Who could trust this man to teach about Russian culture?

Jordanville yesterday — Jordanville today

New Publication from Jordanville's Holy Trinity Church Supply store is a book on Russian culture, by Alexander Schmemann.  He was a co-founder of the OCA schism in the 1970s.  This new Jordanville publication is another sad indication that Jordanville has sunk down into world-orthodoxy.  Old Jordanville starting sinking in 2001 when Metr. Laurus Skurla took control.   He rewrote the entire curriculum of the seminary to make it acceptable to the MP.  Then, in 2007, Laurus' neo-Jordanville submitted to the ROCOR-MP union in 2007.  The book store has been going downhill ever since.

Check this out: 

   old Jordanville 1961

https://startingontheroyalpath.blogspot.com/2018/03/schmemann-liturgical-theology.html

"Liturgical Theology of Alexander Schmemann"

     by Archpriest Michael Pomazansky

   neo-Jordanville 2023

https://churchsupplies.jordanville.org/9781942699507/

Foundations of Russian Culture

     by Alexander Schmemann

In Jordanville's description of their new book offering, the last thing it boasts is, "(Alexander Schmemann) shows what Russia is grappling with in its struggle to find a synthesis that draws both from its own unique elements and its historical and ongoing interconnectedness with the “West” and the “East.”

In Archpriest Michael Pomazansky's essay, "Liturgical Theology of Alexander Schmemann," the first thing he laments is:  "In our tragic era when Russian theological science is nearly obliterated, the study of the Orthodox East has passed exclusively into the hands of Western theologians and historians."

At the same time neo-Jordanville is selling this new book, neo-Jordanville is also still selling the old original collection of Fr. Michael's essays which includes his essay warning us about Schmemann.

https://churchsupplies.jordanville.org/9780884651451.   I'm not sure what to think of that...  

So what is happening here?  I have a theory.  First,  ROCOR-MP, in order to go into the MP union in the first place, had to forget their Fathers.  They do not read or re-read the teachings of our most recent God-given teachers of ROCOR, like Archbishop Averky, Fr. Seraphim Rose, Archimandrite Constantine Ziatsev, Archpriest Fr. Michael Pomazansky.  Everything most important has been translated into English and published in the old Orthodox Life magazines (pre-2000) and the old Orthodox Word magazines (pre-1982).

Then, after ROCOR-MP forgot their Fathers in the first place, then they continued to forget their Fathers.  Even to the point where they have failed to re-read or study Fr. Michael's essays, even though this book is still readily available.  So is neo-Jordanville oblivious to the fact that they have contradictory materials for sale in their store?  I think so...  What is their stand?  What do they uphold? 

I think what they stand for and what they uphold was described by Archbishop Averky quite well when he accused his generation of blindly going, "Forward! Forward! To Antichrist!"* 

     *https://archbishopaverky.blogspot.com/2012/08/stand-fast-in-truth.html

I think it is because of "itching ears."  Because when there is always something new to process, then the old stuff gets buried, like an old unopened email at the bottom of the pile...  continual new stuff on top.  New stuff is a powerful distraction, so rather than heed the Fathers, they keep craving more and more new things.  This is the beginning of how somebody invites into themselves the possibility of mental illness or even possession.  Abp. Averky already, 50 years ago, said the world has gone mad...

Remember your instructors, who have spoken the word of God to you, whose faith follow, considering the end of their life... Be not led away with various and strange doctrines.  

Hebrews 13:7, 9

Remember Your Instructors 

   from Fr. Seraphim Rose: 

The "Right wing" of Orthodoxy in the future is likely to be divided into many small jurisdictions that will compete with each other and anathematize each other. For us it would be enough if our Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia were able to stay safe and keep the right direction - without deviation to the left, as a reaction against the zealots. We must maintain a living contact with Russian clergy of the older generation, even if some of them seem to us too liberal, otherwise we just get lost in the zealot jungle which is growing up around us. First of all, of course, our teachers should be the pillars of the older generation: Archbishop John, Archbishop Averky (Taushev), Bishop Nektary and the like." 

  Letter to Alexey Young, Third Day of Trinity, June 2/15, 1976. 

Remember Your Instructors 

Fr. Seraphim Rose 

Orthodox Word Jan/Feb 1978

 

The true Christian faith, Holy Orthodoxy, is handed down from generation to generation, from instructor to disciple, from the Holy Apostles to our own day.  In our century we are experiencing a crisis of this unbroken Orthodox tradition: outwardly the Orthodox Church has been subjected to fierce persecutions with the open intent of liquidating her entirely; inwardly, Orthodox Christians have been losing the savor of Orthodoxy and finding "wisdom" from sources outside the Church's tradition.  Many are discovering – or rediscovering – Holy Orthodoxy today, but all too often this is chiefly an outward conversion that ends in an adaptation of Orthodoxy to the wisdom of this age, for want of real contact with its living tradition. 

