all-Orthodox pre-conciliar consultation

Comments from Russian Orthodox Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk on the pre-conciliar deliberations at Chambesy, Switzerland, which was to address, in part, “problems in the Orthodox diaspora.” In this interview with the Russian news service Interfax, before leaving for the meeting, the archbishop talks about the “many faces” of the Orthodox ‘diaspora’ and the agenda setting process for a Great Council. The Chambesy meeting, scheduled for June 6-13, is the fourth Pan-Orthodox Pre-Council Conference with the most recent one taking place in 1986, according to the news service.

Interfax: The forthcoming Pan-Orthodox Pre-Council Conference in Chambesy will deal with the Orthodox diaspora. What is today’s Orthodox diaspora in your view? Can we speak about even the smallest degree of its integrity or does it represent scattered local communities of the faithful of Local Churches whose ethnic and national ‘dividing walls’ reach as high as heaven?

Archbishop Hilarion: The life and order of an Orthodox community that exists outside its Local Orthodox Church is often a direct reflection of the picture of church life as it has developed historically within this particular Church. Along with parishes of various ethnic traditions – Greek, Russian, Romanian, Serbian, etc. – in the diaspora there are also multinational parishes, which seek to meet the needs of their parishioners whom the fate has willed to come under their responsibility. The Orthodox Diaspora therefore has many faces just as the Orthodox world itself is diverse.

But to say that Orthodox communities are utterly split would be to show real ignorance about the very life of the diaspora. It is characteristic of an Orthodox person to seek communication with a like-minded Orthodox person, and people would sometimes overcome great distances, language barriers and other obstacles to meet a particular Orthodox priest or attend a divine service. In this way the gradual consolidation of Orthodox diasporas takes place, which we think can lead in the future to the emergence of new Local Orthodox Churches. Continue reading →

From Interfax:

Archbishop Hilarion contemplates the establishment of new local Orthodox Churches

Moscow, June 1, – Head of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Church Relations Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk believes that the current Inter-Orthodox consultations may cause the establishment of new local Orthodox churches.

“It is our opinion that the progressive consolidation of Orthodox communities will eventually result in the establishment of new local Orthodox Churches,” Archbishop Hilarion said Interfax-Religion on Monday.

According to him, the claims that Orthodox communities are “isolated from each other” evidence “the lack of knowledge about the real life of the community.”

“Orthodox believers usually seek communication with each other, and sometimes people make long trips, overcome language barriers and other obstacles to meet a particular Orthodox priest or attend a particular service,” the Archbishop said.

He highlighted that Orthodoxy had always considered its main objective “to foster the Church unity” and keep traditions, and recalled that to meet this objective, the Church “needs to consolidate its theological identity, exchange experience in catechesis and education, extend its pastoral care and pursue social work in today’s environment.”

The 4th all-Orthodox pre-conciliar consultation is to be held in the Constantinople Patriarchate Orthodox center in Chambésy on June 6-13, 2009. Participants will touch upon the topic of organizing Orthodox diaspora (Orthodox believers living out of borders of any local Orthodox Church).

Three all-Orthodox pre-conciliar consultations (Chambésy 1976, 1982, 1986) and five inter-Orthodox preparatory commissions (Geneva, 1971, Chambésy 1986, 1990, 1993 and 1999) were held in the past.

In response to the “First Pre-Conciliar Conference” held in Chambesy, Switzerland (near Geneva) in November 1976, Archimandrite Dr. Justin Popovic composed “On A Summoning of the Great Council of the Orthodox Church.” In this, Fr. Popovic (1894-1979), spiritual father of the monastery of Celie Valjevo (Serbia), expressed his “grievous considerations for the future council.” The Orthodox Christian Information Center has the complete text here.

