THE TIMES OF CONFESSION – The Persecution of the True Faith in Our Days and Christ’s Victory over the Judgment of Men!

By Archimandrite Adrian

Every age of the Church has had its trials, every generation has borne its cross, and every period of unrest has required Christians to answer a question from which they cannot hide: how much do we value the truth of the faith, and how far are we prepared to go so as not to betray it?
Our Lord Jesus Christ did not promise His disciples a life free from opposition. He did not tell them that the world would always understand them, that the authorities would protect them, or that visible peace would continually accompany the preaching of the Gospel. On the contrary, He warned them: “If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you.” The Church was not promised that it would be spared from suffering, but that it would not be overcome by it. It was not promised that it would always be powerful in the eyes of the world, but that the gates of hell would not prevail against it.
Therefore, the history of the Church is not merely the history of great cathedrals, councils, institutions, and visible establishments. It is, above all, the history of consciences that were not sold, of people who remained beside Christ when that remaining cost them their freedom, their honor, their ministry, or even their lives. Emperors have passed away, laws have changed, unjust decisions have been forgotten, and robber councils have remained in history as a disgrace. But the confession of the saints has remained alive, because their truth was not built on the power of men, but on Christ.
Saint Athanasius the Great was banished several times from his see and came to seem almost alone against a world consumed by the Arian delusion. Saint John Chrysostom was deposed by an unjust council and sent into exile, while those who condemned him imagined they had forever silenced the voice of the one who reproved sin. Saint Maximus the Confessor was judged, imprisoned, and mutilated because he did not accept dogmatic compromise, and Saint Theodore the Studite experienced exile and persecution for defending the order of the Church. Saint Mark of Ephesus remained almost alone against a false union, but that “almost alone” proved stronger than the crowd of those who had signed it.
In all these cases, human power seemed to have won. There were decisions, there were condemnations, there were structures and authorities who could point to their documents and say: “This man is condemned.” But time showed that an act of condemnation is not the same as the judgment of God, and an administrative penalty does not transform itself into dogmatic truth or ecclesiastical justice simply by existing.
This lesson is of great importance for our times as well. Today, there are clerics who have ceased commemoration of certain hierarchs, confessing that these hierarchs publicly preach teachings they consider foreign to the right faith. For this decision, some have been suspended, forbidden to serve, or defrocked. Around these cases, there are disputes, differing canonical interpretations, accusations, and harsh words. Precisely for this reason, great discernment is required, because neither must the confession of truth be mixed with passion, nor must ecclesiastical obedience be turned into a silence without conscience.
Canon 15 of the First-Second Council of Constantinople does not bless disorder, personal ambition, or separation for human reasons. Not every disagreement with a bishop becomes a confession, and not every cessation of commemoration is, in itself, proof of holiness. The canon speaks of a precise and grave situation: that in which a bishop publicly, with open head, preaches a heresy condemned by the Holy Councils or the Fathers. In such a circumstance, those who wall themselves off from communion with him before a conciliar judgment are not called schismatics, but are considered worthy of honor, because they have not broken the unity of the Church, but have sought to defend it from the false unity born of heresy.
Here lies a truth that cannot be bypassed: an ecclesiastical sanction pronounced against a cleric does not automatically close the examination into its justice. The Church is not a mere administration, and the canons are not instruments of punishment at the whim of the strongest. They are boundaries set for the preservation of truth, unity, and the salvation of souls. If a disciplinary measure is issued for the very act that a canon protects, then the ecclesiastical conscience is duty-bound to examine not only the external form of the decision, but also the truth for the sake of which the person was punished.
Not every defrocking is unjust. The Church has the right and duty to remove from ministry clerics who fall into heresy, immorality, imposture, or passionate disobedience. But neither does every defrocking become just simply because it bears a signature and a stamp. History shows us that there have been saints deposed by councils, bishops expelled by other bishops, and confessors condemned in the name of a alleged ecclesiastical peace. Sometimes the punishment meant to cover the voice of truth became, over time, the very testimony of the innocence of the condemned.
