Saint Evdokimos the Newly-Revealed (yet unknown) of Vatopaidi

Saint Evdokimos the Newly-Revealed of Vatopaidi (Feast Day - October 5)

There once existed an anonymous monk at Vatopaidi Monastery on Mount Athos. His sacred relics were found hidden in the old cemetery giving off a beautiful fragrance. The entire body was found in a position of prayer and his arms were crossed. An icon of the Theotokos (Panagia Bematarissa) was on his chest, which means that he willingly fled to the cemetery foreseeing his own death and out of humility desired to die alone. Wisely those monks who discovered this wonder named this monk "Evdokimos" ("pleasing one") because he lived pleasingly and it was pleasing to God that his relics be discovered, which began to work many miracles and were transferred to the Katholikon of the Monastery on October 5, 1840.

Fr. Iakovos, the Skevofylax (keeper of the sacred vessels) of the Monastery at that time, originally discovered this hidden chamber. In the narthex of the church he noticed a deep crevice. He called for some help to tear down the wall to see what was behind, and to his astonishment discovered a great many bones scattered about of the previous fathers of the Monastery. He ordered certain monks that all the bones be cleaned and placed back properly and in order. This was Monday, September 28, 1840.

On Wednesday, October 1, about two hours before midday, the workers cleaning the relics noticed a strong beautiful fragrance coming from the pile of bones. Fr. Iakovos had placed a commissary over the task and once this discovery was made the commissary ordered all the workers to work calmly and carefully, since what they smelled was a sign of holiness lest they come across some holy relics and mistreat them. In a short time the discovery was made. The astonished monks notified Abbot Philaret as well as everyone in the Monastery, which included two bishops who were found in the Monastery that day - Bishop Chrysanthos of Smyrna and Bishop Gregory of Andrionople. When both bishops confirmed this to be a miracle of God, everyone present began to glorify God with one voice saying: "Great is the God of the Christians!"

On October 2 they began to wonder who these myrrh-gushing relics could belong to. Since all the fathers were intent on celebrating an all-night vigil to glorify God for this miracle, they wanted also to sing hymns of praise to this newly-revealed Saint and seek his intercessions. To do this they desired to choose a temporary name until, if God so chose, his name was revealed. It was then decided by common consent to name this saint "Evdokimos" for the reasons cited above, and it was justified on the basis that if the Saint did not like his name then he would have to reveal his true name to which they would gladly change it.

It is amazing how much can be inferred by how St. Evdokimos died. His humility and trust in God is astonishing. It can only be that he knew that the hour of his death approached. Taking up an icon of the Panagia he proceeded to the place where the fathers bones were placed awaiting the General Resurrection. Placing himself in a hidden place under these scattered bones he desired to fall asleep in the Lord unnoticed but to God, so that he would not be honored as a saint by his fellow monks. Not deeming himself worthy of honors, he gave up his spirit. But God desired to exalt his humble servant generations later.

On the evening of October 4 which was a Saturday night the fathers went to transfer the holy myrrh-gushing relics of St. Evdokimos to the Katholikon of the Monastery. Throughout the entire night they glorified God and praised their new Saint. Following the Divine Liturgy the fathers one by one venerated the holy relics and then placed them in the Holy Altar.

Miracles

The Great Synaxarion tells us that the holy relics of St. Evdokimos worked many miracles. However, only two are recorded within.

One monk of the Monastery suffered terribly from tuberculosis and began to lose hope because he was not getting better. He then entreated St. Evdokimos saying: "I am a sinner, Holy One, yet I dare to pray to you because I understand that God has given you the grace to heal. And since many have prayed to you and become well, I beg you to work a miracle for your humble servant and show the power of your holiness." He said this among other things until he fell asleep. In his dreams he saw an elegant monk who gave him a cup from which to drink. The sick monk took the cup and drank the whole thing, after which he said: "I thank you, Father, because I was thirsty and you watered me." The monk immediately awoke but felt the dream to have been more of a reality than a mere dream, since he could clearly taste of the drink of which was given to him by the monk. He also noticed immediately that all the pain of his stomach and lungs were gone. Thanking the Saint for his healing, he went and told the spiritual father of the Monastery named Nyphona.

Another monk of Vatopaidi named Gabriel was an educated physician, and one day was in Karyes for some task for the Monastery. While there he began to feel excruciating pain in his kidneys to the point where he could not sleep or even sit. He fanatically tried every method he knew of to alleviate his pain but nothing worked. During this time some monks began to mock him saying: "Physician, heal thyself" and would tell him to pray to St. Evdokimos because "the Saint is an even greater doctor than you". Monk Gabriel then challenged this statement saying: "If it is true that the Saint is a miracle-worker and can heal me, then I will make a reliquary for his sacred skull." That night he was able to catch a little sleep and in his dreams he saw a monk approach him and touch his kidneys, saying: "This is nothing, what are you yelling about?" Monk Gabriel said to him: "Do you mock me Elder? Do you not see what excruciating pain I have?" The Elder then told him "It is well" and left. His appearance was like that of a Saint to Gabriel, resembling closely the icon of St. Euthymios the Great. He asked one of the monks nearby: "Which Elder was here and left out the door?" The monk said: "No one has entered or left". Gabriel then got up and felt completely healed and realized that it was St. Evdokimos who appeared to him and healed him. He then said to the monks: "Bring me the skull of the Saint so that I may venerate it, because truly the grace of the Saint has freed me from my sickness". Venerating the skull of the Saint that was brought to him, he said: "I will silver-plate you, venerable head, because I believe that you are truly a Saint." In 1852 Monk Gabriel commissioned an icon of the Saint to be painted by Deacon Meletios of Vatopaidi.


Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone
With the rivers of your tears, you have made the barren desert fertile. Through sighs of sorrow from deep within you, your labors have borne fruit a hundred-fold. By your miracles you have become a light, shining upon the world. O Evdokimos, our Holy Father, pray to Christ our God, to save our souls.

Megalynarion
Those who embrace piously, the treasury of your relics, and celebrate your memory joyfully, shelter from every danger, Evdokimos thrice-blessed, O most admirable one.

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Saint Methodia of Kimolos and her Canonization

Saint Methodia of Kimolos (Feast Day - October 5)

[The article below was published in the Hellenic Chronicle in 1991. Back then Dr. Cavarnos was a frequent contributor and I would very much enjoy and look forward to reading his articles in my parents restaurant which would receive this newspaper as a subscription. Most Orthodox will probably know the Boston-based Hellenic Chronicle for the weekly question and answer section by Fr. Stanley Harakas, the compilation of which became the book The Orthodox Church: 455 Questions and Answers. These two writers especially contributed to my early catechises in the Orthodox Faith and served to inspire me very much. Dr. Cavarnos' book Anchored in God was the first Orthodox book I ever read because of a weekly series he did in this same newspaper. I remember being especially excited to read the following article which proclaimed the official canonization of a Saint who lived in the 20th century by the name of Methodia from the island of Kimolos in the Cyclades. In 1987 Dr. Cavarnos wrote a book on this holy woman with the anticipating title St. Methodia of Kimolos, and the joy he feels in the proclamation of this holy woman's official canonization, who was already a saint in his own thinking and devotion, is clearly evident. I have transcribed the article below and a short life will follow in another post. - J.S.]

Mother Methodia of Kimolos Officially Recognized As A Saint

By Dr. Constantine Cavarnos
July 25, 1991
Hellenic Chronicle
Boston, MA

"A Saint is the greatest benefactor of mankind."
- Archim. Hierotheos Vlachos

News evoking great joy reached me from Athens a few days ago: Mother Methodia of Kimolos (1861-1906) has been officially recognized as a Saint by the Holy Synod of the Church of Greece and the Oecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. The news came from Father Konstantinos D. Vastakis, Protopresbyter of the great Church of St. George at Kypseli, Athens. Father Vastakis sent me the latest issue of the newspaper Kimoliaka Nea ("Koimolian News"), which is published in Athens. Together with it he sent me a personal card on which he wrote: "When Saints are being praised, the glory goes to the Lord."

On the first page of the newspaper there is a photograph of a recent icon showing St. Methodia, and an article by Fr. Vastakis devoted to this event. The article is a substantial one, and continues on page 3. On the second page of the publication there is an announcement by the Metropolitan of Syros Dorotheos (to whom the Church of Kimolos is subject) addressed to all the members of the committee which has been formed for the organization of the celebration which which will take place in Kimolos on October 5, the day of her repose. This committee includes both clergymen and laymen. Among the clergy is Protopresbyter Vastakis, who painstakingly prepared the papers that were submitted to the Synod of the Church of Greece and that of the Patriarchate recommending that Mother Methodia be officially recognized as a Saint. Such recognition means that henceforth her name will be included in the Hagiologion (List of Saints) of the Orthodox Church, that churches can be built named after her without any ecclesiastical hindrance, and that her memory can be celebrated in churches freely and in a grand manner.

Father Konstantinos Vastakis begins his article in Kimoliaka Nea with these remarks concerning the official recognition of the sainthood of Mother Methodia: "A great event! A just decision! Joyous exaltation in our hearts! The event is truly great and splendid. The official and canonical placing of Holy Methodia in the Tablets of the Saints of our Church is an event which has brought joy to the souls of the Orthodox, especially to her Kimolian compatriots everywhere, who honor and revere her, and through her Grace-imbued Relics are sanctified."

Continuing, he says: "Holy Methodia led her ascetic life quietly, illuminating with her pure life those about her, and strengthening those who aspired after sanctity and who believed and believe that holiness continues to exist in our difficult and sinful century. Besides, in every epoch, our All-Good Triune God shows clearly His saints. He brings to prominence personalities that hold the social organism in the spiritual life. And it is ultimately they who strengthen and inspire us to walk in the uphill path of virtue and sacrifice. Such a holy soul was our Saint."

The late Protopresbyter Ioannis Ramphos, who was the Spiritual Father and fellow-celebrant at the Church of St. George at Athens, played the most important role in calling attention to the sanctity of Mother Methodia, in honoring her, and in making widely known her virtues, her holy way of life, and her beneficent impact upon the people of Kimolos. Father Vastakis duly calls attention to this fact. He notes that what particularly prompted Father Ramphos to do this was the fact that when he was a child, his father, a priest, use to take him to the hermitage of Mother Methodia. There he had the good fortune of seeing her, being impressed by the holiness of her way of life and deemed worthy of receiving her blessings.

