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The Holy and Great Council and Its Implications for Orthodox Unity

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The Holy and Great Council and Its Implications for Orthodox Unity Journal of Eastern Christian Studies 72(1-2), 145-180. doi: 10.2143/JECS.72.1.3287537 © 2020 by Journal of Eastern Christian Studies. All rights reserved. THE HOLY AND GREAT COUNCIL AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR ORTHODOX UNITY THE PERSPECTIVES OF THE RUSSIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH, THE SERBIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH AND THE ORTHODOX CHURCH OF GREECE KARIN HOFMEISTEROVÁ, MIROSLAVA JasenčáKOVÁ, NIKOLA KARASOVÁ* The newspaper headlines referring to the first pan-Orthodox council after more than 1200 years, which took place in Crete in June 2016, suggested that one was witnessing a unique historical event – or even a new era – in the Orthodox world. Some even considered its importance to be comparable to the Second Vatican Council. According to the Ecumenical Patriarchate, which was the central power initiating the Council, the goal was to demon- strate Orthodox unity and the readiness of the Orthodox Church to face the challenges of the contemporary world as well as to address disputed issues in Orthodox ecclesiastical jurisdiction. However, the absence of four autoceph- alous Orthodox Churches, among them the world’s largest (the Russian Orthodox Church) affected the initial purpose of the pan-Orthodox meet- ing. What has the Holy and Great Council (hereinafter the Council) exposed if not a proclaimed unity, and what does it mean for individual Orthodox churches and their mutual relations? By analyzing primary sources that include official documents released by Orthodox autocephalous churches, Orthodox presses and literature, and finally the statements of hierarchs in other media outlets, we assess the stances of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), the Serbian Orthodox Church (SOC) and the Orthodox Church of Greece (OCG) towards the Council in particular and modern pan-Orthodox conciliarity in general. We focus on the period between * Department of Russian and East European Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague. Research for this study has been supported by the Charles University, project GA UK No. 12415 and project PRIMUS/HUM/12. 146 KARIN HOFMEISTEROVÁ, MIROSLAVA JASENčÁKOVÁ, NIKOLA KARASOVÁ 2015 and 2017 when the discussions about the Council were the most intense, first regarding its preparations and later its course of action as well as the documents to be adopted. The three churches seem to be the ideal cases to illustrate different attitudes towards the Council as they opted for negotiation strategies ranging from a positive approach to pan-Orthodox conciliarity, over its conditional support, to its eventual denial. After this, we deal with possible implications of the Council for the position of these churches in the Orthodox world and their future interaction. Based on our academic background, we investigate these issues primarily from the social scientific perspective by con- sidering their historical, political and social context. 1. THE GREAT COUNCILS: A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE The Orthodox Church presents itself as a united organism existing through conciliarity,1 a principle already known by the Apostles whereby the faith was to be maintained by local churches. The consensus, unity and coherence among these local churches were to be secured by the councils.2 Since the Roman Empire adopted a hostile attitude towards Christianity for more than three centuries, the councils – which also appointed bishops, solved internal disputes and kept ecclesiastical order – had to be unofficially organized on the local level. The radical transformation of relations between the Christian Church and the Roman Empire during Emperor Constantine’s rule in the fourth century enabled the Church to call councils of an ecumenical charac- ter, i.e., assemblies of all representatives from church jurisdictions convoked for the settlement of ecclesiastical or doctrinal problems.3 1 On the principle of conciliarity in the Orthodox Church, see P. Valliere, Conciliarism: A History of Decision-Making in the Church (New York, 2012); M. Vasiljević, ‘Synodality: A Misinterpreted Vision’, in Synodality a Forgotten and Misapprehended Vision: Reflections on the Holy and Great Council 2016, eds. M. Vasiljević and A. Jeftić (Alhambra, 2017), pp. 99-128; L. J. Patsavos and E. I. Patsavos, Primacy and Conciliarity: Studies in the Primacy of the See of Constantinople and the Synodal Structure of the Orthodox Church (Brookline, 1995). 2 J. Meyendorff, ‘What Is an Ecumenical Council?’, St Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly, 17 (1973), pp. 259-273, on p. 261. 