As an American convert in the ROCOR struggling with the impending unification of the ROCOR and the MP, I was somewhat perplexed, and not a little amused, to find this article on Interfax. I never realized until today that I am, apparently, a "CIA-influenced Neo-Protestant," engaged in the potential subversion of Vladimir Putin's vision of a greater, pan-Slavic Russian Reich. I thought that I was simply engaged in a bewildered review of St. Cyril of Kazan's letters from the early 1930's, in which he indicated that Metropolitan Sergius was clearly not designated as a Locum Tenans of the Patriarchate by (Patriarch) St. Tikhon. As clearly as I can understand St. Cyril's epistles, the Moscow Patriarchy would cease to have legitimate canonical status if a new Patriarch was not freely elected by the survivng heirarchs (almost all of whom were imprisoned at the time) prior to the death of the three Locum Tenans heirarchs designated by St. Tikhon--including St. Cyril, himself. Has such an election ever occurred?
Sincerely,
--a bewildered, CIA-influenced neo-Protestant
15 January 2007, 17:16
Stalling on signing Act of Canonical Communion profitable for US intelligence services - Union of Orthodox Citizens
Moscow, January 15, Interfax - Standing behind the calls 'to wait a little' with signing the Act of Canonical Communion between the Moscow Patriarchate and the Russian Church Abroad are forces unfriendly to Russia, Kirill Frolov, press secretary of the Union of Orthodox Citizens, has said to Interfax on Monday.
Bishop Gabriel of Manhattan, secretary of the ROCOR Synod, in a talk to the New York-based Novoye Russkoye Slovo the other day described the signing of the Act as 'premature' and called not to be surprised if, as a result of the signing, 'some parishes (of the ROCOR - IF) will begin looking for another jurisdiction, while some parishioners will simply stop coming to the church'.
'Those members of the Church Abroad who have fallen victim to the CIA men's propaganda should be given an opportunity for visiting Russia and the Russian church until May 17, 2007, so that they may see the Orthodox life and Russia and that the Russian Church is free and that there is no obstacles whatsoever for communion with it', Frolov said commenting on the bishop's statement.
He maintains that Bishop Gabriel 'is in close contact with a group of anti-Russia-minded tycoons - Gusinsky and Malashenko, who is responsible for showing the sacrilegious anti-Christian Last Temptation on the NTV channel, and that the bishop's statements concerning the Act sound false and ridiculous, for he himself provokes the flock and then says they are 'not ready'.
Who is 'not ready and will never be ready' is also a part of the flock abroad, Frolov believes, 'led by Yevgeniy Magerovsky, a US secret service colonel with a 35 year-long experience, who does not at all conceal but rather prides himself on his belonging to the US special services'.
A handful of people led by him blackmails the Synod of the Church Abroad by threats to go into schism if the Act is signed. This blackmail is misplaced because the Russian Church hardly needs this CIA-influenced 'flock' who struggle with Orthodoxy by supporting the anti-church Orange Revolution in Ukraine and slander Russia now being inchurched!' the representative of the Union of Orthodox Citizens stated.
These faithful of the ROCOR, he believes, 'are actually neo-Protestants who argue that it is the sheep who must tend pastors'.
Frolov also pointed to the 'odious' nature of the newspaper that has published the comments of the ROCOR bishop and to its sympathy for 'the orange' mass media in Ukraine.
