CONFERENCE ON PRIMACY AND CONCILIARITY BEING HELD IN MOSCOW
Yesterday began the conference, “World Orthodoxy: Primacy and Conciliarity in Light of Orthodox Doctrine,” at Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow. The conference is being put on by the Synodal Biblical and Theological Commission of the Russian Church.
The conference was attended by hierarchs and experts of the Russian Church and distinguished guests from other Local Churches, reports the Synodal
Department for External Church Relations.
The gathering was opened with a welcoming speech by His Holiness Patriarch Kirill, in which he noted that Constantinople has simply buried all the agreements that were reached on a pan-Orthodox level about how autocephaly is to be granted, instead taking this prerogative for itself. And despite Pat. Bartholomew’s efforts to shatter the unity of the Russian Church, his actions have actually strengthened solidarity, the Russian primate said.
His Holiness was followed by a report from His Eminence Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk on “Constantinople’s Claims to Power as a Threat to the Unity of the Church.”
Reports were also presented by His Grace Bishop Irinej of Bačka (Serbian Church), His Grace Bishop Sylvester of Belogorod (Ukrainian Church), and His Eminence Metropolitan Andrei of Gori and Aten (Georgian Church). The report of His Eminence Metropolitan Nikiforos of Kykkos (Cypriot Church) was read out by a Cypriot priest.
His Eminence Archbishop Theodosius of Sebaste (Jerusalem Patriarchate) and His Eminence Metropolitan Isaiah of Tamassos (Cypriot Church) sent video messages.
Following the first part of the conference, Pat. Kirill thanked all the presenters and offered his own thoughts, emphasizing that it’s enough to read the “tomos” of the schismatic “Orthodox Church of Ukraine” to see all the terrible innovations of Patriarch Bartholomew and his advisers.
If Constantinople’s anti-Orthodox actions don’t receive a proper assessment from the Orthodox world, they could turn into a dangerous precedent, where Constantinople continues to appropriate powers for itself outside the canonical tradition, the Russian primate emphasized.
Constantinople’s understanding of primacy is, in fact, neo-papism, His Holiness added. The Russian Council of Bishops that will meet this fall should formulate an official position towards Constantinople’s innovations, he said.
The second session of the conference included many more presentations by hierarchs, clerics, and scholars of the Russian Church. Dozens of hierarchs from around the Orthodox world also joined in the conference online
Also this from the other side:
Moscow Patriarchate Questions Ecumenical Patriarchate’s Legitimacy
By Kostas Onisenko
Patriarch Kirill of Moscow participates in a two-day conference that began yesterday and will be concluded today in Moscow, entitled “World Orthodoxy: Primacy and Synodicality in the light of the Orthodox doctrine.”
This particular conference, according to the information that already exists, aims to denounce the Ecumenical Patriarchate because of the decisions it has taken on the Ukrainian autocephaly issue and, as the title demonstrates, refers to issues of primacy in the Orthodox Church.
As can be seen from the position of Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk at this conference, the Russian Orthodox Church openly disputes the primacy of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in the Orthodox world.
It is simply an “honorary” primacy that was granted to the Ecumenical Patriarchate “due to unfortunate circumstances,” Metropolitan Hilarion said.
On his part, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, went one step further by questioning the permanence of the Ecumenical Patriarch:
“Claims of special rights and privileges have been expressed in the past by hierarchs and theologians of Constantinople, but they have never expressed them in such strict terms and with such an extreme version as today,” said Patriarch Kirill.
He added that “they went so far as to call the Patriarch of Constantinople not the first among equals, but ‘the first without equals’. This innovative ecclesiology has no basis either in the sacred canons or in the ecclesiastical tradition, in general.”
“It is necessary to compare the understanding of primacy and conciliarity articulated today by Constantinople with the original understanding sealed in the Tradition of the Church. It is the most important task: we can prove the invalidity of Constantinople’s position only by comparing this actual position with what has always been in the Orthodox Church with regard to the realization of the role and importance of the first”, Patriarch of Moscow added.
“It is important to think once again what the ecclesiastical schism means, how the local Churches should react to it, whether the prayerful and eucharistic communion with the schismatics is acceptable and what canonical (editor’s note: according to religious canons) consequences of this communion are, if the ecclesiastical authority can be considered legal, which concelebrates with schismatics and the self-ordained priests, who are not ordained according to canons,” Patriarch Kirill said yesterday during the conference held in Moscow.
