Topic: "Origin - Expectations - Disprovals"
Minutes of the Inter-Orthodox Scientific Convention
held in the
Aristotelian University of Thessaloniki - 20 to 24
September, 2004.
"THEODROMIA" PUBLICATIONS
The
Orthodox Church in Rumania
versus
Ecumenism
Hieromonk Vissarion - Hierodeacon Leon1
Sacred Monastery of the Archangels, Neamts.
The excerpt below has
been taken from the Minutes of the Inter-Orthodox Convention which took place in
the Aristotelian University of Thessaloniki, on the 20-24th September 2004.
"....By remaining
steadfastly in the Faith of the Holy
Fathers of Orthodoxy, we stand today
as the carriers of the words of most
monks and nuns of Rumania who are
opposed to Ecumenism, by conveying
the desire for unity in Orthodoxy
and the true witness of the
Apostolic Traditions of the Holy
Fathers, and in order to inform the
Orthodox faithful of the world that
the heresy of Ecumenism is striving
to undermine the One, Holy, Catholic
and Apostolic Church.
The hypocrisy by
which the New Age mentality is daily
becoming rooted in our lives is
indescribable. Beneath the
mask of man-centred love and not of
the love of Christ-centred Humanism,
Ecumenism with its promotion of
syncretism, religious socialism and
common prayer with other religions
and Christian confessions, is
striving - thanks to this immense
apostasy - to establish the reign of
the Antichrist on earth. The biggest
temptation is that the evil spirit
is seeking fervently to break us
away from Orthodoxy and render us
labourers of the new Babylonian
temple, for the material rule of the
Antichrist in this world.
Before moving on
to any kind of judgment regarding
the things of the Faith, we must not
overlook the testimonies of our
predecessors, who knew how to "fight
the good fight" and be victorious to
the end. The Holy Prophets,
Evangelists, Apostles, Hierarchs,
Confessors, Martyrs and Saints have,
throughout the ages and in every
place, unanimously confessed that
the Orthodox Church is the Bride of
our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Ark
of our Salvation.
With an unshaken
belief in all the above, we came
here as representatives of our
Orthodox monasticism, to present
with clarity how Ecumenism is
manifesting itself in Rumania, and
to determine the roots from which
this heretic tree has sprouted near
the walls of our Orthodox Church.
Based on
historical facts, the official and
"legitimate" accession of the
Orthodox Church of Rumania to the
World Council of Churches took place
in 1964, together with other
Churches which were at the time
captives of the then ascendant
communist regimes. However, in
order to have a clear picture of the
present, we shall present to you the
intrinsic factors that prompted the
Orthodox Rumanian Church to reach
the decision to join the World
Council of Churches. In this way, we
can discern the present state of
Ecumenism in Rumania more
objectively and impartially.
The period from
the 13th century up until the 18th
is regarded as the Golden Age for
Rumanian Orthodoxy, given that a
series of pious Orthodox Leaders had
fought at the side of the Clergy to
protect the Church and safeguard our
Christian nation from its
subjugation to the Turks and the
Latins. This happened, because
their love for the Nation was the
same as their love towards Christ
and the Church. Furthermore, their
life was an exemplary sample and an
Orthodox testimony of in-Christ
life, which has remained alive to
this day in the conscience of the
Orthodox Christians of our land.
However, the
biggest changes to ecclesiastic
matters were noted in the middle of
the 19th century, through the
Rumanian "enlighteners" who, albeit
Rumanian Orthodox, had moved to the
West, had entered the ranks of
Masonry, studied in the schools of
the Renaissance and upon their
return to Rumania, had brought along
with them the humanistic spirit of
the West. This spirit was -and is-
clearly opposed to the Church of
Christ, and is outrightly fighting
Her with the aim to alienate Her
from Her Patristic Traditions and
the wealth of Her theology.
The prevalence of
Communism in Russia also had as a
result (and on the basis of its
world theory of becoming universally
widespread) the subjugation of the
Rumanian country in the year 1945.
This was achieved, through a violent
elimination of the existing
political parties of our land, and
through the imposition with aggressive
means of a socialist, atheist regime
which confined to a very minimum
every activity of the Church. After
44 years of Communist ideology and
practice in Rumania, our Orthodox
Church came out, perhaps wounded,
but still strongly preserving the
Faith of the Gospel and with our
people's religious conscience still
unimpaired.
During this dark
period, thousands of Clergymen were
driven out of their Sacred Altars
and after being forcefully
defrocked, were imprisoned: High
priests, Priests, Monks and pious
Christians. Through the
prayers and the sacrifices of those
contemporary martyrs of our Faith,
the Church withstood and survived,
in spite of Her many tribulations.
