Δημοσιεύουμε την
αγγλική μετάφραση του άρθρου του Ιερομονάχου Αντύπα Αγιορείτου με τίτλο «Σχισματικοί
που επέστρεψαν στην Εκκλησία και αγίασαν». Το πρωτότυπο ελληνικό κείμενο
έχουμε δημοσιεύσει εδώ.
***
We publish the English translation of the article by Hieromonk Antipas of Mount Athos entitled “Schismatics who returned to the Church and became Saints”. We have published the original Greek text here.
Hieromonk Antipas of Mount Athos
20/05/2020
After the canonization of Saint Joseph
the Hesychast and Saint Ephraim
of Katounakia, certain
Fathers were made aware of the thoughts that follow and they insisted
that we commit these to paper.
Mostly, this concerns issues
that troubled some people, when many said and wrote that schismatics have no
priesthood, that they lack apostolic succession and that therefore those
ordained by them have no priesthood and remain laymen. Perhaps some will
disagree and will rush (why they are in a hurry, they only know) to respond,
with long texts, as they are usually do.
We will not engage
in dialogue, hoping
and wishing rather
that what we write will benefit the faithful
and the Church and not cause them more trouble. With regards to the Church, we
have previously stated our belief that instead of proclaiming "Orthodoxy
or Death" it is more correct and more Orthodox to say "Church or Death". Simply,
whatever we wrote,
we wrote, because
on the one hand, that is the
way things are – and from which many conclusions can be drawn- and on the other
hand, perhaps some will understand that which we repeat at the end of these
thoughts: the responsibility within the Church lies first and foremost with the
Hierarchy (the Bishops) and the Synod. If some people know better regarding
these issues, they will do well to correct us. And our request is this: those who urge others
not to obey the Church – and in particular some of the fanatical clergy,
to stop doing so, because all they are doing is distancing and removing their followers from the Church.
As St. John Chrysostom says in
his explanation of Ephesians: "strip them of their followers and they will
be nothing."
Saint Joseph the Hesychast
(known in the world as Francis Kottis), from Lefkes on the island of Paros,
came to Mount Athos to be a monk in 1921, at the age of 24. At that time, on
Mount Athos, all the Fathers were united and there was no so-called
"zealotry", which was created with the correction of the Julian
Calendar in 1923 and which - according
to St. Paisios the Athonite
- destroyed Mount
Athos.
St. Joseph and his followers
and father Arsenios, his co-ascetic, joined the group of the so-called
"zealot" Fathers, who did not commemorate the name of the Patriarch
in the services and had no communication with the Monasteries of Mount Athos who persisted
with this commemoration. After 1935, when the so-called "old calendarists" of
Greece acquired a "Hierarchy", St. Joseph joined the most extreme
group, the so-called "Matthewians". He was so fanatical with this
faction that he refused to accept the names of new-calendarists from around the
world, sent to him for commemoration in the Divine Liturgies which he performed
with zealout priests.
St. Joseph's mother, as well
as his two sisters, were tonsured nuns by an old-calendar priest and fell
asleep in the lord, leading monastic lives at home using the old calendar.
His niece, Barbara, the
daughter of his sister Ergina, became a nun with the name Vryaini in the old-
calendar Monastery of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary in Thrakomakedonia.
Saint Joseph to the very end of his life had a lot of respect for the
monastery’s Elder Skourlis (who later became the old calendarist "bishop
of the Cyclades") as well as its Abbess Efthymia. Vryaini, after that,
built her own monastery named Panagia
of Myrtidiotissa in Stamata, Drosia,
Attica, where she died. The monastery
still exists today and belongs to the old-calendarists.
One of the first followers/disciples of the elder was Father
Ephraim Karagiannis, who became a priest
(we do not know who ordained him), fell asleep in the Lord and was buried
outside Mount Athos at the aforementioned old-calendar monastery of Panagia
Myrtidiotissa, where he served as the monastery priest. In 1934 the younger
brother of St. Joseph, Nicholas, was tonsured a monk with the name Athanasios. In 1935 St. Joseph
met Hieromonk Ephraim
of Katounakia from the hermitage of St. Ephraim. This spiritual connection was so strong,
that the then Elder Ephraim
of Katounakia -now Saint
Ephraim of Katounakia - considered him an excellent teacher in his spiritual life.
