| We Orthodox are often happy to bear the dual label, and we sometimes trade upon it. We have food festivals (wonderful things in themselves), and turn this face to the world, displaying our culture with quite justifiable pride in terms of its cuisine, crafts, and dance. The possible down side of this display is that one might be tempted to define Orthodoxy mainly in terms of ethnic culture. In Canada anyway such a display garners more acceptance than a forthright missionary display of the Gospel. Our Prime Minister and our press (for example) happily hear about Greek dancing and our colourful Orthodox customs. They are happy to eat souvlaki as they shake hands and kiss babies at election time, and praise Greek Canadians for the richness of their religion. They are less happy to hear about Jesus Christ and His call to repent and believe, which is the real message of the Greek Orthodox Church and of every other Orthodox Church. It is easy to enthuse about our rich and glorious cultural heritage, partly because there is so much of it. Our cultural heritage stretches back through the centuries, and came to its full flowering in Byzantium, which constituted a kind of high water mark for the Orthodox Church in terms of worldly influence. We had an emperor who presided over the ecumene —i.e. the Roman world—and our bishops were figures of grandeur and power. A few heretics and Jews aside, pretty much all the Roman world had been converted. If you count the Byzantine years generously from Constantine I in the early fourth century to Constantine XI in the mid-fifteenth century, the Orthodox time in the sun ran for over a thousand years. And if you add Slavic Orthodoxy into the mix, the period of ascendency runs for much longer (though admittedly rather further north of the original Byzantium). It is very heady stuff. Perhaps that is why it is so hard to let it go and acknowledge that Byzantium now lies in the dust and the double-headed eagle no longer flies. We still insist on calling Istanbul “Constantinople” although no airline flies to Constantinople anymore. The planes all land in Istanbul. We still insist on calling the bishop residing in Istanbul “the Ecumenical Patriarch”, although the ecumene in which he once exercised his influence no longer exists. It is the same throughout the Orthodox world: the bishop of Antioch’s full title is “Patriarch of Antioch and All the East”, although “the East”—the original secular Roman diocese of “ Oriens ”—also no longer exists as a political division. |
| When Christians lose this singular vision, particularly when they agree to become a religious institution within the greater life of society, the Cross is discarded. We begin to think that our lives are found in the ballot box or shouting louder than those around us. The slave overthrows his master only to become a master over his own slaves. You don’t need a God to do the politics of this world. “But be of good cheer,” Christ said. “I have overcome the world.” Addendum: On Symphonia I have heard numerous objections to this series of articles and their approach on the basis of the theory of symphonia , the cooperative work between Emperor and Church that became a primary vision of the Byzantine synthesis. Its legacy is the double-headed eagle that adorns both national flags and Church decoration to this day. Symphonia (two voices in harmony) represents an icon of the Kingdom of God in this world (though not the thing itself). It served as a guiding principle in Orthodox nations for many centuries, and then lingered like a precious lost object for centuries ever after. It should be noted, first, that symphonia always sounded better in theory than in practice. Emperors rarely behaved themselves and acknowledged boundaries and limits to their power. As often as not, they resorted to the crude life violence. Many saw in Russia the continuation of Byzantium (the title “Tsar” is the Russian form of “Caesar”). Symphonia lived on as an icon and a promise. But that vision was repeatedly violated. From the time of Peter the Great forward, for example, Tsars sought to subjugate the Church in an effort to rationalize state control. The Patriarchate was abolished (thus cutting off one head of the double-eagle) and the Church was largely reduced to a department of state modeled after German Lutheranism (many Tsars admired German efficiency). The nadir of symphonia in Russia can be seen in the Nikonian reforms where the state became the persecutor of Christians in the name of reform with a bitter legacy that the Church has sought to heal in recent years. |
| We still treat our bishops as if they were Imperial dignitaries, even dressing them up in the Imperial sakkos (the robe worn by the Emperor) and the Imperial mitre (the crown worn by the Emperor). The diaconal exhortation at the Trisagion “O Lord, save the Godfearing!” is a prayer for God to save the Imperial Royal Family. Even in my own little St. Herman’s church, the processional cross still rises above a double-headed Byzantine eagle. Long shadows indeed. But here in North America, we have a number of Orthodox churches which are less Imperial in their architecture and numbers, churches which can hold only a few hundred people, if that. That, I suggest, is no bad thing, for it allows us to recover the important personalism from the early church which was increasingly lost in the Church’s Byzantine period. We have the possibility once again of actually getting to know the fellow members of our local church community and of praying for them all by name. Church growth is good, and we are called to grow. But we must take care in our growth not to lose this personalism, which is so important to