Church Greek Orthodox Church

[josemiguel]

Could I do a standup routine in Russia where I'm critical of Putin and state security without being imprisoned and/disappeared?

Yes, this happens all the time. Russia isn't like the west where supporting traditional marriage gets you fired and unpersoned.
America has been more of a police state for the past 22 years than Russia under Putin ever has been. Does Russia have one government agency pumping the streets with Crack and another imprisoning the addicts? Plus statistically by volume of value of theft the group of people most likely to rob me in America is police via civil asset forfeiture.

A couple things to consider:

As opposed to the MP who has the unique privilege of needing permission from Putin while also appearing to be dictated by the FSB?

1 you make a way out of left field claim

we both don't have sources available to prove either my claim for the MP or Michael's for GOARCH

2 you admit you don't have any sources or evidence of any kind to support your claim

The control by their secular government authorities over church affairs however are as bad as wokism in my eyes as a layman.

Two sides of the same coin at the end of the

3 wokism, which is heresy, you put on par with a state's sinful interference. Not only that, but as referred to earlier, putting the gravest error of schism on as being equal to state interference.

Now, for 1 and 2, I also do have a habit of saying "out-there" claims like saying the Founding Fathers of the US were Satanists. I can't expect normies to accept this at face value unless they're Mexican. For American normies I usually start by asking why did Benjamin Franklin have children's bodies buried under his house, and what's that hellfire club he was a member of all about? Rinse and repeat for Jefferson, Adams, Paine etc.

3 is the bigger issue. Schism is treated by the early canons and Fathers as worse than heresy, and communing and concelebrating with Schismatics is as grave. It is good you found a solid Greek parish to make your home, throwing unfounded accusations at MP does you no good in defending your home parish. Don't be suprised by pushback especially from those of us who trained in political science, international relations or history, in particular AngloAmerican history.

God save you in finding a solid in-person priest.

 

[Mackerel snapper]

Wasn’t that patriarchate extinguished by the Tsar then reinstituted by the Communists? Just a puppet of the state.

 

[DanielH]

Wasn’t that patriarchate extinguished by the Tsar then reinstituted by the Communists? Just a puppet of the state.

No, this is libelous. The council that reinstituted the patriarchate started several months before the civil war even began, and was planned many years in advance. Beyond that, Patriarch St. Tikhon was chosen by lot, resisted the communists, and instituted a system of three locum tenens to the Patriarch in the absence of the Patriarch so that all power would not be concentrated under one fallible person during a time of persecution. There was a literal puppet "church," the "Living Church," created by the communists, which died out due to a complete lack of grace and abundance of absurdity. The MP did suffer pressure from the Bolsheviks, but to insinuate that from the beginning, from the 1917 local council, that it was a puppet of the communists, is a completely garbage statement. That council even condemned the actions of the Bolsheviks.

Just a few minutes of research was all it took to find this out.

 

[Cavalier]

Martin Luther: “The Greeks [Orthodox] are not heretics or schismatics but the most Christian people and the best followers of the Gospel on earth.” — (Luther, Martin (1999). Vol. 32: Luther’s Works, vol. 32: Career of the Reformer II)

Martin Luther was Orthodox.

Luther was never a member of or in communion with the Orthodox Church.

 

[Cavalier]

Coming from a trad catholic, that is a helluva complement.

I discovered these guys recently: https://lutheranorthodoxchurch.org/

I reached out to them and their goal was to achieve exactly what Martin and Philipp we're trying to achieve. It's orthodoxy wrapped in the Lutheran German high church tradition with a roccor priest advisor on their synod board ensuring they are keeping everything valid. I would join them if one existed nearby but sadly they are very small.

When a Trad Catholic makes a statement that Luther was Orthodox he means it as a slur against Orthodoxy.

 

[Mackerel snapper]

No, this is libelous. The council that reinstituted the patriarchate started several months before the civil war even began, and was planned many years in advance. Beyond that, Patriarch St. Tikhon was chosen by lot, resisted the communists, and instituted a system of three locum tenens to the Patriarch in the absence of the Patriarch so that all power would not be concentrated under one fallible person during a time of persecution. There was a literal puppet "church," the "Living Church," created by the communists, which died out due to a complete lack of grace and abundance of absurdity. The MP did suffer pressure from the Bolsheviks, but to insinuate that from the beginning, from the 1917 local council, that it was a puppet of the communists, is a completely garbage statement. That council even condemned the actions of the Bolsheviks.

Just a few minutes of research was all it took to find this out.

What is Sergianism?
The current head of the Russian Orthodox Church is not only former KGB, he's also a billionaire from tobacco smuggling:

Why Patriarch Kyrill was called "Tobacco Metropolitan"

Patriarch Kirill: Why he was called the "Tobacco Metropolitan" Many Westerners know little about the new Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox ...

rocorhistory.blogspot.com

 

[DanielH]

What is Sergianism?

