Cyril Lukaris and the Confession of Dositheus

Patriarch Cyril Lukaris

Jason Wallace of the Ancient Paths YouTube channel has produced two videos attacking Orthodoxy. The first was "The Failure of Eastern Orthodoxy," and the second was "Cyril Lucaris: Calvinist Patriarch/Orthodox Saint." Craig Truglia and I did two video responses, which you can view here:

 

More recently, Jason Wallace appeared on "The Dividing Line," with James White, and discussed his videos, but focused on the question of Cyril Lukaris, on an episode entitled "Let’s Make Cyril Lucaris Great Again!" 

This latest video doesn't warrant another lengthy video rebuttal, but there were a number of erroneous things asserted that should be corrected.

To sum up his argument, he claims that Cyril Lukaris was in fact a Calvinist, and that the Orthodox tried to cover up this fact because supposedly this would call into question our understanding of Apostolic Succession, he asserts that the Orthodox Church has affirmed that the Council of Jerusalem and the Confession of Dositheus are on the same level as the Seven Ecumenical Councils and Scripture, and that the Orthodox Church has recognized Cyril Lukaris as a saint, despite the fact that he was a Calvinist, and thus a heretic from an Orthodox perspective. All of this, he claims, proves that the Orthodox Church has contradicted itself and is therefore not infallible, as it claims.

Was Cyril Lukaris a Calvinist?

In Jason Wallace's interview with James White, he claimed that I had asserted that the Confession of Cyril Lukaris was a forgery, but the clip he refers to clearly shows that I said "There is an argument to be made that his confession was a forgery, or that it was altered." I put it this way precisely because the arguments I had read were clearly not proof that this was this case, but they seemed reasonable to me at the time. But I would still say that there is an argument to be made to that effect. Jason Wallace's video does present a strong case that this is not true. The bottom line is that it doesn't really matter that much. Heretical occupants of the patriarchal throne of Constantinople are no novelty in the history of the Church.

The historical context here is very complicated, and there was a lot intrigue going on. The Church of Constantinople was under the thumb of the Turks, and so outside powers, both Protestant and Catholic, were able to manipulate Sultans who were more than happy to remove a Patriarch so that they could extract money from whoever wanted him replaced, and so that is why Cyril was removed five times from that position. In that context, lots of people presented one face to one group, and a different one to another. Cyril may well have been such a person.

Stephanie Falkowski, in her dissertation "Not Quite Calvinist: Cyril Lucaris a Reconsideration of His Life and Beliefs," makes the case that Cyril was not as much of a Calvinist as has been generally claimed, but that he was trying to get help from Calvinists, and so tried to sound like as much of a Calvinist as he could, though he often used ambiguous language to accomplish that purpose. I won't take the time to lay out the case that she does, but would recommend those interested give her dissertation a read.

If Cyril Lukaris was In Fact a Calvinist, Would This Disprove Apostolic Succession?

Most of those who have been labelled as heresiarchs (the founder of a heresy or the leader of a heretical sect) have in fact been bishops, and several were Patriarchs of Constantinople. We do not hide this fact. On the Sunday of Orthodoxy, bishops recite the Synodikon of Orthodoxy, and pronounce anathemas on the most prominent of these heretics. So if Cyril Lukaris was a Calvinist, this would be not be an anomaly in Church history.

Wallace asserts that the reason why Orthodox people, going back to the time of the Council in Jerusalem in 1672, have argued that Cyril Lukaris was not a Calvinist because (he mistakenly believes) this would prove Orthodoxy to be false, but even if we assume Cyril was a full blown Calvinist, the reason why the Council of Jerusalem may have argued otherwise is simply because this was not the face he showed to his flock, and so many had positive memories of him. One of the reasons why he would have sought out specifically Protestant allies is that he had spent much of his ministry battling Jesuits who were promoting Uniatism in Ukraine, which was obviously something the Orthodox would have seen as a very laudable part of his history.  

Wallace noted that the Council of Jerusalem cited sermons of Cyril Lukaris without providing the dates these sermons were delivered, as if this was an intentional way of clouding the facts. Modern footnotes are relatively recent things. They certainly are often helpful, but the fact that the council didn't provide modern footnotes doesn't prove anything, other than that they were not accustomed to later conventions. It may also be that the texts of these sermons simply were not dated. The fact that this Council argued that his Confession was either forged or altered was not necessarily because they knew this was false. There was a lot of confusion that reigned during this time, and so there are good reasons why they probably believed this to be the case, even if, in fact, this was not true.

Did the Orthodox Church Recognize Cyril Lukaris as a Saint?

Jason Wallace seems to think that the fact that the local Church of Alexandria glorified Cyril Lukaris as a saint means that, if he in fact was a Calvinist, the Orthodox Church would be guilty of error, and it its infallibility would be thus disproven. The problem is that the decisions of one local Church have never been considered to be necessarily infallible. The only way the decisions of a local Council to glorify a saint could be claimed to be approved by the whole Church, would be either for the whole Church to affirm that decision in an Ecumenical Council (and that would entail a Council both claiming to be Ecumenical, and that Council being received by all the local Churches as Ecumenical); or he would need to be officially recognized by all of the local Orthodox Church as a saint. Neither of these things have happened.

I have seen references to the Patriarchate of Constantinople recognizing Cyril Lukaris as a saint in 2022, but I have been unable to find anything that actually demonstrates that this happened. But even if it did, that would still be only two local Churches, and there is no guarantee that such a decision would be infallible. The Orthodox Church has never claimed that it was impossible for a local Orthodox Church to fall into error. This is also no novelty in the history of the Church.

Is the Council of Jerusalem of 1672 an Ecumenical Council?

Jason Wallace stated that the conciliar work of the Orthodox Church continued uninterrupted in history through the later councils of universal authority, but there have been no Ecumenical Councils outside of the Seven Ecumenical Councils, that both claimed to be Ecumenical and have been universally received in the Orthodox Church to be such. One does find references to the Eighth and to the Ninth Ecumenical Councils, and they would certainly be the best candidates to be labeled such, but while these councils have been universally received as authoritative, they have not been universally received as being on the same level as the Seven Ecumenical Councils.

The Council of Jerusalem is considered to be of some authority, but it's decrees were in fact not seen to be infallible, as is shown by the fact that another Council in 1723 made corrections to the Confession of Dositheus (see the Epistle of the Patriarchs of the Eastern Catholic Church on the Orthodox Faith (1723). These corrections were reflected in the Russian text of the Confession of Dositheus which was published by St. Philaret of Moscow.

One of the things Jason Wallace highlighted as objectionable in the Confession of Dositheus was what is said in Question 1 of the Confession:

"Question 1

Should the Divine Scriptures be read in the vulgar tongue [common language] by all Christians?

No. Because all Scripture is divinely-inspired and profitable {cf. 2 Timothy 3:16}, we know, and necessarily so, that without [Scripture] it is impossible to be Orthodox at all. Nevertheless they should not be read by all, but only by those who with fitting research have inquired into the deep things of the Spirit, and who know in what manner the Divine Scriptures ought to be searched, and taught, and finally read. But to those who are not so disciplined, or who cannot distinguish, or who understand only literally, or in any other way contrary to Orthodoxy what is contained in the Scriptures, the Catholic Church, knowing by experience the damage that can cause, forbids them to read [Scripture]. Indeed, it is permitted to every Orthodox to hear the Scriptures, that he may believe with the heart unto righteousness, and confess with the mouth unto salvation {Romans 10:10}. But to read some parts of the Scriptures, and especially of the Old [Testament], is forbidden for these and other similar reasons. For it is the same thing to prohibit undisciplined persons from reading all the Sacred Scriptures, as to require infants to abstain from strong meats."

This statement was in the context of the Greek speaking Church, at a time when the Turks suppressed the education of Christians. Cyril Lukaris had published a translation of the New Testament into modern Greek, and this translation was objected to by many. Protestants have many people who still object to updating the King James Version, but these bishops were not objecting to replacing an older translation of the New Testament with a new one -- they were objecting replacing the inspired original text of the Greek New Testament with a modern translation. Greek Orthodox Christians continue to use the original text of the Greek New Testament to this day. It does require some effort for a modern Greek to be able to fully understand it, but I used to have a Greek auto mechanic who had a copy of the Orthodox Bible in Greek, which consisted of the Septuagint text for the Old Testament and the Greek New Testament, which he read regularly. When I admired his copy, he gave it to me, and it is well worn. While one might ridicule people who insist on exclusively reading a 400 year old English translation of the Bible, it should be understandable why Greeks would want to maintain the use of the inspired original Greek text. 

Nevertheless, other bishops did object to the way this question was answered in the Confession of Dositheus, and so it was corrected in 1723 to read:

Question 1. – Should all Christians read the Holy Scriptures?

Answer. We know that all Scripture is God-inspired and beneficial, and so necessary that without it it is absolutely impossible to be pious; but not all are able to read it, but only those who know how to test the Scriptures, to study them, and to understand them correctly. Thus, every pious person is allowed to hear the Scriptures, in order to believe in the truth with his heart and confess with his lips unto salvation, but not everyone is allowed to read certain parts of the Scriptures, especially the Old Testament, without guidance. To indiscriminately allow the unskilled to read the Holy Scriptures is the same as to offer infants the use of strong food.

