Monthly Archives: May 2017

An Anglo-Russian Alliance?

In recent days anti-democratic EU bureaucrats and others in Brussels and Berlin have declared war on the UK, even interfering in the UK elections. They are angered by the UK people’s choice to leave their customs and political union. In their crass words, they have declared that Brexit UK owes it 100 billion euros. In the UK, many consider that the EU owes it 400 billion euros, the sum overpaid to the EU during the years when UK governments treacherously signed away our sovereignty to the EU for its mess of pottage without popular support. They arrogantly refused to consult the people – until Cameron, who at last allowed a referendum, but only because he was so blinded by arrogance and out of contact that he thought he could easily win it.

Now the EU is openly and treasonously trying to destroy the UK by prising away Northern Ireland and Scotland. In the UK there are those who consider that it is time for Ireland to be reunited and for Scotland and Wales to receive independence, but that the four countries should then immediately form a Confederation outside the EU, perhaps with a new Parliament building on the Isle of Man, from where all four countries of the Isles are visible. The old Victorian Parliament buildings in London, now falling down, could then become tourist sights. In an electronic age there is no need for a multinational Parliament to be in the English commercial capital of London.

The EU itself is bitterly divided and in chaos. The euro has been a disaster. Many of its countries, like Austria, the Baltics, Poland, the Czech Lands, Slovakia, Romania and Hungary, are disobeying Brussels as regards immigration controls. Greece is bankrupt. Cyprus is almost. Catalonia wants its independence by a clear majority. Hungary rejects EU meddling. Eastern Europe has in general been ravaged by German economic imperialism, its factories closed and its young people forced to emigrate to Western Europe. Many in France want to leave the EU. As Marine Le Pen correctly said last week, the next President of France will be a woman: either herself, or else Mrs Merkel. It will certainly be no-one else in this Fourth Reich world.

The EU has declared war. It is thus achieving the opposite of what it wants, as it is uniting the British people and ensuring a landslide victory in the UK elections for the Conservative Party. This is now seen as the only Patriotic Party and the only Party with a strong leader, now fortified by the return of UKIP voters, most of whom had left the Conservative Party disillusioned with its takeover by modernists. People always unite around a strong leader in times of war, even though they would otherwise never vote Conservative. The Opposition to the Conservatives is laughable, but also treasonous.

Thus, on the western and eastern edges of the EU are two countries which should be uniting in this time of war against the EU: the UK and the Russian Federation. An unlikely couple: after all such New Cold War NATO British warmongers as Johnson and Fallon are sending British troops and arms to Estonia, controlled by its US puppet regime, in order to threaten Russia. These clowns are even overflying Russian territory in the Baltics, giving war equipment to the EU-sponsored and CIA-run anti-Ukrainian junta in Kiev, sending a British destroyer to patrol off the Russian coast in the Black Sea.

Not natural allies? True. And yet despite this and the imperialist British invasion of Russia in 1854-56, 210 years ago, 100 years ago and 75 years ago Great Britain and Russia fought together side by side against Continental Western European tyrants, Napoleon, the Kaiser and Hitler, the forerunners of today’s EU leaders. Today, again, there is a common enemy. Not to unite today and not to give up ridiculous, Russophobic Cold War rhetoric, would be a missed opportunity for the UK. Perhaps Non-EU Norway and Iceland would join us? And the rest of Scandinavia too? All could sign a friendship pact of mutual non-aggression and thus, we would form a geographical, political and economic bloc towering over the isolated and divided EU.

The UK and Russia are both pro-European countries and want to free the oppressed peoples of Europe from the EU monster. In this centenary year of the British-orchestrated elitist conspiracy that overthrew the greatest European leader of all, Tsar Nicholas II, founder of the Hague International Court of Justice, speaker of five European languages and builder of 18 Russian churches in Western Europe, it would be an act of repentance on the part of Britain to proclaim a new alliance with the Russian Federation.

