In these Undogmatic Days, Lets us Stand against "Unity" at the Cost of Truth: New Book-"UNIA: The face and the Disguise (New edition)"

Book Presentation

(NEW EDITION)

Edition Greek-Orthodox books

«UNIA: THE FACE AND THE DISGUISE»

THE BOOK BY FR. GEORGE METALLINOS

NOW CIRCULATING IN ENGLISH 

Now in circulation is the English edition of the book “UNIA: The Face and the Disguise” by Protopresbyter Fr. George Metallinos, Professor Emeritus of the Athens University School of Theology. This new edition is included in the publications of the Christian Orthodox Philanthropical Society of Friends of the Sacred Retreat of Pantokrator at Melissohori “Saint Gregory Palamas”. 

In this very notable essay, Father George examines the historical course and the significance of the religious-political entity named “Unia”, that is, of the Papist communities in the Orthodox regions of Eastern Europe and the Middle East – mainly during the past four centuries – who have deceptively been observing the Orthodox liturgical rubric (sacred services, language, vestments, etc.), but have acknowledged primacy and infallibility in the person of the Pope of Rome.  The author analyzes Unia’s early link to the Papist “Holy Inquisition”, but also to the Jesuits, who had originally organized Unia as a disguised Latinism.  According to Fr. George, Unia was –on the one hand– a factor that balanced out the damage sustained by Papism on account of the Protestant Reform from the 16th century onwards, and on the other hand, it was also a lever that elevated the Pope as a universal Bishop, whose prestige is supposedly recognized not only in the West but also in the East, that is by the Uniates, who are a mere semblance of “Easterners”.   Unia exploited various favourable coincidences, such as the financial adversity that prevailed in various countries as well as schisms, but, par excellence, it exploited the support of Roman Catholic Governors, to impose itself en masse or even with force on Orthodox populations.  The strengthening of Unia was nothing short of the continuance of the Papacy’s medieval struggle for dominance (Investiture Controversy), for the implementation also of political and not only ecclesiastic authority by Rome.  It was the Pope’s oppression of the Orthodox through Unia that made the Orthodox of Eastern Europe turn to Russia during World War II - the same time during which the Uniates were collaborating with the German Nazis. 

The Professor of Ecclesiastic History especially focuses on the emergence of Unia in the region of Greece and the reaction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Church of Greece, as well as -for example- the successful proselytism to Unia of the destitute Asia Minor refugees, through Uniate “philanthropy”. The upgraded (with Cardinals) status of Unia by the Vatican, both in the Ukraine and the broader area during the last decades, but also the Vatican’s stance on the ethnic and ecclesiastic subject of Skopje’s pseudo “Macedonia” and the wars of former Jugoslavia, prove that the problem of Unia is not one of the past. The Vatican’s persistence in preserving and strengthening Unia despite the reactions of the Orthodox, but also of many important Papist personages – and in spite of the damage to the ecumenist “dialogue of love” – proves that Unia continues to this day to be extremely precious to the Vatican, for the salvaging of its crumbled moral status and also for the weakening of Orthodox peoples, States and alliances (the current events in the Ukraine are most revealing). 

Finally, the author analyzes the soteriological repercussions of Unia’s activity, given that by maintaining all the heretic dogmas of Papism – dogmas that were condemned by Ecumenical Councils – Unia is deemed detrimental to the prerequisites for in-Christ salvation.  The matter of Unia is no longer a hiero-canonical one, as were the instances of Rome’s encroachments over a thousand years ago in the jurisdictions of the Eastern Patriarchates; it is primarily an ecclesiological problem and should be considered as a reason for the revision and redefinition of the theological dialogue of the Orthodox with an uncompromising and aggressive Rome.  The text is also flanked by significant, related, pan-Orthodox documents.

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book size (in cm): 12,5X20.5
Pages: 124
ISBN: 978-618-81489-1-8
Language: English
1st edition: 2015
Publisher: Greek-Orthodox books
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Source:

The Orthodox Church: "Still and Always The One and Only Church", or, a different title: "Don't get cozy with the Roman Catholic Church". I Ain't.

From here: 

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On the Recent Events in Jerusalem and their Ecclesiological Underpinnings

By a Greek Orthodox priest.

What is one to make of the recent events in Jerusalem commemorating the 50th anniversary of the meeting of Patriarch Athenagoras and Pope Paul VI, during which the Patriarch of Constantinople, along with the Archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese and other hierarchs of the Patriarchate, met with the Pope of Rome to conduct joint prayer services and issue joint statements? What problems, if any, do these meetings and statements pose to us as Orthodox Christians and to our Orthodox Faith? And, what, in the final analysis, is the essential theological problem at stake here?
These are some of the questions that many faithful ask, and they deserve a thorough answer in return. This short article will attempt to provide some answers, or at least the beginnings of such answers.

Those who would see in these ecumenical gatherings an overwhelmingly positive development speak of them as "exchanges of generosity, goodwill and hope," and "exchanges in the spirit of Christian love" which are "true expressions of the faith of the Apostles, the Fathers, and the Orthodox." The champions of these gatherings never fail to admit that "although there are serious differences" between the Orthodox Church and Catholicism "which must not be overlooked, nevertheless our faith demands that we join together and witness to our shared Christian commitments." This is how a well-known American Orthodox theologian referred to the Jerusalem event and I believe he is accurately repeating the general conception among supporters.

If, however, we are to understand the meaning of these events in a spiritual and theological manner, we must go beyond the tired clichés and overused platitudes and examine the underlying ecclesiology which is either being implied or being expressed by the Patriarch and his supporters during these meetings. It is quite easy, and unfortunately quite common even among Orthodox Christians, to be satisfied with the flowery language of love and reconciliation and not pay attention to the deeper significance of the theology being expressed in word and deed. If we are to avoid such a pitfall and assist others in the same, we must acquire an Orthodox mindset and judge these important matters within the Orthodox framework and criteria.

