Stump the Priest: Fallen Nature / Original Sin

Question: "Is the idea of a "fallen nature" a later Western concept that was foreign to the early Fathers? If I remember correctly, I've seen prominent Orthodox theologians use the term "fallen nature". But also I think I've seen other prominent theologians say that the term is a later Western concept that was foreign to the Fathers, and that its usage is incorrect. What is your opinion on this topic?"

I think you are actually referring to the objection that some Orthodox writers have expressed to the phrase "original sin". I would hope that no one has been foolish enough to argue that human nature is not fallen. The services of the Church are full of references to our fallen nature. For example, in the service for the feast of the Ascension alone, there are several such references:

"Not being separated from the bosom of the Father, O most sweet Jesus, and having lived on earth as a man, Thou wast taken up in glory today from the Mount of Olives. And having raised our fallen nature by Thy compassion, Thou didst seat it together with the Father. Wherefore, the heavenly orders of the bodiless were amazed at the wonder and stood in awe and astonishment. They were seized with trembling and magnified Thy love for mankind. With them we on earth also glorify Thy condescension toward us, and Thine Ascension from us, entreating and saying: O Thou Who by Thine Ascension didst fill with infinite joy Thy disciples and the Theotokos who bare Thee, by their prayers deem us also worthy of the joy of Thy chosen ones, for Thy great mercy's sake" (Doxasticon at Lord, I have cried...).

"God is gone up in jubilation, the Lord with the voice of the trumpet, to raise the fallen image of Adam, and to send the Comforting Spirit to sanctify our souls" (Doxasticon at the Vespers Aposticha).

"Thou didst raise up human nature which was fallen into corruption, O Christ, and in Thine Ascension Thou didst exalt us and glorify us together with Thyself" (4th troparion of Ode III of the Canon).

"The majesty of Him Who became poor in the flesh hath been manifestly taken up above the heavens; and our fallen nature hath been honored by sitting with the Father.  Let us all make feast, and with one accord let us cry out with jubilation and clap our hands rejoicing" (8th troparion of the Ode IX of the Canon).

There is a tendency among some contemporary Orthodox writers to dismiss anything that they see as being western, and often in the process they end of dismissing important aspects of Orthodox Tradition as well. And in this case, there have been a number of Orthodox writers that have rejected the phrase "original sin." For example:

Archimandrite Vassilios Papavassiliou

Archimandrite Vassilios Papavassiliou

Original sin: Orthodox doctrine or heresy?, Archimandrite Vassilios Papavassiliou

Ancestral Versus Original Sin: An Overview with Implications for Psychotherapy

by V. Rev. Antony Hughes, M.Div

- See more at: http://www.stmaryorthodoxchurch.org/orthodoxy/articles/ancestral_versus_original_sin#sthash.L261SiD4.dpuf

Ancestral Versus Original Sin: An Overview with Implications for Psychotherapy, by V. Rev. Antony Hughes

The problem with this approach is that the phrase "original sin" was used and affirmed by the Council of Carthage, in 418 A.D., and this council was officially affirmed by the 6th and 7th Ecumenical Councils. See: Original Sin and Orthodoxy: Reflections on Carthage, and Original Sin and Ephesus: Carthage’s Influence on the East, by Nathaniel McCallum.

Fr. Michael Pomazansky lays out the Orthodox understanding of original sin in his "Orthodox Dogmatic Theology":

"By original sin is meant the sin of Adam, which was transmitted to his descendants and weighs upon them. The doctrine of original sin has great significance in the Christian world-view, because upon it rests a whole series of other dogmas.

The word of God teaches us that through Adam "all have sinned": "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned" (Rom. 5:12). "For who will be clean of defilement? No one, if he have lived even a single day upon earth" (Job 14:4-5, Septuagint). "For behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and in sins did my mother bear me" (Ps. 50:5); "the seed of corruption is in me" (Evening Prayers).

The common faith of the ancient Christian Church in the existence of original sin may be seen in the Church's ancient custom of baptizing infants. The Local Council of Carthage in 252, composed of 66 bishops under the presidency of St. Cyprian, decreed the following against heretics: "Not to forbid (the baptism) of an infant who, scarcely born, has sinned in nothing apart from that which proceeds from the flesh of Adam. He has received the contagion of the ancient death through his very birth, and he comes, therefore, the more easily to the reception of the remission of sins in that it is not his own but the sins of another that are remitted." (The same thing is stated in Canon 110 of the "African Code," approved by 217 bishops at Carthage in 419 and ratified by the Council in Trullo (692) and the Seventh Ecumenical Council (787). Canon 110 ends: "On account of this rule of faith even infants, who could have committed as yet no sin themselves, therefore are truly baptized for the remission of sins, in order that what in them is the result of generation may be cleansed by regeneration" (The Seven Ecumenical Councils, Eerdmans ed., p. 497).)

This is the way in which the "Encyclical of the Eastern Patriarchs" defines the result of the fall into sin: "Fallen through the transgression, man became like the irrational creatures. That is, he became darkened and was deprived of perfection and dispassion. But he was not deprived of the nature and power which he had received from the All-good God. For had he been so deprived, he would have become irrational, and thus not a man. But he preserved that nature with which he had been created, and the free, living and active natural power, so that, according to nature, he might choose and do the good, and flee and turn away from evil" ("Encyclical of the Eastern Patriarchs," paragraph 14).
In the history of the ancient Christian Church, Pelagius and his followers denied the inheritance of sin (the heresy of Pelagianism). Pelagius affirmed that every man only repeats the sin of Adam, performing anew his own personal fall into sin, and following the example of Adam because of his own weak will. However, his nature remains the same as when it was created, innocent and pure, the same as that of the first-created Adam. Moreover, disease and death are characteristic of this nature from the creation, and are not the consequences of original sin.

Blessed Augustine stepped out against Pelagius with great power and proof. He cited (a) testimonies from Divine Revelation concerning original sin, (b) the teaching of the ancient shepherds of the Church, (c) the ancient custom of baptizing infants, and (d) the sufferings and misfortunes of men, including infants, which are a consequence of the universal and inherited sinfulness of men. However, Augustine did not escape the opposite extreme, setting forth the idea that in fallen man any independent freedom to do good has been completely annihilated, unless grace comes to his aid.

Out of this dispute in the West there subsequently were formed two tendencies, one of which was followed by Roman Catholicism, and the other by Protestantism. Roman Catholic theologians consider that the consequence of the fall was the removal from men of a supernatural gift of God's grace, after which man remained in his "natural" condition, his nature not harmed but only brought into disorder because flesh, the bodily side, has come to dominate over the spiritual side. Original sin, in this view, consists of the fact that the guilt before God of Adam and Eve has passed to all men.

The other tendency in the West sees in original sin the complete perversion of human nature and its corruption to its very depths, to its very foundations (the view accepted by Luther and Calvin). As for the newer sects of Protestantism, reacting in their turn against the extremes of Luther, they have gone as far as the complete denial of original, inherited sin.

Among the shepherds of the Eastern Church there have been no doubts concerning either the teaching of the inherited ancestral sin in general, or the consequences of this sin for fallen human nature in particular.

Orthodox theology does not accept the extreme points of Blessed Augustine's teaching; but equally foreign to it is the (later) Roman Catholic point of view, which has a very legalistic, formal character. The foundation of the Roman Catholic teaching lies in (a) an understanding of the sin of Adam as an infinitely great offense against God; (b) after this offense there followed the wrath of God; (c) the wrath of God was expressed in the removal of the supernatural gifts of God's grace; and (d) the removal of grace drew after itself the submission of the spiritual principle to the fleshly principle, and a falling deeper into sin and death. From this comes a particular view of the redemption performed by the Son of God: In order to restore the order which had been violated, it was necessary first of all to give satisfaction for the offense given to God, and by this means to remove the guilt of mankind and the punishment that weighs upon him.

The consequences of ancestral sin are accepted by Orthodox theology differently.
After his first fall, man himself departed in soul from God and became unreceptive to the grace of God which was opened to him; he ceased to listen to the divine voice addressed to him, and this led to the further deepening of sin in him.

