21.

 Do you agree with the textbook's comments concerning the alter-ability and relative value of canons?

            The textbook's remarks about the alterability and relative value of canons are a modernist deviation from the strictest standards of Orthodoxy. As such, they warrant comment.

            To help eliminate confusion in this matter, the textbook should have begun its discussion of canon law with the notation that there are two types of canons: those of a dogmatic or doctrinal nature, and those of an ethical, practical or structural character. This distinction is not given.

            Concerning the canons of the first group, the dogmatic or doctrinal ones, they have a meaning that remains eternal and unchanging. An example of this kind would be a dogmatic canon speaking about the nature and Person of Christ. This kind of canon can never change.

            The author of the textbook is not unaware of this fact. He merely places all such canons in the category of doctrinal definitions of the Ecumenical Councils, and he recognizes the infallibility and unchanging nature of these definitions. As he points out, they deal with eternal truths, they cannot be revised or canceled, and along with the Bible and Creed, these definitions are a preeminent part of Tradition.

            The author's bone of contention is therefore not with the first group of canons (otherwise he would not be an Orthodox Christian); instead, it is with what he terms “canons as such.” Of these, he maintains that they cannot claim the absolute and unalterable validity that doctrinal definitions possess.

            In reply, it has to be noted that even in the second group of canons, there are once again those that are absolute and unchanging. Canons forbidding the sale of the Church's Mysteries are canons of this type: they can never be changed.

            The author has in mind certain canons of the second group, sc., those dealing with “the earthly life of the Church where conditions are constantly changing and individual situations are infinitely various.” These canons, he claims, form part of Holy Tradition “in a relative sense only.”

            Again in reply, this line of thinking appeared only in the twentieth century, and then not among all Orthodox, but only among the modernist/ecumenist element. Mired in religious relativism and a secular mentality, this group wants to reexamine everything that Orthodox Christianity ever represented and shed its blood for, and which it taught through the Holy Apostles and Ecumenical Councils. The modernists' agenda is what Archbishop Averky of Jordanville calls “an undermining of what has been established from of old, with the relentless violation of the ancient institutions of the Church which originated in Apostolic times, and with the... discarding of all the... beliefs and pious traditions bequeathed to us by the first Christians.”

            “Orthodox” ecumenists trample on the Church's sacred canons. They see the canons, dogmas, and the totality of Tradition as insignificant matters. It appears that deep down inside, these individuals do not believe there is absolute Truth, that there is divine revelation. As a result, controversies rage on the practical canons, that is, on which ones are still applicable and which are not, given the conditions of modern life.

            Regrettably, the modernists always conclude that Orthodoxy should keep in step with the times. However, as Archbishop Averky points out, Christ said to the Apostles at the Mystical Supper, “You are not of the world.” In the same way, the Church is not “of the world,” and it never conforms to the world. Instead, the archbishop notes, the true Church of Christ:

... has always been, is, and will always be a stranger to this world. Separated from it, she is able to transmit the divine teachings of the Lord unchanged, because that separation has kept her unchanged, that is, like the immutable God Himself.

It has never been the understanding of the Church that it must adapt itself to societal or cultural standards. Instead, the faithful must, by the grace of God and in cooperation with Him, become divinized. Moreover, although the Western Churches are trying to keep in step with the pagan culture that surrounds them, one of the four signs of the true Church is that it is holy. The Orthodox Church is holy because it does not go the way of the world, but goes along the path willed by Jesus Christ.

            The textbook creates additional confusion in this matter with its assertion that when and if a new council of the Church is assembled, one of its first tasks would be the revision and clarification of canon law. In final reply, it must be emphasized that while canons of an unalterable and unchanging character can be clarified — that is, explained and developed in new and different words, their essential meaning, it must be repeated, is eternal and unchanging, and they cannot be revised. As for the practical canons, these are not something to cast aside; rather their application is left up to a bishop's use of economy. (The word economy, from the Greek economia, refers to the fact that as part of a bishop's stewardship over the Church, when there is a genuine need, he may apply a canon in a stringent way for specific pastoral reasons, or he may even entirely dispense from the canon).

            The importance of the Church's practical canons is not lost to Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos. He explains that:

It has been observed from Church history that in the periods when Christians had become secularized, many canons were formulated so that people could discern their spiritual instability, distinguish good from evil, and be guided on the path of a cure. So the law is not a human invention, but a revelation by God for man to be cured. Thus it is not a goal, but a means, a medicine necessary for man's cure. The wrong use of the law, changing it from a means to an end, from a medicine to an ideology, is an unhealthy legalism which constitutes Pharisaical justice and self-justification which do not save man [The Mind of the Orthodox Church, pp. 180-81].