June 24 / July 7, 1997.

Your Graces,

Already some years ago, I tried to enter into dialogue with you on the

question of Grace, but you refused. More recently, you have made it clear in

communications to others that you still do not want a dialogue. So be it.

Nevertheless, you have continued very fiercely to attack my writings and my

person in correspondence with other people. I am therefore taking the

opportunity presented by the internet to answer your attack in an open letter;

for while your opinion of me as a person is unimportant, the question of

Grace continues to be, in my opinion, very important, and I believe that your

arguments in defence of your point of view are faulty and misleading.

But first let me deal with some of the less important points you raise. You

criticise me, first, for calling you “Cyprianites”. If, as it appears, you have felt

insulted by this term, then I am sorry. But let me assure you that no insult was

meant. It is just a matter of convenience, a way of avoiding needless confusion

in the midst of our jurisdictional chaos. How, for example, are you going to

distinguish all the various men who call themselves “Archbishop of Athens”

Secondly, you say that I call Archbishop Mark a heretic. That is not true.

deny any of that. I simply state the fact - and a very significant fact it is - that

mean by “Grace”. I mean the Grace of sacraments. I do not deny, and never

have denied, that God may give Grace to people outside the Church.

Cornelius received the Grace of the Holy Spirit before he was baptised.

Everyone who is converted to the truth of Orthodoxy and becomes a

catechumen has already been enlightened by Grace to some degree. But those

outside the Church do not have the Grace of sacraments.

I am also prepared to admit the possibility that even when a community

has been anathematised by a true and valid anathema, God may still protect

certain individuals within that community from the full force of the anathema

for a longer or shorter period. I would only argue that if God, Who is the

Sovereign and Maker of the law, makes exceptions to His law, that is no

reason for us, who are not privy to His secret judgements, not to keep the law.

And the law was stated by the Lord Himself as follows: “If he shall neglect to

hear the Church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.

Verily, I say unto you, whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in

heaven” (Matthew 18.17-18). In other words, we should treat those

anathematised by the Church as outside the Church and not deserving the

honour of Christians (which is not to say, of course, that we should not pray

for their eventual return). And Holy Tradition makes it crystal clear that those

cast out in this way have no sacraments (Apostolic canons 46 and 47).

already) before turning to a consideration of your arguments. Those local

Orthodox Churches that have joined the ecumenical movement and the

World Council of Churches (I will call them “World Orthodoxy” for short) are

outside the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church and do not have the

Grace of sacraments because they “openly and with bared head” confess the

pan-heresy of ecumenism and have been anathematised for this by the Synod

of the Russian Church Abroad in 1983 in the following words: “To those who

attack the Church of Christ by teaching that Christ’s Church is divided into

so-called branches which differ in doctrine and way of life, or that the Church

does not exist visibly, but will be formed in the future, when all branches or

sects or denominations, and even religions, will be united into one body; and

who do not distinguish the priesthood and mysteries of the Church from

those of heretics, but say that the baptism and eucharist of heretics is effectual

for salvation; therefore, to those who knowingly have communion with these

aforementioned heretics or who advocate, disseminate or defend their new

heresy, commonly called ecumenism, under the pretext of brotherly love or

the supposed unification of separated Christians, Anathema, anathema,

anathema!

I am confining myself here to discussion of this conciliar decision alone,

since it is the closest to us and comes from a Church body whose canonicity

we both accept; but it needs to be borne in mind that there are other conciliar

decisions - notably those of the True Orthodox Church of Greece in 1935,

1950, 1974 and 1991, and less well documented ones of the Catacomb Church

of Russia - which also condemned different parts of the body of World

This is a simple argument and quite adequate for the simple believer who

simply wants to obey the Church, and accepts, as both you and I do, that the

Russian Church Abroad is a true Church. But you keep saying that the

situation is actually much more complex than I make it out to be. Well, then,

let us turn to the complexities you point to - but without forgetting that at the