However, God has never deprived mankind of His mercy, help, grace, and especially His chosen people; and from this people there came forth great righteous men such as Moses, Elijah, Elisha, and the later prophets. The Apostle Paul, in the eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, lists a whole choir of Old Testament righteous ones, saying that they are those "of whom the world was not worthy" (Heb. 11:38). All of them were perfected not without a gift from above, not without the grace of God. The book of Acts cites the words of the first martyr, Stephen, where he says of David that he "found favor (grace) before God, and desired to find a tabernacle of the God of Jacob" (Acts 7:46); that is, to build a Temple for Him. The greatest of the prophets, St. John the Forerunner, was "filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother's womb" (Luke 1:15). But the Old Testament righteous ones could not escape the general lot of fallen mankind after death, remaining in the darkness of hell, until the founding of the Heavenly Church; that is, until the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ destroyed the gates of hell and opened the way into the Kingdom of Heaven.

One must not see the essence of sin — including original sin — only in the dominance of the fleshly over the spiritual, as Roman Catholic theology teaches. Many sinful inclinations, even very serious ones, have to do with qualities of a spiritual order, such as pride, which, according to the words of the Apostle, is the source, together with lust, of the general sinfulness of the world (1 John 2:15-16). Sin is also present in evil spirits who have no flesh at all. In Sacred Scripture the word "flesh" signifies a condition of not being reborn, a condition opposed to being reborn in Christ "That which it born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit" (John 3:6). Of course, this is not to deny that a whole series of passions and sinful inclinations originate in bodily nature, which Sacred Scripture also shows (Romans, ch. 7).

Thus, original sin is understood by Orthodox theology as a sinful inclination which has entered into mankind and become its spiritual disease" (Orthodox Dogmatic Theology, pp. 160-164).

For more on this subject, see:

Rags of Morality: Original Sin and Human Nature, Archpriest Alexander Golubov, Ph.D.

Ancestral vs. Original Sin: A False Dichotomy, by Ephrem Hugh Bensusan

Original Sin According to St. Paul, by Fr. John S. Romanides 

Stump the Priest: What do you do when you see someone else mistreated?

Question: I know that Jesus Christ teaches that we should turn the other cheek and forgive those who offend us. But, my question is, how should I, as a Christian, react when I see a friend being treated badly?  I know someone who is very elderly and her son is so distant with her.  I call her everyday because I see that she needs companionship.  She's a widow.  I visit her and talk with her, but I can't do all the things she needs because he's the legal relative.  Her heart is breaking because she sees that her son doesn't care to take time with her.  And inside, it makes me boil with anger for his negligence of his own mother.  I want so much to tell him off.  When she falls asleep in Christ, I don't know if I'll be able to hold back on telling him how much his mother was suffering because of his lack of love towards her.  

This is a complicated question that does not lend itself to simple answers.

If the son in this case was an Orthodox Christians who took his faith seriously, you could follow the steps laid out by Christ in Matthew 18:15-18:

"Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican. Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

Even if he were a non-Orthodox Christian, you could try talking to him, and if that did not work, you could try talking to his pastor. However, if he took his faith seriously, in all likelihood, he would not be treating his mother in the manner that you describe. As St. Augustine put it: "It's your parents you see when you first open your eyes, and it is their friendship that lays down the first strands of this life. If anyone fails to honor his parents, is there anyone he will spare?" ((Sermon 9.7, quoted in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: Old Testament, Vol. III, Joseph T. Lienhard, ed. (Downers Grove, IL: Intervasity Press, 2001) p. 106)).

If, as is likely, the son is not a serious Christian of any kind, how you should approach him is a question of wisdom. It is not a question of turning the other cheek, when it is someone else's cheek that is being slapped. In fact, we are called upon by Scripture to defend the helpless: "Learn to do good; Seek justice, Rebuke the oppressor; Defend the fatherless, Plead for the widow" (Isaiah 1:17). But you should approach this situation in such a way that you will help your friend, and as much as possible, help the son to come to see his responsibilities to his mother. The time to confront him, if you confront him at all, would be to do so before your friend has passed away... and your purpose has to be to help these two people, not simply to tell him off.

What I would suggest you do is first talk to your friend to see what she would suggest. Then I would talk to other people whose opinion you respect, and who perhaps have some experience dealing with difficult situations of this sort. As Proverbs 11:14 says: "Where no counsel is, the people fall: but in the multitude of counselors there is safety."

You also should pray for God's guidance. Pray that He would give you the wisdom to handle the situation properly, and pray sincerely for both the mother and the son. Then after you have sought wise counsel, and prayed for God's guidance, do what seems to be the wisest thing, and do it in a humble and loving way.

Stump the Priest: Is There Anything Special About the Virgin Mary?

Question: I know a protestant who argues that there was nothing significant about the Virgin Mary, and that just about any woman who was a believer "would have been just as good a selection.” How would you reply to someone that said there was nothing special about the Virgin Mary and basically anyone else could have done what she did?

There is of course a great deal that could be said about the Tradition of the Church to contradict what this protestant said, but when arguing with protestants, the arguments that they will find most persuasive are arguments from Scripture.

I would point out, first off that he has no basis in Scripture for the assertion that any other woman would have been just as good of a selection. Scripture does not tell us explicitly why God chose the Virgin Mary, but when we see her obedience, humility, love, and long-suffering in the Gospels it is clear that she was not just a randomly chosen Jewish girl, but rather an extremely holy woman.

Secondly, there are three places in the first chapter of the Gospel of Luke alone in which it is made clear that the Virgin Mary was "special":

1. The Archangel Gabriel greeted her with the words: "Rejoice, thou that art full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women" (Luke 1:28). It is no small matter to be full of grace, for the Lord to be with you, and to be the most blessed of women.

2. When the Virgin Mary went to visit St. Elizabeth, the mother of St. John the Baptist, we are told: "And it came to pass, that, when Elizabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elisabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit: and she spake out with a loud voice, and said, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For, lo, as soon as the voice of thy salutation sounded in mine ears, the babe leaped in my womb for joy. And blessed is she that believed: for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her from the Lord" (Luke 1:41-45). At the sound of the Virgin Mary's voice, Elizabeth was filled the Holy Spirit. We are again told that she is the most blessed of women, she is called the mother of the Lord, and Elizabeth states that she is unworthy of the honor that the mother of her Lord should visit her. She also states that she is blessed because of her faith.

3. The Virgin Mary herself, in her Magnificat, said "...from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed" (Luke 1:48). So I would ask your protestant friend why, if every generation will call her blessed, he refuses to do so along with them?

Protestants do not give much credence to Tradition, but they have a harder time dismissing what the early fathers of the Church had to say, and one of the earliest was St. Ireneaus of Lyons (ca. 130 - 202 AD). St. Ireneaus grew up in Smyrna, and as a boy heard the preaching of St. Polycarp, who was a disciple of the Apostle John. In his famous work, Against Heresies, he speaks of the role that the Virgin Mary played in our salvation as the new Eve, whose obedience and faith undid the disobedience of our first mother:

"In accordance with this design, Mary the Virgin is found obedient, saying, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.” But Eve was disobedient; for she did not obey when as yet she was a virgin. And even as she, having indeed a husband, Adam, but being nevertheless as yet a virgin (for in Paradise “they were both naked, and were not ashamed,” inasmuch as they, having been created a short time previously, had no understanding of the procreation of children: for it was necessary that they should first come to adult age, and then multiply from that time onward), having become disobedient, was made the cause of death, both to herself and to the entire human race; so also did Mary, having a man betrothed [to her], and being nevertheless a virgin, by yielding obedience, become the cause of salvation, both to herself and the whole human race. And on this account does the law term a woman betrothed to a man, the wife of him who had betrothed her, although she was as yet a virgin; thus indicating the back-reference from Mary to Eve, because what is joined together could not otherwise be put asunder than by inversion of the process by which these bonds of union had arisen; so that the former ties be cancelled by the latter, that the latter may set the former again at liberty. And it has, in fact, happened that the first compact looses from the second tie, but that the second tie takes the position of the first which has been cancelled. For this reason did the Lord declare that the first should in truth be last, and the last first. And the prophet, too, indicates the same, saying, “instead of fathers, children have been born unto thee.” For the Lord, having been born “the First-begotten of the dead,” and receiving into His bosom the ancient fathers, has regenerated them into the life of God, He having been made Himself the beginning of those that live, as Adam became the beginning of those who die. Wherefore also Luke, commencing the genealogy with the Lord, carried it back to Adam, indicating that it was He who regenerated them into the Gospel of life, and not they Him. And thus also it was that the knot of Eve’s disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary. For what the virgin Eve had bound fast through unbelief, this did the virgin Mary set free through faith" (Against Heresies 3:22:4).

