronounce and preserve and
defend the primacy of Orthodoxy, begins teaching religious syncretism, questioning the
primacy of Orthodoxy and of Christ? I think not. So, there are many who are ailing in their
Faith but who can be cured. But they will not be cured by those who preach with such
vehemence that they seem to advocate hatred and wish the premature judgment and spiritual
death of sinners.

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As well, religious toleration is not a heresy. Too many of these firebrands, as demonstrated
even more lucidly by what they say in private, lack tolerance and love and have confused
ecclesiological opposition to religious syncretism with bigotry and self-elevation. As one
woman told me recently, "Orthodoxy began its decline when the Emperor of Byzantium whom
you criticize burned the last heretic in the Orthodox East. Our fires should be ready." (This is
a reference to Alexios I Comnenos, the Byzantine Emperor who burned Basil the Physician,
the Bogomil heretic, around 1118, if I recall correctly. This was one of only four or five
instances of violence against heretics in Byzantium, which is something that St. Maximos the
Confessor and other Fathers flatly condemn. It is a vile transgression of the teachings of
Christ.)

Do you remember the extremely interesting event from the life of St. Martin of Tours, when he
cut off communion with all the other bishops of Gaul because they had consented to the burning
of Priscillian? In the Eastern Empire, so far as I know, the event described (with some relish!)
by Anna Komninou is fortunately unique, though there were occasional pursuits of the Jews,
sometimes ending in bloodshed.

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It is quite unique. It was the only case of such an action by imperial decree, to the best of my
knowledge. The story is that, in order to carry it out, the Emperor himself had to prepare the
stake for the burning. There were actions by mobs, but these were not sanctioned by the
Church. Indeed, I am always appalled at the slander against St. John Chrysostomos as an anti-
Semite on the basis of misstating his opposition to the Judaizers (heretics), which consistently
fails to mention his condemnation of mob action against the Jews (or the fact that Jewish
animosity against Christians was not unknown at the time). Thus, those who justify their
hateful attack on heretics have little support in the Patristic consensus.

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However, after the fall of the City, the fourth Rome was quite bloody in its putting down of the
Judaizers and the Old Believers; and they, to be fair, were no more fond of non-violence
themselves!

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Dimitry Pospeilovsky, in his book on the Church in Russian history (I cannot recall the name
of it) says, in fact, that St. Joseph of Volotsk favored the Spanish Inquisition and advocated
the burning of heretics. And, as you say, violence was not unilateral. Pospeilovsky, however,
also points out that the advocacy of the use of violence against heretics by the Church was
"atypical."

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This is not an "orthodoxy" in which I believe.

4) We are considered heretics since our ecclesiology is never honestly presented and is
reduced to simplistic ideas such as "sick" and "healthy" Churches, without providing our
larger Patristic context. We are accused of giving the Mysteries to New Calendarists (which
is not our policy), whom we consider to have valid Mysteries and Grace, by those who in fact
give the Mysteries to New Calendarists, whom they consider to lack Grace! Nor do these
people ever present a justification for their "judgments without synodal authority" from a
Patristic standpoint. If they cite the Fathers, they do so by ignoring historical context and with
a theological naivete covered by the fact that they can cite something. This is not thinking
discourse.

5) Did St. Mark of Ephesus, in his day, act as though he constituted a synod and unilaterally
condemn the unionists as heretics without Grace, or did he wall himself off and resist the
unionists with the aim of restoring unity? And did he not do just that? The answer from history
is quite clear. Moreover, he was dealing in the fifteenth century with a unionist illness that
dated back to the thirteenth century.

Indeed, this is an example to be emphasised.

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The more I read about him, the more I see our own ecclesiology reflected in his
pronouncements, his life, and his work after the False Union. He was a man of immense
moderation, which is lost on those who, reading his words as epithets and without placing them
in historical and personal context, create an entirely false picture of him. How sad.

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+A. (off to Crete in a moment)

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Aklo Taxidi. Asking for your prayers,

Least Among Your Brothers,

+ AC