MOSCOW — After 55 years of preparation, a landmark
effort to promote unity among the world’s 300 million Orthodox Christians
turned into a showcase of disarray on Tuesday after the Russian church, the biggest of 14 Orthodox jurisdictions, announced
that it would not take part in a historic conclave of church leaders scheduled
to start this weekend.
The gathering, known both as the Holy and Great Council and as the
Pan-Orthodox Council, is scheduled to begin Sunday on the Greek island of Crete
and to run through June 26. It had been under discussion since 1961 and has
been billed as the first council of its kind since the eighth century.
While it did not rule out participating in a future
gathering, the Moscow Patriarchate, the leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church, said late Monday that it was “impossible to
participate” in the council because not all Orthodox churches would be present.
At least four branches of the Orthodox faith, mostly with historically close
ties to Russia, like the Serbian Orthodox Church, had complained about aspects
of the Crete council and indicated that they might stay away.
The Russian decision threw into doubt the opening of
the gathering and highlighted longstanding doctrinal disagreements among
Orthodox Christians as well as a struggle over the direction of the church
between the Moscow Patriarchate and a rival leadership based in Istanbul, the
seat of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople.
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I in Istanbul, as
Constantinople is now called, has been the driving force behind the Crete
gathering, which some priests in Russia view as an attempt to diminish or usurp
their authority while elevating the standing of their rival.
Unlike the Roman
Catholic Church, which has a single, undisputed leader in the pope, the
Orthodox or Eastern branch of Christianity is divided into self-governing
provinces, each with its own leadership. As heir to the traditions of the
original Orthodox, or Byzantine, church, based in Constantinople before the
15th-century Muslim conquest of the city, the Istanbul-based patriarch has
traditionally been viewed as the “first among equals” by the Orthodox faithful,
a role that has long nettled Russian church leaders.
The Russian Orthodox Church, which also controls
affiliated branches of Orthodoxy in much of the former Soviet Union, has many
more followers than the Istanbul-based hierarchy. Headed by Patriarch Kirill, a
close ally of President Vladimir V. Putin, the Russian church has increasingly
sought to assert itself as the pre-eminent voice of the Orthodox faith, in
tandem with a push by Mr. Putin to assert Russia’s influence as a global power.
Sergei Chapnin, the former
editor of the Moscow Patriarchate’s official journal, said that the disarray
leading up to the Crete gathering flowed in part from genuine disagreements
over draft texts on theology and other issues, but that it also “showed serious
lines of tension between Moscow and Bartholomew.”
The Moscow Patriarchate and
the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople are embroiled in a long struggle
over property, notably in France, where the Russian Orthodox Church has won
court orders to gain control of a cathedral in Nice previously controlled by
and loyal to the Istanbul archbishop. They have also squabbled over efforts by
Orthodox churches in some former Soviet territories to break their links with
the Moscow church hierarchy and to establish their own independent Orthodox
churches.
While delivering a heavy blow
to Bartholomew by pulling out of the meeting, the Moscow Patriarchate sought to
avoid criticism that it wanted to sabotage the Crete gathering. The Russian
news agency Tass quoted Vakhtang Kipshidze, a deputy chairman of the Synodal
Department for Relations Between the Church and Society and Mass Media, as
saying the Russian church wanted the council to be held at some point and was
offering a “soft way out of the crisis” by merely postponing the conference.
Planning for the Crete meeting
has been dogged by doctrinal and political disputes. The Orthodox church, which
broke from the Catholic Church in the so-called great schism of 1054, has held
several smaller councils over the centuries. But the Crete gathering, at least
as originally conceived, would have been the first full council since 787, when
church leaders resolved a bitter dispute over whether icons could be used for
liturgical purposes. (Those favoring icons won.)
But decades of planning began
to unravel in recent weeks, as Orthodox churches in Bulgaria, Serbia and
several other places threatened not to attend.
The gathering was originally
to be held in Istanbul, but the Russian church, among others, asked that it be
moved for security and other reasons. Russia has also complained about
representation in Crete, asking that all 700 Orthodox bishops be invited to
attend, instead of small delegations from each church, according to Mr.
Chapnin. The Russian Orthodox Church has nearly 400 bishops, many more than
other Orthodox churches have.
Metropolitan Hilarion of
Volokolamsk, chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate’s external church relations
department, told Russian television that the Crete gathering should be postponed
because “there are many problems among various Orthodox churches.” He added
that the “disagreements might seem small but, for historical churches, these
are important issues.”
The disagreements include
arguments over seating arrangements at the Crete conference, squabbles over the
cost of the Holy and Great Council, and substantial discord over how Orthodox
churches should interact with
Christians in the Catholic and other Christian churches.
Mr. Chapnin, the former
journal editor, said the Orthodox church, divided into what are essentially
national church hierarchies, had always been prone to infighting and power
struggles. “For Orthodoxy, this is a very traditional mess,” he said.
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