The Reciprocal Tomos

This is worthy of sharing. . .

Mrs. M
* * *
UOC believers to hand their “Tomos” to Phanar head during prayer in Kyiv

In the reciprocal “Tomos” for the Patriarch of Constantinople, the laity of the UOC call him to admonition and repentance.

At a prayer action in Kyiv on August 21, believers of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church are going to hand their “Tomos” to Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople. The text of the document was published on Friday, August 20, on the Miriane tg-channel.

In this document, believers described in detail what the Tomos, granted by the head of Phanar to the schismatics, actually brought to the Orthodox of Ukraine, and called on Patriarch Bartholomew to admonish and repent “for the encroachment on the leadership in the Church, which belongs solely to our Lord Jesus Christ, for the desire to unite with the Catholics, for the recognition of Ukrainian schismatics, for the seizure of our churches, for the beating of our believers, for the enmity and hatred that you brought to our land!”

The UOJ provides the full text of the document.

“Tomos of the Laity of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church to Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople

You have approached the mountains of Kyiv, where the Holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called preached the Logos, fulfilling the commandment of the Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ: “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19). In fulfillment of this commandment, the Holy Prince Vladimir of Kyiv baptized Rus 1033 years ago. In fulfillment of this commandment, your predecessor, Patriarch Nicholas II Chrysovergis (10th century), sent a bishop and presbyters to our country to baptize and enlighten the people.

The Patriarchate of Constantinople brought the Orthodox faith to Rus. The Thessalonian brothers, Cyril and Methodius Equal-to-the-Apostles, gave the Slavic peoples the Gospel in their native language. The Greek metropolitans of Kyiv carried out their apostolic labors and planted true worship of God in our country. The Holy Mount Athos brought up the ancestor of Russian monasticism, the Monk Anthony of the Caves, from whom all monasteries in modern Ukraine, Russia, Belarus and other countries originated. The holy relics of another predecessor of yours, Patriarch Athanasios III Patellarios (17th century), the Wonderworker of Lubensk, who is known to us as Athanasios the “Sitting”, rest in Kharkiv. There are innumerable spiritual gifts that our country received from Constantinople, for which our people will forever be grateful to the Greek people.

However, what did you personally bring to our country, to Ukraine? You recognized the schismatics, excommunicated from the Church, and accepted them without their repentance! You concelebrated the Divine Liturgy with the persons without holy dignity! You gave the schismatics a tomos on flawed autocephaly, which the Orthodox people of Ukraine did not request of you! You brought enmity, hatred and violence to our country! In your name, cruel militants seize churches, drive families of priests out of church houses, beat believers and commit other iniquities! Ukraine is plunged into tear- and bloodshed from what you brought to our country!

But the worst of all is that you are doing all this within the framework of the approval of a new heresy which the Patriarchate of Constantinople is spreading today. This is the heresy of Constantinople papism. You declared yourself as the earthly head of the Church, as the “first without equal,” as a primate with special and exclusive powers. Moreover, you are leading all your followers to union with the Catholics, as you have repeatedly stated. Many of your predecessors fought against the heresy of papism when Rome was infected with it. Patriarch Michael I Cerularius (XI century) excommunicated the Roman legates and, in their person, all those who’d contracted this heresy. The Monk Mark of Ephesus (XV century) taught us not to make any compromises and not to agree with the heresy of papism. A lot of saints and monks, both Greek and Slavic, testified with their lives and their preaching to the need of preserving the purity of the Orthodox faith, for there can be no salvation of the soul without this. 

Therefore, since the pious and God-saved land of Ukraine is strengthened in Orthodoxy and taught to remain faithful to the Gospel, we reject your claim to be the earthly head of the Church and confess instead that only “Christ is the head of the Church, his body, of which He is the Savior” (Eph. 5:23). We reject the possibility of unity with Rome without the repentance of Catholics in all their heretical delusions.

You “abolished” the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, we remain faithful to Her! You rejected His Beatitude Onuphry, we recognize him as our Primate and Archpastor! Due to your actions, 144 temples have been forcibly seized in our country, but we are building new ones next to them! We testify before the entire world that despite your decisions, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and Her Primate, His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry, are carrying out their saving mission on our land.

We call you to repentance for the encroachment on the leadership in the Church, which belongs solely to our Lord Jesus Christ, for the desire to unite with the Catholics, for the recognition of Ukrainian schismatics, for the seizure of our churches, for the beating of our believers, for the enmity and hatred that you brought to our land!

