TOAST OF HIS ALL HOLINESS

THE ECUMENICAL PATRIARCH BARTHOLOMEW I

AT THE BANQUET OFFERED IN HIS HONOUR
AT MAPLE LEAF GARDENS

(May 31, 1998)

Most Reverend Metropolitan Sotirios of Toronto

Beloved brother in Christ,
Distinguished fellow guests,

Recently, a great discussion has arisen, concerning the responsibilities of

laymen in the Orthodox Church. This issue has not been of concern in the
Orthodox East for centuries, because, the Holy Fathers, who properly instructed us
about everything, and the living tradition of the Church, have implemented an
harmonious collaboration between the clergy and laymen, so that there is no
imposition of the one on the other and the role of neither is ignored, but all are of
sound judgment and cooperate in Christ.
It is characteristic that those who have the call and mission to the priesthood
use, in the ecclesiastical prayers, vocabulary revealing that they feel that Christ
acts through them and that they do not appropriate the spiritual power which
accompanied their priestly status. Moreover, they repeatedly call laymen
"brothers", placing themselves as individuals, at equal rank with them and
acknowledging that the superior value of their priestly status belongs to Christ of
whom they are mere instruments or simple agents.
Orthodox clergy, acting in this spirit, are not possessed by the arrogance of
those having authority, but by the humble disposition of ministry and service to
their fellow men and brothers, by using the charismatic abilities attached by Christ
to the priestly status. That is, the priest and the archpriest serve their brother, as
the doctor serves his fellow man, without feeling that he, as an individual, has any
authority over him other than the one necessary for the healing and salvation of his
brother. Similarly, the layman trusts and respects the clergyman, as the one
commissioned by God to offer him the Divine Grace, which is necessary for the
fruitfulness in his life, for the restoration of his spiritual health, which is
repeatedly pierced in the struggles of life, and his ultimate salvation.
In this way, each member of the Church has a talent or a ministry, as the
Apostle Paul said, to remind us that God has appointed some to be deacons others
to be Apostles, others teachers, others prophets, healers, etc., and no one who
wants to work for the Church is turned away, but at the same time, nobody
arbitrarily intervenes in the tasks not assigned to him, but assigned to others.
Our brothers, the Protestants, though, dismissed Divine Grace as unnecessary
for the salvation of man, and therefore rendered the clergy unnecessary, for their

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work is the offering of Divine Grace to the faithful. As a result, laymen now
perform the duties of the church.
Seeing this, certain Orthodox that are uninformed about the long-living
institution of the Orthodox Church, think that it is possible that most duties in the
Orthodox Church can be accomplished by them, and as a result displeasing claims
and confrontations arise. Also, there are perhaps certain Orthodox clergymen,
although this phenomenon is rare, who are influenced by the diametrically
opposite policy of the Roman Catholic Church, which overemphasizes the role of
clergy and as a result of that view, problems are created. These problems are not
natural in the Orthodox Church, but are exogenous and transferred from the two
other large Christian groups, the Protestants and the Roman Catholics.
Thus, instead of using the arguments of these groups and transposing this
struggle between clergy and laymen that does not concern the Orthodox Church
and was not born in the context of Orthodoxy, we ought to retrace our
ecclesiastical history and Orthodox life and to conform with the beautiful practice
of peaceful and harmonious collaboration of clergy and laymen, "... outdo one
another in showing honour." (Rom. 12:10), so that unaffected by the foreign
problems and controversies, we attain the realization of the genuine and true
Orthodox mind, where we all "render honour where it is due allowing elders that
rule well to be counted worthy of double honour, especially they who labour in the
word and doctrine" (1Tim 5:17) and as such, in peace, love, mutual respect, and
appreciation, let us attain, clergy and laymen united, the desirable collaboration
that our fathers had.