Tuesday, December 19, 2017
The White Church and the Red Church
Documentary from the Holy Land, 1988, impressions by a Dutch crew just before “perestroika”.
Saturday, December 2, 2017
Bishop Ambrose ordains a deacon at Cheltenham
Pictures from the Divine Liturgy on November 13/26 in honour of St John Chrysostom. Bishop Ambrose of Methone visited his parish of the Dormition of the Mother of God in Cheltenham, VIC. A new deacon Anastasios was ordained for the parish. Bishop John of Melbourne (ROCA) attended.
Saturday, November 11, 2017
Pilgrimage to Romania
Please see: Internet Sobor article for full view of photos.
Bishop John, bishop Glicherie (Abbott of Slatioara monastery), bishop Anfim.
The bishops travelled to Niamets to venerate the relics of the venerable Paisius Velichkovsky (n.s. church)
Visit to Varatec monastery (n.s.), where there live 700 sisters:
In the old calendar monastery Dobru, 100 sisters struggle under the guidance of Abbess Barbara:
In the Annunciation monastery at Moisa live Abbess Alexandra and 35 sisters:
Further travel to the skete of the Holy Mhyrrbearing Women, where Abbess Tatiana leads about 30 sisters:
Thereafter we travelled to bishop Sofronie, to the monastery of St Glicherie the Confessor:
Bishop Sofronie, bishop John, bishop Anfim, bishop Glicherie
Further on to bishop Demosfen and the monastery Bratitel Suceava. Here lives Abbess Ierusalima and 300 sisters:
Monday, October 30, 2017
Appeal to the faithful children of the Russian Orthodox Church
Having gathered in the God-saved city of Odessa, the Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad appeals to all Orthodox Christians whose conscience does not accept the modern heresies and innovations. These heresies are actively cultivated in our time by apostates and supporters of globalism.
In our sorrowful days, all the signs of the end times are painfully intensifying. They range from massive natural disasters and wars to the spread of apostasy and wickedness. We are experiencing the period of “casting away stones” [Eccl. 3:5. Russian: “Scattering”, transl. note]. Splits and divisions arise without any substantial motives. People who call themselves Christians unite, not around Christ, but around their personal, miniscule interests. Alternatively, people unite over “political super-tasks” which are distant from the Gospel, as is happening in so-called world Orthodoxy. In the Russian Federation, the official church has become an inseparable part of the ruling class and political elite, irrevocably entrenched in heresy, and spiritually fallen lower than in Soviet times. The Ukraine is given the goal to escape as far as possible from the Russian Federation, as well as, unfortunately, from historical Russia. Therefore, here the emphasis is primarily on Uniatism. We see how the heresies of ecumenism, syncretism (primarily in the form of the introduction of Latinism), Sergianism and modernism increasingly capture so-called world orthodoxy. There is no longer any hope for its recovery from this deadly disease. The more this illness grows in official orthodoxy, the greater the gap will be between it and those who seek to live by the Gospel and the teachings of the Holy Fathers. Both in Russia, the Ukraine, and, especially in Belarus, our Church finds itself in a very unfavourable position, if not in direct persecutions, then in mediated ones. In the West the old emigres have all but departed for the other world. People from the post-Soviet republics have come to take the place of the old emigration, radically changing its spirit. The Church Abroad has become completely different in spirit from what She was under Metropolitan Philaret, and even under Metropolitan Vitaly. A part of the ROCA, having joined with the Moscow Patriarchate, has long ago and irretrievably lost its identity with the former, historic Church Abroad. It has instead become infected with the ecumenical, Sergianist, and latin spirit introduced into the MP.
Thus, today we find ourselves in a new situation. It is the result of changes in the position of the Church that took place in the 20th century and the beginning of the current century. The true Church, which seeks to preserve the patristic traditions, has been significantly reduced in numbers. She has been completely isolated from any influence over political and social processes. In part, this frees the Church of direct responsibility for the massive, global apostasy of modern society. Indeed, we cannot fight mass apostasy, except by prayers and by protecting ourselves and our flock from this apostasy.
However, at the same time there is wavering and lack of unity within the Church itself, as well as in many groups close to it, which generally adhere to identical ecclesiological views. If we leave off consideration of personal factors such as pride and lust for power, this is largely explained by a recently-emerging variant of the destructive ecumenical heresy. It claims that in the last times the Church will lose its unity and will consist of separate groups that do not have prayerful and eucharistic communion with each other. This heresy enables the active fragmentation of the Church and the rapid extinction of individual microscopic “churches,” dioceses and communities resulting from such fragmentation (as a consequence of these divisions, today we see individual communities independent of everyone, which consist of only a few people). These groups do not possess the capability to maintain their own activities, not to mention transmitting their faith to the next generation. Such an ecclesiological position, dictated by this new heresy, is more akin to the sin of suicide than to a confession of faith. Today, madmen and apostates, instead of gathering together the flock of Christ, deliberately destroy the Church, organizing strife and division in Her. They even consider this their own special “podvig”. May Christ, who appeared to St. Peter of Alexandria in a torn robe, edify them. He answered St Peter’s question: “Who, o Creator, tore Thy tunic?” with the words: “Arius the madman tore Me apart, for he separated from Me the people whom I acquired by My blood.” The same is now being perpetrated by all sorts of insane schismatics who do not think about the Church, but only see themselves and their own interests.