Even Romanian history offers us a lesson in humility. Deacon Ion Creangă was defrocked in the 19th century, and after more than a hundred years, the decision was lifted posthumously, his memory being rehabilitated. Of course, his case cannot be placed on the same dogmatic plane as the confession of the great saints of the Church, nor should it be used as proof that any sanction is unjust. But it clearly shows that ecclesiastical authorities, being made up of human beings, can err, and one generation may be called to correct what another decided in haste or under the pressure of circumstances.
One generation punishes, and another repairs. One generation condemns, and another examines and rehabilitates. But the one who suffered does not get back his lost years, his halted ministry, his family’s tears, the solitude, or the shame cast upon his name. Late justice can clean a page of history, but it cannot erase the lived suffering. Therefore, those who judge in the Church must do so with fear of God, knowing that every signature placed against a person will be examined before Christ, and every unjust condemnation can turn into a testimony against the one who uttered it.
This lesson becomes all the more serious when ecclesiastical authority calls upon the power of the state for support. The state has the right to defend public order, to prevent fraud, imposture, and the abusive use of clerical dignity. But religious conscience, dogmatic truth, and the spiritual validity of a confession cannot be decided through police means. Caesar cannot define faith; he cannot transform truth into a lie, nor a lie into truth. He can close a church building, but he cannot close the Church. He can forbid a person to wear a garment, but he cannot erase before God the grace received. He can punish a body, but he cannot bind the conscience that stands before Christ.
In our days, when regulations and measures appear that may come to touch the exercise of religious ministry, special heed is required. The fight against imposture must not be turned into a means of silencing those who invoke a matter of faith and conscience. Otherwise, a church dispute ends up being settled through civil coercion, and the wound in the body of the Church deepens. Truth does not need gendarmes to defend itself. It needs confession, true conciliar examination, repentance, and the illumination of the Holy Spirit.
Romania has already known such wounds. After the change of the church calendar, clerics, monastics, and believers who remained with the old order were subjected to pressure, sanctions, evictions, arrests, and interventions by civil authorities. The history of that period is complex, and all facts and positions must be examined seriously, without idealization and without hatred. But the suffering of the people cannot be denied, and the lesson remains: when matters of faith are resolved through force, the peace obtained is not church peace, but merely the silence of the coerced.
Faith cannot be changed with a baton, and conscience cannot be corrected through fear. A person can be forced to leave a church, but cannot be forced to believe that what he considers holy has suddenly become wrong. He can be deprived of freedom, but not of responsibility before God. And when civil authority is called upon to punish where there ought to have been dialogue, examination, and patience, it does not heal the disturbance, but drives it into the depths of souls, where it will continue to hurt for generations.
The same tragedy was seen, in a much more terrible form, during the communist persecution. In Russia, after the Bolshevik revolution, the Church was struck through the murder of bishops, the arrest of priests, the closure of monasteries, and the infiltration of church structures. Holy Patriarch Tikhon tried to preserve the unity of the Church under almost impossible conditions, and the decree known as Ukase 362 offered a principle of ecclesiastical survival for situations in which normal contact with higher authority became impossible. Later, amid the pressure and imposed compromises, some bishops, priests, and believers chose the path of the catacombs.
The history of the catacomb communities is complex, and the status of their various continuations is judged differently in the Orthodox world. It is not right to make unchecked statements, nor to turn a painful reality into an occasion for jurisdictional triumphalism. But the testimony of those Christians remains staggering: when the churches were closed, they served in houses, in forests, and in hiding places; when their names were erased from official registers, they remained written before God; when visible structures were struck, Christ preserved His people through pastors who preferred persecution to compromise.
From this arises a question that troubles many: if trials multiply, who will preserve the apostolic succession? Who will ordain future priests? Who will continue the ministry when church structures come under increasing pressure?
The answer is not found in anxiety, but in the promise of Christ. The Church is not the property of an administration, nor the creation of a historical era. It is the Body of Christ. The Lord has not preserved His Church until today only to abandon it precisely in the hour of trial. During Arianism, there were Orthodox bishops. In the time of Iconoclasm, there were pastors who did not bow to imperial decrees. In the years of communism, there were hierarchs, priests, monastics, and believers who preserved the faith at the cost of freedom and life.
