On a Summoning of the Great Council of the Orthodox Church
Archimandrite Justin Popovich
The following letter was addressed by Archimandrite Dr.
Justin Popovic of blessed memory, spiritual father of the monastery of Celie Valjevo
(Yugoslavia), to Bishop Jovan of Sabac and the Serbian hierarchy on May 7, 1977, with the
request to transmit this letter to the Holy Synod and the Council of Bishops of the
Serbian Orthodox Church. Its relevance has not diminished with the passing years... and
perhaps has increased in the light of the recent scandalous and unOrthodox events on Mount
Athos.
Not long ago in Chambesy, near Geneva, the "First
Pre-Conciliar Conference" took place (November 21-28, 1976). After reading and
studying the acts and resolutions of this conference, published by the "Secretariat
for the Preparation of the Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church" in Geneva,
I feel in my conscience the urgent, evangelical necessity, as a member of the Holy and
Catholic Orthodox Church, even though its humblest servant, to turn to Your Grace and,
through you, to the Holy Council of Bishops of the Serbian Church, with this exposition
that must express my grievous considerations for the future council. I beg Your Grace and
the Most Reverend Bishops to hear me with evangelical zeal and to listen to this cry of an
Orthodox conscience, which, thanks be to God, is neither alone nor isolated in the
Orthodox world whenever there is mention of that council.
1. From the minutes and resolutions of the "First
Pre-Conciliar Conference," which, for some unknown reason, was held in Geneva, where
it is difficult to find even a few hundred Orthodox faithful, it is clear that this
conference prepared and ordained a new catalogue of topics for the future "Great
Council" of the Orthodox Church. This was not one of those "Pan-Orthodox
Conferences," such as were held on Rhodes and subsequently elsewhere; nor was it the
"Pro-Synod," which has been at work until now; this was the "First
Pre-Conciliar Conference," initiating the direct preparation for the celebration of
an ecumenical council. Moreover, this conference did not begin its work on the foundation
of the "Catalogue of Topics," established at the first Pan-Orthodox Conference
in 1961 on Rhodes and unelaborated up until 1971, instead it compiled a revision of this
catalogue and set forth its own new "Catalogue of Topics" for the council.
Apparently, however, not even this catalogue is definitive, for it will very likely again
be altered and supplemented. Lately, the Conference has also reconsidered the methodology
formerly adopted in the planning and final preparation of topics for the council. It
abbreviated this entire process in view of its haste and urgency to summon the council as
soon as possible. For, according to the explicit declaration of Metropolitan Meliton,
presiding chairman of the Conference, the Patriarchate of Constantinople and certain
others "are hastening to summon" and celebrate the future council: the council
must be "of short duration" and occupy itself with "a limited number of
topics"; moreover, in the words of Metropolitan Meliton, "The Council must delve
into the burning questions that obstruct the normal functioning of the system linking up
the local Churches, into the one, single Orthodox Church..." ("Acts," p.55)
All of this obliges us to ask: what does it mean? Why all this haste in the preparation?
Where is all of this going to lead us?
2. The questions of the preparation and celebration of a
new ecumenical council of the Orthodox Church is neither new nor recent in this century of
the history of the Church. The matter was already proposed during the lifetime of that
hapless Patriarch of Constantinople, Meletios Metaxakis - the celebrated and presumptuous
modernist, reformer, and author of schisms within Orthodoxy - at his Pan-Orthodox Congress
held in Constantinople in 1923. (At this time it was recommended that the council be held
in the city of Nis in 1925, but since Nis was not in the territory of the Ecumenical
Patriarchate, the council was not convened, probably for that very reason. In general, as
it appears, Constantinople has assumed the monopoly of "Pan-Orthodoxy," of all
the "Congresses," "Conferences," "Pro-Synods" and
"Councils.") Later on, in 1930, at the monastery of Vatopedi, the Preparatory
Commission of the Orthodox Churches took place. It defined the Catalogue of Topics for the
Future Orthodox Pro-Synod, which should have been the prelude to the ecumenical council.
After the Second World War came the turn of Patriarch
Athenagoras of Constantinople with his Pan-Orthodox Conferences on Rhodes (again,
exclusively in the territory of the Patriarchate of Constantinople). The first of them, in
1961, called for the preparation of a Pan-Orthodox Council on condition that a pro-synod
be summoned, and it confirmed a catalogue of topics which had already been prepared by the
Patriarchate of Constantinople: eight full chapters with nearly forty primary topics and
twice again as many paragraphs and subparagraphs.
