THE LANGUAGE OF BABYLON

Diplomacy, i.e. the professional art of compromise, is completely alien to Christian morals by its nature: "But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil" (Mt. 5,37). While admissible in worldly politics, it is not appropriate in the Church of Christ which is not of this world. Can one really imagine diplomatic martyrs, or clever confessors?!

"The politics of Vatican", "the Vatican diplomacy" with its reservatio mentalis [10] have become common names of a reality with an age-old practice in intrigues, cruelty, mimicry behind it. Ecumenical politics, which is being inspired by Hades and which has absorbed both the experience of the Vatican and the practice of numerous other heretics, schismatics, and the enemies of the Church of Christ, has attained an unprecedented refinement along its path towards syncretism (via syncretistika) and an unheard of success in justifying all kinds of compromise. For the time being it has not made wide use of force, but only for the time being...

The language of ecumenism, this universal jargon of the latter day Babylon, this tool of anti-Christian forces, would merit a special moral-linguistic research. We wish only to note its world-wide cunning and demonic perfection. This language, for the time being, is one of the main tools of apostates. It is called upon to justify all their lawlessness and lies, all their betrayals of Christ and His Church, all their compromises -- from prayers with heretics and idolaters, which are forbidden by Canons, to an arbitrary lifting of anathemas from unrepentant heretics (Monophysites and Papists). By means of this language they try to conceal their disdain for the Holy Scripture and their hostility towards Holy Fathers, the hostility which makes itself evident even when they are vainly trying to adjust patristic theology to their wretched conjectures! Called upon to unite into one harlot-church, the representatives of most diverse confessions and cults: from pagan idolaters to Orthodox, this language is unusually tensile and flexible.

The ecumenists' inclination to generalizations and the usage of abstract means of expression which is so alien to Orthodox consciousness was brought up as far back as the Second Council of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad in 1938: "Resolutions of ecumenical conferences often suffer from vagueness, diffusiveness, reticence and a nuance of compromise; sometimes they develop formulas in which the same expressions may be interpreted differently" [11].

Being based on the ecumenists' principle -- not to discuss any confessional differences, but to try in every way possible to reveal and emphasize the elements of similarity and the points of contiguity -- this language misleads people untrained in theology. It presents them with a substitute of love -- an ecclesiastical pluralism: "faith is one, but its expressions are manifold depending on the culture", and make ambiguity or vagueness of verbal expression pass for truth. "But how can one justify heretical formulations of Christ's mystery by diversity of cultures, as if the mystery of faith were stipulated by human cultures and not by the Superiour and independent heavenly reality and Divine revelation, to which human culture and reason should submit" (2 Cor. 10,5) ? [12].

The invention of the "pluralism of faith" ("faith is one but its expressions are manifold") is refuted by the entire Holy Tradition. In particular, by the life and work of the great teacher of the Church, hieromartyr Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyon, who lived in the 2nd century, when Christianity was already propagated amongst many peoples of the East and West with different national specifics and cultures. According to Saint Irenaeus, "Despite the fact that the Church, is dispersed throughout the world, but by virtue of the same Spirit of God abiding in it, and because of the continuity of the same apostolic calling, it preserves the same teaching everywhere. It has the same faith, as if having the one soul and the one heart; it preaches and teaches in the same way, as if speaking with one mouth. And though the languages in the world are not alike, the power of Tradition is the same. Churches founded in Germanic countries do not believe and preach faith in their own way; neither do the churches in Iveron, in Celtic lands, in the East, in Egypt, in Lybia, nor the Churches founded in lands surrounding the Mediterranean lands. But like the sun, this creation of God, is the same in all the world, so the sermon of truth, being one and the same in the entire Church, shines and enlightens all" ("Against Heresies"; Book I, Ch. 10. Our emphasis - L.P.)