end of the day, when we have discussed all these complexities, the question is

quite simple: is the Russian Church Abroad’s anathema against ecumenism and the

1. You state: “Some modernists and New Calendarists have fallen wholly

to this spiritual disease [ecumenism]. Others have not. Identifying the disease

It is, of course, true that in almost every community that the Church has

declared heretical there have been individual differences in the acceptance of

the heresy in question. There are some papists who accept the full papist

position, and others who do not. There are extreme monophysites and

moderate monophysites, liberal ecumenists and conservative ecumenists. The

Church calls on the liberals to repent, and on the conservatives to “come out

from among them” and “not be unequally yoked with unbelievers” (II

Corinthians 6.14). And as long as the leadership of the Church is still

Orthodox, judgement is delayed. But as far as the ecumenists and sergianists

are concerned, their leadership has been heretical already for many years. It is

as the Lord said: “I gave her time to repent of her fornication, but she

repented not” (Revelation 2.21). Therefore the ultimate penalty - “I will

remove thy candlestick out of its place” (Revelation 2.5), which signifies “the

deprivation of Divine Grace”, according to St. Andrew of Caesarea - has been

applied. We can have different opinions about just when it was applied. But

for those loyal to the Councils of the Russian Church Abroad, the cut-off point

came at the latest in 1983, when, in response to the unprecedented horrors of

World Orthodoxy’s union with paganism at the Vancouver General Assembly

of the World Council of Churches, the Church pronounced her anathema...

Your own metropolitan, in his recent correspondence with Natalya

Nedashkovskaya, very aptly quotes St. Theodore the Studite: “Chrysostom

loudly calls ‘enemies of God’ not only heretics, but also those who remain in

communion with heretics” (P.G. 99, 1049A). The latter are called enemies

because, although they agree with the teaching of the Church and disagree

with the teaching of their own hierarchs, they remain where they are. As St.

Chrysostom points out in his homily on the rebellion of Core, their agreement

with the Church gives them even less excuse for remaining outside her, where

they mislead others. For people wondering which way to turn say: “Look, the

Orthodox theologian X stays with [the heretical] Synod Y, which means that

The approach of the early Synods to heresy and heretics was much simpler

than yours. If hierarch X proclaimed heresy “publicly and with bared head”, a

Council was immediately convened to condemn him. Consider how quickly

Pope St. Celestine responded to the heresy of Nestorius, writing within one

year of its first appearance to St. Cyril of Alexandria: “Either he [Nestorius]

shall within ten days, counted from the day of your notice, condemn in writing

this wicked preaching of his,... or if he will not do this… he will know that he

is in every way removed from our body as not being willing to accept the care

lavished on him by those wishing to heal him, and as hastening on a

destructive course to his own perdition and to the perdition of all entrusted to

him.” (Epistle 11)

At the beginning of our present time of troubles the same urgency was felt.

Thus renovationism and newcalendarism were quickly condemned by truly

Orthodox Synods in the 1920s and 30s; and their verdicts were confirmed by

great miracles of God (for example, the appearance of the sign of the Cross

over Athens in 1925). The heretics responded by betraying the confessors to

cruel deaths in prisons and camps and blasphemously trampling on their holy

things. But as renovationism was metamorphosed into sergianism, and

newcalendarism into ecumenism (although ecumenism was in fact officially

proclaimed as early as 1920), the condemnations became fewer and less

categorical - while the heretics, especially from the 1960s, became still more

brazen and extreme. And now, in 1997, generations after the first appearance

of the heresies, when hundreds of thousands of martyrs have died rather than

in any way condone the heretics, we still cannot decide whether they are in

the Church or not! We hesitate, and then we start condemning “extremists”

who are loyal to the Councils of the Church more than the extremist heretics

themselves!

Why is this? Is ecumenism any less serious than the earlier heresies? No -

Metropolitan Cyprian calls it “pan-heresy”, and Metropolitan Vitaly - “the

heresy of heresies”. Are communications more difficult now so that it is more

difficult to obtain information and convene Synods? Of course not - such an

excuse might have some weight in Catacomb Russia, but not in the West

where communications are incomparably easier and faster than in the Early

Church.

