File this under “U” for Ugh.
John Couretas is drawing attention to statements by Metropolitan Bartholomeis of Chalcedon. And wow, these are some pretty “unorthodox” statements regarding the sanctity of life from a member of the Orthodox clergy. Take it away, John:
Here is a direct quotation from a July 20, 1990, article, “SF Shows Off Its Ecumenical Spirit,” in the San Francisco Chronicle. Metropolitan Bartholomais of Chalcedon is the current Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew.
Asked the Orthodox church’s position on abortion, Bartholomais described a stand more liberal than that of the Roman Catholic Church, which condemns abortion in all cases and whose clergy have, in some cities, excommunicated leading pro-choice Catholics.
Although the Orthodox church believes the soul enters the body at conception and, ”generally speaking, respects human life and the continuation of pregnancy,” Bartholomais said, the church also ”respects the liberty and freedom of all human persons and all Christian couples.”
”We are not allowed to enter the bedrooms of the Christian couples,” he said. ”We cannot generalize. There are many reasons for a couple to go toward abortion.”
The statement was made in 1990, but Couretas goes on to highlight the same theme in the patriarch’s thought through the years. For a church that talks about being founded in 32 b.c. this is quite a divergence from early Christian practice, which consistently exhibited tremendous concern for the value of human life.
October 27th, 2009 | 9:40 am
See what happens when you split from Rome…
October 27th, 2009 | 11:09 am
“whose clergy have, in some cities, excommunicated leading pro-choice Catholics”
This is used as one of two statements describing the RCC in this story as if it were a widespread phenomena. How many times has it been done? Fewer than it ought to be, to be used as a way of characterizing what the Church’s opposition to abortion. In fact, the most prominent pro-abortion (not just “pro-choice”) Catholics in the US continue to receive Communion publicly.
October 27th, 2009 | 1:03 pm
”generally speaking, respects human life and the continuation of pregnancy”
You can’t respect human life “generally,” you can either respect it or not respect it.
The Patriarch had a column on “climate change” in the WSJ yesterday or Saturday. Hmmmm.
October 27th, 2009 | 3:07 pm
“For a church that talks about being founded in 32 B.C. …”
32 B.C. ?
October 27th, 2009 | 4:27 pm
As an Orthodox Christian, these words are read with sadness.
However, the position stated is in no way a normal Orthodox thought. If His Beatitude still truly believes these things, I’m glad he does not have the power to make it some sort of dogma, nor do I think the Church would accept it.
October 27th, 2009 | 4:34 pm
W, that should read A.D. Will fix!
October 27th, 2009 | 5:26 pm
Look on the bright side… the website with his bio says he is “the first major Christian leader to make the environment a moral imperative.” If saving the mint, dill, and cumin constitutes a moral imperative, the “least of these my brethren” can’t be far behind, right?
On the other hand, if the heresies that fractured the Church in the first millennium were mostly Christological (e.g. Arianism, Nestorianiam, Monophysitism), and the second witnessed ruptures that were largely ecclesiological (not to overlook the role of bald politics in any of this…), the great heresies of our age are clearly anthropological, and the See of Constantinople is apparently on something other than orthodox ground on the most crucial matters of the day – again. Might this possibly turn out to be, at long last, a kind of wake-up call in the Orthodox world that would make a modern “Florence” moment fecund?
October 27th, 2009 | 6:45 pm
Well said, Jeremy.
As an Orthodox Christian myself, I’m dumbfounded when others at my parish attempt to compartmentalize their faith by saying politics can be separate from Christianity or, worse, try to reconcile pro-choice views with the writings of the Fathers and the life of the Church, et cetera. But my jaw hit the floor when I read that this was an Orthodox hierarch that had said these remarks. Disheartening would be an understatement.
October 28th, 2009 | 2:23 pm
A thought that popped into my head when reading the quoted paragraph about the Orthodox’s respect for the soul entering the body from conception, soul or no soul, it is still part of God’s known creation. Psalm 139:13 anyone?
October 28th, 2009 | 4:05 pm
Please, fellow Catholics, let’s not pretend there is anything revelatory in the Patriarch’s utterly dim comments. In the hearts and minds of the common Orthodox, he is esteemed as a spiritual leader of a rank only slightly higher than that of the Queen of England. He’s a bit of a joke, in other words– a joke occupying a right and venerable hierarchical seat, to be sure, but a joke all the same. Lacking a proper flock of his own (Please see encyclopedia entry “Turkish-Greek Population Exchange”) he seems to have used his pastoral platform to court another sort of congregation: the high and European mighty who sip elegant drinks at political round-tables. Poor, deceived Bartholomew, don’t you know that your chums think you look awfully silly in that hat?
The Orthodox almost universally have very good things to say about these things. Look to the Russians for sterner words than are heard anywhere else. Patriarch Bartholomew is an anomaly.
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