Articles for tag: baptism, canons, uniqueness of the Church

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

There is no “valid” baptism outside the Church — Part 2 of 2

The first half of this post is an excerpt from The Heavenly Banquet: Understanding the Divine Liturgy where we discuss the subject of baptism in our brief commentary on the Creed. The second half of this post is a collection of canons from The Rudder that pertain to Baptism.

The “one baptism” we confess is the one granted in and by the Church. According to St. Nektarios († 1920), “Those who are not reborn by the divine grace in the only ONE HOLY, CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC CHURCH, do not belong to any church, either visible or invisible.”1 There are no Mysteries (Sacraments) outside the Church.2 The Church is the great Mystery (see Eph. 5:32) in which all the Mysteries of God are realized. The position of the Church concerning heretical baptism was stated once for all by St. Cyprian of Carthage. Here are two passages from his writings:

Some of our colleagues, by a curious presumption, are led to suppose that those who have been dipped among the heretics ought not to be baptized when they join us; because, they say, there is ‘one baptism’. Yes, but that one baptism is in the Catholic Church. And if there is one Church, there can be no baptism outside it. There cannot be two baptisms: if heretics really baptize, then baptism belongs to them. And anyone who on his own authority concedes them this privilege admits, by yielding their claim, that the enemy and adversary of Christ should appear to possess the power of washing, purifying, sanctifying a man. Our assertion is that those who come to us from heresy are baptized by us, not rebaptized. They do not receive anything there; there is nothing there for them to receive. They come to us that they may receive here, where there is all grace and truth; for grace and truth are one.3

The second quote:

The Church is one and indivisible: therefore there cannot be a Church among the heretics. The Holy Spirit is one, and cannot dwell with those outside the community; therefore the Holy Spirit has no place among heretics. It follows that there can be no baptism among heretics; for baptism is based on this same unity and cannot be separated either from the Church or from the Holy Spirit. It is ridiculous to assert that spiritual birth—that second birth of ours in Christ through the bath of regeneration—can take place among the heretics where, it is admitted, the Spirit has no place. Water cannot of itself purify and sanctify, unless it is accompanied by the Holy Spirit”.4

We repeat the important distinction that we made in our previous post, which should clarify things.

ACCEPTANCE AND RECOGNITION OF BAPTISM
(Acceptance does not mean recognition)

Acceptance addresses the issue how does the Church receive converts.
Recognition addresses the “validity” of baptism.

The Church recognizes no baptism as “valid” that is performed outside of her. However, in the exercise of oikonomia (dispensation), at times and places and special circumstances, at the discretion of a bishop or synod of bishops, she accepts a baptism that resembles to a greater or lesser extent her baptism, of someone who is being received in the Orthodox Church from heresy or schism. Acceptance is not concerned with “validity” or recognition of baptisms performed outside of her, concepts which are foreign to her terminology and practice.

The fact that the Orthodox Church receives certain converts by oikonomia through Chrismation does not mean that the Orthodox Church recognizes a baptism performed outside her pleroma nor does she admit by such action that there is grace among the heterodox.

How the heterodox should be received has become not an issue of whether to exercise akriveia (strictness) or oikonomia (dispensation, exception), but an imposition by the ecumenists of their erroneous belief, namely that there is one baptism and that this one baptism is administered validly by anyone (even by non-Christians!), as long as the name of the Holy Trinity is invoked and water is used in any form.

Because for the prevailing ecumenism, it has almost become an article of faith that any baptism performed, whether inside or outside the Orthodox Church, is a valid baptism (so long as it is performed by invoking the name of the Holy Trinity). For this reason the Ecumenical Patriarchate does no longer allow under any circumstances to receive heterodox through baptism, because it is viewed as a repetition of the one true baptism. They will no longer allow the strictness to be applied even by oikonomia!!

Ecumenists are not willing to accept the patristic and synodal witness, that when the Church allows baptism by oikonomia she does so without addressing at all its “validity” outside the Church–which the ecumenists do because of their ecumenistic and synchretistic considerations.

The holy canons of the Church listed below support fully the above statements.

