THE ECONOMIC AND REFUGEE CRISIS AND THE CHURCH
Το πλήρες κείμενο της ομιλίας του π. Εμμανουήλ Κλάψη στο προσφυγικό συνέδριο του Κέντρου κατά την πρώτη συνεδρία.
The social the economic crisis since late 2009 coupled with the chronic structural inefficiencies of the Greek economy
turned out very quickly into a humanitarian crisis with sharp rises in
poverty rates, unemployment, and inequality. While Greece was in an
already weakened economic position, it was put in the position to have
to manage the most dramatic influx of a significant number of asylum
seekers. People were fleeing from deeply entrenched intransigent violent
conflicts that had caused social and political polarization fueled by
strong population growth, economic inequality, and ideological and
religious schisms. European nations, including Greece, initially
adopted open-door policies welcoming the refugees, but as the numbers of
refugees became more massive, they modified their policies. They
adopted a reactive and short-term approach to migration. Thus, the
Poorly designed and implemented migration and integration policies,
together with high unemployment and increasing inequality triggered
fear, resentment, xenophobia, racism, Islamophobia, political discord,
and an alarming rise in nativist movements. The impact of the austerity
measures and the limited social and economic resources, including social
welfare services, raised the question of who has access to free social
and health care, namely native citizens and/or foreigners (namely
migrants). This dilemma triggered conflicts and political divisions in
all European nations. The economic impact of the refugee crisis and the
social consequences of their presence in European societies motivated
some nations to close their borders, build walls and raise fences for
the purpose to keep the asylum seekers everywhere else except in their
territories. In many European nations, the dignity of the refugees has
been assaulted or rather it has been disregarded.
In addressing the magnitude of the crisis, it has been recognized from
the beginning that it could not just be addressed by any single European
nation. It required joint efforts and collaboration of local, state,
regional and global government agencies with religious communities and
other agencies that have the experience in aiding refugees. The
Christian churches in their public witness and in addressing the
economic and refugee crisis must uphold and defend the rights and the
dignity of the poor and of the refugees who have also being created in
God's image (Gen. 1:26-27; 5:1-3; 9:6; 1 Cor 11;7; Jas 3:9). The
affirmation of their dignity is not only a Christian ethical imperative,
but it also has universal validity. It has been expressed in different
terms in other religious, philosophical, and humanitarian traditions. It
has close affinities with human rights particularly as they are
understood in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the
1951 United Nations Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, which
remains the charter document for refugee rights and protections. All
of them underscored the inherent value and worth of every person,
regardless of their political, economic, social, geographical,
religious, and cultural status. It is impossible to construct just
policies ordered to the common good and to the benefit of society's
weakest members without adequate consideration and affirmation of the
dignity of the poor and of the refugees.
The Orthodox Church has unequivocally expressed her belief that "Defending the dignity of refugees and migrants is nothing less than the fulfillment of the Church's mission of Diakonia to the world. The Encyclical of the Holy and Great Council (Crete, June 2016) claimed that the Church's solidarity with the suffering victims of history has never been limited just too circumstantial good deeds, but rather it has sought to eradicate the causes that generate suffering and inequality. The question here is how the Orthodox churches "have sought to eradicate the causes that generate suffering and inequality and whether such efforts can effectively be carried by a single religious community without collaborating with other communities who also envision a world without violence, inequality, and injustice. The highly complex socio-economic and geopolitical roots of the economic and migrant crisis require from the churches not only goodwill to address their consequences but efforts to understand their depth as much as it is possible and then develop appropriate joint strategies with others who aspire to promote a world with less poverty, injustice, and suffering. The Gospel itself in the parable of the good Samaritan provides guidance and inspiration of how active love for the most vulnerable neighbors must be expressed. The "neighbor" (πλησίον) that we must care is everyone who needs support, regardless of their social, religious, cultural, or political affiliation. This kind of love is certainly costly.