internal spiritual growth. In particular, if a congregation grows to a size of about 200 people or so, they might consider splitting and founding another daughter church somewhere else (obviously with the bishop’s blessing), so that the local church never gets above 150 in number. Church growth gurus teach us that 150 is the maximum number in which authentic community can occur. In any church much bigger than that, it becomes hard to really know your fellow worshippers, and one fades into the anonymity of the mega-church. We have emerged from Byzantium, and are increasingly marginalized in our pluralistic North American society. That brings with it its own sorrows. But it also brings with it the possibility for recovering true community in our churches, and with it, a spirit of love. Code for blog Since you are here… …we do have a small request. More and more people visit Orthodoxy and the World website. |
| The experience of the Byzantine Empire, which remains somewhere in the consciousness of Christian society, has as its symbol the double-headed eagle signifying the harmonious functions of two heads in one body—the Church as the conscience of the Government, and the Government as the protector of the Church. Does this have any meaning for Europeans today? Of course, the Byzantine ideal depends upon Christian emperors. That is a great deal more than emperors who happen to be Christian. In the good examples which Byzantium gives us, we see people who are of great spiritual depth, and under those circumstances it is possible for such a thing to exist. I don’t see that the way modern democracy works is likely to bring people who are more than nominally Christian into positions of leadership. People who are too demonstratively Christian are going to be wiped out in the primaries. That is the nature of the modern political machine. People with strong views about anything are likely to be wiped out. The people you are left with are those who are good at balancing, pleasing all sides. The Church is not like that. The Church should not be like that. The Church has a mission which hasn’t changed from the day that Jesus was physically amongst us on Earth. It is the call to repentance, the call to bring people back to God. Very few states can be seen to have been successful in doing that same thing. You are speaking of states in the Western world, or states in general? In general. I know that Byzantium is a beautiful idea for many, many people. Holy Russia is a beautiful idea for many other people. Yet both the Russian political system and the Byzantine political system fell short of the Gospel in many ways, at least during certain periods of history, and sometimes markedly so. Neither one was of the mold of modern democracy. Unless things change dramatically in the future, I don’t see that the sort of government that existed in Russia, and in Byzantium, is going to be a possibility at all. So I would see the future being where the Church and the State might be amicable, but the Church always needs to reserve the right to criticize. And many governments don’t particularly care for that particular part of the Church’s mission. |
| Russia has long history with Orthodox Christianity, " traditional views " Father John Parker Source: The Post and Courier Rick Warren had an enigma on his mantle: a medallion of a double-headed eagle. When I asked him if he knew what it meant, he admitted that he did not know, and asked me. The double-headed eagle is the symbol of the Byzantine Empire, and that symbol carried through to Russia. One eagle represents church, and one the state. The symbol shows the synergy between both. Then, as now, there have been both benefits and drawbacks to such rule. And still, even though our country is founded in opposition to such a principle (we have a one-headed eagle), it was the way of the Roman and Byzantine Empires for more than 1,000 years, until 1453. Similarly, church and state have long been linked in Russia. Perhaps it is the persistence of the double-headed eagle that Americans find so puzzling about Russia. Knowing these things, as an American Orthodox priest, one whose Christianity is the same as Russia's, Nancy Folbre's Dec. 23 column in the New York Times, " President Putin's Patriarchal Games, " caught my eye. Her politico-religio-social commentary, thinly veiled in an article about the Olympics, was laced with accusations against Russia, her Orthodox church and her president, Vladimir Putin: bribery, power, coercion, environmental corruption and abuse against women. She found it impossible to avoid the tired references to Putin's former KGB days and even compared him to Joseph Stalin. Her column made me wonder: What makes journalists, professors (she taught economics at UMass) and the general public so concerned about Russia, the Russian church and Putin? Folbre wrote one sentence that really captivated me: " The upcoming Winter Olympic Games in Sochi are shining a global spotlight on Russian domestic priorities, including a long history of efforts to enforce traditional gender roles. " Russia, like all nations, has domestic priorities. That is, an emphasis at home and in the home. Russia, as part of the Soviet Union, has seen the face of atheism and Communism at home, where 70 years and more than tens of millions of deaths equaled more Christians martyred in Russia in the 20th century than all the Christian martyrs total in the previous 1,900 years. |
