Abp. Theophan of Poltava on the New Calendar

[Sean]

I found this in the news section of roacusa.org
It is significant since the Platina fathers, who champion Abp. Theophan, are the johnny-come-lately's of World Orthodoxy, and preach pietistical adherence to heretical hierarchs, while remaining aesthetically traditional in one's own observance of Orthodoxy.

Archbishop Theophan on the new calendar.
In 1926, Archbishop Theophanes of Poltava and Pereyaslavl, wrote the following in his work, "Short canonical judgements on chronology":

Question. Have the pastors of the Orthodox Church made a judgement 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.

[Archimandrit Nilos]

Archb. Theophan this great confessor of faith is very strict in his meaning about the innovation of the new calendar. But in on one side he is wrong. We must not are waiting of a conciliar iudgement. With the introduction of the new calendar the Greek Church is become i p s o f a c t o schismatical or heretical. The new calendar was condemned in the 16th century in the years of 1583, 1587 and 1593 from three Panorthodox Synods. Not a new synod was necessary.olor=olive][/color]

[Christophoros]

His Eminence, Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Florina believed - as everyone in the old calendar churches believed at the time - the State Church skirted the Pan-Orthodox anathematizations by implementing only a portion of the Gregorian calendar (the calendar of immovable feasts) but left the movable feasts, obviously including Pascha, unchanged. The Gregorian calendar was condemned in its entirety. By taking a portion of this condemned calendar and grafting it to a portion of the traditional calendar, they created, in essense, another new calendar that per se has yet to be formally condemned. This does not negate the seriousness or uncanonicity of the change, or address the motivation behind the change.

This is also the teaching of the Synod of Metropolitan Cyprian of Oropos and Fili (see "An Informatory Epistle concerning the Ecclesiological Identity of the Orthodox in Resistance to the Panheresy of Ecumenism," under the heading "Dogmatizing and Anathematizing Ignorantly," section12).

[Mark Templet]

Christophoros makes a good point about the "Revised Julian Calendar" used by the World Orthodox. Notwithstanding the lack of official condemnation of this particular calendar, it is clear that any calendar that deviated, even one day, from the Ecumenically accepted Julian Calendar confirmed as the Church's calendar at the First Ec. Coun., breaks the unity of the Church. When one church in one jurisdiction is not celebrating the same feast as the next church down the street then the catholicity of the Church is broken.
The Revised Calendar makes for some ridiculous contradictions, such as feast occurring prior to the period of fasting that is supposed to come before it. Worse yet, is what the OCA does now allowing each individual parish to choose its calendar! How dis-unitied can you get? Their answer is to just get ride of fasting. This is not what was envisioned by the Holy Fathers as how we should be living out the Orthodox faith today. No one could convince me otherwise.
REMEMBER, THE CHURCH STRAIGHTENS YOU OUT, YOU DON’T STRAIGHTEN THE CHURCH OUT!

[Sean]

His Eminence, Metropolitan Chrysostomos of Florina believed - as everyone in the old calendar churches believed at the time - the State Church skirted the Pan-Orthodox anathematizations by implementing only a portion of the Gregorian calendar (the calendar of immovable feasts) but left the movable feasts, obviously including Pascha, unchanged. The Gregorian calendar was condemned in its entirety. By taking a portion of this condemned calendar and grafting it to a portion of the traditional calendar, they created, in essense, another new calendar that per se has yet to be formally condemned. This does not negate the seriousness or uncanonicity of the change, or address the motivation behind the change.

This is also the teaching of the Synod of Metropolitan Cyprian of Oropos and Fili (see "An Informatory Epistle concerning the Ecclesiological Identity of the Orthodox in Resistance to the Panheresy of Ecumenism," under the heading "Dogmatizing and Anathematizing Ignorantly," section12).

Confessional encyclical (Proclamation) of 1935
Confessional encyclical of 1950
Confessional encyclical of 1972