Now I'm a search engine? It's weakness of men submitting to state pressure contrary to Church teachings, and your comment is a shifting of goalposts because your other comment accusing the MP of being a communist puppet from the very beginning was shown to be factually incorrect.

 

[Mackerel snapper]

What is Sergianism?

Never mind, I’ll answer that myself:

The expression Sergianism [ru], which designates a policy of unconditional loyalty to the Soviet regime practised by the leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church, and is associated with his 1927 declaration [ru], is derived from his name[1] (see the Declaration of loyalty toward the USSR section below).

---

DECLARATION OF LOYALTY TOWARD THE USSR
Seeking to convince Soviet authorities to stop the campaign of terror and persecution against the Church, Sergius, acting patriarchal locuk tenens, tried to look for ways of peaceful reconciliation with the government. On July 29, 1927, he issued his famous declaration [ru]: an encyclical letter where he professed the absolute loyalty of the Russian Orthodox Church to the Soviet Union and to its government's interests. In it, he namely stated:

We need to show, not in words but in deeds, that not only those who are indifferent to Orthodox Christianity, not only those who have betrayed it, but also its most zealous adherents, for whom it is dear as truth and life, with all its dogmas and traditions, with all its canonical and liturgicalstructure, can be faithful citizens of the Soviet Union, loyal to the Soviet government. We want to be Orthodox and at the same time recognize the Soviet Union as our civil motherland, whose joys and successes are our joys and successes and whose failures are our failures. Any blow directed at the Union, be it a war, a boycott, some kind of social disaster, or just a murder from around the corner, like the Warsaw one, is recognized by us as a blow directed at us.[4][5]
— Epistle to Pastors and their Flocks, 1927

This declaration, sparked an immediate controversy among the Russian Eastern Orthodox, many of whom (including many notable and respected bishops in prisons and exile) broke communion with Sergius. This attitude of submission to the USSR is sometimes derogatorily called "Sergianism [ru]", after Met. Sergius and his declaration, and is to this day deemed by some Eastern Orthodox Christians, especially True Orthodox, as a heresy.

Sergius also formed the Temporary Patriarchal Council (later called Synod) which received recognition from the Soviet government. In 1934, Sergius assumed a more elevated title of "His Beatitude, Metropolitan of Moscow and Kolomna" and in 1936, following a false report of Metropolitan Peter of Krutitsy's death in prison (in fact, he was still alive until his execution in 1937), Sergius assumed the position of patriarchal locum tenens. Despite his pledges that the ROC would not interfere in secular affairs and would be loyal to the state, the arrests and executions of Eastern Orthodox clergy by the GPU and later the NKVD, destruction of Eastern Orthodox cathedrals, churches, icons, seminaries and so on were commonplace throughout the 1920s and 1930s. Before the 1941 German invasion, for the entire USSR, only 4 bishops remained who were not imprisoned or exiled. Likewise, of the 50,000 Russian Orthodox priests in 1918, only 500 remained by 1935.[6]

Patriarchal locum tenens Peter of Krutitsy died in 1937.

Only after the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 did Joseph Stalin finally start to scale back the anti-religious campaign, needing the moral support of the Church during the war. In the early hours of September 5, 1943, Stalin met with the three chief hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church and promised some concessions to religion in exchange for their loyalty and assistance. Among the concessions were the permission to open the Moscow Theological Seminary and Academy, the release of imprisoned clerics, the return of some church property, including the famous Troitse-Sergiyeva Lavra. In return, the Soviet government put the Church under the control of its secret services.

 

[OrthoSerb]

Now I'm a search engine? It's weakness of men submitting to state pressure contrary to Church teachings, and your comment is a shifting of goalposts because your other comment accusing the MP of being a communist puppet from the very beginning was shown to be factually incorrect.

He's the same sede troll that keeps resurfacing. There's a few give aways, he's been reported.

 

[DanielH]

He's the same sede troll that keeps resurfacing. There's a few give aways, he's been reported.

I figured. If it is that guy, I don't know why he keeps coming back, just makes sedevacantism look bad. He cannot point to anything good about his own position, all he can do is point to the faults of others. "Oh did you know this about Patriarch Kirill? Oh what about Sergianism? Did you know this and that about Pope Francis and Cardinal so-and-so? Look how bad they all are, guess you have to give us money!"

 

[Mackerel snapper]

Are you OK with the KGB still running the Russian Orthodox Church?

 

[DanielH]

Are you OK with the KGB still running the Russian Orthodox Church?

Ironically, if all I saw was the text of your last few posts in a separate document, I'd assume it came from the US State Department.

