www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Do You Agree With This Action

Shlomo Lkhoolkhoon,
Below is an article that I copied from the Palestine Chronicle. After reading it please indicate if you agree with the actions of the Eastern Orthodox Church in the Holy Land.

Poosh BaShlomo,
Yuhannon

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Bush, Blair Excommunicated: Church Of The Nativity

Monday, March 31 2003 @ 07:39 PM GMT

By Yasser El-Banna

BETHLEHEM - Spokesman of the Orthodox Church in the Holy Lands, archimandrite Attallah Hanna declared that U.S. President George Bush, his Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, British Premier Tony Blair, his Foreign Minister Jack Straw have all been deprived from visiting the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem.

This decision was taken to express the refusal of the Palestinian Christians of the U.S.-led invasion on Iraq.

In a special interview with IslamOnline.net, Monday, March 31, Hanna described both Bush and Blair as excommunicates, as they have turned a deaf ear to several calls by the Orthodox Church and other churches before war erupted.

This indicates that leaders of the invading states did not listen to the church, and hence, we deem them excommunicates and perverted.・
Bush and Blair behave in an antagonistically to the Semitic Church that calls for stopping the aggression and hostilities against Iraq,・he added.

The Church of Nativity decided on Sunday, March 30, 2003, to excommunicate Bush, Rumsfeld, Blair and Straw due to their military attacks on Iraq.
The decision was declared Sunday by Father Banar Teyous, representative of the Orthodox Nativity Church during a march, organized by Orthodox institutions in front of the Church, to criticize the U.S. British invasion of Iraq.

Father Banar Teyous said that U.S.-British invaders are war criminals and children assassins and hence, the Church decided to excommunicate them.

The War Has No Religious Cover

The attacks undertaken by the alliance in Iraq is contrary to the instructions and message of Christianity, Father Attalah said.

Such a war targets both Muslims and Christians and is in favor of the world Zionism that seeks to promote the notion of religious and civilizational struggle, he added.

We condemn the aggression and call for an immediate stop thereof, as what is happening in Baghdad, capital of civilization, is extremely painful.・

He expressed the sympathy of the Christian church with the Iraqi people, underlining that there is no moral or religious cover for the deeds of invaders in Iraq.

Hanna said that the excommunication decision is only a means to express disapproval and strong condemnation of what is currently going on in Iraq. It is also an expression of the Church's sympathy with the Iraqi people.

The Church also declared its desire to put an immediate end to the war on Iraq, he said.

Global Christian Campaign

Hanna unveiled the efforts and contacts made by the Oriental Orthodox Church with several Christian churches the world over to organize a global Christian campaign in coordination with the Islamic institutions in order to stop the aggression that targets the Arab nation, the civilization and human values stipulated under the heavenly scriptures.

Archimandrite Hanna called upon the whole world, Christians and Muslims, to cooperate in order to defuse the Zionist and imperialist plans.

He said that there must be an Arab, Islamic and Christian cooperation with the objective of boosting historical links among followers of both doctrines in order to strengthen the values of dialogue and unity in the Arab world.

It is worth noting that the Church of Nativity is the first church on earth and has a special importance for different Christian sects, as it was established where Jesus Christ was born.

The Church consists of a huge religious compound that includes the church building as well as a number of monasteries and other churches that represent different Christian sects.

The Church is managed by three sects, namely, the Oriental Orthodox, Eastern Orthodox and the Franciscans.

[IslamOnline & News Agencies [islamonline.net).] Published at the Palestine Chronicle. IslamOnline

The posting of a reply seemed to do so expecting only a certain response--"rigged" or "I don't care."

Archimandrite Hanna, somewhat of a renegade, does *not* speak for the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem (something he claimed to do before, but which the Patriarchate said he does *not* have the authority to so do), and the Eastern Orthodox Church does not *excommunicate* any which do not belong to her, so the Orthodox Church *cannot* excommunicate President Bush. This is ridiculous.

OrthodoxEast

I doubt that Blair and Bush or Rumsfeld, as followers of protestant sects have the desire to visit the Church of Nativity, why would they have to visit?

Well, the better question is: who is the archimandrite to bar someone from the Church? I mean, it's not an exclusively Orthodox-owned church is it? Isn't it partially owned by the Catholic Church as well?

If not, I can better understand his reasoning.

Logos Teen

It's symbolic.

If one has no way to condemn or combat the actions of others, then one has to use whatever tools are available. In 'church-dom', it is ex-communication. The idea is: these folks claim baptism and therefore participation in the 'one, holy, catholic and apostolic church....'. So, these church people are using the only 'weapon' available to them. Of course, protestants haven't a clue; but among the catho-dox folks in the Near East, it has meaning: we've told the invaders that they are wrong. It's like the Russian Orthodox church excommunicating Stalin, or the Archbishop of Munich-Freising excommunicating Hitler. Little practical value, but one heck of a statement.

Blessings!

Readers should be aware that Fr. Hanna was removed as an official representative of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem in August of 2002. He made similarly bizzare statements, then praising the homicide bombings of Jewish sites. The above article is misleading (as is much that comes out of the Arab press) since it claims to represent the views of the Orthodox Church. It does not. He is speaking for himself, and certainly out of ignorance, excommunicating people who aren't even Orthodox. His statements have been tailored to incite hatred toward Americans and Western interests in lock step with Islamic extremists, with whom he apparently finds more fellowship. The above article is not worthy of discussion, in my opinion.

Priest Thomas

The Church of the Nativity receives huge numbers of pilgrims of all Christian denominations every year. The Church of England has a centre there to assist her pilgrims (as does the Evangelical Kirche) and many denominations sponsor group pilgrimages to the Church.

I would think more Protestants than Orthodox visit the Church.

Well, the Protestants have a lot of money.

I don't understand the relationship of money and spiritual desire.

I won't vote on this. There is no credible source for the story. :rolleyes:

Because it is published in a newspaper doesn't make it true.

Paul

I'm curious how one comes to such a conclusion?

Priest Thomas

First hand observation.

I find this interesting. So you did, what, querried every person that walked into the church for the past, say, 100 years and asked them if they were Protestant or Orthodox? Nice fantasy.

PT

He said that there must be an Arab, Islamic and Christian cooperation with the objective of boosting historical links among followers of both doctrines in order to strengthen the values of dialogue and unity in the Arab world.

He sounds like a contradiction in action to me. I thought that was what is happening. Arab & Islamic = Palastenians, while Christian = Catholic and Protestant of all three cultures plus that of the Jewish culture that are Christian, and then Israel working in conjunction with a Christian nation to try to get the country in some kind of liveable order for both states.

Fr. Thomas,

You clearly have not been to the Holy Land or worked as a travel agent. Kurt 1969a is right. (and this statement was in the present tense, so I don't know where the "100 years" came from).

When you visit the Church of the Nativity and you are surrounded by American teenagers with "Grace Methodist Church" T-shirts, another crowd of people picking up the Swedish language guides to the Church, a third group of German speaking people lead by a woman with a Diakona badge, a fourth walking towards the Church from the YMCA House, a fifth group whose director indicates they will be visiting St. Andrew's Church next (the Presbysterian Church in Jerusalem) and a sixth who has the name of an Evangelical pilgrimage organization on her clip board, you get the message.

I would bet less than 5% of the visitors to the Church are Orthodox. Do you any evidence to the contrary?

Axios