Friday, September 18, 2015

Pompey, Trump, and Hilarion Tells it Like it is


I'd walked the dog, said Morning Prayer and set up on the front porch to write something on Anglican-Orhodox relations. This wasn't easy because my mind kept wandering to the phenomenon that is Donald trump.



Is Donald Trump an aggressive version of Pompeius Magnus, from an alternate future reality? I asked Blue Classicist while clicking through the Moscow Agreed Statement. Blue Triumverate didn't seem to care and started to doze, so I applied myself to Metropolitan Hilarion's 2010 address to the Nicean Club. Here's an excerpt:


"We are also extremely concerned and disappointed by other processes that are manifesting themselves in churches of the Anglican Communion. Some Protestant and Anglican churches have repudiated basic Christian moral values by giving a public blessing to same-sex unions and ordaining homosexuals as priests and bishops. Many Protestant and Anglican communities refuse to preach Christian moral values in secular society and prefer to adjust to worldly standards.



"Our Church must sever its relations with those churches and communities that trample on the principles of Christian ethics and traditional morals. Here we uphold a firm stand based on Holy Scripture.



"In 2003, the Russian Orthodox Church had to suspend contact with the Episcopal Church in the USA due to the fact that this Church consecrated a self-acclaimed homosexual, Jim Robertson, as bishop. The Department for External Church Relations made a special statement deploring this fact as anti-Christian and blasphemous. Moreover, the Holy Synod of our Church decided to suspend the work of the Joint Coordinating Committee for Cooperation between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Episcopal Church in the USA, which had worked very successfully for many years. The situation was aggravated when a woman bishop was installed as head of the Episcopal Church in the USA in 2006 and a lesbian was placed on the bishop’s chair of Los Angeles in 2010."




Hilarion is a remarkable figure, a former soldier, composer, church historian, theologian and No. 2 in the Russian hierarchy. If you're interested in Anglican-Orthodox dialogue, check out his Nicean address.

I file this story under God, Dogs and Country Life in Texas. Didn't get any guns in. Sorry, next time.

LSP

3 comments:

LL said...

Pompeius Magnus wanted to save the Republic. Caesar wanted to turn it into a dictatorship. Hillary is more like the Witch of Endor.

LSP said...

I've long thought that Hillary was a witch. Now I know for sure.

LL said...

Blue Observer doesn't seem to be disturbed by the events with the church. That's because a witch hasn't turned up on his doorstep yet (unless they are wearing mail-man outfits).