In my book, St. Methodia of Kimolos (Belmont, Mass., 1987) - vol. 9 of my series Moder Orthodox Saints - I note other eminent persons who believed in the sainthood of Mother Methodia, and I quote relevant statements which they have made. Among these was late Archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Church of North and South America, Michael, at the time when he was Metropolitan of Corinth. I also speak of the foremost contemporary hymnographer of the Orthodox Church, the Athonite Monk Gerasimos Micragiannanitis. "The Life of St. Methodia" which I have included in that volume in translation was written by him; so was her akolouthia from which I have included many hymns in translation. Among these hymns is the Apolytikion, which appears at the beginning of the volume. It says:

"Let us faithful honor with hymns the venerable Saint Methodia, the offspring of Kimolos, the jewel of virtue, and truly the peer of the holy Ascetics from the earliest times, imitating the deeds of her life beloved by God, crying out: glory to Him Who gave thee power, glory to Him Who crowned thee, glory to Him Who hath numbered thee, O holy Mother, in the choir of the Saints."

Mural icon by the hand of George P. Smoilos, 1985.

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Greece Votes in Hope of a New ’Change’

[The Greek parliamentary elections took place on Sunday 4th of October 2009 with more than 30 parties participating. The major parties include New Democracy (ND), Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK), the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA) and the Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS). The leader of PASOK George Papandreou, son of the late Socialist Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou won in a landslaide victory. Due to the confusing nature of Greek politics, below is an overview of recent happenings that lead to a victory for PASOK. - J.S.]

Phantis

Saturday 3 October 2009
by Nicolas Mottas

When Costas Karamanlis became Prime Minister in March 2004, Greece was reaching one of the most glorious events of its modern history: the Athens Olympics. That had provided to the country a strong aim for more economic development, for the transformation of Athens into a modern metropolis, for more jobs and highly tourist promotion in global media. However, the newly elected government of New Democracy had to invent a new, fresh, aim for the country after the end of the Olympics. But that didn’t happen. On the contrary, the conservative government of Mr. Karamanlis wrecked in the ocean of a singular post-Olympic misery, being denigrated by dozens of serious scandals.

Numerous cases contributed to the deconstruction of Mr. Karamanlis’ doctrine for “modest and humble” governance, creating an environment of scandals throughout the political system. On March 2005 the “Greek Watergate” case dominated the political scene, while a few months later the government was accused for kidnapping and interrogating five Pakistani immigrants without official notice. The big tragedy came on August 2007 when Greece mourned the loss of 84 people, after massive forest fires burned an area of almost 670,000 acres across the country. Three years after the glorious Olympics, the site of Ancient Olympia in Pelopponnese was under the siege of flames – not the Olympic ones though, but those of the fires. But surprisingly, despite the huge anger and disappointment, New Democracy won the election of September with a fragile majority.

Nonetheless, the second part of Karamanlis government was proved much of same. The controversial land deal case in September 2008 (Vatopedi monastery traded low-value land for high-value state property in an allegedly unfair deal with the government) led to the resignation of two Ministers and caused turbulence in Greek media.

On the same time, being in the storm of global financial crisis, Greek economy showed signals of disconcerting recession; growth dropped to 2.9% while the EU had already placed the country under its Excessive Deficit Procedure. But most importantly, the middle and lower social classes felt the pressure of government’s fiscal policy, creating mounting disenchantment within Greek society. Quite obvious if we take into account that Karamanlis’ government decided to prepare a 28 billion Euros rescue plan for the Banks, instead of relieving the working classes.

As a result of the above, an event could be the fuse that could trigger the bomb of rage. That happened on the 6th of December 2008, when 16 year-old Alexis was killed by a police officer in central Athens. But beyond that tragic event, there were deeper reasons which prompted many Greeks into a mass – and in some cases violent - reaction against the government. The riots were actually the proof that the country is under a severe institutional crisis, mainly as a result of moral corruption which dominates the Greek political system during the last decades.

In the shadow of scandals and economic recession, Premier Karamanlis decided to go to an early election on October 4th, asking from the Greeks a brand new opportunity. But, for Mr. Karamanlis and his government, it seems to be too late for a third chance.

The leader of PASOK George Papandreou, son of the late Socialist Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou, has promised to pull the country out of the crisis and to tackle corruption, proposing a new model of governance. Two of his major arguments have to do with the crack on tax evasion as well as with the reformation of Greece’s public sector. PASOK pledges to raise taxes on the wealthy and spend more for the public sector including Health and Education systems. In his recent speech during the annual International Fair in Thessaloniki, Mr.Papandreou announced a package of new economic measures and presented – like Barack Obama – a program for the first 100 days in office.

Like in 1981 - when Andreas Papandreou expressed the motto of "Allagi" (Change) thus winning a landslide victory - PASOK offers a new hope for change and the majority of the voters seem to be attracted by such a perspective. But, actually, apart from the tackling of recession and beyond the effort for a modern and effective social state, Papandreou’s new government will have to do something more difficult: to find and clearly express a new, post-Olympic, vision for Greece. In a few words, to find nation’s next big aim. That aim will be the moving wheel of the country towards progress and success in all aspects of political, social and economic life.

What remains to be answered is if the new PASOK of George Papandreou is capable of transforming the slogan of the ambitious, new “Change” into practice.

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Paranormal Theories on "Shadow People"

[In the paranormal field, there are different classifications of spirits or entities based on the way they reveal themselves. One classification that is increasingly being talked about are the so-called "shadow people". Below is an article that gives the various theories as to what shadow people really are. Since I plan on adressing various paranormal subjects in the coming weeks, I offer this article not as a reflection of my own opinion but as a preparation to understand with what confusion and speculation these subjects are treated in contemporary society. - J.S.]

Shadow People

By Stephen Wagner
About.com

There's a growing interest in the phenomenon of shadow people. What are they? Ghosts? Interdimensional beings? Time travelers? Something else?

"WHAT WAS THAT?" You were sitting comfortably on your sofareading the latest issue of FATE in the dim light when movement across the room caught your attention. It seemed dark and shadowy, but there was nothing there. You returned to your reading - and a moment later there it was again. You looked up quickly this time and saw the fleeting but distinctly human shape of the shadow pass quickly over the far wall... and disappear.

What was that? Some natural shadow? Your heightened imagination? A ghost? Or was it something that seems to be a spreading phenomenon - apparitions that are coming to be known as "shadow people" or "shadow beings." Perhaps this is an old phenomenon with a new name that is now being discussed more openly, in part thanks to the Internet. Or maybe it's a phenomenon that, for some reason, is manifesting with greater frequency and intensity now.

Those who are experiencing and studying the shadow people phenomenon say that these entities almost always used to be seen out of the corner of the eye and very briefly. But more and more, people are beginning to see them straight on and for longer periods of time. Some experiencers testify that they have even seen eyes, usually red, on these shadow beings.

The mysterious sightings have become a hot topic of conversion in paranormal chat rooms, message boards and websites, and it is given widespread attention on paranormal talk radio.

What are shadow people and where do they come from? Several theories have been offered.

THE IMAGINATION

The explanation we get from skeptics and mainstream science - and who are usually people who have never experienced the shadow people phenomenon - is that it is nothing more than the active human imagination. It's our minds playing tricks on us... our eyes seeing things in a fraction of a second that aren't really there - illusions... real shadows caused by passing auto headlights, or some similar explanation. And without a doubt, these explanations probably can account for some if not many experiences. The human eye and mind are easily fooled. But can they account for all cases?

GHOSTS

To call these entities ghosts demands first a definition of what we mean by ghosts. (See the article: Ghosts: What Are They?) But by almost any definition, shadow people are somewhat different than ghost phenomena. Whereas ghost apparitions are almost always a misty white, vaporish or have a decidedly human form and appearance (very often with discernable "clothing"), shadow beings are much darker and more shadow-like. In general, although the shadow people often do have a human outline or shape, because they are dark, the details of their appearance is lacking. This is in contrast to many ghost sightings in which the witness can describe the ghost's facial features, style of clothing and other details. The one detail most often noted in some shadow being sightings are their glowing red eyes.

DEMONS OR OTHER SPIRIT ENTITIES

The dark countenance and malevolent feelings that are often reported in association with these creatures has led some researchers to speculate that they may be demonic in nature. If they are demons, we have to wonder what their purpose or intent is in letting themselves be seen in this manner. Is it merely to frighten?

ASTRAL BODIES

One interesting idea suggests that shadow people are the shadows or essences of people who are having out-of-body experiences. According to Jerry Gross, an author, lecturer and teacher about astral travel, we all travel out of the body when we are asleep. Perhaps, this theory says, we are seeing the ephemeral astral bodies of these twilight travelers.

TIME TRAVELERS

People from our own future, another idea states, could have found the means to travel to the past - our time. However they are able to accomplish this incredible feat, perhaps in that state they appear to us merely as passing shadows as they observe the events of our timeline.

INTERDIMENSIONAL BEINGS

Even mainstream science is fairly convinced that there are dimensions other than the three we inhabit. And if these other dimensions exist, who or what (if anything) inhabits them? Some theorists say that these dimensions exist parallel and very close to our own, although invisible to us. And if there are inhabitants in these other dimensions, it is possible that they have found a way to intrude on our dimension and become, at least partially, visible? If so, they could very well appear as shadows. It has long been held by psychics and other sensitives that beings on other planes of existence are of different "vibrations." Science is beginning to look at reality, on a quantum level, in the same way - that particles of the smallest size exist as vibrations. Perhaps, some theorize, the vibrations of our existence are beginning to mesh with those of another dimension, which accounts for the increase in such phenomena as ghosts, shadow people and possibly aliens.

ALIENS

The alien and abduction phenomena are so bizarre that it's no surprise that extraterrestrials are suspects as the shadow people. Abductees have reported in many cases that the alien grays seem to be able to pass through walls and closed windows, and to appear and disappear abruptly, among other otherworldly talents. Perhaps, too, they can go about their alien agenda disguised in the shadows.

There's a good deal of overlapping among the above ideas, of course. Aliens and ghosts could be interdimensional beings, or aliens could be time travelers - and some believe demons are responsible for all of these disturbing phenomena.

There is no way to prove or disprove any theories about a phenomenon that is so mysterious, that happens so quickly and without warning. Science finds it virtually impossible to catalog or study such phenomena in any methodical way. All we can do, at present, is to document personal experiences and try to piece together what the shadow people phenomenon might be. Perhaps it's an old mystery becoming more recognizable... perhaps it represents a doorway to and from different planes of existence... or perhaps it's just shadows.