PASTORAL ENCYCLICAL of 1935
TO THE ORTHODOX GREEK PEOPLE
Unjustly condemned by the schismatic Synod to deposition and a five-year imprisonment in monasteries, and seized by force by the government which has become the executor's arm of the Archdiocese, which by its mere word has placed itself above the divine canons, the Charter, and the Constitution of Greece because we had the courage and spiritual strength to raise the glorious and venerable banner of Orthodoxy, we consider it our pastoral duty before we depart to direct the following admonitions to you that adhere to the Orthodox festal calendar of our fathers:
While faithfully following the Apostle's admonition, "Stand fast and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or by our letter," do not cease from struggling by every lawful and Christian means for the strengthening and triumph of our sacred struggle, which looks to the restoration of the patristic and Orthodox festal calendar within the Church; only this can re-establish the diminished Orthodox authority of the Greek Church and bring back the peace and unity of the Orthodox Greek people.
By the judgments which the Lord knows, the majority of the hierarchy of the Greek Church, under the influence and initiative of its president, has placed the blot of schism upon what up until now had been its pure and truly Orthodox countenance, when it rejected the Orthodox festal calendar, which has been consecrated by the Seven Ecumenical Councils and ratified by the age-long practice of the Orthodox Eastern Church, and replaced it with the papal calendar.
Of course, this schism of the Orthodox Greek people was created by the majority of the hierarchy, which forgot its sacred and national mission and the old Greek [revolutionary] slogan: "Fight for Orthodoxy and for Greek liberty," and which, without the agreement of all the Orthodox Churches, introduced the papal festal calendar into our divine worship, thereby dividing not only the Orthodox Churches, but also the Orthodox Christians into two opposing camps. ? In assuming the pastoral of the Orthodox Greek populace that follows the Orthodox festal calendar of our fathers, and being conscious of the oath of faith that we took that we would keep all that we have received from the seven Ecumenical Councils, we abjure every innovation and can not but proclaim as schismatic the State Church, which has accepted the papal festal calendar which has been described by Pan-Orthodox Councils as an innovation of the heretics and as an arbitrary trampling underfoot of the divine and sacred canons of the ecclesiastical traditions.
On account of this, we counsel all who follow the Orthodox festal calendar to have no spiritual communion with the schismatic Church and its schismatic ministers, from whom the grace of the All-holy Spirit has departed, since they have set at nought the resolutions of the Fathers of the Seven Ecumenical Councils and the Pan-Orthodox Councils that condemned the Gregorian festal calendar. The fact that the Schismatic Church does not have grace and the Holy Spirit is confirmed by Saint Basil the Great, who says: "Even though the schismatics have not erred in doctrines, yet because Christ is the Head of the Body of the Church, according to the divine Apostle, and from Him are all the members quickened and receive spiritual increase, the [schismatics] have been torn from the consonance of the members of the Body and no longer have the grace of the Holy Spirit abiding with them. And how, indeed, can they impart to others that which they have not?"
While the Schismatic Church imposes oppressive and intolerable measures in order to violate our Orthodox conscience, we exhort you to endure all things and to preserve the Orthodox heritage intact and unstained, even as we received it from our pious Fathers, having us as luminous and fortifying examples, seeing we are not afraid — even in the waning years of our lives — to withstand with boldness and dignity the bigoted and medieval measures of our exile and imprisonment in monasteries, as it were in prisons.
Esteeming this as honor and glory and joy, according to the Apostle, who enjoins us to rejoice and boast in or sufferings in behalf of Christ, we counsel you also to have endurance and persistence in these griefs, and afflictions, and evils, and outrages to which you will be subjected by a Church that is schismatic; and ever hope in God, Who will not permit that you be tried above what you are able to endure, and Who, in His infinite and unfathomable long-suffering, will be well-pleased to enlighten those who, out of innocence, have been led astray and follow the papal festal calendar; and in the end may he grant you the triumph of Orthodoxy and the unity of those who bear the name of Christ, the Orthodox Greek people, for whom we struggle to the glory of Christ, Whose grace and infinite mercy be with you all.
June 21, 1935
+Germanos of Demetrias
+Chrysostomos of Florina
+Germanos of the Cyclades Islands

TO THE MOST REVEREND PRIESTS OF OUR MOST HOLY
CHURCH OF THE GENUINE ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS IN GREECE

Protocol Number 13 May 26, 1950
Beloved Children in the Lord,
Grace and peace be unto you from God, and prayer and blessing from us. ? Taking into consideration reports that some of our most pious priests are negligent in fulfilling the duties on the basis of the canons and the confession [of faith] we made in the year of Salvation, 1935, the Sacred Synod of our Most Holy Church undertakes to remind all of the following:
In the year of Salvation, 1935, we proclaimed the Church of the innovating new calendarists schismatic; we reiterate this proclamation once again and, consequently, we enjoin that the First Canon of Saint Basil the Great be applied, given that the mysteries celebrated by the new calendarists are — since they are schismatics — deprived of sanctifying grace.
Hence, you must not receive any new calendarists into the bosom of our Most Holy Church, nor, as a consequence, minister unto them without their having previously made a confession [of faith], whereby they condemn the innovation of the new calendarists and proclaim their Church as schismatic. Those who have been baptized by the innovators should be chrismated with holy chrism of Orthodox provenance, which also we have in sufficiency.

