The Synod Is Counting on Laypeople

— As a rule, the sessions of the Holy Synod go unannounced and happen unexpectedly. After them it is possible to see twists and turns in the fate of various of the members of the church hierarchy — and along with them, whole dioceses: it’s a rare thing, indeed, when the decisions of the Synod turn out to be predictable. Do you follow the decisions of the Synod?

— I try to follow them. I think that any person who is really in the church, and all the more anyone who is interested in the fate of the contemporary church will follow what is happening with decisions of the Synod which, though they might be hard to sense in the short term or at the parish level, will nevertheless have an effect on the level of the whole church and over a longer time horizon of a year, two years, or five years. Moreover, in comparison to the early or mid-1990’s, when I was received into the church, the current sessions are more informative, the decisions more varied and their wording is lengthier, so I think they are of some ecclesiological interest. In addition, it isn’t easy for the average faithful Christian to glean information about the activities and decisions of our church leadership, so the journal of the Synod is our primary source.

— Several years ago, the Synod took a decision stipulating that laypeople should be recorded in parish registers, because often priests come to conduct church services on the faithful’s requests in parishes for which they themselves don’t have responsibility in a territorial sense, and this can be problematic. Shortly after this decision was taken, we were travelling and visited various rural parishes in which not a single priest (!) knew about it. I imagine that this is still the case. In other words, the bishops had not tasked real deans to notify priests in charge of dioceses of this decision.

— Of course, we are often confronted with the fact that although ecclesial livelihood has achieved significant scale over the last 30—35 years, a mechanism for the dissemination of synodal decisions at the parish level has not been developed. Actually, I don’t so much mean a mechanism but more — you know — a sort of mutually respectful attention on the part of senior clergy to the realities of parish life and on the part of parishes to the decisions of senior clergy. I think that the average parishioner or member of the faithful, like you and me, knows very little in general what makes up the ministry of a diocesan bishop, just as we have little idea of what an archpriest, dean or even our own parish priest does with the time when he isn’t serving in the altar. And I think that bishops don’t understand any better how average members of the faithful live. It’s clear that everyone needs to worry about having what they need to live, earnings, health, and children, but I mean there is little understanding regarding issues of church consciousness which are of concern to the laity. And this rift in church fellowship between “us and them” needs to be healed.

When, like it or not, we look at the experience of Roman Catholics, we immediately notice the attention that all Catholics pay to the words and decisions of the Pope. And this is a sort of example for us Orthodox. We don’t pay as much attention to the decisions of our church hierarchy, though there is also a positive aspect to this. This manifestation of a certain freedom vis-a-vis decisions of our leadership is a long-term tradition. But it also has a serious downside because it speaks of a certain disintegration, separation, and serious distance between different parts of our church, which is surely not good for the church. At this point we need to pay attention to unity among all in our church — and I don’t mean just symbolic unity, but real and thoroughgoing unity.

— Let’s have a look at the decisions of the Synod from the 30^th of May. They are, indeed — as you noted — varied, including in terms of decisions about appointments. Often you don’t even know who those people are, whose names show up in the decisions, or what to make of the information. For instance, what do we make of the decision to remove Bishop Panteleimon (Shatov) from his position as Head of the Synodal Department for Philanthropy? After all, he’s an active and well-known figure, not only in Moscow!

— It really isn’t simple. But as you’ll notice, the language used in the decisions always contains various “markers”, which anyone who knows the form is going to pay attention to. For instance, when someone is removed from a position, the announcement may contain the words “with thanks for his contributions to our labours”, or…it may not. Based upon this we can infer either that the person has been shifted to a higher appointment or that he is the target of some sort of disciplinary action. In the case of Bishop Panteleimon there was no expression of thanksgiving, which means that there was some sort of problem, and the faithful are left only to guess what that might have been. This engenders rumours which isn’t very good for unity.

Of course, it’s understandable that the Synod should take care that their decisions not cause hype or bone picking in the press, as can happen. It is very important to pay attention to accuracy in relation to church figures, their reputations, and to defend one’s own against scandal and insinuation. But in the end, it is also important to think about how laypeople perceive the Synod’s decisions — to purvey an accurate understanding in which they might be consolidated. And it’s obvious that at present not enough attention is paid to the effect of Synod publicity, in this regard.

— It’s curious that there is message on the ministry of laypeople in the church integrated into the block of decisions devoted to topics for the attention of the Inter-Council Presence. In a canonical sense, this particular group of Christians is poorly defined and described. And suddenly we see the topic of laypeople’s ministry coming up in some of its most important nuances, as relate to catechesis, the family within the parish, etc. What causes such particular attention to this topic at this point?