| Russia has long history with Orthodox Christianity, ‘traditional views’ Rick Warren had an enigma on his mantle: a medallion of a double-headed eagle. When I asked him if he knew what it meant, he admitted that he did not know, and asked me. The double-headed eagle is the symbol of the Byzantine Empire, and that symbol carried through to Russia. One eagle represents church, and one the state. The symbol shows the synergy between both. Then, as now, there have been both benefits and drawbacks to such rule. And still, even though our country is founded in opposition to such a principle (we have a one-headed eagle), it was the way of the Roman and Byzantine Empires for more than 1,000 years, until 1453. Similarly, church and state have long been linked in Russia. Perhaps it is the persistence of the double-headed eagle that Americans find so puzzling about Russia. Knowing these things, as an American Orthodox priest, one whose Christianity is the same as Russia’s, Nancy Folbre’s Dec. 23 column in the New York Times, “President Putin’s Patriarchal Games,” caught my eye. Her politico-religio-social commentary, thinly veiled in an article about the Olympics, was laced with accusations against Russia, her Orthodox church and her president, Vladimir Putin: bribery, power, coercion, environmental corruption and abuse against women. She found it impossible to avoid the tired references to Putin’s former KGB days and even compared him to Joseph Stalin. Her column made me wonder: What makes journalists, professors (she taught economics at UMass) and the general public so concerned about Russia, the Russian church and Putin? Folbre wrote one sentence that really captivated me: “The upcoming Winter Olympic Games in Sochi are shining a global spotlight on Russian domestic priorities, including a long history of efforts to enforce traditional gender roles.” Russia, like all nations, has domestic priorities. That is, an emphasis at home and in the home. Russia, as part of the Soviet Union, has seen the face of atheism and Communism at home, where 70 years and more than tens of millions of deaths equaled more Christians martyred in Russia in the 20th century than all the Christian martyrs total in the previous 1,900 years. |
| Succession Preserved. Basil the Great: The nature of existing objects, set in motion by one command, passes through creation without change, by generation and destruction, preserving the succession of the kinds through resemblance until it reaches the very end. It begets a horse as the successor of a horse, a lion of a lion and an eagle of an eagle. It continues to preserve each of the animals by uninterrupted successions until the consummation of the universe. No length of time causes the specific characteristics of the animals to be corrupted or extinct, but, as if established just recently, nature, ever fresh, moves along with time. Hexaemeron 9.2.129 Species Peculiar Properties Received from God. Ambrose: In the pine cone nature seems to express an image of itself. It preserves its peculiar properties which it received from that divine and celestial command, and it repeats in the succession and order of the years its generation until the end of time is fulfilled. Hexaemeron 3.16.68.130 Differences Sustained. Ambrose: The Word of God permeates every creature in the constitution of the world. Hence, as God had ordained, all kinds of living creatures were quickly produced from the earth. In compliance with a fixed law they all succeed each other from age to age according to their aspect and kind. The lion generates a lion; the tiger, a tiger; the ox, an ox; the swan, a swan; and the eagle, an eagle. What was once enjoined became in nature a habit for all time. Hence the earth has not ceased to offer the homage of its service. The original species of living creatures is reproduced for future ages by successive generations of its kind. Hexaemeron 6.3.9.131 1:22 And God Blessed Them Hybrids Are the Work of Humans, Not of God. Ambrose: What pure and untarnished generations follow without intermingling one after another, so that a thymallus produces a thymallus; a sea-wolf, a sea-wolf. The sea-scorpion, too, preserves unstained its marriage bed.... Fish, therefore, know nothing of union with alien species. They do not have unnatural betrothal such as are designedly brought about between animals of two different species as, for instance, the donkey and the mare, or again the female donkey and the horse, both being examples of unnatural union. Certainly there are cases in which nature suffers more in the nature of defilement rather than that of injury to the individual. Man as an abettor of hybrid barrenness is responsible for this. He considers a mongrel animal more valuable than one of a genuine species. You mix together alien species and you mingle diverse seeds. Hexaemeron 5.3.9. 132 |
| And there is no unity on this issue among the schismatics either. Makary’s group has repeatedly stated that it will not join a structure to be headed by Philaret Denisenko. True, Philaret now says that he will not put oneself forward for election, while continuing to call himself patriarch and hoping to have in the new structure the title of ‘Honorary Patriarch of Kiev and All Rus-Ukraine’, to head its ‘synod’ and to enjoy special privileges. He even declared himself as holy archimandrite of the Kiev Laura of the Caves and Pochaev Laura. However, it is not included in Constantinople’s plans. Their wish is that the ‘autocephalous church’ under creation should be headed by a new man while Philaret should be written off ‘to the dustbin of history’. Indeed, they have recognized him not in the rank of patriarch but merely in some hierarchal dignity as ‘formerly of Kiev’. An agreement between President Poroshenko and Patriarch Bartholomew that Philaret will be written off as junk has been reached. But will the ‘episcopate’ in Philaret’s jurisdiction agree with such a development? Not