Posted on 12/22/2006 11:58:59 AM PST by Teófilo
Echoes of our own dissenters can be heard in the Holy Mountain.
Folks, for the last few days I've been tracking several news streams regarding the eviction of a number of monks from the ancient Esphigmenou monastery, located in the monastic republic of Mount Athos—also known as the "Holy Mountain"—in Northern Greece. Most Orthodox Christians see the monks residing in the various Athonite monasteries the theological trend-setters of their communion.
Background
The current dispute centers on ecumenism. The current residents of the Ephigmenou monastery refuse to recognize the Orthodox-Catholic rapprochement, of which the late visit of Pope Benedict XVI to Patriarch Bartholomew was a luminous example. In fact, the Patriarch recently visited the monastery and asked the monks to reconsider their position.
The monks at Ephigmenou wanted nothing to do with this and apparently did something that placed them at odds with the Greek Orthodox hierarchy and with their neighboring monasteries in the Holy Mountain. Although I am not exactly sure what did they do to rock the boat—Orthodox hierarchs must allow a certain degree of anti-Catholicism suspicion to run in their Church, whether they personally agree with the attitude, or not—I speculate that the rebel monks crossed a few red lines that earned them the wrath of the Greek Orthodox Church.
Nevertheless, the dispute has caught the attention of our State Department, which has approached the issue from the viewpoint that the Greek government and the Patriarchate are violating the religious freedom of the rebel monks of Esphigmenou.
The intra-Orthodox doctrinal dispute between Esphigmenou monastery on Mt. Athos and the Ecumenical Patriarchate that administers the region under the 1924 Charter of Mt. Athos continued. Esphigmenou is an Old Calendarist monastery that does not recognize the authority of the Patriarchate. In March 2005, the Council of State declined to rule on the appeal of a 2002 eviction request by the Ecumenical Patriarchate against the abbot of Esphigmenou on the grounds that it was not competent, under the constitution, to judge the ecclesiastic and administrative jurisdiction of the Patriarchate over Mt. Athos, but the Government had not enforced the expulsion order. Approximately ninety similar appeals by other Esphigmenou monks were pending. In late 2005, the Holy Community governing Mt. Athos appointed a new Esphigmenou monastic order, recognized by the Patriarchate, to replace the existing order. An open dispute between the two monastic orders ensued in December. The Esphigmenou monastery complained about restrictions on access to supplies and medical care that it claimed threatened the survival of the monastery. Government and ecclesiastic representatives claimed they preferred to settle this dispute without eviction.The dissenting monks of Esphigmenou have a copy of this State Department finding on their website.
Now, the situation has decayed enough for monks to arm themselves with "crowbars and sledgehammers." A number have been wounded. An eviction action is imminent.
Monks stake position against "the heresy of ecumenism"
Their website states the position of the monks of Esphigmenou as follows:
The fathers of Esphigmenou struggle against the heresy of ecumenism which states that there is no one church which possesses the Truth. The Orthodox Church believes, as the monks of Esphigmenou Monastery believe, that the Church has never lost the Truth or its unity. The Nicene Creed states the Orthodox Church’s dogmatic basis, “I believe in one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. I believe in one baptism.” Ecumenism rejects these fundamental truths of the church by teaching that there are many churches and many baptisms.A recent report also posted on the site statesThe beliefs of ecumenism and the beliefs of Orthodoxy are mutually exclusive. You can either believe in the Creed or you can believe in ecumenism, not both. By embracing ecumenism Patriarch Bartholomew has embraced a belief in conflict with the teachings of the Orthodox Church. This is what the monks object to and what they wish to discuss with the Patriarch. There is not a single saint of the Church, ever, who believes in what Patriarch Bartholomew teaches and practices with regards to ecumenism, and this has caused great concern on the part of the monks. The Patriarch refuses to allay those concerns and refuses to engage in constructive dialogue with the monks. He has, however, demanded an apology in writing for questioning him.
Though praying with non-orthodox is strictly forbidden by the Holy and Sacred Canons of the church, Patriarch Bartholomew has once again demonstrated that things like the Canons of the church don't matter - he is a man above the law. To sin is to transgress God's law; to commit heresy is to change God's law. He'll decide what's lawful and what's not. Starving monks - yup, that's OK. Praying with non-orthodox, that's OK too.When I refer on my ocassional posts on the subject to Orthodox "traditionalists" and "integrists" (this latter term not to be understood as derogatory) I have expressions such as the above in mind, and the ones who uttered them.