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Basilica and Martyr Tomb Discovered at Zrze Archaeological Site

Sunday, 27 September 2009
Macedonia Online

A basilka of the fifth and a martyrs tomb of the fourth century are the new discoveries of excavation activities in the vicinity of Holy Transfiguration Monastery near Zrze.

The discoveries confirm that Christianity was present in this area from the fourth century onward, archaeologist Branko Risteski told reporters.

"These discoveries are very significant for us and they justify the financial means we have been investing in researching. This is grand historic treasure for our country," said Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, who visited the site along with Culture Minister Elizeabeta Kanceska Mileska and Director of the Office for Protection of Cultural Heritage Pasko Kuzman.

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Envy, Alcohol and Cigarettes Steal Life from People, says Russian Centenarian

Envy, Alcohol and Cigarettes Steal Life from People, a 102-year-old Resident of Novosibirsk Believes

Novosibirsk, Russia
September 30, 2009
Interfax

Giving up bad habits, including spiritual ones, is the main receipt of longevity by Novosibirsk resident Anna Naumova who has recently celebrated her 102nd birthday.

“You shouldn’t envy, drink or smoke,” Naumova recommends everyone who wants to achieve her life record.

According to the regional Statistics Service, there are over five thousand long-livers in the Novosibirsk Region and almost three hundred of them have stepped over their 100th birthday.

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ISS Crew to Study Epiphany Water

Moscow, Russia
January 18, 2008
Interfax

Russian scientists intend to set up an experiment on testing qualities of Epiphany water on board of the International Space Station, a staff-member of the Institute for Biomedical problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences Ph.D. Vladimir Tsetlin said.

Dr. Tsetlin is involved in research of exterior factors that influence drinking water for cosmonauts.

‘I was examining drinking water for cosmonauts, when I suddenly detected that its electro-chemical qualities had changed anomalously on the eve of the Epiphany‘, Tsetlin said in his interview to the Moskovsky Komsomolets daily.

According to him, present-day scientific researches confirm that water gains unusual qualities in the night of January 19.

The scientist told that water usually has maximum conductivity on 10:00 a.m. and on 06:00 p.m. when its molecules get active, and it start ‘calming down’ from 04:00 a.m.

‘One of the tests was made on the Epiphany eve’, Tsetlin tells. ‘I was impressed when I detected that molecules had calmed down much earlier in the evening of January 18. Water’s conductivity was reduced to minimum from 06:00 p.m. And it had remained in this condition till midnight’, he told.

Thus he recorded ‘the fact of disturbance in diurnal variation of water conductivity’ on the Epiphany.

Members of the international space expedition are to study this interesting fact.

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"Nail Your Sin": Russian Church Organizes an Event to Repent

Residents of Ivanovo to "Nail" Their Sins

Ivanovo, Russia
September 30, 2009
Interfax

The Nail Your Sin action is held in Ivanovo with the support of Orthodox youth.

The event organizers set a wooden column before the chapel near the Scientific Library and participants in the action should nail with the hammer a sheet of paper with their sins, the local diocese has informed Interfax on Wednesday.

All comers can repent in such an unusual way, and participants in the action also have a chance to talk to clerics.

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Russian Church Houses Ostriches

Rector of Kemerovo Church Sheltered Emus

Kemerovo, Russia
September 3, 2009
Interfax

Australian ostriches live at St. Triphon Church in Kemerovo village of Metallploschadka.

This spring, a parishioner has given two emus as a present to Fr. Gleb Karlyuta, Siberian edition of the Rossijskaya Gazeta weekly has reported on Thursday.

"They gave - I took: why to reject presents! Frankly speaking, I wanted to have something unusual at the church. The idea with birds seemed to be made in heaven," Fr. Gleb said.

The priest reminded that it was mentioned in St. Triphon's life story that he was a protector of farmers and saved fields from plant pests with birds' help as they eliminated gluttonous insects.

Ostriches help increase the number of churchgoers. "Now, ten people pray inside the church and another ten people - near the aviary," the priest told.

Turkey cocks and a hen have come to the churchyard after the ostriches. Their aviary is located near the ostriches. The church guard and sometimes the father rector feed the birds with corn, vegetable peelings, greenery, special compound and even cottage cheese (to strengthen their bones.)

"When ostriches appeared in our churchyard, I came across various opinions in Internet forums, some people wondered if they could be allowed to the churchyard. I believe we have to explain people in different ways that the Church and God are not somewhere in the distant heavens. Church can be a house for cats and for dogs as well. And doves have always lived at churches," Fr. Gleb stated.

It is not the first church in the region to house animals. Thus, Kemerovo Church of St. Xenia of Petersburg has a club of horse riding.

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Russian Scientist Demands Old Testament Be Seen As "Extremist" Literature

Stavropol Scientist Complained Against Old Testament to Prosecutor’s Office

Stavropol, Russia
October 2, 2009
Interfax

Ph.D. Anatoly Dolzhenko from Stavropol demanded that the Old Testament should be considered extremist literature, its distribution should be banned in Russia and those who distribute it should be brought to trial.

He turned with a corresponding 11-sheet statement to the Prosecutor’s Office of the Lenin District, Stavropol issue of Komsomolskaya Pravda daily has reported on Friday.

Evgeny Trufanov, an arbitrator and methodologist on struggle against organized crime and corruption, backs up Dolzhenko.

“We want the Old Testament be officially recognized as literature of extremist content that kindles interethnic hostility and to this end we cite quotations from the Bible in our statement,” Trufanov said.

In the event of refusal, the applicants are going to address the European Court of Human Rights.

The statement cites some quotations that outraged both the scientist and the judge. For instance, “do not give your daughters in marriage to their sons or take their daughters for your sons. Do not seek a treaty of friendship with them at any time.”

Commenting on the unusual initiative of Stavropol residents, press secretary of the local diocese Evgeny Bronsky reminded, “the world of the Old Testament is the world where people rejected God, rejected sense of values, of sin, the world where pagans sacrificed their babies to soulless idols, where mass murder of captives was usual practice.”

“It was possible to restrict this evil and not to let humanity vanish only by force. It was the Lord’s hard way in the world of evil, in the world deprived of grace, it was the way of sufferings. However, this way led the whole humanity to the good news of Christ, to the New Testament,” the Diocese official said.

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Muslim Threats to Christians Rise in Pakistan

October 4, 2009
Anjum Herald Gill
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Lahore, Pakistan

Christians in Pakistan are feeling increasingly insecure after several violent attacks by Muslim extremists in the past two months.

In one case, eight Christians were burned to death by a Muslim mob after reports that the Muslim holy book, the Koran, had been desecrated.

Growing Talibanization of the country and a blasphemy law in place for two decades make non-Muslims, especially Christians, easy targets for discrimination and attacks, Christian and human rights activists say.

"The attacks on Christians seem to be symptomatic of a well-organized campaign launched by extremist elements against the Christian community all over central Punjab since early this year," Human Rights Commission of Pakistan Chairwoman Asma Jehangir said at a press conference last month.

The situation has become so serious that Pope Benedict XVI and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari discussed it during a meeting Thursday at the papal summer retreat in Castel Gandolfo, near Rome, the Associated Press reported.

The Vatican said the two stressed "the need to overcome all forms of discrimination based on religious affiliation, with the aim of promoting respect for the rights of all."

Most of the attacks on Christians' houses and churches followed claims of desecration of the Koran. Subsequent investigations generally proved the claims to be false.

Pakistani Minority Affairs Minister Shahbaz Bhatti, a Christian himself, said that no Christian would even think of desecrating the Koran. Some elements wanted to create an atmosphere of disharmony, but the government would not allow anybody to play with the lives and properties of the Christians, he said.

On June 30, a mob attacked Christians' houses in the village of Bahmani Wala in Kasur district of Punjab province, destroying more than 50 houses after looting.

On July 30, eight people were burned alive in the village of Gojra, also in Punjab, after a purported incident of desecration of the Koran in the nearby village of Korian Wala. Churches were attacked and copies of the Bible and hymn books were burned in both villages. In Korian Wala alone, more than 50 houses of Christians were ransacked.

On Sept. 11, a church in a village in Punjab's Sialkot district was burned after claims that a 20-year-old Christian youth had desecrated the Koran. On Sept. 15, a day after his arrest, Robert Masih was found dead in his jail cell. Police reported it as a suicide, but Mr. Masih's family claims he was killed. Joseph Francis, who runs an organization providing legal assistance to Christians, said he saw marks of torture on Mr. Masih's body.

Christians account for about 4 percent of the 170 million population of Pakistan, which was carved out of India as a state for Muslims at the time of independence from Britain in 1947.

Since then, successive civilian and military rulers have progressively strengthened the Islamic character of the country by introducing Shariah law. A controversial blasphemy law introduced in 1986 also has widened the gap between the minority Christians and majority Muslims.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom listed Pakistan as a "country of particular concern" in 2006, citing forced conversions of Christians to Islam and a rise in hate crimes against religious minorities.

All the recent attacks targeting Christians, activist groups claimed, were provoked by hate speeches made by Muslim clerics on loudspeakers from mosques.

"The rising intolerance and violence against Christians is a result of the Talibanization and promulgation of Shariah law in the country," said Kanwal Feroze, a well-known journalist. "It is not a matter of blasphemy law, but shows a mind-set of the common man."

When the blasphemy law was introduced during the rule of Gen. Muhammad Zia ul-Haq, the punishment was life imprisonment. It was changed to the death penalty by the Federal Shariah Court in 1992 when Nawaz Sharif was prime minister.

Since the inception of the blasphemy law, as many as 976 cases have been registered under it, of which 180 were against Christians. When a Christian is accused of blasphemy, he or she can be granted bail only by the top court in the province.

The step-by-step Islamization of Pakistan began in 1956, when the country's name was changed from the Democratic Republic of Pakistan to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. In 1973, Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto changed the country's constitution to declare Islam the religion of the state. Non-Muslims were barred from becoming president or the prime minister, and denied seats in the Senate.

Mr. Bhutto - father-in law of current President Asif Ali Zardari - also nationalized church-run schools and institutions. Some of them were denationalized later by Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who led Pakistan from 1999 until 2008.

In 1979, Gen. Zia introduced several Islamic laws that discriminated against non-Muslims - strengthening fundamentalist organizations and sowing the early seeds for Talibanization.

Under the Evidence Act of the Islamic law, a Christian man's witness is worth half that of a Muslim. Christian women would not be deemed as witnesses at all.