I believe that the real reason for our hesitations and doublemindedness lies

in a general loss of zeal and weakening of faith in the dogma of the One,

Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. Those who continue to believe that

there is only One Church, and only One Baptism and Eucharist, and that those

who confess heresy are outside the One Church, are described as

“unscholarly”, “immature”, “extremist” and “silly” (to use some of your less

violent epithets). They are called “naive” when they take the official

declarations of the Church at their face value, and “ignorant” because they

fail to see how the public, official declarations of a whole Synod of bishops

can have less weight than the privately expressed doubts of one of those

bishops.

2. “It seems unnecessary to note, since it is so obvious, that to condemn a

I have in front of me the special office of the Triumph of Orthodoxy,

including all the anathemas. Every single one of the anathemas is hurled against

individuals, usually beginning with the phrase: “To those who...” True, no

specific name is mentioned. But you are surely not going to claim that because

no specific name is mentioned, therefore no individual falls under the

anathemas?! Hierarchs who condemn heresies while refusing to condemn the

heretics that preach them are like the watchmen condemned by the Prophet

Isaiah, “dumb dogs that cannot bark” (Isaiah 56.10). They are like judges who

convict a man of murder and then let him go scot-free.

The Holy Fathers were not like that. The sword of their anathema struck

down both heresies and heretics. Thus Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov in his

famous essay “Christians! You must know Christ!” quotes the Fourth

Ecumenical Council’s very powerful, very specific anathema of the heretic

Eutyches. And our service books (for example, the service to the Fathers of the

First Six Ecumenical Councils) are likewise not coy in declaring that Arius,

Eutyches, Nestorius, etc. have been anathematised “and inherited the

substance of eternal fire”. Closer to our time, the Russian Church condemned

both Tolstoyism and Tolstoy. And in 1923 Patriarch Tikhon condemned both

renovationism and the renovationists, declaring all their sacraments to be

3. “It is to a general synod, and a ‘unifying’ one, that we turn for final

All of us look forward to the convening of a general synod which would,

God willing, unify those heretics who repent with the One, Holy, Catholic

and Apostolic Church. But we must be clear about what such “unification”

does and does not entail - and I suspect that your concept of a “unifying”

Council would not be recognised by the Fathers of the Councils. For those

heretics who were united to the Church during the Councils were united only

after formal renunciation of their heresy and only on the clear understanding

that they were outside the Church as long as they confessed their heresy.

In any case, the importance of general synods should not lead us to cast

doubt on local councils’ authority to expel heretics from the Church.

Otherwise, we would be forced to conclude that the Roman Catholics are still

inside the Church (since they were expelled by a merely local Council in

1054)! Many of the heretics of the early centuries were first cast out of the

Church by local Councils. For example, Arius was cast out by a local Council

presided over by St. Alexander, Bishop of Alexandria, and the Monothelites

and Iconoclasts were first cast out by local Councils convened in Rome. When

the heretical bishop Theodosius in conversation with St. Maximus the

Confessor disputed the validity of the local Council under the Orthodox Pope

St. Martin that condemned the Monothelites on the grounds that it was not

convened by an emperor, St. Maximus replied that the validity of a Council

depended on its recognising “the true and immutable dogmas”, not on who

The Ecumenical Councils confirmed the decisions of many earlier local

councils, treating those condemned by the latter as already outside the Church.

In this connection I should like to cite from an unpublished work by Hieromonk (now Bishop) Nectarius (Yashunsky) from St. Petersburg entitled “Ecclesiological Antitheses”, in which he subjects Metropolitan Cyprian’s well-known work Ecclesiological Theses to criticism. First he quotes from oneof Metropolitan Cyprian’s theses: “Towards a union council. Insofar as theChurch of Greece today is divided, a Sacred Council of the united GreekChurch... cannot be convened.... The convening of such a Council wouldbecome possible only when the divided unite in Orthodoxy.