After the Rhodes Conferences II and III (1963 and 1964),
in 1966 the Belgrade Conference was held. At first this was called the Fourth Pan-Orthodox
Conference (Glasnik of the Serbian Orthodox Church, No. 10, 1966 and documents in Greek
published under this title), but later it was reduced by the Patriarchate of
Constantinople to the grade of an Inter-Orthodox Commission, so that the succeeding
conference, held in Constantinopolitan "territory" (the Orthodox Centre of the
Ecumenical Patriarchate at Chambesy-Geneva) in 1968, might be acclaimed the Fourth
Pan-Orthodox Conference in its place. At this conference, apparently, its impatient
organizers hastened to shorten the path to the council, for from the enormous catalogue of
Rhodes (their own work, however, and nobody else's) they took only the first six topics
and defined a new procedure of work. At the same time there was established a new
institution: the Inter-Orthodox Preparatory Commission, indispensable for the coordination
of work on the topics. Moreover, the Secretariat for the Preparation of the Council was
also established; in fact, this meant a bishop of Constantinople who was assigned the
task, with his seat at the above-named Geneva - at the same time proposals for including
other Orthodox members in the Secretariat were rejected. This preparatory commission and
the Secretariat, by wish of Constantinople held a meeting at Chambesy in June, 1971. At
this meeting they examined and unanimously approved abstracts of the selected six topics,
which subsequently were published in several languages and submitted, like all the
previous work in preparation for the council, to the merciless criticism of Orthodox
theologians. The criticisms of the Orthodox theologians (among them my Memorandum sent at
that time through Your Grace and, with Your Grace's approval, to the Holy Council of
Bishops, and subsequently approved by many Orthodox theologians and published in various
languages in the Orthodox world) apparently explain why the decision of the Preparatory
Commission of Geneva to convene in 1972 the First Pre-Conciliar Conference for the
revision of the catalogue of Rhodes, was in fact not observed that year, and the
conference took place only with great delay.
This First Pre-Conciliar Conference was held only in
November of 1976, again, of course, on Constantinopolitan "territory" at the
above-named centre in Chambesy, near Geneva. As is clear from the acts and resolutions,
only now just published, and which I have carefully studied, this conference re-examined
the catalogue of Rhodes to such an extent that the delegations participating in the work
of the various committees unanimously chose only ten topics for the council (only three of
the original six were included in the list!), while about thirty topics, not unanimously
chosen, were set aside for "particular study in the individual Churches" in the
form of "problematics of the Orthodox Church" (a concept entirely alien to
Orthodoxy). In the future these topics could become the subject of "Orthodox
examinations" and perhaps be included in the catalogue. As already stated, this
conference altered the process and methodology of elaborating the topics and the
preparatory work of the council which, I repeat, according to the organizers from both
Constantinople and other places, should take place "as soon as possible." From
all this, it is clear to every Orthodox Christian that the First Pre-Conciliar Conference
has not come up with anything substantially new, but continues rather to lead Orthodox
souls as well as the consciences of many into ever new labyrinths constituted by personal
ambitions. This is the reason why, it would seem, the ecumenical council has been in
preparation since 1923, and why at the present time it is desired to bring it to a hasty
realization.
3. All the contemporary "problematics"
concerning the topics of the future council, the uncertainty and mutability of their
invention, their determination, their artificial "cataloguing," as well as all
the new changes and "revisions", demonstrate to every true Orthodox conscience
one thing only: that at the present time there are no serious or pressing problems that
would justify the convening and celebration of a new ecumenical council of the Orthodox
Church. And if, nevertheless, a topic should exist, worthy of being the object of the
convocation and celebration of an ecumenical council, it is unknown to the present
initiators, organizers and editors of all the above-mentioned "Conferences" with
their previous and present "catalogues." If this were not the case, then how is
it to be explained that, beginning with the meeting in Constantinople in 1923, continuing
through Rhodes in 1961 and up to Geneva in 1976, the "thematics" and
"problematics" of the future council have been constantly changed? The
alterations extend to the number, order, contents and the very criteria employed for the
Catalogue of Topics that is to constitute the work of this great and unique ecclesiastical
body - the Holy Ecumenical Council of the Orthodox Church, as it has been and as it must
be. In reality, all of this manifests and underscores not only the usual lack of
consistency, but also an obvious incapacity and failure to understand the nature of
Orthodoxy on the part of those who at the present time, in the current situation, and in
such a manner would impose their "Council" on the Orthodox Churches - an
ignorance and inability to feel or to comprehend what a true ecumenical council has meant
and always means for the Orthodox Church and for the pleroma of its faithful who bear the
name of Christ. For if they sensed and realized this, they would first of all know that
never in the history and life of the Orthodox Church has a single council, not to mention
such an exceptional, grace-filled event (like Pentecost itself) as an ecumenical council,
sought and invented topics in this artificial way for its work and sessions; - never have
there been summoned such conferences, congresses, pro-synods, and other artificial
gatherings, unknown to the Orthodox conciliar tradition, and in reality borrowed from
Western organisations alien to the Church of Christ.
