Whither, Metropolia?

WHILE THE CANONIZATION services were proceeding in San Francisco and faithful of the Russian Church Abroad throughout the world were rejoicing in the newly-glorified Saint, independent services were being held in Kodiak before the relics of St. Herman by the American Metropolia, presided over by Metropolitan Ireney. The reasons for the seperate services are already known to readers of The Orthodox Word. Since the canonicity and status within Orthodoxy of the Metropolia are now doubly dubious, may may well wonder what validity its sacramental acts possess; but in view of the compassionate and far-sighted decision of the Synod of Bishops to celebrate the canonization on the same day as the Metropolia, this question becomes academic. Thus, by the Church's economy the natives of Alaska, who may never have heard of the Russian Church Outside of Russia, need not have doubted that the Church did indeed on July 27 August 9 number St. Herman in its catalogue of saints.

This being so, it would have been desirable to refrain from further comment on the the Metropolia's preparations for the canonization – had not the Metropolia itself, in the person especially of the hierarch most directly involved with the canonization, used these preparations to defile the very memory of St. Herman with false, irreverent, and sacrilegious statements that were repeated in American newspapers across the country. To be silent in the face of this would be a sin against the truth and against the holy name of St. Herman. And in order to place these incredible statements in their proper context it will be necessary to quote leading representatives of the Metropolia in order to determine what they regarded as the significance of their canonization.

By all reports, those present in Kodiak experienced very exalted religious feelings: these were "days of light and joy," "a miracle of God's mercy" (Fr. Alexander Schmemann, Novoye Russkoye Slovo, Aug. 26). One must believe that the impression created by the services in Kodiak was a profound one, that very deep feelings were touched. But beyond this, what? Even the sermon delivered at the Sunday Liturgy by Bishop Dimitry of Berkeley, and ostensibly devoted to the "meaning of the canonization" (text in The Orthodox Church, Aug.-Sept.), is strangely lacking both in definite content and in inspired tone, offering as its most tangible consolation the fact that "society has taken an interest in this canonization and respects us for our seriousness," and coming to the conclusions that St. Herman "was truly interested in America and its evangelization" and that "holiness is a definite possibility." Such bland statements surely must have little power to inspire the faithful if it is actually true, as Bishop Dimitry says, that "saints have come to mean very little to the average Orthodox Christian in our country."

But does the Metropolia really have no more distinctive idea about St. Herman than this? Let us turn, for a definite answer to this question, to the American press, which represents that "society" that "has taken an interest in this canonization." What did the representatives of the Metropolia inform it that led it to take the canonization so "seriously"?

It must be said, to begin with. that the Metropolia took great pains to see that news of the canonization was accompanied by news of its own recent "autocephaly." The New York Times (Aug. 10) reported that "the canonization was the first important act of the Orthodox Church in America," and Time Magazine (Aug. 24) noted that "now the canonization gives it international dignity." Thus St. Herman, lamentably, is made to use the term of the official Metropolia booklet on the canonization (p. 16) – the "patron" of the autocephaly, i.e., of the concordat with Moscow; and in fact Bishop Theodosius of Sitka, in exchange for the "Tomos" of autocephaly which he received in Moscow, presented to the authorities of the Patriarchate an icon of St. Herman – a painful, but significant, exchange.

What kind of picture did the Metropolia present to the press of St. Herman himself? In magazines and newspapers throughout the country one identical theme was stated and repeated again and again. In the words of Bp. Theodosius of Sitka: "Long before concern for minority groups was fashionable, St. Herman of Spruce Island demonstrated time and again his willingness to place himself in opposition to the civil authorities of the time, to oppose the policies of his own people and his own government." The Metropolia's official booklet, "St. Herman of Alaska," expresses the same idea: "In a time when we are deeply concerned for civil rights, for the freedom of the individual, for the respect and dignity of all people... we should always remember that Father Herman first championed all these causes within the context of the Christian Faith. He was a contemporary American" (p. 16). In another statement Bp. Theodosius goes yet further: "He was a real conscientious objector, a pacifist. He fought the civil authorities of his time when he didn't agree with them; and in that sense he is absolutely contemporary with what is happening among young people today" (New York Times, Aug. 10).