So the attitude taken by your protestant friend is neither Biblical, nor consistent with the view found in the early Church.

Stump the Priest: What does John 20:17b mean?

Question: What did Christ mean when He said to St. Mary Magdalene, "...but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God" (John 20:17b)?

The simplest and most direct answer to this is given by Blessed Theophylact: "God is indeed our Father, but only by grace. He is Christ's Father by nature. On the other hand, the Father is our God by nature; He is Christ's God in respect to his human nature alone. Only after assuming human nature can Christ say the the Father is His God." (The Explanation of the Holy Gospel According to John.  Fr. Christopher Stade, Trans. (House Springs, MO: Chrysostom  Press, 2007), p. 298).


Here is what some other Fathers have to say to expound on this question further:


St. Cyril of Alexandria wrote: "I will explain, then, as far as I am able: In the first place, then, though we are servants by rank and nature (for creatures are subject to their Creator), He calls us His brethren, and designates God the common Father of Himself and us; and, making humanity His own, by taking our likeness upon Him, He calls our God His God, though He is His Son by Nature; that, as we mount up to His exceeding great dignity of station by likeness to Him (for it is not because we are by nature sons of God that we are so called, for He cries in our hearts by His own Spirit, Abba, Father), so also He, since He took our form -- for He became Man, according to the Scriptures -- might have God for His God, though He was truly God by Nature, and proceeded from Him. Be not, therefore, offended, though you hear Him calling God His God, but rather contemplate His words in a teachable spirit, and attentively consider their true meaning. For He says that God is both His Father and our God; and both sayings are true. For, in very truth, the God of the universe is Christ's Father, but not ours by nature; but rather our God as our Creator and Sovereign Lord. But the Son, as it were, blending Himself with us, vouchsafes to our nature the dignity that is in a special and peculiar sense His own, calling Him That begat Him the common Father of us all; while, on the other hand, He receives into Himself, by taking upon Him our likeness, that which belonged to our nature. For He calls His Father His God, being unwilling, through His inherent love and mercy toward mankind, to dishonour our likeness that He had taken upon Himself. If, then, you choose in ignorance to cavil at this saying, and it seem intolerable to you that the Lord should say that God the Father was His God, you will then, in your perversity, be bringing a charge against the scheme for your own redemption; and when you ought to be offering up thanksgiving you will be dishonouring your Benefactor, and be foolishly objecting to the manner in which He manifested His love towards you. For if He humbled Himself, despising shame, and became a Man for your sake, on your head is the charge of humiliation, and to Him Who chose to undergo this for your sake, exceeding great is the honour due. And I am amazed that you have ears merely for the eclipse of glory (for He humbled Himself for our sake), and consider not its restoration, and, regarding only the degradation, reflect not upon the exaltation. For how was He humiliated, if you do not regard Him as perfect, as being God? And in what sense was He degraded, if you do not take into account the lofty attributes of His ineffable Nature? Therefore, when He was perfect and all-sufficient as God, He humbled Himself for your sake, transforming Himself to your likeness; and though He was high exalted as the Son of God, and of the very Essence of the Father, He degraded Himself, being mulcted of the attributes of Divine glory, so far as His Nature admitted. As therefore, now, He is at the same time God and Man, being high exalted because of His parentage (for He is God of God and truly Begotten of His Father), and also made lowly for our sake (for He became Man for us); be of a tranquil mind when you hear Him saying: I ascend unto My Father and your Father, and My God and your God. For it was very meet and right that, as being by Nature God and Son of God, He should call Him That begat Him His Father; and that, as being Man, even as we are men. He should call God His God" (Homilies on the Gospel of John, Book XII, chapter 1).

St. Augustine said: "He saith not, Our Father: in one sense, therefore, is He mine, in another sense, yours; by nature mine, by grace yours. “And my God, and your God.” Nor did He say here, Our God: here, therefore, also is He in one sense mine, in another sense yours: my God; under whom I also am as man; your God, between whom and you I am mediator" (Homilies on the Gospel of John, Tractate 121:3).

St. Cyril of Jerusalem said: "But lest any one from simplicity or perverse ingenuity should suppose that Christ is but equal in honour to righteous men, from His saying, I ascend to My Father, and your Father, it is well to make this distinction beforehand, that the name of the Father is one, but the power of His operation manifold.  And Christ Himself knowing this has spoken unerringly, I go to My Father, and your Father:  not saying ‘to our Father,’ but distinguishing, and saying first what was proper to Himself, to My Father, which was by nature; then adding, and your Father, which was by adoption.  For however high the privilege we have received of saying in our prayers, Our Father, which art in heaven, yet the gift is of loving-kindness.  For we call Him Father, not as having been by nature begotten of Our Father which is in heaven; but having been transferred from servitude to sonship by the grace of the Father, through the Son and Holy Spirit, we are permitted so to speak by ineffable loving-kindness (Catechetical Lectures 7:7).


 "But the Father having begotten the Son, remained the Father and is not changed.  He begat Wisdom, yet lost not wisdom Himself; and begat Power, yet became not weak:  He begat God, but lost not His own Godhead:  and neither did He lose anything Himself by diminution or change; nor has He who was begotten any thing wanting.  Perfect is He who begat, Perfect that which was begotten:  God was He who begat, God He who was begotten; God of all Himself, yet entitling the Father His own God.  For He is not ashamed to say, I ascend unto My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God. But lest thou shouldest think that He is in a like sense Father of the Son and of the creatures, Christ drew a distinction in what follows.  For He said not, “I ascend to our Father,” lest the creatures should be made fellows of the Only-begotten; but He said, My Father and your Father; in one way Mine, by nature; in another yours, by adoption.  And again, to my God and your God, in one way Mine, as His true and Only-begotten Son, and in another way yours, as His workmanship.  The Son of God then is Very God, ineffably begotten before all ages (for I say the same things often to you, that it may be graven upon your mind).  This also believe, that God has a Son:  but about the manner be not curious, for by searching thou wilt not find.  Exalt not thyself, lest thou fall:  think upon those things only which have been commanded thee.  Tell me first what He is who begat, and then learn that which He begat; but if thou canst not conceive the nature of Him who hath begotten, search not curiously into the manner of that which is begotten" (Catechetical Lectures 11:18-19).

We know that this text is not saying that Christ is not God, because at the very beginning of the Gospel of John, we are told that not only was the Word (Christ) with God, but that the Word was God (John 1:1). And later in the same chapter as the verse in question, St. Thomas, upon understanding that Christ was truly risen, addressed Christ, saying "My Lord and my God!" (John 20:28) -- and Christ did not rebuke or correct him, but rather confirmed his statement by responding "Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed" (John 20:29).

Levant Report:Saidnaya under rebel attack: Christian locals believe they are targets of imminent insurgent ground invasion, CNN justifies rebel assault

Source (re-posted with permission).

 
Levant Report’s own sources inside Syria were present in Saidnaya this week: they report that the townspeople are now sounding the alarm to the international community that Islamist rebels in the surrounding mountains are preparing a major invasion of the Christian city. The primary aim of the rebels, the inhabitants fear, is to commit “religious cleansing” against Christians – similar to what happened only months ago in nearby Maaloula. A reluctant international press is also beginning to acknowledge the potential for a genocidal event against Saidnayans, yet disinformation is already in full swing.

This past Thursday, February 6, monasteries and churches in the ancient Christian city of Saidnaya held special celebrations for the feast of St. Elian – a Syrian saint martyred in Homs in the third century. These celebrations took place despite the village being under constant rebel mortar attack – attacks that have been stepped up over the last month.

Saidnaya, which lies 25 minutes by car north of Damascus, and 40 minutes to the southwest of Maaloula, is (alongside Maaloula) Syria’s most celebrated and historic Christian city. Its scenic location at the edge of the Qalaman Mountains, its active churches and monasteries that go back to the time of Emperor Justinian, and multiple restaurants and resort hotels made it a favorite weekend getaway destination for Syrians and tourists of all backgrounds prior to the chaos of the last couple of years.

Saidnaya has, until recently, managed to stay quiet and relatively peaceful for most of the nearly three years of the Syria conflict. Its 5 active monasteries, dozens of churches, and large convent orphanage for girls, have continued life as usual as they have over the past many centuries living under multiple regimes - from the Byzantines to the Ottomans to the Ba’ath.