The contributions of Christian churches and faith communities in joint projects of humanitarian aid and in efforts to overcome racial, cultural and religious bigotry has been recognized to be of crucial importance. Their local initiatives in welcoming the refugees and contributing to their social inclusion and integration into the receiving societies cannot be ignored. His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew has suggested that the refugee crisis could awake the sense of the solidarity and lead to a spiritual and moral renewal of the European nations. It could build bridges among the nations, practicing solidarity, instill confidence, and encourage cooperation among governments, civil society, religious communities, international agencies and others working together in a consistent and coordinated manner in providing a safe and humane environment for the poor and the refugees. The participation of the Churches in such efforts becomes a reality when they decide at some point to translate their intentions that their prayers and public declarations of compassion expressed into actions informed and guided by the cries of the suffering victims of history.
The Response of the Church of Greece to the Economic Crisis.
The Economic and the refugee crisis provided to the Orthodox Church of Greece opportunities to be actively involved in public deliberations about the causes of the crisis; to jointly work with other agents of the civil society, religious communities, international agencies and politicians addressing the complex local, regional and global causes of the economic and refugee crisis; and to respond to the immediate needs of the poor and the migrants through humanitarian aid. Despite the recent attempts of Orthodox academic theologians to develop a political theology that justify the liberative and transformative involvement of the Church in situations of injustice and oppression, the Church with some exceptions has chosen to respond to the socio-economic crisis primarily with an extensive range of social welfare programs. It set up an extensive network of soup kitchens and clothing and food distribution centers; offered shelter, financial aid, free medicine and medical care to all people in need, including migrants; provided and continues to offer material, psychological and social support to all vulnerable people. With these charitable and social activities, she expressed her faithfulness to the Gospel, affirming the dignity of all human beings, and expressing her solidarity with the homeless, the poor and needy regardless of belief, ethnicity, or race.
Humanitarian aid, however, is undeniably a limited, temporary and insufficient solution of addressing social ills It is feared that the effectiveness in addressing some of the most immediate repercussions of austerity at the local level may redirect attention away from systemic inequalities. This is an unintended consequence of humanitarian activities, but it does not preclude the potential to contribute to the formation of active networks of citizens seeking change. While humanitarian aid has the proclivity to de-politicize and individualizes human suffering, humanitarianism does not preclude the politically empowering potential of humanitarian solidarity. Those who participate in acts of humanitarian aid must be aware of this risk and be sensitized to the deeper roots of human suffering. Such a consciousness-raising could enable them to develop or participate - as some already do - in networks of citizens seeking a change of those social structures that assault human dignity and contribute to poverty, violence, human suffering, and inequality.
The Church of Greece has been critiqued for her reluctance to address in a critical and systematic manner the structural causes of the crisis. The attitudes of the Church during the crisis have been aptly summed up in the following terms: "crisis as a disease, the Church as doctor and charity as medicine." She has chosen with some exceptions to abstain from taking part in any social activism or public stance on the weaknesses of the current status of social protection or more generally on solidarity and social welfare rights in Greece as well as the increasing inequality that the crisis has generated. She has focused instead on a fragmented philanthropic approach and limited actions on issues of social justice. Metropolitan Ignatius of Volos offered an interpretation of this position. He stated that the Church, "tried from the beginning to function as a source of unity for the people. She attempted to cope with the crisis by avoiding, the danger of falling into divisive ideological extremism." In responding on whether the Church should critically assess "the financial and debt crisis plaguing Europe," he reminded to the critics that "the economic crisis has serious consequences for all Greek citizens, the Church's flock" and the Church "is not a secular institution or one of the organizations of this world." In the end, however, He admits that Church's response to the economic crisis has mainly taken the form of emergency charity and that her approach is rather superficial because it fails to examine the problem at its roots.
While one can understand the choice of the Church not to speak the truth about the crisis for the purpose of preserving in her discourse the unity of the Greek people, one must note that the crisis did not affect everybody in the same way; the most disadvantaged, marginal, financially vulnerable, and undocumented migrants were affected differently than those groups that still enjoy some rights, for example, the right to work, education, healthcare, and security. On the other hand, it is true that the eschatological orientation of the Church does not encourage her identification with any of the political or economic ideologies that prevail in the world. She must retain a critical distance from all of them. This, however, does not mean that the Church should distance herself from those whose experience of injustice and oppression inspire their commitment to actions for greater justice and peace in the world. The Church in the words of Michael Walzer should act in the public sphere of modern society as a "connected critic." As a connected critique, the Church genuinely cares about the values inherent in any political project. Her critique serves to call a society back to its better nature. Such critique, however, can only be authentically exercised by those who actively participate in public deliberations and efforts to lessen the injustice, oppression, violence, and poverty on the local, regional and global living space.
