Moscow, March 10, 2017
Photo: breezecreatives.com
According to Archimandrite Gregory, the refugees arriving to Greece “are equipped with the most sophisticated cell phones, with skinny jeans, a scarf and cigarettes. Unfortunately, in Mohammed’s time women didn’t wear makeup, so he didn’t speak against such physical appearance…”
The Athonite elder added that it’s not chauvinistic to value your own homeland and culture, wanting to preserve it. “I’m not going to their homeland to fight with them, but I don’t want to see them in my homeland. It’s not chauvinism.” “The government banned the ringing of bells under the pretext that it’s too loud,” he continued, “but when the muezzin yells out three times a day, it doesn’t bother anyone?”
In offering his critique, Fr. Gregory plainly spoke the truth about Islam: “The Islamists hate our faith, and they hate the Cross, Christ, and the Theotokos.” Unfortunately, he says, even bishops remove their crosses when going to visit the refugees so as not to “annoy them.”
Why does the government invite in refugees, he wondered, if they are unwilling to look after Greece’s own homeless and poor?
“The Orthodox Church has encountered two great enemies on its historical path: Islamism and Papism. And today they, taking each other by the hand, have joined forces to destroy Greece… They burned and slaughtered our ancestors, but we think things will turn out better? Why are we receiving them into our country?” the spiritual father asked.
In his words, the refugees are, in fact, conquerors.
“Greece has become the court of the devil—any atheist and antichrist can find shelter in a country of martyrs and saints. There exists hatred and the desire to erase Orthodoxy and Greece from the face of the earth. Who will give an answer for this evil? Our atheistic rulers or the pope of Rome, who have become an object of veneration for some Orthodox? Unfortunately, everything is moving towards us communing of unleavened bread,” Fr. Gregory said, pointing to ancient divergence in Eucharistic practices between the Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic communion. “[A]nd the Koran will be held in our hands,” he said in conclusion.
***
Updated to correct Archimandrite Gregory's monastery from Hilandar to Dochariou.