The mostly Orthodox Christian population tends to be presented as “pro-regime” in Western media reports – this perhaps because Syria’s most well-known political prison is located in Saidnaya. But the city’s Christian population believes that its very survival is dependent on the government checkpoints, tanks, and soldiers that protect it from the thousands of foreign-backed insurgents that are hunkered down in the surrounding Qalamon Mountains.

Unlike the very politically involved Maronites of Lebanon, Syria’s Christian population tends to keep a low-profile, and has enjoyed the historical toleration shown by the secular pan-Arab Ba’athists and socialist nationalist politicians that have led the country for much of Syria’s modern period.

Timothy Heckenlively, a Classics professor at a major central Texas university who has lived in the Saidnaya/Maaloula area, published a brief report in October titled “Saidnaya: another Maaloula in the making?”. After the initial successful insurgent entry into Maaloula, he expressed the following concern:

It appears that the Islamist opposition forces who wrecked [sic] havoc in Maaloula may be preparing for a similar assault on the equally important Christian village of Saidnaya. On Oct. 1, Fides (a site of the Vatican news network) reported that raids were now commonplace and that one man was dead after clashes the previous day.

Since October, insurgents have mounted multiple unsuccessful attempts to capture the mountaintop which overlooks Saidnaya – a strategic place from which they could destroy the city below. At the highest point of this mountain sits Cherubim Monastery – an active monastery and retreat center which has an important cultural heritage site: a church which dates to the third century. One of the tallest Christ statues in the world was recently erected on the monastery grounds - a towering 39 meters tall bronze sculpture that was years in planning with the help of Russian benefactors.

During the spring and summer months, Cherubim Monastery hosts Christian youth camps and church schools. The monks recently had to leave the monastery due to the frequent rebel incursions around the mountain; they are now sheltered in St. George Monastery in the village below.

In an October 2013 Christianity Today article entitled Latest Stop in Race for World’s Tallest Jesus Statue: War-Torn Syria, the reality of an ongoing religiocide in this historic Christian region was noted:

Saidnaya has recently faced sectarian attacks similar to Maaloula, another Aramaic-speaking pilgrimage destination just 15 miles north. In addition to displacing tens of thousands of people, the attacks have prompted 50,000 Syrian Christians to apply for citizenship in Russia, reports Interfax. “It is for the first time since the Nativity of Christ that we Christians of Qalamoun living in the villages of Saidnaya, Maara Saidnaya, Maaloula and Maaroun are under threat of banishment from our land,” reads the group’s appeal to the Russia Foreign Ministry.

The parallels between Maaloula and Saidnaya are all too evident: both are iconic Christian cities that have done their best to prevent conflict from entering their sleepy countryside environs; both contain Syrian cultural and UNESCO heritage sites valued by all Syrians; both have convent-run orphanages for girls and charitable centers and retreat centers; and both are overlooked by mountains from which rebels can wreak havoc and terror on a vulnerable population. Sadly, Maaloula now sits liquidated of its Christian inhabitants (some were kidnapped, some killed, and most fled to Damascus).

Our Lady of Saidnaya Convent and Orphanage is significantly larger than Maaloula’s St. Thekla Convent. It was the very first target of rebel insurgent attack on the city as it was struck by mortar fire back in January 2012. Note that in spite of current opposition and media claims that Saidnaya is primarily a government/military target, this first target of attack was a community of elderly nuns and young orphan girls.

We all know the story of Maaloula. A reluctant international press picked up on the terror attack after it was too late – and even then major outlets like the New York Times did their best to protect the reputation of the rebel insurgents involved in the takeover and brutal cleansing of the city’s Christian population. Maaloula was of no real strategic value to the rebel insurgents – their own actions in the aftermath of the assault testify to the fact that the town’s religious identity had everything to do with it.
Levant Report’s sources, which have a close affiliation with Maaloula’s St. Thekla Convent, confirm that the ancient monastery church and side chapels were stripped completely of their priceless religious icons, and other religious objects were urinated and defecated upon. Christian villagers who were caught in the midst of the rebel assault had their throats slit, or were shot execution style at close range.
According to Matthew Barber, Syria analyst and administrator of the hugely influential Syria Comment site, the Free Syrian Army and allied groups played a central role in the assault and takeover of Maaloula:

The video and photographic evidence available after the attack indicates that the operation was a coordinated effort between (at least) the following groups: Ahrar al-Sham, Jabhat al-Nusra, the Baba ‘Amr Brigades (a rebel group possibly affiliated with the SIF – Syrian Islamic Front), FSA Commandos Unit, and Soqour al-Sham.

It is important to remember that the United States and other governments officially finance and supply weapons to some of these very groups. Though the FSA continues to be sold as “moderate” – it routinely conducts joint operations with Jabhat al-Nusra and other groups. A clear dividing line between “extreme Islamists” and the FSA is a myth sold by the United States and Western governments.

The 12 abducted Maaloulan nuns and 4 young women from the orphanage are still the objects of uncertain on-and-off hostage negotiations. Shamefully, multiple Western mainstream media outlets uncritically reported opposition claims that the nuns were actually “rescued” from Syrian Army forces as a result of the rebel takeover of Maaloula. See National Public Radio’s outrageous December 20 report – Rebel Leader: Nuns Were Led To Safety, Not Seized, In Syria:

“He decided to kill you and blame us,” he recalls pleading with the sisters, referring to Syrian President Bashar Assad, after a surface-to-surface missile shattered the convent’s thick wooden door on Dec. 3…
…But Abu Majid says local rebels were protecting the women from the regime shelling on an ancient Christian town.

Similar propaganda has already begun regarding the ongoing insurgent raids on Saidnaya. In a recent January 24 CNN exclusive report from Saidnaya, the CNN correspondent declared that “Cherubim Monastery is not a civilian target these days” – this because Syrian Army tanks and soldiers are protecting the monastery and the city below. Yet the report also acknowledges that most of the fighters protecting the mountaintop and monastery are simply local Christians who desire to keep the Islamic insurgents from entering. It is unbelievable that a reporter would brazenly declare that a historic Christian monastery that housed elderly monks and was home to summer youth camps is now a legitimate military target for the opposition.

A recent PressTV report, also with camera crew on the ground in Saidnaya, bothered to include an interview with one the monks affected by the rebel shelling. Fr. Isaac Zeina, part of the monastic community that inhabited Cherubim Monastery, said in the interview ”we pray to God for an end to the war.” These are hardly the words of “pro-regime militarism,” yet the CNN report branded Fr. Isaac’s monastery and home as ”not a civilian target.”

Just last week, Al Monitor online news published an in-depth report on the Saidnaya assaults. The Al Monitor article is significant in that it’s currently the only instance of a major international news outlet exposing the clear the intentions of the area’s rebel insurgents:

The city rings its bells whenever danger is imminent, as was the case when mortar shells hit the Cherubim Monastery and the Convent of Our Lady of Saidnaya during the fourth attack [against the city] on Jan. 19. The city’s citizens are now “wanted” by armed militants.
Being from Saidnaya is enough reason to be killed by the militants who have suffered heavy defeats there, the most recent of which was the fourth attack. What’s more, the city’s people are also guilty of being nasara, a derogatory term used by armed groups to refer to Christians.
…“You will be next, after Maaloula,” recounts one of the city’s dignitaries.

The Al Monitor article also confirms that the orphans at Our Lady of Saidnaya are still in residence as rebel mortar shells continue to rain down. These girls are orphans with nowhere to go, and the convent is their home. The article further confirms that Al-Nusra Front is circulating a video declaring a genocidal war against all Christians.

Sadly, major media will on the whole continue to be silent about acts of genocide and religiocide committed by rebels in Syria. Some of the world’s most influential and visible reporters are close enough to events on the ground to know the truth, yet they continue to willfully distort, and commit acts of omission in their reporting.

Anne Barnard is perhaps the single most influential reporter when it comes to shaping American and world perceptions of the conflict in Syria. She is the Beirut bureau chief in charge of covering the Middle East for the New York Times. Anyone who knows her work can easily perceive that she consistently and almost exclusively relies on rebel opposition sources in her reporting.

