Religie, Biserică

Orthodoxy and EU Integration: Opportunity or Stumbling Block?

 

LAVINIA STAN şi LUCIAN TURCESCU

Abstract:
The accession to the European Union has been regarded as the most important moment in the recent history of Romania, but, with some notable exceptions, scholars of religion and politics have largely ignored it. This article surveys some of the most important statements on Europe, European Union, and accession made by Romanian orthodox religious figures, both church leaders and theologians, and shows a marked difference between the conciliatory discourse of national church leaders and the more critical statements delivered by regional church leaders and local priests.

Keywords: accession, European Union, integration, Orthodoxy, religion and politics, Romanian Orthodox Church

Few studies dedicated to the European Union (EU) and its Eastern enlargement have investigated the impact of religious actors on this largely political issue and/or the impact of accession and integration on the religious affairs of new member states.¹ Nevertheless, the interaction between religion and EU politics has acquired increased significance after the accession of Romania and Bulgaria in 2007 both because the predominantly-Orthodox religious make-up of the two new Balkan member countries is significantly different from the make-up of all other EU member states, with the exception of Greece, and because religious identification and religious loyalty continue to remain important in Romania, a country where levels of religiousness are higher than in other EU countries.²

Prior to Romania’s entry into the EU in 2007 the local Orthodox Church maintained a cautious, but largely positive, attitude towards accession and integration in tune with the stance adopted by the overwhelming majority of the Romanian political class, civil society, and general population. While critical of Europe’s reluctance to recognize Romania as an equal partner and insistent that, before 2007, the country already belonged to the European family in virtue of its geography, culture, history and Christian traditions, the official statements of the late Orthodox Patriarch Teoctist remained supportive of accession and integration.³ Teoctist’s conciliatory note, however, was reflected neither in the church’s position towards key legislative proposals needed to prepare the country for EU membership nor in the writings of other Orthodox theologians. The Church mounted open, defiant opposition to legalize homosexual behavior, to give pre-university students the right not to pursue religious instruction, and to relax registration requirements for new religions and religious movements. At the same time, the ROC insisted on being recognized as national church with privileges exceeding those offered to other religious denominations, and joined the Catholic Church and some Protestant groups in demanding that the European Constitution mention Europe’s Christian heritage and Christian identity. The tensions between official statements, unofficial theological writings, and interference into the legislative process represent one layer of analysis we pursue.

When it comes to speaking on the EU accession and integration, there are significant differences between the more open and nuanced position of the national church leadership and the more conservative and critical position of regular priests and monks, who carry significant weight in rural areas, where most Romanians reside. Writing before 2007, theologian Teofil Tia identified two major positions regarding the place of Orthodoxy in Europe. According to him, the first such position has been advocated by „theologians and clerics attracted by the prospect of Romania’s European integration.”⁴ This discourse, emphasizing the positive consequences of integration, was promoted primarily by those who „benefited from direct knowledge of Western culture and civilization,” a group including ROC leaders who completed doctoral degrees at Western universities or carried out missionary work among the Romanian Diaspora communities in Western Europe. The second group includes „clerics, intellectuals and believers extremely reserved toward Romania’s belonging to the European super-power,”⁵ such as Metropolitan of Cluj Bartolomeu Anania. Tia discerned quantitative and qualitative differences between the two groups: the Euro-skeptics were numerous but intellectually fragile, whereas the Euro-supporters were fewer but supported by respected intellectuals and opinion leaders. We consider Tia’s observations to be correct, although the two categories occasionally overlap and a number of authoritative intellectual voices have joined the Euro-skeptic camp.