This is the wording reflected in the text of the Confession published by St. Philaret of Moscow. And, you will note that the beginning word "No" has been removed. And as a matter of fact, St. Philaret of Moscow oversaw the publication of the Russian Synodal translation of the Bible, and encouraged people to read it, especially the New Testament. This translation is still used by many Russian speaking Protestants, by the way. When this text speaks of guidance being necessary for the Old Testament, Protestants who constantly published study Bibles for that same purpose should hardly find that objectionable. Providing such guidance has long been one of the primary focuses of catechetical instruction provided to young Orthodox laymen, as one could see by looking at texts, such as "The Law of God: For Study at Home and School," by Fr. Seraphim Slobodskoy, which is 651 pages in length in the English translation, and close to half of that text is about the content of the Bible, and about half of that is focused on the Old Testament (as can be seen online, here).

Wallace argues that the Orthodox Church declared the Council of Jerusalem to be an Ecumenical Council at the Council of Crete in 2016, having "universal authority, just like the Ecumenical Councils," this is incorrect. For one thing, the Churches of Antioch, Georgia, Bulgaria, and Russia did not attend this council, and so far more than half of Orthodox world was not represented -- contrary to Wallace's assertion that "You had Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, Constantinople, and Moscow, Bulgarians... basically everyone represented." Secondly, even if you look at the Encyclical which Wallace assumes to have referenced the Council of Jerusalem, it actually refers to a council held in Constantinople in 1672, which was held prior to the Council of Jerusalem:

"...and furthermore through the Holy and Great Councils convened in Constantinople, in 1484 to refute the unionist Council of Florence (1438-1439), in 1638, 1642, 1672 and 1691 to refute Protestant beliefs, and in 1872 to condemn ethno-phyletism as an ecclesiological heresy" [Emphasis added].

All of the councils referenced here were held in Constantinople. And while it does cite these councils as being part of the ongoing conciliar work of the Church, it does not actually assert that they are on the same level as the Seven Ecumenical Councils, contrary to Wallace's claim.

Archbishop Vasily (Krivoshein), in his "Symbolic Texts in the Orthodox Church," points out that the Council in 1672 held in Constantinople was attended by 40 bishops, and produced a statement against Calvinism. Later, in that same year, Patriarch Dositheus of Jerusalem, who had participated in that council took advantage of a gathering of clergy and laity for festivities held at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, and presented his Confession. Only 8 bishops were present and signed this document, and so to even speak of a "Council of Jerusalem" is a debatable point, but it was hardly on the same level as an Ecumenical Council, and as stated, was later corrected by a subsequent council, and so while the corrected Confession of Dositheus is a document of some authority, neither that council nor this document was ever seen as an infallible.

Jaroslav Pelikan, who was a preeminent scholar on the history of Christian doctrine (who was a Lutheran most of his life, but converted to Orthodoxy in 1998) discusses in some detail the status of texts like the Confession of Dositheus in his book "Credo: Historical and Theological Guide to Creeds and Confessions of Faith in the Christian Tradition," which has a chapter on the Orthodox Church (which includes a telling subsection entitled "The Ambivalence of the Orthodox Church Toward "Symbolic Books"). Toward the end of that chapter, Pelikan sums things up as follows: 

"Drawing upon this liturgical confession of the faith of the church and shaping it in turn, the doctrinal decisions and formulations of the seven church councils between 325 and 787 stand as the formal deposit of normative dogma for Eastern Orthodox teaching. "The West incessantly asks us for the symbolical books of Orthodoxy," the Bulgarian Orthodox New Testament scholar Nikolaj Nikaronovic Glubokovsky once observed with some annoyance. "We have no need of them. The faith of the seven first councils is sufficient for us." In one sense, therefore, the sacred tradition of the seven ecumenical councils... is a legacy that Eastern Orthodoxy shares with Roman Catholicism, as well as with those other Western confessions in which the validity of the ecumenical councils is acknowledged, albeit with varying degrees of authority being assigned to them. 

In another sense, however, the Eastern Orthodox view of the councils is peculiar to the East. One reason for this is that no later actions of any church, neither those actions that lay claim to the title "ecumenical" in Western dogmatics and canon law nor even the actions of the East itself since 787 at "provincial synods" nor the Eastern Orthodox "confessions" may be ranked on a level with the seven councils" (Credo: Historical and Theological Guide to Creeds and Confessions of Faith in the Christian Tradition (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2003), p. 413f). 

Only God knows the future. The day may come when a new Ecumenical Council is held and is received as being on the same level as the first seven, but that day has not come yet. The Church managed for nearly three centuries without an Ecumenical Council, and so having had Seven, the urgency for another is not as great as many would like to imagine.

Do the Orthodox See the Service of the Church as Being on the Same Level as Scripture?

Another claim Wallace makes is that we see the services as being on the same level as the Scriptures, and cites as an example an Akathist to St. Constantine the Great which states that St. Constantine was baptized by St. Sylvester of Rome, despite the fact that Eusebius and other contemporary writers stated that he was baptized by Eusebius of Nicomedia, who was later condemned as an Arian. He claims that this is an example of the Orthodox Church trying to re-write history to cover up uncomfortable facts.

First off, it is the Orthodox Church that preserved texts, like Eusebius' History of the Church, and so obviously the Church is not engaged in any cover up there. Secondly, the fact that a bishop who was in good standing with the Church at the time later was condemned as a heretic does not mean that those who were baptized by him were heretics, or that the baptism was invalid.

I am not sure where Wallace got the impression that we put the services of the Church on the same level as Scripture, but we do see universally received services as being part of the Tradition of the Church, as are the Scriptures. However, not all parts of the Tradition of the Church are on the same level of authority, nor would we affirm that everything that is true of the Scriptures is equally true of the services. Even within Scripture, not all the Scriptures are on the same level. The book of Esther, for example, is not on the same level of authority as the Gospels -- though we would affirm that all Scripture is inspired and inerrant. 

When it comes to the services, not all services are on the same level of authority. Akathists, aside from the Akathist to the Mother of God, are not appointed to be served in the regular services of the Church. They are a popular genre, because they are easy for laymen to use on their own. However, most of them have not been endorsed by even a single local Orthodox Church, much less the entire Church. The texts of the liturgies of St. John Chrysostom, St. Basil the Great, and the Presanctified Liturgy are certain held in very high regard. Menaion services vary in their authority, because not all of them are used universally in the Church. But we would affirm that any service that is used universally does not contain doctrinal error, and they certainly do lay out our Faith. 

The principle of Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi -- which means "the rule (or law) of prayer is the rule of Faith," was first articulated (at least so far as we have it in writing) by St. Prosper of Aquitaine, who wrote:

"Let us consider the sacraments of priestly prayers, which having been handed down by the apostles are celebrated uniformly throughout the whole world and in every Catholic Church so that the law of praying might establish the law of believing" (Patrologia Latina 51:209-210).

And this stands to reason. I would encourage those who want to dig into this question to read the book "The Shape of the Liturgy," by Dom Gregory Dix. In that book he makes the compelling case that all the ancient Liturgies of the Church have a common order, that this order is rooted in Jewish worship, and so this order is apostolic in origin. It is not as if Christians in 350 would have looked over the shoulder of non-Christian Jews and would have started copying their forms of worship. The only time in Church history that Jewish forms of worship could have entered the Tradition of the Church is the time of the Apostles themselves. And so this is a clear example of Apostolic Tradition which has been preserved by the Church.

Does the Orthodox Church Anathematize All Protestants?

The Church certainly condemns Protestant heresies, but we do not pass judgment on individuals who are outside of the Church. Furthermore, when an anathema is proclaimed, unless it names specific people, it is not a judgment on any individual. There are many people in the Church who hold opinions that are heretical, but in most cases, this would simply be due to ignorance. If an Orthodox laymen stated something that was a condemned heresy, they would only be subject to an anathema, if they refused to be corrected. Anathemas and canons do not work like landmines, which go off on their own accord when someone tramples on them. Similarly, when you have a speed limit sign, the sign does not write you a ticket -- a police officer has to write you a ticket, and then you have an opportunity to dispute the ticket in court. Likewise, if someone says or does something contrary to a canon or an anathema, there are things that the authorities in the Church have to do to make the respective penalty apply to an individual.

