“God Is Allowing Us to Taste the Spirit of ‘Sergianism’ So We Won’t be So Proud”

We are publishing these letters to mark the first anniversary of Metropolitan Hilarion’s departure from this life on May 16, 2022. In May of 2020, Metropolitan Hilarion sent me these letters. They are from Fr. Seraphim (Rose) and were written to Fr. Hilarion when he was the Editor of the bi-monthly English language publication of Holy Trinity Monastery, Orthodox Life.

A collection of Fr. Seraphim’s letters has been circulating online for at least five years against the wishes of the St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood. That collection consists of 328 letters, including the letters I post here: Oct. 12, 1975 (no. 188);  Feb. 4, 1978 (no. 251); and October 3, 1979 (no. 278).  For the first time, I post here, the letters of Nov. 12, 1977, Dec. 13, 1978, and from Great Lent 1980, along with an undated letter.

Arguably, these letters represent Fr. Seraphim better than any other of his writings. He comes across as an experienced pastor, a nuanced thinker, and a sensitive individual. These letters are an essential source for the history of the Russian Church Abroad in general and under-studied theological debates in particular.

Protodeacon Andrei Psarev, May 11, 2023

 

Sept. 29/Oct. 12, 1975
St. Cyriacus

Dear Father Igor,

Greetings in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Forgive me, but we have another request for you, this one a more important one. Could you possibly go to Fr. Michael Pomazansky [1]1888-1988. A son of an archpriest and a graduate of Kyiv Theological Academy. Fr. Michael was an editor of the official publication of the Polish Orthodox Church Voskresnoe chtenie. After World War … Continue reading and obtain for us replies to the questions on the enclosed sheets? We’ve tried for a long time to get a brief biography of him, but to no avail — he’s just too humble! Could you help us? It’s not for his glory, but only to help us poor strugglers to keep contact with our Orthodox theological tradition.

Concerning books — could you tell us if the Vologda Patericon is in the library?

Now, something at last that is not a request, but an expression of our deep concern over our present-day Orthodox mission. Fr. Neketas Palassis. [2]1933-2017. A former clergyman of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North America, who, having been scandalized by the ecumenical activity of Patriarch Athenagoras, was received into the ROCOR in 1968 … Continue reading in his latest Witness again makes a self-assured and quite unfounded attack on Blessed Augustine. Everyone knows of the erroneous doctrine of Blessed Augustine on grace [3]In the late twenty century there was a heated debate amongst English-speaking Orthodox about “original sin” or “ancestral sin.”  St Athanasius (d. 373) simply states: “When Adam … Continue reading — but why this “fundamentalist” attempt to destroy entirely someone who has never in Orthodox tradition been denied a place among the Fathers of the Church? Fr. Theodoritos, [4] Monk Theodoritos Mavros, an Old Calendarist theologian from St. Anne’s Skete on Mount Athos. doubtless speaking for other zealots in Greece and on the Holy Mountain, writes us that of course he accepts Augustine as a Saint, because St. Nikodemos of the Holy Mountain does. Our Vladika John [5] St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco. had a service written to him and had great devotion for him. St. Nikodemos put him in our Eastern Calendar (much as Vladika John put St. Patrick there), and our Russian 19^th century Fathers followed him. The Fifth Ecumenical Council ranks Augustine as a theological authority on the same level as Sts. Basil, Gregory and John Chrysostom, with no qualification. The contemporaries of Augustine who disagreed with him (St. Vincent of Lerins, St. John Cassian) corrected his teaching without mentioning his name out of respect, far less calling him a “heretic”. His other contemporaries, including great Fathers, always addressed him with the utmost respect. The universal Orthodox tradition accepts him as an undoubted Holy Father, although with a flaw in his teaching — rather like St. Gregory of Nyssa in the East. Whence, then, this strangely “Protestant” campaign to declare Blessed Augustine a heretic, and to utterly condemn anyone who disagrees with this? This greatly disturbs us, not so much for the sake of Blessed Augustine (who, after all, is a Father of less weight than many others), but because it reveals a very unhealthy “party” spirit which threatens the whole English-speaking Orthodox mission. Fr. Neketas as much as says: If you do not believe exactly as Fr. Panteleimon [6]Archimandrite Panteleimon (Metropoulos), whom, together with his dependency of the Athonite New Skete in America, Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Brookline, MA, the Russian Church Abroad received … Continue reading believes, you are not Orthodox! If you recommend a 19^th-century catechism (as Vladika John always did to converts) you are a Latin; if you read Unseen Warfare [7]Unseen Warfare has its origins in The Spiritual Combat, published in Venice in 1589 by Fr Lorenzo Scupoli (d. 1610), which had been reprinted many times and had been translated into a dozen … Continue reading you are under Latin influence; if you refuse to believe in evolution (!), you are under Western influence!!!