— It’s difficult to say why exactly this question comes up at this point, because it was important yesterday and the day before yesterday, too. But its inclusion in the list of tasks for the Inter-Council Presence indicates a change in the direction of the church hierarchy’s attention toward laypeople — whom, we might note, make up a majority of the people in the church. This change is certainly something we should welcome. Perhaps it indicates a desire to lessen the distance between the hierarchy, the priests, and laypeople in the church. Perhaps it means that the leadership of our church is striving for great unity and fellowship inside the church.

Insofar as we are speaking about decisions of the highest agency of church governance, it is also possible that these reflect state political interests and trends to a certain degree. As is well known, preserving the people and their way of life is one of the declared internal political priorities of the Russian government, so the synod is reflecting this in its decisions.

Yet another possible reason might be seen in that over the last 15 years, i.e. the incumbency of Patriarch Kirill, the Russian Orthodox Church has seen significant administrative changes and many new dioceses have appeared — the internal geography of the ROC has changed significantly, and external diocesan geography has changed, too. And, of course, questions arise: What are these new dioceses as a whole? How do they recognise themselves? Who belongs to these parishes and how do we know these people? Moreover, we are speaking not only of dioceses on the territory of the Russian Federation, but of those abroad, too. As you see, the reasons for this new attention to laypeople may indeed be many and varied.

— And the rhetoric in terms of how these questions are put is unusual. It’s unusual, for instance, to use the word “ministry” in reference to laypeople. With reference to bishops, priests, and deacons — sure. But laypeople aren’t usually said to “minister”. They are supposed to attain to a pious way of life, care for church property, donate, etc. But suddenly we see the question of laypeople’s “ministry” popping up. Am I seeing something that isn’t there or am I correct here? And how do you see laypeople’s ministry in the church? 

— The concept of “a layperson’s ministry”, or the “ministry of laypeople” isn’t written into the Constitution of the Russian Orthodox Church. The designations of a lay parishioner’s responsibilities are expressed rather unclearly, and the main point, insofar as I can remember, has to do with having a living connection between the parish to which the faithful Christian belongs. (This is chapter XVII, 3 of the Constitution, according to which the parishioner should “have a living tie with the parish”, provide “financial support to the parish and pricht”, “participate in church worship, regularly confessing and receiving communion, observe the canons and regulations of the church, perform works in faith, and strive for religious and moral perfection”. — ‘Stol’”).

Given the break in church tradition which occurred during the Soviet era, it’s not entirely clear what “living tie” means, how it looks, or what it consists of, at this point. Even those very few things which are specified in the Constitution don’t generally occur — nor are they very realistic in our contemporary experience of either church or society. Various pre-revolutionary stereotypes are still at work here, stereotypes from the Constantinian era of the church’s history, when the church still performed many functions which are now performed by the state. We really need to take a new look at these stereotypes, because the positions of both the church and the faithful Christian within society are now quite different than they were before the Revolution. And it’s no coincidence that there were some very purposeful correctives to the decision regarding parishioners being recorded in parish records that you were speaking of at the beginning of this interview. The correctives state that a person can be tied to a parish only in rural regions, but not in cities. This decision was motivated by the concern that faithful Christians living close to their rural home parish church would begin to financially support a parish further from their home if another priest in the region became more appealing to them. The decision was motivated by purely practical goals, and for this reason it doesn’t work.

At the same time, the topic of laypeople’s ministry in the Church was an incredibly important topic as pertains to Orthodox theology and practice in the 19th and 20th centuries — both domestically and abroad. And it’s a very relevant topic for today, too. From both a theological and a pastoral perspective, Fr Sergij Bulgakov, Fr Nikolay Afanasiev, and Fr Alexander Schmemann thought deeply on the issue of the people of God and church ministry, as did Russian religious philosophers A. Khomyakov, V. Soloviev, N. Berdyaev, and Fr Vasilij Zenkovskij. And we mustn’t forget the contribution of Russian canonical theologians and, of course, the new martyrs of the 20^th c., whose experience is so incredibly important for us.

In terms of modern theologians and church activists, Fr Georgy Kochetkov has developed these themes to the largest degree — both in terms of ecclesiology and in terms of practice. This is a strong current in the Russian church over the last two hundred years, and it seems that a leading personality who knows his Orthodox theology and church history is behind this new and direct expression of the question regarding the “ministry of laypeople”. Clearly our church leadership also feels the gap that obtains from lack of lay participation in church life and inadequate responsibility for the church amongst its lay members.