This is made very clear in the most authoritative compilation of the Ecumenical Canons:

"We must know that the penalties provided by the Canons, such as deposition, ex- communication, and anathematization, are imposed in the third person according, to grammatical usage, there being no  imperative available. In such cases in order to express a command, the second person would be necessary. I am going to explain the matter better. The Canons command the council of living bishops to depose the priests, or to excommunicate them, or to anathematize laymen who violate the canons. Yet, if the council does not actually effect the deposition of the priests, or the excommunication, or the anathematization of laymen, these priests and laymen, are neither actually deposed, nor excommunicated, nor anathematized. They are liable to stand trial, however, judicially, here as touching deposition, excommunication, or anathematization, but there as touching divine vengeance. Just as when a king commands his slave to whip another who did something that offended him, if the slave in question fail to execute the king’s command, he will nevertheless be liable to trial for the whipping. So those silly men make a great mistake who say that at the present time all those in holy orders who have been ordained contrary to canons are actually deposed from office. It is an inquisitional tongue that foolishly twaddles thus without understanding that the command of canons, without the practical activity of the second person, or, more plainly speaking, of the council, remains unexecuted, since it does not act of itself and by itself immediately and before judgment. The Apostles themselves explain themselves in their c. XLVI unmistakably, since they do not say that any bishop or presbyter who accepts a baptism performed by heretics is already and at once actually in the state of having been deposed, but that they command that he be deposed, or, at any rate, that he stand trial, and, if it be proved that he did so, then “we command that he be stripped of holy orders by your decision,” they say" (D. Cummings, trans., The Rudder of the Orthodox Catholic Church: The Compilation of the Holy Canons, Saints Nicodemus and Agapius (West Brookfield, MA: The Orthodox Christian Educational Society, 1983), p. 5f [emphasis added]). 

Of course if someone is guilty of sin, either in terms of moral failures or of intentionally harboring heretical views and refusing the correction of the Church, even if the authorities in the Church never take any action either because they are kept hidden, or the authorities neglect their duties, this does not mean that the person will not go to hell as a result, if they refuse to repent. But this does mean, contrary to Donatism, that even if a bishop or priest is secretly living a double life for which they should be removed from the clergy, so long as the Church allows them to continue to function in their role, the sacraments they perform continue to have the grace of God, because the grace of God is not dependent on the worthiness of those performing them. Otherwise, one could never be sure that they ever received any sacrament.

Conclusion

I am sure Jason Wallace is a sincere man, but I would encourage him to spend more time studying what we actually believe, before he comments any further about the Orthodox Faith. He no doubt believes what his own church teaches. I am sure he thinks he is doing the work of the Lord by defending his own beliefs, and attacking what he perceives to be errors in the teachings of the Orthodox Church, but anyone who is familiar with what we believe cannot fail to notice how frequently he fails to understand even some of the most basic teachings of our Faith. 

For more information, see also:

Are Ecumenical Councils Infallible?

Sola Scriptura

The Inerrancy of Scripture

St. John of Shanghai, the Moscow Patriarchate, and Other Local Orthodox Churches

I recently participated in a discussion with an Old Calendarist, and several issues came up that I was not able to fully respond to in the course of the discussion. I intend to write a series of responses on various issues that were raised, but the first one I want to cover is the question of how St. John of Shanghai viewed the Moscow Patriarchate, and other local Orthodox Churches.

The reason why this matters is that those who have gone into schism with the various "True Orthodox" groups try to argue that the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (ROCOR) today has changed its positions on the key issues that resulted in ROCOR being functionally independent during the time of the Soviet Union. However, the evidence shows that the position that ROCOR takes today is the same position that St. John of Shanghai took. And St. John of Shanghai is not just a guy with an opinion. He was a very prominent bishop of ROCOR during his lifetime, and he is now universally venerated as a Saint by everyone who is Orthodox. Now, it is certainly true that there were people in ROCOR who took more extreme views, but unless someone wants to argue that St. John was a modernist, ecumenist, or a Sergianist, they cannot credibly argue that the positions he took were betrayals of ROCOR.

St. John was a monarchist, he was very conservative, and was a staunch defender of the Faith and Traditions of the Church, but unlike the extremists, he was not a sectarian or schismatic. He consistently took a charitable stance when it came to the various parts of the Russian Church which became separated by their differing responses to the Soviet attempts to destroy the Church. He likewise maintained good relations with other Orthodox local Churches.

During my roughly 35 years in ROCOR, I have had the opportunity to get to know three people who knew St. John well, and none of them separated from ROCOR when it reconciled with the Moscow Patriarchate, nor did they hold the extreme views these folks are advocating.

St. John was one of several Russian Bishops who were in China during and after World War II. At the end of the war, not having had any communications with ROCOR's central authority for a very long time, and having been led to believe that ROCOR had ceased to function, St. John, along with the other bishops in China, agreed to come under the authority of the newly elected Patriarch Alexei I of Moscow. Obviously, had he believed the Moscow Patriarchate was a graceless Church, he would never have done this. 

Here is what St. John had to say about this at the time, as quoted in the article The Russian Church Abroad in Hong Kong, by Archpriest Dionysy Pozdnyaev:

"The Diocese of Peking had to resolve the question of its jurisdictional status independently. Saint John of Shanghai, Vicar Bishop of the Diocese of Peking, and a lawyer by training and expert in canon law, convinced Archbishop Victor, his ruling bishop, to adopt the new jurisdiction. On July 31, 1945, he wrote to him:

“[…] Following the decision of the Diocese of Harbin, and in view of the absence, for a number of years, of information about the Synod of the Church Abroad, any other solution would make our diocese entirely independent and autocephalous. There is no canonical foundation for this type of independence since there are no doubts as to the canonicity of the newly recognized Patriarch. Relations with the [Moscow –tr.] church hierarchy are also possible, with the result that the Decree of November 7, 1920 is not applicable. At present, there are no grounds for us to remain a self-governing diocese, and we ought to follow the same course as the Diocese of Harbin. The name of the Chair of the Synod of the Church Abroad ought still to be commemorated at services, since, according to the 14th Canon of the First-Second Local Council, one may not arbitrarily cease commemorating the name of his Metropolitan Bishop. The commemoration of the name of the Patriarch, however, […] must be immediately introduced throughout the whole diocese by a Decree of yours.”

Archbishop Victor agreed with Saint John’s proposal and, in August 1945, he sent a request by telegram to Patriarch Alexis of Moscow asking to receive him and Bishop John into his jurisdiction. The Hong Kong Deanery followed its ruling bishop in adopting the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate."

For some historical context, it should be noted that the leader of the Soviet Union at this time was no less than Joseph Stalin, who had severely persecuted the Church, and murdered millions for their faith in the attempt to remove all religion from the USSR, although World War II forced him to reverse course, and after the war, the Church was given a level of freedom it had not had in a long time.

St. John began immediately to commemorate Patriarch Alexei I, but a response by the Patriarch to Archbishop Victor's petition was delayed by the effects of the war. And in the meantime, St. John received a telegram informing him that ROCOR had not ceased to exist, and so he alone, among all the bishops in China decided to resume commemorating Metropolitan Anastasy of ROCOR as his primate, as had been the previous practice.

He explained his change in decision to his flock as follows:

“The governing authorities of the Church Abroad have seen fit that the Church should continue to take responsibility for our pastoral care, and has notified us of this fact as well as informing His Eminence the Head of the Mission of it. Consequently, we do not consider it possible to take any decisions in relation to this question without the instruction and approval of the authorities of the Russian Church Abroad. As late as the Council of 1938, in which we took part, it was decreed that when the time will come for us to return to our native land, the hierarchs of the Church Abroad should not act separately, but rather the entire Church Abroad should present an account to an All-Russian Council of the acts it has performed while living in forced separation. Communications concerning the restoration of full canonical communion with the Moscow Patriarchate, received by Archbishop Victor on Great Saturday in response to his request to His Holiness Patriarch Alexis last August (1945), were a cause of sincere joy for us, since they allowed us a glimpse of the beginnings of mutual understanding between two parts of the Russian Church divided by a border, and of the possibility of mutual support of two centers that gather the Russian people together as one, inside and outside our Fatherland. If they can strive together towards a single common goal and act separately according to the conditions in which each finds itself, the Church inside Russia and the Church abroad will be better able to achieve both their common aims and the particular ones that each has, up to the point when a complete reunion will be made possible. At present, the Church inside Russia has to heal the wounds that militant atheism has inflicted upon it and free itself from the bonds that are impeding the fullness of its internal and external functioning. The goal of the Church Abroad is to prevent the children of the Russian Orthodox Church from becoming dispersed, and to preserve the spiritual values that they have brought with them from their homeland, as well as to spread Orthodoxy in the countries where they are living. This was indeed the purpose of the acts of the Synod of Hierarchs of the Church Abroad that took place in the city Munich, under Allied occupation, on the anniversary of the defeat of Germany” (Quoted in "The Russian Church Abroad in Hong Kong," Emphasis added).

Archbishop Victor issued a decree relieving St. John of his duties, but St. John announced in a sermon that he had no intention of abiding by that decree. He took seriously his oath of obedience to the Synod of ROCOR at the time of his consecration as a bishop, and so said:

“I will submit to this decree only if it can be demonstrated to me, by way of Sacred Scripture and the law of any one country, that oath-breaking is a virtue and keeping one’s oath is a grave sin.”

So he did not take this action because he came to realize that the Moscow Patriarchate was a pseudo-Church. In fact, he stated just the opposite, but he was obliged to not enter into union with the Moscow Patriarchate, apart from the Synod he had pledged his obedience to.