However, the majority of the
population fully embraced "the
benefits of the dictatorship",
through the systematic teaching of
atheism, through the continuous
propagandist conventions of the
Communist leadership, and under the
unsleeping gaze of the relentless
secret police (Securitate).
Unfortunately,
the strategy of the official
representatives of the Church in
this battle proved to be a utopia.
Because of their outreach towards
para-ecclesiastic and religious
organizations of the West, they
deflected the Church from Her
traditional lines. It was for this
reason that a mentality of
abhorrence came to grow within the
people against Communism, coupled
with another deceptive mentality,
that everything originating from the
West is good and welcome. And
it was along this mentality that the
first communications of the
Patriarchs of the Orthodox Rumanian
Church began with the prince of the
Vatican and his representatives,
followed by the development of
inter-church relations with the
Anglicans and other Protestant
groups. Then the World Council of
Churches made its appearance, like a
bridge, promising recognition of the
Orthodox values that were being
persecuted and subjugated to the
spirit of secularization imposed by
the Communist regime. Thus, the West
-with all its apostasy- meant
freedom for Orthodox Rumania, which
was groaning under the atheist yoke
of Communism.
As of the year
1990, the period of cessation of
persecutions began, without this
meaning that the Church was entirely
free, because all sorts of heresies
had in the meantime infiltrated our
country. The new democratic
state of Rumania -as it is called-
neglected all the fighters and the
martyrs of the Church and the
Homeland, and still does, to this day.
This fact indicates that the
Communist spirit had caused serious
damage to the comprehending and the
experiencing of our Orthodox Faith.
And yet, within this turmoil of
persecution, the Faith was preserved
as a sacred trust by the pious
Rumanian people, who had stood up
against this life-and-death battle
with the "red beast" - which they
eventually defeated, with the power
of Christ.
That is why, for
us Orthodox Rumanians, Ecumenism has
its roots in the ideals of Communist
socialism, which in its time had
fought for a utopia. According to
that utopia, mankind's welfare would
have been perfect, only after the
disappearance of all the class,
racial and religious differences.
All this brainwashing of the
Communist era was perceived as
feasible to the sons of apostasy,
while the presentation of their
ideas was being
served with the cloak of
democratic freedom. Nowadays,
Ecumenism has replaced Communism and
it has done so with remarkable
success, however, the price being
paid by the Orthodox Rumanian Church
on account of tolerance and
condescension is tremendous:
- Communism
brought terrorism and oppression,
whereas Ecumenism has come bearing
freedom, religious tolerance and
dogmatic renewal
- Communism
denied Christ, whereas Ecumenism has
marshalled all the gods of the world.
- Communism
attempted to disorganize and
exterminate the Church, whereas
Ecumenism has been building a new
church from the start; one that is a
mosaic of all the pseudo-churches.
- Communism was
demonic, whereas Ecumenism is
anti-Christ
In Rumania,
Ecumenism has introduced itself with
a deceitful illusion of "revival" of
the supposed lost unity, and has
grafted itself onto the Communist
mentalities of fundamental
supporters, who happen to be the
political leaders and some of the
high-ranking ecclesiastic
personages. These persons see the
Church as a kind of religious party with a Christian orientation, or as
personal property. To be precise,
the Church to them is an
establishment, in which
anti-Ecumenist perception is
regarded as a sin of disobedience;
in other words, a transgressing of
the laws of the Party, or a
deviation, which is punishable by
the methods of Communist ideology.
But, History does
tend to repeat itself. It all began
in 1994, when, by means of official
ecclesiastic decisions, Ecumenist
propaganda appeared in some of
Rumania's schools of theology; then,
with the help of the Mass Media, the
brainwashing spread to the popular
masses. More specifically, the
fruits of Rumanian Ecumenism became
evident during the signing of the
Balamand Agreement in 1994, when it
became obvious who were the ones
that blatantly confessed their
apostasy from the dogmas of our
Orthodox, true Faith, what their
objectives were, and how the
Ecumenists' pursuits will be focused
in the future. Immediately
after the signing of the Balamand
Agreement, the premeditated dogmatic
"poisoning" of the analytical
program of theological education was
put to work. In this way, submission
to the new European programs for the
incorporation of Ecumenism
has
been
striving - among other things - to
reduce the number of students
enrolling and the number of years
required for the teaching of
theological studies, and
also the
elimination of elementary
apologetics lessons. Hence today
there are no apologetics lessons, in
most of the theological schools in
Rumania. In the more than 14
theological schools of Rumania, ever
since 1996, one new lesson has
become compulsory: Ecumenism, which
has - by taking advantage of the
historical misinterpretations in the
lessons of Apologetics, Orthodox
Spirituality and Mystic Theology -
placed within Orthodoxy a new kind
of perception; one that is obliged
to discard its dogmatic teachings as
well as its (obsolete, according to
them) Canons. Instead, the Church is
obliged to accept the misled
"saints" of the West and believe
that She will be complete and true,
only if She embraces the canons and
the decisions of the other
"churches".
