THE RUSSIAN CHURCH AND THE NEW CALENDAR
Vladimir Moss
The calendar question is sometimes considered to have been a temptation
only for the Greek-speaking Orthodox Churches. However, the Russian Church,
too, had to struggle with this temptation. And in view of the fact that
several prominent hierarchs of the contemporary Moscow Patriarchate have
expressed themselves in favour of the introduction of the new, Gregorian
calendar, it may be useful to review the history of this controversy in the
20th-century history of the Russian Church.
On January 19, 1918, the Soviet State introduced the new calendar into
Russia. Thinking "to change times and laws" (Daniel 7.25), a Decree of the
Council of People's Commissars dated January 24, 1918 ordered that the day
after January 31, 1918 would be February 14 - not February 1. How did the
Russian Church react to this order?
By a remarkable coincidence, on the same day that the Soviet State
introduced the new calendar, Patriarch Tikhon anathematised the State,
calling on the faithful Orthodox to have no communion with "these outcasts
of humanity" in any way whatsoever. A few days later the Patriarch's
anathema was confirmed by the Church Council then in session in Moscow. In
view of this rejection of the legitimacy of the State, it is not surprising
that the Church also rejected the State's change of calendar.
Protopriest Alexander Lebedev writes: "The Sobor [Council] addressed
the issue three days after the Decree was signed, at its 71st Session on
January 27, 1918. The need for a prompt decision by the Church on how to
relate to the civil calendar change was clear - the change was to take place
four days later.
"It was decided to send the issue to a Joint Session of two separate
Sections of the Sobor - the Section on Divine Services and the Section on
the Relationship of the Church to the State.
"This Joint Session of the two Sections met two days later, on January
29, 1918 and heard two major reports, one by Professor S.S. Glagolev,
entitled 'A Comparative Evaluation of the Julian and Gregorian Styles', and
one by Prof. I.I. Sokolov, entitled, 'The Attitude of the Orthodox East to
the Question of the Reform of the Calendar'.
"Neither of these presentations in any way supported the introduction
into Church life of the Gregorian Calendar - quite the contrary. Prof.
Glagolev concluded, 'The Gregorian Calendar, in addition to being
historically harmful, is astronomically useless'. Professor Sokolov
concluded: 'Therefore, the controlling voice of the Orthodox East, both
Greek and Slavic, is expressed as being not only against the Gregorian
calendar, as a creature of the inimical to it [the Orthodox East] Catholic
West, but also against a neutral or corrected calendar, because such a
reform would deleteriously affect the ecclesiastical life of the Orthodox
peoples.'
"Finally, the Joint Session of the two Sections prepared a Resolution
on the issue of calendar reform.
"It decreed that the Church must stay with the Julian calendar, basing
its decision on the following:
"1) There is no reason for the Church not to have a separate
ecclesiastical calendar different from the civil calendar.
"2) The Church not only is able to preserve the Old Calendar, - at the
present time it would be impossible for it to move to the new calendar.
"3) The introduction of the new calendar by the Russian Church would
cause it to break unity with all of the other Orthodox Churches. Any change
in the calendar can only be done by mutual agreement of all the Orthodox
Churches.
"4) It is impossible to correlate the Orthodox Paschalion with the
Gregorian Calendar without causing grave disruption to the Typicon.
"5) It is recognised that the Julian Calendar is astronomically
inaccurate. This was noted already at the Council of Constantinople in 1583.
However, it is incorrect to believe that the Gregorian Calendar is better
suited for ecclesiastical use.
"In conclusion, the Joint Session resolved to maintain the Julian
Calendar.
"The Council, in full session, approved this Resolution of the Joint
Session."
In view of the Church's determined opposition to the calendar change,
the State did not impose its introduction for the time being. However, in
1922 the Bolsheviks succeeded in creating a schism within the Russian
Church - the so-called "Living Church" or renovationist schism. Since the
renovationists had been persuaded to introduce the new calendar, the
Bolsheviks decided that it was a good moment to try and introduce it also
into the True Church led by Patriarch Tikhon, especially since they now had
Tikhon in prison pending trial.
The pressure on the Patriarch was indeed enormous. Every day he was
visited by the GPU agent Tuchkov (Tikhon called him "an angel of Satan"),
who made blackmail threats to force him to make concessions to the State.
