On Phyletism Summary by Omar Choudary

Dear friends,

Last Saturday (17th March) I've attended the weekend study at the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies: http://www.iocs.cam.ac.uk/

I'll try to summarise in my own words what I have understood, therefore take into account this is my own version of what has been said. I think this lecture was very awakening and made me think quite a lot about some problems that perhaps I've felt in some sense but never thought about in detail. The problem discussed is a current one and should be at least known so that we can perhaps try to remediate it. The important message is that we are all Orthodox in faith and we should not consider at all from which "nation" we come or belong (this is something of this world). Unfortunately this seems difficult today.

There were 3 lectures: introduction, Romanian Church, Russian Church. The main theme has been the current Orthodox problem of "Phyletism", which dates since about the 18th century.

Lecture 1 - Introduction, by Fr. Alexander Tefft

The term, phyletism, comes from the Greek: "ETHNO-PHYLE-TISMOS", and a quick word translation would be "national tribalism". In more explanatory words, phyletism relates to the problem of separating the unity of the one Orthodox Church into more national Churches that may in some sense compete against each other. The problem arises both in the countries where Orthodoxy is the main religion (e.g. Romania, Russia, Bulgaria, Greece), but also in countries where Orthodoxy is represented by different countries that have representatives there (e.g. UK, France, Canada, US).

The main cause of this problem is the confusion of the nation with the church. That is, today we consider the Romanian (or Russian, Bulgarian, Greek, etc…) Church as the church of the nationals of Romania (etc..), and not (as should be) just the Orthodox Church in Romania. The difference may be a subtle one, but is important. If you consider yourself an Orthodox just because you are a Romanian (etc..) then only (etc…) can be Orthodox (or at least Romanian Orthodox). Therefore we might start to do several things which are against the true Orthodox beliefs such as to reject someone that is Orthodox in faith but foreign in blood (there are several examples of this in the recent past).

Phyletism in its true meaning (not sure if I will be able to convey the sense as well as Fr. Alexander) is a heresy. Unfortunately it is being carried forward by many churches. This phenomena was probably unavoidable, as a result of the mixture between society and religion.

The origins of phyletism are around the 18th century, on the idea that our tribe should be free from foreigners, and that we should keep our blood as our faith, both free from outsiders. The old fathers excluded foreigners by faith but not foreigners by blood. Today we exclude foreigners by blood in front of foreigners by faith. There are clear examples today about this in Canada.

After the 15th century, when the Roman empire fallen, we (the Romans Orthodox) were called the "Rum ", all considered as part of the same old Roman Empire. There was no distinction between the different ethnicities.

Revolts in 18th/19th century around France/Germany made the church part of the national king and later part of the nation. This is when the term in Christianity emerged.

During the 19th century Bulgaria started was developing a nationalism under the Ottoman empire and in 1857 the people in Bulgaria made a request to have Orthodox services adapted for the "Bulgarian nation". In 1870 the Ottoman empire (which was happy about applying a Divide et Impera principle) decided to award a dominance to a new Church for the Bulgarian territory.

In 1872 the "Bulgarian national" church was formed, but soon declared heretic by the existing Orhtodox Patriarchates. In 1945 the "Bulgarian " was accepted at and in 1953 at Constantinople. The period 1872-1945 was a period of major debates around phyletism. Unfortunately that, and the concept of "" (claiming back the territories of your "nation") have led to many wars (Balkan wars, world wars).

Perhaps is important to realise that even if the concept of a "national church" was declared as heretic in 1872, today it is widely spread, and we probably see the phenomena in our everyday life.

Based on a discussion with Fr. Alexander, it appears that the most clean solution in countries like UK (where many "national churches" try to claim authority over their own "diaspora" (if there is such thing), and one that would agree with the Ecumenical councils, would be to create a new territorial Patriarchate of the UK, that would have authority over all the Orthodox churches in UK. Perhaps we should be more aware of this issue and try to come to a good Orthodox agreement, leaving aside any national prides or earthly interests.

Lecture 2 - The , by Razvan Porumb

This lecture presented the history of the Romanian church since 1859.