The underlying problem here that few discuss is the ecclesiological implications of  the Patriarchate and its supporters’ new view of the Church. If the Jerusalem meeting and the accompanying gatherings (such as those in Paris, Boston and Atlanta) are judged to be destructive of Church unity and to undermine the mission of the Church, it is not, of course, because of the flowery language of love and understanding incessantly used on all sides, but because they are not grounded in the Orthodox Faith, in Orthodox ecclesiology. If, however, our representatives in these meetings are not expressing an Orthodox teaching on the Church, what are they expressing?

Unfortunately, there is no shortage of previous statements by hierarchs of the Patriarchate of Constantinople one could reference in order to answer this question. Citing them is both beyond the scope of this article and unnecessary, for in remarks made by the Patriarch of Constantinople in his first speech given in Jerusalem on May 23rd, in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the essence of the new ecclesiology is clearly articulated:

The One, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, founded by the "Word in the beginning," by the one "truly with God," and the Word "truly God", according to the evangelist of love, unfortunately, during her engagement on earth, on account of the dominance of human weakness and of impermanence of the will of the human intellect, was divided in time. This brought about various conditions and groups, of which each claimed for itself "authenticity" and "truth." The Truth, however, is One, Christ, and the One Church founded by Him.

Both before and after the great Schism of 1054 between East and West, our Holy Orthodox Church made attempts to overcome the differences, which originated from the beginning and for the most part from factors outside of the environs of the Church. Unfortunately, the human element dominated, and through the accumulation of "theological," "practical," and "social" additions the Local Churches were led into division of the unity of the Faith, into isolation, which developed occasionally into hostile polemics.

Note that the Patriarch states:

1. The One Church was divided in time.

2. That this division was the result of the dominance of human weakness. It is not stated, but it follows that this human weakness was stronger than the Divine Will for the Church He founded.

3. That the various groups, parts of the One Church, which resulted from this division each "claimed" to be the authentic and true Church. The implication here is that none of them, including the Orthodox Church, can rightfully lay claim to being exclusively the One Church.

4. And, yet, somehow, in spite of these competing groups all exclusively claiming authenticity and truth, the Church is one. Once again, it follows from all that is said that this oneness exists only outside of time, since the Church, as he said, was divided in time.

In order to gain a total picture of the new ecclesiology being presented, we should add to these views on the Church the Patriarch(ate)’s stance vis-à-vis Catholicism, which was on exhibit in both word and deed throughout the Jerusalem event. In all of the promotional material and patriarchal addresses, Catholicism—which synods of the Church and saints have for centuries now considered to be a heretical parasynagogue—is considered to be a Local Church, the Church in Rome. Likewise, the current Pope is considered to be a "contemporary successor of the early apostle [Peter] and current leader of the ancient church [of Rome]." The Patriarch has also referred to the current Pope as his brother bishop, co-responsible for the good governing of the One Church. He considers the sacraments performed by the Pope and his clerics as the self-same mysteries of the One Church. Thus it is not surprising that he views the Church as divided in history and yet somehow still one, if only outside of history.

 
What can we now say of this image of the Church presented by the Patriarch? We can say that:

1. It is in total harmony with the Second Vatican Council’s new ecclesiology as laid out in the conciliar documents Lumen Gentium and Unitatis Redintegratio.

2. It is entirely at odds with the vision of the Church presented in relevant conciliar documents of the Orthodox Church, such as the decisions of the Council of 1484, the Patriarchal Encyclicals of 1848 and 1895, and in the writings of those Holy Fathers who have expressed the mind of the Church on the subject, such as Sts. Gregory Palamas, Nectarius of Pentapolis, Mark of Ephesus, Paisius Velichkovsky, and many others.

The Patriarch and his supporters are aligning themselves and attempting to align all of Orthodoxy with the ecclesiological line drawn during the Second Vatican Council. This new ecclesiology allows for a division of the Church "in time," such that the Orthodox Church and Catholicism are considered "two lungs" of the One Church—yet nevertheless divided. In this ecclesiology, the universal Church includes both Catholicism and all other Christian confessions. It is supposed that the Church is a communion of bodies that are more or less churches, a communion realized at various degrees of fullness, such that one part of the Church, that under the Pope, is considered "fully" the Church, and another part of the Church, such as a Protestant confession, "imperfectly" or only "partially" the Church. Thus, this ecclesiology allows for participation in the Church’s sacraments outside of her canonical boundaries, outside of the one Eucharistic assembly, which is antithetical with a properly understood "Eucharistic ecclesiology." 

Hence, the ecclesiology expressed in word and deed by the Patriarch of Constantinople and the ecclesiology of Vatican II converge in the acceptance of a divided Church, or a Church rent asunder by the heavy hand of history. It might be characterized as ecclesiological Nestorianism, in which the Church is divided into two separate beings: on the one hand the Church in heaven, outside of time, alone true and whole; on the other, the Church, or rather "churches," on earth, in time, deficient and relative, lost in history’s shadows, seeking to draw near to one another and to that transcendent perfection, as much as is possible in "the weakness of the impermanent human will."

In this ecclesiology, the tumultuous and injurious divisions of human history have overcome the Church "in time." The human nature of the Church, being divided and rent asunder, has been separated from the Theanthropic Head. This is a Church on earth deprived of its ontological nature and not "one and holy," no longer possessing all the truth through its hypostatic union with the divine nature of the Logos.

This ecclesiology is, without doubt, at total odds with the belief and confession of the Orthodox in One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. The Church of Christ, as the Apostle Paul supremely defined it, is His body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all (τὸ σῶμα Αὐτοῦ, τὸ πλήρωμα τοῦ τὰ πάντα ἐν πᾶσι πληρουμένου). The fullness of Christ is identified with the Body of Christ which is, like Christ when He walked on earth in time, as Theanthropos, visible and indivisible, being marked by divine-human characteristics. As Vladimir Lossky has written, all that can be asserted or denied about Christ can equally well be applied to the Church, inasmuch as it is a theandric organism. It follows, then, that just as we could never assert that Christ is divided, neither could we countenance the Church ever being divided. (cf. 1 Cor 1:13).