Being cut off from other true Christians, and able to glean information only
from the Soviet newspapers, he came to the conclusion that the renovationist
schism was increasing in strength. And then he heard that the "Pan-Orthodox
Council" meeting in Constantinople under the presidency of the Freemason
Patriarch Meletius Metaxakis had approved the introduction of the new
calendar. He did not know until later that not only the Russian
representatives, Archbishops Alexander and Anastasius, had rejected the
Council, but also the other Eastern Patriarchs and Serbia.
The Council in Constantinople ended on June 10, 1923. On June 11 the
Jew G. Yaroslavsky, president of the Antireligious Commission, wrote to the
Politburo and Stalin: "It is necessary immediately to pass the following
resolution on the case of Tikhon:.2) Tikhon must be informed that the
penalty meted out to him may be commuted if: (a) he makes a special
declaration that he repents of the crimes he has committed against Soviet
power and the working and peasant masses and that he now has a loyal
attitude to Soviet power; (b) he admits the justice of his being made to
answer in court for these crimes; (c) he walls himself openly and firmly
from all counter-revolutionary organisations, especially White Guard and
Monarchist organisations, both civil and religious; (d) he expresses his
sharply negative attitude to the new Karlovtsy Synod and its participants;
(e) he expresses his negative attitude to the attacks by Catholic clergy (in
the person of the Pope, also the Bishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of
Constantinople Meletius); (f) he expresses his agreement with some reforms
in the ecclesiastical sphere (for example, the new style)."
Why was the new calendar and other ecclesiastical reforms important to
the Bolsheviks? Because, as Yaroslavsky explained in another note written on
the same day: "his agreement with even one of these reforms (he has agreed
to recognise the new, Gregorian calendar) will make him a 'heretic' - an
innovator in the eyes of the True Orthodox."
Tikhon explained his decision to adopt the new calendar as follows:
"This demand was repeated many times, and was reinforced by the promise of a
more benevolent attitude on the part of the Government towards the Orthodox
Church and Her institutions in the case of our agreement and the threat of a
deterioration in these relations in the case of our refusal".
In July, 1923, the Patriarch was released from prison. A little later a
"Little Council" of bishops convened by him issued a decree introducing the
new calendar on October 2/15, 1923. However, when the Patriarch learned that
the patriarchates of Alexandria and Jerusalem, as well as the Russian Church
in Exile, were against the change, and when he saw that the Russian people
were also strongly opposed to his decree, as they had been to the
renovationists' similar decree some months earlier, he reversed his
decision. In spite of this, agents of the government posted up notices of
the now annulled decree on the introduction of the new calendar. But the
people saw in this the clear interference of the State in the matter, and so
no attention was paid to the decree.
Only in one part of the Russian Church was the new calendar
introduced - in Finland. In order to understand how this took place, we need
to go back in time. In February, 1921, since Finland was now no longer part
of the Russian State, Patriarch Tikhon granted the Finnish Church
administrative autonomy while remaining within the Russian Church. However,
on June 9, 1922, Patriarch Meletius of Constantinople uncanonically received
this autonomous Finnish Church into his jurisdiction. The excuse given here
was that Patriarch Tikhon was no longer free, and therefore, as Metropolitan
Anthony (Khrapovitsky) put it, Meletius "could do as he pleased".
But in July, 1923 Patriarch Tikhon was released from prison. And so, on
November 14/27, Patriarch Tikhon and the Russian Holy Synod, after listening
to a report by Archbishop Seraphim of Finland, decreed that "since his
Holiness Patriarch Tikhon has entered upon the administration of the Russian
Orthodox Church, the reason for which the Patriarch of Constantinople
considered it necessary temporarily to submit the Finnish Church to his
jurisdiction has now fallen away, and the Finnish eparchy must return under
the rule of the All-Russian Patriarch."
It was too late, however - Meletius was determined to keep the
territory he had seized from the Russian Church (and not only in Finland,
but also in Poland and the Baltic States). And already on September 3 he had
moved to force the great Russian monastery of Valaam, which was now within
the bounds of the Finnish State, to accept the new calendar. At a general
assembly of the 600 brothers, as Nun Angelina (Zhavoronkova) writes, "Abbot
Paulinus read out an epistle from Bishop Seraphim in which he said that both
Patriarchs Meletius of Constantinople and Tikhon of Moscow blessed Valaam to
change to the new style from October 4. Two days later Vladyka Seraphim
arrived. He was met by the objections of the brotherhood and the request
that they remain with the old style. This was refused to them, and less than
two weeks later five of the protesting brothers were forcibly expelled from
Valaam and deprived of the mantia.