The bait called
"Orthodox Ecumenism" was swallowed
by quite a number of Hierarchs also,
who could not discern the
desecration of Christ's Church with
this opening, or the desolation of
our Orthodox Faith; instead, by
seeking a secular and pope-governed
glory for Orthodoxy, they are
governing the Church as though She
is their own, personal property. In
this way, they have provided a
perfect framework for the creation
of a new pan-religion - one that is
renewed according to the laws of our
secularized society. In parallel
with the programs of theological,
university-level education, of late
there have appeared certain
so-called "ecumenical institutions",
all adjoining to the existing
theological schools; this is where -
with funds from the West - all the
bases are being laid and the
infrastructures are being built for
the future, orthodox ecumenist
Church, by means of the
inter-religious conventions, the
series of theological discussions,
excursions and mutual visits, all
for the purpose of a rapprochement
and recognition of the various
seminars, camps, future plans,
ecumenist radio-TV broadcasts, whose
messages and manifestos undermine
the sentiment and the conscience of
our Rumanian, Orthodox population.
An important
place in the propagation of Rumanian
Ecumenism is taken up by the
so-called "Week of Ecumenical
prayer", which has been scheduled to
be observed on the third or fourth
week of the month of January every
year, when our Holy Orthodox Church
commemorates -in that very same
month- all Her major champions and
confessors, such as Saints
Athanasius and Cyril, Maximus the
Confessor, Mark of Ephesus, Saint
Meletios Galisiotis, the three
Hierarchs and others. During that
ecumenist week, the clergymen of
Rumania (i.e. Orthodox, Armenians,
R/Catholics, Uniates, Anglicans and
Protestants) and multitudes of
laypeople, all congregate in
Orthodox or heterodox churches in
the various main cities of Rumania,
and they all pray together, using
specific texts, all adjusted to
appeal to the psychology of the
popular masses. Through these prayer
meetings, they are projecting into
everyone's conscience -and
especially in the conscience of the
ignorant population- all the
blasphemous dogmas of the union of
all religions and the unity of all
the Christian Churches. This
phenomenon has provoked the
ecclesiastic conscience of the
properly-minded Orthodox Clergymen,
Monks and pious Christians, who have
been protesting about the
incompetence of such rash actions,
and their continuous propagation
into other areas of Rumania.
With the
reception of the Pope in 1999 in
Rumania, the endeavour for honorary
veneration also of "saints" of the
Western "church" - such as
Francis
of Assisi and Anthony of Padova -
was validated through suitable
speeches, by Rumanian Orthodox
Christians. So, this year
(2004), in the month of June, the
Papal Cardinal Anthony - bishop of
Padova, Italy, brought over the
bronze bust of their saint Anthony,
a monk of Padova, who lived after the
time of the Schism. This bust
supposedly held his undeteriorated
tongue in his right hand (according
to their rumours), inside a special
silver case, and was paraded about
in litanies by Catholic and Orthodox
churches. It was venerated not only
by Orthodox Christians, but also by
several Orthodox Clergymen.
By examining the
aforementioned facts with the spirit
of Patristic discernment, we can say
- without erring - that the
affirmative desire of mankind has
undergone such distortion, that it
is (and will continue to be) a
steered course and an opus focused
on the establishing of the reign of
the Antichrist. We need to
become aware here of the damage
being caused by Ecumenism throughout
the world: it is something like a
theological and anti-Christ fallacy
that has been embedded as a basis in
every social stratum. Thus, all good
for mankind
(supposedly) no longer comes from the
Church, but from the care of social
or state organizations.
Spiritual progress is no longer
attained through the Grace of the
Holy Spirit, Who resides inside the
Church, but through the rebirth of
the idolatrous deities of our age.
According to all the above, the opus
of the Church is not made incarnate
by Christ, but by Ecumenism.
However, all of
the above are only forms and
manifestations of the phenomenon.