Historical reality is perfectly clear: the holy Councils
of the Holy Fathers, summoned by God, always, always had before them one, or at the most
two or three questions set before them by the extreme gravity of great heresies and
schisms that distorted the Orthodox Faith, tore asunder the Church and seriously placed in
danger the salvation of human souls, the salvation of the Orthodox people of God, and of
the entire creation of God. Therefore, the ecumenical councils always had a
Christological, soteriological, ecclesiological character, which means that their sole and
central topic - their Good News - was always the God-Man Jesus Christ and our salvation in
Him, our deification in Him. Yes, He - the Son of God, only-begotten and consubstantial,
incarnate; He - the eternal Head of the Body of the Church for the salvation and
deification of man; He - wholly in the Church by the grace of the Holy Spirit, by true
faith in Him, by the Orthodox Faith.
This is the truly Orthodox, apostolic and patristic theme,
the immortal theme of the Church of the God-Man, for all times, past, present and future.
This alone can be the subject of any future possible ecumenical council of the Orthodox
Church, and not some scholastic-protestant catalogue of topics having no essential
relation to the spiritual life and experience of apostolic Orthodoxy down the ages, since
it is nothing more than a series of anemic, humanistic theorems. The eternal catholicity
of the Orthodox Church and of all her ecumenical councils consists in the all-embracing
Person of the God-Man, the Lord Christ. This is the central and universal reality, the
theme of Orthodox Councils, this is the unique mystery and reality of the God-Man, upon
which the Orthodox Church of Christ is built and sustained with all ecumenical councils
and all her historical reality. Upon this foundation we are to build, even today, in the
sight of heaven and earth, and not upon the scholastic-protestant and humanistic topics
employed by the ecclesiastical delegates or delegations of Constantinople or Moscow, who
at this bitter and critical moment of history present themselves as the "leaders and
representatives" of the Orthodox Church in the world.
4. From the acts of the last Pre-Conciliar Conference in
Geneva, as in similar situations previously, it is clear that the ecclesiastical
delegations of Constantinople and Moscow differ little from one another with respect to
the problems and themes set forth as the subject of work for the future council. They have
the same topics, almost the same language, the same mentality, similar ambitions. This,
however, is no surprise. Whom do they in fact represent at the present moment, what Church
and what people of God? The Constantinopolitan hierarchy at almost all the pan-Orthodox
gatherings consists primarily of titular metropolitans and bishops, of pastors without
flocks and without concrete pastoral responsibility before God and their own living flock.
Whom do they represent and whom will they represent at the future council? Among the
official representatives of the Ecumenical Patriarchate there are no hierarchs from the
Greek islands where real Orthodox flocks are to be found; there are no Greek diocesan
bishops from Europe or America, not to mention other bishops - Russian, American,
Japanese, African, who have large Orthodox flocks and excellent Orthodox theologians. On
the other hand, does the present delegation of the Moscow Patriarchate in fact represent
the holy and martyred great Church of Russia and the millions of her martyrs and
confessors known only to God? Judging from what these delegations declare and defend,
wherever they travel outside the Soviet Union, they neither represent nor express the true
spirit and attitude of the Russian Orthodox Church and its faithful Orthodox flock, for
more often than not these delegations put the things of Caesar before the things of God.
The scriptural commandment, however, is otherwise: "Submit yourselves rather to God
than to men" (Acts 5:29).