Falsifiers of truth very often attempt to "prove" ecumenical lies, about "ecclesiastical pluralism", about "plurality in unity", by referring to the triunity of the Holy Trinity. However, their "example with the Holy Trinity... is groundless, offensive to God and sacrilegious, because the so called "churches" are false churches compared with the one and only Church founded by our Lord Jesus Christ, and cannot be one with it. In the Holy Trinity everything is Truth: God the Father is Truth (Jer. 10, 10), the Son of God is Truth (John 14,6), the Holy Spirit is Truth (I John 5,6). The Truth makes the Holy Trinity one (John 5,7). The Truth must unite churches, if they want to be one, because Truth cannot be united with error" [13]. The spiritual and moral minimalism of ecumenists determines their flexible vocabulary; their intolerance and rudeness break out only when they feel caught in a lie by the Holy Fathers, particularly by the confessors of Orthodoxy. Therefore these wolves in sheep's clothing have declared secret war on them by having marked the entire Holy Tradition by the detestable term "ideology".

Anyone familiar with the language of ecumenists knows how insistently they like to repeat the words "truth" and "love", although in fact they are just words to them. "Truth comes from God, is contained in the word of God, and is comprehended through the grace of Christ" [14]. The whole truth, not the fragmentary one, is contained in the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, which is "the pillar and ground of the truth" (1 Tim. 3,15), because, in the words of St. Theophan the Recluse, "it is the Church of the living God Who is the God of Truth, or the Truth itself. Do not look for truth anywhere else! There are some likenesses of truth outside it; but the real truth is exclusively within it" [15].

Frequently, when reading documents, speeches and addresses of ecumenists, we noted the gulf which exists between their artful sophisms and clear as living waters the words of the Holy Fathers. Wily words of the language of Babylon usually conceal the pride of mind and the "truth in unrighteousness" (Rom. 1,18). Its senselessness and all-inclusiveness remind us of the "duckspeak" of George Orwell's personages in his famous book "1984", and ecumenical "truth" and "love" unwittingly associate with Orwellian realities -- "minilove" and "minitruth".

As an example we will quote the words of Patriarch Ignatius IV of Antioch, one of the fiercest ecumenists, taken from his speech preceding the opening of the Central Committee of the WCC, "About Truth, Church and Love" [16]. This sweet-sounding figurative rhetoric, like a song of an "ecumenical siren" mesmerizes those who no longer hear the voice of the good Shepherd (comp. John 10, 3-5,11):

"My friend, my dear Christian, I need your glance turned to Christ, in order to open my heart... the body expands so that it encompasses the entire world, and the Church must become the mystery of mankind and of the Universe. We must also have a presentiment of the body uniting in the meeting of religions and cultures (our emphasis - L.P.) ... India and Buddhism testify about the world as the theophany, and about man as the world within. The Law in Judaism and Islam is an obstacle to the rhythm of death. Socialism, if it acknowledges the freedom of Spirit, individualism, if it contests loneliness and finality, will be able, thanks to a Christian leaven, to stimulate this communication, the outlet and openness which constitute the truth (sic!) of man.

"Eastern monks see the heavenly Alpha in Christ, revolutionary Christians of the "third world" see the Omega of history in Him. But Christ is both the Alpha and the Omega at the same time... Alas, the Spirit is suffering just as Christ does. Hatred is foolishness, and the worst foolishness of perfidious reason, and theological slogans (our emphasis - L.P.), in which we wish Him to be contained, are His death (sacrilegious nonsense - L.P.), just as an indifference, mockery, boredom and emptiness. He loves the pride of atheists (?!) (comp. "God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble" /James 4, 6; I Peter 5, 5/) and the humility of the faithful, but slavery and abasement make Him suffer... rejection of the ecclesiasticism of the "heterodox" confessions, rejection of the actual bond with God in other religions, demonization of an atheist (our emphasis - L.P.). All this, according to the Apostle Paul (?!), constitutes malice, perfidiousness, ill-intentiousness...

"Our common task, -- says this Antiochian ecumenist, -- is the development of a post-ideological Christianity (emphasis by Ignatius IV) where the truth is not a system (our emphasis - L.P.), but a Person, witnessing the absolute love... Such love, by constantly increasing the intensity of communication, gradually acquires the force of proof. It will be able to gradually unite the partial truths (our emphasis - L.P.), which will mutually compliment, instead of contradicting each other, and thus will cease being partial... The truth means meeting, and the Church must become the place of the most intense meeting" (our emphasis - L.P.).

The urge to make the Church of Christ the place of all kinds of "meetings" and the search for an "unusual reciprocity" not only with Roman Catholics but also with Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, atheists, socialist, revolutionaries, etc. -- this urge is the object pursued by Ignatius IV and his fellow-ecumenists.