Romanian Orthodox leaders and clergy might take issue with our inclusion of the unofficial statements of theologians, priests and monks not recognized as opinion leaders as part of the Orthodox discourse in that country. The Patriarchate in Bucharest and the Metropolitan and Bishopric sees in Cluj, Iasi, Alba Iulia and Constanta have often insisted that only official statements delivered in an official capacity by officially recognized church leaders are reflective of the ROC’s ‘true’ position. What priests do or say in remote villages and towns, it was argued, should be regarded as the personal opinion of individuals who happen to wear the priestly garb but speak as private persons. This position, however, ignores the fact that priests, monks and theologians carry considerable weight in their communities and command the respect of the faithful. Ordinary faithful can seldom discern between official and unofficial declarations, and they are inclined to regard as more authoritative and wiser the statements of the priests or monks whose advice they seek on a daily basis. Priests and monks, trained in the seminaries and theology departments officially sanctioned by the national church leadership, can speak their mind openly, unfettered by the diplomatic constraints national church leaders must observe.

Romania lacked a serious public debate on EU accession, a process the larger population, the political class, the trade unions, and the civil society supported almost unconditionally. Except for the chauvinistic Greater Romania Party, no major political formation has raised doubts regarding the utility, advisability and feasibility of accession. Given this unquestionable acceptance of EU accession, the ROC has been the most vocal contender of the pros and cons of „entering Europe,” but its relative prominence within the debate on accession was due not to its adamant opposition to the process or support for Romania’s isolation, but to the pro-EU consensus reached by other state and society actors.

Debating the Relationship between Romanian Orthodoxy and the European Union

Debates on the ROC and the EU have revolved around themes such as Romania’s acceptance into the EU, the accession’s impact on the candidate state and its religious affairs, and the accession’s impact on the Union and on Europe’s spiritual and cultural ‘maladies’. While a topic of hot debate in other countries, Europe’s Christian identity and tradition elicited little interest in Bucharest.

Some ROC members were apprehensive about EU accession and the costs it imposed on their country, but church leaders recognized early on that they could not stop Romania’s EU accession and that mounting active and open opposition to a process desired by the overwhelming majority of the population would show them to be „out of sync” with history and consequently make them unpopular. Although some ROC leaders have not warmed to Europe and European values, none of them has openly rejected EU Eastern enlargement in general and Romania’s accession in particular.

Romanian commentators support this interpretation. Discussing the position of the ROC leadership, historian Mirel Banica remarked that European integration represents one of those „signs of the times” that the ROC so skillfully recognized and accepted when opting for a „realistic” strategy in dealing with current political developments. Even if the ROC opposed it, accession would still go ahead, placing the church in the difficult position of denying its „prophetical vocation and capacity to interpret the ‘signs of our times’, and leaving the impression that it failed its own faithful, whose legitimate wishes, ideals and aspirations it chose to ignore.”⁶ Journalist Claudiu Tarziu further noted that, since „Romania’s EU integration is inevitable,” the ROC should not oppose integration, but should contain its negative consequences and turn it into an advantage.⁷

Carp identified the instances when Patriarch Teoctist Arapasu (1986-2007) spoke publicly about Europe and the EU.⁸ In 1995, weeks after the Romanian political parties declared their unflinching support for integration and the country submitted an application for EU membership, Patriarch Teoctist spoke for the first time on the EU accession process.. Teoctist believed that „there can be no European house without the beauty and wealth of Orthodoxy” and the acceptance of predominantly Orthodox countries like Romania.⁹ A year later, the Patriarch insisted that Romania was worthy of acceptance into EU, because „with our church, culture and faith, we’ve been part of Europe ever since we’ve became Christian” at the beginning of the first millennium. The country rightfully belonged to the European family, a view echoed by the Romanian politicians and larger population. For Teoctist, „we [Romanians] are a nation and a country worthy to enter the European community with our traditional values, with our beliefs and arts, with our Orthodox culture.” According to the Orthodox leader, „Romania brings to Europe its history of suffering, sacrifices and martyrs of the faith. The ROC offers Europe the true living of the Orthodox faith in communion [sic].”¹⁰