On this occasion we direct this final appeal to all Genuine Orthodox Christians, inviting them paternally to unite with us. The furtherance of our struggle for the piety of our Fathers demands this and is the fervent desire of all of us.
In extending this invitation to you, we do away with the stumbling-blocks that were created through our responsibility, and to this end we revoke and repudiate whatever was written or spoken by us from 1937 until today, either in sermons, pronouncements, publications, or encyclicals, and whatever was incompatible with or contrary to the principles of the Eastern Orthodox Church of Christ and our sacred struggle in behalf of Orthodoxy, as it was proclaimed in the encyclical published by the Sacred Synod in the year 1935, without any addition or omission, including even the technical phrase "potentially and in actuality".
These things do we affirm this final time for the sake of the scandalized Christians, whose spiritual salvation we desire; and on this occasion we [again] proclaim that all of us must preserve intact even to the end of our days the confession we made in 1935, invoking God's mercy for every deviation.
Wherefore, let us stand well.
With fervent prayers,
The Sacred Synod.
The President
+Chrysostomos, formerly Metropolitan of Florina
The Members
+Germanos, Metropolitan of the Cyclades Islands
+Christopher, Metropolitan of Christianopolis
+Polycarp, Metropolitan of Diavlia

ENCYCLICAL OF THE TRUE ORTHODOX CHURCH OF GREECE?TO THE SACRED CLERGY OF OUR CHURCH
Protocol Number 1191 Athens, June 5, 1974
Most Righteous and Reverend Ministers of the Most High:
Grace, mercy and peace be unto you from God, and prayer and blessing from us.
By means of this present Encyclical we address ourselves to you, bringing to your remembrance of an imperative duty which should distinguish your course of action, in obedience to whatsoever was delivered unto us from of old by the God-bearing Fathers.
Thus, we enjoin you yet once again to limit your ministrations only to the members of our Church, lest you set a stumbling-block before the brethren and, as ones who do not believe those things that are professed by us, draw upon yourselves the criticism of the common people.
The celebration of a Mystery and the giving of Holy Communion to new calendarists were forbidden from the time that the schism created by the State Church began. Therefore, it is necessary that you uphold this position without deviation, in obedience to the understanding of all that has been handed down to us in the Church. Should any from the new calendar desire to ender our ranks, it is absolutely necessary that they make a confession of Faith in regard to all that has been transmitted unto us by our God-bearing Fathers, and that they renounce and condemn every heresy and innovation, among which is the new calendar in the Greek Church, which became schismatic from its acceptance thereof in 1924 until the present, according to the very confession of the innovator, Archbishop Chrysostomos Papadopoulos, and, as a consequence, its mysteries are deprived of sanctifying grace.
Also, regarding those who have been baptized in the aforementioned Church and have not returned to piety, it is necessary that, according to the First Canon of Saint Basil the Great, they be re-chrismated with holy chrism of canonical provenance.
As a consequence of the above, we enjoin that, in conformance with the holy and sacred canons, you henceforth cease any sacramental ministrations you might have tendered anyone coming from the New Calendar Church, unless the above-mentioned procedure is first implemented, since, otherwise, the sanctions predetermined by the sacred canons will be imposed upon those who transgress it.
The President

• Archbishop Auxentios
  The Sacred Synod?
  +Akakios of Diavlia and Attica
  +Gerontios of Piraeus and Salamina
  +Paisios of Euripus and Euboea
  +Chrysostomos of Thessalonica
  +Kallinikos of Thavmakos
  +Akakios of Canada
  +Gabriel of the Cyclades Islands
  +Anthony of Megaris

[Constantine]

"To all things innovated and enacted contrary to the Church tradition, teaching, and institution of the holy and ever-memorable fathers, or to anything henceforth so enacted, ANATHEMA."
-From the Synodicon of the Holy Spirit

"If anyone breaks any ecclesiastical tradition, written or unwritten, let him be anathema"
-Seventh Ecumenical Synod

[Christophoros]

Sean's posting of the Encyclicals of 1935, 1950 and 1974 reveals an interested attribute of Metropolitan Chrysostomos of blessed memory. In private correspondence, he repeatedly stressed his own so-called "moderate" (now known as "Cyprianite") views on the calendar struggle, even after publicly affirming the official "extremist" stance of the True Orthodox Church of Greece. When his views became a hinderance to unity, he set them aside (publicly speaking) in order to further ecclesiastical unity. He put unity above what he believed to be a sound confession of faith on a controversial matter. That was the importance of unity for him - and the Holy Fathers. Something for us all to consider.