Impediments to a Robust Orthodox Witness in the Public Sphere
It is widely recognized that the Orthodox church, most especially in the Holy and Great Council of 2015, has opted to participate in public deliberations and joint efforts to bring greater justice and peace in the world. Yet, despite these apparently expressed intentions, local Orthodox Churches still do not have a robust presence in the public sphere promoting a culture of justice and peace. Let us briefly identified some of the impediments that weaken the presence of the Orthodox Church in the public sphere?
The single most potent constraint to her public witness is her close historical association with the state. Whenever the Church and the state become inseparable; the Church is deprived of the capacity to evaluate the ethical propriety of state actions and institutional practices. On the other hand, the limitation of the Church in the private sphere limits the Church witness and leads to privatism. The Church is more likely to uphold ethical standards if she is intimately engaged in the public sphere participating in deliberations and movements of social transformation.
In the public sphere, the Church must use her language of faith with an emphasis on its hermeneutical potential to illuminate and interpret shared meanings, rather than to witness to her sovereign truth. She should evoke the shareable human experience that allows the citizens of democratic societies to reflect on their shared human situation. In this context, the promotion of human dignity and rights plays a crucial role in the Church's prophetic witness in the world. This kind of presence in the public sphere has the potential to contribute to the initiation of a wide range of alliances in promoting justice, peace, and equality.
Are the Orthodox Churches capable in themselves to develop a discourse and practices that meet the highly complex, interpenetrating, ever-changing challenges of a modern global world? Do they have the skills and the disposition for developing a broader socio-analytical frame of reference needed to make sense of these global developments? The Orthodox churches today are challenged to think and act beyond the notion of the Ethnos in the context of regional and global governance and citizenship. The challenges of the economic and refugee crises and the consequence of widening economic inequality that they generate are challenges that require local, regional and global responses. The World Council of Churches and the European Council of Churches as global and regional ecclesial agencies provide opportunities to the Orthodox churches to study together with other Christian churches all the facets of the emerging highly complex global world. Within these global and regional agencies, the Orthodox Church can collaboratively craft strategies of action that bring the gospel into the life of the world. In their ecumenical deliberations, the Churches can recognize the critical role of the market in modern societies, the logic, and the far-reaching social consequences of the unfettered globalization of market relations. Together, they can develop a vision of life and strategies of action that contribute to a new world with less injustice, violence, and inequality.
The Orthodox Churches, however, have difficulties to be involved in social activism and in many instances have critique those Christian churches that give primary emphasis in their ecclesial praxis to social activism. They may be rigorously attentive to the observance of their liturgical and spiritual obligations (fasting, prayers, pilgrimage, liturgical celebrations, and charitable work), but such observances may not in practice be well attuned to the imperatives of social justice and advocacy for human rights Metropolitan John Zizioulas acknowledges that the Orthodox ethos is primarily shaped by the liturgical actualization of God's kingdom in the Eucharistic celebration. However, he states, the emphasis on the liturgy, in some instances, undermines the Church's mission and involvement in history, being satisfied with a beautiful liturgy without bothering to draw its social and ethical implication, avoiding the conflicts of history by escaping to the eschatological realm of the liturgical celebration. If the liturgy shapes the Orthodox understanding of how to be and relate to the world, it is crucial "to draw the ethical implications of the Eucharist and see it as a source of life in all respects and not simply as a cultic experience."
A disjuncture between liturgical and spiritual practice and societal concerns, whether or not it is the result of a conscious retreat into personal piety, is a severe impediment against constructive responses to the challenges posed by widening economic inequalities, poverty, political corruption, refugee flows, human rights violations, or various forms of environmental degradation. The remedy of such incongruity that limits the Church's public witness can be partly addressed by the kind of catechesis and nurturing that schools of theology, seminaries, monasteries, and catechetical education programs are offering. The question here is the extent to which these institutions through their ethos, curriculum, and pedagogy, equip the community of believers to live harmoniously and creatively not only with each other, but also with people of other faiths, and with the broader community generally.