Muslim men can marry non-Muslim women but a Christian man cannot marry a Muslim woman. The constitutional provisions also welcome a Christian to embrace Islam, but when a Muslim converts to Christianity, the penalty is death.

Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani has promised to review laws that could fuel hate for non-Muslim citizens after the recent attacks. A committee has been formed to look into the laws and make recommendations.

However, hard-line parties such as Jamaat-e-Islami and the banned militant organization Dawat-ul-Irshad already have warned of protests if the blasphemy law is rescinded. Even the mainstream Pakistan Muslim League-Q party of Mr. Musharraf has threatened to resist any change in the law.

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Young People’s Ignorance of Religion Worries Experts

By Graeme Hamilton
National Post
October 3, 2009

MONTREAL — Half of U.S. high-school seniors surveyed recently thought Sodom and Gomorrah were a married couple.

A McGill University professor’s reference to the patience of Job drew blank stares from students in his religion course. An art history teacher in France found children were mystified by the "strange bird" (a dove representing the Holy Ghost) common in Renaissance paintings.

Until recently, such confusion was little more than fodder for faculty-room jokes, evidence of the increasing secularism of Western societies. But educators attending a conference at McGill University this past week heard there is growing recognition in Europe and North America that religious illiteracy creates serious barriers between cultures.

"There exists a widespread illiteracy about religion that spans the globe," said Diane Moore, a professor at Harvard Divinity School. "The most significant consequence is that it fuels antagonism and hinders respect for pluralism, peaceful coexistence and co-operative endeavours."

Quebec, which last year introduced a mandatory Ethics and Religious Culture course to replace Christian denominational classes, was held up as a leader in an effort to improve children’s religious literacy. The Quebec class covers all major world religions and is taught throughout primary and secondary school.

Spencer Boudreau, a professor of education at McGill, said he was struck by how little his students knew about religion. (He was the one who had to explain the biblical story of Job.) "It became more and more evident to me, the lack of knowledge — not only of other religions but of their own tradition," he said in an interview.

"I’m saying, how can you understand Canada, how can you understand Quebec, without some of this background knowledge?"

Ignorance of other religions was on display in Quebec in the recent debate over the "reasonable accommodation" of religious minorities and the move by the town of Herouxville, Que., to enact a code that amounted to a caricature of non-Christian religious practices. For example, the code informed new arrivals to the village that stoning of women was not allowed and that pork was a common menu item.

"What happened in Herouxville, I was embarrassed as a Quebecer," Boudreau said. "And it’s not just Quebec that would think like that."

He said Canadians have to learn to live alongside newcomers for whom religion is central to their identity.

"We’re going to survive as a country by bringing in people from different religions, and many times that is how they define themselves," he said. "Whether you think it’s a good thing or it’s a bad thing, it’s there, and you have to be respectful."

Robert Jackson, a professor of religious education at the University of Warwick in the United Kingdom said the 9/11 terrorist attacks served as a wake-up call for Europe.

"It has propelled the discussion of religion into the public sphere," he said. "We can no longer say that discussion about religion does not belong in the public sphere, and of course part of the public sphere is public education." One result, he said, was a 2007 Council of Europe report containing guiding principles for teaching about religion.

Even France, known for its secular schools and strict division of church and state, has recently opened the door for more religious content in the curriculum. Isabelle Saint-Martin of the Paris-based European Institute of Religious Sciences, recounted at the conference an anecdote about a popular children’s text used in French schools in the early 20th century.

Authorities at the time insisted that a character’s reference to his father being "in heaven" be changed to, "My father is dead." An exclamation of, "My God!" was changed to "Alas!" New French texts have created waves because they include excerpts from the Bible and depictions of Christ’s crucifixion, she said, as part of an explanation of the cultural significance of religions.

Moore, of Harvard, said religious content should be incorporated throughout the curriculum and not restricted to a single course. "Religion permeates all dimensions of human life," she said. She identified a wide range of problems caused by a lack of religious understanding, including anti-Semitism and the equation of Islam with violence and terrorism. She said it also leads to the portrayal of religion as "obsolete, irrational and oppressive."

Boudreau is optimistic the emerging generation is more open to studying religion. Strident secularism in Quebec was a product of the Quiet Revolution, when the province emerged from a period of church domination referred to by some as the great darkness.

"The kids aren’t there any more. They’re very curious, they’re very open," he said. "The religion classes at McGill are full. The students want to know more."

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Step Aside Lucy; It’s Ardi Time

Creation-Evolution Headlines

Oct. 2, 2009 — A new fossil human ancestor has taken center stage. Those who love Lucy, the australopithecine made famous by Donald Johanson (and numerous TV specials), are in for a surprise. Lucy is a has been. Her replacement is not Desi Arnaz, but is designated Ardi, short for Ardipithecus ramidus – the new leading lady in the family tree. Actually, she has been around for years since her discovery in Ethiopia in 1992. It has taken Tim White and crew 15 years to piece together the bones that were in extremely bad condition. But now, Ardi has made her debut and is stealing the limelight.

The special issue of Science published this week had no less than 16 articles on this one fossil – an exceptional amount of coverage for any topic. In the lead Editorial,(1) Bruce Alberts proclaimed, “Darwin was certainly right” to predict that science would solve the mystery of human origins. Popular science reporters, by habit, are going ape with “Read all about it!” headlines announcing the latest saga of human evolution.(2) But wait – wasn’t Lucy the last word back in the 1970s?

A completely new paradigm is emerging alongside the unveiling of Ardi. The scoop is this: Lucy had nothing to do with our family tree after all. She and her kinds were on a separate branch that did not lead to us. In fact, all chimpanzees and great apes are now on different branches. There goes a lot of storytelling. The century and a half since Darwin commonly portrayed humans as higher up the family tree on a continuous lineage with chimpanzees our nearest living relatives. Not any more. Now we are to see all the great apes as highly-evolved (“derived”) mammals on separate branches from a more distant common ancestor that was probably more like small monkeys. Getting tossed out with the housecleaning are some other popular notions: that humans came down out of the trees to hunt in the savannah (Ardi appears to have inhabited a woodland), and that hominids remained on the ground (it appears Ardi still had the feet for tree grasping).

Most important, the new paradigm changes the mechanism of evolution itself. In classical neo-Darwinism, traits evolve in a stepwise fashion through mutations and natural selection (the “referential model”). Some evolutionists are now moving toward a more nuanced view called “adaptive suites.” These are groups of traits that emerge together and evolve together as a package. C. Owen Lovejoy (Kent State Univ.) explained this idea in his Science article “Reexamining Human Origins in Light of Ardipithecus ramidus.”(3) (Since reporting on all 16 articles about Ardi would be excessive, we will focus on this one article that surveys the broad issues.) Before proposing his adaptive suite model, Lovejoy described how wrong all his predecessors had been:

"An essential goal of human evolutionary studies is to account for human uniqueness, most notably our bipedality, marked demographic success, unusual reproductive physiology, and unparalleled cerebral and technological abilities. During the past several decades, it has been routinely argued that these hominid characters have evolved by simple modifications of homologs shared with our nearest living relatives, the chimpanzee and bonobo. This method is termed referential modeling. A central tenet has been the presumption (sometimes clearly stated but more often simply sub rosa) that Gorilla and Pan are so unusual and so similar to each other that they cannot have evolved in parallel; therefore, the earliest hominids must have also resembled these African apes. Without a true early hominid fossil record, the de facto null hypothesis has been that Australopithecus was largely a bipedal manifestation of an African ape (especially the chimpanzee). Such proxy-based scenarios have been elevated to common wisdom by genomic comparisons, progressively establishing the phylogenetic relationships of Gorilla, Pan, and Homo."

Out with the old referential model, in with the new adaptive suites model:

"An alternative to referential modeling is the adaptive suite, an extrapolation from optimization theory. Adaptive suites are semiformal, largely inductive algorithms that causally interrelate fundamental characters that may have contributed to an organism’s total adaptive pattern. One for the horned lizard (Phyrnosoma platyrhinos) of the southwesten U.S. serves as an excellent example (Fig. 1). For this species, the interrelation between a dietary concentration on ants and its impact on body form imply, at first counterintuitively, that elevation of clutch size and intensification of "r" strategy (maximize the number of offspring by minimizing paternal care) are the ultimate consequences of this specialization."

So when we look at upright human bodies with all their specializations, we are to see them as suites of adaptations that evolved together out of some initial lifestyle change. In the case of the horned lizard, some normal-looking lizard ancestor took on a taste for ants. That made it consume more of its new prey because of the large amounts of chitin that had to be digested. This, in turn, changed its body plan and made it more fat and sluggish. Now it had to evolve armor (spines and horns) and camouflage for protection from predators. So from one lifestyle change, a whole suite of adaptations evolved together.

What, then, was the stimulus that made some unknown monkey begin its path to humanity? Lovejoy looked at Ardi for clues. The discoverers claim three traits stand out: (1) less sexual dimorphism (body size between males and females), although this is speculative; (2) reduced canine teeth; and (3) evidence Ardi walked upright (though this is disputed). To him, this means the common ancestor changed its reproductive habits. Sparing our readers the lurid details Lovejoy discussed about genitalia shapes and sizes, promiscuous behaviors and Darwinian concepts like “sperm competition” and “ovulatory crypsis” he deduced that Ardipithecus had a suite of adaptations that would emerge in full flower in the human race – monogamy, straight teeth and upright stance. Maybe it began as a sex-for-food deal. This required explaining away some of the peculiar characteristics of male genitalia, but whatever: the adaptive suite is now the preferred explanatory model. Along with the human adaptive suite came big brains, tool use, fire, language, spear-throwing, food hauling, hugging, and eventually, abstract mathematics and music.

Lovejoy concluded that Lucy was an unfortunate detour in our understanding of where we came from:

"Even as its fossil record proliferated, however, Australopithecus [Lucy and her friends] continued to provide only an incomplete understanding of hominid origins. Paradoxically, in light of Ardipithecus, we can now see that Australopithecus was too derived—its locomotion too sophisticated, and its invasion of new habitats too advanced—not to almost entirely obscure earlier hominid evolutionary dynamics.

"Now, in light of Ar. ramidus, there are no longer any a priori reasons to suppose that acquisition of our unique reproductive anatomy and behavior are unconnected with other human specializations....

"When viewed holistically, as any adaptive suite requires, the early hominid characters that were probably interwoven by selection to eventually generate cognition now seem every bit as biologically ordinary as those that have also affected the evolution of lizards, frogs, voles, monkeys, and chimpanzees. Comparing ourselves to our closest kin, it is somewhat sobering that the hominid path led to cognition, whereas that leading to Pan, our closest living relatives, did not, despite the near-synonymy of our genomes."

