Antoine Arjakovsky
The
Council of the Orthodox Church which opened on June 17th, 2016, at
the Orthodox Academy of Chania, in Crete, was supposed to resolve the discords
which have been paralyzing this Church for at least a century. But this attempt
runs the risk of precipitating a schism which has been smoldering for a long
time among Orthodox Churches which recognize a primacy of honor to the Patriarchate
of Constantinople and those who favor the Patriarchate of Moscow. Behind this
leadership squabble lurks a growing antagonism not only between the zealot –
neo-fundamentalists[1]
– and the proselyte movements which are open to ecumenism, but also between the
proponents of a Byzantine “symphony” and those opposed to any confusion between
the Church and the State. Even more fundamentally, this schism will be the
result of a struggle between those who advocate a return to the Soviet
civilization, “based on the moral foundations of Christianity”[2] according to Patriarch Cyril,
and those who oppose the expansionist ambitions of Russia and consider the
Soviet regime to be totalitarian and anti-Christian.[3]
In
fact, on June 17th 2016, 4 autocephalous Churches (the Church of
Bulgaria, the Church of Georgia, the Patriarchate of Antioch, the Church of
Russia) out of 14 made known their refusal to participate in the Council. This
was after all 14 Churches, without
exception, had accepted, in January of 2016, the communique of the conference
of Chambesy announcing that the Council would be held for the Orthodox Feast of
Pentecost, June 19th 2016[4]. The Ecumenical Patriarch,
confronted with this challenge to his leadership 15 days prior to the event,
maintained that the “Great and Holy Council” would still take place and
declared that its decisions would be binding for the whole Orthodox Church. The
Patriarchate of Moscow let it be known that it would not be able to accept the
decisions of the Council.
Last
February there were signs of difficulties in the preparations for the Council;
a lack of consensus in the pre-council preparatory commissions and an awareness
of the risks involved in some of the decisions made at Chambesy especially
those concerning procedural regulations.[5] But it was also pointed
out that, in spite of what some observers were saying, the importance of such a
council is not a novelty since, at least until the 17th century, the
Orthodox Churches succeeded in getting together, over and above their national
affinities. The debate which followed within the Orthodox world made the
Churches clarify their positions. But the silence about the Russian-Ukrainian
war and concerning the claim of autocephaly on the part of the second largest
Orthodox Church in the world, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, won out over the
pre-council preparatory process. (The Ukrainian Orthodox Church has 25 million
members, separated into three different Orthodox Churches. This makes it the second largest Christian
Orthodox Church nation after Russia with its 58 millions of faithful.[6]
Indeed,
after certain declarations of the Patriarchate of Moscow which wrongly affirmed
that an “agreement has been reached that Ukraine belongs to the canonical
territory of the Patriarchate of Moscow”, Father John Chryssavgis, a high
official of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, clearly denounced these statements on
March 2. He clarified that Patriarch Bartholomew had not renounced “his
canonical and historical right to respond to the needs of the Christians of
Ukraine as a daughter Church of Constantinople”[7]. According to Deacon Andrey
Kurayev, one of the most popular theologians of the Russian Church, there can
be no doubt that this declaration led the Patriarch of Moscow to revise his
decision to assist at the Council which he had announced in January.[8] In the middle of Russian-Ukrainian
war, neither the Kremlin nor the Russian Church can afford to lose their
faithful in Ukraine. But this is what would most certainly happen if
Constantinople recognized the patriarchate of Kiev, an Orthodox Church which
came into being in 1991 and which, in spite of having the greatest number of
adherents, has not been recognized by any Orthodox Church. In fact, a growing
number of members of the other Ukrainian Orthodox Church, that which is under
the protection of Moscow, are feeling more and more uncomfortable within the
Moscow patriarchate and have a great desire to rejoin a Ukrainian Church which
is independent and recognized throughout the world.
