Category: Eastern Orthodox Church

Update 10/6/2015: The below statement that Bishop Ambrose Moran was part of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church appears to be a mistake. Please see the follow-up post on this matter for more details.

Last week I posted about the case of one Bishop Ambrose Moran, an Eastern hierarch who had been linked previously to the Genuine Orthodox Church in America and now, apparently, is aligned with the so-called “Resistance” traditionalist Catholic movement. After having the opportunity to conduct research both online and through personal contacts, it appears that Moran’s claims regarding his past ecclesial affiliation with the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church and Patriarch Josyf Slipyj are fabrications. Not only is there no record that Moran had ever been consecrated by Patriarch Slipyj, but it appears that he was brought up and ordained in the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church — one of three Orthodox jurisdictions currently operating in Ukraine. Although it is likely that he has — somewhere along the line — been validly ordained, clearly the ordination did not come from the Catholic Church.

This is all very unfortunate for several reasons. First and foremost, Bishop Ambrose has willfully shattered any and all credibility which he may have had by fabricating an elaborate tale about his relationship with Patriarch Slipyj and his activities as a Catholic priest and bishop. Had Ambrose simply come clean about his prior affiliations with two (uncanonical) Orthodox jurisdictions before pledging to join the Catholic Church, none of this would be a big deal. Now, however, it appears that Ambrose is (opportunistically) looking for a new outpost to hang his hat, and he’s perfectly willing to lie in order to make it happen.

Second, by aligning with the “Resistance,” Ambrose is not so much joining the Catholic Church as he is assisting those who are effectively outside of her borders. Recognizing neither the authority of any legitimate Orthodox body nor the Catholic Church, Ambrose is vesting himself in the mantle of a true schismatic. If Ambrose honestly desired unity with the Catholic Church, his first order of business should be to submit himself to Patriarch Sviatoslav and go from there. Instead, he is lending his hand to the “Resistance” and attempting — unsuccessfully it seems — to boost their credibility. The irony here is that by letting themselves be conned, the “Resistance” appears even more deluded and foolish than it already was.

Last, Ambrose’s behavior has, sadly, inspired certain traditional Catholics to issue uncharitable and ignorant remarks about the Eastern Orthodox. Ambrose’s case is not normative. Most Orthodox bishops are upstanding servants of their respective churches who carry out their mission with honesty, integrity, and humility. No, the Orthodox Church’s episcopate isn’t perfect and, yes, there remains some substantial (but not insurmountable) disagreements between Catholics and Orthodox that need to be resolved before full communion can be restored. But the case of Bishop Ambrose should not be leveraged into an excuse to engage in needless, and indeed un-Christian, polemics against the Orthodox.

Pray for the man. Pray for his soul, and pray that he finds his way back into the flock of Christ.

I am normally disinclined to write about ecclesiastical gossip on Opus Publicum, especially when it involves the fringes of either the Catholic or Orthodox churches. However, this one is too good to pass up. Although there are very few concrete details at the moment, it appears that Bishop Ambrose (Moran), a (former?) member of the Old Calendarist Genuine Orthodox Church in America (GOCA), has aligned himself with the so-called “Resistance,” a very loose confederation of traditionalist Catholic priests de facto headed by former Society of St. Pius X Bishop Richard Williamson. Moran, as the story goes, was either “received” or “consecrated” by the head of GOCA, a move that initially sparked outrage among some traditionalist Orthodox due, ironically enough, to its “uncanonical” nature. The story later surfaced that Moran had already been a bishop in the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (a point that remains unclear), though the YouTube video linked above indicates that he was, in fact, consecrated clandestinely by Patriarch Josyf Slipyj, the saintly head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. One can easily imagine why hyper-traditionalist Orthodox wouldn’t want that fact coming to light.

Perhaps Moran had a falling out with GOCA since he is now pledging to assist the traditionalist Catholic movement and, aside from some remarks that he had worked with some Ukrainian Orthodox back in the 1970s and 80s, makes no mention of any direct Orthodox affiliation. Certain traditionalist Catholics are, naturally, going nuts over this, albeit for all of the wrong reasons. That the “Resistance” could even think of interacting with a bishop (loosely) associated with the Orthodox is beyond the pale. Beyond the pale—or beyond comprehension—as well is the reality that the borderlands between Greek Catholicism and Orthodoxy have shifted considerably over the centuries; if there is a wall between the two confessions, it’s a porous one. None of this is to say that Moran should have anything to do with the “Resistance” or any other traditionalist movement that routinely demonstrates flagrant contempt toward Rome, but there you have it.

Strange times these be.

Occasionally I grow curious enough to explore WordPress’s Site Stats feature which, among other things, alerts me to some of the search terms people use to find this web-log. Recently there has been a string of hits involving Eastern Orthodoxy and traditional Catholicism, such as “sspx russian orthodox,” “traditionalist catholic views of the orthodox,” and “traditional eastern catholics.” The only reason Opus Publicum pops up in these searches is likely because I am one of the few bloggers who writes on both Orthodoxy and traditional Catholicism, not because I have any great insight into the mind of traditionalism when it comes to the Christian East. The few forays I have made into this territory, such as those involving St. Gregory of Narek and the 21 New Coptic Martyrs of Libya, ended with some rather scornful remarks being directed my way. So it goes. The truth of the matter is that most traditional Catholics, like most Catholics in general, know very little about the Christian East, including the sui iuris churches in communion with Rome. As I have noted in other articles and posts before, this is unfortunate because it contributes to needless theological, spiritual, and liturgical myopia on the part of traditionalists. This is not to say that traditional Roman Catholics ought to “easternize” (Heaven forbid). However, the traditional movement, to the extent it wishes to be a movement for the betterment of the universal Church while being an authentic reflection of the full Catholic tradition, cannot exist in ignorance of the East, or so I would think.

But I have been wrong before about such things. Not long ago I was engaged in what was initially a friendly e-mail exchange that quickly turned sour when I suggested, nay, observed that Eastern Catholics, by and large, have shown more respect for their liturgical patrimony than Roman Catholics. This gentleman—a true blue traditionalist—could not accept that the Divine Liturgy was a “true Catholic liturgy”; its existence within the Church was a “concession” that has since become “an abuse.” Indeed another traditional fellow who used to comment on this blog once went so far as to claim that none of the Eastern Catholics who arrived in North America should have been allowed to retain their rites—a claim that surely would have sat well with the late Archbishop John Ireland, the unwitting founding father of the Orthodox Church in America. Alienating the East is a time-honored tradition some folks apparently can’t let go of.