A response to the article of Bp. Sophron Mudryi

 

The newspaper of the Ivano-Frankivsk eparchy ‘Nova Zorja’ (36/08) has carried on its front page an article under the title: “And their father, the spirit of disruption”, with a subtitle “Beware of false prophets”. The author of the article is Bishop emeritus Sophron Mudryi OSBM. He calls us here various insulting names (e.g. false prophets, strange self-consecrators, pseudosaviours, orthodox self-appointed usurpers etc.). In the same week the front page of the Lvov newspaper ‘Meta’ (9/08) carried a similar article, a similar pack of insults, distortion, lies. Both these articles avoid dealing with the core of the problem: whether Cardinal L. Husar is a heretic or not. Several articles in a similar spirit have also been published in the periodical of OSBM ‘Misionar’.

 

What is the aim of these mendacious and misleading articles? The aim is one: To paralyze the genuinely seeking believers with the spirit of fear and horror, lest they should see that the spirit of heresy, which is behind the apostatic hierarchy, is destroying the substance of the saving faith. Finally, in this fear, to make them receive a different gospel, because, as the heretics say: “Today we must understand the Scripture and the Church’s doctrine in a different way.” The one who has introduced this different gospel is a cardinal of the Catholic Church! Card. L. Husar overtly proclaims these heresies in his book “Discussions with His Beatitude L. Husar: On Postconfessional Christianity” as well as on the radio. It was our duty to make it public that Cardinal Husar is an apostate. We did not excommunicate him from the Church. He did so himself. Naturally, this excommunication is not on the juridical level but on the spiritual one. On the level of external Church structure he may be withdrawn from office only by the Holy Father.

 

Cardinal L. Husar proclaims these heresies: 1)  casts doubt on the Divinity of Christ

2)       casts doubt on the Virginity of the Mother of God

3)       denies the eternity of hell

4)       propagates occultism

5)       divines by pendulum

6)       approves of homosexuality

7)       casts doubt on the primacy of the Pope

8)       approves of reincarnation

 

These heresies are a different gospel and God’s Word pronounces an anathema on them. “If anyone preaches any other gospel to you... let him be accursed – expelled.” (Gal 1:9) This held true in the times of the Apostle Paul and holds true even today. Bishop Mudryi claims that this statement is in the Epistle to the Corinthians and, in addition, that it does not apply to the whole Church and to all times (that is the teaching of HCT). The punishment of anathema for preaching a different gospel applies to bishops in particular. These become false shepherds and false prophets through apostasy. Bishop Mudryi upholds the named heresies of Cardinal L. Husar and calls them negligible.

 

We respond to this: The mentioned 8 heresies are not negligible, on the contrary they are very serious. They deny the essence of the whole Christian faith. Who receives and identifies with these heresies, the one has already excommunicated oneself from the Church, and supposing one died in this state, one would be eternally condemned. And this is not negligible. It is as clear as day to everyone who has sound Catholic and Christian thinking.

 

It is a reality that the Synod (17 bishops) was publicly called to dissociate itself from these heresies overtly proclaimed by Card. L. Husar. None of the bishops of the UGCC Synod in Ukraine did so, whereby all 17 bishops in Ukraine publicly confessed their apostasy, that means automatic excommunication from the Catholic Church. Noone can absolve from this excommunication, not even the Pope himself. We did not excommunicate anyone, each of them did so himself. We were just obliged, for the good of the whole Catholic Church, to make this reality public. This is nothing mean or dishonest on our part, on the contrary it is a heroic deed for the good of our martyrish Church and for the salvation of defenceless and sincere souls. By pointing out the spirit of heresy of Head of the UGCC and of the bishops dominated by him we have given the opportunity for many to defend themselves against this spiritual poison, for the named heresies lead to eternal perdition.

 

The article terms us false prophets.

We respond: False prophets do not point to heresies, on the contrary they endorse and propagate them. We do point to them, and at the same time we emphasize the essence, and that is the saving faith, conversion, repentance and the life in Christ, the same as it was taught and practised by Saint Paul the Apostle and by other Apostles. We therefore have nothing in common with false prophets. We have to state that the one who belongs to them is rather the author of the unsound article in the newspaper ‘Nova Zorja’.

 

The author of the article threatens us with God’s Judgement.