To show support for Romania’s membership into the EU, in mid-2007 Patriarch Teoctist sponsored the opening of a ROC permanent bureau in Brussels. The Romanian Church was not the first Orthodox Church to open such a bureau in Brussels, as the Moscow Patriarchate, the Orthodox Church of Greece, and the Ecumenical Patriarchate had done so at an earlier date, but it hoped to be one of the most active. This pro-European stance has been even more pronounced once Daniel Ciobotea became the new Romanian Orthodox Patriarch following Teoctist’s death in late 2007. Having done graduate studies in the West, Patriarch Daniel has been an avid promoter of ecumenism, and continued dialogue with other Orthodox sister churches, international organizations and Romanian political actors.¹¹

Teoctist’s conciliatory position failed to reflect the deep frustration other ROC leaders felt toward the conditions the Union asked Romania to fulfill before judging it worthy of inclusion, conditions viewed as unfairly more numerous and unreasonably more stringent than those imposed on other former communist candidate countries in Central Europe. Romanians readily admit that the communist regime they endured was far worse than regimes in neighboring countries, but few recognize that Ceausescu’s erratic economic policies, personality cult and megalomania, pervasive use of secret informers, and persecution of dissidents inside and outside of the Communist Party placed the country at a disadvantage that needed years of sustained effort to overcome. Similarly, Romanian politicians apparently wanted EU membership without working hard to reform their country’s political culture and political institutions. Few Romanians recognized that the accession conditions were more stringent because their country had deeper systemic problems to address.

In an influential article, Metropolitan Bartolomeu Anania of Transylvania – one of ROC’s most authoritative voices – noted that Romanians „have always been Europeans, and thus one can speak not of our ‘entry’ into Europe, but of our reinsertion into Europe or, more precisely, Europe’s reinsertion into us.”¹² He lamented that Romanians were treated as „impoverished primitives” by the colonizing Western European countries when those were the very countries responsible for handing Romania over to the Soviet Union without much protest and without trying to defend it from communism (an allusion to the Yalta agreement of 1945), as a result of which Romania was assigned to the Soviet sphere of influence. Instead of repeatedly insisting on Romania’s undemocratic political culture and under-performing economy, Anania reasoned, the West should set aside its „feelings of superiority” and realize it, and it alone, was to blame for the country’s misfortunes. Equally disappointing was, for Anania, the West’s readiness to belittle Romania’s cultural riches and record of genuine accomplishments. In his words, the West „calls us ‘Balkan’, although geographically we are not part of that region” and Romanians „always had the vision of and lived in Europe, the real Europe.” That „real Europe,” Anania reminded, gave the world great philosophers like Plato, Aristotle and Sophocles, a contribution invalidating the oft-cited division of the continent into the civilized, superior West and the primitive, inferior East. The Balkans did not deserve derogatory labels, as they were Europe’s roots drawing inspiration from „Hellenic thought, Christian spirituality and Roman civilization.” It was this old, „real Europe” that the new Western Europe rejected and belittled in order to propose instead „one Europe built on economics and politics, without any trace of culture and religion.” „We don’t expect spirituality on the part of the West, because it has none,” Anania wrote in order to explain why Romanians „don’t need this Europe…[but] Europe must rediscover Romania.”

The metropolitan adopted a moralizing tone when discussing what exactly Europe had to offer candidate states like Romania. His answer amounted to a pessimistic evaluation of Western mores, and a bitter indictment of cherished democratic values. Tolerance, trust and inclusiveness were to be opposed as a concerted assault on traditional Romanian values. „We are asked to tolerate those that lead us astray in our faith…All proposed forms of syncretism, from New Age to neo-Protestant sects forming ‘Evangelical’ and ‘Evangelizing’ federations…are manifestations of spiritual corruption.” Given the EU’s unreasonable position, Anania considered it advisable to be intolerant towards new religious movements entering the country and luring believers away from the dominant Orthodox Church, the only denomination which, following him, was tied to the very core of Romanian identity.