Moreover, is it correct, is it Orthodox to have such
representations of the Orthodox Churches at various pan Orthodox gatherings on Rhodes or
in Geneva? The representatives of Constantinople who began this system of representation
of Orthodox Churches at the councils and those who accept this principle which, according
to their theory, is in accord with the "system of autocephalous and autonomous"
local Churches - they have forgotten that such a principle in fact contradicts the
conciliar tradition of Orthodoxy. Unfortunately this principle of representation was
accepted quickly and by all the other Orthodox: sometimes silently, sometimes with voted
protests, but forgetting that the Orthodox Church, in its nature and its dogmatically
unchanging constitution is episcopal and centred in the bishops. For the bishop and the
faithful gathered around him are the expression and manifestation of the Church as the
Body of Christ, especially in the Holy Liturgy: the Church is Apostolic and Catholic only
by virtue of its bishops, insofar as they are the heads of true ecclesiastical units, the
dioceses. At the same time, the other, historically later and variable forms of church
organisation of the Orthodox Church: the metropolias, archdioceses, patriarchates,
pentarchias, autocephalies, autonomies, etc., however many there may be or shall be,
cannot have and do not have a determining and decisive significance in the conciliar
system of the Orthodox Church. Furthermore, they may constitute an obstacle in the correct
functioning of the conciliar principle if they obstruct and reject the episcopal character
and structure of the Church and of the Churches. Here, undoubtedly, is to be found the
primary difference between Orthodox and papal ecclesiology.
If this is so, then how can there be represented according
to the delegation principle, that is by the same number of delegates, for example, the
Czech and Romanian Churches? Or to an even greater extent, the Patriarchates of Russia and
Constantinople? What groups of faithful do the first bishops represent and what the
second? Recently the Patriarchate of Constantinople has produced a multitude of bishops
and metropolitans, almost all of them titular and fictitious. Is it possible that this is
a preparatory measure to guarantee at the future "Ecumenical Council" by their
multitude of titles the majority of votes for the neo-papal ambitions of the Patriarchate
of Constantinople? On the other hand, the Churches apostolically zealous in missionary
work, such as the American Metropolia, the Russian Church Abroad, the Japanese Church and
others are not allowed a single representative!
Where in all this is the Catholic principle of Orthodoxy?
What sort of ecumenical council of the Orthodox Church of Christ will this be? Already at
the Geneva Conference, Ignatios, Metropolitan of Laodicea and representative of the
Patriarchate of Antioch, sadly affirmed: "I sense uneasiness, for harm is being done
the conciliar experience which is the foundation of the Orthodox Church."
5. Nevertheless, Constantinople and some others cannot
wait to summon the "council." It is primarily in accordance with their wishes
and insistence that the First Pre-Conciliar Conference in Geneva decided that "the
council should be summoned as soon as possible," that this council must be "of
short duration," and that it should "take for consideration a small number of
topics." And the ten chosen topics are cited. The first four topics are: the
diaspora; the question of ecclesiastical autocephaly and the conditions for its
proclamation; autonomy and its proclamation; the diptychs - that is, the order of
precedence among the Orthodox Churches.
Evangelical objectivity obliges one to note that the
conduct of the presiding chairman at the Pre-Conciliar Conference, Metropolitan Meliton,
was despotic and unbefitting a council. This is clear from every page of the published
acts of the conference. There it is clearly and plainly stated that, "This Holy and
Great Council of the Orthodox Church which is being prepared must not be regarded as
unique, excluding the further summoning of other Holy and Great Councils"
("Acts," pp. 18, 20, 50, 55, 60).
In view of all this, an evangelically sensitive conscience
cannot help but ask the burning question: what is the real end of a council summoned in
such haste and in such a highhanded manner?
Most Reverend Bishops, I cannot free myself from the
impression and conviction that all this points to the secret desire of certain known
persons of the Patriarchate of Constantinople: that the first in honour of Orthodox
Patriarchates force its ideas and procedures on all the Autocephalous Orthodox Churches,
and in general upon the Orthodox world and the Orthodox diaspora, and sanction such a
neo-papist intention by an "ecumenical council." For this reason, among the ten
topics selected for the council there have been inserted, indeed are the first, just those
topics that reveal the intention of Constantinople to submit to herself the entire
Orthodox diaspora - and that means the entire world! and to guarantee for herself the
exclusive right to grant autocephaly and autonomy in general to all the Orthodox Churches
in the world, both present and future, and at the same time to determine their order and
rank at her own discretion (this is exactly what the question of the diptychs implies, for
they concern not only the "order of liturgical commemoration" but the order of
precedence at councils, etc.).