By closest living relatives, Lovejoy means close on different branches. The old picture was that they were closer down the same branch. One notices that Lovejoy still employed the word “selection.” That’s right; he is not abandoning Darwin. “As Darwin argued, the ultimate source of any explication of human acumen must be natural selection,” he explained. “The adaptive suite proposed here provides at least one evolutionary map by which cognition could have emerged without reliance on any special mammalian trait.” Ostensibly this means that now evolutionists do not have to explain cognition by the sudden emergence by mutation of just one the “neural substrate”. Now they can employ the word “emergence” to an interwoven suite of adaptive traits that makes us human.

The popular media are all echoing this line that chimpanzees are no longer on our branch of the family tree. The image of Lucy’s famous skeleton has been supplanted by artwork from J.H. Matternes showing a hairy, upright female with Mona-Lisa-like cheeky smile. Surely Johanson is not taking this sitting down, is he? According to the U.C. Chronicle of Higher Education, he conceded that this fossil is “terribly important for all of our thinking” about human origins (emphasis on terribly), but “will undoubtedly generate widespread debate” in days to come. The Chronicle added that the debate will include “the question of whether Ardi is actually a human ancestor.”

One point not emphasized in the popular reports is the fragmentary condition of the bones. Casey Luskin of the Discovery Institute, writing for Evolution News and Views uncovered statements that the specimen was “crushed nearly to smithereens.” The substrate was chalky and squished, resembling an “Irish stew” that would turn to dust at the slightest touch. This included the critical pelvic bones necessary to establish whether the creature walked upright. Six years ago, Tim White himself had cautioned fellow scientists that geological deformation of fossil fragments can produce misleading impressions of species diversity (03/28/2003). Now it’s clear he was working on these badly-damaged Ardipithecus fragments at the time he said that (see, for example, 04/19/2006 and especially the 10/29/2002 and 09/23/2004 fights).

In a second article for Evolution News, Luskin commented on the game-changing nature of this find. Actually, Luskin pointed out, it’s another episode out of an old playbook – claiming that the new find “overturns the prevailing views on human evolution.”

Perceptive readers may also take note of the fact that White dates Ardi at 4.4 million years BP (before present), while Johanson’s Lucy was found not far away and dated at 3.2 million years BP. Some questions not being asked are (1) which way was evolution going for 1.2 million years between Ardi and Lucy, (2) how much did the landscape change geologically in that time, and (3) is it possible these species were contemporaneous. Only Biblical creationists seem to be asking the other overlooked question: how can they prove those dates without assuming evolution? For some creationist responses to Ardipithecus in particular and human evolution in general, see articles 1, 2, and 3 on CMI.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. Bruce Alberts, “Understanding Human Origins,” Science, 2 October 2009: Vol. 326. no. 5949, p. 17 DOI: 10.1126/science.1182387.
2. A short list of popular reports: National Geographic News, Science Daily, Live Science, PhysOrg and the BBC News.
3. C. Owen Lovejoy, “Reexamining Human Origins in Light of Ardipithecus ramidus.” Science, 2 October 2009: Vol. 326. no. 5949, pp. 74, 74e1-74e8, DOI: 10.1126/science.1175834.

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A Zoo in a Russian Church

A Priest Opens Pet's Corner in his Church Near St. Petersburg

Moscow, Russia
August 18, 2009
Interfax

Rabbit cages and aquariums with crocodiles are kept under the same roof with the Holy Hierarch Spyridon parish in the town of Lomonosov near St. Petersburg.

"I want to promote children's love of God's creatures. This is some kind of the live message. Children come to enjoy what they see. I explain them that these are all God's creatures," church's rector Oleg Yemelyanenko explains his idea to open a pet's corner at the church in an interview to Pervy Canal.

Moreover, Father Oleg hopes to distract children from computers by bringing up his young parishioners in love of animals.

Fr. Oleg decided to open a pet's corner at the church when one of his parishioners gave him an iguana as a present. Now the collection counts to over 30 animals, including two chameleons, a male and a female, and several species of cockroaches - Blatella germanica (German cockroaches) and Panchlora cubensis (Cuban cockroaches). The latter reproduce themselves too fast.

The pet's corner and the parish are temporarily located in the former club, as the church's building is currently under renovation. After the renovation works are completed, the parish is going to return to its initial premises, and the club will be turned into a zoo.

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More Protestants Find a Home in the Orthodox Antioch Church

October 2, 2009
Nick Berezniak

LINTHICUM HEIGHTS, MD — Cal Oren was threading his way through the Santa Cruz Mountains of California early one evening in 1993, driving his wife, brother and three tired children back from a day of hiking amid the redwoods. As their car neared the town of Ben Lomond, Mr. Oren said, his brother pointed to a church on the roadside and said: "I've been inside this. It's really neat."

So Mr. Oren pulled to a stop, and as the children stayed in the car, the grown-ups gingerly padded into the sanctuary of Saints Peter and Paul Antiochian Orthodox Church. A lifelong Presbyterian, Mr. Oren knew virtually nothing about the Antiochians or, for that matter, Orthodox Christianity in general. He had always associated Ben Lomond with hippies, geodesic domes, and marijuana fields.

As he entered the sanctuary, a vespers service was underway. Maybe two dozen worshippers stood, chanting psalms and hymns. Incense drifted through thedark air. Icons of apostles and saints hung on the walls and adorned the altar. The ancientness and austerity stood at a time-warp remove from the evangelical circles in which Mr. Oren normally traveled, so modern and extroverted and assertively relevant.

"This was a Christianity I had never encountered before," recalled Mr. Oren, 55, who is a marketing consultant in commercial construction. "I was frozen in my tracks. I felt like I was in the actual presence of God, almost as if I was in heaven. And I'm not the kind of person who gets all woo-hoo."

The ineffable disclosure of that evening, a 15-minute glimpse into Byzantium, rattled everything certain in Mr. Oren's spiritual life. Even as he and his family kept attending a Presbyterian church near their home in suburban Baltimore, he stepped down from his positions as a ruling elder and Bible-study instructor. In 1995, he attended his first service at Holy Cross, an Antiochian church here, about 10 miles south of Baltimore. By late 1996, he was a regular, and in May 1997, he and his family converted and joined.

Any person's conversion is by nature an individual and idiosyncratic journey, and Mr. Oren's reflected not only his visceral sense that Orthodoxy had a "core of holy tradition" but his intense concern over theological concepts like giving the Eucharist to baptized infants, which may not animate other believers quite the same way.

Yet in its broader outlines, his movement from the Protestant realm into the Orthodox one, specifically into the Antiochian branch, attests to a significant and fascinating example of denominational migration. Over the last 20 years, the Antiochian Orthodox Church — with its roots in Syria and Lebanon and its longtime membership in America made up almost entirely of Middle Eastern immigrants and their descendants — has become the destination of choice for thousands of Protestants of Northern European ancestry.

The visible shift began in 1987 with the conversion of nearly 2,000 evangelical Christians, led by Peter E. Gillquist and other alumni of the Dallas Theological Seminary and the Campus Crusade for Christ. More recently, a wave of converts has arrived from such mainline Protestant denominations as the Episcopalian and Lutheran.

Some 70 percent of Antiochian Orthodox priests in the United States are converts, according to Bradley Nassif, who, as a professor of Bible and theology at North Park University in Chicago, is one of the nation's leading scholars of the religion. A generation or two ago, Professor Nassif said, converts made up barely 10 percent of Antiochian clergy.

Professor Nassif went so far, in a 2007 article in Christianity Today magazine, as to suggest that the 21st century might become the "Orthodox century" as disenchanted Protestants grew attracted to the historical roots, theological rigor and social conservatism of the Eastern Christian denominations.

Whether or not the prediction pans out, it is certainly true that no American convert comes to the Antiochian church by convenience or ease. The denomination has only about 250,000 members in 250 congregations in the country, Professor Nassif estimated. Worshippers stand during most of the two-hour Divine Liturgy each Sunday. Nearly half the days in the year require fasting from meat, dairy, eggs and most fish.

Yet when Mr. Oren and his family joined Holy Cross, they found kindred spirits in more ways than one. The church's pastor, Father Gregory Mathewes-Green, had left the Episcopal ministry to convert. His wife, Frederica Mathewes-Green, had written perhaps the definitive book on the subject, "Facing East: A Pilgrim's Journey Into the Mysteries of Orthodoxy" (HarperOne 2006).

Alienated by what he called "spiritual and theological chaos and moral confusion" in the Episcopal church, Father Mathewes-Green, 62, started Holy Cross in early 1993 with 19 members, five of them from his own family. When he formally renounced his Episcopal vows, he lost not only his annual salary but the rectory that was his home.

"There were many times," he recalled in a recent interview, "when I thought, `Today is the day I have to look through the Help Wanted ads.' "

In the years since, though, Holy Cross has grown to 120 members, nearly two-thirds of them converts, and has bought and paid off a $265,000 building. Fittingly for a congregation of spiritual seekers, Holy Cross occupies a stone structure built by Methodists and most recently occupied by the Pentecostals of the Korean Full Gospel New Generation Church.

While the sun streams through a stained-glass window of Jesus that was installed by the original congregation, most of the icons were painted within the last dozen years by an Orthodox convert, Carolyn Shuey. The other day, Father Mathewes-Green was tutoring the latest prospective convert, a Catholic immigrant from Congo.

The unexpected evolution of the Antiochian church has had only one drawback, at least at Holy Cross. When Father Mathewes-Green was persuaded several years ago to raise money with a church supper, people flocked to Holy Cross, expecting the savory specialties of the Levant. What they got was the culinary outcome of the priest's former life as an Episcopalian from South Carolina: hot dogs and brownies.

The fund-raiser, all prayers and chants to the contrary, was a loser.

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The Authenticity of Dionysius the Areopagite's Writings

St. Dionysius the Areopagite (Feast Day - October 3)

[Below are two classic writings by the Rev. John Parker who defended the authenticity of the Areopagite corpus as first century texts with apostolic authority. Though written a little over a hundred years ago, the arguments have yet to be refuted by his many critics who delight in deriding him. The interesting question he asks is whether St. Dionysius was influenced by the Alexandrian School and the Neoplatonists or was it in fact the other way around. The Rev. Parker translated St. Dionysius in the late 19th century into English both very accurately and literally which means that it is often unintelligable, but the benefit of this translation is that it maintains first century terminology that all later translations ignore. This is curious, because even if the writings are the work of "Pseudo-Dionysius", these terms must have been stylistically important as archaisms meant to enhance the feeling of authenticity, and thus worth noting. Though his arguments need to be a bit refined and expanded upon to suit contemporay scholarship, I consider it to still be a credible argument at least worth considering, as it also defends the majority of the opinions of the Church Fathers. - J.S.]

