The Shepherd, July 2004
NEWS SECTION
DEATH OF FR DIMITRI DUDKO
FR DIMITRI DUDKO, who in the nineteen-seventies achieved worldwide renown as a dissident priest in the Soviet Union, who spoke out against iniquities in church-life in Russia and in the atheistic state apparatus, died at the age of 83 on 28th June this year. May he find the mercies of the Lord and eternal rest.
ROCA - MP RAPPROCHEMENT
THE TWO COMMISSIONS, set up by the Synods of the Moscow Patriarchate and the Russian Church Abroad to study the paths and obstacles to rapprochement, met in the Saint Daniel Monastery in Moscow between 22nd and 24th June. Prior to this, the first Joint Meeting of the commissions, the Church Abroad commission met separately in Munich. Each commission of five members also had two consultants attached to it, although the consultants were not to participate in the face-to-face talks. One of the members of the ROCA commission, which is headed by Archbishop Mark, is Bishop Evtikhy of Siberia, but for reasons which are not specified in the press release he would also not be participating in the joint meetings and so will be replaced there by Protopriest George Larin. Prayers have been asked for the furtherance of the work of these commissions, but at the same time a number of clergymen of the Church Abroad, alarmed by what they perceive as the undue haste with which preparations for unity are being pressed ahead, have appealed to the President of her Hierarchical Synod, Metropolitan Lavr, and to the other members of the Synod, asking that an All-Diaspora Council of the hierarchs, clergy and laity of the Church Abroad be convened to consider the issues involved in any possible rapprochement. They stress that, although “there could be no greater joy than that the Orthodox people of Russia and abroad should be united in truth,” before progressing along the path to unity, the fears and doubts of many within the Church Abroad must be addressed. They express the hope that “the process should be genuine and transparent,” saying “there must be not even the appearance of one sidedness or even the appearance of machination.” “Inter-communion,” they say, “is the result of one-mindedness; it does not create one-mindedness.” These misgivings are obviously expressed as a result of what many perceived as the hasty way in which the earlier Nyack Conference was convened, and what appeared to be “machination,” in the way delegates were selected and presentations made.
PEACE RESTORED BETWEEN CONSTANTINOPLE AND GREECE
THE RIFT, which we reported in an earlier issue of “The Shepherd” and which led to a temporary break in communion between the two Churches, has been healed. The dispute over the appointment of Bishops in the northern part of Greece, over which the Patriarchate of Constantinople retains some canonical rights, has been dissolved by the fact that the state Church of Greece has retreated from its earlier position, and thus a measure of peace has been restored.
RELICS STOLEN FROM SERBIAN CHURCHES
A ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST, Fr Christian Venard, has caused great hurt in Serbia for taking sacred relics from desecrated Serbian Orthodox churches. Fr Venard, a Frenchman, serving as a military chaplain in Bosnia and Herzegovina, visited the churches shortly after they were desecrated by Albanian Kosovar extremists in the outbreak of violence against Serbian religious and cultural monuments in March this year. Obviously knowing of the Orthodox practice, Fr Venard took relics from the altars of these churches without the proper knowledge of the Orthodox hierarchy. He later claimed to have been on a “holy relics rescue mission,” although his “rescue” does not appear to extend to handing the relics he had “rescued” over to the Serbian Orthodox Church to whom they belong. He did claim to be handing them over to the RC Bishop Marko Sopi in Prizren. However, the bishopric in Prizren itself claims that it had no information regarding the relics. UNMIK officials are looking into the matter and asking that the relics be returned to their rightful owners, the Serbian Orthodox Church.
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