God may allow confessors to be few, but He does not allow the truth to disappear. He may leave them without the power of the world, but not without grace. He may hide them from the eyes of the crowd, but He does not lose sight of them. Sometimes, the continuity of the Church is not seen in the splendor of institutions, but in the silence of a cell, in the Holy Liturgy celebrated with fear in an unknown place, in the hands of a persecuted bishop who sacredly preserves what he received.
Yet, this truth must not be turned into a justification for every separation. Calling yourself a confessor does not mean you have already become one. Confession is not measured by the harshness of words, by the number of enemies, or by the satisfaction of considering yourself the only righteous one. The true confessor does not rejoice over anyone’s fall, does not desire the bishop’s ruin, does not make the Church’s suffering an occasion for personal glory. He weeps for the delusion, prays for those who persecute him, and ceaselessly examines his own heart, lest, while fighting against a heresy, he fall into pride, hatred, or schism.
Canon 15 is a boundary for defending the faith, not a weapon for settling scores. It does not call for the establishment of a parallel world out of human ambition, but for walling oneself off from heresy. It does not abolish the episcopate, nor does it make the priest the supreme authority. On the contrary, it defends the true episcopal ministry against its falsification, because the bishop is called to be the guardian of the apostolic faith, not the source of a new faith.
Orthodox obedience is not blind submission to any order. It is obedience in Christ, in truth, and within the boundaries of Holy Tradition. Neither is the bishop above the Gospel, nor is the priest free from the order of the Church, nor can the believer make his own opinion the measure of truth. All are under the judgment of Christ. And true unity is not built through the forced silence of conscience, but through the same faith, the same Eucharist, and the same life in truth.
Therefore, priests who have suffered for the confession of faith must neither be idolized nor hastily condemned. Each case must be examined in truth, with documents, with testimonies, with the Holy Canons, and without passion. If they erred, the error must be shown with love and foundation. If, however, they were punished because they refused communion with a publicly preached heresy, then the decision against them cannot be considered just merely because it was issued by an authority. In such a case, the canon does not call them rebels, but defenders of the Church against the division caused by heresy.
There remains, of course, a severe suffering: a sanctioned cleric is prevented from serving, the faithful are troubled, communities are scattered, and the state may come to consider any continuation of service as a violation of a legal norm. Here, two planes meet that must not be confused. The state can acknowledge the existence of an administrative decision, but it cannot judge before God whether that decision was canonical and just. The diocese can forbid access to a building in its ownership, but the truth of a confession is not decided by property rights. The Patriarchate can issue press releases, but the conscience of the Church is not reduced to a press release.
This is not a call to anarchy, to disregarding laws, or to disturbing public order. The Christian does not seek conflict and does not despise state authority. He obeys laws as long as they do not require him to sin or to deny his faith. But when obedience to men comes into direct contradiction with obedience to God, the apostolic response remains unchanged: “We ought to obey God rather than men.”
Confession does not mean provocation, but fidelity. It does not mean a desire to be persecuted, but the refusal to buy peace at the price of truth. The true confessor does not prepare an imaginary crown for himself and does not declare himself holy. He trembles for his own salvation, prays not to err, and accepts suffering only when he can no longer avoid compromise without wounding his soul.
The greatest danger for the Church is not always persecution. Visible persecution often awakens consciences and can give birth to martyrs. More dangerous is becoming accustomed to compromise, the external peace bought through silence, the thought that the stability of the institution is worth more than the truth for which the institution exists. A quiet Church deprived of confession can be more wounded than a persecuted, but living Church.
The confessor is not a person without fear. He is a person who feels fear, but does not allow it to become the master of his conscience. He may tremble before the tribunal, he may weep when he loses his church, he may suffer when abandoned by those close to him, and he may feel the weight of uncertainty. But beneath all this, there is a peace that the world cannot give: the peace of the person who knows he has not sold his conscience.
