Saint Rasputin - no such chance

[Fr_Ambrose]

prodromos:

He was quoting Myrhh, Father

Surely Myrhh is a masculine name? The feminine would be Myrhha.

Myrhha was the daughter of Theias, the King of Assyria, and Adonis was their son.

 

[Myhrr]

## War is a terrible evil, obviously; but was the UK to avoid involvement in WW2 ? We could have kept out - and nearly did. But we had moral obligations to Poland. Sitting back and letting it be even more horribly raped than it was, would have been quite unChristian. Sometimes, war is the least hideous course of action one can take. ##

Britain kept out by appeasing Hitler, not objecting to rearming etc. and meanwhile giving away bits of another country to which it had no rights. When Hitler threatened to bomb Prague anyway and Czechoslovakia surrendered Britain had to enter the war because of its agreement to protect Polish borders, Poland being one of the beneficiaries of Britains previous largesse in giving away parts of Czechoslovakia.

Do you know the history of the Boer War? At the turn of the 20th century gold was found in them thar hills and Britain decided it wanted it and slaughtered the Dutch in that part of South Africa until they got it.

“legally binding dogma” ? Church law can be changed, for sufficient reason; laws can be dispensed from - dogma cannot be dispensed from. Dogma must draw from revelation - legislation must accord with revelation and morals to be good, but need not draw from it. The parish system is a matter of Church law, the Incarnation of the Word is a matter of dogma. Legislation and dogma are both good and useful for the life of the Church - but they are not the same, and do not work in the same way.​

Your claim to wield the sword against heretics etc. is by divine right, that makes it dogma.

And the use of coercion against heretics* is not a dogma*, but was taught, widely, and practiced.

Tis, see above. That was why it was taught widely and practiced, until perfected…

IMO, the less said about that subject, the better - it was not a purely RC thing, unfortunately. It’s not fitting to blame the children for the deeds of the fathers. ##

IMHO I think it should be discussed, it is very much an RC thing and the reasoning behind such claims are still current. Your Church might not be in a position at the moment to use the sword physically at will against those who oppose it, but it still claims it has the divine right to do so. Take a look at Serbia’s recent history and your Church’s genocide of the Orthodox Serbs, adding Jews and Gypsies to that, and now it’s making the Archbishop Stepinac a Saint, insult to injury. And in five hundred years how many will remember that Stepinac was executing orders by divine right? Perhaps as many as now remember Josaphat was another of your butchers by divine right and not the Saint your PR department made him…?

Your Church, your teaching, your laws, your practice. If you’d rather not think about it again then do something to change it, or your children’s children might be wishing they too didn’t have to think about it.

 

[Myhrr]

Maccabees:

You could you the insane card for any monster ie Hitler or Napolean who knows what makes these monster tick.
Your contention that all war is sin is ridiculous. There was a war in heaven was Micheal the archangel sinning when he fought Lucifer? Was Moses sinning? was Joshua? was David? were the Maccabees? etc etc there were many times in the OT where God commissioned his people or was clearly behind his people in warfare.

You’re mixing up swords here. Thou shalt not kill, killing is a sin.

THe Orthoodx took up arms against Islam was that a sin? Was a sin to stop Hitler? Catholcism and yer Orthodoxy is not a Pacifrict faith true the just war theory is something developed in the western church but Pacifism was not part of Orthodoxy I am afriad you have been misinformed you guys are not JEhovah’s witnesses or the Amish or Quakers the Orthodox are permitted to be in the armed forces and bear arms Orthodox countires have fought relgious wars and secualar wars. There is nothing in either tradtion that condemns all wars.

Christ condemns them, He is the prince of peace not war, or is the only way to peace for you to kill all those that offend you?

True war it to be a last result and much sin and attrocity comes out of war even when it is justified but it can be justified under some circumstances. Going against Hitler would be justified

Your use of justified is ambiguous here, if you’re using it in doctrinal terms then no, it is never justified; to justify means to free somebody from sinfulness through faith in Jesus Christ or by the grace of Jesus Christ.

War is a sin there’s no justification for it.

Luke 9:56
For the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them. And they went to another village.

IT sounds like even Father Ambrose an Orthodox priest is calling you out of your false assertions. I question your knowledge of the Orthdox faith young man.:tsktsk:

Where is he doing this?

 

[chrisb]

Peace be with you all,

If I may be so bold, I might say that this thread to moving away from ecumenical dialog and dialog about our shared faith and has moved into political-cultural biased accusations between on another in order to somehow call into question the Truths about what we hold sacred. I would offer that, at least, I am Catholic not because the RCC and it’s members always move through the guidance of the Holy Spirit but that I find fruit, good fruit, among it’s branches in which to nourish my own spiritual growth. Where I find good fruit I tend to recognize rich soil and faith-filled care of it’s source. Of course I am not ignorant to think that everything the Church does is the absolute Will of God but I pray that everything “I” do will be the “Will of God”. Of course, I recognize as a man I am sinful and will error, I think nothing different from the men “within” the Body of Christ, where ever they are. As sinful men and women within the Body of Christ, we will sin. It is not in our sin that we should be recognized as faithful servants of our savior but in our repentance.