". On June 25, 1924 the new Bishop of Karelia visited Valaam. In
November the Valaam monks presented him with a petition asking him to allow
them to keep the celebration at any rate of Pascha according to the old
style, but this, too, was refused them, and those who refused to obey the
decrees of the Finnish Church were threatened with exile from Valaam.
" Fr. Michael [Popov] was the spiritual father of the brotherhood at
this exceptionally difficult time for Valaam. He encouraged everyone to
remain faithful to the traditions of the Holy Orthodox Church. He often
served in distant sketes and deserts and encouraged other Fathers to follow
him. His nearest disciple and follower, Elder Michael the Younger, at that
time Fr. Timon, was one of the most zealous defenders of the Orthodox
calendar right until 1939, when the Valaam brotherhood was forced to leave
their beloved monastery.
"Secret resistance increased especially in 1925. Fr. Michael sent his
spiritual children by night with prosphoras to Gethsemane skete for Fr.
Timon and they unfailing fulfilled their obedience, covering six kilometres
every night. From the first days of the resistance the Gethsemane skete had
become the place where people gathered for services according to the Old
Church Calendar.
"The question of the calendar, the Valaam monks entered into
correspondence with the Athonite zealots of Holy Orthodoxy, the so-called
zealots, the elders of Karoulia, especially the learned monk Theodosius, who
even wrote a whole composition about the importance of the calendar
question. On Valaam Hieromonk Justinian, the main correspondent in this
correspondence, was a disciple of Elder Michael. While Elder Theodosius was
the last spiritual disciple by correspondence with Elder Theophanes the
Recluse.
"In the evening on the eve of the monastery's feast day of SS. Sergius
and Herman of Valaam, September 10, 1925, Metropolitan Germanus of
Thyateira, the representative of the Patriarch of Constantinople, arrived
[from London]. Having gathered together the brethren, he declared that the
new calendar was being introduced from now. On September 16 the brotherhood
sent to Sortavala their own representatives in the persons of Fr. Michael,
Fr. Joasaph the deputy, Fr. Jerome and the other older priests of the
monastery to talk with Metropolitan Germanus. With tears they besought him
to keep the old style in the monastery. In reply the metropolitan irritably
shouted at them. On September 20 Metropolitan Germanus accompanied by Bishop
Germanus arrived on the island to celebrate the all-night vigil. Half of the
brotherhood did not come to the service. He called the brotherhood to peace
and love.
"Immediately after this repressions began. The antimins were taken from
all the skete churches. Fr. Timon was transferred from the Gethsemane skete
to the main monastery. A little later Hieromonk Polycarp was exiled to
Russia to almost certain death in the concentration camps for his published
articles against the leadership of the monastery."
"On September 25, 1925," writes Schema-Monk Nicholas of Valaam, "there
was a division of people in Valaam as to the 'old' and 'new' style. Many of
the brothers remained true to the old style. Legal proceedings began. The
church administration arrived; there was a court with Abbot Paulinus in
charge. They began to summon the brothers one by one, and many were expelled
from the monastery. Then my turn also came. I went into the room, and there
sat Abbot Paulinus with others from the church administration. Father Abbot
said, 'Here is a slave of God; ask him.' One of them said that he would
speak and that everything should be recorded. They asked, 'Do you accept Fr.
Paulinus as Abbot?' 'Will you go to church services according to the new
calendar?' I could not answer this question; it was as if my tongue had
become paralysed. They hesitated and said, 'Well, why aren't you answering?'
I couldn't say anything. Then they said: 'Well, go on, slave of God, and
think this over.'
"I began to pray to the Mother of God, my 'Surety', in my heart. 'Tell
me and indicate my life's path: Which side should I go to, the new or old
style? Should I go to the cathedral or somewhere else?' And I, the sinful
one, prayed to the Mother of God during my obedience in the kitchen. When I
finished my evening obedience, I went to my cell and thought in the
simplicity of my heart, 'Why don't you answer me, Mother of God?' But the
grace of God did not abandon me, a sinner. He wants salvation for all.