46th Apostolic Canon

“We ordain that a bishop, or presbyter who has admitted the baptism or sacrifice of heretics, be deposed. For what concord hath Christ with Beliar, or what part hath a believer with an infidel?”

47th Apostolic Canon

“Let a bishop or presbyter who shall baptize again one who has rightly received Baptism, or who shall not baptize one who has been polluted by the ungodly, be deposed, as despising the Cross and death of the Lord, and not making a distinction between the true priests and the false.”

50th Apostolic Canon

“If any bishop or presbyter does not perform the three immersions of the one initiation, but one immersion, given into the death of the Lord, let him be deposed. For the Lord did not say, “Baptize into my death,” but, “Go, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”

68th Apostolic Canon

“If any bishop, presbyter, or deacon shall receive from anyone a second ordination, let both the ordained and the ordainer be deposed, unless indeed it be proved that he had his ordination from heretics; for those who have been baptized or ordained by such persons cannot be either of the faithful or of the clergy.”

Canon 1 of the Regional Council of Carthage

“[…] No one can be baptized outside of the catholic Church, there being but one baptism, and this being existent only in the catholic Church. […] Among heretics … there is no Church… […] There being but one baptism, and there being but one Holy Spirit, there is also but one Church… and for this reason whatever they [i.e. the heretics] do is false and empty and vain, everything be counterfeit and unauthorized. For nothing that they do can be acceptable and desirable with God. In fact, the Lord calls them His foes and adversaries in the Gospels: “He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad” (Mt. 12:30). […]”

Epitome of Canon 19 of the First Ecumenical Council

“Paulianists must be rebaptized.”

Interpretation by St. Nikodemos: “For how can anyone that has not been baptized in accordance with the Orthodox faith receive a visitation of the Holy Spirit, and grace, in ordination?”

Canon 7 of the Second Ecumenical Council

[Summary:] Certain heretics and schismatics who are baptized the same way Orthodox are baptized are received through recantation of their errors and then through holy Chrism. But those who are baptized with a single immersion and… (those belonging to) any other heresies… we are willing to accept as Greeks [i.e. through baptism].

Summary of Canon 7 of Laodicaea

“Certain heretics are accepted after being catechized and chrismated”, [Interpretation by St. Nikodemos]: “seeing that they used to baptize themselves in identically the same way as are Orthodox Christians, and on this account and for this reason alone they do not need to be baptized a second time.”

Canon 8 of Laodicaea

“As concerning those returning from the heresy of the so-called Phrygians, even though they happen to be in the class which with them is supposed to be the clergy… such persons are to be catechized … and … baptized…”

Epitome of Canon 1 of St. Basil

“The ancients… ordered (that) those that were baptized by [heretics and schismatics], and came over to the Church, to be purged by the true baptism, as those that are baptized by laymen. But let none be received without unction.”

Epitome of Canon 47 of St. Basil

“We re-baptize them all.”

Summary/Interpretation of Canon 66 of Carthage

“If persons baptized by the Donatists in their infancy learn the truth of Orthodoxy after coming of age and attaining to discretion, and come to hate the cacodoxy, whether they, I say, seeing that they have been baptized in the baptism which is performed in accordance with tradition, to wit, that performed by the Orthodox… ought not to be baptized” (Interpretation by St. Nikodemos).

Canon 84 of the Sixth Ecumenical Council

“Following the canonical institutions of the Fathers, we order that whoever does not know nor can prove by documents that he has been baptized, he must without any hesitation be baptized.”

Canon 95th of the Sixth Ecumenical Council

Same as Canon 7 of the Second Ecumenical Council.

We end with another quote from our study on the Divine Liturgy, The Heavenly Banquet, taken from our commentary on “The Catechumens” (p. 153).

“The [Greek Orthodox] Church in America does not baptize the converts any longer, admitting them through Chrismation, as they are allegedly already baptized. But if they were baptized they would be members of the Church. What would they be joining then when they became Orthodox? The Church Canons should be strictly adhered to, in administering the true baptism by triple immersion, practiced only in the Orthodox Church, to those who have not received it.”