Response: We do not fear God’s Judgement. We perceive the topicality of the Apostle’s statement: “Preach the Word in season and out of season, for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine and will be turned aside to fables.” (cf. 2Tim 4:2-4) It is Bishop Sophron who should fear God’s Judgement for his overtly denying Christ and falling in with the heresies of Card. L. Husar. If he fears it not, obviously he has already lost both conscience and the saving faith, and that is something terrible. Unfortunately, his unsound article, behind which is a spirit of disruption, is a witness to this.

 

The article accuses us of sectarianism and heresies.

Response: A fight against heresies (of HCT and syncretism), true conversion to Christ and true following of Christ are called by Bishop Sophron a spirit of sectarianism and heresies. His statement rather applies to him.

Quotation from the article: “We therefore pray to the Merciful Saviour, that He may heal even your souls blinded with malice, hatred and lie. May the Lord save you and have mercy on you.”

Response: This prayer is no prayer but hypocrisy. The whole article witnesses to the fact that it is Your soul, Your Excellency, that is blinded with malice, hatred and lie. If after writing this article You said this prayer for Yourself, God would certainly hear it. We cannot open ourselves to the spirit which is behind this “prayer”, since we cannot turn from Christ to antichrist and from the Spirit of God to the spirit of apostasy. We want to be saved and therefore we cannot follow the way into perdition which Card. L. Husar and the hierarchy united with him have set before us.

Quotation: “For you, for stray God’s children, we pray: Lord, bring the self-appointed bishops (he gives our names) to their senses. Do not allow that they should be punished with eternal fire for their defamatory letters and efforts at a split in the UGCC. Lord, forgive them and have mercy.”

Response: This prayer likewise is a pattern of pharisaical hypocrisy and, moreover, of psychological manipulation of the plain folks and of priests. We are afraid that Bp. Sophron “prays” only when he injects spirits of hatred into the newspapers.

 

We who suffer for the sake of Christ and His Gospel are no stray children; such is rather the author of the article who avows and defends overt heresies for which he has fallen under an anathema. We are no self-appointed bishops. We received episcopal consecration in extraordinary conditions, and we publicly announced this consecration to the Pope asking him for a personal audience where we would like to tell him the relevant information. Our testimonies to Christ are no defamatory letters. Our aim is not a split of the UGCC but her spiritual renewal and resurrection.

 

Quotation: “And you, malice-blinded brothers in Christ, do not tear the garments of Christ’s Church and do not crucify the living Mystical Body of Christ.”

Response: We are not blinded with malice; this is true about You. We do not tear the garments of Christ’s Church, but You do by Your heresies and spirit of apostasy. We do not crucify the Mystical Body of Christ, but You do; we struggle for its renewal, wherefore we are insulted and stained by You. We love Christ and His Church. We ask: Who, in fact, attempts at a painful division of the UGCC? And next: In order to prevent it, are You, bishops, willing to allow the Holy Father to freely solve the situation in our Church and to receive three representatives of our Synod and three representatives of Your Synod, so that he may objectively and globally treat the issue of a true renewal of our UGCC? Instead of willingness and good will, the response is Your mendacious phrases, utterance of all kinds of evil against us falsely and conscious psychological manipulation of the faithful. You are not concerned in the Church, but in Your own power and career. In case we are wrong, and You are really willing to have a common meeting with the Holy Father, we will publicly withdraw this statement.

 

Bishop Sophron states that we have no right to point to heresies.

Response: On the contrary we as well as every bishop have a duty to point to heresies and to warn against them. Calling this primary duty into doubt is, in fact, a sign of internal apostasy from Christ and a conscious escape from the substance of the problem. This substance here is whether the Cardinal does proclaim heresies or not. To identify his heresies one need only ask a common believing woman. She knows that divination and occultism are a grave sin against the First Commandment. She knows that hell is eternal, that homosexuality is a deadly sin, that reincarnation is a nonsense which has nothing to do with Christ and His Gospel. Unfortunately, Bishop Sophron intentionally avoids dealing with these substantial facts, and instead, he calls us names, hypocritically prays for us and publicly before the faithful mendaciously declares us to be the greatest enemies of the Church, worse, in his view, than the Communists. He even goes so far that he dares to malign us, saying that we are tied with the devil, that we are his instrument. This all is a conscious lie touching on the sin against the Holy Spirit. The Pharisees maligned Christ in a similar way when declaring Him to be tied with Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons (cf. Mt 12:31).