The extremists argue that St. John was isolated in China, and so he was unaware of the crimes of the Soviets and the actions of the Moscow Patriarchate. This seems rather unlikely, since he was living near the central headquarters of ROCOR until he was consecrated a bishop in 1934 and sent to China. But in any case, he had many years to learn whatever he might not have known about these issues before he wrote his "History of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad," in 1960, and in that text, he doesn't even use the words "Sergianism" or "Sergianist." In fact, Fr. Peter Perekrestov noted he never used those words in any of his writings:

“In no article, no homily that has come down to us, no letter of which we are aware, did Holy Hierarch St John (Maximovitch) ever use the term “Sergianists"” ("The Church's Helmsman, Both Then and Now, is the Almighty Spirit of God," by Archpriest Peter Perekrestov).

What we find instead are the most charitable interpretations of the actions of Metropolitan Sergius. Here are all the paragraphs in that text in which he mentions Metropolitan Sergius:

After the death of Patriarch Tikhon, the Russian Church Abroad acknowledged the Locum Tenens of the Patriarchal Throne, Metropolitan Peter of Krutitsk; however, he was soon arrested and banished by the Soviet regime for his firmness and his unwillingness to make concessions to the atheist regime. The Church in Russia and abroad continued to regard him as her head and his name was commemorated at Divine services in all churches. Then Metropolitan Sergius became his Substitute. At this time certain differences arose among the Russian hierarchs abroad, and an appeal was made to Metropolitan Sergius with the request that he make a decision on them. This allowed Metropolitan Sergius to express his view on the situation of the part of the Russian Church that was abroad. Addressing himself in a general letter to the bishops abroad on September 12, 1926, he wrote:

"My dear hierarchs, you ask me to be a judge in a matter of which I am entirely unaware... Can the Moscow Patriarch, as a general principle, be the leader of the ecclesiastical life of Orthodox emigrants?... The good of church affairs themselves demands that you, by a common consent, should establish for yourselves a central organ of church administration which is sufficiently authoritative to resolve all misunderstandings and differences and which has the power to put a stop to any misunderstanding and every disobedience without appealing for our support..." In this letter, which is filled with love for his fellow bishops abroad, he says: "We shall scarcely see each other again in the present life, but I may hope by God's mercy that we shall see each other in the future life."

This was the last letter of Metropolitan Sergius in which he freely wrote that which within himself he acknowledged as true. Imprisonment, threats with regard not only to himself but to the entire Russian Church as well, and the false promises of the Soviet regime broke him: within a few months after his letter, so full of love, to the hierarchs abroad, which was as it were his testament before his loss of inner freedom, Metropolitan Sergius issued a Declaration in which he recognized the Soviet regime as a genuinely lawful Russian regime which was concerned for the people's good, a regime "whose joys are our joys, and whose sorrows are our sorrows" (Declaration of July 16/29, 1927). At the same time, in accordance with the promise he had given the Soviet regime, Metropolitan Sergius demanded of the clergy abroad their signatures of loyalty to the Soviet regime.

This document was in complete contradiction with his view expressed nine months before this, that the Moscow Patriarchate could not direct the ecclesiastical life of emigrants. If for those in Russia who were undergoing terrible sufferings there might be conditions that would mitigate their moral capitulation to the cruel regime — just as the church canons at the time of the [ancient] persecutions mitigated the penances of those who renounced Christ after terrible sufferings — nonetheless, for those who were in freedom and comparative safety there were no mitigating circumstances or justification or even meaning at all in such a signature. It can hardly be that Metropolitan Sergius himself believed that anyone abroad would submit to his Ukase, and he did this clearly in order to fulfill the demand of the Soviet regime and thus remove responsibility from himself.

However, Metropolitan Evlogy with his vicars and Bishop Benjamin of Sebastopol did indeed submit to the Ukase. Meanwhile, in Russia itself there were courageous confessors from among the imprisoned bishops and likewise among those who remained in freedom, who declared to Metropolitan Sergius that they did not accept the concordat with the atheist regime that was persecuting the Church. Many of them even broke off communion in prayer with Metropolitan Sergius as one who had "fallen" and had entered into league with the atheists, and a part of the clergy and laity in Russia followed them. The atheist Soviet regime cruelly persecuted such steadfast hierarchs and their followers. The Soviet regime, while not fulfilling the promises to Metropolitan Sergius which had caused him to make the concordat with it, at the same time deprived of freedom, banished, and even executed many of those who did not recognize the Declaration of Metropolitan Sergius.

Among those who did not recognize Metropolitan Sergius' Declaration of loyalty to the Soviet regime were the Locum Tenens of the Patriarchal Throne, Metropolitan Peter (whose Substitute Metropolitan Sergius was), Metropolitans Agathangel of Yaroslavl and Cyril of Kazan (who had been indicated by Patriarch Tikhon as possible Locum Tenenses of the Patriarchal Throne in case Peter should be unable to exercise his office), Metropolitan Joseph of Petrograd, and many other well-known hierarchs. Indeed, Metropolitan Sergius himself had thought exactly like them not long before his signing of the Declaration for the reasons already mentioned.

The Declaration of Metropolitan Sergius brought no benefit to the Church. The persecutions not only did not cease, but they even increased. To the other accusations which the Soviet regime made against clergy and laymen was added yet one more — not recognizing the Declaration. At the same time churches without number were closed throughout Russia. Within a few years almost all churches were destroyed or put to various other uses. Whole provinces remained without a single church. Concentration camps and places of forced labor held thousands of clergy, a significant part of which never regained freedom, being executed there or dying from excessive labors and deprivations. Even the children of priests and all believing laymen were persecuted.

The Russian Church Outside of Russia was spiritually one with these persecuted believers. Except for the several hierarchs already mentioned, all the rest, headed by Metropolitan Anthony, flatly refused to give signatures of loyalty to the Soviet regime, and they came out with an open denunciation. Moreover, Metropolitan Anthony, who very much loved Metropolitan Sergius and inwardly suffered for his beloved disciple and friend, wrote him personally a letter of admonition, which probably never reached him or in any case was no longer able now to influence his behavior.

Like the bishops and faithful inside Russia who did not recognize the Declaration of Metropolitan Sergius, so too the part of the Russian Church that was abroad did not cease to belong to the Russian Church. They all, just as before, remained in spiritual union with the Locum Tenens of the Patriarchal Throne, Metropolitan Peter, who was languishing in a desert place in the far north. His name was commemorated in all Russian churches abroad. In all these churches there were also prayers for the suffering brethren in the Homeland, for their deliverance from the atheist regime, and for the repose of those who had been martyred by the regime. Meanwhile, Metropolitan Evlogy, who had given the signature of loyalty to the Soviet regime which had been demanded by Metropolitan Sergius, was invited to a service of prayer in England for the suffering Russian Church, and he took part in it. This was interpreted as an act against the Soviet regime, and he was forbidden to serve by Metropolitan Sergius. Not wishing to submit to this decree, but at the same time not wishing to acknowledge his guilt before the Russian Synod Abroad, Metropolitan Evlogy asked the Patriarch of Constantinople to receive him and his flock temporarily into the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, which was done.

Notwithstanding the departure from the Church Abroad — and, one may say, from the Russian Church altogether — of Metropolitans Evlogy and Platon with their followers, the Russian Orthdox Church Outside of Russia remains the free part of the Russian Church. She has enjoyed the attention of the Most Holy Patriarchs and the other hierarchs of her sister Orthodox Churches. Patriarch Varnava of Serbia showed special attention to her and strove to return to the Russian Church Abroad those bishops who had separated from her, and he was likewise an intermediary between her and Metropolitan Sergius, whom he respected and loved as the rector of his days in the Academy. However, soon he had to become convinced that Metropolitan Sergius was in the hands of the Church's enemies and that his actions were harmful to her, concerning which he wrote to him directly.

...At first this change did not bring any alterations in the situation of the Russian Church Abroad. She continued to exist and act as before, being governed by the "Decree" which had been accepted under the chairmanship of Patriarch Varnava, and everywhere she enjoyed externally all her former rights. In 1937, the Locum Tenens, Metropolitan Peter of Krutitsk, died in banishment, and apparently not long before this, or soon afterwards, Metropolitan Cyril of Kazan, who was supposed to become Locum Tenens after Metropolitan Peter, likewise died in banishment. The Patriarchal Synod of Moscow, composed of bishops invited by Metropolitan Sergius, confirmed the latter as Locum Tenens of the Patriarchal Throne. At this time the Russian Church inside Russia was in a state of total desolation. There were only twenty bishops in freedom, and the majority of churches were closed, destroyed, or turned to some other use. Whole provinces and vast expanses had not a single church. Relics and wonderworking icons were taken to museums. The majority of the clergy that remained were in banishment, at forced labor, or lived concealing their rank, earning for themselves a pitiful living by any kind of work and only secretly celebrating services at the homes of faithful laymen.

At the same time Metropolitan Sergius, bound by his promise given to the Soviet regime, continued to affirm that there was no persecution against the Church in Russia. The Church Abroad, which was no longer subject to Metropolitan Sergius and his Synod, remained in her previous relationship to him, feeling herself to be spiritually one with the suffering Mother Church, and as before offering prayer for her and her suffering brethren" (Emphasis added).