Joshua Landis, widely regard as the foremost Syria expert in the U.S., tweeted a LevantReport.com article on October 8 of last year that systematically took apart Anne Barnard’s NYT reporting of the first rebel attack on Maaloula. The critique included the following:

Soon the propaganda war began. The FSA posted videos to YouTube claiming that the Assad regime was shelling churches in Maaloula and started promoting them on Twitter using various aliases. This was soon followed by a video in which a wahabi-bearded “liberator” gave a tour of the supposed damage. Their efforts soon met with the desired reward. On September 10, the New York Times ran an article by Anne Barnard giving credibility to such videos and portraying public outcry about Maaloula as potential misperception. Eight days later, Lina Sinjab of the BBC used such materials to portray the whole event as an unfortunate scuffle with few deaths and no particular damage to local churches.

The article tweeted by Landis named Barnard as a propagandist attempting to cover up the crimes of the Syrian rebels. Surprisingly, in perhaps a sarcastic or playful acknowledgement of the critique, Anne Barnard  “favorited” the article on her Twitter account. This “winking” acknowledgment from Barnard lends credibility to those who say that major media institutions such as the New York Times are willfully distorting the true and full context of the Syria conflict.

Saidnaya’s Christians, and all religious and ethnic minorities currently being targeted for genocide by the Syrian rebels need true and accurate reporting of their plight now more than ever. If real and lasting peace, the goal claimed by the Geneva Conference, is ever to be established in Syria, it must begin with a realistic assessment of not just the regime’s crimes and brutalities, but of the unambiguous intention to commit genocide on the part of the rebel opposition.

Brad Hoff served as a Marine from 2000-2004 at Headquarters Battalion, Quantico. After military service he lived, studied, and traveled throughout Syria off and on from 2004-2010. He currently teaches in Texas.

The Hieromartyr Peter of Krutitsa

This past Sunday was the Sunday of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia, and so the sermon was on the life of St. Peter of Krutitsa: Click here to listen.

Papism... any questions?

This is what a Ukrainian Choir sounds like:



This is what a Ukrainian Choir that has embraced Papism sounds like:



Any questions?

The folks at Gitmo may want to consider using the second video in an endless loop for enhanced interrogations.

(h/t Gabe Martini for posting the second video)

Update: It takes all the fun out of something when you have to explain it, but I had a number of people who took the above as if I was trying to make a serious argument.  This was intended to be funny, it was based on the old "This is your brain on drugs" public service announcements that began running in 1987. But to the extent that there was a serious aspect of this post, it is this: the good, the beautiful, and the true are connected. The choir in the second video is not a bad choir. It is actually a fairly good choir, doing horrible music. Since Vatican II, the Roman Catholic Church has increasingly been moving in the direction of the ugly and the bad, in direct proportion to the extent that it has moved away from the true. This does not mean that there are not good Catholic choirs, or beautiful Catholic Churches... just as most of what the Roman Catholic Church teaches officially is still true. However, the trajectory in the past 50 years has not been in a good direction.

Stump the Priest: Prayer for Specific Purposes and the Liturgy

Question: As a former Roman Catholic, in the past I donated funds to have a Mass said for a dead loved one. Is there an Orthodox Christian etiquette to have a Liturgy said for a recently departed friend or candle lit?

In the Orthodox Church, we do not have the practice of doing the liturgy for a special intention... in other words, we would not do a special liturgy because someone wanted to have it devoted to prayer for a loved one, either living or dead. The Roman Catholics have such a practice (the Votive Mass), but they also have the practice of having a priest or bishop serve multiple masses in a single day, and serving those masses on the same altar. In the Orthodox Church, a Liturgy is appointed for most days of the year, but a priest can only serve it once, and a liturgy can only be served once on a given alter, and anything to the contrary is strictly forbidden.

We do have services that can be requested for specific intentions. For example, you could request your priest to serve a Pannikhida for someone who is departed, or you could request a Moleben (Paraklesis) to pray for some other specific purpose.

Within in the context of the Liturgy, there are also ways that you can pray for specific purposes. Of course you can always light a candle in conjunction with any prayer. In Russian practice, you can submit a prosphora before the Liturgy, along with a list of people that you wish to be commemorated during the Liturgy. In parishes that do not follow this practice, you could still ask the priest to commemorate specific people when he is serving Proskomedia, and he will take particles out of the loaves used for that service (the Russian practice is the same idea, it simply involves a separate loaf, which is returned to the person that submitted it, minus the particles that the priest removed). You can also ask a parish or a monastery to commemorate either the living or the date on a long term basis (or even perpetually), but one should offer a donation at least sufficient to cover the expense of the prosphoras, and also for the benefit of the parish or monastery, as an offering given to God on behalf of the person or persons you wish prayed for. For example, some people make an annual donation for this purpose, along with a list of the living and the dead they wish prayed for. For more on this, see Holy Bread in the Old and New Testaments and Stump the Priest: Commemorations.

Usually, on days other than Sunday, a Litany for the Departed can be done at a Liturgy, and so if your parish does daily Liturgies, or on Soul Saturdays, you could ask the priest to commemorate an Orthodox Christian who has departed.

There is also the Litany of Fervent Supplication at each liturgy, in which prayers can be inserted for various purposes, and so for example, you might ask the priest to do a petition for someone who is traveling or who is sick.

Of course if you are going to ask a priest to pray for someone, you should be sure to do so yourself. The idea of these practices is that you join your prayers for these people with the rest of the Church, when you submit names to be commemorated at the Proskomedia.

Stump the Priest: Why do we venerate the Saints?

A Martyrium

Question: Why do we venerate the Saints?

At our parish's Icon Exhibit in 2009, I gave a talk on the veneration of the Saints that you can listen to here: http://audio.ancientfaith.com/houston/hca_2009-02-20.mp3

You may also be interested in reading a related article on the Veneration of Icons.

Sermons on the Ten Commandments

The Fathers say that the two tables of the the Law of Moses were divided according to the two great commandments: 1) To love God; and 2) To love your neighbor.

Here are sermons on the first table of the Law:

1st Commandment: Thou shalt have no other gods before Me. (12/11/2011)

2nd Commandment: Thou shalt not make unto thee any idols. For this commandment, there are two sermons: one on what it does not mean (3/4/2012), and one on what it does mean (10/21/2012).

3rd commandment: Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain (8/26/2012).

4th Commandment: Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy (9/16/2012).

And here are sermons on the second table of the Law:

5th Commandment: Honor thy father and thy mother (6/16/2013).

6th Commandment: Thou shalt not kill. For this commandment, there are two sermons: one on what it does mean (7/7/2013), and one on what it does not mean (7/14/2013).

7th Commandment: Thou shalt not commit adultery (8/11/2013), and a sermon on Divorce (8/18/2013).

8th Commandment: Thou shalt not steal (10/13/2013).

9th Commandment: Thou shalt not bear false witness (11/17/2013).

10th Commandment: Thou shalt not covet (1/26/2014).

Stump the Priest: Who can be a Godparent?

Question: Who can be a godparent?

There are requirements for who can be a godparent, and then there are implications connected with being a godparent that need to be kept in mind.

Requirements:

First of all, a godparent must be an Orthodox Christian in good standing. This is the most obvious, and most important qualification. The purpose of the godparent is to instruct and guide the person who is baptized in the faith. In the case of children, should their parents die before the children become adults, the godparent should be prepared to take his godchild into his own home, and raise him as his own. Of course, in order for this to happen, the parents should indicate this decision in their Will.

One godparent must be of the same sex as the the person being baptized, the other godparent (if there are two), must be of the opposite sex. Only one godparent is necessary (though two are the usual custom in the Russian Church), but if there is only one, that godparent must be of the same sex.

Godparents should not be children (i.e., they should be at least young adults, who understand the faith).

Neither biological parent can be a godparent to their own child.

See also: Godparenting 101.

Implications:

A godparent cannot marry the other godparent of the person who is baptized.  It is a custom in many local Orthodox Churches for the wife or husband of the godparent to also be considered a godparent, but this is an honorary title. Technically, only the spouse of the same gender as the person baptized is the actual godparent. This honorary title is actually given to the spouse of the godparent, even if the godparent marries them after the baptism, and they were not even present at the baptism. However, if you have two actual godparents, they cannot marry, because they have a spiritual relationship.

The godparent cannot marry either the parent of his godchild, nor could he marry the child of his godchild. The same prohibition applies to the natural children of the godparent. Neither can two people who share a godparent get married.

