“Russian” practice and the theological rationale behind it should strike Roman Catholics and other western Christians as comfortingly familiar. Pioneered by the Ukrainian Peter Moghila in the 17th century, this approach is strongly influenced by Latin scholasticism. It not only has dominated the practice of the Russian Orthodox Church and of many others but also has deeply influenced manual theology throughout the Orthodox world. According to this “Russian” approach, mainline Trinitarian Protestants (and also unconfirmed Roman Catholics) are to be received by anointing with chrism following the full post-baptismal rite. This is not just because Protestants deny that chrismation is a sacrament. Protestants lack the apostolic structures of ministry which the Orthodox believe are necessary for the Church. Not having bishops in “apostolic succession,” they lack “valid orders” and in turn, the capacity for consecrating chrism and for conferring “valid chrismation.” Those baptized among them have, as it were, an incomplete Christian initiation. While they have a “valid baptism,” canonically they are in a position roughly analogous to that of a person baptized in an emergency by a layman. On the other hand, confirmed Latin Catholics and Eastern Catholics, like non-Chalcedonians, are to be received by confession of the Orthodox faith, since they have “valid orders” and therefore also a valid “sacrament of chrismation.”9
9 Cf. the Russian Orthodox Church’s rite for reception of Roman Catholic converts (1756, 1776, 1831, 1845, 1858,1895). A French translation of the 1895 edition of the rite is presented by L. Petit, “L’entrée des Catholiques dans I’Eglise Orthodoxe,” Echos d’Orient 2 (1898-99) 129-38 at 136-37. Substantially the same rite, but with diverse
additions chiefly intended to make it appropriate also for persons coming from other groups, is presented in English translation in Isabel F. Hapgood’s Service Book of the Holy Orthodox-Catholic Apostolic Church, a work commissioned by Bishop Nicholas of the Russian North American mission diocese and first published under his successor, Archbishop Tikhon, later Patriarch of Moscow (3rd edition, Syrian Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese, Brooklyn, NY, 1956) 454-63. The rite begins with a carefully worded series of renunciations and affirmations (e.g., “Do you renounce the false teaching which claims that the dogma of the procession of the Holy Spirit is not sufficiently expressed by the word of Christ the Savior himself, ‘Who proceeds from the Father,’ and that it is necessary to add to these words of Christ ‘and from the Son’?”). These are followed by the command “Enter into the Orthodox Church…”; Psalm 67; the prayer “O Lord God Almighty, who dost always offer diverse ways of repentance unto those who have sinned…”; the affirmation “The Orthodox-Catholic faith which I now confess…”; the command “Bow your knees before God…”; and the absolution “Our Lord and God Jesus Christ, who committed unto his apostles the keys of the Kingdom…” (cf. Hapgood 461-63). Note also the provisions of the 1986 Priest’s Handbook of the Midwestern Diocese of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA), pp. 11-12: “Converts from religions which do not practice Holy Baptism or which do not baptize with water in the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are received through the sacrament of Holy Baptism, Chrismation, and Communion… After a proper period of catechetical instruction and affirmation of the Orthodox faith, those who
have previously been baptized in the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are received by the appropriate rite of reception… Non-Chalcedonian Christians (Copts, Armenians, Jacobites, etc.) and validly confirmed Roman Catholic Christians are received by Holy Confession, followed by reception, absolution, and Holy Communion…”
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