Κατά την διάρκεια της χθεσινής του
ομιλίας στην τελετή απονομής του Βραβείου Πατριάρχης Αλέξιος Β από το
Διεθνές Ίδρυμα για την Ενότητα των Ορθοδόξων, για το έργο του προς την ενότητα
των Εκκλησιών, ο Μακαριώτατος Πατριάρχης Θεόφιλος κάλεσε όλους τους αδελφούς
του προκαθημένους σε μία «αδελφική συνάντηση αγάπης» στην Ιορδανία, για να
«συζητήσουμε για την διατήρηση της ενότητάς μας στην Ευχαριστιακή
κοινωνία».
Ο Αρχιεπίσκοπος Ιερώνυμος, προκαθήμενος της Ιεράς
Συνόδου της Εκκλησίας της Ελλάδος, ήδη ανακοίνωσε
ότι απορρίπτει την πρωτοβουλία του Πατριάρχη για ενότητα στην
Εκκλησία, διότι πιστεύει ότι μόνο ο Πατριάρχης Κωνσταντινουπόλεως μπορεί να
καλέσει μία τέτοια σύνοδο.
Το βίντεο και το πλήρες κείμενο της ομιλίας του
Πατριάρχη είναι τώρα διαθέσιμα στο διαδίκτυο. Ο Μακαριώτατος παρέδωσε την ομιλία
του στα Αγγλικά:
The text of his speech is provided by the site of
the Synodal
Department for External Church Relations:
Your Holiness, Patriarch Kirill,
Mr. Valery Alexeyev, the esteemed President of the
Foundation,
Your Eminences,
Your Graces,
Dear Fathers,
Dear Sisters and Brothers,
We bring you the blessings of the Holy City of
Jerusalem and the grace of the Holy Tomb of our Lord Jesus Christ and the
prayers and greetings of the Christian community of the Holy Lord Land.
The ties that bind the Russian Orthodox Church to the
Church of Jerusalem, and Russia to the Holy Land, are profound and historic,
and we would like to take this opportunity first of all to express our
gratitude to you, Your Holiness, for the support that you always give to the
vitality of the Christian presence in the Holy Land and the Middle East.
We also wish to express our gratitude to His
Excellency, President Vladimir Putin, for his leadership and commitment to the
Church in the Holy Land, and in particular for his crucial and generous
assistance in the restoration of the Church of the Basilica of the Nativity.
The Church of the Nativity is at the heart of the Christian world, and every
week we welcome countless pilgrims, many of whom come from the whole Orthodox
world.
We are honored to be here today in this special
gathering and feel humbled to be the recipients of the prestigious Patriarch
Alexei II Prize, which recognizes those who commit themselves to working towards
the unity of the Orthodox Church, and we accept this prize in humility on
behalf of the Church of Jerusalem. For it is the mission of our Patriarchate,
that is the Church of Jerusalem, which has been founded upon the redeeming
blood of Christ, to be the focus of unity for the Orthodox faithful, and it is
our vocation, as those to whom the diakonia оf the Holy Sites has
been entrusted by Divine Providence, to ensure that they remain places of
religious devotion and worship that are accessible to all.
Throughout the centuries, the Patriarchate of
Jerusalem has functioned to maintain our Orthodox unity in the Holy Land, often
in the face of great challenges. And yet by Gods grace we have managed to
ensure that the proper diversity, that characterizes the cultures and histories
of our various autocephalous sister Churches, finds a deep and enduring unity
in our common faith and in our sharing in the common Chalice of the Eucharistic
synaxis. This finds its greatest expression when we celebrate the Divine Liturgy
together in the Church of the Anastasis, where the Uncreated Light that shines
from the Holy Tomb illumines and draws our hearts closer together.
It is in this eirenic spirit of the sacred mission of
the Patriarchate of Jerusalem, as a guardian of our Orthodox unity, that we are
compelled to express our deep concern about the present difficulties that mar
the life of the Church, and about the imminent dangers we are in by our
unfortunate divisions. In our world today, where so many live in situations of
despair, and where the truth and light of the Orthodox faith is a beacon of
hope, our unity is of profound importance not just to ourselves, but as a
living martyria – witness – to the world.
As our Lord Jesus Christ himself prayed for his
disciples:
“Father…I ask…that they may all be one. As you,
Father, are in me and I am in you, so that the world may believe that you have
sent me. The glory that you have given them, so that they may be one, as we are
one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the
world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved
me”.
[John 17.20-23]
It is within this prayerful context and this eirenic
spirit of fraternal love and concern that we present the following invitation.
We would like to host, in our home as the Patriarchate of Jerusalem, our
brothers, the Primates of the Orthodox Church, to gather in the spirit of
fellowship – koinonia – so that counsel will be taken together for
the preservation of our unity in Eucharistic communion. The unity of the Church
in faith and life is a gift of the Holy Spirit, but it is our God-given
responsibility – as those to whom the ministry of our Churches, being the
mystical body of Christ, has been entrusted – to guard the unity of the Church,
even to the point of undergoing sacrifice. We have no choice before God but to
commit every effort to defend our unity.
We take this opportunity, therefore, to declare open
our home in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, for hosting this “fraternal
gathering in love” so that together we may be a witness to the Church and to
the world of the unity of the Orthodox Church and our Orthodox faith.
In hosting this sacred gathering, in the capital of
the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, we do so conscious of the role that His
Majesty King Abdullah II continues to play as the Custodian of the Christian
and Muslim Holy Sites in the Holy Land, and the commitment of the Hashemite
Kingdom of Jordan in ensuring that Jordan remains a country where Christians
pursue their religious worship without hindrance and where all are welcome.
Let us listen to the Godly inspired words of St James
the Just, brother of the Lord and first Hierarch of the Church in Jerusalem:
“Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show
by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. But if you
have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against
the truth. This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual,
demonic. For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing
are there. But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable,
gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and
without hypocrisy. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who
make peace”
[James 3.13]
In accenting this prestigious award, Your Holiness,
dear brother in Christ, Patriarch Kirill, we receive it with this great hope
that the unity of the Orthodox world, of which this prize is a symbol, may be
lived out, among us all who serve in the “vineyard of our Lord”, and that we
maintain the common Chalice in unity and fraternal love in Christ.
Thank you.
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