The Church, it goes without saying, was founded, established, spread, and exists to this day in time (and will exist until the Second Coming, and beyond). This is so because the Church is the Theanthropic Body of the Christ, who entered into time, walked, died, rose, ascended and is to return again in time. The Church is the continuation of the Incarnation in time. And just as our Lord was seen and touched and venerated in the flesh, in time, so too does His Body, the Church, continue—united and holy—in time. If we were to accept the division of the Church, we would be accepting the nullification of the Incarnation and the salvation of the world. As this new ecclesiology of a "divided church" ultimately annuls man’s salvation, it could be rightly considered as heresy.

Our belief in the unity and continuity of the Body of Christ, our confession of faith, this dogma of the Church, is based on nothing less than the divine promises of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, when he said such words as these:

"When he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth." (Jn. 16:13).

"I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock [of faith] I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." (Mt 16:18).

"Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." (Mt 28:16).

"In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." (Jn 16:33).

Likewise, from the mouth of Christ, the divine Apostle Paul, we hear more promises of the indivisibility and invincibility of the Church:

"And hath put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be the head over all things to the church, Which is His body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all." (Eph 1:22-23).

"The house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth." (1 Tit 3:5).

 
"There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; One Lord, one faith, one baptism." (Eph 4:5).

"Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever."(Heb 13:8).

And, from the Apostle of Love, John the Theologian, we read that it is our faith in the God-man and His divine-human Body that is invincible and victorious over the fallen spirit of this world, which is above all, a spirit of division:

"For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." (1 Jn 5:4).

So, then, has not the Spirit of Truth led His Church into "all truth"? Or, are we as Orthodox only advancing a "claim" of authenticity and truth? Has He not guarded His Church so that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it? Or, has "human weakness" overcome Christ’s Body? Has He not remained with us, guiding us even until today and on to the end of time? Or, does He no longer exist as One "in time"? Has not our faith in the God-man overcome the world and the spirit of division? Or, is it, as the Patriarch supposes, that the "human element" and "human weakness" has overcome our faith and the unity of the Body of Christ?

To better understand the impossibility of both the Orthodox Church and Catholicism maintaining the identity of the One Church while being divided over matters of faith, let us look briefly at the marital union. In marriage, a man and a woman are united in Christ. There exists a three-fold unity, or a unity between two persons in a third Person. This is no mere human accord. This is a theanthropic unity, a manifestation of the mystery of the Incarnation and thus of the Church, according to the divine words of the Apostle Paul: This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church. (Eph 5:32).

All unity in the Church is theanthropic. Indeed, truly united human beings are only to be found in the Church, for in the Church alone does man put on divine-humanity (Gal 3:27), the human nature of Christ. As the fallen, unredeemed human nature is hopelessly broken and divided within itself, separated from the principle of his unity, God, man can only be united by "putting on" a new human nature, the human nature of the God-man, which takes place in the mysteries, first of which is baptism. Therefore, we are restored to unity in ourselves, between ourselves and with God only through unity with the God-man in His human nature, in His Body, the Church.

Has there been division? Has the "marriage" fallen apart? Know that first one of the two persons ceased to exist "in Christ," fell away from Christ, and only then from the other. This human division is necessarily preceded by a break in communion with the Divine Person in which the two persons were united. Something similar can be said on the ecclesiastical plane.

The Patriarch maintains that even though "the Local Churches were led into division of the unity of the Faith" and "the One Church was divided in time," nevertheless both the Orthodox Church and Catholicism are united to Christ and manifest this unity with Him in common sacraments. This is impossible, however, for if both were united to Christ, they would necessarily be united to one another, since they find their unity in Christ. Simply put: if we are both in Christ, we are united. If we are divided, we can’t both be in Christ. In terms of ecclesiology, this means that both can’t be "the Church."

From the moment that one holds that the Church is divided, he can no longer hold that the members of the Church are united to the theanthropic nature of the Body of Christ. The Church that is envisioned is necessarily a merely human organism, in which the "dominance of human weakness and of [the] impermanence of the will of the human intellect" reigns and brings division.

We can also see this truth evidenced in the words of the Apostle of Love, the beloved Evangelist, John the Theologian. He states that if a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar. (1 Jn 4:20). Similarly, since love unites us to God, if we say that we are united with God but divided from our brother, we do not speak the truth. Furthermore, on the ecclesiastical plane, if we say that the "churches" are both united with God but are divided between themselves, we do not speak the truth. For, if both are united to God they would also be united to one another, since unity in the Church is in and through Christ.

Based on this new teaching from the Patriarch(ate), some maintain that a "false union" has already been forged. Most dismiss this claim straightaway. It is true that the common cup, at least officially and openly, was not at stake in Jerusalem or immediately anywhere. However, a type of "false union" has undeniably been established on the level of ecclesiology. For, when the mysteries of a heterodox confession are recognized per se, as the very mysteries of the Church, and, likewise, their bishops are accepted and embraced as bishops of the One Church, then have we not already established a union with them? Have we not a union both in terms of recognizing their "ecclesiality" (i.e., the One Church in Rome) and in adopting a common confession of faith with respect to the Church?

If we recognize their baptism as the one baptism, it is inconsistent not to recognize the Eucharistic Synaxis in which their baptism is performed. And if we recognize their Eucharist as the One Body, it is both hypocritical and sinful not to establish Eucharistic communion with them immediately.

It is precisely here that the untenable nature of the Patriarchate’s stance becomes apparent. The fact that the Church has never accepted inter-communion with Catholicism witnesses not to just some tactical decision or conservative stance, but to her self-identity as the One Church and to her view of Catholicism as heresy. If this were not the case, it would be as if we are playing with the mysteries and the truth of the Gospel. As St. Mark of Ephesus famously expressed it, the "cutting off of the Latins" was precisely because the Church no longer saw their "church," their Eucharistic assembly, as if in a mirror, as expressing the "Catholic" Church in Rome. Their identity was no longer that of the Church, but of heresy.

From all that has been written here, it should be clear that there are eternal consequences from every new departure from "the faith once delivered," and the new ecclesiology is no exception. By ignoring the contemporary voices of the Church—from St. Justin Popovich to the Venerable Philotheos Zervakos, to the Venerable Paisios the Athonite—those who went to Jerusalem espousing the new ecclesiology are leading their unsuspecting followers out of the Church and those already outside further away from entry into the Church.

