Orthodox Reflections

For self-defeating actions, the GOA’s Abp. Elpidophoros is the undisputed champion. His 2024 encyclical for the 4^th of July is the latest in a long line of such actions. There are notable points where he is at odds with both history and with the judgment of holy saints of the Orthodox Church.

‘The Fourth of July is our National Birthday . . .’

False. As we have previously pointed out, separation from the British Empire produced thirteen new nations, not one. Now there are 50 nations, instead of 13.

‘ . . . celebrating the Declaration of Independence, a truly remarkable document that every American should read every year on this date.’

We actually agree with His Eminence on this point. The Declaration is ‘truly remarkable’, but not in a positive way. The Holy Father St. Athanasios Parios (+1813) demolishes the concepts lionized in that Enlightenment-tainted political treatise, such as individual freedom and equality.

Of freedom, he says,

. . . I do not accept that people are born free (independent) in the world. On the contrary, I support and will prove that there is no such freedom in the world: people are born and live in the world as “slaves” (dependent) in many ways.

– People are “slaves” of God, just like the rest of creation. That people are “slaves” is so true, that when they are ignorant of their Creator and do not carry out His commandments, they are punished even for eternity. In fact, this punishment does not apply to any other tangible creature, because only people are distinguished from all the rest, since they have reason and have been adorned with the gift of autonomy, so they voluntarily become wicked and worthless servants and disobedient to the orders of their Master.

– Therefore, those who proclaim with words and decide in accordance with the law that people are born free are ignorant and foolish. Those who think this way are among the herd of Epicurus’ followers. They are atheists and believe that the soul is mortal. They are apostates of the Divine revelations, rebels against the greatness of God Himself, deserving of hatred and despising by all creation, as enemies of God, the Creator and Lord of all. So here we have a way of “slavery” (dependence) that is necessary and inevitable, as long as it is impossible for the creature to deny its Creator, the formed its Fashioner, the caused its Cause. After all, who is so ignorant that they do not know that the constituent parts of man are two, that is, the body and the soul? And that the rational soul is the one that governs the body, that is, the irrational part, and causes it to move wherever and however it wants? So is there anyone who doesn’t know and doesn’t accept this truth, which is known even to the Gentiles? A slight observation is enough for everyone to locate it in their consciousness.

. . . – When we encounter another kind of “slavery”, dependence on the body, which is completely natural and necessary, how can various vain people say and write that people are born free? After all, isn’t each of us born under parental authority? Don’t parents naturally have the absolute power over us to treat us the way they want us to live when we don’t live right or obey their promptings? Don’t they punish us? Do they not renounce us and deprive us of our paternal inheritance?

– But isn’t every head of household a kind of monarch at home? Doesn’t he have different people at his workplace and he tells one “come” and they come, and to the other “do this” and they do it? And what happens to every apprentice and students of every specialty? Aren’t they subject to the authority of their teachers, as if they were masters? Who can deny that they obey with respect and definitely carry out the orders and are severely punished when they do not obey the rules of apprenticeship accurately?

– When we see people subjected in so many ways and maybe even more, where is their natural freedom? Even if we consider that they can be freed from parental and doctrinal dependencies, how can we ignore the dominance of the innate soul and that of the First and Supreme Cause, that is, the Creator and God of all?

– To the extent that it is impossible for the Creator and Maker not to be the Lord and Master of men, and to the extent that it is impossible for the soul, as a rational and intangible nature, not to be the hegemonic part of human composition, it is to the same degree that it is impossible for people to be free, independent.

. . . And, if that wise opinion is true (and must be true) that says “it is more burdensome to be enslaved to one’s passions than to external tyrants,” they are absolutely slaves to the passions, and this slavery is much more burdensome, worse and poorer than enslavement to tyrannical people. Because the body is by nature subject to the commands of the dominant soul, and for this reason it is not paradoxical to submit to some external power and perform bodily services and works. However, it is completely unheard of and paradoxical for the dominant soul to fall from its high order, the utterly free one, and to submit with its own will to the irrational and filthy passions of the body.