I bow in reverence before the age-old achievements of the
Great Church of Constantinople, and before her present cross which is neither small nor
easy, which, according to the nature of things, is the cross of the entire Church - for,
as the Apostle says, "When one member suffers, the whole body suffers."
Moreover, I acknowledge the canonical rank and first place in honour of Constantinople
among the local Orthodox Churches, which are equal in honour and rights. But it would not
be in keeping with the Gospel if Constantinople, on account of the difficulties in which
she now finds herself, were allowed to bring the whole of Orthodoxy to the brink of the
abyss, as once occurred at the pseudo-council of Florence, or to canonize and dogmatize
particular historical forms which, at a given moment, might transform themselves from
wings into heavy chains, binding the Church and her transfiguring presence in the world.
Let us be frank: the conduct of the representatives of Constantinople in the last decades
has been characterized by the same unhealthy restlessness, by the same spiritually ill
condition as that which brought the Church to the betrayal and disgrace of Florence in the
15th Century. (Nor was the conduct of the same Church under the Turkish yoke an example of
all times. Both the Florentine and the Turkish yokes were dangerous for Orthodoxy.) With
the difference that today the situation is even more ominous: formerly Constantinople was
a living organism with millions of faithful - she was able to overcome without delay the
crisis brought about by external courses as well as the temptation to sacrifice the faith
and the Kingdom of God for the goods of this world. Today, however, she has only
metropolitans without faithful, bishops who have no one to lead (i.e. without dioceses),
who nonetheless wish to control the destinies of the entire Church. Today there must not,
there cannot be a new Florence! Nor can the present situation be compared with the
difficulties of the Turkish yoke. The same reasoning applies to the Moscow Patriarchate.
Are its difficulties or the difficulties of other local Churches under godless communism
to be allowed to determine the future of Orthodoxy?
The fate of the Church neither is nor can be any longer in
the hands of the Byzantine emperor or any other sovereign. It is not the control of a
patriarch or any of the mighty of this world, not even in that of the
"Pentarchy" or of the "autocephalies" (understood in the narrow
sense). By the power of God the Church has grown up into a multitude of local Churches
with millions of faithful, many of whom in our days have sealed their apostolic succession
and faithfulness to the Lamb with their blood. And new local Churches appear to be rising
on the horizon, such as the Japanese, the African and the American, and their freedom in
the Lord must not be removed by any "super-Church" of the papal type (cf. Canon
8, III Ecumenical Council), for this would signify an attack on the very essence of the
Church. Without their concurrence the solution of any ecclesiastical question of
ecumenical significance is inconceivable, not to mention the solutions to questions that
immediately concern them, i.e. the problem of the diaspora. The age-old struggle of
Orthodoxy against Roman absolutism was a struggle for just such freedom of the local
Church as catholic and conciliar, complete and whole in itself. Are we today to travel the
road of the first and fallen Rome, or of some "second" or "third"
similar to it? Are we to believe that Constantinople, which in the persons of its holy and
great hierarchs, its clergy and its people, so boldly opposed for centuries past the Roman
protectionism and absolutism, is today preparing to ignore the conciliar traditions of
Orthodoxy and to exchange them for the neo-papal surrogate of a "second,"
"third" or other sort of Rome?
6. Most Venerable Fathers! All the Orthodox behold and
realise how important, how significant today is the question of the Orthodox diaspora both
for the Orthodox Church in general and for all the Orthodox Churches individually. Can
this question be decided, as Constantinople or Moscow desires, without referring to,
without the participation of the Orthodox faithful, pastors and theologians of the
diaspora itself, which is increasing every day? The problem of the diaspora, without
doubt, is a church question of exceptional importance; it is a question that has risen to
the surface for the first time in history with such force and significance. For its
solution there would be cause indeed to convoke a truly ecumenical council in which all
the Orthodox bishops of all the Orthodox Churches would truly participate. Another
question that, in our view, could and should be considered at an authentic ecumenical
council of the Orthodox Church is the question of ecumenism. This, properly speaking, is
an ecclesiological question concerning the Church as theandric unity and organism, a unity
and organism that are placed in doubt by contemporary ecumenical syncretism. It is also
related to the question of man, for whom the nihilism of contemporary, and especially
atheistic, ideologies has dug a grave without hope of resurrection. Both questions can be
resolved correctly and in an Orthodox manner only by proceeding from the theandric
foundations of the ancient and true ecumenical councils. For the present, however, I leave
these problems aside so as not to overburden this appeal with new discussions and expand
it unduly.