Elder Ephraim was ordained a
priest in 1936 by the old calendarist “bishop" of Cyclades, Germanos
Varykopoulos, who had been expelled from the official Church of Greece along
with those “bishops” who had ordained
him. The parents
of the truly joyful and saintly Ephraim
of Katounakia, both became
monastics. His father, the monk Job, went to Katounakia and reposed in the Lord
there, with the zealout Fathers, while his mother, Maria the nun, went to the
old-calendar Monastery of Keratea, where she was buried and her relics became fragrant.
The ordination as a deacon
and priest of St. Ephraim was the second ordination of the “bishop” of Cyclades Germanos, while the third
ordination was that of Hieromonk
Ananias from the brotherhood
at the Holy Skete of St. Anne. Elder Ephraim of Katounakia was for many years
the priest for Saint Joseph the Hesychast and his brotherhood. It should be noted that at that time in those desolate
areas of Mount Athos
almost everyone was a zealot.
The only one in Katounakia who never became a zealot was Saint Daniel of Katounakia.
But it is worthwhile to talk
a little more about the brotherhood of the Skete of St. Anne. This brotherhood was spiritually connected with the brotherhood of St. Joseph the Hesychast. When later, through
a revelation, it was revealed to St. Joseph and St. Ephraim of Katounakia that
they should abandon zealoutry and return to the canonical Church of Christ
and to commemorate the Ecumenical Patriarch, the brotherhood of
the Skete of St. Anne also wanted to abandon zealoutry. Then, Hieromonk Ananias
entered the Kyriakon (the main church) of the Skete of St. Anne and (as he
recounted) he felt an abundance of Divine Grace, when he took the censer to
cense on Sunday, something he had not felt while he was separated from the
canonical Church.
Some Fathers, however,
doubted the legitimacy of his ordination, and so he turned to the Abbot of the
Monastery of the Great Lavra, Elder Platon, to which the Skete of St. Anne
belonged, to find out what he should do.
Elder Platon referred this issue to the Ecumenical Patriarchate and Patriarch
Athenagoras replied: "We accept the brother as he
is." This was narrated by Saint Ephraim of Katounakia himself.
When St. Ephraim stopped
being part of the zealots, although he did not doubt his own priesthood, he
nevertheless accepted at the urging of Elder Joseph of Vatopedi, that Bishop
Ioannis of Sidirokastros, who was then at the Holy monastery of Stavronikita,
say a prayer for him. The Bishop not knowing what else to do, said the prayer
of forgiveness for him. It is a fact that Saint Ephraim of Katounakia saw many
miracles in his priestly life while he belonged to the zealots, but he saw them
- as he said - vaguely, while when he came to the canonical Church, he saw everything
very clearly.
Saint Joseph the Hesychast, before returning to the canonical Church, accepted into his brotherhood Elder Ephraim, now known as Ephraim of Arizona and previously the Abbot of the Holy Monastery of Philotheou, Elder Charalambos the later Abbot of the Holy Monastery of Dionysiou (it should be noted that both Elders Ephraim and Charalambos were ordained as priests by a Bishop of the Ecumenical Patriarchate) and finally Elder Joseph, later of Vatopedi monastery, who was from the Monastery of Stavrovouni in Cyprus and came to Mount Athos with the name: "Monk Sophronius”. From the information we have, these three Fathers were tonsured by Saint Ephraim of Katounakia, who as their priest gave them Holy Communion for many years.
Some express a concern about
these events. While St. Ephraim had not been ordained by a canonical Bishop,
the Church still accepted him into its ranks without re-ordination (and today
he is recognised as a Saint together with St. Joseph the Hesychast), which is
inconsistent with the views of many, who have also publicly stated -as we
mentioned in the beginning- that the schismatic bishops and priests who were ordained by them, do not have any kind of priesthood, do not have an apostolic succession and are therefore
laymen.
If we accept these views,
then the aforementioned holy Fathers Ephraim and Charalambos never became
monks, while Elder Joseph of Vatopedi never became a great-schema monk and
therefore should not be called Joseph, but rather with his first name, Sophronius,
just because these tonsures were done by Saint Ephraim
of Katounakia. This would also mean that for all the years that they were
with the zealots, they were not communing the Body and Blood of Christ.
Why do we write all this?
Because the Church on many occasions, sometimes using accuracy and sometimes
leniency, accepted schismatics and even recognised heretical ordinations, such
as the ordinations of the Arians: St. Meletius of Antioch (who baptized and
ordained St. Chrysostom as a deacon), St. Cyril of Jerusalem and others. Let us
note one detail here. The Arians, in protest to the very orthodox Saint
Meletios, installed their own Patriarch in Antioch, Paulino, whose cooperation
Saint Meletios requested on several occasions when the populace was in a difficult
situation.