In the face of these statements we can no longer doubt that the Metropolia does, after all, have a distinctive (and entirely imaginary!) idea of St. Herman-not, as the Orthodox Church until now has thought, as a shining example of the monastic, ascetic, other-worldly Orthodox ideal, but as an activist of "civil rights" and the "social gospel," and even as something more incredible; for Bp. Theodosius, in a statement distributed by the Associated Press and printed in the New York Times and other newspapers throughout the country on August 10, allowed himself to say: "In modern terms you might call him a hippie." In newspapers such as the Monterey (Calif.) Peninsula Herald this statement of Bishop Theodosius' inspired a full-page headline: RUSSIAN CHURCH CANONIZES U.S. 'HIPPIE' MONK.

This cruel sacrilege a sin against the holy things which the Orthodox Church today above all is called upon to defend and revere before the unbelieving world-came, needless to say, as a great shock and source of pain to those who deeply love and revere St. Herman. The Soviet Government itself could not have thought up a better way of slandering and discrediting an Orthodox saint. One cannt believe that such sacrilege was conscious; it can only be the result of that unbelievable ignorance on which the Soviets evidently calculated when they offered the Metropolia its "autocephaly," an ignorance that cannot distinguish between the monastic outlook and the civil rights movement, between an Orthodox saint and the representatives of the "hippie" cult of drugs and increasingly open forms of satanism. Other statements of a political nature by the same Bp. Theodosius, that "as Americans we have to reassess our ideas of life in the Soviet Union," that in the USSR people "don't like a lot of things about the government but neither do Americans" (Juneau Southeast Alaska Empire, July 2) only serve to reinforce this impression of abysmal ignorance and reveal the "autocephaly" as an important tool for Moscow in politically "neutralizing" public opinion in the West.

Another form of this ignorance is revealed in the Metropolia's "Service" to St. Herman, which was specially composed for the canonization, approved by the Metropolia's "Liturgical Commission," and published with the blessing of the Chairman of that Commission, Archbishop Kiprian of Philadelphia. Quite apart from the content and style of this Service, where tastes may differ, its very structure and several key features reveal the feeblest awareness of what an Orthodox service to a saint – and in particular the triumphant service to the first Orthodox saint of a new land – should be.

1. One is puzzled at the outset to find that the Metropolia's "Liturgical Commission" seems to be uncertain as to whether this is a service with polyeleos, as befits a major saint, or a simple service without polyeleos, such as is appointed in the Menaion for less well known saints. All the Theotokia following stichera and the troparion in a service to St. Herman should, of course, be those of the Sunday or Resurrection service; but in the Metropolia's Service a choice is given of as many as four different Theotokia in each instance, as if the form for the "Common" of monk-saints had been literally copied out. One wonders why such superfluous alternatives are given, and, again, why they are sometimes given and sometimes not given. The Service as a whole is so inconsistent that, as written, it is not possible to serve it properly in any case. This is even more true of the Slavonic Service, translated from the English original, where several essential Theotokia are simply omitted. It is evident that the Metropolia's Service is the work of a "Liturgical Commission" that is decidedly not well grounded in the church services; one wonders, in fact, if – and how – its members ever serve Vespers and Matins at all.

2. In several places there is a conflict between the English and Sla vonic versions as to the tone in which various stichera are to be sung, and in some cases there is no indication of tone at all. One can only suppose that this has become a secondary question for the Metropolia, and that she has given up singing many of these – but one would think that the form of the traditional services, if nothing else, would be carefully preserved. And one looks in vain, of course, for any trace of the marvellous ancient Russian (and Greek, Romanian, etc.) tradition of podobni or "special melodies" or variations on the eight tones; although these are sung today in comparatively few places, every Slavonic service book appoints their frequent use, and one would expect that at least this form would be preserved in the first composed English service (as it was in the recent translation in Europe of the Festal Menaion). Here as elsewhere the Metropolia's Service proves to be, not a model for an Orthodox future based on the best Greek and Slavic usage, but simply an expression of the Metropolia's own lax practice and unconscious reformism.