This letter is “dated” in that, written more than 30 years ago, it could not foresee the fall of communism and the revival of the Russian Church, nor anticipate the expansion of the Holy and Sacred Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate to include members from outside of Turkey. And it is always risky to draw close analogies from one historical moment to the present. But some of the language in the letter reads as if it could have been written yesterday. Here are some selections in which Fr. Popvich gives some thoughts on the “diaspora” and the historical background and justification for a Great Council:

On new local Churches:

The fate of the Church neither is nor can be any longer in the hands of the Byzantine emperor or any other sovereign. It is not the control of a patriarch or any of the mighty of this world, not even in that of the “Pentarchy” or of the “autocephalies” (understood in the narrow sense). By the power of God the Church has grown up into a multitude of local Churches with millions of faithful, many of whom in our days have sealed their apostolic succession and faithfulness to the Lamb with their blood. And new local Churches appear to be rising on the horizon, such as the Japanese, the African and the American, and their freedom in the Lord must not be removed by any “super-Church” of the papal type (cf. Canon 8, III Ecumenical Council), for this would signify an attack on the very essence of the Church. Without their concurrence the solution of any ecclesiastical question of ecumenical significance is inconceivable, not to mention the solutions to questions that immediately concern them, i.e. the problem of the diaspora. The age-old struggle of Orthodoxy against Roman absolutism was a struggle for just such freedom of the local Church as catholic and conciliar, complete and whole in itself. Are we today to travel the road of the first and fallen Rome, or of some “second” or “third” similar to it? Are we to believe that Constantinople, which in the persons of its holy and great hierarchs, its clergy and its people, so boldly opposed for centuries past the Roman protectionism and absolutism, is today preparing to ignore the conciliar traditions of Orthodoxy and to exchange them for the neo-papal surrogate of a “second,” “third” or other sort of Rome?

6. Most Venerable Fathers! All the Orthodox behold and realise how important, how significant today is the question of the Orthodox diaspora both for the Orthodox Church in general and for all the Orthodox Churches individually. Can this question be decided, as Constantinople or Moscow desires, without referring to, without the participation of the Orthodox faithful, pastors and theologians of the diaspora itself, which is increasing every day? The problem of the diaspora, without doubt, is a church question of exceptional importance; it is a question that has risen to the surface for the first time in history with such force and significance. For its solution there would be cause indeed to convoke a truly ecumenical council in which all the Orthodox bishops of all the Orthodox Churches would truly participate. Another question that, in our view, could and should be considered at an authentic ecumenical council of the Orthodox Church is the question of ecumenism. This, properly speaking, is an ecclesiological question concerning the Church as theandric unity and organism, a unity and organism that are placed in doubt by contemporary ecumenical syncretism. It is also related to the question of man, for whom the nihilism of contemporary, and especially atheistic, ideologies has dug a grave without hope of resurrection. Both questions can be resolved correctly and in an Orthodox manner only by proceeding from the theandric foundations of the ancient and true ecumenical councils. For the present, however, I leave these problems aside so as not to overburden this appeal with new discussions and expand it unduly. Continue reading →

From Interfax:

Moscow, May 26 – The 4th all-Orthodox pre-conciliar consultation is to be held in the Constantinople Patriarchate Orthodox center in Chambésy on June 6-13, 2009.

“Participants will touch upon the topic of organizing Orthodox diaspora (Orthodox believers living out of borders of any local Orthodox church),” Acting Secretary of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Church Relations Priest Igor Yakimchuk has told Interfax-Religion on Tuesday.

He noted that several centuries had passed after the last seventh Ecumenical Council and “there are a lot of questions that need all-church solution for the sake of strengthening unity and avoiding schisms in one Orthodox Church.”

“To settle these questions it is planned to hold the Holy and Great Council of the Eastern Orthodox Church in foreseeable future,” the priest said.

It was decided to get ready for the Great Council by way of convening all-Orthodox pre-council consultations and inter-Orthodox preparatory commissions.

Three all-Orthodox pre-conciliar consultations (Chambésy 1976, 1982, 1986) and five inter-Orthodox preparatory commissions (Geneva, 1971, Chambésy 1986, 1990, 1993 and 1999) were held in the past.

Ten-year break in holding meetings and preparatory commissions was caused by complications in inter-Orthodox relations connected with disagreements between the Moscow and Constantinople Patriarchates on church structure in Estonia. The Istanbul meeting of primates and representatives of Orthodox Churches in October 2008 made it possible to resume inter-Orthodox cooperation for getting ready to the Council.

Next session of the inter-Orthodox preparatory commission is planned for December 2009.