Speaking of God's love and mercy, this "Orthodox hierarch" resorts to a metaphor which we categorically refuse to quote because of its indecency. Ignatius IV makes use of Freudian-sexual terms for his verbiage which he calls "intuition". He notes that at the beginning of our century "great Russian sophiology tried to express this intuition" [17] (he has in mind Sophianism and its authors-heresiarchs, clerics Pavel Florensky, Sergei Bulgakov and their followers whom we discuss in the respective Chapters).

We permitted ourselves to quote extensively from Ignatius' IV speech in which he so remarkably expressed the general pathos of ecumenism, its syncretism, and relevance. It is true, intellectualism does not always mean reverence and fear of God... It is probably those like Ignatius IV that Bishop Maximos of Pittsburg had in mind when he called them "trained theologians" who can "understand the theological terms and the fine connotations" of ecumenical dialogues, particularly that of the Balamand Agreement with the Catholics, which "can neither be understood, nor correctly interpreted by untrained theologians and lay people" [18] . While doing justice to Ignatius' IV vivid style and brilliant erudition, we should note how unfavorable by contrast to him are the ecumenists-renovationists from the Moscow Patriarchate - Kochetkov, Sviridov, Chistyakov, and the like, sluggishly and tiresomely imposing their "truths" on the pages of the Paris based Pensée Russe.

Let us note that the words of the "Patriarch" of Antioch constituted a sermon and were delivered from ambo prior to a liturgical service. Subsequently the entire spiritually harmful speech was published by the JMP, which at that time (1989) was almost the only source from which millions of people in Russia eagerly reaching out for Orthodoxy could learn about the Church's teaching. Practically all issues of this Sergian-ecumenist newspaper are speckled by similar "sermons" and texts. One encounters routine samples of ecumenical "theologizing" at every step. Not many people show their surprise now, and even fewer express their indignation. Here is, for example, the text of a patriarchal telegram: "To his Eminence hambo-lama Gaadan, the President of the Buddhist Conference for Peace: "Dear brothers! I cordially greet you and all the Buddhist brothers... I trust that we will continue... Joining our efforts in the field of spiritual development and exaltation of man (our emphasis - L.P.)... May your efforts be blessed... Alexius, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia" [19].

What, then, was the subject of the Conference attended by "His Eminence" hambo-lama Gaadan and other "Buddhist brothers" of Patriarch Alexius II, greeted and blessed by him in the above quoted expressions? JMP informs: "They had five topics on their agenda: Buddhist philosophy and the contemporary world; harmony between nature and man; Buddhist ethical principles and upbringing in the spirit of peace; heritage of Buddhist art; astrology (our emphasis - L.P.) and Eastern tradition in Buddhism" [20]. As we see, the "most holy" first hierarch of the Orthodox Church invokes a blessing (could it be God's blessing?) on the people of alien religion who are engaged, among other things, in occult astrology which is forbidden by the Church.

In the same issue of the JMP the Moscow Patriarchate has officially endorsed also the following heretical declaration: "The Evangelical [21] and Orthodox Churches are equally (our emphasis - L.P.) called upon by Jesus Christ, their Lord to witness and to serve." [22] Should one be surprised at the heterodox and sectarian propaganda raging lately in Russia?!

However, today "Orthodox" ecumenists understand both the witness and service in a fully Protestant fashion. It is not confession of the true faith, salvation of man's soul, or opposition to apostasy that ecumenical bishops are preaching most frequently. They see the real purpose of spiritual struggle in ... "social justice, economic equality among nations, preservation of our ecological system" [23].

Metropolitan Damascene, (Switzerland, the Patriarchate of Constantinople) says: "For Orthodoxy - to serve the contemporary man does not simply mean to bind him again in theoretical plan to the spiritual content of patristic Tradition. It is necessary to activate this tradition, in order to withstand the pressing problems of our time, in order to impartially apply the principles of social justice in overcoming social inequality between the East and the West, the North and the South" [24]. Patriarch Batholomeos - "Unification of Europe politically, economically, etc., must go with the preservation and consolidation of European civilization" [25], - his hierarchs in diaspora: Metropolitan Damascene, Archbishop Stylianos of Australia (about his blasphemous views see the Chapter on the Balamand Agreement), Archbishop James and Bishop Maximos of Pittsburg (USA), and many other false hierarchs - they all bring stones for the erection of the "common house" of apostates, of the tower of Babel. There is little that would stop them in this spiritual transgression. Thus, even their judgment concerning the end of the world proceeds in social-political categories.

