Author: Administrator
June 24, 2014
As per the Romanian Patriarchate’s website “basilica.ro”, on April 29, 2014 Romania’s President, Traian Basescu decorated several Romanian Bishops from the “Diaspora” stating: “The Romanian Orthodox Church remains the only institution which, beyond the frontiers of Romania, can keep Romanians together… the flag of Romania is wherever the Romanian Orthodox Church is”. The Romanian Patriarch Daniel then said: “the Romanian Orthodox Church has never had such a large Diaspora, almost 4 million faithful… [and] the Church follows her faithful and meets their pastoral, spiritual needs wherever they are.” Addressing himself to the President, the Patriarch thanked the Romanian State for supporting the mission of the Romanian Orthodox Church in the Diaspora and continued saying: “we wish to express our gratitude for the passion and wisdom with which … you support the Romanian Diaspora in general, and especially the Romanian Diaspora which attends church … [W]e are very encouraged when you accentuate the importance of maintaining the Romanian identity and at the same time, the cooperation between State and Church.”
As per the Romanian Patriarchate’s website “basilica.ro”, on April 29, 2014 Romania’s President, Traian Basescu decorated several Romanian Bishops from the “Diaspora” stating: “The Romanian Orthodox Church remains the only institution which, beyond the frontiers of Romania, can keep Romanians together… the flag of Romania is wherever the Romanian Orthodox Church is”. The Romanian Patriarch Daniel then said: “the Romanian Orthodox Church has never had such a large Diaspora, almost 4 million faithful… [and] the Church follows her faithful and meets their pastoral, spiritual needs wherever they are.” Addressing himself to the President, the Patriarch thanked the Romanian State for supporting the mission of the Romanian Orthodox Church in the Diaspora and continued saying: “we wish to express our gratitude for the passion and wisdom with which … you support the Romanian Diaspora in general, and especially the Romanian Diaspora which attends church … [W]e are very encouraged when you accentuate the importance of maintaining the Romanian identity and at the same time, the cooperation between State and Church.” These words are proof of the importance that the Romanian State and the Romanian Orthodox Church place on the parishes of what they consider to be their “Diaspora”, and the rationale for controlling the parishes outside Romania, a plan started under the Communists, and which continues to this date, emanating from the Romanian State which funds the Church, and thus controls her. The Romanian State continues to use the Church to promote the Romanian language and culture, and to have political platforms in foreign countries, while the Romanian Orthodox Church (BOR) gives this priority rather than promoting Orthodoxy in foreign lands, to the detriment of evangelizing these non-Orthodox countries in their respective languages as is required by Universal Orthodoxy. With the above ‘justifications’ BOR attempts to explain why it created so many eparchies and hundreds of parishes in non-Orthodox lands, many in competition with pre-existing ones that are not under their control. (We call these BOR parishes ‘parallel parishes’.) So BOR, particularly in foreign lands, is first and foremost a tool in the hands of the Romanian State. (Who is thinking of our children, born in these non-Orthodox lands, who lose their faith as a by-product of inevitably losing their parents’ mother tongue?) Even so, let us hope that Universal Orthodoxy will continue to support the main goal of the Assemblies of Canonical Orthodox Bishops for each non-Orthodox country/land or territory which is: “…the promotion and accomplishment of [Orthodox] Church Unity” in all non-Orthodox territories. With the recent creation of Assemblies of Canonical Orthodox Bishops in the USA, Canada and Latin America (whose mandate is to unite all Orthodox churches in these three territories into distinct jurisdictions), discussions regarding the ROEA (OCA) and ROAA (BOR) unity/merger issue are now obsolete, particularly after 4 years of total inactivity. Therefore, the May 2012 Administrator article remains valid.