But in the event that you do public penance for all the above, we, the believers of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, agree to continue to honor you as the Primate of the Orthodox Church of Constantinople, as the first in honor among equal primates, as the heir to the saints, who shone forth on the Throne of Constantinople, and as God’s bishop.

In view of this, the present Tomos is issued for you to permanent value, written and handed to you in the God-saved city of Kyiv for your admonition and repentance.

August 21st, 2021.

Laity of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

Recall that on August 21, 2021, UOC believers gather for a prayer standing at the Verkhovna Rada, where a meeting of the head of Phanar with spokesman Dmitry Razumkov is scheduled. The purpose of the prayer action of the UOC is to testify to their faith and to show Patriarch Bartholomew that his vision of the church situation in Ukraine has nothing to do with reality.

The UOJ broadcasts the event online.

https://spzh.news/en/news/82013-na-molebne-v-kijeve-verujushhije-upc-khotyat-vruchity-glave-fanara-svoj-tomos

 

Comments

  1. What is it going to accomplish? He won’t give them the time of day. Will anyone be able to get close to him? Even if it ends up in his physical hands, he won’t read it.

    • Like all prophetic words, it may not “accomplish” much. The point is that he is now firmly and definitely admonished. Think of Jeremiah and the “effectiveness” (or seeming lack thereof) of his prophetic warnings.

      And then remember what happened to Zedekiah.

  2. Amen

    Not to be a pessimist, but, Bartholomew isn’t going to repent. That much should be obvious. We can only pray so much but if pride is blinding someone and they refuse to see, then that is on them.

    I always tried to formerly refer to him as Patriarch Bartholomew. No more. As far as I am concerned, and the Church is concerned, him concelebrating with schismatics means he is no longer a bishop.

    Though that’s awful for Bartholomew, the Church will of course live on without him and he will be remembered as a stain on the Patriarchate of Constantinople.

    • George Michalopulos says

      While Bartholomew is resolute in his path towards schism, as well as the fact that we can do nothing to dissuade him from it, the fact remains that the Ukrainians are right to issue this tomos and to hand it to him in whatever fashion possible.

      It’s not a stunt or political theater. Or I should say that it is but in the purest sense. Someday, the children and grandchildren of these Ukrainian dissidents will ask “why didn’t you do something back then when you had a chance?” Their parents and grandparents will say “We tried”.

      At the risk of patting ourselves on the back, when Gail and I went to the Stop the Steal back in December, I read that passage from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn about “what if we only fought back?” I could tell by looking at the people there they they had never heard those words and perhaps only maybe 1/4 were familiar with Solzhenitsyn. But I saw lights clicking off above heads.

      And so, we come to a far more significant person than myself, Sen Rand Paul, who said essentially the same thing: “Resist! They can’t arrest us all! They can’t put all of us in jail!” That’s the Americanese version of what Solzhenitsyn said.

      Anyway, what these canonical Ukrainian Christians are doing is the right thing. Bartholomew will ignore them, thinking that he knows best. But his conscience will be pricked. If that is all that happens, that’s better than nothing.

    • “. . . he will be remembered as a stain on the Patriarchate of Constantinople”

      More like a complementary splotch among the smudged spectrum of blemished leadership in that Ecumenical See. Has there been an orthodox Orthodox patriarch there since Anthimus VII?

  3. Change can only begin when the laity take up arms!

    • Gail Sheppard says

      Yeah, how many times has that worked? I can answer the question for you: Never.

      The bishops need to fix this.

      • George Michalopulos says

        Slight correction my dear: I remember reading about two incidents fairly recently in Russia. One in which two homosexuals bribed a drunken priest to marry them and another in which the old ladies locked arms and prevented a homosexual bishop from entering their church.

        In the 1st instance, the people of the village burned down the church.

    • Perhaps. But which bishops? It ain’t gonna happen in the GOA or in any other EP group. All any of them understand is a threat to their money and power/position in the world. If the laity were to pull those rugs out from under the bishops it would be a beginning. Also, don’t expect any laity connected to the EP to make any noise regarding papism, ecclesiology, heresy, etc.

