The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1905-09-30
GREEK CHURCH AND ITS
RELATIONS TO ROME
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Continued from Page j.
sacred tribunal of Penance The secrets of the con
fessonal, for which Catholic priest must suffer
death rather than reveal. are VIGOROUSLY made
known by the "Orthodox" clergy to the car and his
officials. In a work published in Paris in 1854 by
SnagoanO, a Greek archimandrite the writer de
pcts the schismatical state of the Russian church
III It's relations to the Greek church We quote one
passage from this book: The Russian Church.
he writes is simply schism, because it has sepa-
rated from the great Eastern Church; because it
does not recognize the Patriarch of Constantinople
its head; because it does not receive the Holy
UEction from Byzantum because it is ruled by a
Synod, over which the car Is despot
and because Confession. instituted for the better
ment and the salvation of penitents has become
through the servility of the Muscovite clergy a
mere instrument of espionage IN the interest of
Czarism" This is no exaggeration the part
of the Greek monastic digntary. In The Raskol.
written by member of the "OrthodCx' church. the
author says that there is ordinance which com
pels each priest to reveal to the government every
plot against it which may come to his knowledge IN
the confessional" Peter the Great, in a ukase is
sued February II, 1922. confirmed this ordinance
by requiring all his clergy to subscribe to the fol-
lowing oath before ordination: Il will denounee
and reveal Gall conspiracies) with entire truthful
ness and without any disguise pallation. having
in my mind the fear of losing my honor and my
life" With this proclamation of the sacraments. it
Is not to be wondered at that the great
body of church COMMITMENTS i'll the
Russian church are listess and that
its clergy are derelict in their duty. On
this point Lescoeur. volUminous writer. remarks :
1T would be easy, and it has been done thous
and times. to multiply proofs of the absolute degra
dation of the Russian sacredotaI order III its rela
tions with the government. Were we to examine
the grades of the hierarchy, from the pretended
Holy Synod which is servile when it is silent, and
more servile when it speaks, down to the humbest
village pope; from the Universities and the priv-
legged converts where are trained the few distn-
guished governmental candidates for bishoprics.
for diplomatic posts or for the general run of the
public Offices down to the miserable converts Of
men or of women, in which there anguish wretched
beings without pety charity, and which are in
evitably homes of ignorance and vice. everywhere
we would find the same conditions produced by the
same cause.-The subordinaton, or rather the absO
lutte placement of the religious element, absorbed
by the civil power
For Russia to resume Its former greatness 1t Is
necessary to divorce the spiritual and temporal
power become reunited to the chair of Peter, give
its people reasonable liberty; not by tearing down
its old institutions and threatening Its people who
may oppose It's policy with Siberia, but By develop
ing some of its old decaying Institutions. and
spreading the light of modern civilization among
all its subjects +. d.