Suddenly the cathedral appeared before me, the same as it is: the same
height, length and width. I was amazed at this miraculous apparition - how
could it enter my small cell? But my inner voice said to me: 'Everything is
possible with God. There is nothing impossible for Him.' 'Well,' I thought,
'one must go to church in the cathedral according to the new style.' Then,
as I was thinking thus, a blue curtain came down from above, in the middle
of which was a golden cross. The cathedral became invisible to me, and the
inner voice said to me: 'Go to the old style and hold to it.' And I heard a
woman's voice coming from above the corner: 'If you want to be saved, hold
fast to the traditions of the Holy Apostles and the Holy Fathers.' And then
the same thing was repeated a second time, and the third time the voice
said: 'If you want to be saved, keep fast to the tradition of the Holy
Apostles and Holy Fathers, but not these "wise" men.' After this miracle,
everything disappeared and I remained alone in my cell. My heart began to
rejoice that the Lord had indicated the path of salvation to me, according
to the prayers of the Mother of God."
"On September 12, 1926," continues Nun Angelina, "the former cathedral
elders of Valaam, who had remained faithful to patristic Orthodoxy, were
summoned to a new trial in Serdobol. The trial was pro forma, and 35 monks
were condemned to exile, while the abbot was to deal with the rest,
dispersing them among all the sketes.
"On October 9 the sentence was carried out. One of those exiled from
Valaam, Hieromonk Nicander, the former spiritual father of the famed Lesna
monastery, remembers:
"'We shall never forget that. sad day. Our own Abbot Paulinus and our
own monastic brothers handed us over to the police. For the sake of
temporary comfort, out of fear of men, they drowned out the voice of their
conscience and transgressed the holy canons of the Church. The day of our
exile that autumn was exceptionally quiet, Lake Ladoga was calm and the
first powdery snow covered Valaam. By eight o'clock in the morning we had
all gathered on the ferry. the Old Calendarist monks who remained, together
with some unwilling new calendarists, came to say goodbye to us; not a few
tears were shed on both sides. (Even the gendarme wept, remembered Fr.
Philemon.). How bitter it was for us to leave our native nest, but our souls
were at peace, for we felt that we were suffering for the sake of
righteousness and that God was with us.'
"On November 15 an Investigative Commission arrived at the monastery,
and in the course of four days interrogated each of the brothers on their
own, asking whether they recognised Bishop Germanus and whether they would
serve with him. Fr. Michael was defrocked by a church court, removed from
his obedience as Spiritual Father and exiled on December 15 to the distant
St. Herman skete. (According to the words of Fr. Athanasius, who left
memoirs of his elder, Fr. Michael was first exiled to Tikhvin island.)
Thence he was transferred to the Skete of St. John the Forerunner in 1926,
where he spent the following eight years [until his death on May 8, 1934],
suffering from a weakness of the heart in the severe conditions of the
strictest skete on Valaam. In that year 44 of the brothers were exiled and
48 left Valaam."
In 1939, when the Soviets captured Old Valaam, the spiritual life of
the great monastery came to an end.
Something should be said about this Bishop Germanus. He had been
consecrated as a vicar bishop for Finland by the Ecumenical Patriarch
Gregory IV, although he, the priest Aava, "was not only not tonsured", as
Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky) writes, "but not even a rasophore.
Moreover, this was done not only without the agreement of the Archbishop of
Finland, but in spite of his protest. By these actions the late Patriarch of
Constantinople violated a fundamental canon of the Church - the sixth canon
of the First Ecumenical Council [and many others], which states, 'If anyone
is consecrated bishop without the consent of his metropolitan, the Great
Council declares him not to be a bishop.' According to the twenty-eighth
canon of the Fourth Ecumenical Council, the patriarch cannot even place a
bishop in his diocese without the approval of the local metropolitan. Based
on precisely this same canon, the predecessors of Gregory vainly attempted
to realize his pretensions and legalize their claims to control. This
uncanonical 'bishop' Aava, once consecrated as bishop, placed a monastic
klobuk on his own head, and thus costumed, he appeared in the foreign
diocese of Finland. There he instigated the Lutheran government to persecute
the canonical Archbishop of Finland, Seraphim, who was respected by the
people. The Finnish government previously had requested the Ecumenical
Patriarch to confirm the most illegal of laws, namely that the secular
government of Finland would have the right to retire the Archbishop. The
government in fact followed through with the retirement, falsely claiming
that Archbishop Seraphim had not learned enough Finnish in the allotted
time. Heaven and earth were horrified at this illegal, tyrannical act of a
non-Orthodox government. Even more horrifying was that an Orthodox patriarch
had consented to such chicanery. To the scandal of the Orthodox and the evil
delight of the heterodox, the highly dubious Bishop Germanus (the former Fr.