An Anglo-Russian alliance? Most probably not, but a friend in need is a friend indeed…

In Montenegro on the eve of the vote on joining NATO the victims of the NATO aggression of 1999 are remembered in prayer

The service was led by Metropolitan Amfilohije of Montenegro and Primorje. On the eve of the vote in the Parliament of Montenegro on the issue of NATO membership, on April 27 2017 in Podgorica was made a remembrance liturgy for the victims of the NATO aggression in Montenegro, Serbia and the world. The Liturgy was celebrated by Metropolitan Amfilohije of Montenegro and Primorje, who concelebrated with Bishop Budimlsko-Nikshichsky Ioanniky, said the official website of the Serbian Orthodox Church.

After the Divine Liturgy, both the bishops and the clergy did a memorial service for the victims of NATO. The memorial service was attended by many, including leaders of the opposition parties in Montenegro.

Before the service,Metropolitan Amfilohije said: “Just as at Easter 1941, Belgrade was bombed and was destroyed in 1999, the capital of Serbia. In celebration of the Easter period the capital of Montenegro, Podgorica also became the object of bombing of the so-called “allies”. Thus, it was chosen as a new bombardment at Easter, a day of joy, of light, of peace, of reconciliation between God and men, the day of mutual forgiveness, both in the family and in society and in the international community. ”

Metropolitan Amfilohije said that it is our duty as members of the Church of God – to remember those who died during the bombing in 1999 and previous bombings. “We have to do this and we must do it here, in front of the shrine with the relics of St. Petrer of Cetinje, the right hand of St. John the Baptist and the fragment of the precious Cross of Christ, our God [these relics are kept in Cetinje Monastery nowadays], in which the Lord showed that only those people and those people who sacrifice themselves for the sake of others, for others, for the welfare of mankind and the world, only these people and the people – real people and real peoples “, – added the bishop. Metr Amfilohije also noted that there are other people – “those who are like the wicked thief, those who, like Herod, Pontius Pilate, and those who then was the head of the Jews, who sacrifice others for their ideas, their ideology and their interest “,” who sell God for earthly honor, fame and fortune. ”

Metropolitan Amfilohije also remembered on the holy Prince John Vladimir and Aleksanere Nevsky, who taught their people that God is not in power but in truth. “And it is this always lived and breathed Montenegro and our people”, – said the Bishop. “We are holding on to each other before the shrine of St. Peter of Cetinje, in order to learn from it, and we encourage others to it – this is the way, which should go to Montenegro. If we want to go on this way, it is the way of St. John-Vladimir, who sacrificed himself in the short-term “, – said the Metropolitan, adding that to follow this path and were guided Serbs and Montenegrins Nemanjic – St. Simeon and St. Sava. “St. Sava taught us that Christ is the way that leads to eternal life. We followed this path in the XIII century, and we go to them to this day “- said Bishop Amfilohije.

“Get the servants of the tyrant – is something that can be done only by those who deviate from the path of God’s justice and truth. Saint Peter of Cetinje instructs and reminds everyone, both for us and for those who are currently managed by the State, his way of suffering between Asian and European tyranny, as it is called by his nephew Peter II Njegos. And nothing has changed to this day, “- the Metropolitan warned.

The First Hierarch of the Orthodox Church in Montenegro, said that the violence associated with the imposition of an agreement to join NATO is the continuation of Nazi violence. It would be good to those who today refer to their anti-fascism, we understood that those who were killed in the battles of the Yugoslav partisans against the Nazis, those who died in the concentration camps in Croatia during the Second World War, did not sacrifice themselves and their human dignity for the sake of their descendants today carried out violence and coercion, said Metropolitan Amfilohije, referring to pressure on Montenegro in terms of its entry into NATO.

“We urge the people of Montenegro and those who are destined to resolve these days its fate, we encourage them to look again at the way which we are taking: Use the injustice and violence, robbery of others, the satisfaction of their earthly interests, or to sacrifice themselves following the example of St. Peter of Cetinje”, – concluded Metropolitan Amfilohije.

Source: http://www.sedmitza.ru/text/7165136.html

Orthodox Christianity in the British Isles and Ireland: Seven Orthodox Churches, Nine Dioceses, One Deanery, Four Choices

Introduction

Every Christian denomination in every country of the world is divided into dioceses and parishes which reflect the geographical area where they are located. Moreover, there may also be internal, sociological divisions. For example, in the town where I live there are several parishes of the C of E (Church of England), but two of these parishes refuse to talk to each other because their views and patterns of worship are utterly different, one is ‘Anglo-Catholic’, elderly and wealthy, the other is ‘happy-clappy’, middle-aged and financially modest. There are also two Baptist churches which refuse to talk to one another, because one is strict, the other is liberal.