Note 651 in The Heavenly Banquet. Saint Nektarios, Two Studies, 1. On the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church 2. On Sacred Tradition (in Greek), Bookstore Nektarios Panagopoulos, Athens 1987, p. 28.

Beginning of Note 652 in The Heavenly Banquet. Read the small treatise, I Confess One Baptism… by Protopresbyter Dr. George D. Metallinos, St. Paul’s Monastery, Holy Mountain 1994.

(Epistle LXXI. 1, in Henry Bettenson, The Early Fathers, A Selection from the writings of the Fathers from St. Clement of Rome to St. Athanasius, Edited and translated by Henry Bettenson, Oxford University Press, Oxford-New York-Toronto 1969, p. 271)

(ibid., LXXIV 4-5)

Fr. Emmanuel Hatzidakis (+2024) is the author of The Heavenly Banquet: Understanding the Divine Liturgy and Jesus: Fallen? The Human Nature of Christ Examined from an Eastern Orthodox Perspective.

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

There is no “valid” baptism outside the Church — Part 1 of 2

Dear A.,

The topic of the reception of heterodox Christians by the Orthodox Church addressed in your comment to our “MANIFESTO”1, is of broad interest, and I would like to share my response to you with our readers. For their benefit here is your comment in its entirety:

I appreciate the aim of this manifesto. However, I think that the idea that baptism is necessarily the way to receive heretics is far from established. When the Russian church decided to rebaptize Catholic converts in the seventeenth century, bishops of Eastern churches clamored to stop them. And the Russians did stop that practice. Baptism only became the normative means of receiving Catholics in the Greek church in the eighteenth century because of an obscure theological controversy that was inspired by a dubious figure. Just read the history, the answer is not clear. Sources: Fr. Ambrose Pogodin provides a good history here. Andrei Psarev examines a relevant canon here. Fr. John Erickson (I know) has a useful overview here.

It seems that you have not read carefully the particular paragraph concerning baptism.2 We are not saying that “baptism is necessarily the way to receive heretics”; rather, we are critical of the guidelines of the Ecumenical Patriarch who recognizes baptisms that take place outside the Church as valid–something the Church outright rejects–turning the oikonomia (the exception) into akriveia (the rule), and not allowing akriveia even by oikonomia!–something never before seen throughout the history of the Church.

According to Prof. Fr. John Romanides:

Orthodox Churches usually accepted into their membership individuals or Churches by means of either exactitude (akribeia ) or economy (oikonomia ).

By Exactitude one is accepted by baptism, chrismation and profession of the Orthodox Faith accompanied by rejection of former errors.

By Economy one is accepted by chrismation and profession of the Orthodox faith and the rejection of former errors.

Neither of these two means of entry into the Church is in itself a judgment on the validity or non-validity of the sacraments of the Church of origin, since there are no mysteries outside of the Body of Christ.3

Even the arch-ecumenist Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk confesses the one and only Orthodox FAITH concerning the question of sacraments outside the Church:

“The Augustinian understanding of the ‘efficacy’ of the sacraments was never fully accepted in the Orthodox Church. Such an understanding of the sacraments is unacceptable for Orthodox Tradition, for it is an understanding in which the grace inherent within them is considered autonomous, independent of the Church. The sacraments can be performed only within the Church, and it is the Church that bestows efficacy, reality, and salvation on them.”4

When and how to exercise oikonomia is a secondary issue, and it is left up to the discretion of the bishops and their episcopal synods when and how to apply it. The main issue that all Orthodox should and must agree upon is that baptisms that take place outside the Church are not valid baptisms. I briefly addressed this subject elsewhere many years ago. Here is what I wrote:

ACCEPTANCE AND RECOGNITION OF BAPTISM
(ACCEPTANCE DOES NOT MEAN RECOGNITION)

Acceptance addresses the issue how does the Church receive converts. Recognition addresses the “validity” of baptism.

The fact that the Orthodox Church receives certain converts by oikonomia through Chrismation does not mean that the Orthodox Church recognizes a baptism performed outside her pleroma nor does she admit by such action that there is grace among the heterodox.