DIONYSIUS THE AREOPAGITE AND THE ALEXANDRINE SCHOOL

ALEXANDRIA became the home of Christian Philosophy, but Athens was its birthplace. Pantaenus and Ammonius-Saccus were chief founders of the Alexandrine School. They were both Christian. They both drew their teaching from the Word of God, “the Fountain of Wisdom,” and from the writings of Hierotheus, and Dionysius the Areopagite—Bishops of Athens. For several centuries there had been a Greek preparation for the Alexandrine School. As the Old Testament was a Schoolmaster, leading to Christ, so the Septuagint, Pythagoras, Plato, Aristobulus, Philo, and Apollos were heralds who prepared the minds of men for that fulness of light and truth in Jesus Christ, which, in Alexandria, clothed itself in the bright robes of Divine Philosophy.

Pantaenus was born in Athens, 120 AD, and died in Alexandria, 213 AD. He was Greek by nationality, and Presbyter of the Church in Alexandria by vocation. First Stoic then Pythagorean, he became Christian some time before 186 AD, at which date he was appointed chief instructor in the Didaskeleion of Demetrius, Bishop of Alexandria. Pantaenus recognised the preparation for the Christian Faith in Greek Philosophy. Anastasius of Sinai describes him as “one of the early expositors who agreed with each other in treating the first six days of Creation as prophetic of Christ and the whole Church.”

Eusebius says that “Pantaenus expounded the treasures of the Divine dogmas preserved direct, as from father to son, from St. Paul and other Apostles. Photius records that Pantaenus was pupil of those who had seen the Apostles, but that he certainly had not listened to any of them themselves. Now, if Pantaenus was pupil of those who had seen the Apostles, and yet had not listened to their oral teaching, it is natural to infer that he was pupil through their writings. I am a pupil of Dr. Pusey, but I never listened to his oral teaching; I am pupil through his writings. Now, there exist, to this day, the writings of two Presbyters who had seen the Apostles—both, converts to the faith through St. Paul,—-whose writings contain the treasures of the Divine dogmas, received from St. Paul and the other Apostles. Those two Presbyters are Hierotheus and Dionysius the Areopagite, both ordained Bishop of Athens by St. Paul. Dionysius the Areopagite expressly calls St. Paul his “chief initiator,” and as such, gives his teaching on the holy Angels, in the sixth chapter of the Heavenly Hierarchy; and frequently describes St. Paul as his “chief instructor.”

If, then, we can prove that the writings of Dionysius existed before and were known in Alexandria, when Pantaenus delivered his lectures in that city, we may fairly infer that Pantaenus would know, and knowing, would use, the writings penned by the Chief of his own Areopagus, and Bishop of his own Athens.

Historical criticism does not permit us to reject probabilities, merely because they confirm the Christian Faith.

Dexter, in his Chronicle, collected from the Archives of Toledo and other churches in Spain, gives this testimony: “U.C. 851 (98 AD). Dionysius Areopagita dicat Eugenio Marcello, dicto, propter ingenii excellentiam, Timotheo, libros de Divinis Nominibus.”

Dionysius of Alexandria, writing to Pope Sixtus II, c. 250, respecting the writings of Dionysius the Areopagite, affirms “that no one can intelligently dispute their paternity—that no one penetrated more profoundly than Dionysius into the mysterious depths of Holy Scripture—that Dionysius was disciple of St. Paul, and piously governed the Church of Athens.” If, then, the Bishops of Alexandria and Rome exchanged letters only a few years after the death of Pantaenus, and only seven years after the death of Ammonius, and in those letters affirmed the writings to be undoubtedly written by Dionysius the Areopagite, it would be the height of absurdity to affirm that such writings were unknown to Pantaenus and Ammonius.

But we do not need to base our proof on mere supposition. Routh gives two fragments of Pantaenus. The second is a distinct echo of Dionysius. In Divine Names (c. 7), Dionysius discusses how Almighty God knows existing things, and explains the text; “He, knowing all things before their birth” as proving that “not as learning existing things from existing things, but from Himself, and in Himself, as Cause, the Divine Being pre-holds and pre-comprehends the notions and essence of all things, not approaching each several thing according to its kind, but knowing and containing all things within one grasp of the cause. Thus Almighty God knows existing things, not by a knowledge of existing things, but by that of Himself.” Dionysius (c. V. s. 8) speaking of creation, declares that the Divine and good volitions of Almighty God define and produce existing things.

Pantaenus teaches the same: “Neither does He know things sensible sensibly (αἰσθητῶς), nor things intelligible intellectually. For it is not possible that He, Who is above all things, should comprehend things being, after things being (κατὰ τα ὄντα), but we affirm that He knows things being” as His own volitions . . . yea, as His own volitions, Almighty God knows things being, since by willing (θέλων), He made all things being.”

In Mystic Theology (c. V.) Dionysius says, “Almighty God does not know existing things, qua existing.” The teaching of Ammonius-Saccus is the same; Ammonius uses the word βούλημα, Dionysius and Pantaenus θελήματα, of God, as Source of Creation.

But, though the known fragments of Pantaenus are few, we possess abundant writings of two pupils, Clement of Alexandria and Origen, from which we may gather the teaching of their master. Clement speaks of Pantaenus as his “great instructor and collaborator.” Such is the similarity between the writings of Clement and Dionysius, that some have hazarded the conjecture that Clement the Philosopher, mentioned by Dionysius, was Clement of Alexandria! I give only one familiar illustration. Clement writes: “As then, those riding at anchor at sea, drag the anchor, but do not drag it to themselves, but themselves to the anchor, thus those who are drawn to God in the gnostic life, find themselves unconsciously led to God.” Dionysius in the Divine Names (c. III. s. 1) says, “Or, as if after we have embarked on ship, and are holding on to the cable, attached to some rock, we do not draw the rock to us, but ourselves, and the ship, to the rock. Wherefore, before everything, and especially theology, we must begin with prayer; not as though we ourselves were drawing the power, which is everywhere, and nowhere present, but as, by our godly reminiscences and invocations, conducting ourselves to, and making ourselves one with It.”

Origen confessed that Pantaenus was his superior in the philosophy of the schools, and that he moulded his teaching upon the model of Pantaenus. Do the writings of Origen bear the stamp of Dionysius and Hierotheus? Origen, on the resurrection of the body, says, “For how does it not seem absurd that this body which has endured scars for Christ, and, equally with the soul, has borne the savage torments of persecutions, and has also endured the suffering of chains, and rods, and has been tortured with fire, beaten with the sword, and has further suffered the cruel teeth of wild beasts, the gallows of the cross, and diverse kinds of punishments, that this should be deprived of the prizes of such contests. If forsooth, the soul alone, which not alone contended, should receive the crown, and its companion the body, which served it with much labour, should attain no recompense, for its agony and victory, how does it not seem contrary to all reason, that the flesh, resisting for Christ its natural vices, and its innate lust, and guarding its virginity with immense labour, that one, when the time for rewards has come, should be rejected as unworthy and the other should receive its crown? Such a fact would undoubtedly argue on the part of God, either a lack of justice or a lack of power.” Dionysius (E. H., c. VII.) says, “Now the pure bodies of the holy souls, enrolled together as yoke-fellows, and fellow travellers, which together strove during the divine contests, throughout the Divine Life, in the unmoved steadfastness of the souls, will together receive their own resurrection. For, having been made one with the holy souls, to which they were united during this present life, by having become members of Christ, they will receive in return the godlike and incorruptible immortality and blessed inheritance.” Dionysius (D. N., c. VI. s. 2) says, “What is still more divine, it promises to transfer our whole selves (I mean souls and bodies, their yoke-fellows), to a perfect life and immortality. Others again do this injustice to bodies, that, after having toiled with the holy souls, they unjustly deprive them of the holy retributions, when they have come to the goal of their most divine course.” And “For if the man have passed a life dear to God in soul and body, the body which has contended throughout the Divine struggles will be honoured together with the devout soul.”

To show that Origen knew the works of Hierotheus, we give an extract from his letter to Gregory: “Would that you might both participate in and continually augment this part, so that you may not only say, ‘we are partakers of Christ,’ but also partakers of God.” Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis (fragment V.), c. 140, says, “The Presbyters, the disciples of the Apostles, say that this is the gradation and method of those who are saved, and that they advance through steps of this nature, and that, moreover, they ascend through the Spirit to the Son, and through the Son to the Father; and that, in due time, the Son will yield up His work to the Father.” Who the Presbyters, the disciples of the Apostles were, we may gather from the three last chapters of the “Book of Hierotheus" Br. Mus. (Ad. Rich. 7189), in which the very same doctrine is taught. Is it not, then, a legitimate inference, that when Photius says “ that Pantaenus was a pupil of the Presbyters who had seen the Apostles,” he designated Hierotheus and Dionysius the Areopagite, generally known under that title?

Ammonius Saccus was born of Christian parents in Alexandria, and died in that city, 242 AD. Anastasius of Sinai calls him “the Wise,” and Hierocles “the taught of God.” Besides being famous for his expositions of Holy Scripture, he wrote the Diatesseron, or Harmony of the Gospels, contained in the Bib. Patrum. In 236 he wrote the agreement between Moses and Jesus. He was the great conciliator, who sought the good in every system, and to make all one in Christ. Pressensé beautifully describes him as a man who wished to believe and to know, to adore and to comprehend, to conciliate the Greek Philosophy with the Mysteries of the East. He wrote a commentary on the golden verses of Pythagoras, which Hierocles published, as well as reproduced his other works. The titles of his books, mentioned by Photius, such as Providence and Free Will, recall those of the lost books of Dionysius, of which we have only a summary in his known works. (Cod. 251-214.)

Ammonius was surnamed Saccus from having been a corn carrier. Virgil, Shakespere, Milton, were great geniuses in themselves, but when we know the sources from which they drew, we can better understand their achievements.

Dionysius was indebted to Hierotheus—Ammonius drew from Dionysius. This we shall show, not as we might by his works as described by Photius, but from Plotinus, his disciple, in order that we may have the prevailing proof, to some minds, of testimony not necessarily Christian.