For more on this, see Concerning Relationships Due to Holy Baptism.

See also: The Orthopraxis of Godparents in the Orthodox Church.

ROCOR and the Assembly of Bishops

There has been a lot of hand-wringing by commentators in other jurisdictions regarding the letter that Archbishop Kyrill wrote recently to Archbishop Demetrios, regarding ROCOR's view of how things should proceed in the near future, regarding plans for jurisdictional unity in North America.

Let me preface my comments by saying that I have no inside scoop on the deliberations of the ROCOR Synod of Bishops, and base my comments only on the feel I have gotten from talking to other ROCOR clergy and laity on these matters. I am also speaking only for myself.

First off, my take on one of the main points of this letter is that it seems to be arguing that in the "diaspora", i.e. in those parts of the world where there is not a recognized, established autocephalous or autonomous Church, the presence of multiple jurisdictions is not a canonical violation, in and of itself. It is an anomalous situation, but it is not the result of anyone thumbing their noses at the canons, and violating them. The Russian Church rejects the idea that Canon 28 of Chalcedon gave the Ecumenical Patriarch jurisdiction over all unclaimed territory in the world... which is a ridiculous interpretation, given the fact that Constantinople was then second among equals, and no one ever suggested that Rome, for example, needed to get the Ecumenical Patriarch's permission to evangelize the Germans or Scandinavians. In the history of the Church, missions have always happened when a local Church was in a position to reach out to a new area, and then did so, without seeking permission from anyone else. So long as they were not establishing parishes or dioceses within the bounds of another local Church, there was no canonical violation. And as a matter of fact, since the fall of Constantinople to the Turks, almost all the missionary work of the Church has been done by the Russian Church... not because it had or claimed to have any special prerogatives, but simply because it was in a position to do it, and so did it.

Secondly, I think there are a lot of issues that are probably not being stated in public, because it would be considered accusatory for ROCOR to do so, but which nevertheless are serious concerns. For example, when the faithful of ROCOR look out on the landscape of American Orthodoxy, and see jurisdictions that have laymen in good standing, and even clergy, who are openly advocating for gay marriage, and proclaim that committed monogamous homosexual relationships are not sinful, this is a cause for great concern. Of course no jurisdiction has endorsed such ideas, but the fact that they are tolerated is a statement that is being made by their respective bishops and jurisdictions. We also see jurisdictions that have prominent clergy and laity that advocate various degrees of ecumenism that are abhorrent to the Orthodox Faith. We also see liturgical abnormalities that have become normal in many jurisdictions, as well as a lack of concern for basic standards of Orthopraxy. How serious these problems may be in any jurisdiction is something that can be debated, but it is simply a fact that these are issues that concern the faithful of ROCOR.

Furthermore, when we look at the shape that such a unified jurisdiction would most likely take, we have concerns. Given the current claims that the Ecumenical Patriarchate has made about its authority -- claiming a level of authority that is neo-papal, and prerogatives that threaten the integrity of every established local Orthodox Church (such as the claim that it could rescind past recognition of autocephly, unilaterally*); and given that the most likely arrangement for a unified American Church would be that it would be autonomy, but under the EP -- the prospect of finding ourselves under the authority of the EP is not something that would come without great concern. Even if the American Church were to be established as autocephalous from the start, the concern would be that this could be revoked at will, by the EP.

Some have responded to such concerns by saying that ROCOR should come along for the ride, to lend its help and influence to solve these problems, but the problem with that is that ROCOR is far smaller than the other major jurisdictions, and so it is not likely that it would have a great deal of influence under those circumstances. Also, I believe St. John Chrysostom once pointed out that it is far more likely that a healthy person hanging around a sick person which catch the sick person's illness, than that the sick person will catch the well person's health. This not to say that ROCOR does not have problems -- we certainly do. However, as things stand right now, I like the problems we have better than the problems I see in some of the other jurisdictions right now, and while I support closer cooperation, and increased interaction with other jurisdictions, I think we should not be in too big of a rush to move things along, and that in the mean time, we should all work on our short comings, in order to make unity not only more likely, but also more productive, and spiritually beneficial.

One other thing that has to be understood about Archbishop Kyrill's letter, is that it did not say, "Full unity... never". It basically said "Full unity... not so fast." One other area of concern expressed is that each jurisdiction has its own liturgical traditions and piety, and doing anything that would result in a forced homogenization of liturgical practice and piety, would be very damaging to our flock.

Also, many of the responses that I have seen to Archbishop Kyrill's letter, have claimed that the letter represents Russian ethnocentrism. However, Archbishop Kyrill expressed concerns regarding things that are "a matter of gravest spiritual peril to the souls of all our flocks in these lands, whether ethnically of Russian heritage or not..." And speaking as one who is not a Russian, I share those concerns. The idea that ROCOR is a Russian only enclave is belied by the many parishes, such as my own, that do the services entirely in English, and have only a minority of ethnically Russian parishioners (my own parish, with regard to adults, is about half convert, and half cradle Orthodox, and the cradle Orthodox, are a good mix of Arabs, Russians, Greeks, Poles, and Serbs. And the converts are fairly diverse as well).

Here are some things that I think would help facilitate Orthodox unity in North America:

1. Obviously, the problem of laity and clergy promoting anti-Orthodox agendas needs to be taken seriously. If those jurisdictions want unity, they need to see these things as threats to that unity, and they need to deal decisively, and publicly with those individuals.

2. Since the EP is likely to be a big player in an unity in North America, it needs to cut out the neo-papist rhetoric, and renounce the notion that it could rescind unilaterally any autocephalous status of a local Church... because if it doesn't, that really means that any agreements that would be reached about the nature and status of a united American Orthodox Church would not be worth the paper they were written on. One other thing that would help, in my opinion, would be for the EP to move operations to Mount Athos, much as the Patriarchate of Antioch moved to Damascus. If we had a future EP that was a respected Athonite elder, I don't think any pious member of any jurisdiction would have any difficulty entrusting themselves to his authority. Being under a primate that must be approved by the Turkish government is not something that the faithful of ROCOR want to see.

3. Since there is a diversity of liturgical traditions in North America, some guarantees will need to be forthcoming that would safeguard local parishes from having a bishop from another liturgical tradition, coming in like gangbusters, and facing them to conform to the tradition of the Bishop's preference. One way would be to simply put such a guarantee into the charter of the Church, make it unchangeable by any entity, other than a super majority of the parish. There could also be commissions for each liturgical tradition, that would oversee liturgical publications, and deal with matters of a purely liturgical nature if some controversy were to arise.

I am in favor of unity in America, under healthy circumstances. We should pray for that to come to pass, but if American Orthodox unity means that advocates for gay marriage will have free reign, and liturgical abnormalities will become the norm, then I pray that jurisdictional divisions in America will continue until Christ returns. However, if we all seek to embrace the Tradition of the Church, and to remain faithful to our doctrines, unity will happen one way or another, because real unity naturally comes from a unity of Faith.

p.s. One thing I should also add is that most of the clergy that I have met from other Orthodox Jurisdictions are pious and committed men, and so I don't want anyone to think that I do not hold a great many clergy and laity from other jurisdictions in very high regard. If every jurisdiction emulated the best examples of clergy and laity found within them, we would have unity in very short order.

*"This threefold primacy translates into specific privileges, such as the right of appeal and the right to grant or remove autocephaly (for example, the Archdioceses-Patriarchates of Ochrid, Pec and Turnavo, etc.), a privilege that the Ecumenical Patriarch exercised even in decisions not validated by decisions of the Ecumenical Councils, as in the case of modern Patriarchates, the first of which is that of Moscow" ( Met. Elpidophoros of Bursa, First Without Equals). It should be noted that the EP actually threatened recently to remove the autocephaly of the Slovakian Orthodox Church, because of some perceived slight, despite the fact that it was the Moscow Patriarchate that had granted them their autocephaly.

Update: Nathaniel McCallum has written a post entitled:  ROCOR Says Overlapping Dioceses are Canonical: An Ecclesiological Analysis.

Nathaniel goes down a number of rabbit trails in terms of the canons, in his attempt to refute the idea that the current situation we have in North America is not a canonical crime. However, ROCOR’s interpretation of the canons seems to be pretty similar to all the other local Churches who have established parishes in North America. After all, the Russian Church was here first. Every other jurisdiction that is here now, interpreted the canons to mean that they could establish their own ecclesiastical presence in North America, to meet the needs of their people who had come here. The fact that no one has been brought up on canonical charges when you have a 100 years worth of people doing something is a good sign that no one thinks the canons are being violated. Now is the situation an anomalous one? Yes. But no one has set out to violate the canons, in this regard, in any of the legitimate jurisdictions we have in North America.

