AN OPEN EPISTLE TO ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS EVERYWHERE FROM THE TRUE (OLD CALENDAR) ORTHODOX CHURCH OF GREECE The Holy Synod in Resistance under the Presidency of Metropolitan Cyprian of Oropos and Fili CENTER FOR TRADITIONALIST ORTHODOX STUDIES Etna, California 96027 1995Preface First published in ‘Op86S0fos “Evoraots kai Maprupia (Vol. 1, No. 10 (January-March 1988], pp. 216-220), this encyclical has been slightly adapted from its original form. Initially written in response to the ecumeni- cal excesses of the then Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, the ever~ lamentable Demetrios 1, its timely message has become even more urgent in the face of the persistent violations of the Faith perpetrated by his treacher- ous successor, Bartholomew 1. Ic is a simple, direct, and concise self-defini- tion of the Holy Synod in Resistance of the True (Old Calendar) Orthodox Church of Greece, a self-definition simultancously embraced by three other anti-ecumenical Synods: the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, the True (Old Calendar) Orthodox Church of Romania, and the True (Old Calendar) Orthodox Church of Bulgaria. Together, these four canonical Synods maintain parallel witnesses within their respective Mother Churches. Having attained a consensus in their ecclesiological thinking, they now comprise a coalition of Sister Churches in full licurgical communion with one another. Standing in God-pleasing resistance to the heretical errors and virtual apostasy of the “official” Orthodox Churches, they offer ecclesiastical sanctuary to Chris- tians who wish to wall themselves off from the innovations of modernistic jurisdictions. Their common ecclesiology of resistance is known as moderate waditionalism, the embodiment of True Orthodox Christianity in our day and age: Such is the Royal Path of Christ. Wich regard to this Royal Path, we must “turn not aside therefrom to the right hand or to the left” (Joshua 23:6). Moderation prevents us from turning aside to ecumenism on the left hand—the path of religious syncre- tism—or to extremism on the right hand—the path of religious sectarian- ism. Those Orthodox who turn aside from the criterion of Truth and fol- low either of these deviant pathways compromise the integrity of the Church. This open epistle calls bor ecumenists and extremists back to the straight and narrow way delineated for us Orthodox by the Holy Fathers, the very way of life which we moderate traditionalists are struggling to pro- tect and to preserve. Hreromonk Grecory Satyt Grecory Patamas MonasteryAN OPEN EPISTLE TO ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS EVERYWHERE BLEssED CHRISTIANS: The recent meetings of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constanti- nople with the Pope of Rome and other Western religious leaders lays stress on the preoccupation of the modern world with the sub- ject of religious unity. This subject is at the center of public atten- tion and certainly demands, also, our appropriate response. Thus, we would like to address ourselves to three questions that present themselves: What constitutes the world’s genuine religious unifica- tion? What does it consist of? And how may it be accomplished? In answer to these questions, one segment of humanity turns to man’s past history. For example, we can cite the typical appeal of the Jewish people to the period of time contained in the Old Testament. Views consistent with this historical age they would channel into the modern-day world in contemporary form and expression. Yet another segment of mankind looks to the future, casting it in terms of certain religious convictions or philosophical presuppositions about the course and evolution of human affairs—usually according to politico-religious formulations. A characteristic example of this, with particular regard to the question of religious unity in the world, is the chiliastic (millenarian) teaching concerning a would-be, fu- ture, thousand—year paradise of the religious and political unity of humanity. We must, however, stand staunchly opposed to these two appeals to man’s past and future. They ignore the reality of Chris- tianity and cannot be generally accepted, insofar as they are based on a limited temporal view of things, are one-sided, and are erroneous. Clearly, our correct appeal must aim at that which is at once beyond time and temporal, both above the world and in it: the Church of our Lord and God Jesus Christ, Who is “the same yesterday, and to day, andAn Open Epistle 3 for ever” (Hebrews 13:8), the truly immutable and eternal “Truth” (St. John 14:6). Certainly the locus of unity for the world’s religions cannot be those religions of the past which encompassed errors both in their theory and practice, as for example, idolatry and sorcery. As well, we cannot support the established Christian heresies, which are respon- sible for the division of the Christian world, as loci of union. And thus we cannot support the historical error of Papism, which fails to understand the presence of the Church both in this world and be- yond it, which has introduced a worldly element into the Western church and which, in a