In the cities there is a similar situation in Roman Catholic parishes, which can have completely different tendencies (Polish/Irish/liberal/ traditional/‘charismatic’…) and also in monasteries, which belong to different orders. Nowadays, larger Roman Catholic parishes have masses at different times for different ethnic groups in different languages and with different Roman Catholic rites, Polish, Syro-Malabar, Greek-Catholic Ukrainian etc. There is often very little communication between these diverse groups. What is the situation regarding the Orthodox Church in this country? What sort of divisions are there here?

Seven Local Churches and Ten Groups

Of the fourteen Local Churches that make up the worldwide Orthodox Church only seven are represented outside their home countries. In the British Isles and Ireland these seven Churches have nine dioceses and one deanery. These are the following: the Serbian, Bulgarian, Romanian, Georgian, Constantinople (two dioceses, Greek and Ukrainian, and one deanery, Paris), Antiochian and Russian (two dioceses, Sourozh and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia). These nine dioceses and one deanery are not territorial, but are superimposed on one another on the same territory. However, even so there is often little communication between them, as each caters for its own ethnic group. Of these ten groups, the first six, the Serbian, Bulgarian, Romanian, Georgian and the big Greek and the tiny Ukrainian nationalist dioceses of the Church of Constantinople, are largely concerned only with their own ethnic members.

Thus, the above generally appear not to observe the Gospel commandment of Matthew 28, that we are to go out into all the world and teach and baptize all. For example, although a small minority of parishes in the big Greek-speaking Diocese of the Church of Constantinople, mainly Cypriot by ethnicity, do sometimes accept English people, generally these people are Hellenized or even come from a Hellenophile public school background. Moreover, its archbishops, who must have Greek or Cypriot nationality, usually impose Greek names on any they may ordain, such as Kallistos instead of Timothy, Meletios instead of Peter, Aristobulos instead of Alban, and imposes names like Athanasios, Panteleimon and Eleutherios on others. This leaves four choices to the majority of native English speakers who are interested in trying to live according to the teachings of the Orthodox Church without having to change their name and national identity.

Four Choices

The first two of these choices, the Parisian and the Antiochian, appear to cater for two specific small English sociological groups, whereas the last two groups are both part of the Russian Orthodox Church. These are at once sociologically much broader as regards the range of English and other local people within them, but those people sometimes have a Russian connection and they are in a majority Russian Church.

1. The Paris Deanery (also called the Exarchate)

This is a very small Deanery belonging to a Diocese under an elderly and sick French bishop, received and ordained into the Church in 1974, based in Paris under the ‘Greek’ (Constantinople) Church. It has virtually no property of its own. Founded in Paris in the 1920s by anti-monarchist Saint Petersburg aristocrats, who had tried but failed to seize power from the Tsar, it had a small parish in London until 1945. However, in 2006 the group was refounded in this country after a noisy, aggressive and unfriendly divorce from the Russian Orthodox Sourozh Diocese (see below) and it strongly dislikes the Russian Orthodox Church as it is. In 2006 it was 300 strong, out of a then total of about 300,000 Orthodox in the UK, so it represented about one in a thousand Orthodox. Despite its tiny size, in 2006 its foundation was strongly supported by the Russophobic bastions of the British Establishment, the Church of England, the BBC, The Times, The Guardian and The Daily Telegraph. It is known for its attachment to the arts, philosophy and intellectualism and ordains easily, providing that the candidates come from ‘the right background’.

It tends to cater for rather elderly, upper-middle class Establishment figures – which is why it belongs to the Western-run Church of Constantinople, which uses the Roman Catholic calendar for the fixed feasts, and not the independently-run Russian Orthodox Church. It is thus rather politicized and its perhaps clubby, county-town members tend to support the elitist Liberal Democrats. Its members, often in groups as small as five or ten, may, like their founder, be attracted to spiritual techniques, such as Buddhism, Sufi Islam, yoga or what is called ‘the Jesus Prayer’ (= noetic prayer in Orthodox language). It is not incarnate in any Local Orthodox Church and mixes different practices and customs, also introducing ‘creative’ customs of its own. Some of its more effete members quite unrealistically call their tiny Deanery ‘The Orthodox Church in Britain’, despite the fact that it is dwarfed by nine much more proletarian Orthodox Dioceses. This is rather like some members of the ‘Orthodox Church in America’, a US Orthodox group with a huge title which the Deanery much admires, but which is also dwarfed by others, numbering only some 30,000 out of 3,000,000 Orthodox in North America.