The celebration of the 1900 anniversary since Revelation was written by the Holy Apostle John the Theologian, which was organized by the Patriarchate of Constantinople, was turned into an ecological symposium "Revelation and the Environment". The opening of this forum took place on the day commemorating the death of St. John the Theologian. "Politicians, scientists and clergy gathered in Babylonian confusion, discussed the fate of the planet at the end of the century. The festival was honored by the presence of Boutros Ghali, the General Secretary of the UN, A1 Gore, the Vice-President of the USA, Prince Philip of Great Britain, the Greek Prime Minister Andreas Papandreu, and many other politicians and representatives of ecological movement of the world. Present were also Archbishop George Carey of Canterbury, Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, Cardinal Edward Cassidy, many Roman Catholics and Protestants, and even a few Muftis" [26]. Orthodox Patriarchs - those of Alexandria, Antioch, Serbia, Rumania, a Bishop of Greek Church and a representative of the Bulgarian Patriarchate also took part.

Those assembled on Pathmos exploited the painful problems of mankind, when they tried to present the Revelation, this most mystical Book of the New Testament, only as a forewarning about an ecological catastrophe. As it is usual at ecumenical gatherings, here too they substituted the truth of the word of God "by translating it into the "language" of the new global world view, which paradoxically gives Christian form to its anti-Christian and anti-Biblical substance". Antichrist's accomplices wanted to reduce the universal meaning of the Apocalypse to a mere voice in defense of nature, offering ecumenical dreams about the better "New World Order", and peace and security throughout the world instead. "It was not by chance that on Pathmos there was no discussion of the passages in the Book of Revelation, which are closely bound with eschatological perspectives of the Church of Christ - with the extinction of the seven lamps, the sign of Antichrist's arrival, and persecution of the Church before the end of the world. Archimandrite Paulus Nikitaris, the Abbot of the Pathmos Monastery noted with a heavy heart: "they spoke of man, not of God; of creatures, not of the Creator..." [27].

The "celebration" of the memory of the blessed eyewitness of mysteries which was performed by Constantinopolitan and other "Orthodox" participants on the holy island can only be referred to as mockery. How they must hate his words that "whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ hath not God". Being the Apostle of love he, nevertheless, taught to neither receive in one's home those who come with a teaching which is different to the teaching of Christ, nor to bid them God speed. "For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds" (2 John 1, 9-11).

Was it not an evil deed to submit a Biblical text "to free interpretation and dramatization" performed by a "well-known poet, who is completely alien to the Church's life and faith"? Do they have God, those organizers of the "PanOrthodox" celebration on Pathmos, who arranged for it to be concluded with a theatrical performance of the "Voice to the Woman" with Irene Papas in the main role? A few years ago this Greek actress surprised her country by the record which called upon people to love Satan and which attractively displayed the apocalyptic number of the beast on its cover [28].

It is noteworthy that Orthodox inhabitants of Pathmos and those that arrived from other places, and who protested against this outrage were driven out or arrested by the police until the end of the festival. Printed materials and placards of "terrorists", as the policemen called the protesting clergy and lay people, were immediately confiscated. "During those days, people, who watched the heretic cardinals freely entering Orthodox churches and monasteries, felt as if they were occupied by Papists. And yet, a loud cry of an elderly confessor: "Bartholomeos is a traitor of Orthodoxy!" reached the Patriarch prior to his departure on board his luxury yacht under the British flag... " [29]

The world power which speaks through traitor-bishops, forces its obedient mass-media to repeat these pernicious lies thousandfold. Such is also the Pensée Russe, hostile to everything implied by its name. Its publication is subsidized by the Vatican, and today it is the cheapest newspaper in Russia like the former Soviet Pravda and Izvestiya [30].

