Tuesday, February 2, 2016

Fr. Theodoros Zisis on the upcoming council

I watched this a few days ago and since have had a few requests to post it. Apologies for the delay.


8 comments:

  1. This garbage is laughable. With all due respect to the office of priest, here are the top 5 problems with this fellow's deluded words:

    1) He thinks that "keeping marriage affinity guidelines as they are" and "allowing cousins to marry" are the only two options. Apparently he's not aware just how ridiculous the affinity restrictions are as set forth in the Pedalion and the Council of Trullo. They go a good three or four layers beyond the most restrictive consanguinity laws in the Saeculum. For example, a man cannot marry a woman whose brother's wife is the daughter of a man who is the first man's child's godparent. It's no wonder over half of Orthodox marriages in the U.S. are with non-Orthodox.

    2) Which brings me to my next point: over half of Orthodox marriages in the U.S. are with non-Orthodox! He thinks this is an "innovation" of the council. Yet here we stand: papists, protestants, you name it...we marry it. Marriages to other denominations of Christians are overwhelmingly approved by our bishops.

    3) "The New Calendar was an invention of the Masons"...you're right, sir. We MUST celebrate Christmas in January. Anything else is an innovation of some (American) occult group.

    4) Engaging in dialogue with "monophysites" and other types of Christians is not a "pan-heresy" for which the rest of the council is "merely a wrapping." Get thee to NFTU.net.

    5) "This is not the right time to have a council, because the [bishops I disagree with] are running rampant." Sounds like Protestantism. Fr. Theodoros, if you want a governing body that you can just denounce every time you disagree with it, I recommend joining one of the many evangelical denominations.

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  2. 2. But we need to remember the diaspora leniency on things like marriage and baptism are not the norm but an issue of laxity.

    3. The history of political pressure that brought us this broken new calendar is well known. It's not ideal and we need to either move completely into something that doesn't break things or return to what the majority of the Orthodox are doing.

    4. His fear is accepting everyone where they are and giving moral legitimacy to immoral or heretical teachings. I'm not one of those NFTU people, but neither am I going to join hands with Methodists or Masons or Maronites...

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  3. 2. With such a massive consensus of American bishops on this issue, why do you choose to say "laxity" as opposed to "oikonomia"? This seems a textbook case of the latter, given that the demographic situation in the New World is so much different than that in the Old World.

    3. 1923 was a baby step. Eventually we won't have January Christmas and "Orthodox Easter" so the entire world can see that Christians don't get along.

    The idea that the Old Calendar is "what the majority of Orthodox are doing" rings hollow, because it is essentially equivalent to saying that all Orthodox should do as the Russians do (since they have the majority of members, 150 million).

    4. That is a very charitable reading of what he actually says in the video.

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  4. I think this is a solid, patristic, and very Orthodox break down of the upcoming meeting....I'm boggled how someone could call the truth "garbage." I applaud Fr. Theodore's blunt honesty and his dedication to the Church. It worries me deeply that his honest and very beautiful call to return to our deep, saving orthodoxy is mocked so quickly and with such spite. He supports holy marriages, wants to guard the Faith from the ravages of ecumenism,and points out the painful, honest truth of the calendar change, and is called delusional? May God help us in these crazy days when the wisdom of such a wise, holy priest is so easily cast aside.

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  5. This a a very sobering presentation from someone who actually spent time involved in this whole process and who taught Patrology for forty years. The ignorance of 'theguide42' on some fundamental issues of Orthodox theology and the general Orthodox phronema demonstrates just how valuable a talk like this is (I am referring to his position regrading marriage which says, 'This is what we have been doing so it must be correct', and his claim that is it Protestant for Orthodox Christians to disagree with the hierarchy).

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  6. Finally some sanity! Fr. Theodore is speaking the truth in love!

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  7. Anyone who claims to be Orthodox but does not respect the Orthodox consensus or Orthodox Tradition is an Eastern Rite Protestant Renovationist heretic. 80% of the Orthodox Church preserves the Orthodox calendar. Saints of the Church have condemned ecumenism as heresy. Renegade bishops writing documents in secret and disallowing the faithful participation in the conciliar process and shutting down all discussion are the makings of a robber synod. This assembly is an assault against Orthodoxy.

    If said Renovationists can't even discuss issues without insisting on russophobic, Eastern Rite Protestant invective, insisting that the Russian church be silenced, then THERE SHOULD NOT BE ANY SUCH COUNCIL!!! Orthodoxy will not become an Eastern Rite Protestant Renovationist echo chamber! These puerile, Renovationist mutants will apostatize soon enough. Time will tell. Goodbye and good riddance! You were among us but not of us.

    The Russian brand of Orthodoxy is normative of the historical Church and of 95% of all Orthodox Christians today. Get with the program or go back to the Protestant church you never really left.

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