This new ecclesiology is the spiritual and theological challenge of our day to which every Orthodox Christian remains indifferent to his own peril, for it carries with it soteriological consequences. In the face of a terribly divisive and deceptive heresy, we are all called to confess Christ today, as did our ancient forbearers in the days of Arianism. Our confession of faith, however, is not only in His Person in the Incarnation, but His Person in the continuation of the Incarnation, the Church. To confess the faith today is to confess and declare the unity of His divine and human natures in His Body, the one and only Orthodox Church—unmixed, unchanged, undivided and inseparable (ἀσυγχύτως, ἀτρέπτως, ἀδιαιρέτως, ἀχωρίστως). [Oros of the Fourth Ecumenical Council].

Hieromartyr Hippolytus the Pope of Rome, Virginmartyr Chryse, Censorinus, Sabinus, Ares, Felix, Maximus, Herculianus, Venerius, Styracius, Mennas, Commodus, Hermes, Maurus, Eusebius, Rusticus, Monagrius, Amandinus, Nymphodora, Cyrus, Theodore the Tribune, Maximus the Presbyter, Archelaus the Deacon and Cyriacus the Bishop

 

 St Hippolytus, Bishop of Rome                                                            Virginmartyr Chryse

 Commemorated on January 30

The Hieromartyr Hippolytus, and the Martyrs Censorinus, Sabinus, Chryse the Virgin and 20 Others suffered during the third century.

When St Hippolytus, Bishop of Rome, learned of the suffering of the martyrs, he appeared before the governor despite his advanced years and rebuked the torturers for their inhumanity. The enraged governor sentenced the holy bishop to be tortured. After long torments, they tied him hand and foot and threw him into the sea.

St Censorinus was a high-ranking magistrate during the reign of the Roman emperor Claudius II (268-270). He was arrested and thrown into prison for his faith in Christ. By the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ he raised up a dead man. As a result, twenty soldiers and prison guards were converted to Christ. They were beheaded with St Censorinus. Then the virgin Chryse was brought for interrogation. She bravely confessed herself a Christian and was subjected to torture. After horrible torments, she was drowned in the sea.

Saint Sabinus had heavy rocks tied around his neck, and then they hung his body on a tree and burned his sides with torches. In his torments, he gave up his holy soul to the Lord.

With St Chryse suffered the martyrs Ares, Felix, Maximus, Herculianus, Venerius, Stiracius, Mennas, Commodus, Hermes, Maurus, Eusebius, Rusticus, Monagrius, Amandinus, Olympius, Cyprus, Theodore the Tribune, Maximus the Presbyter, Archelaus the Deacon, and Cyriacus the Bishop.

All these Roman martyrs suffered in the year 269. The relics of the Hieromartyr Hippolytus were put in the church of the holy Martyrs Laurence and Pope Damasus at Rome. St Hippolytus was a disciple of St Irenaeus, Bishop of Lugdunum (Lyons in France), and he is also renowned as a Christian theologian who wrote many treatises against the heretics.

St Hyppolitus compiled a Paschal Canon, the famous Apostolic Tradition, "On Christ", and a "Treatise on the Antichrist." St Hippolytus also wrote many commentaries on Holy Scripture, on the Biblical Books: Genesis, Exodus, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs, and on the Gospels of Matthew, Luke and John, and on the Prophets Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Zechariah, on the Psalms of David and on the Apocalypse. Part of his works are preserved only in fragments. His discourses, devoted to the Theophany and the Prophet Daniel, are preserved in full. His discourses demonstrate his masterful style of preaching. He was one of the last Western Fathers to write in Greek.

TROPARION - TONE 4

Your lamb Chryse,
calls out to You, O Jesus, in a loud voice:
"I love You, my Bridegroom,
and in seeking You, I endure suffering.
In baptism I was crucified so that I might reign in You,
and I died so that I might live with You.
Accept me as a pure sacrifice,
for I have offered myself in love."
Through her prayers save our souls, since You are merciful.

Your holy martyrs, O Lord,
Through their sufferings have received an incorruptible crown from You, our God.
For having Your strength, they laid low their adversaries,
And shattered the powerless boldness of demons.
Through their intercessions, save our souls!

SOURCE:

SAINT OR FEAST POSTED THIS DATE 2012(with 2011's link here also and further, 2010, 2009 and even 2008!):

A letter of complaint by His Eminence Metropolitan Seraphim of Piraeus to the US Foreign Minister

From here.
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HELLENIC REPUBLIC
HOLY METROPOLIS OF PIRAEUS
AKTI THEMISTOKLEOUS 190
18539 PIRAEUS
TEL. +30 210 4514833
FAX. +30 210 4518476

7 September 2012

To the
Honourable
Daniel Smith
Ambassador of the USA
ATHENS GREECE

Your Excellency

I submit in writing my strong protests concerning the way my name is mentioned in the report of the Foreign office concerning religious freedom and I would kindly request you to forward this letter to Her Excellency the Secretary of State.

I would like to thank your Excellence in advance and may our Giftgiving Lord bless you with Health, Happiness and Progress.

HELLENIC REPUBLIC
HOLY METROPOLIS OF PIRAEUS
AKTI THEMISTOKLEOUS 190
18539 PIRAEUS
TEL. +30 210 4514833
FAX. +30 210 4518476

7 September 2012

To: Hillary Clinton
United States Secretary of State
USA Minister of Foreign Affairs
WASHINGTON U.S.A.


Your Excellency,

In the Report of your Department referring to the respect for religious freedom internationally and particularly in my country, my name is mentioned and my actions as well as my speeches are described without me having any chance to explain how things really stand.

As a world citizen and inhabitant on this planet I feel I am obliged to express my protest since there is obviously a violation of the Human Rights and the USA constitution in the way this specific Department Reports are constructed.

The founding of your country by the Leaders of your Nation was based on the Universal values which were born in my country; that is the freedom, democracy and respect of the human personality.

Since you are an experienced politician and a person of major contribution in your great country, you are certainly aware that according to the rules of law convicting someone without giving him the chance to apologize is unacceptable because the universal law of justice demands both sides to be heard before judgment.

