Russian Orthodox Church to Skip Pan-Orthodox Council

Sputnik ^ | 06-10-2016

[NRx]

Russian Orthodox Church spokesman Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk has not departed for Crete to attend the Pan-Orthodox Council on the Greek island of Crete after the church decided to suspend its participation following the refusal of several orthodox churches to take part, a church source told RIA Novosti Friday.

[NRx]

I don't think this has been formally announced as of yet, but the writing is on the wall. My guess is that the meeting of a Great Synod will happen in due course. But too many of the local churches, monastics, hierarchs and respected theologians have expressed concerns for it to go ahead as presently envisioned. There need to be some changes to the proposed documents and the Church as a whole needs to deal with a major dispute between Antioch and Jerusalem. For now the EP really needs to just accept this and agree to postpone the Synod for maybe six months so these issues can be ironed out.

[NRx]

Note to self: Proofreading is my friend...

[NRx]

The last word in the title should be Council. Could you fix that please? Thanks...

[milford421]

No biggie NRx, we knew what you meant.

[RitaOK]

This article says what the Council is *not* about. (Not ecumenical and not doctrinal.)

So is this Council meeting more a meet-and-greet than a serious “COUNCIL”, as the word “Council” implies?

The whole thing seems unnecessarily mysterious, unless it really is simply a friendly social event.

[vladimir998]

Another one bites the dust.

So much for “unity” among the Eastern Orthodox.

[jtal]

I think that this (the council failing to meet) is probably a good thing for the Orthodox. They dodged the Vatican II bullet.

[Honorary Serb]

Uh-oh! This is a big one—the largest Local Church body in the Orthodox world !!!!

It looks like the celebrations of Pentecost in our local parishes will be the big events of that day. Perhaps eventually there will be a great Council of the Orthodox Church!

Keep praying!!!!

[piusv]

But they didn’t dodge the Great Eastern Schism bullet. So they’re already behind the 8 ball.

[Kolokotronis]

You worry too much. Notice who is falling off the Ladder of Divine Ascent. We've known about hierarchs pretty much from Day 1.