Ecumenism itself is basically a
demonic spirit, which is expressed
as a multiform plague that infects
man's psychosomatic world, the
boundaries of his religious
community and the nation or the
countries that it infiltrates, but
is thereafter regarded as being the
product of his own thought
processes. To the Orthodox,
Ecumenism wants to be -and to be
called- a "church"; a purpose that
it is constantly working towards, for
its promotion. It constantly
changes its principles and adjusts
its objectives (depending on the
circumstances, exactly like a
chameleon), towards a Pan-Ecumenism.
This fabrication however is only an
illusion; a collection of utopian
ideas that deceive like a magic act
and attract only those who are not
aware of (or shun) the Orthodoxy of
the Holy Fathers. Ecumenism
seeks to supposedly promote the true
face, the Tradition and the virtue
of Orthodoxy, without knowing
anything about these things. If we
do not look upon Ecumenism as a
heresy, then that Ecumenism will be
identified as Orthodoxy, and from
then on, people will believe that
Ecumenism is in fact the Orthodox
Church and will embrace it, without
any distrust. Ecumenism is a
virus (a microbe) with a thousand
faces; it gleams like a golden idol
of mankind, and it strives for the
anti-Christian desires of every
person on earth.
After all the
above, we need to reply to the
question: "Is Rumania an Ecumenist
country?" The answer that we
give can only be this: "Not
yet." In our country, only the
infrastructure of theological
education and our Hierarchy are
Ecumenistic. The majority of
our monasticism - with the Elders
and the Eldresses in the lead - as
well as our pious population, are
Orthodox and are fighting against
this forerunner heresy of the
Antichrist.
Here are the
proposals that our Rumanian
Monasticism has to offer, for a
mutual collaboration between all
those who believe that Ecumenism is
the pan-heresy of the last
centuries:
- 1.
A strengthening of
communications - in the
framework of the catholicity
of the Orthodox Church -
between hierarchs and other
Orthodox Churches, for their
brotherly and discerning
intervention in the specific
problem of the Ecumenist
tendencies displayed by a
portion of the Clergy and
the people of the Rumanian
Church. It is important for
us to understand in time
that deviations and
downfalls of any local
Orthodox Church into
schismatic or even heretic
teachings are simultaneously
deviations and downfalls of
their own Churches, given
that we are all part of the
one, same Body - the Body of
the Church of Christ.
- 2.
The creation of a documented
theological basis against
the heresy of Ecumenism,
with a Scriptural and
Patristic content that will
be accessible to those who
want to study contemporary
Orthodox Apologetics. This
basis should furthermore
provide the necessary
weapons for defeating this
heresy as well as other
theological aberrations. To
better inform our readers,
we propose the composing and
posting in various languages
on the internet the
appropriate theological
Patristic texts that prove
how rotten the edifice of
Ecumenist pan-heresy is.
At the same time, we would
like to propose that there
be updates on a permanent
basis covering the daily
course of events of the
Orthodox Church in every
part of the world, so that
the guardians can watch out
for their folds.
-
3. The drafting of a
letter on behalf of a
pan-Orthodox theological
committee, pointing out the
danger inherent in the
appearance and the spreading
of Ecumenism. This
Encyclical letter should be
sent, if possible - and
translated - to all the
Patriarchates and the
Autocephalous Churches of
Orthodoxy everywhere.
-
4. This Encyclical
letter should also primarily
contain the precise Orthodox
teaching regarding the
condemnation of Ecumenism
and, in the event of
endangerment of a Church, a
Pan-Orthodox Council should
be convened, for the clear
formulation of the Orthodox
dogma and the jubilant
condemnation of the heresy.
- 5.
The transmission of the
proposals and decisions of
the present convention to
every Orthodox country,
while for the Orthodox of
the Diaspora it should be
done by printing relative
books and distributing them.
All the Holy
Fathers confess the following
unanimously: Through the
Crucifixion of Christ, the
Church acquired a sacrificial
nature; through His
Resurrection, She became the
conqueror of death; and through
the Descent of the Holy Spirit
into Hades on the Day of the
Pentecost, the Church thereafter
became the fulfilment of the
Truth, of Grace, and Salvation
of mankind. Only the Orthodox
Church has given true Saints,
sanctification and holy relics
to the world, and She will be,
throughout Time, the solitary
Church that will fight against
all the pseudo-churches that
attempt to usurp Her status.
The Orthodox
Church alone embodies all these
charismas, because She alone was
made the One, Holy, Catholic and
Apostolic Church, by Her Founder
and Her Head - the Godman Jesus
Christ. Only the Orthodox Church
has remained unaltered and
unshakeable throughout the ages
and the guardian of the
once-delivered, to the Saints,
Faith2...."
1. On
behalf of a group of Orthodox monks
of the Orthodox Rumanian Church
2.
Judas 3.