We share our concern with you, because we are really being discouraged by this unhealthy attitude, which is really ревность не по разуму. [8] “zeal without knowledge.” We and others have tried gently to communicate with Fr. Neketas and Fr. Panteleimon about such things, but the impression is that no communication is possible; on every subject they are “right”, they are the “experts,” and no other opinion is possible. You know how from the beginning we have supported the “Greeks” in our Synod, and it is really out of despair for the future that we tell you of our concern.

We are in correspondence with Dr. Alexander Kalomiros [9]1931-1990. Friend of the iconographer, Photios Kontoglou (1895-1965), Dr Alexander Kalomiros was a medical doctor who became a lay theologian, and a founding member of the parish of St. John the … Continue reading in Greece, who himself writes us despairing letters concerning the actions of Fr. Panteleimon in Greece (without the blessing or knowledge of his own bishop) in favor of the Mathewite schism, which. Dr. Kalomiros calls real “fanaticism and legalism.” Fr. Panteleimon has offended and made enemies of Archimandrite Cyprian and other zealots in Greece, and has entirely cut off Dr. Kalomiros who recently wrote us that we are the only ones in America who will even write to him. Dr. Kalomiros believes Fr. Panteleimon and those with him have fallen into “group pride,” and he thinks the recent burning of their church in Boston is God’s mercy to them, sent in order to wake them up for the sake of their good deeds for Orthodoxy in the past. He believes Fr. Panteleimon is very gifted and remarkable, although he does not have a Greek soul, but an American soul, which is why he is not able to have rapport with true Greeks, as opposed to Greek Americans. (I don’t know for sure about all that, but that is what Dr. Kalomiros says, and he is quite sensitive about such things.)

We ourselves know at first-hand how several years ago Fr. Panteleimon and Fr. Neketas put very cruel pressure on Alexey Young, [10] Now Great schema-priestmonk Ambrose. Nikodemos was the predecessor to the publication Orthodox America. evidently trying to stop him altogether from printing Nikodemos, merely because of articles against evolution and for the Shroud of Turin, and also because Alexey resisted their pressures to force him to go through their censorship. Has our Orthodoxy in America become so narrow that we must be under the dictation of a “pope-expert” and we must accept a “party-line” on every conceivable subject? This is against everything Vladika John taught and did in missionary labors.

Already the rumor has spread through the Greek Archdiocese that Fr. Panteleimon is about to “go to some strange Old-Calendar jurisdiction,” and it does seem that the false zeal which Fr. Neketas sometimes reveals is already pointing in that direction. Fr. Panteleimon’s recent act regarding Vladika Averky and Bishop Petros [11] In 1962 two ROCOR bishops, without permission from Metropolitan Anastasii, consecrated Archimandrite Petros Astyfides (1915-1997) as a bishop for the Genuine Orthodox Church in America. has already cost him some supporters of long standing, and we only pray that the stern but loving letter of our own Archbishop Anthony to him has caused him to stop and think where his path is leading. (Vladika Anthony forbade him to come to the San Francisco Archdiocese until he begs forgiveness of Archbishop Averky—not over the question of Bishop Petros, but over the crudeness and untraditional way of “breaking off communion.”)

Please forgive us for burdening you with all this. We would very much like to know your thoughts with regard to any of this. Is there any way that our “Greeks” can be persuaded to be less reckless? There seems to be no one from the “Russians” for whom they have any respect, — everyone is under “Western influence.” (This is Schmemannism!) How can they be made to see, before it is too late, that we should all be humble and not think much of our own “theology”, that we are all perhaps under “Western influences” of various sorts (this is very evident in the case of Fr. Neketas himself), but that this should not exclude us from Orthodoxy, as long as we are struggling to understand the truth.

