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The latest straw Mark Stocoe is reduced to snatching at

I submitted the post to orthodoxnews.com which rejected it. I was able, however, to post it on Aleksandr Andreev’s site, http://typiconman.wordpress.com/about/ which is less hostile to all things Russian – and, incidentally, has some very clever html tricks which those interested in up-to-the-minute technical sophistication would surely find fascinating.

on August 4, 2008 at 2:20 pm

Laura Jones

Hi typiconman! I think it is of interest that the comment/suggestion I submitted to orthodoxnews in response to the indicated item has not been posted. Regards, Laura Jones

Speak the Truth! - Orthodox Christians for Accountability 
August 1, 2008
 http://www.orthodoxnews.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=EditorialsOpinion.one&content_id
=17151&CFID=114698087&CFTOKEN=531444
By The Hon. Edward Bearse


===================================

Comments/Suggestions:
Laura Jones’ response to “Speak the Truth!”

To the Hon. Edward Bearse:

I, Laura Jones, will gladly speak the truth, and most emphatically. I am in a superb position to do so. I had a very expertly programmed (by myself) computer and printer stolen from me by – well, whoever Fr. Dn. Eric Wheeler was working for at the time, it was to him that I handed it over. As I did so, he exclaimed excitedly, his eyes glistening with anticipation, “Have you calculated how much that will bring on the [Russian] black market?” I was too stunned to mumble, “Why, no, Father Deacon, such a thing never came into my head! I programmed it for a professor at the Leningrad Theological Academy! When one of our monks directed me to turn it over to you, I supposed this was because you would expedite its delivery to this professor!” But by the time I finished thinking this, he had slammed closed the trunk of the stretch limousine and driven off.

A few days later I myself went to Russia, having intended to present the system which I had – not without considerable effort, this was back in the days when each element of a foreign language system, especially one with a different orthography, had to be individually located, acquired, and then programmed into the whole – built for my friend the theology professor. Of course he had not heard hide nor hair about the system, nor had anyone else. I made a very thorough search all over Russia, but never did I come across the merest clue as to what had transpired. Although I did learn quite a lot, and for being so knowledgeable I was subsequently twice excommunicated from the OCA.

So I am well placed to inform you, your Honor, about the manipulations of the former OCA chancellor, one Robert Kondratick, who victimized our former metropolitan, taking advantage of the metropolitan’s failings to aggrandize himself – to the tune of this sum you are concerned with in your post, “Speak the Truth!” Kondratick also shamelessly played one Orthodox jurisdiction off against another, doing untold damage to the Church’s ability to carry out her sacred mission. To Kondratick, the only things sacred are his bank account and his political machinations.

Our present metropolitan, Met. Herman, with a skill that could only be divinely inspired (especially in the face of Kondratick and his cabal) managed to have the former metropolitan retired and himself – canonically and with all due process - elected metropolitan. Also, with minimal instability within the Church – and this in spite of the unrelenting and unrelentingly malicious attacks of Mark Stokoe – Met. Herman has replaced almost the entirety of the leadership within the OCA. Our two seminaries in the “lower 48” have been completely overhauled, and the egregious situation in Alaska, which can only be laid at the feet of R. Kondratick, is now at last being compassionately addressed and resolved.

The situation in Alaska came to a head (I know because I reported on the matter myself, the only person doing so, and for this incurred my first excommunication) – so this situation came to a head when the former metropolitan point blank fired the truly beloved, and justly so, then bishop in Alaska, and sent up a replacement who was personally unfit for the office, and was thoroughly disliked and rejected by the Alaskans. The burden of my reporting was that this is fundamentally uncanonical, as reflected in the fact that in our Orthodox ordination services, the people to serve whom the candidate is being ordained cry out “Axios”, meaning “worthy” during the service. The ordination was in Alaska itself, and almost all of the OCA bishops went up to Alaska and participated in the charade, although one, who was versed in canon law, did not attend. At the time during the ordination service to call out “Axios” a former student of the Alaskan seminary cried out “Unaxios”, meaning unworthy. He was unceremoniously dragged out of the church, and I was told that the bishop who had refused to attend (no doubt anticipating what occurred) stated that this would invalidate the ordination. When all the brouhaha was over, I was told on very good authority that Kondratick, still of course chancellor at that time, said: “Well, we certainly learned our lesson!” Was the lesson that at the very least canonical procedures should be observed? No, Kondratick continued, according to this report, “Next time we will ordain the bishop BEFORE we send him out to his see.”

So that pretty much brings us up to date. From your post I see – no offense to you personally, your Honor – that our inimical “friend” M. Stokoe has evidently run out of malcontents in our own Orthodox Communion, so that he is reaching out to one who is not even in Communion with our Church, but describe himself thusly: “I have not converted. I am only a seeker. The scandal may well prevent me from converting in an institutional sense.” While we appreciate your serious study of Orthodox theology, your Honor, this does not, according to the canons and practices of our Church, suffice to make you “about 90% Eastern Orthodox theologically”, and most especially since your allusions to Eastern Orthodox theology betray an egregious failure to indicate even an awareness of the most fundamental teachings of our Church upon which all the rest depends.

I have, your Honor, spoken the truth most emphatically, undeterred by considerations of whether it will resonate pleasantly or unpleasantly with those who read this post.

What I suggest to all concerned is that at this point the OCA be allowed to cut its losses and move on. Robert Kondratick has been unfrocked and – most generously, I would say – given a job in which he cannot continue his malicious manipulations but is accorded a modest but sufficient salary.

Do you honestly think, your Honor, that putting a dollar figure on all the millions, maybe more, that Kondratick siphoned into his own pocket over the years – not to mention the agony of soul he cruelly inflicted on those who fell under his sway - is really worth what this would cost the OCA in terms of the necessary freedom to carry on the mission that God has entrusted to His Church?

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