Therefore I express my strong dissatisfaction that without being asked about what I really said or what really happened, I am literally accused internationally of being a so-called fundamentalist and violating the rights of my fellow men.

If the Services of your Ministry had the courtesy and the consciousness to ask me before accusing me about the specific issues, I would have informed them that I addressed in writing  the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Athens and requested the Blessing of the school year in the Roman Catholic School of Jean D’ Arc of Piraeus to come into effect exactly in the way the Roman Catholic School of Saint Paul of Piraeus does. I suggested that the blessing of the school year should be conducted by an Orthodox priest for the Orthodox students and by a Roman Catholic priest for the Roman Catholic students (who comprise a minority in this school), given the fact that in the Orthodox self consciousness and according to the canon law it is forbidden to pray together with people who believe in different dogmata and do not take part in the Holy Communion.

However, the Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Church did not condescend to give us an answer and in this way I was not able to protect the Orthodox consciousness of the students in this school and as their Bishop and Shepherd I had no other way but appealing to the justice of Law and to the corresponding Law Services.

What else could I have done to confront the intransigent attitude and the obstinate obsession against the Orthodox Self Consciousness? Is there, in your opinion irrationality in my view? The justifiable conclusion which is deducted is that the Report was biased against me since there was no knowledge of the real facts and no mention was made in the attitude of the Roman Catholic Archbishop. In your Report there are unprovable allegations about my beliefs and combine them with ant-semitic expressions which supposedly were mine but these are distortions of my words trying to defame me.

I have never expressed myself against the Jewish Nation which I respect exactly as much as every other Nation on Earth. However, I must communicate the strong opposition of the Orthodox Jewish against the distortion of Judaism and the deviation from the divine approach to life into an apocryphistic system based on the dark teaching of Kabbalah, the surviving of eosphorism and the practice of black magic.

Therefore, I have never expressed anti-Semitic views. However as a Christian Bishop I had the right to interpret the Prophesies of the Old Testament and especially those of Prophet Daniel and Prophet Isaiah and prove that the longed for Messiah came in this world in the person of Lord Jesus Christ and the one who is expected by Judaism to come (and for whom the restoration of the Third Temple of Solomon and ceremonial and worship symbols – as publicized though the Internet – are prepared) is the one who is referred in the Apocalypse of Evangelist John as the Antichrist. 

Finally, do you consider as fundamentalism and anti-Semitism the obvious and universal reality that the bank system is one of the favorite economic activities of the powerful – in your country – Jewish lobby? Would you be kind enough to inform us who the three international Financial Institutions Moody’s Standard and Poor’s and Fitch belong to?  

Could you inform us what Nationality the founder of the Tri later Commission is? Could you inform us what is the Nationality of the members of the Bene Berith Lodge, which sites in Washington and has branches all over the world including my country? Could you inform us who comprise the governing body of the appearing as think Tank Bildeberg Group?

As a conclusion, I sincerely wish the Peace of God and feelings of understanding and tolerance between people to prevail on Earth. However the freedom of consciousness is of ultimate value which we are obliged to defend even with our lives and surely justice imposes the respect of all people’s rights especially of the weaker ones and of those who do not have power in this world.

Yours respectfully
The Metropolitan of Piraeus
+ Seraphim

Refuting the Dogma of Reincarnation

From here.
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Fr. ANTHONY ALEVIZOPOULOS
Dr. of Theology - Dr. of Philosophy
Refuting the Dogma of Reincarnation

The Foundation of Reincarnation

If we want to determine the premise of reincarnation, we need to make reference to its dogma that every person, according to their innermost self, is eternal and subject to the eternal law of cause and effect, called karma. This law pushes the person into consecutive births after each death. A basic cause which makes up the 'fuel', so to speak, for the continuous movement of this wheel of deaths and births is a person's attachments and desires in connection with external reality. Each and every thought, word or deed returns to that person during his new incarnation. His new life composes a living movie, and he is now called to be like a perfect actor to reenact this 'drama' on the new screen. 

According to this concept, a basic aim becomes the passage through all the hardship and experiences corresponding to the accumulated karma and the effort put into restricting these activities and attachments, so that new karma accumulation can be avoided. 

A final objective is one's 'liberation' not only from death but from life as well.  

In contrast, the 'western version' of reincarnation views this belief as potential for a better, future life on earth, as a course leading to continuous greater advances of development, reaching the level of a super-being. 

Both perceptions on reincarnation are based on the holistic theory of the world, forming an anti-Christian worldview. 

According to the Christian faith, man is not uncreated and eternal, but a creation: not a result of God's substance, but the fruit of divine will and love. In the Old Testament the distinction between the Maker and his creations is underlined, between the human and the rest of creation. Only the human being is made 'in God's image'. His position in God's world is a position of authority, which according to God's plan translates into a position of responsibility and love on man's part towards all of God's creation. 

There is no single 'evolutionary scale' between the human and the rest of beings. The human as 'according to the image' of the personal God, who is a communion of persons, meaning freedom and love, is not determined according to blind laws, but he himself participates in determining his course. Following God's plan and God's path in respect to human existence and the meaning of his life, he remains in communion with God and becomes a bearer of God's benefaction. 

Man was created as a psychosomatic entity from the beginning; his body is not evaluated negatively but is a blessing. This is why man's hope rests not in 'liberation' from the body, but the resurrection,  imperishability and immortality of the body. 

Interpretative Deadlocks

  

If we accept the view that life inside the body is a fall and a state of punishment, with the aim of instructing the soul, this creates for the faithful person, who accepts the Scriptures as divine revelation, interpretative deadlocks.  

The Holy Scriptures tell us that God made man as a psychosomatic entity and gave him His blessing and the commandment to be fruitful and multiply and 'fill' all the earth. If this life inside the body is a 'curse', God would not bless man. It would not be God's will for man to be fruitful and multiply and fill the world with 'cursed' beings. 

If again, we assume that Adam, in a state of pre-existence sinned, and that is why he was incarnated ― to be punished and instructed ― then why should the same thing happen to all the other souls, and how could the protoplasts 'multiply' as psychosomatic entities, actually taking this multiplication as a blessing? If Adam sinned, then only he should become incarnate and not all people. 