We ask your prayers for us. With love in Christ, Seraphim, monk

P.S. A final request: Is it possible to obtain a copy of part of the Russian manuscript of the book by Butakov on the Shroud of Turin — the one from which the Russian and English booklets were made? [12]Н.Бутаков, Мельбурн, Австралия, 9 сен. 1967 г.  Святая плащаница Христова. [“Holy Shroud of Christ”] Православный путь … Continue reading We have in mind not the scientific parts, but only the parts containing historical and iconographical evidence, which according to the introduction was much abridged or omitted in the printed version. We are very much interested in a sober and objective investigation of the Shroud according to Orthodox sources — until such a thing is done, we hesitate to give full acceptance to it, despite the impressive scientific argument. The argument of Fr. Neketas that it is “unknown” in Orthodox tradition seems not to be backed up by any investigation at all of even the traditional evidence that has been offered so far. The Shroud, if it is genuine, could have a very powerful influence on faith in the USSR — precisely because the religious level there is so primitive and in need of some kind of “scientific evidence” to combat the influence of decades of “scientific atheism”. See, for example, the new book of Fr. Dimitry Dudko, which is very revealing, despite some flaws in Fr. Dimitry’s ideology.

 

Oct. 30 / Nov. 12, 1977

Dear Father Hilarion,

Christ is in our midst!

Please forgive our long silence. We would like to write more often and have better contact, but the life is always so pressing!

About our printing projects — we are doing now mostly documents and lives from the Catacomb Church, mostly from Polsky [13]Protopresbyter Michael (1891-1960). The author of the groundbreaking collection of the lives of the confessors of the faith Новые мученики российские [New Martyrs of Russia]. … Continue readingThis issue [14] An issue of Orthodox Word, an ongoing periodical of St. Herman of Alaska brotherhood in Platina, CA.

we will have Metr. Cyril of Kazan [15] Metropolitan of Kazan (d. 1937), a locum tenens of the Patriarchal Throne, a new martyr. — if Fr. Herman [16] Fr. Herman (Podmoshenskii), abbot of the Platina monastery at that time (d. 2014). hasn’t already asked you, could you send us once more the cliché of Metr. Cyril (as enclosed)? We need to print it this next week.

This issue will also have Andreyev’s Orthodox Jewish Confessor which you printed long ago — we already had it set up when we saw yours. But it’s not too much of a duplication.

We’ve suggested already to several people — couldn’t there be a “seminary project” of translating several basic Orthodox books — Vlad. Averky’s commentaries on the Gospel and Epistles, Fr. Constantine’s [17] Archimandrite Constantine Zaitsev (1887-1975), an ideologist of Holy Trinity Monastery, the editor of Pravoslavanaia Rus’ (Orthodox Russia) and a faculty member of the seminary there. Pastoral Theology, Andreyev’s Russian literature, etc. [18] Ivan Mikhailovich Andreev (1894-1976), a psychiatrist, a prisoner of Solovki concentration camp and later a member of the Catacomb Church in Russia; then a professor at Holy Trinity Orthodox Seminary. That might help the “school spirit” also.

Please pray for us. The times are dark, and we sense more than ever the need of close cooperation among those of the same Orthodox spirit.

 

With love in Christ, Unworthy Priest-monk Seraphim.

 

Jan. 22/Feb. 4, 1978
Apostle Timothy

Dear Father Hilarion,

Christ is in our midst!

Many thanks for your kind letters and Xeroxes of recent weeks. I think we never sent you a list of things we intend to publish, so here is a list of those we can think of now:

Life and Epistles of Bishop Damascene of Glukhov, new martyr.

Life of St. Andrew Fool for Christ.

Life of St. Paphnutius of Borovsk.

Life of St. Tikhon of Kaluga.

Bishop Simon of China (1933).

Bishop Iona of Manchuria (1925).

Epistles of Archbishop Theophan of Poltava, mostly letters, we went even to the next issue to begin them.

Life of Sts. Boris and Gleb.

A series on Elders of Optina, one by one.

Life of St. Photios of Constantinople.

Life of St. Theodore Studite.

Life of St. Niphon of Cyprus.

Life of St. Brigit of Ireland.

Life of St. Columba of Ireland.

Life of St. John the Baptist.

Holy Apostles Peter and Paul.

Glinsk Monastery Ascetics.

How are you with the life of St. Maximus the Confessor? [19] Translated by Deacon Christopher Birchall and, as it turned out, published by Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Brookline, MA in 1982. Is it coming out soon?