There is one other letter by St. John that we have in English that addresses the question, from September 13, 1963:

If someone began to talk in Metropolitan Anthony’s  [First Hierarch of the ROCOR, Khrapovitskii] presence about “wrong actions by the Church,” he would stop them, pointing out that the actions of the hierarchy cannot be attributed to the Church, since the hierarchy is not the whole Church, even though it speaks on its behalf. On the See of Constantinople, [there sat] Paul the Confessor, Makedonios, Gregory the Theologian, John Chrysostom, Nestorios, Proclus, Flavian, Germanos. Some [of them] shone with holiness and Orthodoxy, others were heresiarchs, yet the Church remained Orthodox. During Iconoclasm, after the expulsion of Severinus, Nikephoros and others, not only their sees, but also the majority of episcopal ones were replaced by Arians. Other Churches did not even have communion with [the Byzantine Church], according to the testimony of the St. Paul, who abandoned heresy and the [patriarchal] throne, not wanting to have communion with the iconoclasts, but still the Church of Constantinople remained Orthodox, although part of the people and especially the guardsmen and officials were carried away into iconoclasm.

So, it is now understandable when the expression “Soviet Church” is used by ordinary people who are less familiar with church language, but it is not suitable for responsible and theological conversations. When the entire hierarchy of Southwestern Rusʹ embraced Uniatism [after the Brest union of 1596], the Church continued to exist in the person of the faithful Orthodox people, who, after much suffering, restored their hierarchy. Therefore, it is more correct to speak not of a “Soviet Church,” which cannot exist in the correct understanding of the word “Church,” but about the hierarchy that is in the service of the Soviet government. The attitude toward this hierarchy may be the same as toward other representatives of that government. Their rank gives them the opportunity to act with great authority and replace the voice of the suffering Russian Church and misleads those who think to learn from them about the actual position of the Church in Russia. Of course, among them there are also conscious traitors, and those who simply do not find the strength to fight the surrounding environment and went with the flow: this is a matter of their personal responsibility, but in general, it is the apparatus of the theomachist Soviet regime. While there is only one hierarchy in the liturgical area, for Grace acts independently of personal dignity, in the socio-political area this hierarchy serves is a cover for Soviet atheistic activities. Therefore, those abroad and those who join its ranks become deliberate accomplices of that power. ("Did the Byzantine Church Cease to be the Church During Iconoclasm?" Emphasis added).

It is clear from this letter that St. John did not think people in the west should voluntarily join the Moscow Patriarchate, under the circumstances of the time, but it is also clear that he did not think the Russian Church that the bishops of the MP headed was a false Church. The bishops of the MP had varying degrees of responsibility, for which they would have to account to God, but that the grace of the Church was not dependent on the worthiness of the bishops. To say otherwise is to espouse the heresy of Donatism.

The Donatist controversy arose at the end of the last Roman persecution. There was a bishop in North Africa that the Donatists accused of being a traditor, which was a person who handed books or sacred vessels over to the Romans to be destroyed. The bishop in question denied this charge, but the Church determined that it was heretical to question the sacraments of a bishop in good standing, even if he in fact was guilty of such sins, and lied about them to boot, because the grace of the Sacraments do not depend on the worthiness of those who perform them -- it depends on the Church having authorized them to perform them. Were this not the case, one could never be sure that they ever received grace-filled Sacraments, because they could never know what secret sins a bishop or priest might be harboring within themselves. And so, until and unless a bishop is deposed from office, as long as he is acting on behalf of the Church, his sacraments have the grace of the Holy Spirit.

I have also come across two bishops who knew St. John, who both gave testimony to St. John's views on the Moscow Patriarchate:

Archbishop Anthony of Geneva:

"As far as the Moscow Patriarchate was concerned, Vladyka avoided extreme positions, witnessed by his letter to Fr Dimitri Dudko: “The late Archbishop John, whom we all respected and loved, would say ‘the official Church in Russia, of course, possesses grace, though one bishop or another might conduct themselves poorly.’” (Quoted in "A Brief Biography of Archbishop Anthony (Bartoshevich, +1993) of Geneva and Western Europe," by Bernard le Caro).

Bishop Basil Rodzianko:

"I thought that I would remain forever cut off from my parents and that I would be behind the Iron Curtain and never meet them, but then I suddenly left for Paris, after I had been released from a communist Yugoslav prison and, one might say, "advised" in quotation marks to leave Yugoslavia (this was after Tito had quarreled with Stalin). and in Paris itself he left the station - where? - to the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, and there I was offered to serve. And the first thing I said after the first meeting, the first tears of mutual tears, I said openly and directly to Vladyka John, that I could not in my conscience throw a stone at the Russian Orthodox Church, as many did in the Diaspora, its Patriarch and its hierarchs. Do you know what he told me? He told me: "Every day at the proskomedia I commemorate Patriarch Alexy. He is the Patriarch. And our prayer still remains. By force of circumstances, we were cut off, but liturgically we are united. The Russian Church, like the entire Orthodox Church, is united in the Eucharist, and we are with her and in her. And administratively, for the sake of our flock and for the sake of certain principles, we have to follow this path, but this in no way violates our mysterious unity of the entire Church. Therefore, as a Serbian cleric, you can serve wherever you want – in the canonical Churches, of course – and come and serve with me." This is how the unforgettable Vladyka John Maximovich acted with me in his holiness, in his truly authentic blessed vision" (Machine translation of "About Vladyka John," by Bishop Basil Rodzianko, Emphasis added).

When it comes to how St. John viewed other local Orthodox Churches, we likewise see that he was always guided by charity. I know from Archbishop Peter (Loukianoff) of blessed memory that St. John had the practice on Holy Saturday, of visiting every Orthodox parish in San Francisco and venerating the Epitaphios (Plashchanitsa) that would have been in the center of every Church on that day. He clearly did not see these other jurisdictions, even ones with a checkered history with ROCOR (like the American Metropolia (which became the Orthodox Church in America), as false Churches.

While in France, Archbishop Peter told us the story of an elderly Russian couple that had met late in life, and had only one son, who was in the French Army, and had foolishly killed himself, playing Russian roulette. The parents were of course devastated. They attended a parish that was under the "Evlogians" (the Russian Exarchate), which had once been part of ROCOR, but went into schism, and joined the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Many in ROCOR considered them to be graceless schismatics. In any case, no sooner had the parents received the telegram with this devastating news, they heard a knock on the door, and St. John was there to console them. They never knew how he could have found out, because they had only just found out themselves, but St. John had spiritual insight that didn't require a telegram (see "Remembrances of St. John of Shanghai," by Archbishop Peter (Loukianoff), around the 42 minute mark).

We know that St. John held such views about the "Evlogians" from no less than Metropolitan Philaret (Voznesensky), who held very different views on them, as well as on the Moscow Patriarchate, and the OCA):

"And I do not understand the position adopted in this matter by the late Vladyka John [St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco -ed.], a true servant and man of God. Why did he not “dot the i’s”  from the very beginning and explain to the Evlogians all the unrighteousness of their path and position!" ("A Letter of Met. Philaret to Mother Magdalina," Emphasis added).

Contrary to the extremists, St. John was not in favor of breaking off communion with other local Churches, even when they were plagued by serious theological or canonical problems:

"In 1939, in his report "The Status of the Orthodox Church after the War", St. John considered that: "We (the faithful of the Russian Church Abroad – Protopriest P.P.) must stand firmly on the foundation of the Church’s canons and not with those who are straying from them. In former times for the exposure of canonical irregularities in a Local Church canonical communion was broken with her. The Russian Church Abroad cannot act in this way, in so far as her status has not been clearly defined. For this reason she must not break communion with the other Churches, if they do not take this step first. But, while maintaining communion, {the Church Abroad} must not remain silent over violations against the righteousness of the Church" (Bishop John of Shanghai, "The State of the Orthodox Church After the War," Acts of the Second All-Diaspora Council, Belgrade, 1939, p. 400. Quoted in "St. John, Wonderworker of Shanghai and San Francisco and His View of the Russian Church in the 20th Century," by Archpriest Peter Perekrestov).

The problems the Russian Church faced were in many ways unprecedented, and not everyone in the Russian Church agreed on how to respond. And divisions were intentionally stoked by the Soviets who wanted to divide the Russian Church, so it could more easily destroy it. In Russia itself, you had the official Church under the Moscow Patriarchate, the Catacomb Church, which largely considered the MP to be traitors, and thus without grace, and then you had those who took a middle road -- not accepting the policies of the MP, but also not condemning it entirely. The Catacomb Church blamed the MP for their persecution. Many in the MP, who were also suffering under persecution, had animosity towards those in the Catacomb Church. Outside of Russia, there were a couple of periods in which most Russian bishops were united, but we ended up with at least four groups: Those under the MP, ROCOR, the Paris Exarchate, and the American Metropolia (which became the OCA). Unfortunately, there was a lot of animosity between all of these groups -- and again, this was exactly what the Soviets wanted.

St. John of Shanghai was one of those people who was able to view people that he disagreed with charitably. He recognized that most were trying to do what they thought best, under the circumstances, and so was not quick to condemn. It is understandable, that people like Metropolitan Philaret, whose father died in a Soviet gulag would have a hard time taking a charitable view of the Moscow Patriarchate (even though his father was himself a bishop of the Moscow Patriarchate). But on the feast of the Transfiguration this year we will mark 34 years since the Soviet Union came to an end. Most of the extremists I see getting worked up about condemning the Moscow Patriarchate are converts with no family who were murdered by the Communists, and most are not even old enough to remember when the Soviet Union was still in existence. 