Being in complete agreement with a legion of similar ecumenical democratic publications, Pensée Russe is capable of speaking only in ideological clichés. If they write about the Pope of Rome, then, of course, he is "the only one of religious and political leaders..., who can be heard and understood by practically the entire population of the planet. His language is universal... his voice has always been the voice of truth", etc. [31] Endowing the Pope with "infallibility" and "holiness", Pensée Russe excels in "enlightening" Russian people by papist ideas of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Henri de Lubac, Louis Bouyer and those like them. Because of the nature and content of publications of Pensée Russe (Russkaia Mysl in Russian) it has been aptly called Vatikanskaia Mysl. Invariably ecumenical and pro-Catholic, Pensée Russe admits of having become aware of the "inevitable unity" and the necessity to "overcome confessional differences", and expresses the "desire to cast off the burden of everything old, out of date, unnecessary, and impeding the growth" (i.e. the "burden" of Orthodoxy - L.P.) [32]. In other words, suggestion is made to abolish Holy Tradition and to renounce the holy Martyrs and Confessors who stood firm and uncompromising for the purity of Orthodox faith until their death.

Practicing ecumenical-Jesuit tight-rope walking this newspaper often reflects on the "crisis" of Orthodoxy and on the "ways of rapprochement" with Rome. Every issue of Pensée Russe prints articles, reports and speeches of "Orthodox" clergymen of the Moscow Patriarchate -- Archpriest Ioann Sviridov, hegumen Innokenty (Pavlov), priests Georgii Kochetkov, Alexander Borisov and those like them, whose names have become offensive to the faithful in Russia because of their adherence to Catholicism, ecumenism and renovationism. These agents of the influence of the WCC and the Vatican are tirelessly propagating ideas of the enemies of Orthodoxy. Archpriest Ioann Sviridov, for example, declared that "the one and the other Church confess the same Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed (sic!)... we are already one, despite disagreements. A dialogue with Roman Catholics must be and is the most important matter for Orthodox people... ecumenism needs renewal of ideas, in order to become effective in history..." [33] On the same page of Pensée Russe he is echoed by Cardinal Silvestrini: "relations between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches are somewhat paradoxical. After all, they have everything in common (sic!): sacraments, hierarchy, spirituality, theology, all this coinciding in everything concerning the basic truths (?!). Their meeting, however, takes place with a chronical delay caused by numerous factors known to us all (comp. Chapters on the Vatican - L.P.)... history makes us face the urgent necessity to follow precisely this path of rapprochement with the Orthodox" [34] (our emphasis L.P.).

As they converge with heretics, the "Orthodox" transgressors withdraw from the Church all the more ; they lose not just simply the Christian judgment (which they, most probably, did not have in the first place), but also an elementary discretion and a sense of measure. In spite of all this, they are being published by their employers, the tolerant Pensée Russe [35] amongst them, which has lost its former high level. Let us consider priest Georgii Chistyakov's article "Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth" -- its title alone counts for a lot [36]. All this extensive text is full of abominations, competing with one another. Here is one of them: "Firstly, they declare Christianity as the only correct world view [37], i.e. they perceive it as an ideology... Secondly, all those who do not agree with them even in little things, are immediately ranked among heretics... Even Patriarchs of Constantinople, Antioch, Bulgaria and others are almost mechanically listed among the heretics, for they make use of the new calendar..." [38] Chistyakov goes even as far as condemning patristic teaching and contrives to set it off against the Holy Scriptures: "Ascetic literature interprets Christianity as a struggle with passions. It is possible that precisely this orientation renders it so unprotected from being penetrated by the mentality which involves a search for enemies, heretics, etc. [39] The fact is that the Bible does not contain a teaching concerning a struggle with passions (sic!)... The Holy Apostles see the path of a Christian not as the path full of struggle with passions [40] but namely as throwing off of old clothing and as growing out of it. (?) If we think that evil is like clothing which can be thrown off, this means that we understand it to be something external, non-inherent with regard to the depth of one's self... If we begin to analyze sin... we turn into fighters, and our Christianity simply ends there. Out of the depth of our consciousness we transfer the struggle into the outside world and begin fighting anyone who seems to be thinking and acting differently, etc." (our emphasis - L.P.).