  4. UOC Law Dept.: Bartholomew shamefully
    avoids those whom he calls his flock

    https://spzh.news/en/news/82138-jurotdel-upc-varfolomej-pozorno-izbegajet-teh-kogo-nazyvajet-svojej-pastvoj

    ‘ The head of the Law Department noted that Patriarch Bartholomew calls Orthodox Ukrainians his flock, but at the same time avoids meeting with them. “Bartholomew (Patriarch – Ed.) for some reason shamefully avoids meeting people whom he considers his flock, hiding behind the screen of the canonical tradition. It seems to me that the Gospel tradition is much higher than the canonical tradition. If you undertook to heal, so heal, a good doctor always monitors the results of his treatment,” said Father Alexander. … ‘

  5. UOC was heard: “Blessing of Ukraine”
    at St. Sophia’s without Phanar head

    https://spzh.news/en/news/82140-k-upc-prislushalisy-blagoslovenije-ukrainy-v-sofii-proshlo-bez-glavy-fanara

    ‘ The President of Ukraine with his wife and the heads of religious confessions took part in the official event on the Day of Independence of Ukraine in St. Sofia of Kyiv.

    On August 24, 2021, the Primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry of Kyiv and All Ukraine took part in the traditional event “Blessing of Ukraine”, which is annually held on the territory of the St. Sophia of Kyiv on Independence Day.

    Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople did not attend the celebration, as the UOC Chancellor Metropolitan Anthony (Pakanich) of Boryspil and Brovary, who accompanied the Primate at the event… ‘

    Judging by the wording of the Tomos wot he wrote,
    Bartholomew is not exactly in full-hearted favour
    of the independence of Ukraine.

  6. “An evil faith and a false church is arising.”

    About this quote:
    “An evil faith and a false church is arising.” (Bishop Theophan the Recluse †)
    hierarchs of the Church of Christ are carrying out a very real betrayal of our holy faith and Church

    All I’m finding in English is that this is something Abp. Averky said that St. Theophan said. Very likely can be found in Russian, Abp. Averky wrote a book [or article] in Russian “Forseer of Russia’s Destiny: Bishop Theophan the Recluse” (1960) which I assume was published by Jordanville.

    http://www.romanitas.ru/eng/THE%20BATTLE%20FOR%20THE%20RUSSIAN%20ORTHODOX%20CHURCH.htm

    [279] This, for example, is what Vladyka Averky said in his welcoming speech to Metropolitan Philaret on his namesday, December 1/14, 1967: “We are going through a terrible time. But not only because the forces of world evil are gaining a greater and greater hold over the world, but still more because – terrible to say! – many highly-placed hierarchs of the Church of Christ are carrying out a very real betrayal of our holy faith and Church. Some completely new epoch in Christianity is being proclaimed. They are thinking to create new church into which not only all the Orthodox must enter, but also the heterodox, and even the Muslims, Jews and pagans. They are even talking about some kind of “dialogue” with the atheists! In this way, instead of the true faith and the true Church, a false faith or, in the expression of our great Spirit-bearing lamp, Bishop Theophan the Recluse, an evil faith and a false church, is arising.
    “And it is in these terrible times that we wish to see in your person our steadfast and unshakeable spiritual leader inspiring us all for the holy struggle – the holy battle – for the true faith and the true Church against this false faith and false church.
    “That’s what we want!.. And only this!”
    “We must make a decisive break with ecumenism, and we must not have anything in communion with its co-travellers,” wrote Vladyka Averky in 1969. “Our path is not theirs. We must say this decisively and show it in our deeds. A time of genuine confession is coming for us, a time when will perhaps remain alone and will be in the position of being persecuted. Insofar as all the Orthodox Local Churches have now entered into the ranks of the ‘World Council of Churches’ and have thereby betrayed Orthodoxy and bowed down to satan, the time of our complete isolation has come. We cannot and we must not have any communion with apostates from True Orthodoxy, and we must be ready, if required, to depart into the “catacombs”, like the “True Orthodox Christians” in our homeland.
    “Our position as fighters and confessors of the pure and undefiled truth of Christ places us under great obligation, more than at any time in the past.
    “We must always remember that a true pastor of the true Church of Christ can never and must never have any other interests besides pure zeal for the glory of God and the salvation of the souls of his flock – to this and this alone must all his thoughts, all his feelings and all his activity be always directed.”

    Doxa to Theo, John

  7. (Russian?) Orthodox Christians protesting in Sydney

    Aussie Cossack

    No to the NWO! No to Abortion! Слава Богу!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAUp1N2Cge0

  8. Not a single mask visible in the crowd…in Australia no less!

    Here’s another from the land of the Aussies.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1QgjDenQ_s