wholly unspiritual fashion, has secularized it and separated it from Orthodoxy. The Papal claim to the primacy of the Pope is not Christian in its source, but worldly, deriving from a classical Roman model. Papism maintains its primacy not simply as one of honor, but principally as a primacy of authority and, indeed, politico—religious power, the prototype of which is to be found in the idolatrous cult of the emperor in ancient Rome. So it is that Papism has provoked just and necessary opposition, as epitomized by the traditional anti~Papism of the Orthodox East and the objec- tions of the Protestant world in the West. Papism, indeed, has been condemned by the Orthodox Church. It is to be rejected today in particular, since, on the model of the Roman pantheon and under the universal authority of the Pope, it has as its goal a pseudo—union of heresies and false religions that is decidedly outside of the boundaries of Christianity. This was made clear by the significant events at Assisi during 1986. This Papal vision of a universal religion has absolutely no relationship to the True Church of our Lord Jesus Christ, since it is simply based on an exer- cise of Papal power. It is for this reason that Orthodox ecumenists, the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople among them, who have sacrificed Truth for worldly unity, support this universal reli- gion. As for the Protestant world, it admits that it is incapable of at-4 An Open Epistle taining unity, not only because it does not constitute a single Faith {as does Orthodoxy), but also because it lacks a unifying administra- tion (such as that of Papism). For this reason, Protestants have not turned towards that which is correct, but are in danger of being in- fluenced by the orderliness of governance in the Papal system and of wrongly returning to that from which they justifiably departed, that is, to a locus of illusory and false unity. There arises again an imper- ative necessity for a path and for guides to true unity. Truly, beloved in Christ, our guide to a life of unity is not a man, but God our Lord, the God—Man Jesus Christ, Who said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life” (St. John 14:6). After Christ the Savior, His guides for the rest of humanity are the very best of mankind itself, the Saints. These are His Holy Apostles and the Ho- ly Fathers who came after them, especially the Fathers of the CEcu- menical Synods of the first nine centuries of undivided Christianity, along with those upon whom the Synods relied and to whom they referred by name. To these very Saints, the Lord of the Church has said: “He that heareth you heareth Me; and he that despiseth you despiseth Me” (St. Luke 10:16). For He made them chosen vessels of His Grace and Truth—that is, of Orthodoxy. The Holy Fathers teach that Orthodoxy is the Church of Christ. It is the Grace and Truth which “came by Jesus Christ” (St. John 1:17) and which grants men rebirth into a holy and Divine life in the unity of faith in Christ. Ecclesiastical administration serves as a means to this end. Christ “gave” the Church “Apostles,” “pastors and teachers,” not to exercise authority over it, as the Papal ecume- nists would imagine, but “for the work of the ministry,” “for the perfecting of the saints,” that is, of the Faithful, “till we all come in the unity of the Faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God,” Je- sus Christ (Ephesians 4:11~-13). Consequently, true unity or union, that which is of God and towards which we should strive, is the uni- ty of the Orthodox Faith. For this reason, the Apostle urges that weAn Open Epistle 5 preserve “the unity of the Faith” and “of the Spirit” (Ephesians 4:3), indeed of Divine Truth and Grace, into which the Holy Fathers—as well as those among our contemporary pastors and teachers who are united to them in Faith and Spirit and who manifestly teach what they did—can lead us. Those who disagree with these Holy Fathers abolish the unity of the Faith, even if they have taken possession of the administration of God’s Church. The Lord’s Church lies not in something administrative, but, as we have previously noted, rests on Truth and Grace, which are Christ Himself. Therefore, the Orthodox Church does not have, nor does it recognize, a Pope, but is ruled by Bishops who are equal, one with the other. In their administration, these Bishops do not rule ty- rannically, but minister for the sanctification of the Faithful. The Gc- umenical Patriarch is not another Pope. Rather, his title is under- stood as one of honor, not of authority over the Church, and this only insofar as he remains Orthodox. This is why a believer is obliged to wall himself off, that is, to separate, from his pastor, if the pastor has deviated from the Faith—regardless of who this pastor might be, even the Patriarch of Constantinople. The Church’s Faithful who separate, in these circumstances, from an errant pastor are eminently Orthodox. On the contrary, those who remain united with such a pastor in Faith and administration are reckoned, along with him, heretical. These heretics “abolish the unity of the Faith” and “split the unity of the Church,” even though they