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modernity and ecumenism. But the absence of Bulgaria, Antioch and Georgia
was stated to make the Council proper impossible for Russian participation
and it called for a last minute postponement, further hinting that all bishops
should be invited.
Meanwhile the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew had already stated (9
June) that a further pre-conciliar conference contradicted the agreement of the
Assembly (Synaxis) of the Primates earlier this year authorising him to convene
the Council. Three days later (12 June) an open letter of Orthodox theologians
from all the Churches including those now declining to attend was sent to
Constantinople with no less than 1,000 signatures. It stressed the urgent need
for global conciliarity and argued that a Council is the best place to settle
disputes. Having already formally reiterated that the Council would go ahead
the Ecumenical Patriarchate stood firm.
Not all bishops had been invited at attend the Council, each
autocephalous church sent a delegation of 24 bishops, together with advisers,
including a number of women theologians. Voting was by church not
individually by the delegated bishops. Decisions required consensus, though
how that was rightly discerned was debated. As to the agenda, an early list
proposed around 100 items! Wisely, it was reduced to ten and then – after
strong debate in the preparatory sessions to six. These are: the Mission of the
Orthodox Church in the contemporary world; The Orthodox Diaspora;
Autonomy (of the newer Orthodox Churches); Marriage Questions; Fasting
Today; Ecumenical Relations. Important questions knocked off the agenda
include the question of a common Christian Easter. Behind this and other
tensions lies a debate within Orthodoxy which is familiar enough to other
Christians, though in a different register: a conservative critique of modern
western culture and the assertion that ‘western’ churches – and the ecumenical
movement – have succumbed to the spirit of the age. There is also, and related
to this, an underlying intra-Orthodox debate between Constantinople and
Moscow on jurisdictional questions in relation to the debate on the autonomy
of newer churches. The question of marriage (of course the Orthodox have
always permitted canonical divorce) and fasting are also related to the impetus
from the diaspora to relate in a new way to their culture, so different from the
historical heartlands of Orthodoxy. So also does the ecumenical agenda. Six
agenda items but a single underlying question: how does Orthodoxy respond to
modernity?
So the Council duly began. Its first working session started on Monday
20th June, preceded by the solemn liturgies of Orthodox Pentecost Sunday, the

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