The article on angels in the new Orthodox Life — isn’t it translated straight from Fr. Michael Pomazansky’s Dogmatic Theology? That should be noted; but in any case, we’re working on the whole book and hope to have it out this year. We’ve also done Abba Dorotheus, but now hear that the Cistercians have published it, so will have to see what their translation looks like. Are there any special translation projects at the monastery now? Is anyone working on Vladika Averky’s commentaries? on Father Constantine’s Pastoral Theology?

Would you be able to come to visit us when you go to Alberta? We would love to see you.

Please pray for us. May Christ our God strengthen you in your labors and grant you courage and good-hearted struggle!

With love in Christ, Unworthy Priest-monk Seraphim

P.S. May God make you most Grad Kitezh, [20] Grad Kitezh is a legendary town that went to the bottom of Lake Svetloyar at the advance of the Mongols. Here this seems to be the title of a book. please. And we hope you could spend some time with us.

 

Nov. 30/ Dec. 13, 1978
Holy Apostle Andrew

Dear Father Hilarion,

Christ is in our midst!

Thank you very much for sending the MS of Fr. Vladimir Glindsky [21]A Russian imperial officer who became a priest in 1942 in the US and served in the church of the Kazan icon of the Mother of God in San Francisco and other places. Fr. Vladimir died in 1977 and is … Continue reading — unfortunately I haven’t had time to sit down and look at it yet. Also the Fr. Dimitry Dudko’s газета [22] The newspaper В свете преображения [In the Light of Transfiguration], which a well-known dissident priest started to publish in the Soviet Union in 1978. — it’s wonderful! Are you planning to print any of it in English? We have a rough English version already and will probably print the whole thing if you aren’t planning to.

What about the two tapes I sent of Vl. Averky’s commentaries on the Gospel? If no one has transcribed them yet, please send them back, as we have some willing transcribers here who have already done several tapes beyond those.

We had a good visit with Fr. George Cheremetiev, [23] An HTOS alumnus, who used to serve in Rochester, NY.
but a sad experience with Fr. Gregory of Boston — alas, бездушный формализм! [24] soulless formalism.” This is a reference to Priestmonk Gregory (George), who founded the Dormition Skete in Buena Vista, CO. May God preserve us from that!

Fr. Lev Puhalo has sent us notice that he’s going to expose the “Platina doctrine of the soul” as some kind of neo-paganism.[25]In the late 1970s a theological debate about the post-mortem experience of the soul took place between representatives of St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood, Holy Transfiguration Monastery and Holy … Continue reading We are happy he accuses Jordanville and our Vladika John of the same “heresy”. Apparently such troubles and conflicts are sent us for our sins and to make our thoughts more humble. If it weren’t for voices like Fr. Dimitry Dudko, I fear gloom would envelope us all.

We hope to hear a word from you — and please send the tapes if they aren’t transcribed.

With love in Christ, нед. Иером. Серафим. [26] Unworthy Priestmonk Seraphim.

 

 

Sept. 20/Oct. 3, 1979
Great Martyr Eustathius

Dear Father Hilarion,

Christ is in our midst!

I had planned to write you after our Pilgrimage about your spiritual son, John Van Deerlin, and here almost two months have slipped by. Laziness and distractions! Anyway, he arrived safely before the first day of the Pilgrimage and stayed for several days of courses.[27] St. Herman of Alaska Academy. He started off a little “smart” and wanted to discuss things that were beside the point (why is marijuana worse than alcohol? etc.), but he was humbled a little and seemed to get the point. He had a problem at first with “communism”, and after my talk (where I had discussed communism, I thought, from a spiritual rather than a political point of view), he wondered whether he had wandered into a “California right-wing group”. But after some gentle discussions, he calmed down and took the rest of the lectures and courses very seriously. He even began reading Gulag [28] Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago (1973). and was enlightened about the Tsar by one of our 18-year-old converts. In the end he left a good impression, and with maturing in the faith he could be a sober Christian. We confirmed for him what you had told him about jurisdictions and receiving Communion. Of course, he is still fresh and a little vague about his Orthodoxy — but we’ve come to prefer this to the super-correctness of some of our new converts. We remember him fondly, and he promised to write.