Then Fr. Nectarius presents his antithesis: “Here it is proclaimed that a

Council could not be convened for the condemnation of any heresy without

the participation of the heretics themselves (in accordance with the

terminology of the given text: ‘members of the Church who were weak in

faith’). Moreover, the Council could be convened only for the union of the

divided parts of the Church, being at the same time a fruit of this union.

Below, on page 9 each Ecumenical Council from the First to the Seventh is

called ‘unifying’, from which it logically follows that the heretics condemned

at them - the Arians, Nestorians, Monophysites and others - were also

‘members of the Church weak in faith’! Pursuing this logic further, we shall

have to recognize the Roman Catholics and Protestants as ‘as yet

uncondemned members of the Church’, because since the time of their

separation there has not been (and until ‘their union in Orthodoxy’ there

cannot be) a Council of the united (undivided Universal Church) in common

with them! That is precisely what the ecumenists say in their attempt to prove

that the Latins belong to the Church. “The existence of heresies condemned by the Ecumenical Councils many years after them, and some even to the present day (for example, Monophysitism and Nestorianism) historically proves the groundlessness of the understanding of the Councils as exclusively ‘unifying’. Moreover, we

know from history that the Second, Fifth and Sixth Ecumenical Councils took

place without the participation of heretics. As far as the Seventh Council is

concerned, not only did it not consider the iconoclasts to be a part of the

In support of this last statement, Fr. Nectarius quotes from the Acts of the

Seventh Ecumenical Council. “These are the words of the uniting iconoclasts.

Thus Basil, bishop of Ancyra, said: ‘As far as I was able, I investigated the

question of the icons and converted to the Holy Catholic Church with

complete conviction.’ Theodore, bishop of Myra, said: ‘... I beseech God and

your holiness to unite me, the sinful one, to the Holy Catholic Church.’ (pp.

41, 43) And here are the witnesses of the holy Fathers of the Council: “His

Holiness Patriarch Tarasius said: 'What is now to be our relationship to this

heresy that has again arisen in our time?' John, the most beloved of God,

locum tenens of the apostolic throne in the east, said: 'Heresy divides every

man from the Church.' The Holy Council said: 'That is evident.' The Holy

Council said: 'Let the bishops who are standing before us read their

If your reasoning on Councils were correct, we should have to draw the

following conclusions: (1) The decisions of all the local Councils convened to

condemn heretics and schismatics since the early 1920s to the present day

have no more than a provisional character, since they have not been validated

by a general Council. (2) Both Orthodox and heretics are within the One, Holy,

Catholic and Apostolic Church until the convening of a general Council, in

spite of the fact that, as St. Maximus the Confessor says, “the Lord Christ

called the Catholic Church that which contains the true and salvific confession

of the faith”. (3) A general Council can be convened only with the

participation of the heretics, who constitute one part of the divided Church.

Therefore (4) since it has been impossible to convene a general Council with

the heretics, the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church for most of the

20th century has been deprived of her God-given authority to bind and to

loose, to decree who is within her sacred enclosure and who is outside. And

(5) the conclusion of the general Council and the “Triumph of Orthodoxy”