Aava) strolled the streets of Finland in secular clothes, clean-shaven and
hair cut short, while the most worthy of bishops, Seraphim, crudely betrayed
by his false brother, languished in exile for the remainder of his life in a
tiny hut of a monastery on a stormy isle on Lake Ladoga."
After the Patriarch recovered from his mistake, he and the Russian
Church as a whole set themselves firmly against the new calendar. In 1924
Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky) of Kiev, the second hierarch in rank
after the Patriarch and President of the Synod of Bishops of the Russian
Church Abroad, set off on a seven-month trip to the East to muster support
against the renovationist reforms among his friends from before the
revolution - Patriarchs Photius of Alexandria, Gregory of Antioch and Damian
of Jerusalem. He also visited Mount Athos in spite of the opposition of the
Patriarch of Constantinople.
The three Eastern patriarchs, together with Patriarch Demetrius of
Serbia, spoke out strongly against the new calendar and the other reforms
introduced by Constantinople, and Metropolitan Anthony entertained hopes
that even the patriarch of Constantinople would reverse course. Thus in a
letter to Gregory's successor, Constantine VI, dated February 4/17, 1925, he
both defended Patriarch Tikhon and compared Meletius and Gregory to the
heretical patriarchs of Constantinople condemned by the Seven Ecumenical
Councils: "It is on this same path of disobedience to the Holy Church and
the canons that the two last predecessors of your Holiness descended."
Unfortunately, however, Metropolian Anthony did not take the decisive
and canonically correct course adopted by the Greek and Romanian Old
Calendarists of breaking communion with the renovationists. In 1925 he even
took part, with the patriarch of Constantinople, in the enthronement of the
new calendarist Freemason Miron as patriarch of Romania. So it is not
surprising that his actions were ultimately unsuccessful: the patriarch of
Constantinople never abandoned the new calendar, and the Churches of
Alexandria and Antioch both in time accepted it.
What was the attitude of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (ROCA) to
the Greek Old Calendarists? As we have seen, the Russian Church in all its
jurisdictions retained the Old Calendar, and in outlying parts of the former
Russian empire which came under the power of new calendarists, such as
Valaam and Bessarabia, Russians offered strong resistance to the innovation.
The ROCA condemned it, and in 1930 Metropolitan Anastasy concelebrated with
the leading Romanian Old Calendarist, Hieromonk Glycerius.
However, the first-hierarch of the ROCA, Metropolitan Anthony
(Khrapovitsky), adopted a more ambiguous position. In 1926, writing to the
Russian Athonite Hieroschemamonk Theodosius of Karoulia , he refused to
break communion with the new calendarists of the Constantinopolitan and
Greek Churches: "You know the 13th, 14th and 15th canons of the
First-and-Second Council, which speaks about separating oneself from a
Bishop or Patriarch after his conciliar condemnation. And then there is the
canon (the 15th), which says that that clergyman is worthy, not of
condemnation, but of praise, who breaks with links with him [the heretic]
for the sake of a heresy condemned by the holy councils or fathers., and
besides 'when he (that is, the first-hierarch) preaches heresy publicly and
teaches it openly in the Church'. But this, glory to God, neither
P[atriarch] Basil [III of Constantinople] nor [Archbishop] Chrysostom [of
Athens] have done yet. On the contrary, they insist on keeping the former
Paschalion, for only it, and not the Julian calendar itself was covered by
the curse of the councils. True, P[atriarch] Jeremiah in the 15th [correct:
16th] century and his successor in the 18th anathematised the calendar
itself, but this curse: 1) touches only his contemporaries and 2) does not
extend to those who are frightened to break communion with him, to which are
subjected only those who transgress the canonical Paschalion. Moreover (this
needs to be noted in any case), the main idea behind the day of Pascha is
that it should be celebrated by all the Christians (that is, the Orthodox)
on one and the same day throughout the inhabited world. True, I myself and
my brothers do not at all sympathise with the new calendar and modernism,
but we beseech the Athonite fathers not to be hasty in composing letters
(Romans 14). - Do not grieve about our readiness to go to the
C[onstantinople] Council. Of course, there will be no council, but if there
is, and if we go, as St. Flavian went to the robber cou[ncil], then, of
course, we will keep the faith and deliver the apostates to anathema. But as
long as the last word has not been spoken, as long as the whole Church has
not repeated the curses of Patriarch Jeremiah at an ecumenical council, we
must retain communion, so that we ourselves should not be deprived of
salvation, and, in aiming at a gnat, swallow a camel."
