From the letter of Bishop Juvenaly of Tula and Odoevo to Holy Patriarch Tikhon the Confessor

November 6, 1920

"From my numerous talks with them [i.e. leaders of the Athonite Fathers living in exile in Moscow: Abbot David of St. Andrews Skete, monks Iriney, Peter and Manasses of St. Panteleimon’s Monastery] and having been  acquainted with them for over five months, I was fully convinced in their Orthodoxy, and I have not noticed anything heretical in their reasoning. With your blessing, I even sent monk Iriney to Your Holiness [i.e. to Patriarch Tikhon] for a personal interview, and as you told me, neither did Your Holiness find anything heretical in him."

The Athonite debate over the Name of God and its consequent fate Hegumen Andronik (Trubachev) Pravoslavnaya Beseda, #4 (2000) 39.

Papism in the Orthodox Church

Michael Alexandrovich Novoselov

(future Hieromartyr and Catacomb Bishop Mark, +1937)

In May of the present year [1913], the Holy Synod published an epistle dedicated to the analysis of the teaching concerning the Name of God. This epistle must be subject to a serious and substantial discussion by Orthodox people to whose consciousness matters of faith are close. Such analyses are already appearing in print. Without touching the above-mentioned teaching, we would like to answer one question, entirely unrelated to the above-mentioned teaching, but which is being posed to us from all sides: “Do we accept the unconditional authority of the synodal epistle [i.e. the decision of May 1913 against the Athonite fathers]? Do we see in it “the voice of the Church”, which is the “Pillar and Foundation of Truth” - as the Synod demands from us? We answer decisively - no, no and no. We were shocked to read it and we reject the conclusive thought of the synodal epistle, which says: “now that the leadership of the Churches of Constantinople and Russia have expressed their position, their (that is, of Schema-monk Hilarion, Hieromonk Anthony and others) further insistence on “Name-glorifying” will equal to the opposition to the truth.” This is an unlawful infringement of the inalienable rights of the ecclesiastical body, the guardians of the faith - the Orthodox faithful.

It seems that the Holy Synod has forgotten that “the infallibility rests only in the catholicity of the Church, united in mutual love” (A. S. Khomyakov). It [i.e. the Synod] does not want to remember what was declared in 1848 to the whole Orthodox and heterodox world by the Ecumenical Patriarch, in his answer to the Roman bishop: “With us, neither patriarchs, nor councils could ever introduce anything new, because the guardian of the faith is the very body of the Church, that is, the faithful.” The spiritual collegium [i.e. the Synod] not only did not wish to invite and hear out the voice of the faithful, but to the contrary, it tried to smother it with draconian methods far surpassing even those of the Roman high-priest [i.e. the Pope].

And now, we are paying the price of such hastiness.

Published in "Religious-Philosophical Library"

Moscow, 1913, p. 4.

Letter of Holy Tsar-Martyr Nicholas to the Overseer of the Holy Synod V.K. Sabler

"On this Feast of Feasts, when the hearts of the faithful strive with love to God and to neighbor, my soul is grieved about the Athonite monastics, who have been deprived of the joy of communing the Holy Mysteries and of the consolation of attending the Church [services]. Let us forget the quarrel: it is not for us to judge about the Greatest of Holies – the Name of God, and by doing so to incur the wrath of the Lord on the Motherland; the trial must be cancelled, all monastics must be settled in different monasteries, they must receive back (following the example of metropolitan Flavian) their monastic habit and they should be allowed to serve [the divine services]."

Pascha, April 15, 1914

Letter written in 1918 by Michael Alexandrovich Novoselov (future Catacomb Bishop and Hieromartyr Mark, + 1937).

Dear NN! Peace be unto you, and rejoice in the Lord.

This letter will probably surprise you, and maybe also sadden you, but I cannot remain silent on these matters which fill my soul. I will start from the very beginning… At the last session of the Missionary Council, which I attended, one of its members (it could have been you) offered the Council that he might speak on the subject of immediately preparing apologetic Christian literature – brochures, articles, maybe even bigger works – with the purpose of spreading it among the people, because a plentitude of harmful anti-religious materials are already circulating among them. Regarding that proposal I replied that even if we could cover the whole of Russia with such apologetic literature, it would not bring much benefit to the Church, because the main affliction of church life in Russia is established much deeper within the church, and thus it can not be cured by such superfluous means of apologetics. And this affliction is nothing else but the lack of Orthodox understanding, Orthodox feeling perception, the abandonment of the patristic foundations of the religious life and religious thought. And this affliction, I pointed out, affects, first and foremost, our hierarchs (surely you remember, that I gave examples and names), and representatives of our academic circles, and clergy, especially the learned ones. Naturally, this spiritual sickness spreads from these heights wide and deep into the whole Church, society and people. I will not repeat here in detail what I said back then, because you recorded my words in the Council minutes yourself. Here I will only continue what I began at the Council, but could not finish. That last speech of mine I ended with these words, which, it seems, were not really heard by the attendees: I said that after pointing out all the sores that afflict the earthly body of our Church, I will not speak about the one wound that I consider to be the most grievous – for I think speaking about it would be untimely and premature. This is what I did not talk about the last time; this is what I want to tell you now. The most severe abandonment of Orthodox reasoning I see is in the so-called name-fighting, that is, in that peculiar message, which was articulated in the infamous epistle of the Synod “to all the brothers, struggling in monasticism”, published in May 1913, and the reports attached thereto.

Answer to an Enquiry

Answer to an Enquiry