For Anania, Orthodoxy is the true, „right” religion, while ecumenism is an abdication from core Romanian spiritual values. Accession offered „economics – that is, bread. Through bread we are offered liberty, in whose name we must accept aberrant demands for this Europe to accept us: homosexuality, vice, abortion, fornication, pornography, all damaging to our society, all sins which we, the people, our church and fortunately our Christian Orthodox youth have firmly rejected because we don’t want to lose our national identity in their [sic] accession process.”¹³ Anania was not the only critic of homosexuality, the accession requirement the Parliament fulfilled in 2000 by scrapping Article 200 of the Criminal Code just hours before the Council of Europe threatened to re-start evaluating the country’s human rights record.¹⁴

Patriarch Teoctist repeatedly praised the Romanians’ natural ability to distinguish „sin from virtue, natural from unnatural, normal from abnormal, right from wrong,” and criticized the „acceptance of the degradingly abnormal and unnatural [homosexual] lifestyle as normal and legal.”¹⁵ While stating that „the church condemns sinful love in order to protect sacred love, rejects the tyranny of egotistic passions unable to bear fruit to protect the freedom to love in virtue, rejects the unnatural to protect the dignity of the human being,” Teoctist reminded legislators that „the church works for the salvation of all, even the spiritually and physically sick,” and „appeals to its believers in Parliament to defend human dignity, the moral health of the people, the stability of the family, and the spiritual rebirth of the Romanian society.”¹⁶ To deter Parliament from amending the Criminal Code, Orthodox theologians, priests and monks extolled the virtues of the traditional position vis-à-vis sexual relations and called for rejection of the ‘Westernization’ of Romanian mores.

In a similar line, Teofan Sinaitul, the Holy Synod secretary, attacked legalization of homosexual behavior as a move fostering confusion between „normal and abnormal, good and evil,” and an attack on democracy, since it ran counter the wishes of the majority of the Romanian electorate. Indeed, opinion polls had shown that a majority of the Romanian citizens did not look favorably on homosexual behavior and same-sex couples.¹⁷ Parish priest Sandu Mehedinti deplored it as the „devil’s work” signaling the country’s renunciation of its centuries-old Christian ethics and willing subordination to the secularized and immoral West, while Bishop Andrei Andreicut of Alba Iulia accused politicians of encouraging „social aberrations” if legalizing homosexual behavior.¹⁸ Deputies representing both government and opposition denounced homosexuality, and deplored the EU’s insistence to „corrupt our youth.” A deputy opposed the legalization drive by stating that „We want to enter Europe, not Sodom and Gomorrah,”¹⁹ while another took the very extreme view that even „incest is preferable to homosexuality since at least the former preserved the chance of procreation.”²⁰ Orthodox canon law condemns homosexuality, a view consonant with the position of the overwhelming majority of Romanian Orthodox theologians and married clergy. Other denominations – especially the Roman and Greek Catholics – also came out in favor of the ban on homosexual behavior.

Ordinary Romanians expected EU accession to bring renewed prosperity, higher living standards comparable to those of Western countries, new possibilities for unhindered travel abroad, and offers of high-paid jobs. Romanian politicians believed accession would grant access to significant financial aid packages, well-paid offices in the European political structures in Brussels and Strasbourg, and recognition of their efforts to help the country to fulfill the accession pre-conditions. For some Orthodox theologians, intellectuals and historians accession was a mixed blessing, a process fraught with dangers and difficulties. Chief among these dangers were secularization and the abandonment of Orthodoxy in favor of other religious denominations.

