Changing Trains

Nationalism - A Sin

As a footnote to the previous post, other evidence exists that there are those within the hierarchy of the Church who potentially have a quite different worldview to that assertively expressed by others. This from an interview conducted by a Turkish Cypriot journalist with the Bishop of Morphou, in April last year, published in Yeniduzen and available here:

Interviewer: I want to find out what it means when you say `nationalism is a sin and the Greek Orthodox Church has committed this sin.
Bishop: Nationalism appears after the French Revolution in the Middle East and in Greece after the Greek Revolution of 1821. As I understand it from what I have read not only theologically but from the legal and historical point of view, nationalism is the worshiping of a nation. But in all religions we only worship God. We love our country of course but we do not worship our country. Nationalism has arrived in Cyprus from various currents – from Greece starting at around 1922… So I feel that the Cypriot Church being a living organism has entered this adventure of nationalism as a temptation...

Responding to the Turkish Cypriot journalist, who expressed surprise that these views were being expressed by a Bishop, he went on:

Bishop: In the beginning you asked me how old I am and where I come from which is a very usual question which I also ask to people who come to me for confession. Now I am making a confession to you: and I told you that I am 42 years old, thus I am not a child either of the Turkish Ottoman Empire nor of the British Colonial times… I am a child of the independence of Cyprus. Also our Archbishop Chrysostomos who is going through a very difficult sickness has lived through the `atmosphere` that I described earlier. Therefore, he did not have a lot of potential to escape from the atmosphere within which he grew up…The Bishop who was able to transcend this was Makarios. It was Makarios who moved from the ideal of Enosis to the ideal of independence. But unfortunately nobody allowed this independence to work, neither the Greek Cypriot nor the Turkish Cypriot nationalisms or the foreign powers did not allow independence to survive. I come from a household where my father was singing Amanes (Ottoman music). The CDs I bought from England recently are mainly Turkish and Ottoman music, simply because I like it and not to make any political point in favour of rapproachment....And in my later studies I concluded that Byzantium operated as a common bridge between the Greek and Turkish cultures. And one of the monks in the monastery of Mavrovuni in Larnaca where I was before I became a bishop, is learning Turkish. I sent him to learn Turkish… I am `prophesizing` (he smiles) that by the time we have the next interview, this monk would have learnt Turkish and will have been promoted to the priesthood. His teacher is a Turkish Cypriot woman from England.

Where Does the Church Stand?

According to more than one press report up to 3,500 Greek Cypriot refugees gathered last Sunday to ' denounce' the Annan Plan. Prominence was given to Bishop Paul of Kyrenia who, after prayers asking for God's intercession so that the refugees could return, denounced the Annan Plan as 'satanic, accursed and an abomination which would not work.'

As an observer at the event, held in the Nicosia International Conference Centre, it is worth commenting on aspects of the rally which have passed without comment:

*3,500 participants were claimed - a more accurate figure would be closer to 2,000.
*Despite the Bishop asserting that ' we condemn the plan and categorically say no to it', the conference generally offered its support for Papadopolous' efforts to ' secure a just solution.'
*That speakers from the platform chose to direct strongly expressed criticism at politicians for giving them a series of false promises down the years that all Kyrenia refugees would return to their homes.
*The crowded Conference Centre was largely comprised of the middle-aged and older who listened intently to the proceedings in a sober manner.

The Kyrenia Bishop is perhaps the most hardline within the Holy Synod. A couple of weeks previously he refused to sign a joint declaration issued by that body which backed the Greek Cypriot President in talks, explaining that he would call on the people to reject the deal in the forthcoming referendum. Recent evidence suggest other significant differences within the Church over how to respond to the present circumstances. Bishop Chrysostomos of Paphos initially expressed his support for Archbishop Christodoulos’s rejection of a United Nations blueprint for the reunification of Cyprus, which the Archbishop warned would “de-Hellenize” the island (see earlier post). Having taken this initial position, within a short space of time he tempered this support, asserting that the Archbishop had perhaps not been adequately informed about the situation in Cyprus 'due to (his) distance (from the island).' Chrysostomos backtracked after other Cypriot clerics opposed the archbishop’s claims that the UN plan would 'de-Hellenize'.

It should also be noted that there are important elements within the Greek Cypriot political elite who are, at the very least, irritated with a more extreme rejectionist position taken by some. This from Politis:

Expressing his distress and his astonishment at the statements of the Archbishop of Athens against the Annan plan, Mr. Vasiliou said that “it seems that he either hasn’t read the plan or that he doesn’t understand it....I consider it a provocation directed against the Cyprus Hellenism to be accused of anti-Hellenism after having suffered so much,” adding that “he should at least respect Ethnarch Makarios, who had to make a historic settlement with the Makarios-Denktash and the Kyprianou-Denktash Agreements, which constitute the basis of the current effort for solution.”