Having used for the title of his article the words of Psalm 137, one of the most favorite Psalms of Orthodox people, who during the Great Lent with great tenderness sing: "By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, and wept...", this blasphemer permits himself to mock the holy Psalmist and patristic interpretation of the last words of this Psalm: "Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones". Instead he offers his pitiful conjectures: "For two thousand years, Church writers have tried to interpret them to the people of God, and as a rule, they agree that the Psalmist speaks here not of Babylonian children, whose heads are cursed by the authors of Psalm 137, but of evil intentions which one should suppress in oneself in their incipiency, without waiting for them to gain strength. We think that this pious explanation ...is not quite correct. The Psalm speaks of children, and the Book of Esther also speaks of the actual slaughter... It should not be this way. Although this was the case with Mordecai. May this not be so, even though this was the dream of the authors of Psalm 137" (our emphasis - L.P.)

This self-confident moralist, who ridiculed the holy Book of Psalms, the expressions of which were often quoted by the Lord Himself, apparently had reason to omit the stern entreaty of this Psalm immediately preceding the words about killing of children: "O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us". The daughter of Babylon is the name given by the holy Psalmist to Babylon itself, which is impiety and sin. Besides, Babylon, as everybody knows, is the synonym of the harlot-church of Babylon. Judging by his numerous comments, it is to this church that this blasphemer belongs. Along with other henchmen of Babylon, he will receive his reward. It is about them that the late Patriarch Timothy of Jerusalem said: "Good Jesus Christ! There are people in Thy Church who are not Thy Apostles and who do not pray to Thee: ... they have forgotten Jerusalem and embraced Geneva, where they have created new tablets of covenant. But you too, Geneva, exalted unto heaven, will be brought down to hell!" [41]

Huge sums of money are spent for propaganda and inculcation of anti-Orthodox ecumenical ideas into the consciousness of millions of people of the whole planet earth. Like the powerful and wealthy mass media Pensée Russe, this anti-Orthodox and Russophobic mouth-piece of the Vatican by means of its publications has for many years persisted in calling upon ecumenists of all countries to unite.

One may easily assume that in the near future criticism of ecumenism will be publicly censured, and the struggle against it -- made punishable by law. "Using Church organization for their worldly objectives, world rulers will categorically consider all those who dare to protest, to be "terrorists". It is not without reason that A1 Gore, the Vice-President of the USA in his book dedicated to the problems of environment, declared Christians who do not think of the earth as their home ("For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come" -- Hebr. 13, 14), to be the enemies of society and progress. It is not without reason that it was precisely he who, together with the General Secretary of the UN, had exercised special care over the arrangements for the meeting on Pathmos..." [42] The infernal warfare against Orthodoxy had never ceased; today it has only changed its tactics without having become any less fierce.

(photo-center)

[10] This term denotes the method legitimized by Rome of conscious misleading of fellow men by means of intentionally ambiguous expression of thought.

[11] The Acts of the Second Council of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, with representatives of clergy and lay people participating, on 1/14 - 11/24 of August 1938 in Sremsky Karlovtsy in Yugoslavia, Belgrade, 1939, pp. 301, 306.

[12] Archim. Seraphim (Aleksiev), Archim. Sergius (Iazadzhiev), "Why an Orthodox Christian Cannot be an Ecumenist", SPb., 1992, p. 25.

[13] Ibid., p. 25.

[14] St. Simeon the New Theologian, "Sermons". Moscow, 1892, vol. 1, p. 307.

[15] Bishop Theophan, "Interpretation the Epistles of the Holy Apostle Paul", Moscow, 1894, p. 62.

[16] Sermon of Patriarch Ignatius IV of Antioch and All the East, delivered during the service prior to the opening of the Central Committee of the WCC on 17 July 1989, "About Truth, Church, and Love". "Ecumenical Contacts", JMP, No. 12, 1989, pp. 5257.

[17] Ibid., p. 53.

[18] Bishop Maximos, "Introductory Note" in Illuminator (March-April, 1994), the official newspaper of the New Calendar Greek Orthodox Diocese of Pittsburg.

[19] JMP, 1991, No. 2, p. 51.

[20] JMP, ibid.

[21] "Evangelical" is the name assumed by an iconoclastic Protestant "church" has broken with Holy Tradition, venerates neither the Mother of God, nor the saints, and does not recognize most of the Church Sacraments. The holy canons forbid to have common prayers with this "church", as with all other heretics.