A participant to this debate was Ion Bria, the ROC’s representative to the World Council of Churches in Geneva, who noted early on the prudence with which Romanian theologians debated the links between Orthodoxy and Europe, despite the fact that such a discussion „could lead to the country’s spiritual unity.” Without explaining his position, Bria argued that European integration could lead to the elimination of confessional differences and their convergence with Orthodoxy. He did say that in the long run the Orthodox East is bound to prevail over the non-Orthodox West, because the West „is burdened by substantialism [sic!], rationalism and spiritualism,” and therefore the latter cannot serve as an example for the former. Bria considered two themes as holding significance in discussions revolving around the place of the ROC in the extended Europe: first, that Orthodoxy won a place of honor among religions on the continent because of its resistance and endurance in the face of the communist threat, and second that Europe must protect Orthodoxy because that faith was a component of its Christian heritage.²¹

A provocative text was written in 2005 by historian Petre Guran. In his suggestively titled article „The Romanian Nation Will Be History, and the BOR a Provincial Sect,” he noted that „the sovereignty of the Romanian state has been in constant accelerated decline starting with World War II, but only today, by its own volition, the Romanian state is prepared to renounce de jure most of its sovereignty and it might completely give up the very idea of national sovereignty if the European federalization project would take off.”²² With an eye to the country’s then planned acceptance as a EU member in January 2007, Guran predicted that „within two years the Romanian political nation will be history, within ten years Bucharest [will be] the host of a consular authority, and within 30 years the ROC [will be] an obscure sect in an obscure province.” Given the expected rapid blurring of the contours of Romanian ethnic, national and religious identity, Guran felt compelled to ask: „How will the local church be thought of in a nationless continent composed only of different languages and cultures?” His answer, more programmatic than convincing, tipped the balance toward the transnational Orthodox Church: „the symbolic recognition of the Orthodox Church’s unity…would be a first step towards conquering the anachronism that closes the Orthodox Churches in national islands.”²³

Guran’s predictions did not materialize, as Romania did not lose its national or religious identity following accession into the EU, and the EU did not transform the country into a marginalized, exploited colony. Moreover, Guran’s analysis failed to win support. Some commentators criticized his premise that accession led to national annihilation and continental uniformity, since the Union had failed to bring cultural convergence during its decades-long existence prior to the Eastern enlargement. Others agreed with the timeline of his predictions, which ultimately relegated the ROC to the position of „an obscure church in an obscure province,” since even after accession Romania remained on the fringes of the Union as a member state of second-hand importance. Tarziu took issue with Guran’s assertion that „integration into the EU translates into the abandonment of Orthodoxy,” a statement which placed him in an apparently unsolvable dilemma. As he explained, „if I am for integration, then I turn my back on Orthodoxy; if I maintain an Orthodox position, then I opt for isolation, which could mean self-destruction.” The dichotomy was a false one, Tarziu contended, since the two – Orthodoxy and the EU – were perfectly compatible and reconcilable, both theoretically and practically.²⁴

Other commentators and theologians examined the dangers of possible secularization through closer contact with Western Europe in the framework of the enlarged EU. For Tia, the secularization that accompanied accession represented a risk the ROC had to assume, and a challenge the Romanian Orthodox clergy and faithful must face and address through flexibility and aggiornamento, an effort to accord church ritual, dogma and social program to present realities.²⁵ Tarziu was among the few who noted that EU accession will not trigger secularization, since the process had already been under way for some time in Romania during communist and post-communist times, but could very well accelerate it. In his view, „after the integration into the EU a-religiousness will be on the rise. Our churches will become as empty as those in the West, the more so since the aggressively a-religious European [political] institutions will impose a secularization policy.” At the same time, he wisely remarked that „integration does not bring secularization; it only accelerates” a process already begun. The text ends with an encouragement for the ROC to „come out of its hibernation, to communicate better, to step up its instructional work, and to clean up internally.”²⁶