Finally, the credibility of the Church's advocacy for human rights, however, is severely threatened by the tendency of the Church's hierarchy to intervene in the political sphere, solely or predominantly in defense of self-interested objectives or nationalistic aims. Here we have in mind the various causes that Church's hierarchs often espouse with predictable vociferousness and, at times, intransigence. These cases generally fall into two categories: political pressure designed to protect and expand the physical infrastructure of religious establishments; and advocacy of specific rules and regulations that form part of personal morality, with particular reference to sexual relations. The net effect is to tarnish Church's image and to feed a widespread perception that the Church's activism is no less self-interested or more far-sighted than other self-seeking pressure groups. The fact that faithful are unlikely to be animated by precisely the same aspects of the Orthodox tradition also weakens the public witness of the Church. More often than not, the faithful are subdivided into distinct schools of thought, spiritual practices or tendencies. They adhere to sharply conflicting interpretations of the Orthodox faith. They contest on who offers the most authoritative and binding interpretation of the Orthodox tradition, and this militates against a shared or coherent response to major national or international crises. Thus, as the Church attempts to contextualize its ethical message, it is important to be in dialogue not only with the challenging and highly contested realities of the world but to commence an intra-ecclesia dialogue about the different options that the Church has at her disposal for the purpose of being a vibrant presence in the life of the world.
(Delivered at the Interdisciplinary International Ecumenical Conference on the Economic and Refugee Crises held in Thessaloniki, 20-22 February 2018)
The Orthodox Church has unequivocally expressed her belief that "Defending the dignity of refugees and migrants is nothing less than the fulfillment of the Church's mission of Diakonia to the world. The Encyclical of the Holy and Great Council (Crete, June 2016) claimed that the Church's solidarity with the suffering victims of history has never been limited just too circumstantial good deeds, but rather it has sought to eradicate the causes that generate suffering and inequality. The question here is how the Orthodox churches "have sought to eradicate the causes that generate suffering and inequality and whether such efforts can effectively be carried by a single religious community without collaborating with other communities who also envision a world without violence, inequality, and injustice. The highly complex socio-economic and geopolitical roots of the economic and migrant crisis require from the churches not only goodwill to address their consequences but efforts to understand their depth as much as it is possible and then develop appropriate joint strategies with others who aspire to promote a world with less poverty, injustice, and suffering. The Gospel itself in the parable of the good Samaritan provides guidance and inspiration of how active love for the most vulnerable neighbors must be expressed. The "neighbor" (πλησίον) that we must care is everyone who needs support, regardless of their social, religious, cultural, or political affiliation. This kind of love is certainly costly.
The contributions of Christian churches and faith communities in joint projects of humanitarian aid and in efforts to overcome racial, cultural and religious bigotry has been recognized to be of crucial importance. Their local initiatives in welcoming the refugees and contributing to their social inclusion and integration into the receiving societies cannot be ignored. His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew has suggested that the refugee crisis could awake the sense of the solidarity and lead to a spiritual and moral renewal of the European nations. It could build bridges among the nations, practicing solidarity, instill confidence, and encourage cooperation among governments, civil society, religious communities, international agencies and others working together in a consistent and coordinated manner in providing a safe and humane environment for the poor and the refugees. The participation of the Churches in such efforts becomes a reality when they decide at some point to translate their intentions that their prayers and public declarations of compassion expressed into actions informed and guided by the cries of the suffering victims of history.
The Response of the Church of Greece to the Economic Crisis.
The Economic and the refugee crisis provided to the Orthodox Church of Greece opportunities to be actively involved in public deliberations about the causes of the crisis; to jointly work with other agents of the civil society, religious communities, international agencies and politicians addressing the complex local, regional and global causes of the economic and refugee crisis; and to respond to the immediate needs of the poor and the migrants through humanitarian aid. Despite the recent attempts of Orthodox academic theologians to develop a political theology that justify the liberative and transformative involvement of the Church in situations of injustice and oppression, the Church with some exceptions has chosen to respond to the socio-economic crisis primarily with an extensive range of social welfare programs. It set up an extensive network of soup kitchens and clothing and food distribution centers; offered shelter, financial aid, free medicine and medical care to all people in need, including migrants; provided and continues to offer material, psychological and social support to all vulnerable people. With these charitable and social activities, she expressed her faithfulness to the Gospel, affirming the dignity of all human beings, and expressing her solidarity with the homeless, the poor and needy regardless of belief, ethnicity, or race.