Commenting on a journalist’s remark that the Bishop of Paphos endorsed the Archbishop’s statements, Mr. Vasiliou noted that he hasn’t seen the statements of Paphos Bishop yet, adding that “if he made such statements, he should apologize to the Cypriot people.” “We should get serious and stop tolerating these things. Any dissenting opinion is welcome,” Mr. Vasiliou said, adding that “we cannot start accusing each other of being unpatriotic and treacherous.”

UPDATE

This from Politis, published here:

“The Annan Plan is disastrous! Is cursed! Is evil too!” shouted on Sunday Metropolitan Pavlos of Kyrenia the top of his voice. Thus, your Eminence, to make it clear, did the nameless devil come down, or to be exact come up, and said to Annan “get pencil and paper and write down”? And so, did he sit down and wrote the evil lines of his plan? Oh! God! What terrible things! However, we should praise God. If there wasn’t for Metropolitan Pavlos of Kyrenia to realize the dirty tricks of Evil what would we have done? No, no... No matter what, his Eminence should go to Nicosia Airport and exorcise the place, hoping to reverse the curse and defeat the Evil One.

But, your Eminence, if the Annan Plan is indeed a masterpiece of Satan, shouldn’t its supporters have been obedient organs of the Evil? Dark angels, in other words. And they are among us, your Eminence! Have mercy… What do we have to do in order to save the people and the country from the disastrous plans of the Antichrist? Should we consider the possibility of burning the mischievous evil before spread itself? What do you think? Should we throw the servants of satin at stake? To make sure that they would not infect other people.

So, thank God, we have Metropolitan Pavlos of Kyrenia and the rest prelates to guide us in these difficult moments. Paphos Metropolitan said the day before yesterday: The decision on the Annan Plan should be taken not by the people, but by the “political and spiritual” leadership, which would “guide the people what to do”. In other words, we should let his Eminence Metropolitan of Paphos, the Kyrenia Metropolitan and the rest decide on our future. Excellent idea. Indeed, looking back to our recent History, we have experienced only good things from the involvement of priests in politics, haven’t we? So, the Column suggests replacing Papadopoulos (prior to starting slapping De Soto and Weston for daring telling him how to negotiate…), giving our prelates carte blanche to handle the fate of our country. Let’s establish the Cypriot Theocracy and put our Holy priests in charge, instead of President and Ministers.

It is also reported by Ηaravgi, here, that the following were in attendance:

...DIKO Mps Mr. Z. Koulias, Mr. S. Fittis, Mrs. A. Papadopoulou, the Ecologists’ Mp Mr. G. Perdikes, the New Horizons chairman N. Koutsou. Mr. E. Iosifides attended the event on behalf of ADIK, Mrs. R. Mavronikolas represented the Women Socialist Movement. Also, representative of the Russian Embassy in Cyprus, of the Eu and others also were present.

Archbishop Calls For a “Paroxysm of Prayer”

I admit, I had to look it up...Paroxysm is from Greek paroxusmos, from paroxunein, "to irritate, provoke or excite (literally to sharpen excessively)," from para-, "beyond" + oxunein, "to sharpen, to provoke."

As reported here by the Greek paper Ekathimerini:

Dismissing the United Nations blueprint for the reunification of Cyprus as a bid to “de-Hellenize” the island, the head of Greece’s Orthodox Church on Sunday urged an Athens congregation to engage in frenzied prayers against the peace deal.

Speaking in the church of Aghios Andreas in Patissia, central Athens, Archbishop Christodoulos said that under UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s plan, “Cypriots will have to forget Greece, their language and their flag, in order to submit to the world’s potentates.”

Christodoulos called on believers to join in a “paroxysm of prayer” against adoption of the blueprint, arguing that “politicians are under pressure to accept a solution which, deep down, they do not want.”

This is an Archbishop who sees "the forces of evil at work" when public opposition was succesfully mounted against the building of a church conference centre and percieves of Turks as “barbarians” who had no place in a predominately Christian European Union.

Perhaps the Archbishop has a viable alternative to the Annan Plan which would secure consent from Turkish Cypriots and simultaniously maintain the hellenic identity of the island. If such an alternative exists we really ought to be told.

An observer writing in Politis offers his own thoughts on the Archbishop's comments by evoking his love for Greece but also being clear as to what the object of his affections are:

(A) Greece that knows where it stands and where it is going, and not the other Greece of the “rebels” who preach in churches and universities about the revolutions, in which they never participated. The Greece that, loyal to its greatness, chooses not to close its eyes in front of reality, but, on the contrary, to shape it in the most positive way. Because, what is Greece, Your Beatitude? Is it a closed room from which any patriot looks back (selectively) in the past so as to appear in the evening news? Or is it a continuous force that knows to identify even a foreign element, to study it, to absorb it so as to turn it into culture at the end of the day?