But the Scriptures mention that God placed man in paradise and not in a 'state of hell'. The place that God gave man as a residence was a place of 'delight' and not punishment. That is why man is called to serve God's paradise, preserve it and not eliminate his relation with it (Gen. 2:15). 

The Holy Scriptures underline that punishment for man is not life in the body, but exactly the contrary. God warned man that his biological life would end if he sinned but not so if he remained faithful. If this life was a result of 'karma' and a negative stance of man in the state of a spiritual being, then sinners should live and the righteous should die, since this life would be considered a curse and not being released from life. 

Denial of Salvation in Christ 

The dogma of karma and reincarnation nullifies the mystery of salvation in Christ. The incarnation of the Son and Word of God constitutes the foundation of the Church and is linked with the mystery of man's salvation (Math. 16:17-18, 1 Tim. 3:16). His 'taking on' the whole person, not only the soul but also the body, constitutes the manifestation of God's glory (John 1:14, Hebrews 1:1-3). It cannot be considered negative. But these grounds for salvation are canceled when we accept the beliefs of karma and reincarnation. 

Christ conquered death, not through the liberation from the body, but through the resurrection and incorruptibility of the body. This change in a person's life does not come through continuous births and deaths, but 'in a moment', during Christ's second coming. For the Christian, there are no repeated judgments, which define the 'quality' of a new life each time, but only one biological life and only one judgment, which will take place in front of Christ's judgment seat. In front of the eternal Judge man will stand not only as a soul but also as a body, to answer for his deeds, which occurred by way of this body. 

This state of 'new creation', of incorruptibility, is lived by the Christian already in this life during the Holy Eucharist. The teaching of reincarnation, which regards the body negatively, not only nullifies the Christian's hope in Christ but also the meaning of divine worship, the primary purpose of the Holy Eucharist. 

Pedagogy Requires the Feeling of Responsibility 

The dogma of karma and reincarnation interprets this life's negative situations with acts which took place in a supposed previous life. For those acts, man is called to punishment, so as to erase his 'karma' and his attachments, aiming at complete 'liberation'. 

But man is not conscious of this fact. He does not remember those deeds that supposedly 'drove' him to a new reincarnation and to those difficulties he is now going through. He does not remember committing those deeds, for which he is supposedly being punished. When we accept that man is punished for things he is unable to remember, the significance of 'pedagogy' is abolished. When there is no memory, then punishment does not have an educative end. It could be a result of a blind law, which nonetheless rejects the existence of a God, who directs the course of history, who is a communion of persons ― that is, freedom and love. 

'Gospel' of the Serpent 

According to the Christian faith, man is not autonomous. He is by nature 'according to the image of God', and therefore, communion and love defines the person's life and corresponds to his real nature. However, man was made autonomous, following the serpent's advice, that is, a 'different gospel'.  

The teachings of karma and reincarnation are another expression of that same 'gospel', not of the gospel of freedom and love in Christ. 

The changes that take place within a person and the 'evolutions', as they are perceived by the followers of this dogma, occur without contact with the absolute existence, without communion with a personal God, Who is love. Man becomes completely autonomous. He is not conscious of the existence of a God, which can intervene in his life. He does not seek a god outside of himself. When he is happy, he attributes this happiness to himself and is confined within himself. When he is unhappy, he is led into passiveness; he does not seek a way out. Nor does he seek help from anyone outside of himself. 

He who believes in karma and reincarnation sinks into his misery and does not hope. He does not seek a God, nor anyone from his surroundings. He is expected to passively accept his state without 'attachment'. He cannot experience faith and gratitude for God's presence in his life. Even if he refers to 'a law of grace', it is aimed at  mechanistic and automatic consequences of a blind law, and this is why he is called on to act without internal involvement, without 'attachment', as he claims. Nevertheless, man is by nature a communion of persons. This is why the complete loneliness in which the dogma of karma and reincarnation immerses its believer constitutes an 'unnatural' state. 

On the contrary, the Christian believer accepts with gratitude all states in life and seeks a solution that is external to himself. He seeks God's face and the communion of love with Him. This gives him a deeper meaning in life. He feels that God does not abandon him and resides close to him, even if he faces negative situations. For the believer, sorrows and pain hold a deeper meaning. There are no unchangeable situations for him in life, an unalterable 'destiny', which is determined through a blind law. A person's will and God's grace can alter the spiritual state and life of that person. A Christian does not face anything passively but responsibly and with awareness of God's presence in his life. The Christian has undoubtedly abandoned the path of being distant and autonomous and follows the path of the 'new creation' in Christ, that is, the path of gratitude, love and hope. 

The dogma of the pre-existence of the soul and of reincarnation has been condemned by the Church as foreign to the Christian faith. Still there are guruistic, neognostic, theosophic, occult groups which claim that the dogma of karma and reincarnation was an integral part of Christ's teachings and of the first Church. 

These views rely on occult sources and are a result of para-psychological and spiritual practices and 'experimentation'. This means that they are the fruit of religious convictions from a sphere outside Christianity. 

The occultists project examples of 'memory' and use 'recollection' techniques. But if they do not concern situations which can be interpreted in a different way or cases of conscious deceit, we still find ourselves in front of 'phenomena' and 'testimonies' that are of no scientific, but only religious value. In order for them to be accepted, one must abandon the spiritual sphere of Christian faith and move to the sphere of Asian spirituality. 

Even people within the sphere of orthodox Hinduism, who believe in reincarnation, when referring to the phenomena of so-called 'spontaneous memory', underline that they pertain to 'demonic seizures', meaning demonic states. 

There is no Continuation in the Life of Personality 

The followers of reincarnation claim that on the path to 'liberation' there exists an intermediate state in the 'cosmic spheres' of the spiritual world. In this state, the personality of the previous life is dissolved and disappears before the soul is reborn into a new body. However, if the soul completely rejects its previous earthly personality, then, when it returns to life in a new reincarnation, it does not involve the same being, but another. 