To keep on the topic, I will only comment on the discussion related to Phyletism. The Romanian Orthodox Church has sent a very controversial statement in 2010: http://www.patriarhia.ro/en/documents/communique_9.html (please read)

In short: any Romanian abroad (e.g. me here in the UK) needs a blessing from the Romanian Patriarchate (in some form, perhaps could be from a priest belonging there) to attend an Orthodox Church of another Patriarchate. Even more, the statement claims that the Romanian Patriarchate has the right to take any Romanian national from the Orthodox Churches of other Patriarchates. This seems absurd to me, and apparently (Fr. Alexander's perspective) it is actually against the ecumenical councils (the canon law on territoriality - contrary to what the statement says). This link contains a good description of the territorial canon law: http://www.ec-patr.org/docdisplay.php?lang=en&id=287&tla=en in particular I find this paragraph very close to my heart: "The Church was revealed by God to the world through Jesus Christ for the salvation of all people and of the world itself, regardless of race,and not to serve political or personal ambitions or other secular pursuits and opportunistic goals. The Church is not Russian or Greek, Serbian or Rumanian and so on, but the Orthodox Catholic Church in Greece, in Russia, in Serbia, in Rumania and so on. The boundaries of the local Churches are geographical and were defined not with national and racial criteria, but with administrative ones, following, in general, the civil administrative divisions of the Roman Empire (Saint Photios), in order to provide the best pastoral care for the people of God, irrespective of race, to bring them to salvation in Christ."

As mentioned earlier, this problem is not just a Romanian one, but unfortunately it is present in all the Orthodox churches (well, perhaps less in the Orthodox Church in (north)-America).

Lecture 3 - The Russian Church today, by Fr. Alexander Tefft

This lecture was concerned with the problem of phyletism in the Russian church, but also gave some very sad insights into what almost 300 years of prosecution and attacks on the Orthodox church have done. The history was rather long so I will mention just a few points.

In 1721 the bishop Feofan suggests to the Tar to replace the existing Orthodox church hierarchical system (patriarch and bishops) by a more national, government controlled system, the "Synodical" system. This has led to the creation of an "Oberprokuror", who was effectively a representative of the state ruling over the Orthodox Church in Russia, controlling when the bishops met, and when things happen. There were things like the "communion receipt", which meant that in order to get your salary this year you had to prove that you have been to at least one confession.

In 1905 a revolution takes place in Russia, replacing the ad-hoc leadership to a parliament style: the Duma. The Synodical period ends. There was an agenda of over 4-volumes of changes for the Church. In 1917 the metropolitan Tikhon is elected Patriarch and tried to reform the church according to Orthodox beliefs. Unfortunately very soon after the Bolshevik revolution takes place and Russia goes into the following main periods:

- War communism: a very dark period for the church, vandalism, many monks and priests killed. Many members of the Church flee outside Russia, in Constantinople, and try to create a church of the outside Russia (HROCAA).

- Stalinims: another dark period. Beginning of the Exarchate. Many people killed and Orthodoxy really threatened.

- Khrushchev crackdown: perhaps even a worse period for the church. Monks are given drugs for mental problems. However a young generation of priests manages to emerge and the old generation (of retired people) manage to keep the Orthodox church alive.

- 1970s: "survival mode". The church signs anything and does anything the state does, as long as it can continue to exist.

- 1980: people start realising the situation with the church is not normal. Chernobyl is a significant wake-up call for the Russian people to Orthodoxy.

- 1990 (Millenium): patriarch Alexis II takes on the leadership and the Orthodox Church in Russia is free again from political influence.

Unfortunately due to many of the dark periods for the Russian church there are now many Russian orthodox churches around the globe with different names. Perhaps a more sadly result is the "stalinism" remaining in the mind of many orthodox people.

The HROCAA, now ROCOR (Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia), was officially dissolved by decree of Patriarchs Tikhon of Moscow and Gregory VII of Constantinople in 1924. It went on to call itself the Russian Orthodox Church in Exile, now the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia. It is not related to the Missionary Diocese in America, now the Orthodox Church in America, except in a cultural origin in the Russian Empire. Indeed, they are deadly enemies.

The original Missionary Diocese in North America, which evolved from a mission of eight monks in 1794, had become a Metropolia by 1924. It declared itself autonomous of Metropolitan Sergii's Stalinist , fell out with both ROCOR and Moscow, and, after decades of no communion with the latter, won its (the right to elect its own bishops) in 1970. It renamed itself the Orthodox Church in America (OCA), thus shedding any national adjective and affirming only where it is located geographically.

Currently, ROCOR and the OCA vie for territory on the traditional mission grounds of the OCA, that is, North America.