Because of the prevailing ecumenism, it has almost become an article of faith that any baptism performed, whether inside or outside the Orthodox Church, is a valid baptism (so long as it is performed by invoking the name of the Holy Trinity). For this reason the Ecumenical Patriarchate no longer allows, under any circumstances, the reception of heterodox through baptism, because it is viewed as a repetition of the one true baptism. They will no longer allow the strictness to be applied even by oikonomia!!

I also ask you to look up the index entry “baptism” in my book The Heavenly Banquet5. I argue that especially in this country of “church-hoppers” the akriveia should be followed.

Coming back to your comment, I ask you: when you say – if you do – that Roman Catholics should not be baptized when they are received, is it because you believe the baptism conferred to them should be recognized as “valid” or because we don’t want to offend them, and we should not make conversion more difficult for them and therefore we should exercise oikonomia?

If you want to defend the validity of the baptism offered by the Roman Catholic Church, searching Church history won’t give you the answer. The current practice is that even if you wanted to be baptized it is not granted to you in the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical (read ecumenist) Patriarchate, so it has become a moot point. In fact, conversions are discouraged because the Ecumenical Patriarch wants the Orthodox Church to be united with the Roman Catholic Church in toto, as two sister Churches who recognize each other as two lungs of the same body, and re-establish a broken communion caused by misunderstandings, therefore conversions [through Baptism] are no longer allowed.

But please tell me: why would anyone who has already received the “ONE baptism for the remission of sins” want to join the Orthodox Church since…

he has received the laver of regeneration and has been spiritually reborn
he has already received remission of sins (Acts 2:38) and “the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:38)
he is already walking “in newness of life” (Rom. 6:4)
the doors to the kingdom of God are already wide open to him (John 3:5).

What more would one hope to obtain in the Orthodox Church that he has not already received?

If through a baptism outside the Orthodox Church one has been incorporated into the Body of Christ, it follows that one has become a member of the Holy Church, so what else would one be seeking? If one has this, the first and most fundamental of the Church’s Mysteries, one can receive all of the sacraments. If one has the authority to baptize, he also has the authority to offer the bloodless sacrifice. Why, then, would anyone abandon his Church in order to join the Orthodox Church?

We will address this subject more in our next post.

Posted on March 10, 2017.
“The [Ecumenical] Patriarch has given the directive to no longer receive those Christians who want to become Orthodox through baptism, because, he says, since they are baptized in the name of the Holy Trinity they have a valid baptism. For us there are no Sacraments outside the Church.”
A Critique of the Balamand Agreement, Orthodox Christian Information Center, October 14, 2001.
Orthodox Christianity Vol. II: Doctrine and Teaching of the Orthodox Church, p. 405.
pp. 211-212. I wish everyone would have this book as a reference for many topics. [editor’s note: Order this book and receive a 30% discount by using the coupon code: 1BAPTISM at checkout. Order three or more of our books and receive 40% off by using the coupon code 4BAPTISM at checkout.

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

“Pope of the East” throws napalm bomb on world Orthodoxy

The following post is a commentary on the recent decision of the patriarchal synod of Constantinople to grant autocephaly to the Ukrainian Church. By Lykourgos Nanis, physician.

The patriarchal synod convened in Constantinople recently, obviously bowing to the command from the aptly dubbed “Pope of the East”, Patriarch Bartholomew, took the disastrous, definitive step to proceed with granting autocephaly to the schismatic “Church” of Ukraine, at the same time “restoring” the schismatic bishops Philaret and Makary. By pulling the strings at the extinguished Fener1, the transatlantic global hawks have made it much easier to accomplish their latest geopolitical and geostrategic plans…

The decision “legitimizes” canon violations and lawlessness, and by conducting an ecclesiological and ecclesiastical coup d’etat, widens even more the already existing rift with the Russian Church, with the likelihood that an intra-orthodox schism is imminent and, in a short time, will become pan-Orthodox. [by now an accomplished fact. Tr.]

The Fanariots, who have the “first and foremost” “presiding hierarch” among them, assume that ecumenical Orthodoxy is their feud and conquest, and behave and act in like manner, as if they do not even give consideration to the safety of the spiritual and sacred canons, in their quest to implement their distorted plans to fulfill their hegemonic ambitions.