Christian Agape takes precedence and must prevail.
It also seems to me that in terms of their beliefs, attitudes, and interpretations of past and present canonical law, these monks are little different from our own schismatic "traditionalists" who stand in judgment of the Church and of the Successor of St. Peter, they being the only ones in the right and everyone else, wrong, by their own fiat.
There's an argument, a powerful one methinks, that the command to agape, that is, to LOVE, takes precedence over any fundamentalistic reading of the canons, such as these monks engage in, or our own "traditionalists" do in respect to the Mass of Pius V and the "Syllabus of Errors" of Blessed Pope Pius IX, to give two equivalent examples. Needless to say, our own schismatic "traditionalists" are as fond of the Orthodox Church as theirs are of our Church.
I think that "traditionalism" of this kind is legalistic and at its core, loveless and sterile. Traditionalists of the Christian East and West suffer from a deep-seated illness of the soul, one that moves them to presume that the Churches' only legitimate course of action is to submit to their own narrow interpretations, or else. It is the same sickly and deplorable attitude I see in militant Islamists and as such irrational and ultimately, unworthy of a disciple of Christ.
The present age demands a closer living of the Gospel in faith and love. The confrontation between the Eastern and the Western Churches undermines the preaching of the Gospel, the administration of the sacraments, and therefore, the salvation of the world. There's a Greater Law than the canons--many of which are no longer enforced--to which all judgmental attitudes of the "traditionalist" sort must yield.
It appears to me that the monks in question are in a state of disobedience to legitimate canonical authority and when monks become disobedient, they lose any claims to their patrimony as a consequence—particularly since their patrimony is suspect in the first place. A sad truth they're going to learn the hard way.
Now, I am not sanctioning violence here of any kind, from any side, mind you. But it seems to me that, had religious obedience and humility prevailed here, this wouldn't have happened. Yes, I know, that's an obvious observation but angry people seldom heed obvious observations.
- Read the Excommunication Decree and Removal Notice written by Patriarch Bartholomew against the rebel monks of .
- Read the Wikipedia article about the Greek Old Calendarists and compare their outlook with the one shown by the SSPX
PING
As I believe Nihil Obstat commented elsewhere, "Orthodox sedevacantists".
There will always be a feeling of wariness among many Orthodox toward the Roman Catholic Church. On many theological points I can sympathize, but too many Orthodox whinily tend to to bring up historical happenings eg; the Sacking of Constantinople by Crusaders, as if it happened last Thursday---get over it.
Looking for a place to attend Christmas Mass, I went down to the Greek Orthodox Church and chatted with the Priest.
I was favorably impressed with everything, except that he does get information from MSNBC and thinks Bush lied about WMD to get us into Iraq.
On the plus side, he didn't get hostile when I ventured my opinion that Bush was set up by a cabal of Clintonoids within the CIA, and actually thought he was telling the truth.
Set up regarding what?
The size and status of Saddam's WMD programs.
"On the plus side, he didn't get hostile when I ventured my opinion that Bush was set up by a cabal of Clintonoids within the CIA, and actually thought he was telling the truth."
The man should be congratulated for not laughing in your face.
If you are ignorant of the fact that there was a cabal of Clintonoids in the CIA working to undermine Bush, then I should be congratulated for not making an insulting comment about it.
Yep. Cuckoo birds.
-Theo
Okay, that is it. I am not a Orthodoxie nor Catholicist, but they mess with Mt. Athos and I am likely to take up the Crusader Cross and go medieval on somebody! (Where did I put that broadsword?)
--The fathers of Esphigmenou struggle against the heresy of ecumenism which states that there is no one church which possesses the Truth.
--The Patriarch refuses to allay those concerns and refuses to engage in constructive dialogue with the monks. He has, however, demanded an apology in writing for questioning him.
Okay, what the heck is Patriarch Bart teaching here? Methinks the monks got a point. Doctrine is not something that one can back down on just so 'we can get along'. You do that and what you get is Rick Warren or Joel Ostein (search for them here if you haven't a clue.)