Humanitarian aid, however, is undeniably a limited, temporary and insufficient solution of addressing social ills It is feared that the effectiveness in addressing some of the most immediate repercussions of austerity at the local level may redirect attention away from systemic inequalities. This is an unintended consequence of humanitarian activities, but it does not preclude the potential to contribute to the formation of active networks of citizens seeking change. While humanitarian aid has the proclivity to de-politicize and individualizes human suffering, humanitarianism does not preclude the politically empowering potential of humanitarian solidarity. Those who participate in acts of humanitarian aid must be aware of this risk and be sensitized to the deeper roots of human suffering. Such a consciousness-raising could enable them to develop or participate - as some already do - in networks of citizens seeking a change of those social structures that assault human dignity and contribute to poverty, violence, human suffering, and inequality.
The Church of Greece has been critiqued for her reluctance to address in a critical and systematic manner the structural causes of the crisis. The attitudes of the Church during the crisis have been aptly summed up in the following terms: "crisis as a disease, the Church as doctor and charity as medicine." She has chosen with some exceptions to abstain from taking part in any social activism or public stance on the weaknesses of the current status of social protection or more generally on solidarity and social welfare rights in Greece as well as the increasing inequality that the crisis has generated. She has focused instead on a fragmented philanthropic approach and limited actions on issues of social justice. Metropolitan Ignatius of Volos offered an interpretation of this position. He stated that the Church, "tried from the beginning to function as a source of unity for the people. She attempted to cope with the crisis by avoiding, the danger of falling into divisive ideological extremism." In responding on whether the Church should critically assess "the financial and debt crisis plaguing Europe," he reminded to the critics that "the economic crisis has serious consequences for all Greek citizens, the Church's flock" and the Church "is not a secular institution or one of the organizations of this world." In the end, however, He admits that Church's response to the economic crisis has mainly taken the form of emergency charity and that her approach is rather superficial because it fails to examine the problem at its roots.
While one can understand the choice of the Church not to speak the truth about the crisis for the purpose of preserving in her discourse the unity of the Greek people, one must note that the crisis did not affect everybody in the same way; the most disadvantaged, marginal, financially vulnerable, and undocumented migrants were affected differently than those groups that still enjoy some rights, for example, the right to work, education, healthcare, and security. On the other hand, it is true that the eschatological orientation of the Church does not encourage her identification with any of the political or economic ideologies that prevail in the world. She must retain a critical distance from all of them. This, however, does not mean that the Church should distance herself from those whose experience of injustice and oppression inspire their commitment to actions for greater justice and peace in the world. The Church in the words of Michael Walzer should act in the public sphere of modern society as a "connected critic." As a connected critique, the Church genuinely cares about the values inherent in any political project. Her critique serves to call a society back to its better nature. Such critique, however, can only be authentically exercised by those who actively participate in public deliberations and efforts to lessen the injustice, oppression, violence, and poverty on the local, regional and global living space.
Impediments to a Robust Orthodox Witness in the Public Sphere
It is widely recognized that the Orthodox church, most especially in the Holy and Great Council of 2015, has opted to participate in public deliberations and joint efforts to bring greater justice and peace in the world. Yet, despite these apparently expressed intentions, local Orthodox Churches still do not have a robust presence in the public sphere promoting a culture of justice and peace. Let us briefly identified some of the impediments that weaken the presence of the Orthodox Church in the public sphere?
The single most potent constraint to her public witness is her close historical association with the state. Whenever the Church and the state become inseparable; the Church is deprived of the capacity to evaluate the ethical propriety of state actions and institutional practices. On the other hand, the limitation of the Church in the private sphere limits the Church witness and leads to privatism. The Church is more likely to uphold ethical standards if she is intimately engaged in the public sphere participating in deliberations and movements of social transformation.
In the public sphere, the Church must use her language of faith with an emphasis on its hermeneutical potential to illuminate and interpret shared meanings, rather than to witness to her sovereign truth. She should evoke the shareable human experience that allows the citizens of democratic societies to reflect on their shared human situation. In this context, the promotion of human dignity and rights plays a crucial role in the Church's prophetic witness in the world. This kind of presence in the public sphere has the potential to contribute to the initiation of a wide range of alliances in promoting justice, peace, and equality.