After years of reveling in contempt for the sacred canons that regulate the relations of the Orthodox Church with heretics and heathens, violating and trampling on a host of them, the important men in charge of ecclesiastical affairs in Bosporus have, with one stroke, without any substantive ecclesiastical reason and cause, made a foolish and unwise action that will lead to an intra-Orthodox schism, and “legitimizes” their papally inspired and implemented hegemony.

Despite receiving agonizing pleas and early warnings from local Churches, bishops, scholars of theology, respected people who love Orthodoxy, who toil to preserve pan-orthodox unity, recalcitrant Mr. Bartholomew, all the while aware of the consequences of his decisions, proceeded with the act of attacking, dividing and murdering the much talked about “pan-Orthodox unity” promoted at the pseudo-synod of Crete!

The extinguished Fener is now the sole instigator, fabricator, preserver, and promoter of dysfunction and disorder in contemporary ecclesiastical life.

Though the decision of the Fanariot synod is incendiary, a napalm bomb dropped on Ukraine as well as on ecumenical Orthodoxy, the Synod communiqué appeals “to all sides involved that they avoid appropriation of Churches, Monasteries and other properties, as well as every other act of violence and retaliation, so that the peace and love of Christ may prevail”! Behold the moral contradiction among the Fanariots! But wasn’t it you who lit the fire that is now a blaze? And now you expect peace to prevail? Peace without its precondition, i.e. adhering to the established order?

How long will world Orthodoxy become darkened and razed by the Patriarchate of Constantinople under its current leadership? When will it finally convene a REAL intra-Orthodox Synod that will finally put an end to this kind of papal-governing mentality that they are ensnared in?

Lykourgos Nanis is a physician and Orthodox (non-ecumenist) theologian.

Original article (in Greek). Translated by Fr. E.H. and T.H.

Fener is the name of the district in Istanbul, Turkey, where the patriarchate is located. Fener, in Greek φανάρι (fanari), means lantern.

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

Did Christ Have a Fallen Human Nature? – Part 5 of 8

In this series of blog posts we are addressing the subject of the human nature of Christ from the perspective of the Orthodox Church. In this post we’ll address the question:

What happened when the Son of God assumed our nature?

The answer given by our blogger (who prompted the writing of this series) to this strange question is “Jesus became like us in every way.” He lived in this fallen world in the one and only humanity that exists. Certain Fathers too, including Church documents (as we’ve seen in a previous post), state that in some way the Son of God assumed a fallen human nature. However, even in such instances we are not to assume that He lived as all of us do in our “post-fallen” condition. Why? Because what He assumed He renewed and deified it.

The following quotations from Church councils, Church fathers, services and contemporary authors bring the Church’s answer to this question into focus.

1. An official pronouncement of the Church

Fourth Ecumenical Council, Tome of Leo

“The fact that He partook of our human infirmity did not make Him a partaker of our transgressions. He took on Him “the form of a servant” without the defilement of any sin, augmenting what was human, without diminishing what was divine.”

2. The witness of the Holy Scripture

Acts 2:27 (Ps. 16:10)

“For You will not abandon My soul to Hades, nor let Your Holy One see corruption.”

John 1:14

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father.”

3. The witness of the Fathers of the Church

St. Athanasios the Great

“Christ’s body by virtue of the union of the Word with it, it was no longer subject to corruption according to its own nature, but by reason of the Word that was come to dwell in it, it was placed out of the reach of corruption.”

St. Gregory the Theologian

“Because the devil led astray to the transgression of God’s commandment the nature which God created sinless and caused to it sin, which brings death, this self-same nature did God the Logos assume once more (pavlin) unto Himself, and rendered it incapable of the diabolical deviation and of invention of sin. That is why the Lord said, “The ruler of this world is coming, and he finds nothing his in Me.”

St. Gregory of Nyssa

“He Who has taken all that was ours, on the terms of giving to us in return what is His, even as He took disease, death, curse, and sin, so took our slavery also, not in such a way as Himself to have what He took, but so as to purge our nature of such evils, our defects being swallowed up and done away within His stainless nature.”

