Holiness...in graceless "World Orthodoxy" ?

[GOCTheophan]

[What was Elder Silouan???

In a "grey area". It is hard to say whether he was in the Church or not.

Theophan.

[Constantine]

Unfortunatly I disagree with you Theophan, in Orthodoxy there is no such thing as a "grey area". Even Christ states "yes or no, black or white anything else is from the evil one"

My opinion on this matter is as follows, it is possible for someone to live a Saintly life but not be a Saint. Just as when a moslem goes to the relics of St. John the Baptist and asks for a miracle, and it happens, it does not mean the moslem faith is the correct faith, Christ is rewarding the moslem for the respect and love towards St. John th Baptist. The bible states many times "for they shall have their reward" , well this reward shall be aquired here and not in the afterlife. I believe the same applies for new calenderists and world orthodoxy, the mysteries are graceless but their are individuals who love Christ so much, pray and worship him so much, and for this beacause Christ is the perfect Judge, Christ shall reward them, BUT the bottom line is where these people commune(world orthodoxy), which puts them outside of the True Orthodox Church.

Constantine

[GOCTheophan]

Unfortunatly I disagree with you Theophan, in Orthodoxy there is no such thing as a "grey area". Even Christ states "yes or no, black or white anything else is from the evil one"
Constantine

In God's eyes there is no "grey area"- I agree with you there. However how many of us can see with those? Yes we do have canons and dogmas which we know do reflect God's will and we have to follow them but we also have cases such as that of St Isaac the Syrian who has been recognised as a Saint by Holy Church who also belonged to a "grey area" so much so that impious modern acedemics claim he was a nestorian.

Elder Silouan died in 1938 and spent his whole life on the Old calendar on Mount Athos at a time when it still seemed possible that the State Church of Greece would pull back from Apostasy. Today we know that the EP is nothing but a corpse animated by the demons of Freemasonary and outside of an amazing miracle of God will never return to Orthodoxy. Yes he should have joined the non-commemorators outside of the big monastries and I for one wouldnt venerate him just in case.

However I dont think he can be classed in the same ranks as a modernist heretic such as Justin Popovich who was definitely a "faux zealot" and is recognised as such by the True Orthodox Church of Serbia.

Theophan.

[ioannis]

Yes he should have joined the non-commemorators outside of the big monastries and I for one wouldnt venerate him just in case.

For the record, I am pretty sure none of the monasteries on Mt. Athos commemorated the EP at this time. I don't think any of them did for until it was promised to them that there would be a council. Then they did commemorate for awhile, but again withdrew when it seemed likely that there would not be a council. Then in the 60's, one by one, they started to commemorate again, until now, all do except Esphigmenou.

So you see, Esphigmenou is nothing new, not commemorating has been the norm last century.

[Priest Siluan]

Well, according to different sources 50% of the population on the Mount Athos is non commemorating.