Of equality, the following:

– But with their declarations of freedom, they also link the declaration of Equality. And high on their flags they write “Freedom-Equality”.  And the reckless and relentless mob, what else more attractive, appealing and motivating for uprisings against superiors would they expect to hear beyond these declarations? With the proclamation of Freedom, he imagines himself free from all external human power, which he indiscriminately calls tyranny, even if it is not. With Equality statements, the water carrier and the one who cleans the feces, imagines himself as the most noble and prominent.

Stupid and vain people! If, as Gregory the Theologian says, the monkey imagines he is a lion, what good will such an imagination do him? Equal! Tell me, where is this equality? He lives in fancy palaces and towering towers, and you, unfortunate one, have a poor hut, enough to house your sick and tired body. He is resting in a golden and ivory bed and on soft mattresses, and by force you have a wooden mat, to lay down your tormented body. There is not much space left on his table due to the abundance of food and wine, and you just have some bread and some poor quality cheese to fool your hunger!

But why expand on the matter? How can two people be called equal when one is very rich and the other is starving and forced to steal because of his poverty? These declarations are an invention of cunning and insidious people, who, wanting to satisfy their passions and fulfill their evil desires, instilled in the minds of the common people this unbridled wind of equality, to help them achieve their purpose. Can there ever be equality in societies dominated by greed, dominated by passions, where no other expression is heard more often than “mine” and “yours”?

St. Athanasios points out where real equality can be found, and it ain’t in ‘Murcan democracy’ or capitalism, but in the life of the Orthodox Church:

Equality, yes, did exist once! But where? In the newly formed Church of those good Christians, the simple and pious! There, as Saint Luke describes it (Acts 4:32), no one had anything of their own, but it was all common – money, clothes and food. But why was everything common? Because, he says, the hearts and souls of the faithful were one! Everyone had an opinion and a will about God and they were all connected with brotherly love, so close that, although they were a lot of people and of different ages, men and women, old and young, they were all so unified that they looked like one body that was moved by one soul.

The same equality and solidarity has existed for many centuries in the coenobiums of the Venerable ones of old, Pachomios, Savvas, Euthymios, Theodosios and many others, because in them brotherly love and solidarity were preserved. That, indeed, was true Equality!

If the Archbishop’s views of freedom and equality sound more Freemasonic than Christian, it is because they are. St. Athanasios explains:

And who are those who have fallen into this wicked, filthy and vicious slavery? The Illuminati! That is, the enlightened. From where were they enlightened? From philosophy, as they themselves boast. And of course, no other country and no other nation has been fortunate enough to be as rich in academic schools and in every kind of science as the Kingdom of France. And yet, “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools” (Rom. 1:22), according to the Holy Apostle.

Returning to the Archbishop’s encyclical, he continues to wax eloquent on philosophic/Illuminati democracy:

‘For “democracy,” the noble experiment conceived by the Hellenic mind over 2,500 years ago, has never been static.’

Is democracy really so noble? One of the most revered Hellenes and Orthodox Church Fathers, St. Gregory the Theologian (+ c. 390), did not fancy that it was:

The three most ancient opinions concerning God are Anarchia, Polyarchia, and Monarchia. The first two are the sport of the children of Hellas, and may they continue to be so. For Anarchy is a thing without order; and the Rule of Many is factious, and thus anarchical, and thus disorderly. For both these tend to the same thing, namely disorder; and this to dissolution, for disorder is the first step to dissolution. But Monarchy is that which we hold in honour.

And remembering how much in honor Ukrainians are amongst the Patriarchate of Constantinople at the moment, surely Abp. Elpidophoros has not forgotten the blessed and golden words of a martyr of Kiev?

A priest who is not a monarchist is not worthy to stand at the altar table. The priest who is a republican is always a man of poor faith. God himself anoints the monarch to be head of the kingdom, while the president is elected by the pride of the people. The king stays in power by implementing God’s commandments, while the president does so by pleasing those who rule. The king brings his faithful subjects to God, while the president takes them away from God. –Metropolitan and New-Martyr St. Vladimir of Kiev (+1918)

(Both quotes on monarchy via this essay.)