In another letter he admitted that akriveia was on Fr. Theodosius'
side, but argued in favour of oikonomia: "It is in vain that you torment
your conscience with doubts about continuing to be in communion with the
Constantinopolitan Patriarchate. Present this matter to the judgement of the
hierarchs, and until it has taken place remain in communion."
However, the wording of the 16th century Councils that anathematised
the new calendar does not support the metropolitan's interpretation:
"Whoever does not follow the customs of the Church,. but wishes to follow
the Gregorian Paschalion and Menaion [calendar],. let him be anathema."
Moreover, there is no word about the anathema applying only to the
generation of the anathematisers. In general, anathemas, as expressing the
unchanging decision of God with regard to something that is eternally false,
are necessarily applicable, if valid and canonical, in all places and at all
times.
In the same year of 1926, a different opinion to that of Metropolitan
Anthony, and one closer to the conciliar consciousness of the Orthodox
Church, was expressed by the second member of the ROCA Synod, Archbishop
Theophanes of Poltava and Pereyaslavl:
"Question. Have the pastors of the Orthodox Church not made special
judgements concerning the calendar?
"Answer. They have, many times - with regard to the introduction of the
new Roman calendar - both in private assemblies and in councils.
"A proof of this is the following. First of all, the Ecumenical
Patriarch Jeremiah II, who lived at the same time as the Roman calendar
reform, immediately, in 1582, together with his Synod condemned the new
Roman system of chronology as being not in agreement with the Tradition of
the Church. In the next year (1583), with the participation of Patriarchs
Sylvester of Alexandria and Sophronius VI of Jerusalem, he convened a Church
Council. This Council recognised the Gregorian calendar to be not in
agreement with the canons of the Universal Church and with the decree of the
First Ecumenical Council on the method of calculating the day of Holy
Pascha.
"Through the labours of this Council there appeared: a Conciliar tome,
which denounced the wrongness and unacceptability for the Orthodox Church of
the Roman calendar, and a canonical conciliar Decree - the Sigillion of
November 20, 1583. In this Sigillion all three of the above-mentioned
Patriarchs with their Synods called on the Orthodox firmly and unbendingly,
even to the shedding of their blood, to hold the Orthodox Menaion and Julian
Paschalion, threatening the transgressors of this with anathema, cutting
them off from the Church of Christ and the gathering of the faithful.
"In the course of the following three centuries: the 17th, 18th and
19th, a whole series of Ecumenical Patriarchs decisively expressed
themselves against the Gregorian calendar and, evaluating it in the spirit
of the conciliar decree of Patriarch Jeremiah II, counselled the Orthodox to
avoid it.
"Question. Is the introduction of the new calendar important or of
little importance?
"Answer. Very important, especially in connection with the Paschalion,
and it is an extreme disorder and ecclesiastical schism, which draws people
away from communion and unity with the whole Church of Christ, deprives them
of the grace of the Holy Spirit, shakes the dogma of the unity of the
Church, and, like Arius, tears the seamless robe of Christ, that is,
everywhere divides the Orthodox, depriving them of oneness of mind; breaks
the bond with Ecclesiastical Holy Tradition and makes them fall under
conciliar condemnation for despising Tradition.
"Question. How must the Orthodox relate to the new calendarist
schismatics, according to the canons?
"Answer. They must have no communion in prayer with them, even before
their conciliar condemnation.
"Question. What punishment is fitting, according to the Church canons,
for those who pray with the new calendarist schismatics?
"Answer. The same condemnation with them."
September 26/ October 9, 2003.
)