 

Positive aspects concerning Bishop Sophron Mudryi

We have to admit that Bishop Mudryi did much good in the span of eight years of his administration of the eparchy of Ivano-Frankivsk. He renovated the seminary, built up the episcopal residence and the episcopal church, admitted new religious communities into the eparchy: men and women religious of the Institute of the Incarnate Word, Institute of St. Andrew the Apostle, contemplative sisters; he even ordained three priests who now as bishops are members of the orthodox Catholic Synod (membership in this Synod is publicly avowed by 9 bishops today). When we talked to him once in the past, he clearly dissociated himself from the practices of Card. L. Husar who psychologically forced the priests to call our faithful in the Divine Liturgy “pravoslavni” (Orthodox). One must also admit that he supported the charismatic renewal.

 

Negative aspects concerning Bishop Sophron Mudryi

1)      About six years ago the Ivano-Frankivsk television (“Halychyna”) carried a broadcast (at about 9pm) which publicized Bishop Sophron’s participation in a ceremony of the Masonic association in the cathedral church. Three well-known personalities in black gowns with hoods were dubbed with a sword and received the Order of Stanislav. This created confusion among the faithful; however, when they raised questions concerning Bp. Sophron’s participation, it was denied and the whole affair was quickly closed.

2)      There is a question: Was simony tolerated in his eparchy during his administration (entrance into the seminary, assignment to parishes, abuse of charity financial gifts from abroad etc.)? All these forms of simony are best known to the priests themselves; however, these are bound by silence.

3)      He recommended his treasurer M. Simkaylo to the post of a bishop. Can one say that this candidate was and is a moral pattern for priests?

4)      The closest co-worker of Bp. Sophron, Fr. O. Kaskiv, committed as a judge a judicial crime against us. He broke not only CCEO but even conscience and God’s laws. He abused the authority of his office, morally killed those who defend the purity of faith and sided with the one who has power – with L. Husar – at the cost of betrayal of Christ and His Gospel. He himself, similarly to Bp. Sophron, put himself under God’s anathema. We ask: Were these mean judicial proceedings of a young judge in compliance with justice, conscience and with God’s as well as canon laws?

5)      Bishop Sophron gave an ecclesiastical approval to the book “Jesus of Nazareth: A Myth or the Saviour?” by Fr. I. Luzhetskyi, which is written in the spirit of the historic-critical method (HCT). This method casts doubt upon the Divinity of Jesus Christ, it speaks about so-called historical Christ and Christ of faith. This approval is an abuse of the authority of the Church by recommending poison as spiritual nourishment for the daughters and sons of the catacomb Church.

6)      In a discussion with us the Bishop revealed that he is an adherent of the heresy of syncretism. He claimed that pagan religions are also ways to salvation.

 

Dear Excellency, by Your article You made it public that You are in conscious and internal unity with the heresies of Card. L. Husar. Your article is a testimony that You no longer have any qualms of conscience, nor sentire cum ecclesia, and that is why You call the grave heresies of Cardinal L. Husar “negligible”.

 

We remind You that this attitude cannot be recompensed with phrases You wrote, saying that You believe in Christ as God. Nowadays even Jehovah’s Witnesses believe this, they only understand this Divinity in a different way. The same is declared even by those who proclaim the heresies of HCT; however, in accordance with relativism they understand it in a new way. The same as You they will also say that they “believe in trueness and holiness of the Holy Scripture”, but they understand it differently. It is likewise no renouncement of heresies of Card. L. Husar when You wrote: “We believe everything what the Holy Catholic Church presents us to believe.” For nowadays many professors of theology as new prophets (false prophets) present a new view of it saying that today we have to understand everything in a different way. And they term this heretical view “the teaching of the Catholic Church”. This Church is said to be represented by them – heretics. Unfortunately, many bishops are influenced by them. The fact that Cardinal L. Husar has written heresies in his book is absolutely clear. Of course, in the present time this spirit of heresy is masterly disguising itself, the same as once through the Arian bishops who liquidated true-Catholic priests and bishops and by help of the Church’s and state power led the whole Eastern Church into apostasy from the true faith. This spirit is the same and it works not only in the Western Church but in the present time also in our Eastern Church. Therefore it is necessary to renounce not only heresies but also the spirit of heresy. Only then is it necessary to profess clearly and concretely the true apostolic and Catholic faith. Unless You do so, then, unfortunately, You remain in apostasy and under the curse of anathema. You Yourself have betrayed Christ, You Yourself have to repent. We cannot do it instead of You, even if we wanted to.