‘For with mere language, it [the Declaration—W.G.] renewed a positive vision for the human polis, one that has stood the test of time . . .’

Plenty of people can see with their own eyes that American ‘democracy’ doesn’t offer a ‘positive vision’. Rod Dreher, for instance, makes the point especially well that if Trump and Biden are the best the US political system can produce, it has failed utterly:

Joe Biden is the walking embodiment of the exhausted American Establishment. More and more people have simply lost their faith in our Ruling Class. You could scarcely have a more potent symbol of its impotence. Biden represents one form of American decline.

Donald Trump represents a different, more vigorous, version of the same thing. He’s not a serious person. He is the barstool’s idea of a strong leader — all egotistical smack-talk. It’s impossible to believe he has convictions, a moral and intellectual foundation, and a plan to do what democracies need their chief executive to do. . . .

This, I think, is what Prof. Lancellotti means by America’s crisis being a cultural and historical turning point. If American liberal democracy has brought us to last night’s debate, between two candidates of that caliber, then people aren’t wrong to wonder if the system is still fit for purpose.

Despite all this, his Eminence would like us to believe that faith in a flimsy ‘Providence’ is enough to keep everything humming along just fine in Exceptionalstan:

‘We behold how “a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence” is the guarantee of our liberties. On such a basis, without exclusivism, we can “pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.” A belief in a higher purpose of our freedom is ultimately the unifying principle by which we can bond as fellow-citizens . . . . it can bind up and heal any wounds in our national consciousness, lest they fester and infect our domestic tranquility and prosperity.’

It is impossible that this would be the case. The Archbishop’s passionate obsession with ‘all manner of minorities, racial, ethnic, and otherwise’ ensures it. If one rejects exclusivism and insists on the cacophony of aggrieved minority voices, including those opposed to the Orthodox teachings of the Fathers on things like LGBT and abortion, it is a given that there will be many who do not accept any notion of ‘Providence’ or ‘a higher purpose for our freedom’. To insist that these minorities limit their freedom for the sake of obedience to ideas that they explicitly deny would violate both their own perceived sense of identity and ‘pursuit of happiness’ (another part of the ‘remarkable’ Declaration) and Abp. Elpidophoros’ own support for minority rights.

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‘The Constitution of our Nation, ratified fourteen years after the Declaration of Independence, presciently predicted that our United States of America would always be in process to “form a more perfect Union.”’

This may sound pleasing to some ears, but once again, history undermines this simplistic view of constitution and nation. The Philadelphia constitution of 1787 itself came into being under dubious circumstances. Taking advantage of an uprising called Shay’s Rebellion in western Massachusetts, the political elite of the early United States relentlessly pushed a propaganda of fear onto the citizens of the States until they acquiesced in giving the elite the more powerful, centralized government that they wanted to replace the weaker, decentralized Articles of Confederation:

“Never let a good crisis go to waste” isn’t just some modern invention by people who want to expand government power. It seems to be an approach used to convince people of the need to replace the Articles of Confederation with a new Constitution in 1787.

Even James Madison admitted as much later in life.

Shays’ Rebellion was one of the most prominent reasons given for a system of government more “energetic” than the one formed under the Articles. Federalists, who had for years failed to expand congressional power under the Articles, repeatedly cited the Shays’ crisis as a glaring example of the weakness and insufficiency of the system – and a reason for a new one.

For instance, in a 1787 letter to William Carmichael, John Jay asserted that the rebellion and the federal government’s inability to fund troops to put down the uprising made “the Inefficiency of the fœderal government [become] more and more manifest.”

In a 1786 letter to Henry Lee, George Washington described the rebellion as “clouds that have spread over the brightest morn that ever dawned upon any Country.”

“You talk, my good Sir, of employing influence to appease the present tumults in Massachusetts. I know not where that influence is to be found; and if attainable, that it would be a proper remedy for the disorders. Influence is no Government. Let us have one by which our lives, liberties and properties will be secured; or let us know the worst at once.”