May God continue to use each of us to work His Will. Amen.

Peace, Love and Blessings,

 

[Myhrr]

1) Do the Orthodox priests and Bishops who bless the troops and bless the weapons have to do penance? The excommunication period for a soldier is, by the sacred Canons, 3-7 years. Are the bishops also excommunicated for 7 years for not only blessing sin but insisting on it?

Is this another example of one rule for the bishops and another for the oiks? A heretic bishop returning repentant gets chucked out of Apostolic succession but gets to stay in communion as plain laity and plain laity gets excommunicated…

Some animals are more equal than others…?

1. Is it possible for Bishops to bless people to commit sin? Are there any other sins which the Church gives her official blessing?

Is it? Are there?

1. When Saint Sergei Radonezhski blessed, even though reluctantly, Prince Dmitri Donskoi and the war against the infidel, how could he possibly bless something which was a sin? All sin is an abomination in the sight of God. Did Saint Sergei sin against God?

Did he?

 

[Brendan]

Myhrr:

You’re mixing up swords here. Thou shalt not kill, killing is a sin.

Did David sin when he killed Goliath?

Yes or No?

Lev 13:12-15

12 If you hear it said about one of the towns the LORD your God is giving you to live in
13 that wicked men have arisen among you and have led the people of their town astray, saying, “Let us go and worship other gods” (gods you have not known),
14 then you must inquire, probe and investigate it thoroughly. And if it is true and it has been proved that this detestable thing has been done among you,
15 you must certainly put to the sword all who live in that town. Destroy it completely, both its people and its livestock.

Is God commanding sin here?

 

[chrisb]

Brendan:

Did David sin when he killed Goliath?

Yes or No

Peace be with you Brendan,

Was Jesus Christ incorrect when he said “He who is without sin, cast the first stone?”

Measured defense is surely justified to protect the dignity of the innocent but I would question any act of force that failed to meet the Just War Doctrine.

Peace, Love and Blessings,

 

[Myhrr]

Brendan:

Did David sin when he killed Goliath?

Yes or No?

Yes.

Lev 13:12-15

Quote:
12 If you hear it said about one of the towns the LORD your God is giving you to live in
13 that wicked men have arisen among you and have led the people of their town astray, saying, “Let us go and worship other gods” (gods you have not known),
14 then you must inquire, probe and investigate it thoroughly. And if it is true and it has been proved that this detestable thing has been done among you,
15 you must certainly put to the sword all who live in that town. Destroy it completely, both its people and its livestock.

Is God commanding sin here?

Decide for yourself:

Vyacheslav:

Orthodoxy is also clear that hiring a mercenary to do the killing is also a sin, so the person who made the order is a sinner. Orthodox dogma doesn’t say that that is OK.

Matthew 5
20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
21 Ye have heard that it was said of them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment:
22 But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.

**Romans 13
**8 Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.
9 For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
10 Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

biblegateway.com

 

[Myhrr]

Mark 7:7
Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.

Mark 10:19
Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Defraud not, Honour thy father and mother.

Mark 12:29
And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord:

Luke 1:6
And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.

John 14:21
He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.

John 15:10
If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.

John 14:15
If ye love me, keep my commandments.

 

[Volodymyr]

I find an idle comment meant to be humorous creates controversy. An authority on Orthodox Teaching about War is the Russian Church’s Sobor. I can translate Section 8 of the Social Basis of Conceptions of the Russian Orthodox Church from the 2000 Archireiskii Sobor.

VIII.2 Recognizing war as an evil, the Church nonetheless does not prohibit her sons from participating in military actions, if the question concerns defense of neighbors and the the reinstitution of justice. Then a war is considered although undesirable, a necessary means. Orthodoxy in all times has related with the deepest reverence to soldiers who at the cost of their own lives protect the life and safety of their neighbors. Many soldiers the Holy Church numbers among the saints, teaching their Christian virtue and applying to them the words of Christ, “There is no bigger than that love of the one who offers his soul for his friends.” (John 15:13)

VII 3. The three principles which set the moral limits of war were worked out by the christian world in the Middle Ages.

 

[Myhrr]

We pray for mercy not for justice

From stgeorgecathedral.net/articles.html

“Peace and War in the Eastern Orthodox Church” Father Paul:“The Orthodox Church therefore has never elaborated a theory of “just war.” For Orthodox Christians, “just war” is a contradiction in terms.”

Part 1 of 2

stgeorgecathedral.net/article_1202.html

Part 2 of 2

stgeorgecathedral.net/article_0103.html

From: "No Just War in the Fathers"by Father Stanley Harakas

“In light of the patristic evidence, my conclusion was and still is: The East did not seek to answer questions concerning the correct conditions for entering war and the correct conduct of war on the basis of the possibility of a “just war,” precisely because it did not hold to such a view. Its view of war, unlike that of the West, was that it is a necessary evil. The peace ideal continued to remain normative, and no theoretical efforts were made to make conduct of war into a positive norm. In short, no case can be made for the existence of an Orthodox just-war theory.”

ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/jim_forest/Justwar.htm

 

[Brendan]

Myhrr:

Yes.

Did God guide David to kill Goliath?

(Hint, 1 Sam 17:45=46
45David said to the Philistine, "You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied.
46 This day the LORD will hand you over to me, and I’ll strike you down and cut off your head.

Decide for yourself:

I have already decided.

I requested your opinion on that passage. Do you not care to provide one?

When God ordered the Israelites to put those who turned away from Him to the sword, is God commanding the Israelites to SIN?

 

[GrzeszDeL]

Volodymyr:

During current Archiereski Sobor of the Russian Orthodox Church, Moscow Patriarchiate, one humorous occurence. Mitropolit Iuvelanii Krutitski announced that despite “advocates” advancing Tsar Ivan Grozni (Terrible) and Gregorii Rasputin, to be canonized that because of the terror of Ivan and the debauchery of Gregorii, neither will be canonized after “careful study”.

Does it really make much of a difference that some Metropolitan says “nyet”? After all, the Orthodox do not have a Congregation for the Causes of Saints like we Catholics do. So long as a popular cultus persists, an individual’s cause is still open. I admit that I do not see a lot of staying power for the cults of Rasputin, Ivan & Stalin, but then I would not have predicted that they would have come to be in the first place.

 

[Fr_Ambrose]

Myhrr:

War is a sin there’s no justification for it.

War is ghastly.

War is horrible.

War is to be avoided at all cost.

But war is not a sin.

The Church blesses war.

The Church cannot bless sin.

Therefore war is not a sin.

The Church insists that soldiers must go to war.

The Church has Services in her Trebniki/Euchologia/Book of Needs for the blessing of soldiers and for the blessing of weapons.

The Church cannot bless sin.

The Chuch cannot bless murder.

The Church cannot bless abortion.

The Church cannot bless euthanasia.

The Church does bless war.

Denying that is moving into the unreal.

 

[Fr_Ambrose]

GrzeszDeL:

I admit that I do not see a lot of staying power for the cults of Rasputin, Ivan & Stalin, but then I would not have predicted that they would have come to be in the first place.

Josaphat Kuntsevich? Alojzije Stepinac? Cults confirmed by Rome. One already canonised , the other well on the way.

 

[Myhrr]

Fr Ambrose:

Myhrr:

War is a sin there’s no justification for it. /QUOTE]

War is ghastly.

War is horrible.

War is to be avoided at all cost.

But war is not a sin.

The Church blesses war.

The Church cannot bless sin.

Therefore war is not a sin.

The Church insists

that soldiers must go to war.

The Church has Services in her Trebniki/Euchologia/Book of Needs for the blessing of soldiers and for the blessing of weapons.

The Church cannot bless sin.

The Chuch cannot bless murder.

The Church cannot bless abortion.

The Church cannot bless euthanasia.

The Church does bless war.

Denying that is moving into the unreal.

Oh right, the history of the early Church is full of heroic stories of our martyrs resisting evil by killing…

 

[Myhrr]

Brendan:

Did God guide David to kill Goliath?

(Hint, 1 Sam 17:45=46
45David said to the Philistine, "You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied.
46 This day the LORD will hand you over to me, and I’ll strike you down and cut off your head.

I have already decided.

I requested your opinion on that passage. Do you not care to provide one?

When God ordered the Israelites to put those who turned away from Him to the sword, is God commanding the Israelites to SIN?

biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?search=shalt+not+kill&SearchType=AND&version=KJV&restrict=Books_of_Moses&StartRestrict=&EndRestrict=&rpp=25&language=english&searchpage=0&x=12&y=10

 

[Fr_Ambrose]

Myhrr:

Oh right, the history of the early Church is full of heroic stories of our martyrs resisting evil by killing…

A red herring! :tsktsk: Martyrs are not soldiers. They tend to be innocent civilians under the heel of a vastly superior government and its army. This is not war as we are speaking of it in this context, is it?

The Orthodox tradition is broader and richer than people imagine. It honours not only princes who gave up their lives rather than resist evil, but also warrior-saints whose icons were carried into battle by soldiers chanting, “Grant victory to Orthodox Christians over their adversaries.” (Troparion to the Holy Cross)

The history of the early Church is replete with warrior Saints. If one goes into a church which has been frescoed according to the traditional way, the Saints which are arranged around the walls of the church at the eye level of the congregation are all the warrior-saints.

 

[Myhrr]

Some Orthodox perspectives, for interest:

orthodoxytoday.org/articles4/HilarionNationalism.shtml

vor.ru/English/Victory/vict_09.html

incommunion.org/resources/iraqwar.htm

 

[Myhrr]

Fr Ambrose:

A red herring! :tsktsk: Martyrs are not soldiers. They tend to be innocent civilians under the heel of a vastly superior government and its army. This is not war as we are speaking of it in this context, is it?

dash it, I thought my little fishies were well hid…