THE HOLY SYNOD
OF THE CHURCH OF GREECE
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SYNODIC COMMITTEE ON HERESIES
26TH PAN-ORTHODOX CONVENTION OF AUTHORIZED
ORTHODOX CHURCHES AND SACRED METROPOLISES
ON MATTERS OF HERESIES AND PARA-RELIGION
(Lamia, 3rd to 5th November 2014)
RESOLUTIONS
The 26th Pan-Orthodox Convention of Authorized Orthodox Churches and Sacred Metropolises on matters of heresies and para-religion, which took place under the auspices of His Beatitude Hieronymos II, Archbishop of Athens and All Greece at the Spiritual and Administrative Center of the Sacred Metropolis of Fthiotis Province in Lamia, from the 3rd to the 5th of November 2014, with the hospitable provision of the Very Reverend Metropolitan Nicholas of Fthiotis and under the chairmanship of the Very Reverend Metropolitan Paul of Glyfada, Member of the Synodic Committee on Heresies, on the subject of “Exo-Christian, heretical and occultist views regarding Christ”, unanimously approved the following resolutions pursuant to an extensive discussion thereof:
1. The Orthodox Church is based on the steadfast faith that Jesus Christ is the Son of the Living God. That very same Person had revealed Himself initially as the “Unincarnate Logos” to the Just of the Old Testament, and later came into the world and History as the “Incarnate Logos” and as the perfect and sinless One, for our salvation. According to the irrefutable testimonies of those who had met the incarnated Son and Logos of God and had seen His glory, Jesus Christ is the True God, the only Master and Lord, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End, the Alpha and the Omega. He is the only way to the Father, and the one responsible for our salvation and our deification.
2. The Orthodox Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, believes and confesses the Lord Jesus Christ in accordance with the Oros (stipulation) of the 5th Ecumenical Synod, as being “perfect in divinity and perfect in humanity; truly God and truly human; truly of a logical soul and body; of the same essence as the Father as regards His divinity and of the same essence as us as regards His humanity; in everything the same as us, without sin... recognized with two natures: unconfused, unchangeable, indivisible, inseparable...».
3. In antithesis to the faith and the witness of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church, the exo-Christian, heretical and occultist views regarding Christ are based on the stale speculations of fallen man’s clouded mind, with which the truth about the God-Human Person and the opus of Jesus Christ is being relativized, or altered and perverted. A consequence of this was the disorientation and alienation of man from the main purpose of his existence, which is his union and communion by Grace with the source of life: the True, Triune God.
4. Every attempt to alter and/or abrogate the particularity of the Godman Person of the Lord - that is, the recorded and perennial, living Apostolic experience of the ecclesiastic Body – is undoubtedly a confutation of Christ’s salvific opus and leads to delusion.
5. Erroneous heretical approaches such as these had already appeared during the proto-Christian years and are mentioned in the sacred texts of the New Testament as well as in the Literature of the ancient Church. With Her Ecumenical and Her Local Synods, and with the opus of Her God-bearing Fathers, the Church had confronted tremendous heresies which had altered Her Christology and subsequently Her Soteriology. In recent years, mainly in the West, with its unilateral use of the historical-critical method, Christ appears only as a historical personage, and the ecclesiastic dogmatic tradition pertaining to Him is overlooked.
6. According to the terminology of Theosophy, which is one of the basic expressions of the “New Age”, Christ is not a unique and unprecedented Person – that is, Jesus Christ – but is merely a “state”, in which various “enlightened teachers” are reincarnated from time to time. This “christ” has no relation whatsoever with the historical Jesus Christ of the Holy Gospels and the Church, Who was born in Bethlehem of Judea and Who, during the time of Pontius Pilate, had suffered, was buried and rose from the dead. Besides, Theosophy has clearly proclaimed that “in the God of the Christians, in the Father of Jesus, in the Creator, we do not believe. We reject the idea of a personal God.” (Helena Blavatsky)
7. Another characteristic alteration to the God-Human Person of Christ also takes place in the system of Anthroposophy, which originates from Theosophy and denies or distorts the Biblical teaching regarding Christ. By using as its main source the “Akashic Records”, it underrates the Person of Christ and links it to unhistorical, neo-gnostic type, imaginary constructs about Him. Also according to the beliefs of Anthroposophy, the experience and the certainty of in-Christ freedom is negated and is replaced by the relentless constraint of an impersonal, secular, natural law which supposedly governs everything.
8. The “Watchtower” organization of the “Jehovah’s Witnesses” completely perverts the teaching of the Holy Bible, by projecting a turbid perception regarding Christ – similar to that of ancient Arianism. For the “Watchtower”, Jesus Christ is not the Creator God of the entire world, its only Saviour and final Judge, but instead, He is only a creation of Jehovah – a servant of his. According to the organization, Jesus Christ - as He appeared in the world and in History – is not the true God, Who had become a man for our salvation, but merely a “perfect man, and nothing more”, who cannot offer salvation.
9. Neo-pagan polytheism – as an inseparable sector of the “New Age” – has formulated analogous beliefs regarding the Person of Christ. Because of the many and conflicting trends within that space, it either negates His historicity, or relegates Him within nationalist, ethnic-racial, occult and polytheistic cadres. It is obvious that Neo-paganism’s “Christ” is either regarded as a historical person, or a social or national revolutionary, or a myth, or an allegory; he is certainly not the Christ of the Gospels and of the Church.
10. In the face of all the above - older and contemporary - counterfeiting of the truth regarding the Person of Christ, the Church evangelizes the uniqueness of in-Christ salvation, by repeating the words of the Holy Bible, that “…nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12) The Convention exhorts the Orthodox flock to believe, to be aware and to confess the faith of the Church, which is a prerequisite for our salvation.
The Convention unanimously approves the above mentioned Resolutions and hereby authorizes its Chairman to undersign them.
The Chairman of the Convention:
† Metropolitan Paul of Glyfada, Hellenikon, Voula, Vouliagmeni and Vari.
The Authorized representatives of the Orthodox Churches:
The Ecumenical Patriarchate: Metropolitan Damascenos of Kydonia and Apokoronas
The Patriarchate of Jerusalem: Archibishop Demetrios of Lydda
The Patriarchate of Russia: Hegumen Feofan Lukianov
The Patriarchate of Serbia: Hieromonk Eusebius Meandzia
The Patriarchate of Rumania: Professor Cyprianos Stretza
The Church of Cyprus: Bishop Christophoros of Karpasia
The Church of Greece: Protopresbyter Kyriakos Tsouros
The Church of Poland: Protopresbyter Andreas Levcak
The Host of the Convention: Metropolitan Nicholas of Fthiotis
The Chairman of the Convention:
† Metropolitan Paul of Glyfada, Hellenikon, Voula, Vouliagmeni and Vari.
Translation by A.N.
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