Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk

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Russian Metropolitan Blasts Anglican Communion’s Sexual Innovations

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Hilarion praises Global South stand on marriage. Absence of heresy deplored.

Our Church must sever its relations with those churches and communities that trample on the principles of Christian ethics and traditional morals. Here we uphold a firm stand based on Holy Scripture.

By David W. Virtue
www.virtueonline.org
Sept. 13, 2010

Metropolitan Hilarion

In a groundbreaking address at Lambeth Palace before the Nicean Club that included the Archbishop of Canterbury, Russian Metropolitan Hilarion blasted those parts of the Anglican Communion experimenting with sexual innovations saying they threatened continuing dialogue with the Orthodox Church.

In surprise remarks that observers say embarrassed Dr. Williams, Hilarion ripped Western Anglican liberals who have deviated from heterosexual marriage calling it “an abyss that divides traditional Christians from Christians of liberal trend.”

Continue reading →

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The DECR Chairman: “We vigorously oppose atheism perceived as a ‘common denominator’ of all religions”

Archbishop Hilarion’s interview with Der Spiegel

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Source: Moscow Patriarchate

Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk

Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk, chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate department for external church relations, answered questions from Der Spiegel magazine. Below is the text of the talk His Eminence Hilarion had with the magazine’s correspondents. The interview was published in Der Spiegel’s issue No. 51, 2009. (This transcript is the source of the Interfax article — please see preceding post — on comments regarding a Moscow-Rome meeting. –Ed.).

Der Spiegel: How would you explain the difference between the Orthodox, the Catholic and the Protestant Churches?

Archbishop Hilarion: The Orthodox and the Catholic Churches have only some differences in theology and models of church order. Thus, we do not recognize the supreme authority of the Pope of Rome over other Churches. However, the differences between Orthodoxy and Catholicism are not fundamental. We recognize the Sacraments of the Catholic Church. If a Catholic priest moves over to Orthodoxy we accept him as priest. As for Protestant churches, we do not recognize them as Churches, seeing in them only communities of Christians. We have fundamental differences in theology and ethics.

– What are they exactly?

– Many Protestant churches have liberalized their notions of ethics, giving a theological justification to homosexuality and blessing same-sex couples. Some refuse to consider abortion to be a sin. We do not share the understanding of the Church and church order, especially as the Protestants, unlike the Orthodox and Catholic Churches, ordain women.

– Because the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany elected a woman as chairperson in the person of Margot Kaessmann, you have broken off your dialogue…

– It was the way in which some mass media presented the situation, whereas I only said that we cannot continue theological dialogue in the former forms. Continue reading →

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Moscow thanks Pope for not pressing on meeting

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From Interfax (2009-12-16):

Pope Benedict and Archbishop Hilarion

Moscow — The Moscow Patriarchate is grateful to Pope Benedict XVI for understanding problems between the two Churches and not pressing on with visiting Russia and meeting with the Patriarch.

“Pope Benedict XVI perfectly understands the existing difficulties and therefore is not pressing on his meeting with the Patriarch, not to mention visiting Russia, as was done under his predecessor. We are grateful to him for this,” the head of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Church Relations Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk said in an interview published in Der Spiegel, whose Russian translation the Department for External Church Relations has published on its website.

The Russian Orthodox Church does not rule out the possibility of a meeting between the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia and the Pope, but believes that it should be preceded by the resolution of the problems between them rather than be turned into “just a protocol meeting and handshakes between TV cameras.”

“We want a breakthrough in our relations. When the situation in western Ukraine improves radically, when we, the Orthodox and the Catholics, agree once and for all that we are not adversaries gaining believers over from each other, then a meeting between the Pope and the Moscow Patriarch will be possible,” he said.

Following the breakup of the Soviet Union, Greek Catholics in western Ukraine “seized hundreds of Orthodox churches, and thousands of Orthodox believers were actually thrown out into the street,” Archbishop Hilarion said.

‘Europe, spiritual homeland’

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In “For Rome and Moscow, It’s Spring Again,” Sandro Magister on Chiesa looks at the book, in Italian and Russian, presented to Pope Benedict recently by Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk. It is a collection of the main speeches of Benedict, as cardinal and pope, on European culture made over the past ten years.

Pope Benedict and Abp. Hilarion

The title of the book is taken from an expression that Benedict used in Prague: “Europa, patria spirituale [Europe, spiritual homeland].” Magister translated the archbishop’s introduction (excerpts reprinted below). But listen to his amazement:

Those who expect an Orthodox Church removed from time, made up only of remote traditions and archaic liturgies, will come away shaken from reading the introduction to this book.

[ … ]

The image that emerges from it is that of a Russian Orthodox Church that refuses to let itself be locked up in a ghetto, but on the contrary hurls itself against the secularist onslaught with all the peaceful weapons at its disposal, not excluding civil disobedience against laws “that oblige the commission of a sin in the eyes of God.”

It is a text that is also striking for its frank, politically incorrect language, unusual for the pen of a high Church authority.

As you read Archbishop Hilarion’s words, note the stark contrast to the formulations of neo-dhimmitude we’ve been receiving non-stop from the Phanar of late. May God grant this bishop many years.

The help that the Russian Orthodox Church can give to Europe

by Hilarion Alfeyev, Archbishop of Volokolamsk

Introduction to: Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, “Europa, patria spirituale,” Moscow/Rome, 2009

When traveling in Europe, especially in the traditionally Protestant countries, I am always astonished at seeing not a few churches abandoned by their congregations, especially the ones turned into pubs, clubs, shops, or places of profane activities of yet another kind. There is something profoundly deplorable in this sad spectacle. I come from a country in which for many decades the churches were used for nonreligious purposes. Many places of worship were completely destroyed, others were turned into “museums of atheism,” and still others modified to be used as secular institutions. This was one of the traits of the so-called “militant atheism” that dominated for seventy years in my country, and collapsed only in fairly recent times. But what is the cause of similar phenomena in Western Europe? Why has the space for religion in Western society been reduced in such a significant way in recent decades? Why does religion have less and less space in the public sphere? And again: why has this contraction of the religious presence in Europe coincided with processes of consolidation on the political, financial, economic, and social level? […] Continue reading →

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