3 J. Meyendorff, The Orthodox Church: Its Past and Its Role in the World Today (New York, 1981), p. 29. THE HOLY AND GREAT COUNCIL AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR ORTHODOX UNITY 147 The Orthodox churches acknowledge seven ecumenical councils to date.4 All of these were held under the specific historical circumstances of the Christian Roman (Byzantine) Empire and designed to clarify and articulate the Church’s visible organization. They also set up a clear framework of dogmatic and canonical norms to prevent ‘heresy and errors’.5 The ecu- menical councils were convoked by the emperors and conciliar decisions were legally binding within the Empire. The Church had autonomy in deci- sion-making while the Empire assumed responsibility for protecting the results of the councils.6 While the number of participants was not crucial, bishops had the right to vote whereas lower clergy played a consultative role, assisting bishops in studying particular topics; laity, theologians, philoso- phers and others familiar with the issues under discussion were likewise allowed to participate in meetings.7 The councils, however, frequently brought doctrinal and political disa- greements rather than unity. While it was agreed that ecumenical councils established international law and protocol for all Christians, which of the great councils counted as ecumenical was often a source of heated debate.8 The Christological controversies ‘resolved’ at the Council of Chalcedon (AD 451), for example, separated the so-called Oriental Orthodox (Non-Chalce- donian Orthodox) from the ‘imperial’ Church, which was de facto reduced to the Greco-Roman world.9 From the Orthodox perspective, the conflict 4 They are the First Council of Nicaea (AD 325), the First Council of Constantinople (AD 381), the Council of Ephesus (AD 431), the Council of Chalcedon (AD 451), the Second Council of Constantinople (AD 553), the Third Council of Constantinople (AD 680) and the Second Council of Nicaea (AD 787). 5 K. Ware, The Orthodox Church: An Introduction to Eastern Christianity (London, 1993), pp. 18-42. 6 Meyendorff, The Orthodox Church (see n. 3), pp. 28-29. 7 M. Vasiljević, ‘Conciliarity in the Church History and Today’, Lecture, Montreal, 29 April 2017; C. Hovorun, ‘Conciliarity and the Holy and Great Council’, in Synodality — A Forgotten and Misapprehended Vision: Reflections on the Holy and Great Council 2016, eds. M. Vasiljević and A. Jeftić (Alhambra, 2017), pp. 81-98, on pp. 83-84; R. Radić, ‘Vaseljenski Sabor [The Ecumenical Council]’, Peščanik, 26 June 2016, pp. 1-2, https:// pescanik.net/vaseljenski-sabor/. 8 Eds. P. Kalaitzidis et al., Orthodox Handbook on Ecumenism: Resources for Theological Education (Oxford, 2014), p. 5. 9 Meyendorff, The Orthodox Church (see n. 3), p. 40. For more on the Oriental Orthodox churches referred also as ‘Non-Chalcedonian’ or Monophysite, see Kalaitzidis et al., Ortho- dox Handbook on Ecumenism (see n. 8), pp. 545-546. 148 KARIN HOFMEISTEROVÁ, MIROSLAVA JASENčÁKOVÁ, NIKOLA KARASOVÁ between Latin and Byzantine churches was probably more fatal, again having two layers (political and theological), as it escalated into the ‘Great Schism’ in 1054, further dividing Christendom into the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches.10 The Orthodox Church claims to remain faithful to the ancient councils, making her the ‘One Church’. Despite Eastern Christianity often being char- acterized by antiquity and timelessness, the Church had to react to external incentives and keep up with historical developments. Conciliarity, as the main instrument of dealing with Orthodoxy-wide issues, has been preserved, yet the ‘modern’, pan-Orthodox councils – lacking full conciliarity – have typically not qualified as ecumenical.11 Certain local churches have argued that the Orthodox world should respect some councils on dogmatic or canonical questions and should proclaim them ecumenical in a future coun- cil. However, other Orthodox churches or distinctive factions within them have often opposed such calls.12 At the beginning of the twentieth century, serious discussions on a coun- cil enjoying full conciliarity and addressing the new political, social and ecclesiastical problems were launched: for instance, the ecclesiastical irregu- larities of the Orthodox diaspora, the emergence of new autocephalous churches, the question of primacy and diptychs, the lack of a common stance between the Orthodox Church and other Christian churches and religions, the fasting rules, canonical obstacles to the Christian Orthodox marriage and the reform of the calendar. These issues simultaneously represented the main impediments to inter-Orthodox dialogue and created tensions between and 10 See S. Runciman, The Eastern Schism: A Study of the Papacy and the Eastern Churches During the XIth and XIIth Centuries (Oxford, 1955); A. E. Siecienski, The Filioque: History of a Doctrinal Controversy (New York, 2010). 11 The rediscovery of the principle of conciliarity was connected particularly with the work of Russian theologians of nineteenth century, especially
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