Tia noted that Orthodoxy could help reshape Europe’s identity, if the ROC first solved its own problems, continued its social work, vigorously pursued the dialogue with science, attracted competent and dedicated lay people, continued its commitment to ecumenical dialogue, and „promoted the mystical vocation of the Orthodoxy.” As other Orthodox theologians, Tia deplored „the fragility of Europe” and its numerous illnesses, which, he thought, Orthodoxy could cure. Among these illnesses Tia identified the disintegration of the (traditional) family, the cultural crisis sustained by a „Godless anthropology,” the philosophical nihilism, the moral relativism, the cynical pragmatism, the hedonism of everyday life, the de-Christianization of the elites, as well as the destructive prominence of mass-media associated with an a-moral and destructive „culture of death.” Unsurprisingly, his conclusion was that the Western society was doomed, and only Orthodoxy was capable to improve its moral fiber, to provide general direction, and to help it to rediscover its long-lost spirituality.²⁷

Voicing the concerns of the conservative Euro-sceptic camp, the very popular Hieromonk Amfilohie Branza, who recently has gained increased authority among regular churchgoers and whose sermons are also available on the internet, took a stand against Europe, the EU, and Romania’s membership in a series of widely distributed articles and sermons.²⁸ In one such strong-worded article that got substantial attention from conservative Orthodox believers, he derided democratic values, took issue with what he perceived to be the West’s arrogance toward the impoverished East, and warned that European integration could address economic needs, not spiritual yearnings: „EU is an economic, cultural and political refuge for the countries impoverished and then thrown into the materialistic warp of this century. Most supporters of the European integration see it only as a ‘satisfaction of the belly’. Before we know it, the European Community, under the attractive mask of democracy (human rights, universal suffrage, individual liberty, political participation, security guarantees, etc) will generate an unprecedented conflict on our old continent. Not a military, but a religious conflict stemming from the cutthroat confrontation between the traditional Christian values and the European lifestyle.”²⁹ Branza continued by recognizing the „obvious antagonism between the Church of Jesus Christ and the politics of the European Community,” which post-integration „could turn into conflict, as it pits two ways of life: the Christian way, centered on Christ and His teachings, and the European way, based on the belief that man is the measure of all things. From an Orthodox perspective, the European integration is an offense against Christian life and a slap on Jesus’ face. The Church means nothing for the European legislation, and the notion of ‘sin’ is not even in the EU vocabulary!.... European integration is the work of the national de-Christianization current which, through compulsory Westernization, seeks the Church’s defeat and decay through the creation of a European ecumenical pseudo-church controlled by political authorities in which the true Church is disconnected from the people.”

The EU integration aimed „to rob people of their God, faith and Church through the imposition of legislation excluding all moral responsibility.” As socialism and communism, European democracy „is a political formula implanted in materialism,” whereas the EU, „founded on such a materialistic and atheistic doctrine, soulless and full of devilish pride, is a new Babylon through which the modern humanity seeks to usurp God’s attributes.” The ROC had to assume „the serious provocation that the European civilization raises in front of our Christian life,” First, because the faith that helped the Romanians maintain their Christianity in the face of communist-sponsored atheism „will help them to overcome the secularization threat coming from the EU.” Second, because for the Romanians „the Church is not mere a historical monument, and the Gospel of Jesus is not a mere a museum artifact” one could say that „the Church is the past, present and future of our nation [neam], our life and strength, the true shore, where souls can take solace in the certainty of faith.” As such, „we know that the Holy Spirit that assists [our Church] will not allow the EU or the hell to defeat it!”³⁰

Conclusion

As other Romanian actors, the ROC has been remarkably supportive of the country’s accession into the EU, adopting a much more reserved position with respect to its integration, including the convergence of Romanian and EU mores and values. There is a visible difference between the pro-European attitude of the ROC leadership and the Euro-skeptic position of some metropolitans, bishops, priests, monks and theologians who commend significant support from the faithful. For now, the conciliatory church leadership has had the upper hand when it comes to actual church policy and actions towards the EU, but the conservative group centered around Metropolitan Anania, his followers, and like-minded monks have been far more vocal than the pro-European Orthodox theologians.