One should never forget that the Orthodox Church is a Catholic Church. According to the definition of Alexei Khomiakov: “The church is called one, holy, catholic [catholic and universal] and apostolic, because she is one, and holy; because she belongs to the whole world, and not to any particular locality; because by her all mankind and all the earth, and not any particular nation or country, are sanctified; because her very essence consists in the agreement and unity of the spirit and life of all the members who acknowledge her, throughout the world; lastly, because in the writings and doctrines of the Apostles is contained all the fulness of her faith, her hope, and her love.” Of course, because of our small number, we cannot completely realize this in life, but according to Her spirit, the Church should be exactly like this. The opposite of catholicity is individualism, isolation and self-isolation on the one hand, and on the other – self-will and dictatorship. We must distance ourselves both from dictatorship, which is usually manifested in the form of “guruism” - an authoritarian pseudo-spiritual leadership and pseudo-eldership of the leaders of such groups – as well as from the self-isolation and false self-sufficiency which is peculiar to small sects.
Many continue to justify their divisions today with Decree No. 362. But its action, as well as the fact of its ever having been written, are conditioned solely by external circumstances that occurred during a certain historical period when there was a break in communication between the parts of the Church, both within and outside of the Soviet Union. However, today we see the exact opposite situation. Instead of the isolation found in the USSR, technical development makes it possible to communicate with people from all corners of the earth without interference, even without knowing each other’s language. Therefore, this Decree no longer applies to parts of the Russian Church isolated from communication, parts which no longer exist. Instead, this Decree extends to the entire Church, and is mandatory for all without exception.
Today, the following paragraphs of this Decree remain relevant:
2) (…) the diocesan bishop immediately enters into relations with the bishops of neighbouring dioceses for the purpose of organizing a higher instance of ecclesiastical authority for several dioceses in similar conditions (in the form either of a temporary Supreme Church government or a Metropolitan district, or anything else) [i.e. all bishops who have the same confession of faith must unite and organize for themselves the highest organ of ecclesiastical authority].
3) Care for the organization of a Supreme Church Authority is the objective of the entire group of dioceses which find themselves in the position indicated in paragraph 2, is the indispensable obligation of the senior bishop of such a group.
9) In case of the extreme disorganization of ecclesiastical life, when certain persons and parishes cease to recognize the authority of the diocesan bishop, the latter, finding himself in the position indicated in paragraphs 2 and 6, does not relinquish his episcopal powers, but forms deaneries and a diocese; he permits, where necessary, that the divine services be celebrated even in private homes and other places suited therefore, and severs ecclesiastical communion with the disobedient.
[i.e. those unwilling to fulfill paragraph 2 are disobedient to the Church and are the dissenters].
10) All measures taken in places in accordance with the present instruction, afterwards, in the event of the restoration of the central ecclesiastical authority, must be subject to the confirmation of the latter.
These are paragraphs of Decree No. 362 that we must fulfill if we consider ourselves Orthodox Christians.
Guided by this Decree, our Council of Bishops once again appeals to all scattered and fragmented Orthodox Christians with the plea to stop mutual hostility and, in accordance with paragraph 2 of Decree No. 362 (“the diocesan bishop immediately enters into relations with the bishops of neighbouring dioceses for the purpose of organizing a higher instance of ecclesiastical authority”), start discussions with one another. We must pray and make efforts that the present time of “scattering” is changed to a time of formation and gathering.
Now we are living through a period on which the continued existence of the Orthodox Russian Church depends. On the one hand, She is faced with the very imminent threat of union with the Latins, and a complete and final falling away from Holy Orthodoxy, similar to what happened in the 11th century with the Orthodox Roman Church. On the other hand, She is in danger of fragmentation and transformation into small sects that are at war with each other, all of which being threatened with imminent extinction in the near future. It is within our power to stop opposing God, Who acquired the Church through His own sufferings.
“That they all may be one; as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us: that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me” (John 17:21). Let us not forget that these are not mere words. They are the prayer of the God-man.