The distance between clerics and laypeople cuts against the church in two directions at once. First, it means that clerics need not “give the reason for their hope” to anyone other than those among their number; secondly, it means that laypeople feel they have absolutely no responsibility. As well-known churchman and theologian Fr Vitalij Borovoj said, “a parishioner is a person who comes…and then goes”.* And, therefore, we don’t know who parishioners are, these days. Is it all the baptised, Orthodox citizens of the Russian Federation? Is it those who come to church and at least sometimes have the need to pray to God, and perhaps even repent of their sins? Or is it those laypeople who, although they hold no church office, are nevertheless friendly and have trusting personal and business relationships with bishops, priests, deans, etc.? And how shall we refer to those “laypeople” who share with the Church and all her people the fullness of life and bear full responsibility for it despite all the vicissitudes of life in society? Are all these cases really to be called by a single name? After all, there are gradations of ministry amongst the clergy: deacons, priests and bishops all have different ministries; monastic service differs from non-monastic service. I think that the service of laypeople should also be distinguished according to God’s callings, in terms of both content and responsibility. But we need to learn to recognise these callings and their content as ecclesial. If we do this, our church will be spiritually enriched. It’s hardly coincidental that the well-known Roman Catholic researcher of Orthodox tradition, Robert Taft, comments on the ministry of laypeople by saying “laypeople are the church”.

We might do well to remember that in ancient times those who had only the external trappings of church about them were called, with slight disregard, “laypeople” — those who were baptised, sometimes went to church, participated in some of the rites, yet for the most part lived in the world and by the rules of the world. Are we talking about that when we say “laypeople”? True, even members of the clergy live in the world these days, whether bishops or priests…and I’ll even risk saying that they have greater dependence about the laws of this world that simple laypeople.

On the other hand, we can remember the confessors of the Russian 20^th c. church, both those who held church posts and those who didn’t — both women and men, older and younger, and in particular those who were members of church communities and brotherhoods at a time when such groups were strictly prohibited, and their members persecuted. Such people gave help to innocent prisoners, preserved living memory of church consciousness and traditions. There is no way that these people should be referred to as “in the world” (translator’s note: the Russian word for laypeople actually means “people in the world”), because they lived in this world and were not of it, just as the gospel prescribes. In fact, this was the very essence of their confession.

— So then, what should we call a simple member of the faithful who wishes to serve God?

— Yes, we have term, “faithful”. Remember the document entitled “On the Participation of the Faithful in the Eucharist”, where this word is used in a complete valid sense, though both clergy and laypeople are called “faithful”, whether they hold church office or not. In theological literature we also find the Greek term “laik”, which means a member of the people of God. Whether or not this is exactly the same as the Russian word “miryane” (layperson) is a question that we should reflect upon seriously, and it is wonderful that this task has been set before the Inter-Council Presence.

The exact same is true of the concept of “ministry”. In the everyday parish sense of the word, any activity whatsoever might be called “ministry” if the person involved in the activity is contributing to the life of the parish. But in the primary sense of its use, “ministry” is a high-minded concept. Often “ministry” is understood only as holy ministry such as serving liturgy and sacraments, and “ministers” are understood only to be clerics or, at best, lesser clerics and church singers, especially, if these people serve without remuneration. Not every bishop and priest out there can tell you what the ministry of laypeople looks like, so it’s wonderful that the question has been posed at the highest level.

How will the question be considered and what definitions will be put forward? What real life experience will be taken up by the Inter-Council Presence in coming up with these new definitions? Will the Presence involve those who they refer to as “laypeople” in their discussions? All of these are important questions, the answers to which may show the degree to which our conscience is ecclesial and the degree to which we are able to make this manifest. The church, after all, should be a single organism. And if we look at the make-up of the Inter-Council Presence at the moment, we’d have to say that it looks more like a council of archbishops. There are almost no laypeople in the Presence, which does cause some reservations vis-a-vis how well the recent decisions can be fully worked through so as to produce the necessary results. 

— St. Paul speaks of ministry in a broader sense than just bishops, priests and deacons. His list includes also apostles, prophets, evangelists, teachers and healers. Ordination to ministry required the reaction of the whole church in ancient times, and this reaction was enunciated at the time of ordination — the laying on of hands which was initially the form of church reception. Should contemporary laypeople also be received into ministry through liturgical rites? Is this sort of reception necessary? Or is any person in the church a priori someone who serves the church?

— Members of the church from any rank and file of the people of God are always able to serve, and this includes laypeople. This was, is and always will be the case, quite apart from any external form or decisions of church leadership, because this is the way life is in the Church where the Holy Spirit is acting. The Church lives by the Spirit and faith. And those who desire to serve God will bear their service and overcome even the obstacles that stand in their way.