[22] JMP, ibid. p. 58.

[23] Quoted from: La Lumiere du Thabor, Lumiere du Thabor, Revue Internationale de Theologie Orthodoxe, No. 39-40. Fraternite orthodoxe St. Gregoire Palamas. L'Age d'Homme, 1994, p. 11.

[24] Ibid., p. 12.

[25] Patriarch Bartholomeos' speech of August 13, 1993 at the evening function organized by the UNICEF to mark his official visit to Rumania. Quoted from La Lumi6re du Thabor, No. 39-40, p. 159.

[26] "The Festivities on Pathmos". Article from the Bulgarian journal Orthodox Word, Dec. 1995, based on the texts from Agios Agathangelos Esphigmenitis , No. 151, 9 Oct. 1995 and Orthodoxos Typos , Nos. 1144, 1145 and 1146, Oct. 1995. In Russian see Orthodox Russia, Jordanville, No. 1555, 15/28 March 1996, pp. 10-11.

[27] Ibid., p. 11.

[28] Ibid.

[29] Ibid.

[30] Irina Ilovaiskaya-Alberti, the Chief-Editor of Pensée Russe is also the Head of the editorial staff of the Catholic Radio Station "Blagovest". Numerous photographs placed in Catholic newspapers and periodicals on which one can see Mme Ilovaiskaya in a company of cardinals and the Pope of Rome himself testify to close collaboration between them. According to the Bulletin Aide " 1'Eglise en Detresse (AED), Mareil-Marly, mars 1995, p.4, in 1994 Pensée Russe received from this Vatican organization 400.000 USD. This Bulletin reported that in the same year the Papists spent 25 million USD for the needs (i.e. catholicizing) of the Eastern Church, this sum, according to them, constituting more than 40% of their subsidies (Bulletin AED, No.4, Juin 1995, p.2).

[31] Pensée Russe, No. 3861, 11 January 1991, p. 13, col. 1.

[32] "The Time of Church". Documents of International Conference, Moscow, 28-29 May, 1996. Special Supplement (Pensée Russe, No. 4130, 13-19 June 1996, p. 1, col. 1, pp. III-IV).

[33] "On the Path of Rapprochement and Reconciliation", Conference in Rome, dedicated to interrelationship between the Orthodox and Catholics. Pensée Russe, No. 4064, 9-15 February, 1995, pp. 16 and 18.

[34] Ibid.

[35] However, as we know from personal experience this newspaper is only relatively tolerant. Thus, in a letter which we wrote to its editor (No.3569, 16 May, 1985, p. 14) our, as it would seem, inoffensive words, for the Russian paper, commenting that a Russian person, unlike Zinoviev's "homo Sovieticus", will find the way out of the impasse, were replaced by impersonal "people". Beside this personal, but significant example, being familiar with the atmosphere and editorial staff of Pensée Russe, we know how selective is its tolerance.

[36] Priest Georgii Chistyakov, "Blazhen izhe imet i razbiet" (Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth), Pensée Russe, No. 4120, 4-10 April, 1996, p. 16.

[37] Is, then, Christianity, according to this Orthodox priest, not the only correct and salutary faith?!

[38] About the problem of the Church calendar, as one of the most important one for the Church, see the Chapter "Calendar Reform" and the Supplement "The Julian Calendar -- the 1000 year Icon of Time in Russia".

[39] Encountering such "spiritual gems" of this priest of the MP one may ask whether he read all of the Holy Scriptures and whether he received theological education. Has he not been trained, instead, in the party school, or some other Soviet organization, where, like his colleagues from the MP "who hide a KGB shoulder strap under the cassock" (Igor Tal'kov) he has acquired, along with other habits, also its dull vocabulary and logic?

[40] About the strict condemnation of passions and the struggle with them requiring "to crucify flesh", in order to "mortify passions", see Gal. 5,24; Col. 3,5; Rom. 1,26 and 7,5; 1 Tim. 6,4.

[41] Sermon of Patriarch Timothy of Jerusalem (+1955) marking the feast of the Holy Pentecost. Quoted from: Archim. Seraphim, Archim Sergius, "Why Orthodox Christians...", p. 7.

[42] "Celebrations on Pathmos", Orthodox Russia, 1996, N26, p. 11.