Odessa, 13/26 October, 2017
Iveron Icon of the Mother of God
The President of the Council
Metropolitan Agafangel
Members of the Council
Archbishop George, Bishop Athanasius, Bishop Gregory, Bishop Roman, Bishop Kirill, Bishop Nikon, Bishop Nicholas, Bishop Anastassy, Bishop Anfim, Bishop John
Bishop Athanasius signed in proxy of Archbishop John
Sunday, July 30, 2017
Orthodox Christians should be ready for self-sacrifice and even martyrdom
…In order to pray one had to be ready at any minute for a martyr’s death. And we were ready for it…
…everyone who entered [the one remaining church that did not accept the Declaration of 1927 by Metropolitan Sergius] was registered and later arrested. This was the time when the atheist Soviet power demanded of believers that they go to the Churches of the official Church.
I, too, was arrested and banished for five years. At Solovki I encountered many hierarchs of the true Church. And there we already had our Catacomb church.
In the concentration camps the persecution against faith was completely open: priests were shorn and shaved, forbidden to wear cassocks and crosses. For making the sign of the Cross a new term of imprisonment was given. Of course there was no question of any open services. (…) In order to pray one had to be ready at any minute for a martyr’s death. And we were ready for it, always carrying with us, like the first Christians, a Particle of the Holy Gifts. I brought such a Particle abroad and gave it to Metropolitan Anastassy.
what terror overwhelmed me when, fairly recently, I managed to come abroad and found that some people here ’spiritually’ recognize the Soviet Church. Spiritually!
And not only were we ready to die, but many did die, confident that somewhere there, outside the reach of the Soviet authorities, where there is freedom - there the Truth was shining in all its purity. There people were living by it and submitting to it. There people did not bow down to Antichrist. And what terror overwhelmed me when, fairly recently, I managed to come abroad and found that some people here ’spiritually’ recognize the Soviet Church. Spiritually! Many of us there fell, ‘for fear of the Jews’, or giving in to the temptation of outward cooperation with the authorities. I knew priests of the official Church who, at home, tore their hair out, who smashed their heads making prostrations, begging forgiveness for their apostasy, calling themselves Cain - but nonetheless they did not have the strength to decide upon martyrdom. But even they spiritually did not recognize the Red Church. But these others abroad - it is precisely spiritually that they submit to it. What good fortune that our priest-martyrs, in dying, did not find out about this betrayal!
…even they spiritually did not recognize the Red Church. But these others abroad - it is precisely spiritually that they submit to it. What good fortune that our priest-martyrs, in dying, did not find out about this betrayal!
I. M. Andreyev: Russia’s Catacomb Saints
Saturday, July 15, 2017
The old Russian Orthodox Cathedral in Melbourne
The old Russian Orthodox Cathedral in Melbourne is for sale again. First it was lent by ROCOR(MP) to the use of the New Calendar parish of the MP. It was later sold, the buyers remodelled, and now it is advertised as a ‘great party house’.
The cathedral that was:
Being listed as a heritage building, the architects are not allowed to change the basic structure of the building. The old Altar area appears to have been removed.
The ROCOR(MP) parish has moved to their new Pokrov cathedral:
Friday, May 26, 2017
Ascension of our Lord in Sydney
On Thursday, 12/25 May, Bishop John visited the parish of St Cosmas and Damian (GOC) in Sydney. Priest Nebojsa (ROCA) concelebrated. The service was chanted in English and Greek.
Thursday, May 11, 2017
ROCA: Pastoral Epistle of the Council of Bishops 2017
See then, that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, Redeeming the time, because the days are evil (Eph. 5:15-16)
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ!
Christ is Risen!
Currently, the times are such, that when in both civil and ecclesiastical society, authority is crumbling, numerous false teachings are invented, and many groups refer to themselves as if Christ is among them. How can a person keep one’s balance in this chaos, where the media easily convinces a host of people that black is white and vice versa? It is not within a person’s strength nor within his ability to be able to understand such a variety of lies- it is possible only if God Himself opens the veil of Mysteries before him.
We believe that we have been vouchsafed God’s mercy, and that His mercy has been manifested to us by pointing towards the direction of the historical Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, as the only true stewardship of the earthly flock of Christ of the Russian Church, through which the earthly Church is ruled by our Divine Savior.
“I am the vine, ye are the branches: he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth like a branch, and is withered” (John 15:5 -6).
We believe that our Russian Church Abroad is the vine of Christ- the vine on which a multitude of genuine spiritual fruits have blossomed- including the parishes of the Catacomb Church, which were deprived of their centralized administration, and therefore have attached themselves to this vine. This vine is the source that gives us eternal life and salvation. If we lose that, we will lose God’s saving grace. That is why Holy Tradition, which is passed down from generation to generation by our spiritual Fathers, is what we must hold on to, in spite of all the trials and temptations. Whoever dares to revise this living Tradition and distorts and rejects it, will deprive himself not only of a spiritual foundation, but will deprive himself of a connection with Christ- a connection that is passed on like a continuous thread from the time of the apostles down to our days.