2. The Antiochian (Arab) Diocese

This very small ethnic ‘British Orthodox’ group, originally 300 in number, was founded as a Deanery as recently as 1996 by and for dissident Anglicans. They came from backgrounds as diverse as conservative Evangelicalism, moralistic Puritanism and charismatic Anglo-Catholicism, but all were dissatisfied with Anglicanism. Having since then converted only a few other Anglicans and apparently (??) without much interest in Non-Anglicans, its ex-Anglican clergy sometimes rely on Romanians to fill their churches. The group is known for its missionary zeal and sincerity, providing pastoral care where other Dioceses have failed to do so, but is also known for its lack of knowledge, pastoral and liturgical, and lack of realism. It has little property of its own. In 2016 this Deanery, which uses the Roman Catholic calendar for the fixed feasts, became a Diocese and the first task of its new Arab bishop, without an Arab base and tradition, is in his own words to teach his clergy how to celebrate the services and so enter the mainstream. In the past it has ordained very easily, providing that its candidates are Anglican vicars. This, however, may be changing.

3. The Sourozh Diocese (also incorrectly called the Patriarchal Diocese) of the Russian Orthodox Church

Directly under the control of the Russian Orthodox Church in Moscow, this Diocese has existed for 55 years. It has had a varied history, having been marked by tendencies of liberal modernism as well as Soviet patriotism under its former bishop and founder, the late Metropolitan Antony Bloom of Paris, with his unique personality cult and curious personal views. After his death most of his closest followers, mainly ex-Anglicans, left to found the Paris Deanery (see above) and now the Sourozh Diocese seems to be more and more for the many ethnic Russian immigrants who have settled in this country over the last 20 years. However, there are exceptions and it still has some very active English groups (as well as dying traces of a Bloomite past), though most of its English clergy are now elderly.

4. ROCOR, the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia (also incorrectly called ROCA or ‘the Church Abroad’)

This Diocese of the British Isles and Ireland of the Church Outside Russia is one of many dioceses under a Synod of fifteen Russian Orthodox bishops (three of them retired) centred in New York. It was originally founded in 1920 by Patriarch Tikhon of Moscow for White Russian émigrés exiled throughout the world. Self-governing and only indirectly under the Russian Orthodox Church in Moscow, with which it has excellent relations, ROCOR, once worldwide, is now dominant only in the English-speaking world, especially in the USA and Australia. It has seen many of its ethnically very closed parishes in South America and continental Western Europe shut or else dissolve into the more missionary-minded local dioceses of the rest of the Russian Orthodox Church, centred in Moscow. However, in the English-speaking world it is the voice of Russian Orthodoxy and its missionary-minded Canadian Metropolitan, formerly Archbishop of Australia and New Zealand, is, symbolically, the head of dioceses in New England and ‘Old’ England.

The local Diocese has a chequered history, with various incarnations. These range from noble White Russian roots, which especially after 1945 were infected by unpleasant, very right-wing and nationalistic anti-Communism and a generation after that by equally unattractive Anglo-Catholic sectarianism. The latter movement even tried to prise the Diocese from its faithfulness to Russian Orthodoxy. However, these generational nightmare incarnations thankfully died out with the end of the Cold War, quit the Church or else were pushed to the margins, where as relics they have almost disappeared. Over the new generation, after decades of neglect and nearly dying out in the early 1990s, this Diocese has been returning to its White Russian roots, understood as faithfulness, in Russian or in English, to the Orthodox Tradition, which has so much revived among Russians. Today’s ROCOR mission is to spread the Orthodox Faith and values of the reviving multinational Christian Empire of Holy Russia here and throughout the English-speaking world, as well as in its missions from South America to Western Europe, Haiti to Hawaii, Pakistan to South Korea, Costa Rica to Indonesia, and Nepal to the Philippines.