As delegates to the North American Faith and Order Study Conference,
appointed by His Eminence, Archbishop Michael, to represent the Greek
Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America, we want to make the
following preliminary statements.
We are glad to take part in a
study-conference, devoted to such a basic need of the Christian World as
Unity. All Christians should seek Unity. On the other hand, we feel
that the whole program of the forthcoming discussion has been framed
from a point of view which we cannot conscientiously admit. "The Unity
we seek" is for us a given Unity which has never been lost, and, as a
Divine gift and an essential mark of Christian existence, could not have
been lost. This unity in the Church of Christ is for us a Unity in the
Historical Church, in the fullness of faith, in the fullness of
continuous sacramental life. For us, this Unity is embodied in the
Orthodox Church, which kept, catholikos and anelleipos, both the
integrity of the Apostolic Faith and the integrity of the Apostolic
Order.
Our share in the study of Christian Unity is determined by
our firm conviction that this Unity can be found only in the fellowship
of the Historical Church, preserving faithfully the catholic tradition,
both in doctrine and in order. We cannot commit ourselves to any
discussion of these basic assumptions, as if they were but hypothetical
or problematic. We begin with a clear conception of the Church’s Unity,
which we believe has been embodied and realized in the age-long history
of the Orthodox Church, without any change or break since the times when
the visible Unity of Christendom was an obvious fact and was attested
and witnessed to by an ecumenical unanimity, in the age of the
Ecumenical Councils.
We admit, of course, that the Unity of
Christendom has been disrupted, that the unity of faith and the
integrity of order have been sorely broken. But we do not admit that the
Unity of the Church, and precisely of the "visible" and historical
Church, has ever been broken or lost, so as to now be a problem of
search and discovery. The problem of Unity is for us, therefore, the
problem of the return to the fullness of Faith and Order, in full
faithfulness to the message of Scripture and Tradition and in the
obedience to the will of God: "that all may be one".
Long before
the breakup of the unity of Western Christendom, the Orthodox Church has
had a keen sense of the essential importance of the oneness of
Christian believers and from her very inception she has deplored
divisions within the Christian world. As in the past, so in the present,
she laments disunity among those who claim to be followers of Jesus
Christ Whose purpose in the world was to unite all believers into one
body. The Orthodox Church feels that, since she has been unassociated
with the events related to the breakdown of religious unity in the West,
she bears a special responsibility to contribute toward the restoration
of the Christian unity which alone can render the message of the Gospel
effective in a world troubled by threats of world conflict and general
uncertainty over the future.
It is with humility that we voice
the conviction that the Orthodox Church can make a special contribution
to the cause of Christian unity, because since Pentecost she has
possessed the true unity intended by Christ. It is with this conviction
that the Orthodox Church is always prepared to meet with Christians of
other communions in inter-confessional deliberations. She rejoices over
the fact that she is able to join those of other denominations in
ecumenical conversations that aim at removing the barriers to Christian
unity. However, we feel compelled in all honesty, as representatives of
the Orthodox Church, to confess that we must qualify our participation,
as necessitated by the historic faith and practice of our Church, and
also state the general position that must be taken at this
interdenominational conference.
In considering firstly "the
nature of the unity we seek," we wish to begin by making clear that our
approach is at variance with that usually advocated and ordinarily
expected by participating representatives. The Orthodox Church teaches
that the unity of the Church has not been lost, because she is the Body
of Christ, and, as such, can never be divided. It is Christ as her head
and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit that secure the unity of the
Church throughout the ages.
The presence of human imperfection
among her members is powerless to obliterate the unity, for Christ
Himself promised that the "gates of hell shall not prevail against the
Church." Satan has always sown tares in the field of the Lord and the
forces of disunity have often threatened but have never actually
succeeded in dividing the Church. No power can be mightier than the
omnipotent will of Christ Who founded one Church only in order to bring
men into unity with God. Oneness is an essential mark of the Church.
If
it be true that Christ founded the Church as a means of unifying men
divided by sin, then it must naturally follow that the unity of the
Church was preserved by His divine omnipotence. Unity, therefore, is not
just a promise, or a potentiality, but belongs to the very nature of
the Church. It is not something which has been lost and which should be
recovered, but rather it is a permanent character of the structure of
the Church.
Christian love impels us to speak candidly of our
conviction that the Orthodox Church has not lost the unity of the Church
intended by Christ, for she represents the oneness which in Western
Christendom has only been a potentiality. The Orthodox Church teaches
that she has no need to search for a "lost unity," because her historic
consciousness dictates that she is the Una Sancta and that all Christian
groups outside the Orthodox Church can recover their unity only by
entering into the bosom of that Church which preserved its identity with
early Christianity.
These are claims that arise not from
presumptuousness, but from an inner historical awareness of the Orthodox
Church. Indeed, this is the special message of Eastern Orthodoxy to a
divided Western Christendom.
The Orthodox Church true to her
historical consciousness declares that she has maintained an unbroken
continuity with the Church of Pentecost by preserving the Apostolic
faith and polity unadulterated. She has kept the "faith once delivered
unto the saints" free from the distortions of human innovations.
Man-made doctrines have never found their way into the Orthodox Church,
since she has no necessary association in history with the name of one
single father or theologian. She owes the fullness and the guarantee of
unity and infallibility to the operation of the Holy Spirit and not to
the service of one individual. It is for this reason that she has never
felt the need for what is known as "a return to the purity of the
Apostolic faith." She maintains the necessary balance between freedom
and authority and thus avoids the extremes of absolutism and
individualism both of which have done violence to Christian unity.