Perhaps one generation will condemn him. Perhaps another will lift his penalty. Perhaps his name will be cleared after death, when he will no longer be able to hear the words of rehabilitation and will no longer be able to cross the threshold of the church from which he was driven out. But he who has suffered for the truth will bear before Christ a joy that no human decree can take away from him. Not the joy of one who considers himself without fault, but the humble peace of one who can say:
“Lord, I was weak and sinful. Perhaps I did not know how to say everything as it should have been said. Perhaps I sometimes mixed my pain with my confession. But I did not wish to betray You. I did what I understood I was bound to do to preserve the faith received from the Holy Fathers. If I remained standing, You strengthened me; if I erred, may Your mercy correct me.”
This is the measure of true confession: not boastful confidence in one’s own righteousness, but faithfulness joined with repentance. The confessor does not present himself before Christ asking for reward, but asking for mercy. He does not say: “I was better than others,” but: “I sought not to deny You.” He does not rejoice that others fell, but gives thanks that God did not let him fall along with them.
On the Day of Judgment, titles, ranks, decrees, or temporary decisions will no longer speak. A person will not be asked how much power he had, but what he did with it. The bishop will answer whether he preserved the faith and whether he loved his flock. The priest will answer whether he served with a pure heart and whether he did not turn the altar into a place of personal ambition. The monk will answer whether he preserved the spirit of repentance. The layperson will answer whether he confessed the truth with love and humility.
Then it will be seen clearly who preserved the unity of the Church and who merely defended the peace of an administration. It will be seen who truly obeyed and who used obedience as a cover for fear. It will be seen who confessed out of love for Christ and who made confession an occasion for pride.
Until then, we are called not to judge lightly, but neither to remain silent out of cowardice. Let us not call every punished person a confessor, nor every condemned person guilty. Let us test the spirits, preserve the faith received, guard against hatred, and not allow the fear of men to be greater than the fear of God.
The Church will not be saved by violence, rhetoric, or the ambition of men who believe themselves to be its sole defenders. It is preserved by Christ through holiness, through faithful bishops, humble priests, praying monastics, and laypeople who have not lost their conscience. Sometimes these will be known; at other times they will remain hidden. Sometimes they will serve in cathedrals; at other times in houses, in forests, or in catacombs. But wherever the right faith, the apostolic succession, and the Holy Eucharist are preserved in truth, there Christ does not cease to be present.
Therefore, we must not despair. Times of confession are not only times of danger, but also times of great grace. They reveal what peace conceals. They show how much faith is worth to each of us, how deep our obedience to Christ is, and whether we love the Church for its truth or merely for the security it offers us.
Perhaps people will take away from a priest the church in which he served. Perhaps they will take his vestments, his name from the registers, and his right recognized by institutions. Perhaps they will call him a rebel, a fanatic, or a schismatic. But no one can take away the purity of his conscience, if it is truly pure; no one can take away his prayer, if he prays without hatred; and no one can erase before God a confession made out of love for the truth.
One generation may punish, and another may repair. A decision may remain in force for a hundred years and then be recognized as unjust. But above all generations stands the same judgment of Christ. It is not influenced by circumstances, political pressure, majorities, or interests. Before it, neither the powerful nor the persecuted will have priority, but only those who have remained in truth, in humility, and in love.
Blessed then will be the person who will be able to hear the word of the Lord: “Well done, good and faithful servant.” Not because he defeated men, but because he conquered himself. Not because he had the last word in a controversy, but because he did not deny Christ. Not because he was praised as a confessor, but because he remained faithful to the end.
This is the victory of the Church: not the triumph of one faction over another, but remaining in Christ. Not the defeat of a bishop, a priest, or an institution, but the deliverance of all from falsehood. Not the revenge of the persecuted, but the repentance of the persecutor and the salvation of both.
And when all human decisions have passed, when all the powers of the world have become dust, and when every soul stands before the Righteous Judge, there will remain only the question from which no one can hide:
HAVE WE BEEN FAITHFUL TO CHRIST?
In the face of this question, all our fears shrink, and all the sufferings of the confessors are illuminated. For Christ has never abandoned His Church, nor will He abandon the person who, with humility, with repentance, and with a pure heart, has chosen to obey God rather than men.