Obviously the situation with the Church in Cyprus is not exactly analogous, but for a reason that Nathaniel did not mention. North America is not a recognized autocephalous Church. Even the tomos of autocephaly received by the OCA, while it granted the OCA independence, provided for the continuation of a presence of the MP in North America, and stated that it did not imply that the other jurisdictions in America were uncanonical — and so really, it was never autocephaly, in the full traditional sense.

Generally speaking, the canons address situations in which you have recognized autocephalous Churches, and thus speak of how they should interact. There is not a lot in the canons about how unclaimed  territories should be handled. But the history of the Church has been that local Church who were in a position to establish Churches in a new area, simply did so. The immigrant history of America is unprecedented in the history of the Church, and so what has resulted was not foreseen or specifically addressed by the canons. And so to speak of this situation as a violation of the canons is simply unfounded.

The bottom line is ROCOR has some concerns about the proposals for a quick integration of the jurisdictons, and those concerns will have to be addressed in order to bring ROCOR and the Russian Church into agreement. However, ROCOR is not stating a categorical opposition to jurisdictional unity, with ROCOR included, as ever happening. It is just opposed to such a union as things stand, and under the current proposals on the table.

Many will have seen the video of the meeting that was held in Cleveland to discuss the Episcopal Assembly, in which Protodeacon Peter Danilchick spoke. However, I spoke with Bishop Peter, who was also there, and he said that there were comments that were edited out of the video… and one of them was a question in which someone asked if America had a future as an autocephalous Church. Bishop Peter answered that yes, it does, however, he listed a number of things that he thought would need to happen first. Metropolitan Savas, said “No”, but that rather the American Church would be autonomy... under the EP — and that is a future that, as things stand, I would not want to see come to pass.

Nathaniel also uses two arguments that are unnecessarily inflammatory: 1. He tries to taint ROCOR's position with the charge of Ecumenism, and 2. He suggests that ROCOR is only taking this position because it is carrying water for the MP. Were it not for the modernistic and ecumenistic elements present in some of the larger jurisdictions in North America, there would be a lot less caution on the part of ROCOR. The views expressed by Archbishop Kyrill bear no resemblance to the Protestant notion of an invisible Church, because if it did, we would not care whether someone was a member of a legitimate Church or a vagante jurisdiction… but obviously, we do. Furthermore, I have not gotten any sense from anyone in ROCOR that ROCOR is being forced into any position by the MP. However, making these kind of charges is an attempt to open the wounds received during the fight for reconciliation with the Moscow Patriarchate, when those who eventually went into schism claimed that we would just be stooges for the MP and that we were giving up the fight against ecumenism, and we were thus now ecumenists ourselves. The relationship between ROCOR and the MP has actually been a very good one, and the MP has been very careful not to interfere with ROCOR or to come off as heavy handed, even in some cases where they might have had a good argument for doing so, had they been so inclined. ROCOR is very clear on its stance on Modernism and Ecumenism… and were this only true of all the Orthodox in North America and their respective mother churches, we would have no serious obstacles to a united Church in North America. ROCOR is not denying that a unified American Church is what we should have, and would like to have, under the right conditions. However, one does not have to be willing to accept a hasty union, under whatever terms might be dictated by the EP, for that to be so. There are worse options that not having jurisdictional unity, and one would be losing the purity of the Faith. St. Mark of Ephesus said that there can be no compromise on matters of the Faith, and there are matters of the Faith that are at issue.

ROCOR simply is not going to be rushed into a quick union, on the EP’s terms, without their concerns being addressed, and all the ramifications being given due consideration. However, ROCOR reaffirmed in this letter that it intends to continue to work with the Episcopal Assembly processes. On the other hand, Antioch has completely withdrawn, in order to Protest the Jerusalem Patriarchate having established a parish in Qatar… and yet there are no lengthy responses that I have seen taking the Antiochians to task for their actions… but leaving the Episcopal Assembly altogether obviously makes coming to some eventual agreement are less likely than taking the position that certain issues need to be dealt with first before an agreement can be reached. So rather than expending all this energy giving ROCOR grief for its epistle, I would suggest expending energy dealing with the issues that have been raised, and working patiently to come to an ultimate agreement that it likely to work well, and takes the legitimate concerns of all local Churches into account.

Update 2: Nathaniel replied: "And my argument is: 1. The failure to fix it right now is, according to the Fathers, a greater risk to our salvation than any particular terms we might find objectionable.2. The idea that we don’t have to fix it right now is fundamentally the same theological move as the Protestant notion of the “invisible Church” which undergirds the ecumenical movement."

My response: Satire alert....

If you so strongly believe that we should fix it now, how about starting with the OCA, which has not one, not two, but three ethnic dioceses that overlap all of their other dioceses. Fix it now, Nathaniel… show us how it is done. How about starting with an article entitled “The OCA believes parallel ethnic dioceses are canonical.” And then when all the Bulgarians, Albanians, Romanians, and the rest of the OCA are living happily ever after, then let’s get the EP to do the same, and fix the parallel Ukrainian, Carpatho-Russian and Greek dioceses. Once we have seen all that work, then we can have the quick establishment of an autonomous American Church, under the Moscow Patriarchate, since the Russians were here first. Fix it now, Nathaniel. Then let’s all agree to do it the way the Russians want it done. It’s that simple! Problem solved. Now let’s fix the Calendar problem — everyone goes back to the status quo ante. Problem solved. Now what’s next?

Stump the Priest: Why was Christ Baptized?

Question: Why was Christ baptized?

He was not baptized because He had sins that needed to be cleansed. St. John the Baptist himself recognized this. In the Gospel of Matthew, it says: "Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him. But John forbad him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?" (Matthew 3:12-14). Christ's answer gives us the first answer to your question: "And Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer [allow] it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness. Then he suffered him" (Matthew 3:15).

So what does it mean that "it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness"?

St. John Chrysostom says this:"He shows also how this “becometh” Him. How then doth it so? “In that we fulfill the whole law;” and to express this He said, “all righteousness.” For righteousness is the fulfilling of the commandments. “Since then we have performed all the rest of the commandments,” saith He, “and this alone remains, it also must be added: because I am come to do away the curse that is appointed for the transgression of the law. I must therefore first fulfill it all, and having delivered you from its condemnation, in this way bring it to an end. It becometh me therefore to fulfill the whole law, by the same rule that it becometh me to do away the curse that is written against you in the law: this being the very purpose of my assuming flesh, and coming hither” (Homily 12:1 on Matthew).

Christ fulfilled all the law. He was circumcised on the eighth day; He was subject to his earthly parents; etc. He lived the perfect life that we have failed to live. If it was only necessary for Christ to have been incarnate and then to die, God could have allowed Herod to have killed him as an infant. But it was also necessary that he live the life that we should have lived, and then to die and rise again.

St. Chromatius says: "Jesus therefore descended to fulfill all the observances of the law, and in this context he was baptized by John in Galilee at the Jordan" (Tractate on Matthew 12:1, quoted in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: New Testament, Vol. 1A, Manlio Simonetti, ed. (Downers Grove, IL: Intervasity Press, 2001) p. 51).

St. Gregory Palamas says: ""Thus it becommeth us to fulfil all righteousness (Matt. 3:15), that is, that I may leave no divine commandment undone, thus perfectly justifying human nature and filling it more visibly with divine and eternal grace. For when I receive baptism at your hands, I shall manifestly draw down it from above the Spirit of adoption. (Homily 59 "On Holy Baptism and Repentance," Christopher Veniamin, trans. Saint Gregory Palamas: The Homilies (Waymart, PA: Mount Thabor Publishing, 2009),  p. 492).

St. Cyril of Alexandria says: " It was necessary therefore that the Word of the Father, when He humbled Himself unto emptiness, and deigned to assume our likeness, should become for our sakes the pattern and way of every good work. For it follows, that He Who in every thing is first, must in this also set the example. In order therefore that we may learn both the power itself of holy baptism, and how much we gain by approaching so great a grace, He commences the work Himself; and, having been baptized, prays that you, my beloved, may learn that never-ceasing prayer is a thing most fitting for those who have once been counted worthy of holy baptism" (Homily 11 on the Gospel of Luke).