St. Gregory Palamas

“Christ took upon Himself our guilty nature from the most pure Virgin and united it, new and unmixed with the old seed, to His divine person. He rendered it guiltless and righteous, so that all His spiritual descendants would remain outside the ancestral curse and condemnation.”

4. The witness of the hymnology of the Church

Feast of the Annunciation

Today…is the festival of the Virgin… Adam is renewed… the tabernacle of our nature, which the Lord took upon Himself, deifying the substance He assumed, has become the Temple of God … Christ God, our salvation, has assumed our nature, restoring it to Himself.

Feast of Holy Transfiguration

With Your invisible hands, O Christ, You formed man in Your image; You now manifest the original beauty in that same body; You reveal it not as an image, but as You are in Yourself, truly both God and man by nature.

Feast of the Ascension

The pre-eternal and un-originate God, having mystically deified the human nature He assumed, has now ascended.

5. The confirmation by Orthodox Theologians

Nikos Matsoukas

Christ’s human nature remains always created, before and even after the Resurrection. On account, however, of the hypostatic union, it becomes a partaker of theosis and incorruption, not being subject to any corruption (neither decay nor dissolution). Before the Resurrection however it is subject voluntarily to the real blameless and natural passions through concession, so that the plan of divine economy may be realized.

Some of this material was drawn from my book, Jesus: Fallen? The Human Nature of Christ Examined from an Eastern Orthodox Perspective (Orthodox Witness: Clearwater, FL, 2013).

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

What Should we do when our Bishop is an Ecumenist?

Fr. Emmanuel,

Bless!

What is your opinion on the Orthodox ecclesiological statements that Patriarch Bartholomew makes when speaking to Orthodox audiences? Which Patriarch Bartholomew should we trust? The one who speaks like an Orthodox bishop on Mt. Athos or the one who concelebrates with the heterodox? What should traditional Orthodox do when our first hierarch is tending towards Uniatism?

Maximus
[from a comment to this post]

Dear Maximus,

What a glorious name you bear! As long as you remain anchored unto this luminary of Orthodoxy you too will shine with the truth (as you do).

Thank you for asking this vexing question. It has been in my mind for many years. I have come to a solution that works for me—uneasily, I should add.

Admittedly it is painfully true that the ecumenical (read ecumenist) Patriarch speaks from both sides of his mouth, depending upon who his audience is: Orthodox in his statements for internal consumption; ecumenist when addressing his non-Orthodox “brethren.”

So, dear Maximus, with justification you raise the question, what should we do when we witness the acknowledged first-in-honor bishop of the Orthodox Church flagrantly violating the canons of the Church with common prayers and with statements that compromise the uniqueness of the Church?

What better authority to turn to in order to obtain a reliable, Orthodox answer to your question than the luminary of the true faith and life, the one you chose to be named after—the Confessor himself!

St. Maximos the Confessor would not receive holy communion from the hands of those he considered to be heretics because this supreme act of inter-communion was tied to their erroneous confession of faith, and it would be viewed as a public admission that he shared in their heresy.

More importantly, let us not forget that the Lateran council convened in 649 under pope Martin, in which St. Maximos was present, condemned and deposed the Patriarchs and bishops of the East who had embraced Monothelitism. Therefore St. Maximos had every justification to break communion with them.

Our situation is different. While our Patriarch and most of our bishops, whether openly or tacitly, are ecumenists, they don’t make holy communion a test, neither have they been officially condemned by a Church synod.

For us who are unequivocally non-ecumenists, the faith of the Patriarch, as that of his two predecessors, is a personal matter. They are not the Church. Those who faithfully follow the Fathers and keep the true faith are the Church.1

As long as things remain the way they are, we’ll continue to keep our Orthodox faith, while openly condemning ecumenism as a heresy, exactly as St. Maximos did—and accept the consequences.

However, if our bishop happens to be an ecumenist who will equate reception of holy communion to acceptance of his erroneous faith, then we too will stop receiving it from his hands, and we’ll look for an Orthodox bishop to follow.2

Old Calendarists will retort that they feel fully justified breaking communion with the New Calendarists based on the 31st of the Holy Apostles and especially on the 15th Canon of the First-Second Synod and, according to which Christians wall themselves off heretical or schismatic bishops.3

We are not ready to follow them and their uncanonical bishops. We will suffer where we are and we will continue to give witness to the true faith from within, praying that soon the truth will shine.

