THE COMING MONTH

A Septendecimal Centenary!
- And it happened in Britain

JULY this year celebrates a very important anniversary for all Orthodox Christians and one that should be especially close to the Orthodox Christians of this country. On 25th July, 306 A.D, one thousand seven hundred years ago this year, Constantius I, one of the four rulers who made up the tetrarchy established by Diocletian, died in York. His son, Constantine, was immediately proclaimed Emperor by the troops in the same city. Thus, in Britain, seventeen centuries ago began the imperial reign of one who is now known to us as the holy Peer of the Apostles, Saint Constantine the Great. He was, of course, to free the Christians from persecution, later himself to become a Christian believer, to found the City of Constantinople, and convene the First OEcumenical Council. His feastday is kept on 21st May, and in our calendar the day on which he became Emperor is kept as the Dormition of St Anna, but on that day perhaps especially this year we should remember with thanks the great work that he did in liberating and establishing the Christian Church, thus opening up for her greater missionary opportunities, and bringing multitudes of people to holy Orthodoxy.

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POINTS FROM CORRESPONDENCE

In reply to a letter on jurisdictionalism from P.L., London:

NATURALLY, I think that, as you suggest, jurisdictionalism would have faded away as the succeeding generations feel less and less attached to the mother country of their forebears, but for two reasons this is not happening.

First of all, most of the Orthodox have very firmly stressed their national heritage as a means of keeping their people in the diaspora together. This is not altogether wrong. Their home-cultures were, after all, shaped by centuries of Orthodox commitment. The national culture has become a vessel for the transmission of Orthodoxy. However, very often the emphases are wrong, especially as time passes, and one sees the national culture promoted with little or no reference to Orthodoxy, and one often sees the very worst aspects of the “mother culture” promoted. This happens in myriads of ways and at all sorts of levels: Russia lauded for her imperial military might by people who know next to nothing about her saints, icons or monasteries. Cyprus lauded as the “Isle of Venus” rather than as the Island of the Kykkos Icon or of Saint Barnabas. Greece seen as the outpost of classical culture, rather than a land of the New Martyrs, and so it goes on. This is a clever ploy of the devil because it is always easier to make people descend to the lower rather than to aspire to the higher things. And one notices that in succeeding generations, often there are resurrgences of such misguided “nationalistic” passion. Sadly I think that it is sometimes even promoted by the clergy who believe that it might lead straying people back to the Church. At this stage the national culture, if it can be called a vessel for the transmission of Orthodoxy at all, is a dirty and leaking one.

Secondly, sadly, jurisdictionalism has found another latch to hang on to in the various things I mentioned in my first letter, the divergences of practices and the various levels of acceptance of the mores of the non- Orthodox world around us, - in short the split between traditionalist and liberals.

  But I think that we should not be looking at the thing this way all the time. Our purpose as Orthodox Christians is to bring people to Christ, first and foremost (as the most needy) ourselves. That purpose should direct the path we take, not concerns about trends within church-life and the like