Another
blogger who is popular in Russia, Alexander Soldatov, affirms that the
decisions taken by the Bulgarian, Antiochean and Georgian Churches were
instigated by Moscow by stirring up the smoldering ashes of orthodox
fundamentalism.[9]
He states specifically that the decision made on June 1 by the Bulgarian Church
not to go to Crete followed the canonization, on May 28, at Sophia and in
conjunction with the patriarchate of Moscow, of Mgr. Serafim Sobolev, an
anti-ecumenical and ultra-conservative bishop. The visit of Patriarch Cyril and
Vladimir Putin to Mount Athos at the end of May had exactly the same effect
since, a few days later, the monks of this peninsula, who are very influential
in Greece, vigorously rejected the pre-council working documents. At his return
from Mount Athos, Patriarch Cyril convoked a meeting of his synod on June 3 to
demand that Constantinople accomplish the impossible mission of holding another
pre-council meeting before June 10. The Church of Antioch which, historically,
has been close to the Russian Church, took advantage of the situation to
announce its decision not to go to Crete. In this context, Damascus would have
a better chance of promoting the priority of its claims on the jurisdiction
over Qatar (a territory it disputes with the Church of Jerusalem) on the six
themes on the Council’s agenda. Finally, there is the refusal of the Church of
Georgia, announced by the news agency TASS, which is traditionally hostile to
ecumenism and frustrated because its rank in the hierarchy of Churches was not
put on the agenda of the Council.
All
that was left for Patriarch Cyril to give the final blow and he proceeded to do
on June 13 by affirming that the Russian Church could not assist at the Council
“given the absence of 4 Orthodox Churches” and “the lack of a preliminary
consensus at Chambesy”. The representatives of the Ecumenical Patriarchate
voiced their profound deception, reminding the participants that at Chambesy
all the Churches had agreed to hold the Council in June and pointing out that
everything had been done to facilitate the participation of all the Churches at
the Council, even moving the site of the Council from Turkey to Greece
according to a petition of the Russian Church… But the very same day, Father
Vsevolod Tchaplin, Patriarch Cyril’s right-hand man for 5 years, (deprived of his functions since December 2015
for having called for a holy war in Syria,[10]), not only approved this
decision of the Russian Church but linked it to apocalyptic happenings because,
according to him, the number of the Beast, 666, is found inscribed in the agenda
of the Council:
“Now
that the ‘Council of Bartholomew’ is going to take place in the absence of 5
Churches which represent the absolute majority of the Orthodox world, there is
justification for considering it illegitimate and to judge, cost what it may,
the principle fanatics who organized it. If, through them, the document on the
acceptance of ecumenism and the participation [of the Orthodox Church] in the
World Council of Churches passes, it is entirely possible to consider it as an
act of highway robbery. Everything that is happening is normal. The hour of
truth has arrived. There is no divine blessing on the Council of 16-06-06[11].”
The
ecumenical friends of the Orthodox Church, caught up in this crisis in spite of
themselves, are also going to have to make a choice. Either they will continue
to give priority to what still remains of unity and openness towards the
ecumenical movement within this Church and, in this case, they should then
firmly support the conciliary process undertaken by Patriarch Bartholomew with
a view to treating the numerous wounds of these Churches which have remained
faithful (as the Holy See announced when it confirmed that a delegation
presided by Cardinal Koch would be sent to Crete).
Or they will decide to favor the powerful
Russian Church in order to preserve a dialogue with it, particularly by helping
it to emerge from its neo-fundamentalist rut. But the importance of this Church
should not be over-exaggerated since, in spite of its weight, it only
represents a third of the Orthodox faithful (58 million
adherents in Russia, to which can be added 12 million faithful in Ukraine, 4
million in Belarus and another million abroad which makes a total of 75 million
compared to 274 million of Orthodox adherents in the world – counting the
Oriental Orthodox Churches.). Also, its reputation in Russia has gone downhill
as can be seen from the number of those participating in its offices.[12]
In both cases, we must remember
that, according to the Gospel, the reconciliation among Christians is only
possible through love and truth.
[3] Patriarch Cyril is
opposed to the thesis that Russia was the aggressor in Ukraine and, on March
2016 affirmed that the pope agreed with him on that point. http://www.religion.in.ua/news/vazhtivo/32287-patriarx-kiril-vpervye-pryamo-otricaet-vneshnyuyu-agressiyu-protiv-ukrainy-i-utverzndaet-chto-tak-zhe-schtaet-papa-francisk-htlm
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