Proto-ecumenism before the 1920s

[Jean-Serge]

What is historically untrue in what I wrote?

[Suaidan]

What is historically untrue in what I wrote?

 

Nothing (to be fair I haven't checked); just "a Tsar calling for a memorial service to a dead heterodox royal in defiance of the wave of liberalism in France" doesn't rise to the level of "nascent ecumenism" for me.
 

[Jean-Serge]

Indeed, the categorization and interpretation of the fact as ecumenism might be incorrect.

[Jean-Serge]

From my blog : http://orthodoxie-libre.over-blog.com/2 ... ard-3.html

It appears that the king Edward VIII had 2 orthodox godparents, contrary to orthodox canons. I could not find details of this they attend or not the baptism. Did they sponsor at distance. I guess I will have to write to the Royal House to know more. These godparents were the future Nicholas II and the queen Olga of Greece. https://www.unofficialroyalty.com/house ... istenings/

Once again, it is not sure that fits the definition of proto-ecumenism, but for sure this is really bad and favours indifferentism.

[SavaBeljovic]

From my blog : http://orthodoxie-libre.over-blog.com/2 ... ard-3.html

It appears that the king Edward VIII had 2 orthodox godparents, contrary to orthodox canons. I could not find details of this they attend or not the baptism. Did they sponsor at distance. I guess I will have to write to the Royal House to know more. These godparents were the future Nicholas II and the queen Olga of Greece. https://www.unofficialroyalty.com/house ... istenings/

Once again, it is not sure that fits the definition of proto-ecumenism, but for sure this is really bad and favours indifferentism.

 

Not to defend this, but in the 20th century there was something of an "Anglican fetishism" especially with Orthodox Christians as many people (including some Saints) thought Anglicanism was "close to Orthodoxy" theologically and there could be an attempt to bring them in. There was a big movement at that time towards Anglo-Catholicism (Anglicans attempting to look as much like the Papists as possible)... Sadly a lot of people got caught in this wave without realizing the true nature of things. Russians were very low info on the Anglicans and only saw people who were very much against Papism while not looking like most other Protestants. Not everyone was like Fr. Julius Overbeck who understood Anglicans were not trustworthy.

Also the royal family of Greece was so secular and many of its members were not even Orthodox to begin with, so them being involved is unsurprising. As for the Holy Martyred Tsar, he still had to play a part in European politics and he was related to all these people. Again, not justified, but hopefully this sheds some light and why it might've happened to begin with.

EDIT: Fr. Joseph can talk more about how the Russian Bishops viewed the Anglicans as compared to Fr. Julius, and also the Russian Church added many pre-schism British Saints even before the Revolution as a result of this "Anglican fetishism". So while it was mostly bad, it wasn't all bad. We did get a lot of Saints added to our calendar out of it at least.
 
 

[Barbara]

I think all of Jean-Serge's historical anecdotes are fascinating !
What label they would go under ideally, nobody knows. But these incidents are greatly worthwhile to present to the readers, so we are much better clued in to so much.

Thank you for taking the time to research all this ! Please keep going with the project.

The comments add more insight, too. The Greek royal family had many non-Orthodox members ? I know they weren't very religious, but many had almost no connection with the church ? Could you explain that further, Sava ? Do you mean the people who married into it from other religions but did not convert or make a show of converting to Orthodoxy ? Or were there Greeks who were not Orthodox - or not practicing Orthodox ?

I know that Greek Princess Alice, mother of Prince Philip, was a rarity in selecting a semi-monastic path later in her life. But I didn't realize that plenty of the rest were so far away from the Church !

Also, who was Fr Julius Overbeck ? I've never heard of him. Though I am familiar with the era of Orthodox-Anglican overtures. They began with Palmer. The Oxford scholar William Palmer, a truly remarkable man, went all the way from England to Russia in the 1840s, traveled around, met all sorts of famous people whose names we know today.
But his idea to merge the Orthodox with the Anglicans did not gather support on either side.
He deserves a separate thread.
And that movement of Anglicans copying Catholics started well before the 20th century, right, with the Oxford Movement of the 1830s and after ?
 
 

[SavaBeljovic]

The comments add more insight, too. The Greek royal family had many non-Orthodox members ? I know they weren't very religious, but many had almost no connection with the church ? Could you explain that further, Sava ? Do you mean the people who married into it from other religions but did not convert or make a show of converting to Orthodoxy ? Or were there Greeks who were not Orthodox - or not practicing Orthodox ?

I know that Greek Princess Alice, mother of Prince Philip, was a rarity in selecting a semi-monastic path later in her life. But I didn't realize that plenty of the rest were so far away from the Church !

Also, who was Fr Julius Overbeck ? I've never heard of him. Though I am familiar with the era of Orthodox-Anglican overtures. They began with Palmer. The Oxford scholar William Palmer, a truly remarkable man, went all the way from England to Russia in the 1840s, traveled around, met all sorts of famous people whose names we know today.
But his idea to merge the Orthodox with the Anglicans did not gather support on either side.
He deserves a separate thread.
And that movement of Anglicans copying Catholics started well before the 20th century, right, with the Oxford Movement of the 1830s and after ?
 
 

 

King George I of Greece, the first king of Greece, was a Lutheran and never converted to Orthodoxy. His children were all Orthodox and so was his wife. But since Greece imported monarchy from other European countries, they also had to import their monarch from Germany.

Fr. Joseph has talked about Fr. Julius Overbeck on his show multiple times, and there's quite a few articles on him and his life floating around, as well as some of his books. All of which are quite fascinating as Fr. Julius is a very important figure in recent Orthodox history.

Yes, the Anglo-Catholic movement started in the 1830s in Oxford (oh how times have changed!...) and was popular until about 1960 or so. But it was in absolute overdrive in the early 20th century.