Of late, it seems, we’ve fallen into even more disfavor with “Boston.” Fr. Herman wrote Fr. Panteleimon a note asking if the monastery could help with some translations from Greek, to which he received a disdainful and critical answer by Fr. Mamas,[29] Dr. Dana Miller, a classmate of the future Metropolitan Hilarion at Holy Trinity Orthodox Seminary. condemning our use of Bp. Theophan’s translations of St. Symeon the New Theologian, etc. I replied with a brief note to the effect that “expertness” was not the highest of virtues (having in mind his boasting of knowing Syriac and Greek and translating St. Isaac from the original), and that our St. Symeon booklet was a humble venture, having as its protection the spiritual authority of Bp. Theophan. I thought at the time: what if this provokes an “open letter”? — but the note was so obviously personal to Fr. Mamas that I thought no more of it, thinking also that the “open letter” era was past. But alas! In a week we received his reply, accusing us of Old-Believerism, the spreading of “pious fables”, and various heresies (including teaching the “baptism of the dead”!), and having such a disdainful tone to our poor Russians (including Vladika Andrew) that it hurt. I didn’t answer his accusations, but wrote him a personal reply, telling him frankly that he needed a good dose of warm-heartedness and simplicity and warning him that obedience was not the infallible panacea he claimed it was. (In effect he had written that he couldn’t be criticized because he acts under obedience, which is an infallible guide.) To this there has been no reply.

Just recently I came across some letters to us from Boston 12 years ago — and what a difference! They were just strugglers then, and too bogged down in daily labors to be writing such long-winded epistles. What has happened? I fear it is not for the good. The “correct” converts who follow the “Boston line” are going down a blind alley, I think — that’s not where the real Orthodox life and concern should be today. I hate to think of where it will end. Fr. Lev Puhalo, I think, is an example of where this misdirected zeal can take one.

Well, enough negativism. We are trying to direct our missionary labors to a simpler kind of flock, and we do have responses from it. Fr. Dimitry Dudko still seems to us to be nearest the center of the true spiritual concern today, and there are even signs that the “revival” in Russia is beginning to touch the Russian youth abroad. People who were at the conferences in Toronto and Angwin (the latter was a very boring and academic thing last year) have told us that the Russian young people are “waking up” — glory be to God.

Please pray for us. We remember you with much love. We don’t know yet when Fr. Herman might be able to come to Jordanville to talk about his Mt. Athos trip — time and money are always too short.

With love in Christ, Unworthy Hieromonk Seraphim

 

Third Week of Lent, 1980

Dear Father Hilarion,

Christ is in our midst!

Here, finally, is the text of my Jordanville talk. I hope it’s in time, isn’t too long, and is readable. Please forgive the long delay — this last month or two has been a very busy and hectic one, but thanks to God we are more or less back to normal now.

I have nothing but good impressions from my trip and thank God I was able to make it. I see a more sober, suffering spirit in our church people now, which is good and prepares us to be a little closer to suffering Russia. I had a very good visit with Fr. Valery [30] Protopresbyter Valery Lukianov (1927-2018) published a number of his collected work volumes in Russian at the St. Herman of Alaska Press. in Lakewood, and now I see he’s coming under a little attack for “disobed­ience.” I fear there’s no answer to this problem in our Church, but that God is allowing us to taste a little of the spirit of “Sergianism” to test us, and so we won’t be so proud. May God help us all to stand in the truth, whether or not it has the form of “canonicity.”

It was very good to see you again. May God grant there always to be a spirit of mutual understanding and oneness of heart between us and our brotherhoods!

Please pray for us, and also for the very sick Liudmilla in our Medford parish.

With love in Christ, Unworthy Hieromonk Seraphim

 

[no date]

Christ is in our midst!

We send you heartfelt greeting on the feast of Christ’s Nativity and Baptism.

Thank you for your letter, so warm and kind — we have the same feelings for you.

I’ve written to Fr. Ioannikios (Abernathy) [31] One of the first American monastics at Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville, NY. Now schema-priestmonk John at the Sts Cyprian and Justina Monastery in Fili, Attika, Greece. about the tapes, hopefully we can cooperate and share transcripts of this and other books. We don’t have plans for printing as yet — just to get a rough typescript to start with. But I don’t quite understand — do you or don’t you have a version of the first 45 pages?  (Forgive my denseness.)

Please pray for our labors in the New Year — we have several books to do, not least of which is Fr. Michael’s Dogmatic Theology, which we would very much want to present to him before he dies.

May God grant you a good and fruitful New Year. With love in Christ,

Unworthy Hieromonk Seraphim.

 

Commentaries by Protodeacon Andrei Psarev