MP is against Constantinople’s attempts to intervene in other Orthodox Churches’ affairs

interfax ^ | 22 November 2006, 14:54 | interfax

[kawaii]

22 November 2006, 14:54

Moscow Patriarchate is against Constantinople’s attempts to intervene in other Orthodox Churches’ affairs

Moscow, November 22, Interfax - The Russian Orthodox Church denies that the Patriarchate of Constantinople can intervene in internal affairs of other Churches and urges to prevent division in the Orthodox world.

‘We deny the Patriarchate of Constantinople’s capacity to intervene in the jurisdiction of other Churches. This idea separates us from Rome at present,’ said the Chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate department for external church relations Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad at the opening of the annual Radonezh festival of Orthodox films and TV programmes that took place in St. Nicholas’ church at the Tretyakov Gallery on Wednesday.

The Metropolitan remarked that the Orthodox Church is keeping its unity. The Patriarchate of Constantinople and the Russian Orthodox Church are in the eucharistic (liturgical) unity.

‘This unity must be preserved. One should not react to any provocations because of which this unity may be frustrated,’ he underscored.

According to Metropolitan Kirill, ‘the world would have looked differently,’ had Rome and Constantinople not divided in the 11th century.

‘We should prevent a division in the Orthodox world,’ the hierarch of the Russian Church underscored.

He remarked that an untraditional perception of the role and importance of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, ‘in no way connected with the canonical tradition of the Orthodox Church,’ began to develop in Constantinople in the early 20th century resulting in the split of Orthodoxy in the Baltic countries, Finland, Poland and within Russian emigration.

‘We do not think that the Patriarch of Constantinople is invested with powers as far as other local Orthodox Churches are concerned. We think there is no such a centre to which [the Orthodox Churches] can appeal. Only the Pan-Orthodox Council could play the part of this centre,’ Metropolitan Kirill said.

The Patriarchate of Constantinople has recently taken in its jurisdiction in violation of canonical rights the former administrator of the Sourozh diocese of the Russian Church Bishop Basil (Osborne) and supported schismatic groups in Ukraine.

[kawaii]

The MP-EP mudslinging continues to abound...

[kawaii]

ping

[Claud]

"Third Rome tells New Rome not to act like Old Rome"

[Kolokotronis]

In other news, dog bites man!

[kawaii]

i would like to see a pan orthodox response on the uockp...

[Claud]

What's the EP doing that's provoking this reaction? I couldn't understand that last paragraph in the article.

[kawaii]

A few years back the Orthodox in Estonia wanted to schism and form their own church, and the EP rubber stamped them.

About a year ago, an MP Bishop asked the MP to move his parish under the EP hoping to focus on non-immigrants. The MP said no, and the EP took the Bishop, though not the parish. To do this the EP is SUPPOSED to get a letter from the MP releasing the Bishop first.

Most recently a church under the EP in the United States (one of a slew of splinter Ukrainian Orthodox churches) invited the head of yet another schismatic church in Ukraine for dinner, and apparently prayer. The head they invited is a former MP bishop who was defrocked, who subsequently started his own church amid vapid nationalist banter. He's also auded to coming into communion with Catholics; its not hard to question the Orthodoxy of said Bishop (Filaret), and thus wonder why a more less canonical EP church would be inviting him as the guest of honor at dinners.

Also the EP has been reguraly intervening in lands which at least for the last 500 years or so have been considered canonically to be under the Russian church, putting schismatic national churches directly under the EP.

Frankly it seems like a sad attempt to increase the EP's control over Orthodoxy, more than 70% is under the Russian church directly or indirectly. And growing with the ROCOR-MP union.

[Kolokotronis]

I know virtually nothing about this situation, but as always, take what comes out of Moscow with a grain, or perhaps a pound, of salt (same goes for Constantinople too, by the way).

Here's a link which attempts to explain what's happening. I have no idea if it is accurate but at least it doesn't seem polemical.

http://orthodoxwiki.org/Diocese_of_Sourozh

[Agrarian]

"In other news, dog bites man!"

It does get old, doesn't it? The MP really doesn't have any choice but to keep repeating this stuff, though, until the situation changes...

I still say that the primary job of the EP should be to evangelize and convert the people living in his own traditional jurisdictional boundaries. Granted, it would mean that he would have to leave Constantinople and go into exile to do it, but it would show that he is as serious about his own people as the other Patriarchates are about theirs.

Alexandria is evangelizing sub-Saharan Africa, Antioch is working to bring the Melkites et al back into the Orthodox fold, the MP and the other Eastern Europe patriarchates are tending to the spiritual recovery and re-evangelization of their people, (we won't comment on Jerusalem...) JPII was very serious in his efforts to restore Christian belief and practice in Italy and Western Europe -- and I would imagine that BXVI will be, if anything, more aggressive in this regard.

Constantinople's emphasis on retaining control of a few city blocks in Istanbul and on developing a role as the Pope of the East seems to be a glaring exception to my admittedly prejudiced eyes.