Are the Orthodox Churches capable in themselves to develop a discourse and practices that meet the highly complex, interpenetrating, ever-changing challenges of a modern global world? Do they have the skills and the disposition for developing a broader socio-analytical frame of reference needed to make sense of these global developments? The Orthodox churches today are challenged to think and act beyond the notion of the Ethnos in the context of regional and global governance and citizenship. The challenges of the economic and refugee crises and the consequence of widening economic inequality that they generate are challenges that require local, regional and global responses. The World Council of Churches and the European Council of Churches as global and regional ecclesial agencies provide opportunities to the Orthodox churches to study together with other Christian churches all the facets of the emerging highly complex global world. Within these global and regional agencies, the Orthodox Church can collaboratively craft strategies of action that bring the gospel into the life of the world. In their ecumenical deliberations, the Churches can recognize the critical role of the market in modern societies, the logic, and the far-reaching social consequences of the unfettered globalization of market relations. Together, they can develop a vision of life and strategies of action that contribute to a new world with less injustice, violence, and inequality.
The Orthodox Churches, however, have difficulties to be involved in social activism and in many instances have critique those Christian churches that give primary emphasis in their ecclesial praxis to social activism. They may be rigorously attentive to the observance of their liturgical and spiritual obligations (fasting, prayers, pilgrimage, liturgical celebrations, and charitable work), but such observances may not in practice be well attuned to the imperatives of social justice and advocacy for human rights Metropolitan John Zizioulas acknowledges that the Orthodox ethos is primarily shaped by the liturgical actualization of God's kingdom in the Eucharistic celebration. However, he states, the emphasis on the liturgy, in some instances, undermines the Church's mission and involvement in history, being satisfied with a beautiful liturgy without bothering to draw its social and ethical implication, avoiding the conflicts of history by escaping to the eschatological realm of the liturgical celebration. If the liturgy shapes the Orthodox understanding of how to be and relate to the world, it is crucial "to draw the ethical implications of the Eucharist and see it as a source of life in all respects and not simply as a cultic experience."
A disjuncture between liturgical and spiritual practice and societal concerns, whether or not it is the result of a conscious retreat into personal piety, is a severe impediment against constructive responses to the challenges posed by widening economic inequalities, poverty, political corruption, refugee flows, human rights violations, or various forms of environmental degradation. The remedy of such incongruity that limits the Church's public witness can be partly addressed by the kind of catechesis and nurturing that schools of theology, seminaries, monasteries, and catechetical education programs are offering. The question here is the extent to which these institutions through their ethos, curriculum, and pedagogy, equip the community of believers to live harmoniously and creatively not only with each other, but also with people of other faiths, and with the broader community generally.
Finally, the credibility of the Church's advocacy for human rights, however, is severely threatened by the tendency of the Church's hierarchy to intervene in the political sphere, solely or predominantly in defense of self-interested objectives or nationalistic aims. Here we have in mind the various causes that Church's hierarchs often espouse with predictable vociferousness and, at times, intransigence. These cases generally fall into two categories: political pressure designed to protect and expand the physical infrastructure of religious establishments; and advocacy of specific rules and regulations that form part of personal morality, with particular reference to sexual relations. The net effect is to tarnish Church's image and to feed a widespread perception that the Church's activism is no less self-interested or more far-sighted than other self-seeking pressure groups. The fact that faithful are unlikely to be animated by precisely the same aspects of the Orthodox tradition also weakens the public witness of the Church. More often than not, the faithful are subdivided into distinct schools of thought, spiritual practices or tendencies. They adhere to sharply conflicting interpretations of the Orthodox faith. They contest on who offers the most authoritative and binding interpretation of the Orthodox tradition, and this militates against a shared or coherent response to major national or international crises. Thus, as the Church attempts to contextualize its ethical message, it is important to be in dialogue not only with the challenging and highly contested realities of the world but to commence an intra-ecclesia dialogue about the different options that the Church has at her disposal for the purpose of being a vibrant presence in the life of the world.
(Delivered at the Interdisciplinary International Ecumenical Conference on the Economic and Refugee Crises held in Thessaloniki, 20-22 February 2018)