3. The traditional "Magnification" (Megalynarion) to the Saint, whose wording is always the same, is here replaced by a senseless conglomeration consisting of the first half of the traditional "Magnification" and an apparently "newly-composed" second half which begins "you are the defender of the defenceless"! The reason for this childish innovation is doubtless to be found in a dissatisfaction with the traditional ending of the "Magnification": instructor of monks and converser with angels. Possessing no understanding of the monastic-ascetic life and its central place in the authentic Orthodox outlook, the Metropolia (for which "monk" evidently means "hippie") chooses to de-emphasize or eliminate the monastic element and substitute for it something more comprehensible for the "contemporary American." "Defender of the defenceless" can be interpreted in the Metropolia's "civil rights" image of St. Herman. But thus the Metropolia faithful is deprived of yet one more opportunity of entering into the Church's authentic spirit.

4. The Canon introduces the totally unheard-of novelty of ending each troparion with verses from the Beatitudes: "Blessed are the poor in spirit," etc. One is at a loss to find any explanation for this, unless it be that at this point the "Liturgical Commission" ran out of inspiration (the troparia themselves are very brief and almost empty of content) and simply added the Beatitudes to fill up space.

These criticisms are made not with the aim of mockery or belittlement, but simply to point out the vast discrepancy between the Metropolia's highsounding words and its very mediocre acts, between the crowd-pleasing, sensational publicity in which it is now basking, and its incompetent, indifferent, and senselessly reformist approach to the basic treasures of Orthodox life and worship. The Metropolia now loudly proclaims itself to be "the Orthodox Church in America," a mature and "autocephalous" Church that is, in Metropolitan Ireney's words to the 14th All-American Sobor, "the inheritor of all the gifts, all the riches, all the traditions of Universal Orthodoxy." One oberver in Kodiak boasted that the ceremonies there were "as it were a display of the youthful powers of Orthodoxy – of young and energetic priests, of the Orthodoxy of the future in America" (Russian Life, Aug. 15); and Bishop Dimitry stated in Kodiak that this canonization "must be the very source of inspiration that will set the direction of our Orthodox Church in America for her future." These are exalted words, but they are a facade behind which there is nothing whatever. One must distinguish between the impressive external aspect of Orthodox services which the Metropolia still remembers and, in some measure, preserves, and the internal aspect of content, understanding, and faithfulness to the tradition and spirit of Orthodoxy. In this light the Metropolia's high claims are an evident fraud, and it becomes the obligation of anyone to whom Orthodoxy and its future in America are dear, to point out this fraud. In what "direction," indeed, must the Metropolia be going if its first English service, on so solemn an occasion, is a work of extreme liturgical illiteracy, the aim of which is to glorify a "hippie" agitator? The answer is clear: in the direction of conformity to mindless contemporary fads, of senseless innovation, and of abandonment – out of ignorance and indifference of the whole wealth of Orthodox tradition; in the direction of "Eastern-rite Protestantism."

Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann, in his enthusiastic article describing his and others' feelings at the Kodiak ceremonies, summed them up in these words: "Time is not felt, and the heart acknowledges that the whole substance of faith was once and for all expressed by the Apostle who said to Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration: Lord, it is good for us to be here..." (Novoye Russkoye Slovo, Aug. 26; The Orthodox Church, Aug.-Sept.) But Fr. Schmemann has strangely-yet symptomatically – missed the point of this Gospel event, for St. Luke relates that the Apostle Peter spoke these words not knowing what he said (St. Luke 9:33); because, as St. Ephraim the Syrian adds in his commentary on the passage, "Simon was still looking upon Jesus from the human point of view" – and then the cloud overshadowed them and the Father's voice was heard, and there was no more such talk.