So with reincarnation there is no continuity between successive lives. The destruction and disintegration of personality of every human after death does not differ so much from the atheistic conviction regarding man's extinction. In reality, the only thing that gets reincarnated is karma that is broken away from the body. This conviction has as a consequence that the being, who receives a new body, does not have, and cannot have any memory of a former existence, so that it can then achieve correction of its life and perfection during the coming lives.  

Consequently, it is possible that 'momentarily' the reincarnation theory satisfies some, offering an explanation for injustice and inequality, but in essence, it does not solve the problem, since man's personality dissolves and the being that is reincarnated does not have the required memory of those crimes for which it is being asked to pay. M. Albrecht brings up as an example the case of Joseph Stalin. The reincarnation of this dictator could suffer for Stalin's terrible crimes, without retaining any memory that indicates to him that he is Joseph Stalin. Besides, there is no indication that it is possible to ensure the 'evolution' of Stalin's new reincarnation; he could just as well increase his 'bad karma', instead of living a life that would drive him into 'evolution' into a new reincarnation.

But since one's personality dissolves and there is no ontological connection between the two beings, the possibility of 'another chance' proves ungrounded.  

The 'Cosmic Game' 

According to the views of the Theosophical Society, faith in divine providence leads the Church into desertion. To regain lost ground, the Christian Church needs to replace this faith with the belief of karma and reincarnation, which completely satisfies the evolved intelligence of modern man, argues Cooper. 

But this belief constitutes a religious conviction which 'exceeds' any possibility of guarantee in the human intellect. This is accepted in the areas of guruistic – occult groups that preach reincarnation as a 'key solution' for man's and the world's existential problems. 

The teacher of the 'harmonious life', following guru Sai Baba's steps, referring to 'the creation of the world' and the soul's 'involvement' in karmic relations and 'tendencies', writes:   

 
“The question comes to mind as how this cosmic game got started. How and why was the first samskara (impression or tendency) developed.” “The origin of the universe has been a question which has enticed the human mind into reflection ever since we've existed on this planet.” (Robert Najemy, Universal Philosophy, p.142,90).  

Najemy makes reference to various religious groups, which each “offers their own creation stories”, but that are “beyond the capacity of our limited mind to understand” (Universal Philosophy, p. 90). The teacher of 'harmonious life' presents as his own answer the belief in reincarnation: 

“The idea is that the spirit, for some reason, has separated from its perfect eternal state of union with God and is experiencing life in the physical world. Although the Spirit, in reality, remains perfect in its union with God, its projection on the earth plane, that is, the soul in the incarnated body, loses its awareness of that divine state. The soul then begins to experience and experiment with the physical world by entering into physical vehicles. 

“At first the soul could manifest itself only through very simple vehicles such as one-celled organisms like amoebas. Eventually as the soul has more and more contact with the physical world, through repeated birth and death of these various simple forms of life, it gradually develops the ability to incarnate into more advanced physical vehicles, such as plants, fish, insects, animals, primates and finally human beings”. (Robert Najemy, The Mystical Circle of Life, p. 140-141).

How is it possible for the soul, which is a 'projection' and 'reflection' of the Absolute, to lose consciousness of its godly state and start wandering about in the material world, to obtain something that evidently it did not have, the experience of matter? How is it possible for the perfect Spirit to be 'trapped' in matter? How and why did it have to be firstly reincarnated into 'inferior entities', such as is the amoeba, before it begun the 'evolutionary course' upwards? Wouldn't it be more natural to pass through in a contrary stream towards the bottom, from a manifested spirit to be embodied into the entity of man and then to fall further down, to become humanoid, animal, fish, plant, amoeba, mineral, since it 'desired' to experience all levels of matter? 

We see that the belief in reincarnation does not at all satisfy the 'evolved mind of contemporary man'. In this Robert Najemy also agrees. He writes:
 

“Because our conceptual ability and language are limited by the concepts of time and space, there is no way we can understand the final truth about creation with words or the rational mind. The answer to this question lies within the higher mind which is able to transcend time and space and realize the answer through direct experience of the process of creation itself. That answer is, of course, incommunicable as our language does not offer the necessary terminology”. (Universal Philosophy, p. 90)
 

The 'mind' belongs to the 'world of dualism', says Najemy. So, to arrive at an 'experienced' answer to the problem of creation, we must 'overcome' the world of 'dualism'. “However, even if once you have experienced the answer, you cannot communicate it because it is beyond duality and beyond the comprehension of the mind. Accepting that it has started in some way...” (Universal Philosophy, p. 142-143).  
 

That which the 'harmonious life' offers as an answer to the problem of how the first 'impression or tendency' (karma) developed, and of how the soul lost 'consciousness of its godly state', constitutes a religious view, which belongs within the sphere of Asian perception, external to the Christian sphere. This is how this religious view is expressed:
 

“The stance of Universal Philosophy is that creation is not an event that took place millions of years ago but rather a process that is eternally happening every second.” ... “There is a void, an infinite non-physical, unchanging, unmanifest Reality from which creation is constantly being projected somewhat in the way that an image is projected onto a screen by a projector.” (Universal Philosophy, p. 90)
 

A similar religious approach is attempted by so-called 'Esoteric Christianity'. According to the 'Esoteric Orthodoxy' of Boris Mouravvief “Orthodox Tradition teaches that the Universe was created by a sacrifice of God...God's sacrifice is Self-limitation by manifestation.” “...life in the Universe is nothing but a perpetual process of creation in every domain, on every plane, and at every step.” (Boris Mouravieff, Gnosis, Volume 1-Exoteric Cycle, p. 70,75)
 

D. Dorizas of 'Esoteric Christianity' expresses this referring to man's purpose in life: “You will be able to be diffused in the same way within forms and within the Formless and Non-manifested Essence, that exists and governs the Infinite Universes. A purpose and aim is to become Exhalation, and exhalation is the Word. And the Word is Flow, which is continuously recycled and perpetually transmits consecutively in a movement and vibrations so fast, that it seems not to palpitate or vibrate. When you become Exhalation, the Word, the Endless Flow of the Universe, you will be absorbed into the Formless, unifying with the Formless, but without losing the possibility to manifest yourself in Infinite ways...” (D. Dorizas, 2001, p. 84 [translated from Greek text]).       
 