It just happens that recently (Nov. 27, 2014) the Metropolis of Piraeus, Greece, organized a seminar, in which three Orthodox theologians, including the Metropolitan of Piraeus Seraphim himself, addressed the aforementioned Canon and the question “when is it allowed to wall ourselves off from communion with our bishop”?4

The seminar expanded and explained the Canon stating that a priest or bishop may break communion with his superior if he publicly preaches a heresy even though it has not yet been condemned by a synod, but is acknowledged by the Fathers to be a heresy.

A couple of observations: First, breakage is not mandatory. It is a right, not an obligation. Second, we follow the holy Fathers, not our impulses. Even though many Fathers have written against ecumenism, calling it a heresy, even a pan-heresy, they fought against it from within, suffering the consequences.

We are not going to behave as supreme keepers and judges of the faith. There are others more knowledgeable and more pious than we are. Let us bear patiently in longsuffering if our bishop happens to be an ecumenist. We have as examples the recently declared Saints Justin Popović, Paisios the Hagiorite, Philotheos Zervakos, Sophrony Zaharov, and many other contemporary elders.

I praise and glorify God who gave me the answer to your question through the lips of the newest Saint of the Church, St. Paisios the New, who writes:

In our times we see that many faithful children of our Church, monastics and laymen, have unfortunately seceded from her, on account of the philo-uniates. I am of the opinion that it is no good at all to separate from the Church every time the Patriarch is at fault. Instead, from within, near our Mother Church, everyone has the duty and obligation to struggle in his own way. To discontinue the Patriarch’s commemoration, to secede and form one’s own Church, and to continue to speak insulting the Patriarch—this, I think, is illogical. If we separate ourselves at the first and second detour of our Patriarchs from our own churches – God forbid! – we’ll surpass even the Protestants.5

We should add, however, that later on, and for three years (1970-1973), the Saint together with other Hagiorite Fathers and a few Metropolitans interrupted the commemoration of Patriarch Athenagoras. At the same time we should note that they did not impose the cessation of the commemoration to other hierarchs, neither did they condemn as heretics those who continued to commemorate him, but maintained the ecclesiastical communion with the patriarchate and the Church of Greece.

Metropolitan of Gortynos Jeremiah included the above quotation from St. Paisios in his homily for the feast of St. Gregory the Theologian (Jan. 25, 2015), as an example to follow. Let us do that, while praying that soon a synod will specifically and directly condemn ecumenism and those bishops who follow it, praying and hoping that they will repent and will once more “teach the word of truth correctly” (2 Tim. 2:15).

This is what Saint Paisios the New says: “Our Orthodox Church lacks nothing. She only lacks serious hierarchs and pastors with patristic principles. The chosen are few. Yet it is not disheartening. The Church is the Church of Christ. He is the One who governs her.” (Orthodoxos Typos, Feb. 20, 2015)
Fr. Thomas Hopko gave a podcast on the subject (Resisting Like St. Maximus).
Pedalion, pp. 46-48 and pp. 470-71.
See Orthodoxos Typos, Dec. 12, 2015.
Letter of Elder (now Saint) Paisios of Jan. 23, 1969 (Orthodoxos Typos, Feb. 20, 2015-my translation).

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

There is no “valid” baptism outside the Church — Part 2 of 2

ACCEPTANCE AND RECOGNITION OF BAPTISM
(Acceptance does not mean recognition)

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

There is no “valid” baptism outside the Church — Part 1 of 2

ACCEPTANCE AND RECOGNITION OF BAPTISM
(ACCEPTANCE DOES NOT MEAN RECOGNITION)

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

“Pope of the East” throws napalm bomb on world Orthodoxy

GIVING WITNESS TO THE TRUE CHURCH

Orthodox Christians all over the world have received the unchanging Christian Faith, passed down from the Holy Apostles to their successors, and continue to practice it today in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church – The Orthodox Church.

Did Christ Have a Fallen Human Nature? – Part 5 of 8