World Orthodoxy doesn´t even know what day it is. A truth seeker discovers who does know what day it is, always! And who they are.

 

World Orthodoxy doesn´t even know what day it is. A truth seeker discovers who does know what day it is, always! And who they are.

 

Let´s take the example of a travelling businessman, Christos Prodromou, we´ll call him. He goes to Helsinki. The Finnish Orthodox Church is entirely on the Western Calendar. He attends the Triumph of Orthodoxy Sunday for the first time.

 

He flies back to Greece, and attends it for the second time.

 

He goes to Armenia. Only Armenian Monophysites “pre-Chalcedonians” there, at all near to where he is staying. Attends a service denying the creed.

 

He goes to a remote part of Italy. Attends a Roman Catholic service, again which denies the creed. But, that´s one of the benefits of Ecumenism, don´t you know!

 

His business affairs take him back to Finland. They are now celebrating Easter (Pascha) at the same time as the West.

 

Flies back to Greece, celebrates Pascha for the second time.

 

13 days later he finds himself visiting Mount Athos. He celebrates, because it is all Old Calendar there, the same saints whose feast day coincided with his second Pascha celebration.

 

He finally thinks, it would be nice to get some consistency in when we celebrate things.

 

He walks past Esphigmenou monastery. Well they´re more consistent. But, wait, you´re saying, in effect, that you are registered as being heterodox under the Greek state laws, though you call yourself “True Orthodox”. Something´s still not quite right with you and your synod.

 

He decides to do a search for True Orthodoxy on the Internet. The site www.trueorthodox.eu comes up. He contacts them, asking whether they have any parishes in Greece. They do indeed, in Athens, their bishop being the Bishop of Pallini and Western Europe, Philaretos.

 

Finally, he´s found some people who are Truly Orthodox and who always celebrate things on just one day, using the same consistent calendar they have always used. Well, that makes life so much simpler. The Lord wants us to be like little children. Simple, unconfused, and always sticking to the same calendar and to all of our traditions.

 

He asks how he can join. He is told that he must accept all of the additional anathemas that World Orthodoxy does not have, which he does, and that as he has already had a baptism with 3 immersions, he can just be chrismated, but he does have the option of being re-baptised. He much prefers to be re-baptised, and so chooses this option.

 

He learns, in the process a Greek verb he didn´t know existed before: palaeologitimo. To return to the Old Calendar. He is so happy to have done so, and prays especially for the intercession of those martyred in defence of church traditions, including the Patristic or “Old” (or “Julian” calendar), such as Catherine of Mandra, near Athens, martyred in 1927. He decides to do his best to model his life on hers, in gratitude.