Sacred Tradition is the only solid ground on which one can protect the Church from schisms. Whichever winds of modernism are raging about, if you stand on the firm rock of Tradition - they are powerless. However, if one gives in just a little to the “spirit of the times” and allows oneself to think for but a moment that tradition is outdated and does not correspond to modern challenges – then one can easily slip from a solid foundation and thus be carried along the waves to eternal perdition.
“Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell: and great was the fall of it.” (Mt. 7.24-27).
So will it be with those who reject the rock of living Holy Tradition, the canons and rules which the Fathers established, declaring them obsolete and not binding, and who justify their unlawful actions for lack of any arguments at all, with some imaginary “spiritual approach” and with the “demands of the times.” This baseless justification for lawlessness can be compared to how the supporters of the traitor of the Church Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky), justified and justify his betrayal owing to his “special wisdom” corresponding to that time, but not within the boundaries of patristic Orthodoxy. Similarly, the enemies of Christ, the Masons, even blasphemously distort the meaning of the betrayal of Judas, which, supposedly, only those of their initiated can truly understand.
Of course, there are things within in the Church that change with time, subordinating itself to the current period. But this applies only to the external attributes, the forms of the exposition (presentations) of its invisible sacred content. One and the same truth can be conveyed, for instance, in different languages. In this case, the language can change, but the truth does not. The mistake that many make, is that they do not distinguish well enough the difference between where the truth is, and where the form of its presentation is. Having the desire to make the truth more understandable, often and without knowing it - they distort it and smother it.
Nowadays, ecumenism is a particular, subtle evil - a heresy that often enters into the Church and into the soul of a person like some diabolical flattery, gradually and imperceptibly. Thus, unexpected for many, not only were the representatives of the well familiar-to-us official Orthodoxy susceptible to this heresy, but so were some separate old-calendar groups as well, professing that one could be saved in isolation from other Christians, that the Church has ceased to be the One, Holy and Universal, but rather has divided itself into a multitude of supposedly self-sufficient “Church-Synods”. It is precisely this thought, through which the heretical, false doctrine hides behind. Insofar as the Church of Christ has always been singular, so will it remain as such - being the only One (Church), according to the Savior’s word, until the end of time.
The First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia Metropolitan Vitaly, had said that he believes that those whom the Lord has prepared for salvation, He Himself leads, simply guiding them along His pathways, and eventually leading them to our Russian Church Abroad, and, accordingly, cutting off those who are headed towards perdition. Therefore, we must love and appreciate our Church and remember that it is singular, and that a schism in the Church means perdition, and that the (heretical) confession that all the various Churches in which one supposedly can also be saved, of which there are many – amounts to an ecumenical heresy, and to even greater perdition.
The Synod of Bishops warns all of its faithful children of the Church of Christ of the harmful nature of such a false confession of faith that contradicts the words of Christ Himself: “I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” (Mt.16:18), and likewise the ninth article of the Creed: “I believe … in One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.” The Lord created one Church. Therefore, the Head cannot have many Bodies. Thus did the Lord create it, so the apostles taught, so believed the holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church. So do we also believe. “This is the apostolic faith, this the faith of the fathers, this is the Orthodox Faith, this faith confirmeth the universe!” (From the Service of the Triumph of Orthodoxy).
During these festive days of Pascha, The Synod of Bishops addresses our entire flock with a call especially relevant in our times of apostasy: “Behold, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.” (Rev. 3:11).
Truly, Christ is risen!
Chairman of the Synod of Bishops
+ Metropolitan Agafangel
Right Reverend Bishops:
+ Archbishop George (Secretary of the Synod)
+ Bishop Athanasius
+ Bishop Kirill
+ Bishop Anfim
For Bishop Gregory and Bishop Nikon + Archbishop George (Secretary of the Synod)
April 20 / May 3, 2017, St. Theodore Trichinas.
Thursday, April 20, 2017
Two walls of frescoes completed
Two walls of frescoes using traditional fresco technique on wet lime plaster have been completed at the hermitage of the Annunciation. It was decided to decorate the trapeza with women ascetic saints to strengthen our monastic labour.
Sunday, April 16, 2017
Passion Week and Pascha in Australia
Photos from the services of Passion Week and Pascha in Melbourne and Sydney:
Blessing of eggs at the end of the Paschal midnight service in Melbourne.
Palm Sunday in St Gregory the Theologian parish in Melbourne and holy week services in Sydney.
The shroud in Sydney St John of Kronstadt parish:
Melbourne: The procession with the shroud on Holy Friday evening, which had been beautifully decorated by the sisterhood.
Joyous chanting in Sydney
The Annunciation Sisterhood monastery chapel at Pascha