The question is whether the church will recognize this service to God as its own. For instance, in the Transfiguration Brotherhood we have quite a few sisters who are catechists, i.e., Orthodox Christian women who, over the course of a long period of time, teach adults the basics of Christian faith and life, bringing people into the Church. These people stay in the Church and become active members. I think this is a real service to the church, to which the fruit bears witness, first and foremost. That first is the people themselves who have believed and dedicated their lives to God and the Church. Just as the words of the apostle say: “Even though I may not be an apostle to others, surely I am to you! For you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.”

But how this service be expressed as mystery or sacrament and whether or not this expression is necessary is not a simple issue which demands a foundational theologically and pastoral approach. The reception in generally of one or another ministry into the church is an important part of the topic on lay ministry put forward by the Synod.

In the case of the Transfiguration Brotherhood, Christian brotherhood itself is in many senses a guarantor of ministry being ecclesial. In brotherhood there are people who can identify whether the ministry is ecclesial or not out of their own church experience. The spiritual father, and elders, and many years of practicing the reception of such service also help to answer this question. But this experience may go unnoticed.

But dedication to ministry isn’t the first issue at hand. There is no discussion of ordination for anyone other than clergy. As regards all the other church ministries and orders, usually a bishop, as the elder figure amongst the people of the church, would bless one or another person to teach, preach or be a missionary, for instance. But again, we know each other so poorly and trust each other so little — the bishop barely knows the people, the people poorly understand who the bishop is and what his ministry entails — that to speak about that, at the moment, is premature. Of course there are laypeople who work in one or another church institution, but they aren’t who we are talking about. It’s important not only to give a definition to the ministry of lay people who are well educated in church literature, but to collect the living experience of the 20^th century and our current times. In the first place we need to collect the experience of communities and brotherhoods, because the most conscientious and responsible amongst laypeople collect in these forms. Everything of value needs to be collected: we are not so rich that we can afford to leave anything out.

And the data needs to be collected soberly, using ecclesial criteria and evaluations. It would be good to be able to just these things in the council of believers according to spirit and fruit. A significant element in the church-sobornal mechanism, in as far as we can understand the idea of his holiness the Patriarch, is expressed in the Inter-Council Presence, and should play its role.

— Focus on the biggest part of the church people does, indeed, bring hope. But will the efforts of the Inter-Council Presence be enough? In what other ways can our church react to the decision of the Synod?

— I repeat, we should welcome the idea, itself. Making it a reality is yet another difficult issue. At this point, the talk is about developing documents — several foundational texts that should express the church consensus on this topic at present and to which everyone in the church can look for guidance in making it a reality. These documents will be developed within the framework of the Inter-Council Presence which may attract various experts, who also need to be sourced at this point.

In general, it would make sense to discuss decisions ratified by the Synod, as well as any future documents produced, at the level of every diocese and even every parish, where most of the people who have an interest in the service of laypeople can be found. Of course, the so-called laypeople themselves aren’t very ready for this, and neither are the clergy. But this isn’t so bad — after all, we need to start somewhere. And if we relate to this affair with faith and reason, which it makes sense to do, then this sort of a discussion, with varying degrees of success, is of course possible. Furthermore, the discussion will engender heightened trust and unity within the church.

You see the thing is that we can really only speak seriously about ministry in relation to people who have been fully received into the church, or are “full members of the Church”, as Fr Georgy Kochetkov says. Not people who are just Orthodox by birth or because they were baptised in childhood, and not people who belong to the church in just a cultural sense. All of this is important, yet insufficient if we are talking about ministry as a quality of the entire life of the faithful Christian. Therefore, without making reception into the church possible, without full catechesis for adult Christians, beginning this conversation on a serious level within parishes isn’t really possible. Very purposefully, the topic of post-baptismal catechesis was also posed by the Synod, as was the topic of pastoral practice. And some liturgical topics are also, in my opinion, related to the ministry of laypeople, for instance the problem of understanding church liturgical texts, for instance. The task has been posed on a large scale and in an interesting way — we’ll have to work to make it all happen in the right way and at the right level, so that the Inter-Council Presence can truly provide the impulse to make the Synod’s decision turn into a reality in our lives.

The development of working documents isn’t everything. The ideas which are laid down in these documents need to be actionable in real life on the level of dioceses and parishes. But this is the next step. At this point, I repeat, we need to gather experience rather than think that we are starting something from scratch. We have both historical modern life experience, but this experience needs to be taken on board by the church. More than anything, the experience of the Russian confessors of the church is of great importance. Not only because these people died for their faith, but also because they lived by faith for Christ and for the Church, refusing to be unfaithful or betray their Lord in a time and place when this was impossible. And these were not only members of the clergy; many lay confessors also gave their entire lives to God and His Church.

Source: “Stol” Media Project