 

You ask us about our faith; quotation: “And what do you, blind pseudoprophets, believe in, arrogantly imposing your pathological sectarian teaching? ... Our clergy and believers have already recognized who you are, what is your inward nature and whose children you are. It only remains to summarize who is guiding your deeds and with what aim, who is the main director of the spiritual sabotage which you, like blind marionettes, practise so obediently and unyieldingly. Remember, nothing is secret that will not come to light.”

Response: All who read our letters and books unbiasedly (Four Words from Ukraine, Letters from Ukraine /3 vol./), can clearly see what our faith is like. We are willing to confess it but we cannot renounce it, whereas You, Your Excellency, call orthodox Catholicity “pathological sectarian teaching”. You use only mendacious phrases and fearsome insults with the aim of our moral defamation and purposeful manipulation of the common believers, thereby abusing Your authority of a bishop. The clergy as well as the believers who truly have at heart the salvation of souls, have really recognized “who we are, what our inward nature is and whose children we are”. Moreover, our letters are addressed above all to the Holy Father, to cardinals and to bishops. We are not afraid of judgement for these letters either by the Holy Father or by the Church or by Jesus Christ whom we preach and defend against the spirit of lie and death which breathes from Your whole article.

 

To the question who directs us we respond: Our conscience, our Catholic faith and unity with Christ crucified. The main director of the “spiritual sabotage” against the representatives of a different gospel is the same Spirit who guided Paul the Apostle, and all the apostles and prophets – the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of repentance. We are not His blind marionettes but conscious co-workers. Who reads our letters and the letters of the Apostle Paul, which are part of God’s Word, the one knows that behind them is one and the same Spirit. We wish it could be clear even to You. On the contrary it is us who warn You, Your Excellency, that You should remember that nothing is secret that will not come to light. Through Your article it became manifest who You really are.

Saint Basil, for Your case, writes in the short rule N.7: “Who neglects to exhort a sinner (heretic) to improve, and even justifies him, the one confirms him in his sin (of apostasy) and leads others to similar sins.”

 

Two methods of the spirit of disruption

 

1)     Method of threat and shout

The whole article is but shouting, insults and condemnation, just as it was used by those who condemned Christ. The Church hierarchy of that time fanaticized the crowd who then shouted: “Away with him, crucify him! Crucify him!” However, when the governor asked what evil He had done, the response was just venomous and demagogical shouting: “Crucify! Crucify! Unless you crucify him we’ll show you. We’ll tell the state power (Caesar) on you.” (cf. Jn 19:12) Similar methods and a similar spirit are found even here. This method has just one aim – moral liquidation and death. Behind it is a spirit of disruption, as the whole article is called. Through the apostates in power this spirit is disrupting our martyrish Church.

 

2)     Method of lie

Mendacious proceedings (against us), mendacious judges, false arguments, sentence prepared in advance and this article full of lie. Vinedressers who usurped Lord’s vineyard act according to the motto: We have power, so only we are right. In the name of God they condemned and again condemn Christ. This spirit of disruption and death condemns everyone who sincerely defends Christ and His Gospel. The fruit is “the abomination standing in the holy place”. The Church in Ukraine is still less and less the salt and the light, the process of self-destruction continues. Who is responsible for it? Those who sit in Moses’ seat have taken people the keys which through conversion and repentance open the kingdom of God.

 

Examples of demagogy and lie

 

Quotation: “Dear faithful in Christ, sons and daughters of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church. What the enemy of God and man – satan – did not manage to do in the hardest years of persecution of the Holy Church – the martyress – through the Communist regime, he is now brutally accomplishing in the conditions of independent Ukraine. He was not able to defeat our faith from outside, so he started to disrupt it from inside – to disrupt it by the hands of people who call themselves spiritual persons – shepherds of souls.”