We
re-assert what was declared at Evanston and what has been made known in
the past at all interdenominational conferences attended by delegates
of the Orthodox Church. It is not due to our personal merit, but to
divine condescension that we represent the Orthodox Church and are able
to give expression to her claims. We are bound in conscience to state
explicitly what is logically inferred; that all other bodies have been
directly or indirectly separated from the Orthodox Church. Unity from
the Orthodox standpoint means a return of the separated bodies to the
historical Orthodox, One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.
The
unity which Orthodoxy represents rests on identity of faith, order, and
worship. All three aspects of the life of the Church are outwardly
safeguarded by the reality of the unbroken succession of bishops which
is the assurance of the Church's uninterrupted continuity with apostolic
origins. This means that the uncompromised fullness of the Church
requires the preservation of both its episcopal structure and
sacramental life. Adhering tenaciously to her Apostolic heritage, the
Orthodox Church holds that no true unity is possible where episcopacy
and sacraments are absent, and grieves over the fact that both
institutions have either been discarded or distorted in certain quarters
of Christendom. Any agreement on faith must rest on the authority of
the enactments of the seven Ecumenical Councils which represent the mind
of the one undivided Church of antiquity and the subsequent tradition
as safeguarded in the life of the Orthodox Church.
We regret that
the most vital problem of Ministry and that of the Apostolic
Succession, without which to our mind there is neither unity, nor
church, were not included in the program of the Conference. All problems
of Order seem to be missing in the program. These, in our opinion, are
basic for any study of Unity.
Visible unity expressed in
organizational union does not destroy the centrality of the spirit among
believers, but rather testifies to the reality of the oneness of the
Spirit. Where there is the fullness of the Spirit, there too will
outward amity be found. From Apostolic times the unity of Christian
believers was manifested by a visible, organizational structure. It is
the unity in the Holy Spirit that is expressed in a unified visible
organization.
The Holy Eucharist, as the chief act of worship, is
the outward affirmation of the inner relation rising from unity in the
Holy Spirit. But this unity involves a consensus of faith among those
participating. Intercommunion, therefore, is possible only when there is
agreement of faith. Common worship in every case must presuppose a
common faith. The Orthodox Church maintains that worship of any nature
cannot be sincere unless there is oneness of faith among those
participating. It is with this belief that the Orthodox hesitate to
share in Joint prayer services and strictly refrain from attending
interdenominational Communion Services.
A common faith and a
common worship are inseparable in the historical continuity of the
Orthodox Church. However, in isolation neither can be preserved integral
and intact. Both must be kept in organic and inner relationship with
each other. It is for this reason that Christian unity cannot be
realized merely by determining what articles of faith or what creed
should be regarded as constituting the basis of unity. In addition to
subscribing to certain doctrines of faith, it is necessary to achieve
the experience of a common tradition or communis sensus fidelium
preserved through common worship within the historic framework of the
Orthodox Church. There can be no true unanimity of faith unless that
faith remains within the life and sacred tradition of the Church which
is identical throughout the ages. It is in the experience of worship
that we affirm the true faith, and conversely, it is in the recognition
of a common faith that we secure the reality of worship in spirit and in
truth.
Thus the Orthodox Church in each locality insists on
agreement of faith and worship before it will consider sharing in any
interdenominational activity. Doctrinal differences constitute an
obstacle in the way of unrestricted participation in such activities. In
order to safeguard the purity of the faith and the integrity of the
liturgical and spiritual life of the Orthodox Church, abstinence from
interdenominational activities is encouraged on a local level. There is
no phase of the Church’s life unrelated to her faith. Intercommunion
with another church must be grounded on a consensus of faith and a
common understanding of the sacramental life. The Holy Eucharist
especially must be the liturgical demonstration of the unity of faith.
We
are fully aware of deep divergences which separate Christian
denominations from each other, in all fields of Christian life and
existence, in the understanding of faith, in the shaping of life, in the
habits of worship. We are seeking, accordingly, an unanimity in faith,
an identity of order, a fellowship in prayer. But for us all the three
are organically linked together. Communion in worship is only possible
in the unity of faiths. Communion presupposes Unity. Therefore, the term
"Intercommunion" seems to us an epitome of that conception which we are
compelled to reject. An "intercommunion" presupposes the existence of
several separate and separated denominations, which join occasionally in
certain common acts or actions. In the true Unity of Christ’s Church
there is no room for several "denominations." There is, therefore, no
room for "'intercommunion." When all are truly united in the Apostolic
Faith and Order, there will be all-inclusive Communion and Fellowship in
all things.
It has been stated by the Orthodox delegates already
in Edinburgh, in 1937, that many problems are presented at Faith and
Order Conferences in a manner and in a setting which are utterly
uncongenial to the Orthodox. We again must repeat the same statement
now. But again, as years ago in Edinburgh, we want to testify our
readiness and willingness to participate in study, in order that the
Truth of the Gospel and the fullness of the Apostolic Tradition may be
brought to the knowledge of all who, truly, unselfishly, and devoutedly
seek Unity in Our Blessed Lord and His Holy Church, One, Catholic, and
Apostolic.
Bishop Athenagoras Kokkinakis, Chairman
Very Rev Georges Florovsky
Very Rev Eusebius A. Stephanou
Rev George Tsoumas
Rev John A. Poulos
Rev John Hondras
Rev George P. Gallos
September 3-10, 1957
Oberlin Ohio
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