The question of the diaspora is, then, both grievous and
extremely important in contemporary Orthodoxy. However, do the conditions at present exist
that would guarantee its solution in council as correct, Orthodox, and according to the
teaching of the Holy Fathers? Is it possible, indeed, for there to be a free and real
representation of all the Orthodox Churches at an ecumenical council without outside
influence disturbing them? Are the representatives of many, especially of the Churches
under militantly atheistic regimes, really able to express and defend Orthodox principles?
Can a Church that denies her own martyrs be an authentic confessor of the Cross of
Golgotha, or a bearer of the spirit and conciliar consciousness of the Church of Christ?
Before a council takes place, let us ask ourselves whether it will be possible for the
consciences of millions of new martyrs, made white by the blood of the Lamb, to speak out
in it. The experience of history teaches that whenever the Church is crucified, each of
her members is called upon to suffer for her Truth, and not to debate artificial problems
or to look for false answers to real questions - "fishing in muddied waters" in
order to satisfy personal ambitions. Shall we not remember that so long as the
persecutions of the Church endured, no ecumenical councils were convened - which does not
mean that the Church of God in those times did not live or function in a conciliar
fashion. Quite the contrary, the age of the persecutions was its period of richest fruits.
And when afterwards the First Ecumenical Council gathered, there gathered also the
confessors with their wounds and scars, the bishops tried in the fire of suffering, who
then could freely testify concerning Christ as God and Lord. Will their spirit be present
also at this time? In other words, will the bishops of our own age who are similar to the
martyrs be present at the council that is now preparing, so that this council might think
in accordance with the Holy Spirit and speak and decide according to God, and that there
not be heard in it primarily those who are not free from the influence of the powers of
this world? Let us consider, for example, the group of bishops of the Russian Church
Outside of Russia who, for all their human weakness, bear upon themselves the bonds of the
Lord and of the Russian Church that has fled into the wilderness from the persecutions in
no way inferior to those of Diocletian: these bishops have been excluded in advance by
Moscow and Constantinople from participation in the council, and in this way condemned to
silence. Let us think of those bishops of Russia and of other openly atheistic countries
who will be unable to participate freely in the council or to speak and make decisions
freely; some of them will not even be allowed to attend the council. Not to mention the
impossibility of them or their Churches preparing in a worthy manner for so great and
significant an occasion. Is this not more than sufficient proof that at the council the
conscience of the martyred Church and the conscience of the ecclesiastical pleroma will
both be silent, that their representatives will not be allowed even to enter - such as
occurred with one of the most illustrious witnesses of the persecuted Church at the
assembly in Nairobi (I refer specifically to Solzhenitsyn)?
We may leave aside the question of how moral or even
normal it may be that at a time in which the Lord Jesus Christ and faith in Him are
crucified in more terrible fashion than ever before, His followers should be deciding who
will be first among them. At a time in which Satan is seeking not only the body but the
very soul of man and the world, when mankind is threatened with self-destruction, is it
moral and normal that the disciples of Christ should be occupied with the same questions
(and in the same way) as the contemporary anti-Christian ideologies - ideologies that sell
the Bread of Life for a mess of pottage?
Keeping all this in mind and painfully aware of the
situation of the contemporary Orthodox Church and of the world in general - which has not
substantially changed since my last appeal to the Holy Council of Bishops (May, 1971) my
conscience once more obliges me to turn with insistence and beseeching to the Holy Council
of Bishops of the martyred Serbian Church: let our Serbian Church abstain from
participating in the preparations for the "ecumenical council," indeed from
participating in the council itself. For should this council, God forbid, actually come to
pass, only one kind of result can be expected from it: schisms, heresies and the loss of
many souls. Considering the question from the point of view of the apostolic and patristic
and historical experience of the Church, such a council, instead of healing, will but open
up new wounds in the body of the Church and inflict upon her new problems and new
misfortunes.
I recommend myself to the holy and apostolic prayers of
the Fathers of the Holy Council of Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church.
The unworthy Archimandrite Justin
(Spiritual father of the monastery of Chelie)
Eve of the Feast of St. George, 1977
Monastery of Chelie, Valjevo (Yugoslavia)
See also Ostroumoff, Ivan N., The History of the Council of Florence (Boston:
Holy Transfiguration Monastery, 1971). This is a reprint of the original 19th century work
published in Moscow. It is the best book on the subject and highly relevant to our modern
day.
|