And indeed, the "whole substance of faith" is not at all the exalted. feelings the Orthodox heart experiences at such great festivals one assumes in all sincerity that Fr. Schmemann and others did indeed experience them for these are a decidedly secondary aspect of the path to salvation and offer in themselves no infallible indication of the rightness of one's faith. Faith without works is dead (St. James 2:26). We have already seen some of the Metropolia's "works": its "Service" to St. Herman and its sensational press re leases. Another yet more basic "work" may be seen in the writings of the same Protopresbyter Alexander Schmemann, who is one of the architects of the "Orthodoxy of the future" of which the Metropolia now boasts itself to be the guardian. In his book, Liturgical Theology, where he prepares the foundation of a future "liturgical reform," Fr. Schmemann complains about the "literal inundation of worship by the monthly calendar of saints' days" (p. 141). But this is the same Fr. Schmemann who now feels in his heart "the whole substance of faith" when he experiences the maximum degree of that very "inundation" – the services to the newly-glorified Saint Herman! What is the meaning of such a glaring self-contradiction?

It becomes evident that Fr. Schmemann, like the Metropolia, has come to a crucial crossroads of his Orthodoxy, which is itself rooted in an internal discord. His heart – if he has accurately described his feelings at Kodiak – is still Orthodox; but with his mind he is leading the "reform" of the Metropolia and of Orthodoxy that will precisely make it impossible for future generations to feel what he felt, for they will no longer be Orthodox at all.

One can only conclude – from the words of the Metropolia's own representatives – that the Metropolia literally did not know what it was doing in Kodiak: that it attempted to canonize a Saint without understanding what he represents or how the Church properly praises Her saints; that it enjoyed the exhilarating atmosphere of the Church's services without being aware that its own theologians (who were present!) are working to destroy this atmosphere for future generations; that, finally, anything at all Orthodox that its members may have felt in Kodiak is the result of a spiritual capital of which the Metropolia is now manifestly, and totally, bankrupt.

Fr. Schmemann and the Metropolia enjoyed at Kodiak a free spiritual banquet which was the result of generations and centuries of the labors, the sweat, and the blood of others whose conception of Orthodoxy would not today allow them to sit at the same table with the leaders of the Metropolia. And because it was not their labor that went into it, because these leaders are themselves of a completely different mind about Orthodoxy, this feast cannot be the foundation of their future; it can only be an example-perhaps the last major one of what the Metropolia has rejected, alike by its reform consciousness, by its unprincipled concordat with Moscow, and by its definitive and callous rejection of the Russian Church Outside of Russia, which even by the admission of the Metropolia's theologians has better than any other "jurisdiction" preserved traditional Orthodoxy.

Its own ignorance has blinded the Metropolia to the enormity of the evil it has perpetrated in the name of Orthodoxy. And so now it is in vain that it attempts to use its canonization of St. Herman to bring about "peace" and "reconciliation" with everyone. "In this light, in this joy," Fr. Alexander Schmemann concludes his article, "all our quarrels, accusations and judge. ments seem so trifling, human, and sinful... There at the tomb of St. Hermany in the shining of his humility, it was given us to see that reality which alone really gives life to the Church..." One can only point out once more that "that reality which alone gives life to the Church" is not seen only at moments of great religious fervor, but must accompany one's every word and deed as well. And in our day of widespread betrayal of Orthodoxy, witness is given to this reality not only in glorifying St. Herman, but alike in rejecting the shameful concordat with Moscow, which many of the Metropolia's own former faithful have bravely done.

Let the last word to the Metropolia in connection with St. Herman come from Alaska, from Archimandrite Gerasim of Spruce Island, who for thirty years stood guard over the relics of St. Herman and never ceased to accusefor those who would listen – the "Platonites," "Leontyites," and other perpetrators of schism from the one Russian Church Abroad. Now the Metropolia imagines itself to be "reconciled" even with him, and as a token of this it invites to his Spruce Island Hermitage, where his body is buried, two Soviet hierarchs – Juvenaly in June, and Nikodim himself just after the canonization – so that they who (as Fr. Gerasim wrote about "Patriarch Alexy and his loyal friends") "intercede for the godless power and against our faithful confessors" might trample upon his memory. Fr. Gerasim stands to accuse them and all their fellow betrayers of Orthodoxy in the words which he applied to the "Platonites, Evlogians, and their followers": "In the deeds of the Church of Christ there must not be any lie, for Christ founded His Church on the rock of Truth."

Even so we know full well that St. Herman cannot be the "patron" of the impious "autocephaly," and that his heavenly help is with those who stand firmly and uncompromisingly in the Truth.