St. Jerome gives three reasons why Christ was baptized: "First, because he was born a man, that he might fulfill all justice and humility of the law. Second, that by his baptism he might confirm John's baptism. And third, that by sanctifying the waters of the Jordan through the descent of the dove, he might show the Holy Spirit's advent in the baptism of believers" (Commentary on Matthew 1:2:13, quoted in Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: New Testament, Vol. 1A, Manlio Simonetti, ed. (Downers Grove, IL: Intervasity Press, 2001) p. 51).

Christ also imaged His death and resurrection in His baptism. St. Gregory Palamas says: "For at the time of His descent into Hades, He went under the earth for our sake, and on returning thence, He opened all things both to Himself and to us, not just things on or around the earth, but highest heaven itself, to which afterwards He ascended bodily, "wither the forerunner is for us entered" (Heb. 6:20). Just as he foreshadowed the mystical bread and cup, and then handed on this mystery to the faithful to perform for their salvation (I Cor 11:25; Luke 22:17-20), so He mystically foretold His descent into Hades and His ascent from their through this baptism of His, and afterward passed on this sacrament to believers to perform that they may be saved. He allowed Himself what was painful and difficult, but bestowed on us communion in His sufferings right from the start through these painless means, causing us, according to the apostle, to be "planted together in the likeness of his death" (Rom. 6:5), that in due time we might also be vouchsafed the promised resurrection" (Homily 60 "On the Holy Feast of Theophany," Christopher Veniamin, trans. Saint Gregory Palamas: The Homilies (Waymart, PA: Mount Thabor Publishing, 2009),  p. 495f).

Stump the Priest: Fasting on the Eves of the Nativity and Theophany

Question: The Eves of Christmas and Theophany are called "strict fast days;" however, it appears that these days are also "wine and oil" days, and not just when they fall on Saturday or Sunday, but any day. At least this is so on calendars in the Slavic tradition. However, I do see that on the Greek Archdiocesan website, the Eve of Theophany, is counted as a fast without wine and oil despite it being a Sunday. So maybe the Greeks keep these days strictly by abstaining from wine and oil even on Sundays. But what does it mean for Slavic usage if it's a "strict fast day", but with wine and oil? 

There are different degrees of fasting, in terms of what may be eaten, but there are also various rubrics regarding at what point in the day we can eat something on fast days. But then sometimes the rubrics in the typikon are not very explicit, and so are capable of more than one interpretation. The Typikon is very explicit that when the Eves of Christmas or Theophany fall on a Saturday or Sunday, that it is not a strict fast. The Typikon says that when this happens, after the Liturgy we eat some bread and drink a cup of wine, and then have a fuller meal after Vespers. Whereas, when these days fall on week days, if health allows, we do not eat or drink anything until after Vespers. Even during Lent, wine and oil are always permitted on Saturdays and Sundays, because strict fasting is forbidden on those days. The exception to this is Holy Saturday, on which we do not eat until after the Vesperal Liturgy, which is according to the rubrics, the lattest Liturgy of the year, and then we have wine, but not oil, and may otherwise have a simple lenten meal. I suspect that the Greek practice is actually the same on this point, and that the Greek Archdiocesan website is just imprecise on this point.

On Holy Friday, the typikon actually calls for nothing to be eaten:

"On this Holy day neither a meal is offered nor do we eat on this day of the crucifixion. If someone is unable or has become very old and those unable to fast, he may be given bread and water after sunset. In this way we come to the holy commandment of the Holy Apostles not to eat on Great Friday" (Trans. Fr. Eugene Tarris, see http://transfig.orthodoxws.com/files/Bulgakov/0543.pdf).

As is often the case, however, modern practice is generally more lenient, but this is the ideal.

Now as to whether or not wine and oil would be permitted on the Eves of Christmas or Theophany, the Festal Menaion notes "The Forefeast of Christmas (24 December) is observed as a fast, and neither animal products nor fish may be eaten. In the Greek use, wine and oil are not permitted, except when the Forefeast falls on Saturday or Sunday; but in the Slav use, wine and oil may be taken, whatever day of the week it may be" (Festal Menaion (Tr. Mother Mary and Archimandrite Kallistos Ware, Faber and Faber, London, 1984), p. 220).  There is a similar note for the Eve of Theophany (Festal Menaion, p. 313).

This difference seems to arise from the fact that the Typikon, while explicit on what is allowed when these days fall on Saturday or Sunday, is not explicit regarding what is allowed when these days fall on weekdays. But even though wine and oil are permitted according to Slavic practice on these days, when they fall on weekdays, both Greek and Slavic practice agree that eating and drinking should be postponed until the evening. It is a pious custom to await the appearance of the first star on Christmas Eve before eating a meal (See Bulgakov's Handbook for Church Servers, December 24th).

It is also a practice among Ukrainians, Poles, Carpatho-Russians, and many Russians (those living in the South, and Western parts of Russian) to eat a somewhat elaborate lenten meal on the Eve of Nativity, in which each dish has a symbolic meaning related to the the feast of the Nativity. This meal is often called "the Holy Supper."

Stump the Priest: What is the Difference Between the Sunday of the Holy Forefathers, and the Sunday of the Holy Fathers?

Question: The two Sundays prior to Christmas seem to have almost identical themes. What is the difference between the Sunday of the Holy Forefathers and the Sunday of the Holy Fathers (the Sunday immediately before Christmas)?

The themes of these two commemorations are indeed close. The Titles of these two commemorations are part of the confusion. The second Sunday before Nativity is called the Sunday of the Holy Forefathers, to distinguish it from other Sundays of the Holy Fathers (which commemorate the Fathers of the Ecumenical Councils) at other times during the year. The proper title of the Sunday before Nativity is actually "The Sunday Before Nativity", and only secondarily is it referred to as a commemoration of "the Holy Fathers" (Christopher Veniamin, trans. Saint Gregory Palamas: The Homilies (Waymart, PA: Mount Thabor Publishing, 2009),  p. 632, note 952).

In the service of the Holy Forefathers itself, we hear the following hymns:

"O ye faithful, let us praise today all the fathers of the old Law: Abraham, the beloved of God, and Isaac, who was born according to the promise, and Jacob and the twelve patriarchs, the most meek David, and Daniel, the prophet of desires, glorifying with them the three youths that transformed the furnace into dew, and who ask remission of Christ God, Who is glorified in His saints" (The Doxasticon at Lord, I have cried...).

"Come, ye lovers of the feasts of the Church, and with psalms let us praise the assembly of the forefathers: Adam, the forefather of us all, Enoch, Noah, Melchizedek, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; and, after the Law, Moses and Aaron, Joshua, Samuel and David, and, with them, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and the twelve prophets, together with Elijah, Elisha and all the rest, Zachariah and the Forerunner; who all preached Christ, the Life and Resurrection of our race" (The Doxasticon of the Vespers Aposticha).

During the Canon, we also hear mention of Abel, Enoch,  the Patriarch Joseph, and Job... none of whom were ancestors of Christ.

The prophets of God are mentioned by name:  Hosea and Micah, Zephaniah and Habbakuk, Zechariah and Jonah, Haggai and Amos, Malachi, Obadiah and Nahum, Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel, together with Daniel, Elijah and Elisha -- and none of these were ancestors of Christ.

There is also mention of the Fore-mothers: "Hannah and Judith, Deborah and Huldah, Jael and Esther, Sarah and Miriam the sister of Moses, Rachel and Rebecca, and Ruth the exceeding wise" -- only  3 of whom are ancestors of Christ.

So the Sunday of the Holy Forefathers commemorates all of the faithful of the Old Testament, with special emphasis on Daniel and the Three Youths.

The Sunday before Nativity has many similar themes, and even some of the same hymns, but being the Sunday of the Genealogy, there is more of an emphasis on the Patriarch Abraham. He is mentioned about twice as frequently in this service. The Prophet Daniel is again included, but less frequently than in the previous Sunday. So there is a good deal of overlap, but there is a subtle shift from focusing on all the fathers and mothers of the Old Testament, to Christ's ancestors -- especially Abraham.

See also: 

The Synaxarion of the Sunday of the Holy Forefathers

The Sunday Before Nativity, by Sergius V. Bulgakov.