The Church even accepted
Arians without re-ordination in the days of St. John the Merciful, the
Patriarch of Alexandria, and also iconoclasts, later, in the time of St.
Photios, the Patriarch of Constantinople. The issues
around the Meletian
schism are well known, but let us note in this instance the following details. This
schism was created by the bishop of Lykopolis-Thebes, Meletios, who ordained many bishops and made his own "Church". Neither he nor his bishops
ever apologized to the
Church of Alexandria, from which
they were cut off. The First Ecumenical Council dealt with this schism and wanted to heal it for the sake
of the people who followed these schismatics.
In 1945, the Ecumenical
Patriarchate "withdrew the published Synodal Tome declaring the Bulgarian
Schism that was issued by the Great Synod of 1872 " and accepted in
communion all the bishops of the Bulgarian Church
without re-ordination, who were the spiritual descendants of the 1872 pioneers,
which the then Synod had deposed and had excommunicated.
At about the same time, the Polish Church
accepted schismatic old-calendarists without re-ordination,
whom it then ordained as bishops.
A typical example is
"Aquilias Claudius", who was a former Catholic.
He had been converted to
Orthodoxy by the Russians. He then joined the old calendarists, who did not
ordain him, so he resorted to the Syro-Jacobites of America (Nestorians), who
ordained him. He was then accepted
by the canonical Polish Church,
without re-ordination, but also without
being listed in its official
lists. Despite all this, there are photographs of him co-celebrating with
Polish Bishops. After his death,
the monastery he had built
in the village of Montaner,
in Vittorio Veneto,
Italy, as well as
the flock that followed him, joined the Greek Orthodox
Diocese of Italy
and remain part of it to this day.
At the same time, a great schism arose in the Church of Serbia, specifically among the expatriate Serbs of America, Australia, and New Zealand. All the bishops
of this so-called "Free Serbian Church" were ordained by schismatic Bishops
of the "Autocephalous Ukrainian Church." The last leader
of this "Free Serbian Church", the Metropolitan of New Gratsanitsa,
Ireneos Kovacevic, after many attempts at reconciliation by the canonical
Serbian Church, joined the canonical
Church, along with his bishops, the priests and his flock without
re-ordination, but with just a festal co-celebration of the Lirurgy
with the Patriarch Paul of blessed memory, the Metropolitan of
Montenegro Amphilochios and others.
The Church of Serbia
was always in communion with the so-called "ROCOR", the Church of the Russian
Diaspora, which was condemned as schismatic by the official Church of Russia
and which was also reunited with the Church of Russia without the re-ordination
of bishops, again with just a co- celebration
of the Lirurgy with them.
It was "ROCOR" that canonized
the beloved St. John Maximovich, who is well known in Greece,
who was then considered a schismatic by the Church of Russia.
We will now mention two more
cases, which we mention with reservation, because we could not verify how they came about.
During the 19th century, a
large group of Maronites, clergy and laity, sought to join the Patriarchate of
Antioch, which accepted them without the re-ordination of their clergy.
After the fall of Communism
in Russia, a small group of so-called "Raskolniks" joined the
canonical Church, from what we know, without re-ordination.
In our time, Catholic
priests, who have asked to join the Orthodox Church,
have been admitted
without re-ordination (relatively recently they have been accepted in
Russia and Italy).
After all, the Church always
has the final word and the responsibility, and when the Church decides anything
in synod, the word of the laity and the clergy, who, for their own reasons,
condemn these decisions, is unnecessary and also dangerous. If they want their
word to be heard, they must express it humbly, without
audacity - because
audacity within the Church, which unfortunately abounds
today, is indeed a wound that does not heal easily and this audacity
usually comes from egotism or from corruption.
They will, of course,
help more with their prayer.
The Church always
imitates her divine
Founder, and could not do
otherwise, Who wants "all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of
the truth" (1 Timothy 2: 4). It is a fact that the Church
has often suffered
and is in pain from heresies and schisms,
which are borne - according to the incomparable Saint Chrysostom - from
"the glory of love and the vanity of tyranny, this engulfing flame"
(Explanation of Ephesians) . The Church always wants - and must want - to heal
them. A Church, whose leaders are endowed with the arrogance of power, wickedness and vengeance, but also by nationalism is doomed to experience "vicissitudes". A Church,
which cultivates love, is indeed
the Church of Christ, who, out of love left the 99 sheep, to find the lost
one and shed His Blood for all people.
Hieromonk Antipas of Mount
Athos resides at the Holy Iviron Cell of Saint Anna in Karyes, Mount Athos.