However, as prominent Anti-Federalists warned, there is evidence that supporters of a strong centralized government were merely using and even hyping Shays’ Rebellion in order to achieve their goals of more centralized power.

. . . In 1821, James Madison went so far as to admit that Shays’ Rebellion was overblown and resulted in a more powerful government than what was “warranted.”

In a letter to John G. Jackson, Madison wrote, “most of us carried into the Convention profound impressions, produced by the experienced inadequacy of the old Confederation, & by the monitory examples of all similar ones antient and modern, as to the necessity of binding the States together by a strong Constitution.”

Madison specifically mentioned the “alarming insurrection” led by Shays, writing that it had “a very sensible influence on the public mind.”

“Such indeed was the aspect of things, that in the eyes of the best friends of liberty, a crisis had arrived.”

But Madison went on to admit that, “This view of the crisis made it natural for many in the Convention to lean to a higher toned system than was perhaps in strictness warranted by a proper distinction between causes temporary as some of them doubtless were, and causes permanently inherent in popular frames of Government.” [Emphasis added]

That is hardly forming ‘a more perfect union’ (and it is eerily reminiscent of how our current elite used Covid to try to concentrate even more power into their hands).

In addition, the scale of the constitutional union is detrimental to the cherished diversity of the Archbishop. During the ratification debates of the Philadelphia constitution, when the proposed union was limited to 13 nations on the east coast of North America (as opposed to the trans-continental federation of today), the opponents of that document expressed their fears of the destruction of cultural diversity:

With the dramatic increase in scale that a continental republic represented, Anti-Federalists like George Mason feared that:

The General Government being paramount to, and in every respect more powerful than, the State governments, the latter must give way to the former. Is it to be supposed that one National Government will suit so extensive a country, embracing so many climates, and containing inhabitants so very different in manners, habits, and customs? It is ascertained by history, that there never was a Government, over a very extensive country, without destroying the liberties of the people.

In other words, the Constitution’s great powers over territory as vast as the United States threatened to consolidate the states into a national government. Consolidation erased the various circumstances of population, customs, economies, and geography that characterized the states’ diversity, replacing it with what the Federal Farmer described as a “uniform system of laws” that conflicted with and proved detrimental to the “different laws, customs and opinions” of the separate states.

. . . The scale of this continental republic threatened not only republican liberty but the homogeneity necessary for self-governance. As Brutus explained:

The different parts of the union are various, and their interest, of consequence, diverse. Their manners and habits differ as much their climates and productions; and their sentiments are by no means coincident. The laws and customs of the several states are, in many respects, very diverse, and in some opposite; each would be in favor to its own interests and customs, and of consequence, a legislature . . . would be composed of such heterogeneous and discordant principles, as would constantly be contending with each other.

Thus, as homogeneity gave way to heterogeneity, different and potentially conflicting cultures would clash. Should one gain the levers of power, nothing could stop them from carrying out their will.

Again, it is rather obvious that the current constitution, in destroying the good and beneficial diversity of the several States, and replacing it with the aggressive cult of Wokeness (or whatever The Current Thing has been, is now, or will be) from the top down via federal directives, for the sake of a grand union, is not moving us to ‘perfection’.

What the Anti-Federalists predicted came true:

Thus, as homogeneity [of the individual State or the shared regional culture involving a number of States—W.G.] gave way to heterogeneity [of a union of States and cultures too big for its own good—W.G.], different and potentially conflicting cultures would clash. Should one gain the levers of power, nothing could stop them from carrying out their will.

