Dan Everiss
<oregdan@hotmail.com> | Mon, Apr 4, 2016 at 11:27 AM |
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Shared by Archimandrite Alexias in the UK.
Begin forwarded message:
From: Bishop Chrysostomos
Subject: Re: Bishop George Khodr, Sunday of Orthodoxy 2016 - English
Date: 2 April 2016 16:43:38 GMT+01:00
Dear Michael:
Evlogia Kyriou. Thank you for translating the sermon by the Antiochian Prelate.
He
is right. His “Orthodoxy" is no different from the confessions of other
Christians. He gives no credence to Holy Tradition, gives no heed to
the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, and apparently shows no
honor to the Fathers and Saints and Martyrs who gave their lives for the
cause of correct faith and correct confession. Why bother to be
Orthodox? While I am the first to follow the Fathers in fostering
respect and toleration between religions, I do not do so in a cognitive
vacuum where such respect and toleration, instead of rising out of
thought, inner formation, and civilized discourse, come forth from
equating truth with falsehood, good thought with superstition, and
haplessly imagining that religion is not a search for the truth of
Truths.
I am not surprised at this man's
ecumenical platitudes, but I have never read such a clear expression of
heresy and disbelief in the context of a “piety” that is totally empty,
since the very things that he says that he upholds—such as prayer to the
Theotokos—he also dismisses as ultimately meaningless or
insignificant. Astonishing. He at least reveals to us that ecumenism,
where he is a well-kown voice, is an intellectually empty farce, when
taken to the extreme of simply reducing all things to one common
statement that is devoid of content. Ecumenists apparently accept any
belief, as long it does not impede their own belief, however ignorant
and the opposing belief and however unexamined and superficial their own
“confessionless” confession. The folly of mere religion and “official”
Orthodoxy in pure form.
These people are
insidious, ignorant in the Faith, and “ecclesiastical” diplomats more
than anything else. It is a tragedy for their souls that such clergyman
teach what is false and condemnable, and we must pray for them. But
think of the innocents who, looking to them for leadership, are led to
religious syncretism of the most base kind, “ecclesiological
agnosticism,” as another ecumenical clergyman once described his beliefs
to me, and the destruction of souls. A teaching about belief and
spiritual experience—which for Orthodox are empirical ( part of an
encounter with God and the Truth)—that mocks the conceptualization of
the truth in principles, dogmas, and theological truths is like a
science that equates superstition with observable, replicable, and
operative laws and formulae.
With affection in Christ, Least Among Monks, † BC
============================== ============================== ==============================
On Apr 2, 2016, at 6:29 AM, Michael C wrote:
Evlogeite
Reverend Hierarchs,
Father Akakios,
I am sure you won't be surprised by the following article.
Wishing you a Blessed Lent.
Asking for your prayers,
Michael
------
The Most Reverend Chrysostomos, former
Archbishop and Metropolitan emeritus of Etna
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The offensive ecumenist statement:
Translator's Note. The
following is a translation of an article written in Arabic for the
Sunday of Orthodoxy 2016 by the veteran Antiochian arch-ecumenist Bishop
George Khodr. It appeared in the Lebanese Al-Nahar Newspaper* on
Saturday March 19, 2016 (New Style).
As the enlightened true Orthodox reader will see, this ecumenist's heretical and delusional ideology spills out of the page!
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tomorrow
is the first Sunday of Great Lent in my church, and it is called Sunday
of Orthodoxy, which, in Arabic, means the Sunday of Right Belief. Since
the fourth century or around that period, right belief for its
proponents has meant the un-adulterated
tradition which they have received from the ancients. And contrary to
this right belief is heresy. In this article, Right Belief means
maintaining the sound dogma featured in the Gospels for Christians who
accept the Seven Ecumenical Councils, and these are seven for the
Catholics and the Orthodox, and for others they are less than that, with
the reassurance that all Christians do not differ in the tenor (ie
content/meaning – trans.) of their faith, even if some confess only four councils that are binding and others seven or more.
To
put it very simply, there is no essential difference in dogma between
Christians. They all believe in the Crucifixion of the Master, His
Resurrection, and the Trinity, and anything else is just details.
Generally and surely, the faith of the Christians is one or used to be
one before the (Roman – trans.) Catholic Church declared the primacy of
the Pope and his infallibility a dogma in 1870.
We
and the Catholics and the Evangelicals, speak on thing in Christ.
However, if most of us declare that He has two natures, and some of us
that he has one nature, the essence of the speech is one, that is God and man together. There isn't a group that fuzes
the Divinity of the Master with his humanity, by separating one from
the other. In the truth of the meaning intended, even if the expressions
differ, there is absolutely no difference between us when talking about
the essence of Christ. We have differed in speech but not in the truth
of our faith. So, if faith was faith in what is Christ, then there is no
difference between any Christian group and another group.
When
it comes to speaking of Christ, we are all of correct belief. The rest
is speech other than Christ. The declaration of the Church of Rome in
1870 that Papal Supremacy and Infallibility is a dogma was something
new. Does the Catholic church today exclude us from Right Belief if we
don't speak of a dogma she declared in the year 1870 only as an official
declaration, and by that I mean the supremacy of the Roman Pope and his
infallibility? What I do know is that the Church of Rome does not
consider the Orthodox Church in a state of heresy. She sees it as in a
state of schism, and the schism occurs
in the one church and does not constitute two churches. To be precise,
the Orthodox and the Catholics are in a state of estrangement as long as
no official position is declared from either one, wronging (or
criticizing – trans.) the other dogmatically.
Does
the dogma of Papal Supremacy and Infallibility declared in 1870
comprise an express criticism of the Orthodox Church? Each one calling
the other a 'sister church' is not a naming out of politeness, but of
conviction. It does not mean another independent entity. Until now, I
have not found a Catholic text accusing the Orthodox of dogmatic and
ecclesiastical deviation. We are then in a state of symmetry
between brethren. In theology we don't use terminology for social
civility. And no matter how much the dispute tightens among the
fanatics, what is important is their unity, which Christ sees.
I
accept from among the Christians whoever does not address Mary in
prayer, as long he does not blaspheme (literally, “consider an infidel” –
trans.) those who do address her. Pray as you wish and don't separate
me from you. I know from among the Protestants those who love Mary very
much. They don't address her in prayer; that is their business as long
as they don't blaspheme me if I address her. I have nothing against
whomever does not love nor address Mary, as long as he leaves me free to
address her.
I am saddened that a Christian refuses to address Mary, but I do not
compel him if he sees that in doing that he becomes lacking in his love
for Christ.
Whoever
sees that in his intercessions of the Saints, he diminishes from his
love for Jesus, that is up to him, and whoever sees that he loves the
Saints with Jesus, that is up to him also. Let us not blaspheme each
other (ie declare each others infidels – trans.) for no reason. God
shall judge whomever He wishes if His judgment is at hand. Don't rush in the judgment according to your own will. Who am I to judge anyone? God alone is the judge.
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