--It also seems to me that in terms of their beliefs, attitudes, and interpretations of past and present canonical law, these monks are little different from our own schismatic "traditionalists" who stand in judgment of the Church and of the Successor of St. Peter, they being the only ones in the right and everyone else, wrong, by their own fiat.
Nope. That is all wrong. Their are NO schismatics in the RCC. I read it here myself from good Catholics when they mention that the Prots have 450000 denominations and cannot agree on doctrine. That simply CANNOT happen with the RCC. (Just ribbing you guys! :o))
Merry Christmas to all those on that side of the Tiber.
(Does this mean I am the Etruscan King and you guys are Horatio? Defend honorable Rome! and all that...)
:-D
-Theo
"these monks are little different from our own schismatic "traditionalists" who stand in judgment of the Church and of the Successor of St. Peter, they being the only ones in the right and everyone else, wrong, by their own fiat. "
I am so sick of that wrong-headed, wrong-hearted crap.
Maybe if we tell it as a fairy tale...
Once upon a time, there was a church that believed A, B, and C for 2000 years. Then, one day, a bunch of people said, "No, no, A, B, and C aren't right. You all have to start believing X, Y, and Z, which have always been associated with the deadly enemies of your church."
Some in the church were sheeple, and went along. A very few said, "No, you have no authority to substitute X, Y, and Z for A, B, and C."
The theological Stalinists then waxed wroth, and, arguing as leftists always do, tried to ignore the 2000 years of Church history and paint A, B, and C as nothing more than the opinions of the non-sheeple.
Where these "traditionalists" stood in judgment of the theological Stalinists for substituting their own whims for Church doctrine, the Stalinists calumniated them for "standing in judgment of the Church," a naked lie of the sort in which leftists habitually deal.
Where the non-sheeple compared the dictates of the theological Stalinists with the established doctrine of the Church and found the Stalinists in error, the Stalinists prattled of "their own fiat," to make it seem like it was only the dissenters arrayed against them and not all of Church teaching, doctrine, Tradition, revelation, and Scripture.
In other words, they reacted to dissent from theological Stalinism with the same dishonest ploys secular Stalinists use in the political sphere.
Satan has a particular, unmistakable stench. The liberal church in America reeks of it.
Nope. All this is from a good flu. Just in time for Christmas...*sigh*
Christmas blessings to you, should I forget to throw some your way laters!
It must be true...
"If you tell a lie often enough, it becomes the 'truth'."
Saddam used WMD against his own people...unless all those corpses died of imaginary nerve gas.
The CIA told Bush that beyond a doubt Saddam had an ongoing WMD program. We have found warheads loaded with nerve gas. To accuse Bush of lying when he was at worst too trusting of the CIA is just not reasonable.
All this was discussed right here on FR. Have people already forgotten?
You know what's funny about this? The common defense of Bush's lying is in essence that he was an ineffectual, incompetent, fool, who surrounded himself with the same. The record is rather that Bush had no interest in any intelligence that moved him away from his desire to invade Iraq.
"We have found warheads loaded with nerve gas."
"We" found a bunch of degraded missiles left over from the eighties that Saddam didn't even know he had.
"All this was discussed right here on FR."
That is only meaningless.
"For bureaucratic reasons we settled on one issue, weapons of mass destruction, because it was the one reason everyone could agree on," - Paul Wolfowitz.
The only question is - "Who is 'we' Kemosabe?"
When one single analyst told the administration that aluminum tubes could only be used for uranium enrichment, the Dept of Energy (the folks who know from uranium enrichment) were saying just the opposite, that the tubes were not at all suitable for such use.
Bush went public only with the former claim of course, presenting it as a certainty - there are only two plausible explainations for this decision - either Bush, and his VP, and his National Security advisor were hopelessly inconpetent boobs, or they had no regard for the truth.
It is impossible for me to decide which of those two possible explanation condemn this administration the most thoroughly - perhaps you, Dsc, ever hopeful that ideology serves truth more reliably than mere facts, can be the decider here...
It's the truth. Get over it. Move on.
-Theo
You know, I've got that too, a mild case of the sniffles, along with sore throat, muscle pain, lethargy, the works.
You are not alone.
Merry Christmas to you too!
-Theo
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