ern and Western, especially at the points in history when theyrnare explicitly opposing each other or together combating thernsame contemporary errors. The happy result of this can be arngenuine ecumenism, an ecumenism, if you will, of the “antiecumenical,”rninnocent of ideology or indifferentism. DomrnGerard Calvet, abbot of the traditional Benedictine abbey ofrnthe Madeleine, Le Barroux in Provence has said: “The true ecumenismrnis that of Tradition . . . the more I deepen my understandingrnof Tradition, the more I rediscover other men.”rnAfter the pilgrimage to the Holy Mountain, I went to Serresrnin Macedonia near the Bulgarian border, to the monastery ofrnthe Holy Forerunner, to the tomb of Gennadios Scholarios,rnfirst patriarch of Constantinople imder Turkish domination, tornpay a debt of gratitude to him by praying for the repose of hisrnsoul, having completed in 1993 a study of his thought for a doctoraternat a Roman universit)’. The monastery, to which he retiredrnand from which he hoped (and hopes still!) to rise in thernparousia, is now flourishing after many years without a monasticrncommunity. There are nuns there, the spiritual daughters ofrnthe great Father Ephraim, abbot of Philotheou on Athos, whornhas foimded a number of observant communities in Greecernand most recendy in Arizona at a desert town ominously—forrnthe Orthodox at least—named Florence. Two kind nuns accompaniedrnme to the katholikon where they were amazed andrna bit reluctant to see me venerate the relics of the monastery,rnand they stood by, one on each side, with a certain skeptical vigilancernas I knelt and prayed a rosary more romano at the epitaphrnof the patriarch. They simply did not know what to expect fromrna Latin priest, but they were willing and charitable enough inrntheir watchfulness.rnHere was another touching and curious scene, yet one morerntrulv indicative of the state of things past and present and futurernthan that written on the postcard icon. This was a living icon ofrnthe clarit}’ about tradition just commended, with the tense, butrnkind-hearted akribeia (strictness of interpretation) which oughtrnto characterize the relations between Roman Catholics andrnEastern Orthodox. None of us had made a compromise, butrnsomething true had brought us together. The nuns representedrnthe living tradition of Orthodoxy; the kneeling priest, thernfaith of the Roman Catholic Thomist. What did the patriarchrnlying in death, surrounded by his modern mourners, represent?rnGennadios Scholarios was the hand-picked successor of St.rnMark of Ephesus as leader of the zealot opposition to thernunion council of Florence, at which they had both assisted.rnWhen the union decree of the council was promulgated byrnEmperor Constantine and the papal legate, Cardinal Isidore ofrnKiev, in Hagia Sophia in December 1452 (just six months beforernthe fall of the city), Gennadios published the followingrnproclamation on the door of his cell in the monastery of Charsianeitesrnnearby:rnO miserable Romans, why will you abandon the truth;rnand why instead of confiding in God will you put yourrntrust in the Italians? In losing your faith you will losernyour city. Have mercy on me O Lord! I protest in yourrnpresence that I am innocent of the crime. O miserablernRomans, consider, pause, and repent. At the same momentrnyou renounce the religion of your fathers, by embracingrnimpiet- you submit to a foreign servitude.rnLater, after the fall of the city, Mehmet II brought Gennadiosrnback from captivity to make him the patriarch of the Romansrnand the first ethnarch of the Greek-speaking Christians underrnthe Turcocracy. Gennadios resigned in 1457 to go to Vatopedirnon Athos, was brought back again in 1462, and then resignedrndefinitively in 1464 and went into retirement at the monasteryrnof the Forerunner in Serres. There he continued a theologicalrnand philosophical production which had characterized his lifernsince the conclusion of the Council of Florence. He reposedrnin the Lord sometime in the year 1472.rnGennadios professed an Orthodoxy of the utmost purity andrnpossessed an anti-Latin animus firm enough to make him doctrinallyrnacceptable to the saintiy arch-zealot Mark of Ephesusrnand politically acceptable to the wily sultan. One would expectrnhis writings to reflect this. On examining them, then, one isrnstruck with amazement to see that he is an ardent and enthusiasticrnfollower and translator of St. Thomas Aquinas.rnWe must be vigilant to ensurernthat we do not adopt the ideologicalrnpreoccupations of political andrnphilosophical movements which arernforeign to our faith and its tradition, lestrnwe undermine the very thing we arernstriving to preserve.rnWestern scholasticism is supposed to be the bane of both thernecumenically minded and traditionalist Orthodox today, one ofrnthe only points they share in common. There is barely a pointrnof heterodox Latin theology or liturg)’ which the zealots do notrntrace to it. There is barely an aspect of traditional Orthodoxrnpractice that the modernists want to change in which they dornnot see some latinizing scholastic or even —perish thernthought—Augustinian influence. Both lament the influencernof Latin scholasticism on some of the standard Orthodox theologicalrnmanuals and catechisms in use until recently in Greecernand in Slavic countries. Scholasticism, synonymous (it wouldrnseem) with rationalism, and the cause of secularism, is perniciousrnand fundamentally unorthodox, a foreign influence, anrnaberration. But let us hear what Gennadios, the patriarch, patriot,rnand anti-Latin zealot has to say in the preface to his summariesrnof the two Summae of St. Thomas Aquinas:rnThe present book is a summary of two books, one of thatrnagainst the Gentiles, or those heresies which oppose therntruth, the other the first part of the Summa Theologiae ofrnwhich there are three parts. We have taken up the laborrnof such a summary on account of our great love for theserntwo books.. . . The author of these books is a Latin byrnDECEMBER 1998/15rnrnrn