a sure thing either. – Nevertheless, if the ‘uniting council’ does take place, who will be able to head the new structure? – Various names are being considered and discussed. Metropolitan Simeon of Vinnitsa has already been asked to head it as he is the only hierarch who attended the Bishops’ Council of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church but who refused to put his signature under the Council’s statement. For Constantinople, it would be important of course that the structure be headed by a canonical hierarch, not someone of the schismatics. In Constantinople’s view, it will give the new structure a greater legitimacy. That is why it is a very slim possibility that the structure will be headed by someone from Philaret’s ‘episcopate’. Rather, it may be headed by one of the two ‘exarchs’ of Constantinople – Archbishop Daniel (Zelinsky) or Archbishop Job (Getcha), who recently has been increasingly active in the Ukrainian field. |
| Thirdly, it is common knowledge that the schismatic community legalized by Patriarch Bartholomew is made up of two groups, one of which had no canonical hierarchy when recognized by Constantinople. One group – the so-called “Kiev Patriarchate” – is led by a man whose excommunication was recognized by all the Local Churches, including Constantinople. The other group is traced to a bishop of the Russian Church, suspended from serving, and a man who never had not only episcopal consecration, but even ordination into priesthood. In common terms such people are called “self-ordained.” This false hierarchy was recognized without a proper study into its origin and even without formal re-consecration, but by Patriarch Bartholomew’s volition alone. Fourthly, even after receiving the “Tomos” the schismatic community continues to demonstrate absolute canonical lawlessness, trampling upon all the church rules. This community, which calls itself the “Orthodox church of Ukraine,” has two heads with almost identical titles. One calls himself “Metropolitan of Kiev and All Ukraine,” while the other – “Patriarch of Kiev and All Rus’-Ukraine.” The first one exists for external use, while the second one – for internal. It is the second one, not the first one, who governs the “Kiev Metropolia.” Here is what he has recently said: “The OCU is officially recognized by the Ecumenical Patriarch. Yet, in Ukraine there is the Kiev Patriarchate, because we are not satisfied with a status of metropolia. We have been existing as a patriarchate for over 25 years. And people chose patriarchs. I am the third patriarch. Before me there was Patriarch Vladimir, Patriarch Mstislav. There were patriarchs! Therefore, for Ukraine we are a patriarchate. And for the outside world, that is for the Orthodox world, we are the Kiev Metropolia.” Can any of the Local Orthodox Churches recognize such a two-headed hydra? Fifthly, the schism demonstrates its complete spiritual and canonical failure. Provisions of the “Tomos” are subjected to ambiguous interpretation and not carried out into practice. For instance, the “Tomos” stipulates that the “Orthodox church of Ukraine” cannot include parishes outside Ukraine. However, from a point of view of false patriarch Philaret Denisenko such parishes can remain within the so-called “Kiev Patriarchate.” “We cannot make them and we cannot reject them,” he said, “Since they do not want to leave us, we consider them ours.” The two-headed hydra cannot but have double-entry book-keeping. For an internal user there is still the “Kiev Patriarchate” with a network of “parishes” abroad, and for an external user – the “Kiev Metropolia” without such. |
| 469.23-24 ; cf. PG. Vol. 99. Col. 1397A), while visibly she is headed on earth by the five patriarchs. On this basis St. Theodore speaks of ‘the five-headed church body’ (πεντακρυ ον κκλησιαστικ ν σ μα— Ep. 406.27–28, 407.20–21; cf.: PG. Vol. 99. Col. 1280B, 1281B) and ‘the five-headed power of the Church’ (πεντακρυ ον κρτος τ ς κκλησας— Ep. 478.63–64; cf.: PG. Vol. 99. Col. 1417C). In his letter to Leo Sachellarius, St. Theodore stated that the five patriarchs jointly possessed the power necessary for making dogmatic judgments; a legal Ecumenical Council could not be convened without the knowledge and consent of the five patriarchs . Singling out the five primatial patriarchal sees, St. Theodore conceded that the primates occupying them and their flocks could divert from Orthodoxy but believed that by God’s providence the right faith was always preserved in one of the Churches . If any one of the patriarchs diverted from the true faith, St. Theodore said, he should ‘accept a correction’ from another patriarch and reunite with the body of the Church. Thus, reflecting on ‘the five patriarchs’, St. Theodore spoke of them as primarily the mouthpieces of the faith of the Churches they headed. He did not affirm that the ‘division’ of the one Church into five parts was something established by God and that it should exist to the end of time but rather described the situation of the contemporary Universal Church, stressing that all her parts (‘five heads’) should have one true faith which had been asserted from of old and should be asserted by Ecumenical Councils. In a classical form the teaching on the Pentarchy was formulated by Patriarch Peter III of Antioch (1052-1056) mainly in his letters to Patriarch Dominique of Acquila (PG. Vol. 120. Col. 756–781; Acta et scripta quae de controversiis Ecclesiae Graecae et Latinae s. XI composita extant/Ed. C. Will. Lipsiae; Marpurgi, 1861. P. 208–228). Divine grace installed the five patriarchs in the world and this number could not be exceeded. |
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