Metropolitan Saba (Isper), Primate

Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese

Earlier today, on the official website of the Antiochian Archdiocese, Metropolitan Saba (Isper) published the most courageous statement to come from an American hierarch of any Orthodox jurisdiction in recent memory. We think it no exaggeration to compare His Eminence’s bravery to that of Archbishop Iakovos of thrice-blessed memory when he walked side by side with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., almost sixty years ago. Metropolitan Saba places himself squarely in the crosshairs of the very priests and laypersons under his omophorion whose behaviour toward their Orthodox brothers, sisters, and siblings he decries as the “new Pharisaism.” 

His Eminence leaves little doubt as to whom he has in mind:

There is a negative trend in the Church these days, with certain people criticizing everything. […] The adherents of this trend tend to be aggressive in their attacks and fundamentalist in their opinions, denouncing as heretics all those who disagree with their opinions, views, and citations.

Therefore, their responses come as brutal, hostile attacks, lacking the love that marks disciples of Christ.

They do not assign any importance to the changing course of history or the turning points of science [emphasis ours] and the challenges these pose. In their rigid view, humans are subject to requirements of the Faith according to their historical formulations, without regard to human capabilities and advances [emphasis ours] across generations.

These people are armed with the malleable phrase “according to the holy fathers” to support their opinion. If you ask most of them about their references, they cannot provide an answer. The phrase “holy fathers” has become a term used to defend and justify their positions, but often without knowledge or understanding.

In addition, you sense in them a fear for the upright faith, bordering on terror—to the point that it almost becomes a pathological obsession, seeing in everything a conspiracy against the Orthodox Church and the truth that it faithfully preserves.

If these people poison the Church with a spirit of hatred, discord, blasphemy, and hostility toward every leader, guide, and spiritual father who does not say what they say, then they miss seeing themselves as a tool of Satan.

Truly, this is the greatest sin. [Emphasis ours.]

We urge our hundreds of thousands of readers around the planet most strongly to read the entire text of His Eminence’s letter here.

Certainly, His Eminence says nothing to suggest that he agrees with every online publication or every individual targeted by the new Pharisees in the ferocity of their attacks disguised as “defending the Faith.” We would not expect this. We do not require this in order to hold a hierarch in the highest esteem. What he does seem to say is that the Orthodox Church—and particularly the Antiochian Archdiocese—is a much bigger tent than the new Pharisees, most of them unconverted converts, imagine it to be. The Church of Christ is a family where fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters and siblings, can ask difficult questions that express the concerns of this time and this place, propose solutions that might reflect Holy Tradition in new and unexpected ways (cf. St. Maximus the Confessor), and live in the Church in peace without fear of tarring-and-feathering as heretics and perverts. 

The Antiochian Archdiocese is home to some of the worst manifestations of the new Pharisaism, whether it be its own official organ, Ancient Faith Ministries; or its own clergy who travel the world to demonize gay, lesbian, and transgender children of God and lovers of Christ; or its own clergy who prevail by default in frivolous lawsuits against defendents who live 2000 miles away in a foreign country and have no money to hire an attorney—clergy who then conspire with the defendant’s blood relations in a family matter to cause him even further harm (a matter fraternally resolved, incidentally, with no help from the man of God).

We pray that His Eminence take concrete steps to make the Archdiocese a safer, more welcoming, more loving home for all, and in so doing, become a shining example of compassion and fearlessness to all his brother hierarchs in the American Church.

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