consists, not in the converting of the heretics to the Catholic Church through

the renunciation of their heresy, but in the overcoming of the external, purely

organisational divisions in the Church so as to reveal the internal sacramental

unity between the Orthodox and the heretics, a unity that has always existed

I know that some have called this teaching “ecclesiological heresy”, akin to

the “branch theory” which the ecumenists espouse and for which they have

been anathematised. I take their point, but I wouldn’t go so far as that. I

would simply call it a violation of Apostolic Canon 46: “We order that any

Bishop or Presbyter that has accepted any heretics’ Baptism or Sacrifice, to be

deposed; for ‘what agreement hath Christ with Beliar? Or what part hath the

4. “A desire to cut off others from salvation, a sectarian notion that only a

few million people on earth (if not a few hundred thousand) are in possession

of the salvific Grace of Orthodoxy - even if correct in form, it is wrong in

spirit. What mature Christian wishes for such a scenario? Indeed, our fight

against religious relativism should NOT constitute an endorsement of

Forgive me, Fathers, but where did you glean that I desire to cut off others

from salvation?! God forbid that I should ever desire such a thing! My father

died an Anglican, but I did not wish him to die in that state, I did my utmost

to help him out of it. He cut himself off from salvation; I did not desire that,

but greatly lament it. I have exactly the same attitude to the heretics of World

And what makes you think that it is sectarian to believe that “only a few

million people on earth (if not a few hundred thousand) are in possession of

the salvific Grace of Orthodoxy”? Are we not constantly reminded by the

Church that ours is the “little flock”, and that in the last times (as indeed in

earlier times) there will be few that follow the narrow path of the Orthodox

confession? Is it “sectarianism” to obey the conciliar decisions of the Church

into which I was baptised? Is it “personal hatred” to believe that a man who

declares that Mohammed is an apostle of God is no longer a Christian

(“Patriarch” Parthenius of Alexandria)? Is it “intolerance” to believe that a

man who has worked zealously for over 40 years for the KGB, whose

ecumenism is so extreme as to embrace non-Christian religions, and who

recently broke down the doors of a monastery of the Russian Church Abroad

in Hebron with the aid of Muslims who then rang the bells exultantly - is an

enemy of God (“Patriarch” Alexis of Moscow)? Perhaps it is. But then I would

say that the Lord Himself praised such intolerance when He said: “But this

thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate”

(Revelation 1.6).

I consider it love, not hatred, to tell people the truth about their situation -

provided it is “in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be

tempted” (Galatians 6.1). If your argument with me was that I lack meekness,

then I would accept what you say, considering your rebuke to be to my profit.

But what you are really saying is something different; you are saying that I

am objectively wrong in considering the heretics of World Orthodoxy to be

outside the Church. And such a charge I will resist with all my strength. For it

is counter to the teaching, not only of the bishop who baptised me and

accepted my confession of faith when I came over from the Moscow

Patriarchate, but also of the whole Synod of Bishops of the Russian Church

Abroad in 1983, whose anathema against ecumenism has never been repealed

by any competent authority - and could never in fact be repealed, since it is

I would like to make one more point. Suppose I - or rather, the official

teaching of the Church to which I belong - were wrong, and the heretics of

World Orthodoxy, such as “Patriarchs” Alexis of Moscow and Bartholomew

of Constantinople, were in fact still members of the One, Holy, Catholic

Church. Then we have a truly awful scenario: that many hundreds of

thousands, perhaps even millions of people who confess or condone the

ecumenist heresy are receiving the sacraments of Christ to their

condemnation! This is not just my personal opinion. In the letter written by

Hieromartyr Cyril, Metropolitan of Kazan, in 1934, which your colleagues

often cite in support of your position because he (very tentatively) expressed

the opinion that the sergianist clergy (more precisely: those who had been

ordained by non-sergianists) still had valid sacraments, the hieromartyr says

that those clergy and laymen who receive the sacraments in sergianist

churches while knowing the unrighteousness of the sergianist position,

The situation now, in 1997, is very substantially worse than in 1934. (And

Metropolitan Cyril had already considerably hardened his position by the

year 1937.) In particular, there are no clergy who have been ordained by nonsergianists in the Moscow Patriarchate (except for a handful of renegades

from the Russian Church Abroad), and the evil of sergianism has been

compounded by the horrors of ecumenism - the sin of Judas by the sin of

Now let me put this question to you: would not deprivation of the Grace of

sacraments be a mercy for the World Orthodox? Would it not be an act of the

loving kindness of the Saviour, Who does not wish people to be burdened

with the extra condemnation of receiving His sacraments while preaching or

condoning heresy? And is this not in fact the basic reason why the Lord

deprives people of His Grace - so that they should not be scorched by It

because of their unworthiness?