 

[Cavalier]

I figured. If it is that guy, I don't know why he keeps coming back, just makes sedevacantism look bad. He cannot point to anything good about his own position, all he can do is point to the faults of others. "Oh did you know this about Patriarch Kirill? Oh what about Sergianism? Did you know this and that about Pope Francis and Cardinal so-and-so? Look how bad they all are, guess you have to give us money!"

It is impossible to make sedevacantism look good. After all the whole point of the Roman Catholic schism from the Orthodox Church is the belief in the Pope. To not follow the Pope, yet still remain with all the errors accrued to the Western Church since the schism, while refusing to accept and join Orthodoxy, takes a special kind of stubbornness and twisted logic.

 

[Mackerel snapper]

Ironically, if all I saw was the text of your last few posts in a separate document, I'd assume it came from the US State Department.

Of course you would!

 

[JustinHS]

Coming from a trad catholic, that is a helluva complement.

I discovered these guys recently: https://lutheranorthodoxchurch.org/

I reached out to them and their goal was to achieve exactly what Martin and Philipp we're trying to achieve. It's orthodoxy wrapped in the Lutheran German high church tradition with a roccor priest advisor on their synod board ensuring they are keeping everything valid. I would join them if one existed nearby but sadly they are very small.

If you want Orthodoxy wrapped in a Latin rite, there is Western Rite Orthodoxy:



Which looks like a Latin mass sans commemoration of the Pope.

 

[Samseau]

Luther was never a member of or in communion with the Orthodox Church.

Yes and? The Catholics were persecuting those who tried to leave their heretical rule at the time, it's no surprise no communion ever happened. Politics kept things from happening, and after Luther passed the Protestant churches became flooded with charlatans. 100% Catholicism's fault. Spanish troops were flooding into Germany at that time massacring German peasants, Catholics did everything they could to keep Protestants from uniting with their long rivals, the Orthodox, at that time.

 

[Cavalier]

Yes and? The Catholics were persecuting those who tried to leave their heretical rule at the time, it's no surprise no communion ever happened. Politics kept things from happening, and after Luther passed the Protestant churches became flooded with charlatans. 100% Catholicism's fault. Spanish troops were flooding into Germany at that time massacring German peasants, Catholics did everything they could to keep Protestants from uniting with their long rivals, the Orthodox, at that time.

It is the context and source. The now banned poster since he was a trad catholic was trying to imply that Orthodoxy is in error and in schism. Major stumbling blocks for Luther and other Protectants were the embrace of Sola Scriptura, legalism, and original sin. Because of the innovations of the Roman Church which they mostly kept as doctrine, they would have had a hard time aligning themselves with Orthodoxy.

 

[get2choppaaa]

It is the context and source. The now banned poster since he was a trad catholic was trying to imply that Orthodoxy is in error and in schism. Major stumbling blocks for Luther and other Protectants were the embrace of Sola Scriptura, legalism, and original sin. Because of the innovations of the Roman Church which they mostly kept as doctrine, they would have had a hard time aligning themselves with Orthodoxy.

That and certain books of the bible Martin Luther didn't want included going forward due to his own issues and the problematic nature of his separation from Catholicism... But that's a 2 beer story as we say.

 

[The Beast1]

Coming from a trad catholic, that is a helluva complement.

I discovered these guys recently: https://lutheranorthodoxchurch.org/

I reached out to them and their goal was to achieve exactly what Martin and Philipp we're trying to achieve. It's orthodoxy wrapped in the Lutheran German high church tradition with a roccor priest advisor on their synod board ensuring they are keeping everything valid. I would join them if one existed nearby but sadly they are very small.

When a Trad Catholic makes a statement that Luther was Orthodox he means it as a slur against Orthodoxy.

Sorry, it was late at night and I missed the *whoosh* over my head.

 

[The Beast1]

Luther was never a member of or in communion with the Orthodox Church.

I know, i'm reading between the lines of what they wrote. I've got a gut feeling that he and Phil wanted to adjust their beliefs to align with the church. But distance, time, and their eventual passings prevented that. That book I posted has translated letters to that effect and the people who took up the cause after Marty and Luther's deaths didn't have the same deference to "the Greeks" that Phil and Marty had. Take a read in the book of letters I posted, it is pretty much shows that. Why bother writing to the Greeks if they didn't want to align their beliefs with the ancient church? Marty and Phil weren't going to get the Greeks to change and I'm willing to bet they knew that.

Hard doesn't imply impossible. Take Roosh for example. He took the hard path of realigning his beliefs by becoming a Christian and alienated part of his audience while keeping and growing a much stronger and more resilient one. Such realignments are possible and the spirit of what Luther and Phil wanted was what I needed to pull the trigger.