Maybe the MP could take a more positive approach and announce that they are going to assist Constantinople in tending to the conversion of Turkey -- would that help? :-)

Just my thoughts -- of course its easy for me to make these recommendations from the safety of the American heartland...

[Claud]

Archbishop Innokenty (Vasilyev) of Korsun was sent by the patriarchate to read out a patriarchal decree at the Sourozh cathedral in London retiring Basil and placing control of the diocese under Innokenty. Basil's response was to appeal to the arbitration of the Ecumenical Patriarch, citing canons 9 and 17 of the Fourth Ecumenical Council, which grant to clergy the right of appeal to the exarch of their diocese or to 'the throne of the imperial city of Constantinople'.[2] Bishop Basil and his supporters have interpreted these canons to demarcate a general ecclesiastical principle that in general a dispute with a superior hierarch may be referred to Constantinople.[3] This interpretation is rejected by Moscow.[4]

This seems to be the salient part of the wikipedia article.

[kawaii]

Maybe the MP could take a more positive approach and announce that they are going to assist Constantinople in tending to the conversion of Turkey -- would that help? :-)

LOL. They'd probably do a lot better job though, as you mention working from Outside Turkey would make the task a lot easier, though also the church's clout with the Russian government may hold more sway that the EP's with Turkey's government.

[Claud]

Granted, it would mean that he would have to leave Constantinople and go into exile to do it, but it would show that he is as serious about his own people as the other Patriarchates are about theirs.

Is that the deal? If the EP leaves the city he can't come back?

I tend to think you're right Agrarian.

[Kolokotronis]

"Constantinople's emphasis on retaining control of a few city blocks in Istanbul and on developing a role as the Pope of the East seems to be a glaring exception to my admittedly prejudiced eyes."

Well, as you know, many of us Greeks tend to agree with you, though I should add that his jurisdiction does extend over most of the "Greek Diaspora". I doubt anyone else would want us! :)

I once suggested to certain hierarchs that the EP ought to move to DC as the new seat of the Empire. My suggestion was not well received...in great measure on account of the self-interest of the hierarchjs present!

The foregoing notwithstanding, as I have said before, beware the embrace of the Russian bear. I am not even remotely convinced that the interests of the ROC and the MP are anymore divorced from those of the Russian state than they have been since Peter the Great.

[Kolokotronis]

" This seems to be the salient part of the wikipedia article."

So it would seem and the canons do seem to say what it is claimed they say.

"IF any Clergyman have a matter against another clergyman, he shall not forsake his bishop and run to secular courts; but let him first lay open the matter before his own Bishop, or let the matter be submitted to any person whom each of the parties may, with the Bishop's consent, select. And if any one shall contravene these decrees, let him be subjected to canonical penalties. And if a clergyman have a complaint against his own or any other bishop, let it be decided by the synod of the province. And if a bishop or clergyman should have a difference with the metropolitan of the province, let him have recourse to the Exarch of the Diocese, or to the throne of the Imperial City of Constantinople, and there let it be tried."

and

"Outlying or rural parishes shall in every province remain subject to the bishops who now have jurisdiction over them, particularly if the bishops have peaceably and continuously governed them for the space of thirty years. But if within thirty years there has been, or is, any dispute concerning them, it is lawful for those who hold themselves aggrieved to bring their cause before the synod of the province. And if any one be wronged by his metropolitan, let the matter be decided by the exarch of the diocese or by the throne of Constantinople, as aforesaid. And if any city has been, or shall hereafter be newly erected by imperial authority, let the order of the ecclesiastical parishes follow the political and municipal example."

[kawaii]

As far as the Peter the Great comment you may wish to read this:
http://www.holytrinitymission.org/books/english/third_rome_m_johnson.htm

Ceaseropapism wasn't as entrenched in the church under Peter the Great as some western sources have aledged...

[kawaii]

This ignores the apparent embrace of the UOC-KP though... folks who've said they may commune with Catholics...

[Kolokotronis]

"This ignores the apparent embrace of the UOC-KP though... folks who've said they may commune with Catholics..."

I hadn't heard this, but it doesn't surprise me. In Lebanon the Antiochians, the Melkites and the Maronites are doing it too.

[Claud]

Interesting, thanks for the cite. It says "Imperial throne": does that mean the emperor to the exclusion of the patriarch, or is understood they are sort of the same unit here since we're talking about ecclesiastical matters.

I could see someone picking it apart..."no emperor anymore, therefore no appeal!" LOL

[Kolokotronis]

"It says "Imperial throne": does that mean the emperor to the exclusion of the patriarch, or is understood they are sort of the same unit here since we're talking about ecclesiastical matters."

Well, the canons say "the Throne of the Imperial City" and "the throne of Constantinople", meaning the Patriarchial throne, but I'll bet the Russians are hanging their hat on exactly your thought.

[kawaii]

Did you check out the link to the Holy Trinity Mission Site?

I find it interesting that the Slavs generally have never heard of the allegations popular here in the west that the Tsar ruled the church with an iron fist...