These beliefs move externally to Christian faith, are anti-Christian teachings, which project absolute monism and the cyclical outlook of history, meaning a pointless 'cosmic game':
 

“Although this physical creation is in a constant rhythmic process of creation and destruction, this Ultimate Reality (as Spirit or Consciousness) cannot be created or destroyed. All of creation alternates between expansion, manifestation and contraction then back into the latent unmanifest state. Just as we have the rhythmic cycles of night and day, summer and winter, we have the cycles of creation and reabsorption of the universe back into the Unmanifest.” (Universal Philosophy, p. 91)    
 

This endless 'cosmic game' of continuous alternation between 'expansion towards manifestation' and 'contraction towards absence, into a latent unmanifest state', the continuous recycling of all, cannot possibly provide us with a satisfactory answer to the question for a deeper meaning of life. It's a religious view that does not offer solutions but leads to dead ends. It sinks a person into an endless loneliness.
 

Based on this perception, man is indeed doomed to loneliness. He is deserted to his 'destiny' helpless. Nobody can change his fate, not himself, nor another person, not even God. He has substituted Divine Love and Divine Providence with karmic plans, which define events in his life just like episodes of a movie, which are projected from a machine onto a screen. In the end, what is written in the movie will be screened, irrespectively of how philanthropic or horrific the scenes of the 'movie' are which are played in each life.   
 

According to the perception of the teachers of reincarnation, one must not even try to change the 'scenario' of his life. But even if he did try, it would be in vain, as the 'movie' will be played in any case. What one is called to do is to 'play his part' without 'identification [with things]' and without 'attachment'. It does not matter what the role is, if it is the role of a robber or of that being robbed, a criminal or a victim!  
 

The behavior of others towards him is also a result of 'karmic stipulations'. The same applies to relations formed with one's relatives, school, profession. The 'roles' change continuously from life to life. In one life one is a mother, in another one is a father, in the next a spouse, in another they afflict him, torture him, treat him unjustly, rob him, lead him into wretchedness and death. Under no circumstances is there the element of responsibility for one's fellow human or the concept of injustice. There is no God-lawgiver, who institutes ethical laws and calls on man to follow God's path, who will lead him into the fulfillment of the meaning of man's life, according to God's will. Man is only subject to karma's blind law and will not have to explain himself to anybody for his actions. He is submerged in complete loneliness.     
 

What is important is not what one does, but if he does it with 'attachment' or without identifying with what he does. It does not matter if his action is considered good or bad, but if he feels it is helping him in happiness and 'evolution'. “We want to see what’s useful for our evolution and not get caught up in concepts of sin, guilt” (Universal Philosophy, p. 207). For teachers of absolute monism, every action, regardless of whether it's considered good or bad, “is equally an expression of the one Universal Consciousness and thus, each deserves the same respect and love independent of what he or she does or does not do on the external levels.” (Universal Philosophy, p. 71)
 

If someone is strong, and considers it 'useful' to oppress someone weak, he may do it, 'without attachment'. If someone else is weak and is oppressed, he must also endure 'without attachment' or 'empathy'. Both deserve the same love and respect, regardless of whether they are oppressors or oppressed. Nobody wrongs anybody. The ones who perceive things differently are moving in the level of 'dualism' and are at a low evolutionary level. This is the theoretical foundation of ethics based on reincarnation.  
 

There is no injustice in reality. The ones who 'do us injustice' as we think, are only carriers of actions that, according to the 'scenario' of our life's movie, must take place, for our evolution's sake! If we endure without protesting, we will have learned our 'lesson' and in a future life we will advance in evolution! (self-evolution).   
 

It becomes obvious that the precept of karma and reincarnation does not lead to the development of man's personality, but to its destruction; it does not nurture relations of mutual responsibility and love between people, but the maggot of ego centrism. This faith does not know mercy and threatens the pillars of our whole society and civilization.  

The belief of karma and reincarnation means a reversal in the evaluation of our society. Any form of sociability is negatively evaluated, because the aim is not the development of society in all its expressions, but abstinence from every active and essential participation in social relations. Every such participation and relation is considered 'empathy' or 'attachment', which creates 'karma', and leads a person to be bound to the endless wheel of samsara, to the continuous 'torture' of successive births and deaths. This 'cosmic game', in which man also takes part, does not at all make sense.       
 

Nobody doubts that each person has the right to make his religious choice, to keep his faith in the resurrection and hope in Christ or to become a follower of reincarnation. But this choice must take place freely. That is why, one must realize that both of these are incompatible with each other. One cannot believe in reincarnation without denying the hope of resurrection. He cannot say, “I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the age to come” (The Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed), and at the same time confess belief in karma and reincarnation.    
 

For these beliefs to be taught as Christian, using Christian terminology and using the Holy Scriptures, is a pitiable error ‒ if, of course, this does not occur on purpose ‒ otherwise it is dishonest. Either way, it causes confusion and prevents unsuspecting people from having a free choice.      
 

If someone wishes to choose to believe in reincarnation, they must beforehand know that apart from the fact that this path is anti-Christian, they are not led to a 'better life' or to the 'development of man's abilities'. Because the final aim, according to the principle of karma and reincarnation is not a better life, but the termination of life, the 'absorption' into an impersonal 'Universal Reality'.
 

On the contrary, the Christian faith, according to which God, out of love, created the world and created man 'according to His image and to His likeness', not as a result of His divine substance, but His divine will and freedom. It offers an answer to the question of creation and deeper meaning in man's life. This meaning does not end in an 'absorption' of a person into the 'Universal Reality', but into his participation in God's life 'in Jesus Christ', with the eternal communion of love with the Holy Trinity (for more information, please see our book The Orthodox Church: Faith-Worship-Life, Preveza 1991).   

Fr. ANTHONY ALEVIZOPOULOS
Dr. Of Theology - Dr. Of Philosophy
REINCARNATION OR RESURRECTION: AN ORTHODOX OUTLOOK ON EVIL

Translation by: Holy Monastery of Pantokrator