I am old enough to remember the Soviet Union, and my wife has many family members who were murdered by Communists (which nearly included her father) -- though not in the Soviet Union -- they were murdered by the Chinese Communists, and not because of religious issues. This, however, goes to show that Communists didn't need "Sergianists" to enable them to engage in mass murder. This is what Communists do when they take power. 

After more than three decades, it is time for us to try to view what happened during the Soviet period with some historical perspective and dispassion, but also with Christian charity, as did St. John. The Soviets tried to destroy the Church. They failed.

О которых не молится ни один из верующих

Original English Text

Прерванная традиция

Мы с женой православные уже 34 года, но мы оба из неправославных семей, и поскольку за эти годы мы потеряли родственников, мы стали часто использовать Акафист за упокой усопших. Этот Акафист возносится за всех умерших, как православных, так и неправославных, христиан и нехристиан. Он особенно возносится за тех, кто умер при трагических обстоятельствах, таких как самоубийство. За тех, кто умер без покаяния, тех, кто умер в юном возрасте и т. д. Я нашёл в нём большой источник утешения.

Но есть в этом Акафисте одна строка, которая напоминает трагедию иного рода. Заключительная молитва начинается так: «Боже духов и всякия плоти, смерть поправый и диавола упразднивый, и живот миру Твоему даровавый! Сам Господи, упокой души усопших рабов Твоих...» И далее следует длинный список категорий усопших, о которых молятся, и среди них мы молимся «о всех, кто повелел и просил нас молиться о них, о которых нет молящегося из верующих...»

Когда я молюсь этими словами, я не могу не думать о многих пожилых россиянах, которых я знал на протяжении многих лет, у которых нет потомков, которые были бы активными членами Православной Церкви. Хотя они и происходили из семей, которые сохраняли веру на протяжении многих веков, эта длинная череда верных христиан пришла к трагическому концу, когда они не смогли передать веру своим собственным детям и внукам.

Как это происходит?

В случаях, которые я наблюдал на протяжении многих лет, проблема, как правило, заключалась не в том, что родители не пытались передать им Веру. Они водили своих детей в Церковь. Они пытались научить их Вере так, как они сами ее получили от своих родителей. Проблема была в основном в двух вещах. Во-первых, я думаю, что они недооценили некоторые токсичные аспекты американской культуры, особенно в том, что касается государственного образования в Соединенных Штатах. И эта проблема свойственна не только русским, но иммигранты в целом более склонны считать, что наши школы на самом деле нацелены на предоставление хорошего образования, и они часто не осознают, насколько враждебно школы стали относиться ко всему, что хоть отдаленно напоминает традиционное христианское мировоззрение. Но другая проблема — это неспособность понять, что их дети, как правило, вырастут, не понимая русский язык так же хорошо, как их родители, а следующее поколение, как правило, вырастет, вообще не понимая русского языка. Не говоря уже о церковнославянском, который даже носителям русского языка трудно понять, если они выросли, не посещая богослужений.

Когда русские отправились в Китай после большевистской революции, они смогли основать русские колонии, которые в значительной степени воспроизвели лучшие аспекты русской культуры, но это стало возможным благодаря тому факту, что ни один китаец не считал их или их детей китайцами, даже если они родились там и могли говорить по-китайски как местные жители. Америка, с другой стороны, является очень гостеприимной культурой, и к людям, которые являются иммигрантами, но становятся гражданами и принимают Америку, уже относятся как к американцам. И их дети, следовательно, вырастают, считая себя американцами, и все остальные тоже думают о них как об американцах. Но вместе с этой гостеприимной чертой американской культуры присутствует много тонкого давления, направленного на ассимиляцию. Хотя страны Западной Европы более гостеприимны к иммигрантам, чем раньше, у них нет ничего похожего на ту динамику, которая есть у нас здесь. Следствием всего этого является то, что семье очень трудно поддерживать использование языка, отличного от английского. Я не против семей, пытающихся сохранить передать своим новым поколениям второй язык. Мы делали это в моей семье. Моя жена китаянка. Наши дети выросли, говоря на китайском языке. Мои внуки также растут, говоря на китайском языке. Однако моя младшая дочь не говорит на китайском так же хорошо, как моя старшая дочь, и мои внуки вряд ли будут говорить на нем так же хорошо, как их родители.

Я, конечно же, надеюсь, что они будут говорить на китайском так же хорошо или лучше, и я думаю, что стоит приложить усилия, чтобы плыть против течения и воспитывать детей, говорящих на втором языке, потому что это значительно облегчит им изучение любого другого языка в будущем. Но реальность такова, что это требует больших усилий, и большинство семей вообще не будут прилагать усилий, необходимых для передачи второго языка. Не говоря уже о том, чтобы вырастить детей, которые понимают этот второй язык так же хорошо, как носитель языка.

Когда я стал православным, я состоял в приходе, где говорили по-английски, за исключением редких ектений или праздничных тропарей на славянском. Но когда мы с женой вернулись в Хьюстон, где мы и встретились, единственным приходом РПЦЗ во всем штате Техас в то время был приход Св. Владимира, где в Литургии в основном использовался славянский язык. Если бы это был первый приход, который я посетил до того, как стал православным, не уверен, что я бы обратился. Просто потому, что было бы трудно следить за службами на языке, которого я не знал. 

Но, приняв веру, мы пошли туда, и в какой-то момент я преподавал в классе воскресной школы. К тому времени я немного выучил славянский и подумал, что будет полезно научить детей некоторым основным славянским фразам из служб. Я начал с того, что спросил их: «Знает ли кто-нибудь, что означает «Господи, помилуй»? Никто из них не знал. А если вы не знаете, что означает «Господи, помилуй» (что значит «Господи, помилуй»), то вы, скорее всего, ничего не знаете по-славянски.

Моя семья посещала церковь Святого Владимира около шести лет, и за это время я начал замечать закономерность. Дети добросовестно приходили со своими родителями, но когда они становились подростками, я начинал видеть их только изредка, если вообще видел. Очевидно, они становились достаточно взрослыми, чтобы сопротивляться посещениям церкви, и их родители в конце концов уставали и переставали заставлять их ходить. Я знаю семьи, которые ходили в церковь не пропуская служб, и во многих случаях их дети также добросовестно посещали церковь, но их внуков, как правило, мы уже не видели в храме. Были некоторые исключения, но эти исключения были редки.

Вот, собственно, почему я так упорно стремился основать приход с преподаванием на английском языке. У меня были собственные дети, о которых нужно было заботиться, и я отказывался смотреть, как мои дети растут, не понимая служб, и увидеть, как они уходят из Церкви, когда я больше не смогу заставить их ходить в Церковь. А так, слава Богу, все мои потомки — активные православные христиане, и я сделаю все возможное, чтобы так и оставалось.

Это верно, что проблема токсичной антихристианской культуры, которая стала доминировать в Америке, может быть причиной отпадения некоторых детей от Веры, потому что вы можете наблюдать, как это происходит по всему религиозному спектру в стране. Но когда вы видите, что к третьему поколению от церкви отходят почти 100% детей, то проблема заключается не только в токсичной культуре. Я думаю, это можно объяснить только тем, что многие из наших приходов не смогли перейти на использование английского в качестве основного языка на богослужениях.

Что нам с этим делать?

Проблема иммигрантских церквей и языка не является уникальной для православия. Когда я встретил свою жену, она посещала китайскую баптистскую церковь. И китайские баптистские церкви столкнулись с теми же проблемами. Они существуют, потому что есть китайцы, которые не говорят на английском как на своем родном языке, и поэтому, естественно, хотят ходить в церкви, где службы проходят на их языке. Но эти церкви пришли к пониманию того, что второе и третье поколения их членов не будут хорошо понимать китайский язык, и если они хотят выжить, им придется начать переходить на английский (см. «Этнические церкви добавляют английский для 2-го и 3-го поколений», Baptist Press, 2019).

Русская Православная Церковь Заграницей, членом которой я являюсь уже более трех десятилетий, достигла большого прогресса в использовании английского языка за то время, что я в ней нахожусь, — большего прогресса, чем я мог бы надеяться в 90-х годах. Но у нас все еще есть приходы, которые упорно продолжают использовать исключительно славянский язык, и это проблема. Это проблема не только потому, что это препятствие для людей, которые могут захотеть обратиться в веру, как это сделал я, но это проблема даже если бы единственной нашей целью было удержать детей русских в вере их родителей. Я не думаю, что каждый приход должен быть в первую очередь сосредоточен на привлечении новообращённых, хотя считаю, что все они должны быть приветливы к ним. Однако самой первой целью каждого прихода должно быть передать веру своим собственным детям. И если бы РПЦЗ удалось сохранить хотя бы половину детей, которые родились в ней после Второй мировой войны, мы были бы гораздо более большей церковью, чем сегодня. На самом деле, если бы не новая иммиграция, многие наши приходы давно бы закрылись.