Response: Bp. Mudryi ascribes this mendacious characterization to us; however, in fact, it applies to him and to Card. L. Husar. In the time when the Ukrainian Church was in catacombs they both lived contentedly in the West. There, unfortunately, both of them opened themselves to the spirit of HCT, relativism and syncretism. This spirit of death is implanted by them both in “our Holy Church – martyress”. They, and not us, are those who are disrupting this Church. For three years we have been warning and alarming against this spirit of death which is behind HCT, syncretism and relativism. Through both hierarchs, Card. L. Husar and Bp. S. Mudryi, but also through others who actively opened themselves to this spirit, this spirit gained power to destroy our martyrish Church. They call themselves spiritual persons, shepherds of souls. These so-called shepherds of souls have not written a single pastoral letter in which they would warn the believers against the invasion of negative spiritual streams from the West and against occultism. Only now, when their covert apostasy has been revealed in public and when their “good living” began to be at stake, they raised a general alarm and started a fight, yet not for Christ but against Christ! And in that all, they are not ashamed to masterly abuse national feelings and the love of the believers for the martyrish Church. It thus became manifest at last what spirit they have and whose children they really are.

 

Quotation: “Pious Christians – confessors of the catacomb UGCC – are astonished today that even the Communists did not invent something like this against our believers.”

Response: Yes, even the Communists would not invent something like this against our believers. For the Communists were overt enemies, whereas fallen-away and disguised apostates in episcopal vestment, who act as the official leadership of the Church and at the same time proclaim a different gospel, represent really the greatest danger to the whole Church.

 

Quotation: “So do not deceive the people, do not deceive the Church of Christ, because everyone knows that you are strange self-consecrators, that You are the fifth column of internal disintegration of our long-suffering Ukrainian Catholic Church of Byzantine-Kievan rite.”

Response: This call does not relate to us; we defend the true Catholic teaching and Christ’s Spirit. We are not, but You, Reverend Bishop Sophron and Cardinal Husar, are “the fifth column of internal disintegration of our long-suffering Ukrainian Church”. We add to this: Do not deceive any more, You have been deceiving Christ’s Church for quite a long time already. Now that God has given clear light You have nowhere to hide any more.

 

Quotation: “We have to tell you categorically with Christ, who, when fasting in the desert after His baptism, said to satan who was tempting Him: ‘Be gone, satan!’ Be gone, pseudoprophets and destroyers of the Holy Church.”

Response: Again, this call fully refers to You, not to us. We defend the teaching of the Gospel and the whole orthodox Tradition. The call “be gone” refers to the pseudoprophets who are destroyers of the Holy Church through HCT and syncretism. You were to state here in truth: “Be gone out of me, satan!” For that which is crying out of You here can be very easily identified.

 

Your Excellency, we forgive You for Your stooping to lying, blackening and demagogy before the whole Church. But realize that You are 85 years old and God can soon call You to eternity. You have united Yourself with the heresies of Card. L. Husar and thus You have put Yourself under God’s anathema. Unless You renounce these overt heresies, You remain in apostasy as an apostate from Christ’s Mystical Body – the Church – and You will be eternally condemned. Be really wise (note: in Ukrainian Mudryi means wise) and dissociate Yourself from the overt and concrete heresies of Card. L. Husar, thereby setting a pattern for other bishops. You will thus cast out this spirit of disruption and death and prepare the way for true spiritual resurrection of the UGCC. We really feel pain over the state You are in; however, on the other hand we can also see a positive aspect, that is, that the spirit which has kept You in covert heresy for long years could now come out into the open through Your article, whereby God gives You a chance of repentance and salvation. Please, do not reject it. The eternity is at stake. We mean sincerely by You. We are aware that in the span of 8 years of Your administration as ordinary You did many good things for the sake of the Church. We do not condemn You. We hereby want to condemn – separate from You – just the spirit that deceived You. We ask for forgiveness if at the same time we touched Your person too. We ourselves are fully aware of our own poorness. Our desire is to be once in eternal happiness and to be there also with You. We do not want You to be eternally condemned.

 

        Yours in Christ,

                + Eliáš OSBM

                + Metod?j OSBM

                + Samuel

                + Markian OSBM

 

                                                                                                                       Pidhirtsi, 17th September 2008

 

Address: Bishops’ Synod of the UGCC, Pidhirtsi 19, Brody dist., Lvov reg., 80660, Ukraine

www.community.org.ua