may be ranked in the Church’s administration and even though, until they are synodally condemned, mysteriological (sacramental) Grace may be found among them. It is not administrative power, but the cor- rect Faith which constitutes ecclesiastical unity. So it is that the Church’s Saints assert that those who wall themselves off from heretical pastors and stand in resistance, that is, who struggle against heresy for the Truth of the Orthodox Faith, actually maintain the “unity of the Faith,” preserving the “unity of the Church,” even though they are not6 An Open Epistle ranked in the “unified administration” of the heretics and may be pun- ished and persecuted by the same. The persecutions inflicted on the Orthodox for their faithfulness (often in the forms of unjustified ex- communication, banishment, and deposition) are to be taken as ti- des of honor and a proof of the authenticity of their Orthodoxy and their ecclesiastical status (Fifteenth Canon of the First-and—Second Synod). Consequently, those who are recognized today by the heret- ical Patriarch of Constantinople are either heretics themselves or “friends of heretics” and enemies of true unity! Those who have been repudiated for the sake of their faithfulness to the Holy Fa- thers, however, are worthy of the name Orthodox and are to be numbered among the true laborers for a Godly union, regardless of how few they may be in number. Our Holy Synod of Bishops, beloved Christians, is called the “Syn- od in Resistance” since, according to the commandment of God, we have walled ourselves off from our brother Bishops, who have embraced error and heresy. We have done this that we might remain in Ortho- doxy, that we might guard the Truth and Grace of the Orthodox Church, that we might preserve the “unity of the Faith” with the Holy Fathers, that we might defend the unity of the Orthodox Faith, and that we might preserve a Godly place of refuge, where the lovers of Di- vine unity might take shelter until the time the Church can gather in an Orthodox Synod to judge the apostasy that has currently befallen many of Her leaders. By this Orthodox Synod we do not mean the so-called “Great Synod” for which the ecumenists are now prepar- ing, in order to proclaim their false union, but another Synod—an Orthodox Synod, faithful to the ancient Ecumenical Synods of the Holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church, which will condemn the ec- umenical false union and proclaim Orthodoxy, which unifies and brings peace. Thus it is that there is a place of Orthodox refuge. This place is ours: canonically walled off from error and carrying out a God-pleasing resistance movement. Do not be swept away by the false union proposed by the Pope and the sadly like-minded Patri-An Open Epistle 7 arch of Constantinople. Flee from the bearers of deception and a union that thwarts true unity, even if the purveyors of such union be a great multitude, “as the sand of the sea,” as we read in Scriptural prophecy (Revelation 20:8). Come to those Orthodox places of holy refuge to which Christ calls us, saying: “Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (St. Matthew 11:28). Let us warn you, too, to be wary of false places of refuge, which may seem right, but which are not. The Lord of the Church tells us that, “Ye shall know them by their fruits” (St. Matthew 7:16). To this end we advise: Those who are truly Orthodox are those who will not unite with the supporters of Papism and other heretics. They are those who wall themselves off from the Orthodox ecu- menists. They are those who do not follow the Festal Calendar innova- tion of 1924. They are those who follow the Holy Fathers, who confess Or- thodoxy, and who struggle against the false union of the Pope and the CEcumenical Patriarch. They are those who have sacrificed and lost much and who have suffered false condemnation. But they are also those who, having an Orthodox and Patristic ec- clesiology, do not deny the presence of Divine Grace in the Mysteries (Sacraments)—correctly performed according to the rubrics of the Orthodox Church—of those Orthodox who, though having fallen to the heresy of ecumenism and Papism, have not yet been irrevocably condemned by an Orthodox Syned. Unto those who keep all of the above things: Draw near. Those who are not truly Orthodox are those who have not8 An Open Epistle walled themselves off from the CEcumenical Patriarch’s ecumenism and from his Papal consorts. They are those who follow the Papal Festal Calendar innovation of 1924. In addition, they are. those who have kept their silence before the ecumenical union of the CEcu- menical Patriarch and the Pope, who have not stood in resistance to this abomination, confessing the Holy Fathers. Moreover, among such un—Orthodox parties, as we have noted above, are those who have an errant ecclesiology and who, deviating from the Fathers, deny the Grace of the Holy Mysteries correctly performed according to Orthodox rubrics of those not yet condemned irrevocably by an Orthodox Synod. With these, then, be they involved in even one of the above, you must not take refuge. For the Holy Synod, its President, + METROPOLITAN CypRIAN OF OROPOS AND FILI