Как минимум, я думаю, что каждый приход должен проводить половину служб на английском языке. Другое решение этой проблемы — проводить параллельные службы, одну на английском и одну на славянском. Те приходы, которые это делают, также проводят объединенные службы, и поэтому дети, растущие в таких приходах, будут слышать службы на английском языке, по крайней мере иногда, и, таким образом, по крайней мере, будут знать, что есть возможность проводить службы на их родном языке. 

Наш приход был основан как англоязычный, но поскольку у нас сейчас много русских и украинцев, мы проводим славянскую литургию раз в месяц по субботам. Если бы не было другого прихода РПЦЗ в зоне досягаемости, я бы, вероятно, чувствовал себя обязанным хотя бы немного использовать славянский язык в наших регулярных службах. Я полностью понимаю желание русских молиться на языке своих сердец, и христианская любовь должна побуждать нас стараться быть уступчивыми друг другу, но любовь к нашим детям также должна побуждать нас подходить к этим вопросам такими способами, которые, скорее всего, действительно сработают как в сохранении веры наших детей, так и в общении с теми, кто еще не является православным вокруг нас.

Я не виню приезжающих сюда русских иммигрантов-мирян за то, что они не понимают необходимости использования английского языка на наших богослужениях, но те из нас, кто прожил здесь достаточно долго, чтобы увидеть, к чему это привело за последние 75 лет, должны начать поступать иначе, чем мы делали раньше. Потому что мы уже знаем, что приходы, использующие исключительно славянский язык, — это верный путь к потере наших детей для Веры. И нет ничего важнее, чем предотвратить это, не повторяя ошибок прошлого в будущем и наблюдая, как лучшая часть еще одного или двух поколений наших детей уходит из Церкви. 

Обновление: Обновление: Кто-то прислал мне текст проповеди святителя Николая (Велимировича), которая имеет отношение к вопросам, затронутым выше. Эта проповедь была произнесена где-то между 1946 годом (когда он прибыл в Соединенные Штаты) и 1956 годом (когда он скончался), и поэтому он сказал эти вещи по крайней мере 68 лет назад, но они показывают, что даже тогда эти проблемы возникали и нуждались в решении. Вот, в частности, что он говорит ранних иммигрантах, которые принесли Православие в Соединенные Штаты:

«Увы, последнее из этих старых православных поколений быстро уходит. Их сыновья и внуки, их дочери и внучки теперь выходят на поле. И это новое поколение родилось в Америке. Они хорошо говорят по-английски, но мало или совсем не говорят по-гречески, по-сербски, по-русски, по-румынски, по-сирийски или по-албански. И неудивительно: они учились в американских школах, многие из них служили в армии США, они выросли в соответствии с американскими стандартами жизни, их сердца не разделены между двумя странами. Они по природе американцы и намерены оставаться американцами. Соответственно, у них есть некоторые требования по отношению к Церкви своих отцов.

Они хотят, чтобы английский заменил национальные языки в церковных службах. Они желают слышать проповеди на английском языке. Это законное желание. Наши мудрые священники каждой национальной православной церкви в этой стране уже проповедуют как на английском, так и на своем национальном языке. Они находятся в трудном положении в настоящее время, поскольку они должны, с одной стороны, быть внимательными к пожилым людям (старым поколениям мам и пап), которые плохо понимают английский, а с другой стороны, они готовы отвечать желаниям и нуждам молодых поколений. В этом вопросе я думаю, что эволюция лучше революции, поскольку Церковь является матерью и старых, и молодых» (Святитель Николай Велимирович о Православии в Америке и его будущем).

None Among the Believing

Русский перевод

Failed Handoff

My wife and I have been Orthodox for 34 years now, but we both come from families that were not Orthodox, and so as we have lost family members over the years, we have come to use the Akathist for the Repose of the Departed a lot. This Akathist prays for all who have died, both Orthodox and Non-Orthodox, Christian and Non-Christian. It specifically prays for those who have died under tragic circumstances, such as suicide, those who died without repentance, those who died in their youth, etc. I have found it to be a great source of consolation.

But there is one line in this Akathist that brings to mind a tragedy of a different kind. The final prayer begins: "O God of spirits and of all flesh, Who hast trampled down death and overthrown the devil and given life to Thy world!  Do Thou Thyself, O Lord, give rest to the souls of Thy departed servants...." And then it runs through a long list of categories of the departed that are being prayed for, and among them, we pray "for all who enjoined and asked us to pray for them, for whom there is none among the believing to pray for them..."

When I pray these words I cannot but think of many elderly Russians I have known over the years who have no descendants who are still active members of the Orthodox Church. Though they came from families that maintained the faith for many centuries, that long line of faithful Christians came to a tragic end when they failed to successfully pass on the faith to their own children and grandchildren.

How Does This Happen?

In the cases that I have observed over the years, the problem has not generally been that the parents made no attempt to pass on the Faith. They took their children to Church. They tried to teach them the Faith as they had received it from their own parents. The problem has been primarily two things. First, I think they have underestimated some of the toxic aspects of American culture, particularly as it has affected public education in the United States -- and that is a problem that is not unique to Russians, but immigrants are more prone to assume our schools are actually focused on providing a good education, and they are often unaware of how hostile they have become to anything remotely like a traditional Christian worldview. But the other problem is a failure to understand that their children will generally grow up not understanding Russian as well as their parents, and the next generation will generally grow up without understanding Russian at all -- not to mention Church Slavonic, which is difficult for even native speaking Russians to understand if they did not grow up attending the services.

When Russians went to China after the Bolshevik Revolution, they were able to establish Russian colonies that largely reproduced the best aspects of Russian culture, but this was made possible by the fact that no Chinese would think of them or their children as Chinese, even if they were born there and could speak Chinese like a native. America, on the other hand is a very welcoming culture, and people who are immigrants, but who become citizens and embrace America are already treated as being Americans, and their children consequently grow up thinking of themselves as American, and with everyone else thinking of them as Americans too. But along with this welcoming feature of American culture comes a lot of subtle pressure to assimilate. Though western European countries are more welcoming than they used to be to immigrants, they do not have anything like the same dynamic that we have here. The consequence of all of this is that it is very difficult for a family to maintain the use of a language other than English.

I am not opposed to families trying to pass on a second language. We have done that in my family. My wife is Chinese. Our children grew up speaking Chinese. My grandchildren also have been growing up speaking Chinese. However, my younger daughter doesn't speak Chinese as well as my older daughter, and my grandchildren are not likely to speak it as well as their parents. I hope they do as well or better, and I think it is worth the effort to swim upstream, so to speak, and raise children to speak a second language because it makes it a lot easier for them to learn any other language down the road. But the reality is that this takes a lot of effort, and most families are not going to put forth the effort necessary to pass on a second language at all, much less are they likely to raise children who understand that second language as well as a native speaker.

When I became Orthodox, it was in a parish that used English aside from doing an occasional litany or festal troparion in Slavonic. But when my wife and I moved back to Houston, where we met, the only ROCOR parish in the entire state of Texas, at the time, was St. Vladimir, which used mostly Slavonic in the Liturgy. Had that been the first parish I visited before I became Orthodox, I am not sure that I would have converted... simply because it would have been hard to follow the services in a language I did not know. But having embraced the Faith, we went there, and at one point I taught a Sunday School class. I had learned some Slavonic by this time, and I thought it would be helpful to teach the children some basic Slavonic phrases from the services. I began by asking them "Does anyone know what "Gospodi pomiluj [Господи, помилуй]" means? None of them knew. And if you don't know what "Gospodi pomiluj" means (which is "Lord, have mercy"), you most likely don't know anything in Slavonic.

My family attended St. Vladimir for about six years, and during that time, I began to see a pattern. Children would faithfully come with their parents, but when they hit their teens, I would begin to see them only infrequently, if at all. Evidently, they got old enough to fight going to Church, and their parents would finally be worn down and stop making them go. I know of families that were in Church without fail, and in many cases, their children likewise were faithful in their attendance, but their grandchildren were generally nowhere to be seen. There were some exceptions, but those exceptions were rare.

This was, as a matter of fact, why I pushed as hard as I did to establish an English language parish. I had my own children to be concerned with, and I refused to watch my children grow up without understanding the services, and to see them walk away from the Church when I was no longer able to make them to go to Church. As it is, thanks be to God, all of my descendants are active Orthodox Christians, and as long as I have anything to say about it, I will do what I can to keep it that way.

While it is true that the problem of the toxic antichristian culture that has come to dominate America can be blamed for some of the children who fall away from the Faith -- because you can see this happen across the religious spectrum in this country. But when you see something close to 100% of the children falling away by the third generation, that is not just the toxic culture that is the problem. I think this can only be explained by the failure of so many of our parishes to transition into using English as a primary language in the services.

What Should We Do About It?

The problem of immigrant churches and language is not unique to Orthodoxy. When I met my wife, she was attending a Chinese Baptist church. And Chinese Baptist churches have had to navigate the same issues. They exist, because there are Chinese people who do not speak English as their primary language, and so naturally want to go to churches that have services in their language. But these Churches have come to realize that the second and third generations of their members will not understand Chinese well, and if they want to survive, they have to begin transitioning into English (See "Ethnic churches add English for 2nd & 3rd generations," Baptist Press, 2019).

The Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, which I have been a member of for more than three decades now, has made a lot of progress, when it comes to using English, during the time I have been in it -- more progress than I would have dared to hope for back in the 90's. But we still have parishes that persist in using Slavonic exclusively, and this is a problem. It is not just a problem because it is a barrier to people who might want to convert to the Faith like I did, but it is a problem if the only goal we had was to keep the children of Russians in the Faith. I don't think every parish needs to be primarily focused on reaching new converts, though I think they should all be welcoming to them, but the very first goal of every parish should be to pass the faith on to their own children. And if ROCOR had managed to keep even half of the children that were born into it since World War II, we would be a much larger jurisdiction than we are today. In fact, were it not for new immigration, many or our parishes would have closed a long time ago.

At a minimum, I think every parish should be doing half of the services in English. Another solution to this problem is having parallel services, one in English and one in Slavonic. Those parishes that do this also have combined services, and so children growing up in parishes like that would hear the services in English at least some of the time, and so would at least know that there was an option for having the services in their primary language. 

Our parish was established as an English language parish, but since we have a lot of Russians and Ukrainians now, we do a Slavonic Liturgy once a month on a Saturday. Were there not another ROCOR parish within a reasonable drive, I would probably feel obligated to do at least some Slavonic in our regular services. I completely understand the desire for Russians to want to pray in the language of their hearts, and Christian love should compel us to try to be accommodating of one another, but love for our children should also compel us to approach these questions in ways that are most likely to actually work in both preserving the faith our children, and reaching out to those who are not already Orthodox around us.

I don't blame Russian immigrant laymen who come here for not understanding the need for using English in our services, but those of us who have lived here long enough to see how this has played out over the past 75 years should start doing something different than we have been doing, because we know that parishes using Slavonic exclusively is a recipe for losing our children to the Faith, and there is nothing more important than preventing that by not repeating the mistakes of the past into the future, and seeing the better part of another generation or two of our children walk away from the Church. 

Update: Someone sent me the text of a sermon by St. Nikolai (Velimirovich) that is pertinent to the issues addressed above. This sermon was delivered sometime between 1946 (when he arrived in the United States) and 1956 (when he reposed), and so he said these things at least 68 years ago, but they do show that even back then, these issues were emerging, and were in need of being addressed. He says in part, speaking of the earlier immigrants who brought Orthodoxy to the United States:

"Alas, the last of these old Orthodox generations is rapidly passing away. Their sons and grandsons, and their daughters and granddaughters are now coming to the field. And this new generation is American born. They speak good English but little or no Greek, Serbian, Russian, Rumanian, Syrian or Albanian. And no wonder: They attended American schools, many of them served in the US army, they have grown in conformity with the American standard of living, their hearts are not divided between two countries. They are naturally Americans, and they intend to remain American. Accordingly, they have some demands respecting the Church of their fathers.

They want English to replace national languages in church services. They desire to hear sermons in English. This is a legitimate desire. Our wise priests of every national Orthodox Church in this country are already preaching in both English and in their respective national tongue. They are in a difficult position at present, for they have on one hand to be considerate of the elderly (elderly generations of Moms and Pops) who do not understand English well, and on the other hand they are willing to respond to the desire and need of the younger generations. In this matter I think evolution is better than revolution, for the Church is the mother of both the old and the young" (St Nikolai Velimirovich on Orthodoxy in America & Its Future).

Romans Chapter 1 & 2

We are currently doing a study of the Book of Romans via Google Meets, which I intend to post to our parish channel on YouTube. Unfortunately, I didn't hit the record button for the last session, which went back over a few things from chapter 1, and then covered chapter 2. Here is a summary of a few things covered in that session:

In our first session, we discussed the fact that St. Paul is largely concerned with the problem of the relations between Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians. In the second session, I pointed out how the expulsion of the Jews from Rome under Claudius probably forms the backdrop of this problem. Suetonius records that Claudius ordered all the Jews to leave Rome, because they were rioting over a certain "Chrestus." This most likely means that the Jews in Rome were having violent disagreements about whether Jesus Christ was the Messiah. So while all the Jewish Christians, including Ss. Priscilla and Aquila (cf. Acts 18:1-18), were gone, the Roman Church became a Gentile Church over night, but when Claudius died, the Jews were allowed to return, and so Jewish Christians, who had been running things in the Church would likely have had some difficulties adjusting to a now Gentile Church. We know from the final chapter of Romans that St. Paul knew many of these Jews, and no doubt heard about these problems from them, and so this was at least in large part the occasion for St. Paul writing this letter.

I also went back and talked a but about Romans1:17, because I was side tracked in first session, by my microphone problem, and so forgot to point out a few things.

Romans 1:17 says: 

"For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith."

This is a quotation from Habakkuk 2:4, which neither follows exactly the Septuagint or the Masoretic Hebrew text.

The Hebrew text of Habakkuk 2:4, as we now have it, reads:  

"Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith" (KJV)

The Septuagint Greek text reads:

"If he should draw back, my soul has no pleasure in him: but the just shall live by my faith" (Brenton LXX).

One other thing I pointed out is that one could translate the Hebrew text as the NET Bible does: 

"Look, the one whose desires are not upright will faint from exhaustion, but the person of integrity will live because of his faithfulness." 

St. Paul phrases the text in such a way that it could be taken in both senses -- that the righteous is justified by his faith, and by God's faithfulness. And it also could be understood to encompass both that the righteous man is justified by faith, and by being faithful. We will be getting into this in more detail later, when we talk about the relationship between faith and works.

On Romans Chapter 2, I have preached three sermons which cover some of the same ground I covered in session 2:

To the Jew first, and also to the Gentile (Romans 2:1-11)

Conscience (Romans 2:12-16)

Circumcision of the Heart (Romans 2:17-29)

You can also read St. John Chrysostom's Fifth and Sixth homilies, which cover Romans 2.

Should Orthodox Christians Vote? Two Contemporary Saints Answer

 

I often hear Orthodox Christians who are understandably frustrated with our political system make statements like: "Why should I vote? What difference does it make?" We have two contemporary saints that comment on the subject.

In the biography "Saint Paisios of Mount Athos," by Hieromonk Isaac (which I highly recommend), we find St. Paisios dealing with similar comments. When asked how to vote, he would say:

“Vote for the one you believe it is best; the one who loves God and our country.” 

But when he would hear the answer: "They are all the same, Father." he would reply:

"Well, look here. All olive trees are the same; all of them are affected by the same disease called dakos. However, some are affected 100% by it, others 80% and others 50%. Since we are in need of olive trees, we have to look for the ones that are affected the least. When we go to vote, we should always bear in mind two things: a) how much the candidate loves God and is thus a conscious member of the Church, and b) how much he loves his country and look solely after its interests and not his own. If someone uses another criterion to vote, he is acting out of self-interests and is not behaving like a true Christian. Later on, divine justice will allow him to pay for his mistake."

When this quote has been cited, the response some make is that we live in a Non-Orthodox country, and so don't have people who love God, like St. Paisios is referring to. But this brings us to the second contemporary saint who commented on this subject, and said almost the same thing, but was speaking about American elections. The Elder Ephraim has not been officially glorified yet, but he undoubtedly will be. Back during the 2008 presidential election, a group of people asked him how they should vote. A person who knew the Elder (whom I know well and consider a trustworthy source) said that the Elder told them that they should vote for John McCain. Several people became very indignant because they favored Obama, and so they began to point out all the bad things John McCain had done. Then he said:

“Look, they both have horns, you have to vote for the one with the smaller horns.”

John McCain was a very flawed candidate. He was a neocon who supported many wars that brought death and devastation to many people around the globe. However, he did have a pro-life record in terms of his votes related to abortion, and that is perhaps why the Elder considered his horns to be smaller. The choice in that election was certainly not a slam dunk question, but the Elder taught people to vote, and what criteria they should use.

Not everyone is going to agree who has the smallest horns in an election, but we should pray that God would give us the wisdom to make discerning choices. 

In order to vote, you of course need to register to vote. Which you can do online. Prior to an election, if you live in Harris County, you can view the ballot ahead of time, and then do your own digging to determine who to vote for. Personally, I use voter guides put out by pro-life Christians, such as the Link Letter, or the Houston Area Pastors Council. I don't always go with their recommendations, but especially in primaries, where there are many candidates that I don't know anything else about, these voter guides give me some idea of how to sift through the options.

If you live in Harris County, you can also find where you can vote in early voting, or on election day by going to Harris Votes. If you live in one of the surrounding counties, there are probably similar websites run by your county clerk's office.

One other thing to consider, if you don't think it matters who you vote for, consider how different states and counties reacted to the Covid lockdowns. Some closed business and churches, and had very repressive policies... some even preventing people from sitting on their own porch. Obviously, it mattered a lot then, and it didn't just matter who was in the White House, which is why you should pay attention to local elections, because in many ways those officials have a lot more power over your daily life than anyone in Washington, D.C.