Brethren stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye were taught, whether by word or by epistle of ours (II Thes. 2:15). The following names are a list of some of the instructors who have handed down the Orthodox faith and tradition to us in the Russian Church Outside of Russia in the 20th century, and particularly in the difficult years of the Diaspora.  While these fathers are of particular significance in our St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood, they have been Orthodox instructors also, by their lives or writings or personal examples, to many others in the Church as well; and some of them are of universal Orthodox significance for our times.

 

There is a taint of abstract, self-assured "knowledge" in so much of today's "Christianity."  But we Orthodox Christians, who are not our own authority but have humbly received our Christianity from our fathers, should be foreigners to all intellectual re-interpretations" of our Faith.  Critics point to different kinds of Orthodoxy today – ecumenist, renovationist, charismatic, legalistic-canonical, and the rest – and ask us: And how do you believe?  To this question our first answer is: "We believe as our fathers believed and taught us, and through them we receive the teaching of the Apostles and our Lord Jesus Christ Himself."  All men being fallible, these fathers sometimes erred, and sometimes may even have disagreed among themselves; but the whole witness of them together can not be mistaken. 

And so, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, even in our most evil days, let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the author and perfecter of our Faith (Heb. 12:1-2), knowing that these fathers who have begotten us spiritually through the Gospel (I Cor. 4:15) will not fail us in our hour of trial, and that the unbroken link which we have through Jesus Christ, and His authentic teaching will not be broken to the end of the age. 

It is appropriate for Orthodox Christians on the day of repose of the departed to commemorate them at the Divine Liturgy and offer memorial services for the repose of their souls. The date of the repose is indicated first in this list, and the year of repose after the names.*

Jan. 16/29 ARCHBISHOP APOLLINARY (1933)
     preserver of the canonical Russian Orthodox Church in America. 

Jan. 17/30 BISHOP SAVVY of Edmonton (1973)
     preacher of spiritual awakening and chronicler of the holy life of Archbishop John Maximovitch 

Feb. 6/19 ARCHBISHOP THEOPHAN of Poltava (1940)
     a leading theologian of the Diaspora, noted as an ascetic and man of prayer, who ended his days as a cave-dweller in the south of France. 

Feb. 11/24 ARCHBISHOP SIMON of Shanghai (1933) 

     missionary, ascetic, theologian, and miracle-worker. 

Mar. 8/21 ARCHBISHOP VITALY of Jordanville (1960) 

     printer-missionary in the tradition of St. Job of Pochaev, in Carpato-Russia, and in America. 

Mar. 17/30 ARCHBISHOP TIKHON of San Francisco (1963)
     strict ascetic and man of prayer, disciple of the holy elder Gabriel of Pskov, in the Optina tradition. 

Mar. 31/Apr. 13 ARCHBISHOP AVERKY of Jordanville (1976) 

     righteous Orthodox accuser of renovationism and ecumenism in the Church. 

May 8/21 METROPOLITAN ANASTASSY (1965)
     second Chief Hierarch of the Russian Church Outside of Russia, known because of his sobriety and tactfulness as the "most wise". June 19/July 2 ARCHIBISHOP JOHN MAXIMOVITCH (1966) 

     ascetic, theologian, missionary, and miracle-worker. 

June 19/July 2 ARCHBISHOP LEONTY of Chile (1971)
     sufferer under Communism, supporter of the Greek Old Calendarists, righteous accuser of church injustice, who was granted to die on the fifth anniversary of the repose of his Abba, Archbishop John. 

July 28/Aug. 10 Metropolitan Anthony Khrapovitsky (1936)
     first Chief Hierarch of the Russian Church Outside of Russia, Orthodox, apologist and inspirer of church youth. 

Sept. 30/Oct. 13 ARCHIMANDRITE GERASIM of Spruce Island (1969) 

     guardian of the relics and memory of St. Herman of Alaska. 

Oct. 7/20 BISHOP JONAH of Manchuria (1925)
     disciple of Optina elders, educator of children in the Church's spirit, miracle-worker. 

Nov. 13/26 ARCHBISHOP IOSAPH of Canada and Argentina (1955) 

     missionary, disseminator of the monastic ideal, founder of Canadian sketes, miracle-worker. 

Also see:

https://startingontheroyalpath.blogspot.com/2009/08/holy-fathers-part-1.html

From The Orthodox Word, Vol. 10, No. 5 (Sept.-Oct. 1974), pp. 188-195.

 * note from Joanna:  by giving us the dates of their repose, Fr. Seraphim is suggesting that we also remember to pray for them, not just to remember their instructions.  The reason for this is that these instructors are in heaven now, and they can help us in supernatural ways that by-pass the language barrier, and that by-pass any need for intellectual understanding.  They can help you acquire spiritual discernment.  We can read their names off the list when we pray for the souls of the departed in our daily morning prayers.  If we make it to heaven, surely we could meet them there, and we will recognize them, even though we never met them in person during our earthly life.