The terms “brotherless, disrespectful, and indecent” aptly describe Russia’s attack on the Ecumenical Patriarchate, according to Elder Metropolitan Apostolos of Derkoi. Commenting on the accusations directed against Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the Metropolitan observed that this is far from an isolated incident. “This is not the first time,” he noted, “that Moscow, together with its deep state and using the SVR as an instrument, has launched an attack against Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew in a brotherless, disrespectful, and indecent manner.”
He said that, on this occasion, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), prompted by the official state apparatus and the Church aligned with it, deployed a “remote-controlled bombshell.” “Not,” he clarified, “like the one used to strike an apartment building and a playground in Kharkiv, Ukraine, killing six people and injuring at least fifty-five, among them a fourteen-year-old girl. Not like that bomb with which they hit a maternity hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine, and, among other things, fatally injured an unfortunate pregnant woman and with her and her child she was carrying, “he added: “This time the SVR drone from the deep state of Russia unleashed a bomb of other technology, ancient and tested.” “The core of this attack,” he said, “is a political–religious mixture of absurd and arrogant claims, threats of every kind, and fratricidal slander.”
“This narrative is not new,” Metropolitan Apostolos of Derkoi continued. “It is directly linked to the ideology of the so-called ‘Third Rome,’ an idea fabricated by Russian political power and imposed upon its instrument, the Church of Moscow.”
“These events demonstrate,” he said, “that the serpent’s egg was hatched centuries ago, and that its venom continues to poison Orthodoxy to this very day.” Metropolitan Apostolos pointed to the year 1448, when ruler Basil ordered the unilateral secession of the nascent Church of Moscow from its Mother Church, the Ecumenical Patriarchate. “An uncanonical synod of Russian bishops was then convened,” he explained, “which elected Archbishop Jonah.”
“This was the first time,” he added, “that a Russian hierarch assumed the title ‘Metropolitan of Moscow and All Russia.’” He further noted that, in 1452, as the Ottomans stood at the gates of the imperial capital, the Ecumenical Patriarchate was compelled, under extreme pressure, to recognize the election of Jonah, effectively blessing the Russian ecclesiastical rebellion. “This recognition, however,” he stressed, “did not include granting the Moscow Synod the canonical right to elect its own metropolitan.” “Yet only seven years later,” Metropolitan Apostolos concluded, “the ruler ordered that bishops were no longer to be elected by the Ecumenical Patriarchate, but exclusively by the local Synod of Moscow. The first rift occurred.”
He added: “A century later, in 1580, Tsar Ivan IV, known as the Terrible, exerted pressure on Patriarch Joachim V of Antioch to elevate the Archdiocese of Moscow to the rank of a Patriarchate. The Patriarch refused, stating that such a decision belonged exclusively to the Synod of Constantinople. Did the Tsar abandon his obsessive demand that the Church of Moscow be elevated by the Ecumenical Patriarchate? His successor, Tsar Theodore, renewed the pressure, this time upon Patriarch Jeremiah II of Constantinople, whom he effectively kept under detention until his demand was met. Under these coercive circumstances, Jeremiah was forced to convene a large Synod in 1590. The Patriarchal and Synodal Golden Bull elevating Moscow to a Patriarchate was then officially signed, always and unmistakably under the authority and auspices of the Mother Church, the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Yet even this concession did not satisfy Russian power, which went on to incorporate into its imperial ambitions the theory that it was the rightful heir of the Byzantine emperors.”
And he wondered: “And what, then, of the Moscow Patriarchate itself? It proved unable to articulate an independent voice grounded in authentic Christian ideals, neither during the era of Tsarist Russia, nor under Soviet rule, nor in the period of Putin’s Russia. He has consistently remained a loyal partner of Russian state power and, unsurprisingly, reaps the benefits of this tight embrace.”
The Metropolitan pointed out: “Yet neither the Constitution of Christianity, the Holy Bible, nor the canonical ethos of the Church calls the Patriarchate of Moscow to walk such a path. More precisely, the Primate of the Moscow Patriarchate increasingly resembles the figure of Diotrephes, who “loves to have the preeminence,” slanders others with “malicious words,” and rejects the authority of the elder presbyter of the local Church (3 John 9–10). The recent slanders disseminated by the SVR secret service reveal who stands behind them. Only the primate of the local Church possesses the authority to define who is labeled a “rasophorous antichrist” or an “incarnate devil.” The fact that such accusations are arbitrarily and arrogantly attributed, beyond and contrary to the Canons of the Church, to the Primate of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the very Mother Church that elected him, reinforces the conviction that the Moscow Patriarchate functions as a mouthpiece of Putin’s power.”
And he concluded: “How, then, does the Mother Church respond? The Ecumenical Patriarchate, and its Primate Bartholomew, firmly affirm that “fake news, insults, and fabricated information of every kind do not discourage the Ecumenical Patriarchate.” Faithful to the tradition of the Christian Constitution, he continues to commemorate the Patriarch of Moscow, recalling that the first Christians were “of one heart… steadfast in fellowship” (Acts 2:46). For the Ecumenical Patriarch, it is an act of hubris to disregard the exhortation of the Apostle Paul, apostle of all nations, that Christians should glorify “with one mouth the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 15:6). In stark contrast, the Patriarch of Moscow chose to cease the commemoration of Patriarch Bartholomew and to sever communion with hierarchs of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Yet Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the Green Patriarch, the Patriarch of reconciliation, internationally recognized and honored by parliaments worldwide as the preeminent spiritual leader of Orthodoxy, continues to wait with patience. He waits as a father waits for his rebellious and restless child to mature, and as the father of the parable awaits the return of the prodigal son to the paternal home: the Ecumenical Patriarchate.”
Translated by: Konstantinos Menyktas