Plotinus was born in Lycopolis, 205 AD, and died in Campagna, 270 AD. At the age of 29, he began to search for truth in the schools of Alexandria. He wandered from teacher to teacher, but could find no rest until he was persuaded to go and hear Ammonius-Saccus. After listening to him, he exclaimed, “This is what I sought.”

Plotinus remained under him eleven years, until the death of Ammonius, 242 AD. In 244 AD, Plotinus began to teach in Rome. Plotinus was not a refined scholar. Porphyry, therefore, committed his teaching to writing. Porphyry was regarded as the greatest enemy to the Christian Faith in the early centuries. Persecutors burned the bodies of Christians, but Porphyry sought to undermine their faith in the Holy Scriptures, by quibbles of unbelief, which have been revived to-day as “New Criticism.” Porphyry wrote against the Holy Scriptures with a bitterness engendered by a conviction of their truth. Now, it is a startling fact, that though the teaching of Plotinus comes to us through Porphyry, there is not a word in the Enneades, in which the teaching of Plotinus is given against the Christian Faith. It is true that Eutochius published another version of the teaching of Plotinus, on the ground that his teaching was coloured by Porphyry, but we prefer to rest our proof on Porphyry, as not being prejudiced in favour of the truth.

Let us then first see what Plotinus teaches respecting the Holy Trinity. He says, “We need not go beyond the three Hypostaseis” (Persons). It is true that Plotinus presents that Trinity as “One,” “Mind,” and “Soul,” whereas Dionysius gives the formula “Father, Son, and Spirit.” Occasionally Plotinus uses “Logos” instead of “Mind.” But even this substitution of “One” for “Father” may be traced to Dionysius, who speaks of the Triad, ἐναρχικὴ and even ἐναρχικῶν ὑποστὰσεων, “One springing”. The “One” represents the Father. Plotinus says, “We may represent the first principle, ‘One,’ as source, which has no other origin than Itself, and which pours Itself in a multitude of streams without being diminished by what it gives.” Dionysius speaks of the “Father” as sole source of Godhead, and says that “the Godhead is undiminished by the gifts imparted.” In Chap. XII of Divine Names, Dionysius treats of “One” and “Perfect” as applied to Almighty God.

Let Us now hear Plotinus on the “Beautiful” Enneades (I. 6-7). Plotinus says, “The soul advances in its ascent towards God, until being raised above everything alien, it sees face to face, in His simplicity, and in all His purity, Him upon Whom all hangs, to Whom all aspire; from Whom all hold existence, life and thought. What transport of love must not he feel who sees Him! With what ardour ought he not to desire to be united to Him! He, who has not seen Him, desires Him as the Good; he who has seen Him, admires Him as the sovereign Beauty; and struck at once with astonishment and pleasure, disdains the things which heretofore he called by the name of Beauty. This is what happens to those to whom have appeared the forms of gods and demons; they no longer care For the beauty of other bodies. What think you, then, should he experience who has seen the Beautiful Himself—the Beautiful surpassing earth and heaven! The miserable is not he, Who has neither fresh colour nor comely form, nor power, nor royalty; it is alone he, Who sees himself excluded from the possession of Beauty—a possession in comparison with which he ought to disdain royalty, rule of the whole earth, of the sea, and heaven itself, if he should be able, by abandoning, by despising all these, to rise to the contemplation of the Beautiful, face to face.” Plotinus also recognised, “that the eye soiled with impurity could never bear the sight, or attain to the vision of that Beauty. We must render the organs of vision analogous and like to the object that they would contemplate. Every man ought to begin by rendering himself beautiful and divine to obtain a Vision of the Beautiful and the Deity.” Well might St. Augustine say, that “with the change of a few words, Plotinus became concordant with Christ’s religion.” No wonder that Gregory and Basil quoted so largely from Plotinus. Let us now hear what Dionysius says of the “Good and Beautiful”: “Goodness turns all things to Itself; all things aspire to It, as source and bond and end. From this Beautiful comes being to all existing things. All things aspire to the Beautiful and Good, and there is no existing thing which does not participate in the Beautiful and Good.” Read the Fourth Chapter of the Divine Names.

Porphyry records that Plotinus attained to that vision of the Beautiful three times during his life. How that vision of the Beautiful is to be attained, Dionysius describes in the Mystic Theology:“But thou, O dear Timothy, by thy persistent commerce with the mystic visions, leave behind both sensible perceptions and intellectual efforts, and all objects of sense and intelligence, and all things not being and being, and be raised aloft agnostically to the union, as attainable, with Him Who is above every essence and knowledge. For by unchecked and absolute ecstasy, in all purity, from thyself, and all, thou wilt be carried on high to the superessential Ray of the Divine Darkness, when thou hast cast away all and become free from all.” Ammonius had such ecstasy during his lectures, in which he seemed to have Divine visions.

Plotinus differs from Dionysius in regarding creation as an act of necessity, whereas Dionysius regards it as an act of love. Plotinus treats evil as “an elongation from God.” Dionysius speaks of Almighty God as immanent in matter the most elongated from spirit. Plotinus traces evil to matter; Dionysius to the fallacious choice of a free agent. May it not be that the pagan colouring of Porphyry in these respects led Eutochius to give a more faithful and consistent account of the teaching of Plotinus.

But the crowning proof that Dionysius was the source from which the Alexandrine School drew much of its wisdom, is Proclus (450-485). Suidas affirmed long ago that Proclus cribbed whole passages from Dionysius. Professor Stiglmayr fills seven pages with parallel passages.

Vachérot describes certain chapters of the Divine Names as extracts from Proclus, word for word, and says the whole doctrine of Dionysius seems to be a commentary upon the Theology of Alexandria. Barthélémy St. Hilaire says that Dionysius and Scotus Erigena almost entirely implanted, in the Middle Ages, the doctrine of Neo-Platonism. Matter is more profound; Professor Langen finds in Dionysius the “characteristics of Neo-Platonic speculation.” The similarity of doctrine is denied by none. Which writings appeared first? That is the question.

Dexter commemorates the Divine Names from Tabularia of Toledo, 98 AD. Polycarp quotes Dionysius verbatim as “a certain one.” Jerome quotes him as “quidam Graecorum.” Dionysius of Alexandria (250 AD), writing to Sixtus II, declares that no one can intelligently doubt that the writings are those of Dionysius, the convert of St. Paul, Bishop of Athens. Tertullian expresses the Agnosia “nihil scire omnia scire,” and Origen quotes him by name. Theodore (420 AD) answers objections, whom Photius approved. Gregory calls Dionysius “an ancient and venerable Father.” The Second Council of Nicea quotes the very words, contained in the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy (c. I. s. 4) as those of the great Dionysius. Bishop Pearson proves that the best judges in the sixth, fifth, fourth and third centuries regarded the writings as written by Dionysius the Areopagite. German scholars today admit that the external testimony is in favour of their genuineness.

Yet eccentric critics, on account of the precise theology, cannot believe that the works were written by a learned Greek,—Chief of the Areopagus, who forsook all to follow Christ, the convert and disciple of St. Paul, the familiar friend of St. John and other Apostles, to whom our Saviour revealed the mysteries of the Father; but those critics can believe that an unknown man, whose century no one can fix, and possibly a Syrian, may have gleaned from writers of the first four centuries these theological pearls expressed in Greek in a style unique and always like itself. They can believe that the Author of these Divine writings would incorporate fictitious allusions to persons and events of the apostolic age, to add lustre to incomparable works, and to impute them to another. They can believe that writings, so composed, were foisted upon a credulous Christendom, so that Dionysius of Alexandria, Maximus, St. John Damascene, and the Council of Nicea, accepted them as the genuine works of Dionysius. I do not belong to that school. Only unbelief could believe anything so incredible. Rational men will not hazard the surmise that works known in the first century were gleaned from writings composed four hundred years afterwards.

The tone of the Alexandrine School may be further illustrated from Amelius and Dionysius the Sublime. Amelius attended Plotinus twenty-four years as companion and pupil. Eusebius gives an extract from his writings, in which Amelius says, “This plainly was the Word, by Whom, being Eternal, things becoming became, as Heraclitus would say.” It was probably he who said, “The Prologue of St. John’s Gospel ought to be written in gold, and placed in the most conspicuous place in every church” (De Civ. Dei, LX. c. 29). Dionysius, the famous secretary of Zenobia, attended the lectures of Ammonius-Saccus. He was the “arbiter” of all literary questions. He expresses his admiration (De sub. L. 9) of the diction of Moses in the description of the six days’ creation, and numbers St. Paul amongst the most brilliant Greek orators, as a man who propounded a “dogma beyond demonstration.”

We claim that the testimony of these illustrious men, and the extracts from Pantaenus, Ammonius, and their disciples, justify the conclusion that the Alexandrine School was Biblical, Christian, and Philosophical, that its Philosophy was a Divine Philosophy of the Faith, not a pagan philosophy against the Faith, and that the main sources of its Divine Philosophy were the writings of Hierotheus and Dionysius, Bishops of Athens.

JOHN PARKER

Cannes,
Epiphany, 1899.

For a sketch of the Life, Internal Evidence of Date, and External Testimony to Genuineness during the first nine centuries, see Celestial and Ecclesiastical Hierarchy (Skeffington, 2s. 6d.).

St. Hierotheos of Athens (Feast Day - October 4)

OBJECTIONS TO GENUINENESS

THE most plausible objection to the genuineness of these [Areopagite] writings is thus expressed by Dupin: "Eusebius and Jerome wrote an accurate catalogue of each author known to them, with a few obscure exceptions, and yet never mention the writings of the Areopagite." Great is the rejoicing in the House of the Anti-Areopagites over this PROOF; but what are the facts?

Eusebius acknowledges that innumerable works have not come to him; Jerome disclaims either to know or to give an accurate catalogue either of authors or works. The Library of Caesarea contained three hundred thousand volumes, according to the modest computation of Doublet, and according to Schneider, and many more. Jerome says there are some writings, so illustrious in themselves, that they will not suffer from not being mentioned by him. Jerome follows Dionysius on the Heavenly Hierarchy. Jerome's Catalogue of Illustrious Men contains one hundred and thirty-five names.

Josephus is mentioned for his testimony to Christ. Seneca for his correspondence with St. Paul. Philo for his description of the Therapeutse of Alexandria. Yet Dupin would have the unwary infer that Jerome gives a full catalogue of each Author known to him, with a few obscure exceptions.

The Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius treats of the nature of Christ, the companions of the Apostles, the Martyrdoms, the succession of Bishops, the persecutions, and the folk-lore of the Church to the fourth Century. The book would fill about 125 pages, yet Dupin would have us believe that he gives a complete catalogue. He does not give the writings of Hymenseus and Narcissus, of Athenagoras, and Pantaenus, nor a complete list of Clement, Origen, and Dionysius of Alexandria. His silence, in my opinion, is owing to "odium theologicum." According to Eusebius, Jesus is διττός; according to Dionysius, Jesus is ἁπλοῦς; both true when properly understood, but when misunderstood, "Hinc lachrymae illae". Dupin formed his premise for his conclusion, not from facts.(1)

Fallacy of Names

Pearson, Daillé, Blundellum, Erasmus, Valla, Westcott, Lupton, pronounce against the genuineness. Who are you? But Pearson demolishes Daillé; Vossius pulverises Blundellum; Erasmus repudiates Valla. Dr. Westcott, following Dupin, assumes the non-genuineness, but his literary instinct places his Article on Dionysius before that on Origen. Dean Colet bumps the scale against Mr. Lupton.

Pearson, in the 10th Chapter of Ignatii Vindiciae, gives the shortest and best summary in favour of the genuineness. Speaking of the scholars of his own day, he says, "No one is so ignorant as not to know that these writings were recognised as genuine by the best judges in the sixth, fifth, fourth, and third centuries." Unhappily, he also said, every erudite person regarded them in his day as written in the fourth century, and he assumed the date of Eusebius' death, as the date of the works, to account for his silence. Hence every inerudite persons, who wished to pass for erudite, maintained that opinion for his own reputation. But when Pearson had re-surveyed the evidence, he confessed, with shame, that though he had given, what seemed to him a true opinion, he left the decision of the whole matter to the judgment of a more learned person.

Erasmus, in his Institutio of a Christian Prince, writes thus: "Divus ille Dionysius qui fecit tres Hierarchias." In his prime work, Ratio Verae Religionis, Erasmus not only enumerates the Divine Names and the Mystical and Symbolic Theology, but calls them, not Stoic, not Platonic, not Aristotelian, but "celestial" philosophy. He so moulds Dionysius into his book, that it becomes Dionysius writing elegant Latin. The only reason which outweighed with him all external testimony was that Erasmus could not imagine that any man, living in apostolic times, and so far removed from the age of Erasmus, could possibly have penned such a mirror of apostolic doctrine. How could the Areopagite, though disciple of Paul, and familiar friend of John the Theologian, possibly be so learned as the author of these writings? Such is the testimony of the two Theologians who have been permitted to be doubtful of the genuineness.

Gregory of Tours (2)

Gregory is the great authority of those who think that the St. Denis of France is not identical with Dionysius the Areopagite. The authority is worthy of their critical acumen. Gregory collects the more obscure martyrdoms, in Gaul, under Nero, and subsequent Emperors. He gives several martyrdoms under Nero, and thus proves the Apostolic Evangelization of Gaul. Gregory quotes, and misquotes, and misunderstands the ancient document (3), "Concerning seven men sent by St. Peter into Gaul, to preach."(4) "Under Claudius-sub CLDIO-Peter the Apostle sent certain disciples into Gaul to preach, they were Trophimus, Paulus, Martial, Austremonius, Gatianus, Saturninus, Valerius, and many companions." These men were sent 42-43 AD. Gregory omits Valerius, and inserts Dionysius, who was not converted to the Christian Faith till 44 or 49 AD. Then Gregory misreads "Claudio" for "consulibus Decio", and adds "Grato" as the fellow-consul. Thus a disciple of the Apostles, sent by Clement, successor of Peter, arrives in Gaul in 250, and the identical names of his companions recur miraculously in the third century. At the very time that Trophimus (5) is thus supposed to have arrived at Aries, we have a letter from Cyprian, 254 AD, urging Pope Stephen to depose Marcion, 15th or 18th Bishop of Aries from Trophimus. Such is the basis upon which our critical friends build their house upon the sand.

The Pères Bolandistes

The Pères Bolandistes are a wonder in Christendom. They are critical, and yet follow the gross blunder of Gregory of Tours. They belong to the papal obedience, and yet prefer Gregory of Tours when wrong to Gregory XIII when right. They pronounce the solemn declaration of Pope John XIXth, "that Martial of Limoges was an apostolic man (6)," as of no historic value. They think that St. John Damascene did not possess the same critical apparatus for proving the authenticity of the writings of Dionysius that we possess in the 19th Century. Their "actes authentiques"(7) of Dionysius acknowledge that he was sent to Gaul by Clement, successor of Peter; and yet they affirm that he arrived in Gaul in 250. After Clement I, who succeeded Peter and Paul, there was not another Clement Bishop of Rome for a thousand years (8). Happily, Les petits Bolandistes are more rational and critical than their Pères.

General Objection

"The style, the theological learning, the language and allusions, prove the writings written after the apostolic age."

Is the Epistolary style the proof? St. Paul, St. John, St. Peter, St. Luke, and nearly the whole of the New Testament is written under the form of Epistles. The Epistle of St. James, the first written in the Canon of the New Testament, will bear comparison with the book of Job for ornate diction. Consult the marginal references to the Epistle of St. Peter to see the scriptural knowledge of the Apostles. Men use the testimony of the High Priests, that the Apostles were unlearned and ignorant men, but omit their testimony that they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus; and the further testimony that Jesus opened their understanding, that they should understand the testimony of the Scriptures respecting Himself; and further, that the Holy Spirit should recall to them whatever He had said to them. Those who would rather assume twenty miracles, than acknowledge one natural fact, surmise that a Syrian, in the fourth century may have written Greek permeated with technical expressions of Plato and Aristotle. There is not a single allusion to persons or events after the first century, unless it be supposed that the Epistle of Ignatius, 108 AD, is quoted. The works abound in names recorded in the New Testament. The Apostolic Epistles allude to the leaven of heresy already working. The Antwerp edition gives about five hundred references to Holy Scripture in the Writings of Dionysius. He quotes every book in the Bible, except the two last particular Epistles of St. John, or John the Presbyter. Dionysius writes four letters to Gaius, to whom St. John wrote his third Epistle. We have, therefore, in the writings of this Apostolic man, a proof that the Canonical Scriptures were quoted as the Oracles of God, in the first century, and a triumphant testimony that Faith is more trustworthy than criticism.

Thanks be to God!

Printed by James Parker and Co., Crown Yard, Oxford.

-----------------------------

1. Vidieu, page 107.

2. L'Abbé Darras. St. Denys 1'Areopagite, p. 34.

3. Ibid., p. 51.

4. See Monuments inédits de M. Faillon, t. ii. p. 375.

5. Darras, p. 14.

6. See Surius.

7. Darras, 293-300.

8. Clement I., A.D. 67, Cl. II. 1046.

Life of St. Dionysius the Areopagite (October 3rd)

This Saint was from Athens, a learned man, and a member of the famous judicial court of Mars Hill (in Greek Aeros Pagos, hence the name Areopagite (see Acts 17:19-34). When Saint Paul preached in Athens, he was one of the first there to believe in Christ, and, according to some, became the first bishop of that city. Others say -- and this may be more probable--that he was the second Bishop of Athens, after Saint Hierotheus, whom Dionysius calls his friend and teacher "after Paul" (On the Divine Names, 3:2). With Saint Hierotheus he was also present at the Dormition of the most holy Theotokos; the Doxasticon of the Aposticha for the service of the Dormition is partly taken from a passage in Chapter III of On the Divine Names. According to ancient tradition, he received a martyr's end (according to some, in Athens itself) about the year 96.

Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone
Since thou hadst been instructed in uprightness thoroughly and wast vigilant in all things, thou wast clothed with a good conscience as befitteth one holy. Thou didst draw from the Chosen Vessel ineffable mysteries; and having kept the Faith, thou didst finish a like course, O Hieromartyr Dionysios. Intercede with Christ God that our souls be saved.

Kontakion in the Plagal of the Fourth Tone
In spirit, thou dist pass through Heaven's gates, instructed by the great Apostle who attained to the third Heaven's heights, and wast made rich in all knowledge of things beyond speech; and then thou, O Dionysius, didst illuminate them that slumbered in the darkness of their ignorance. Hence we all cry out: Rejoice, O universal Father.

Life of St. Hierotheus of Athens (October 4th)

According to some, Hierotheus, like Saint Dionysius, was a member of the court of Mars Hill. Having first been instructed in the Faith of Christ by Paul, he became Bishop of Athens. He, in turn, initiated the divine Dionysius more perfectly into the mysteries of Christ; the latter, on his part, elaborated more clearly and distinctly Hierotheus' concise and summary teachings concerning the Faith. He too was brought miraculously by the power of the Holy Spirit to be present at the Dormition of the Theotokos, when, together with the sacred Apostles, he became a leader of the divine hymnody. "He was wholly transported, wholly outside himself and was so deeply absorbed in communion with the sacred things he celebrated in hymnology, that to all who heard him and saw him and knew him, and yet knew him not, he seemed to be inspired of God, a divine hymnographer," as Dionysius says (On the Divine Names, 3:2). Having lived in a manner pleasing to God, he reposed in the Lord.

Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone
Since thou hadst been instructed in uprightness thoroughly and wast vigilant in all things, thou wast clothed with a good conscience as befitteth one holy. Thou didst draw from the Chosen Vessel ineffable mysteries; and having kept the Faith, thou didst finish a like course, O Hieromartyr Hierotheos. Intercede with Christ God that our souls be saved.

Kontakion in the Plagal of the Fourth Tone
As Athens' Hierarch, we acclaim thee, since through thee we have received instruction in things awesome and ineffable; for thou wast a God-inspired writer of divine hymns. O Hierotheus all-blessed, do thou pray to God, so that we may be redeemed from all calamities, that thus we may cry: Rejoice, O Father wise in things divine.

[Note: In citing all the connections above between Sts. Hierotheus and Dionysius with the Alexandrian School, I find it interesting that the Church Calendar honors all the Saints who form this connection within days of each other. Beginning with St. Dionysius (Oct. 3) and St. Hierotheus (Oct. 4), we also honor St. Dionysius the Great the Archbishop of Alexandria (Oct. 5), St. Demetrius the Archbishop of Alexandria (Oct. 9) and St. Denys of Paris (Oct. 9). Could this be more than a mere coincidence?]

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