Handing Over the Pastoral Staff
News and Comments (1)
On the occasion of handing over the pastoral staff from the Coptic Church to the Archbishop of Finland, who believes in the excommunicated Council of Chalcedon and the Tome of Leo that invented the heresy of the two natures, we had written an article in which we said: It is not permissible to hand over the pastoral staff to a bishop who differs from us in faith…
And we wished to conclude this subject and not return to speaking about it. Were it not that some continued to publish successive articles in Coptic newspapers and magazines, trying to give readers the impression that the matter is sound from a church standpoint. We can forgive any mistake that is acknowledged, for we are all liable to error. But we absolutely cannot allow portraying error as though it were right!!
They said that the staff is received by the bishop through a special rite, whereby the staff is placed on the altar, and the Pope hands it to him while the deacon cries out, “Receive the pastoral staff from the hand of our father the Patriarch Anba …” And they said that many heads of churches have exchanged the pastoral staff as a kind of friendship or courtesy. And they said that it is like a great guest who visits our country, to whom we hand the key of the city… The response to all of this is simple:
1- The rite mentioned takes place at the ordination of a new bishop. As for the case of the Archbishop of Finland, the matter is different, because we were not in the process of ordaining him a bishop so that he would receive the staff while the deacon calls out. No, we received him as an archbishop.
2- If this rite had taken place and we had said to him, “Receive the pastoral staff from the hand of the Pope…,” he would thereby have become subordinate to us, under our presidency, and the matter did not reach that extent.
3- As for the claim that this matter has occurred many times among heads of churches, let them inform us of the name of one of the Popes of Alexandria who previously presented a pastoral staff to one of the Chalcedonians.
4- As for the analogy of “the key of the city,” it does not apply. We do not hand over the key of the city to a guest unless he is in complete agreement with us politically. It is as though we are thereby saying to him, “Consider yourself as if you are entirely in your own country.” This is what we do with regard to any bishop who agrees with us in faith: if he visits us, we hand over the church to him—he conducts the prayer, offers the sacrifice, gives the blessing, and gives the absolution… as though he were entirely in his own church, like the guest who receives the key of the city. But with a bishop who differs from us in faith, none of this is permissible at all.
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An article by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III – in Al-Keraza Magazine – Third Year – First and Second Issue, January and February 1967 A.D.
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