The New England Yankees, gaining control of the federal government with Lincoln’s election, made their sectional will paramount and proceeded to invade the States of Dixie to create a homogenous union out of a heterogeneity of very different States. It is quite comical how those Southerners, so often demonized by Yankeefied people like Apb. Elpidophoros, have a much firmer grasp of what the federal constitution was and how it was intended to operate. One such execrable man (according to them) is Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederate States of America – once universally esteemed by Southerners before another strong propaganda push by the elite made the South ashamed to even speak his name. In just a few paragraphs, he demolishes the notion of the divinely ordained, eternal Union of States under the federal constitution’s government in DC:

On November 6, 1860, the Legislature of South Carolina assembled and gave the vote of the State for electors of a President of the United States. On the next day an act was passed calling a State Convention to assemble on December 17^th, to determine the question of the withdrawal of the State from the United States. Candidates for membership were immediately nominated. All were in favor of secession. The Convention assembled on December 17^th, and on the 20^th passed “an ordinance to dissolve the union between the State of South Carolina and other States united with her under the compact entitled ‘The Constitution of the United States of America.’” The ordinance began with these words: “We, the people of the State of South Carolina, in convention assembled, do declare and ordain,” etc. The State authorities immediately conformed to this action of the Convention, and the laws and authority of the United States ceased to be obeyed within the limits of the State. . . .

The State of South Carolina is designated in the proclamation as a combination too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings, or by the powers vested in the marshals by law. This designation does not recognize the State, or manifest any consciousness of its existence, whereas South Carolina was one of the colonies that had declared her independence, and, after a long and bloody war, she had been recognized as a sovereign State by Great Britain, the only power to which she had ever owed allegiance. The fact that she had been one of the colonies in the original Congress, had been a member of the Confederation, and subsequently of the Union, strengthens, but surely can not impair, her claim to be a State. Though President Lincoln designated her as a “combination,” it did not make her a combination. Though he refused to recognize her as a State, it did not make her any less a State. By assertion, he attempted to annihilate seven States; and the war which followed was to enforce the revolutionary edict, and to establish the supremacy of the General Government on the ruins of the blood-bought independence of the States.

. . . In the nature of things, no union can be formed except by separate, independent, and distinct parties. Any other combination is not a union; and, upon the destruction of any of these elements in the parties, the union ipso facto ceases. If the Government is the result of a union of States, then these States must be separate, sovereign, and distinct, to be able to form a union, which is entirely an act of their own volition. Such a government as ours had no power to maintain its existence any longer than the contracting parties pleased to cohere, because it was founded on the great principle of voluntary federation, and organized “to establish justice and insure domestic tranquility.” Any departure from this principle by the General Government not only perverts and destroys its nature, but furnishes a just cause to the injured State to withdraw from the union. A new union might subsequently be formed, but the original one could never by coercion be restored. Any effort on the part of the others to force the seceding State to consent to come back is an attempt at subjugation. It is a wrong which no lapse of time or combination of circumstances can ever make right. A forced union is a political absurdity. . . .

Men do not fight to make a fraternal union, neither do nations. These military preparations of the Government of the United States signified nothing less than the subjugation of the Southern States, so that, by one devasting blow, the North might grasp for ever that supremacy it had so long coveted.

The current union is therefore unjust and imperfect, and no amount of unhistorical word juggling by Abp. Elpidophoros, Prager U, Fox News, or any other outfit of the Left or Right can change that.

Once again, we plead with his Eminence, and with all Orthodox clergy in the 50 States, to reject the fiction that ‘America’ is one nation. It will only hamper Orthodox missions to the real cultural kin-groups that exist amongst them. The Ludwell Orthodox Fellowship is doing good work in Dixieland; we encourage all clergy in the Southern States to attend the conference they have planned for September in Texas. Likewise, New England has unique characteristics that must be taken into account when presenting Orthodoxy to them. And so on for all the cultural groups.

Celebrating July 4^th as a ‘National Birthday’ for the US is terribly misguided. Forced unions have a funny habit of falling apart, no matter how repressive the regimes become to hold them together, from Charlemagne’s empire in the 8^th-9^th centuries to the Soviet Empire in the 20^th, to the current uncongenial European Union and United States. If Abp. Elpidophoros and the other elite will not willingly recognize this, they may find that ‘divine Providence’ has ways of forcing people to acknowledge reality – and for the hard-hearted and stubborn, they are often not very pleasant to experience.

–Walt Garlington is an Orthodox Christian living in Dixieland.  His writings have appeared on several web sites, and he maintains a site of his own, Confiteri: A Southern Perspective.