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Reply to Pope Leo XIII (1895)
Patriarch Anthimus VII, tr. Metallinos, 1896
d1
A RELIGIOUS desire has been expressed that the Patriarchal and Synodical Encyclical Letter, which was delivered by the Great Church of Constantinople in reply to the Papal Encyclical of Leo XIII, concerning reunion, should be translated into English and published with the Greek text, for the sake of the members of the orthodox Eastern Church who live in England and other English-speaking countries, and of those who wish to learn what are the hindrances to reunion.
In fulfilment of this desire I readily undertook the task of translating the Patriarchal reply, and having completed the translation, I reverently reported it to the Most Holy Patriarch of Constantinople, asking his blessing.
The Most Holy Patriarch by an all-sacred letter dated December 9/21, 1895, was pleased not only to bestow upon me his blessing, but moreover, in accordance with the decision of the Holy Synod assembled round him, to communicate to me the approbation and thanks of the Great Church for my pious suggestion, expressing at the same time the desire that the translation should be accurate and before all things faithful.
I had, from the very first, taken every care that the translation might in all respects faithfully render the sense of the text. But nevertheless I thought it right that it should be revised by some other person, in order that it might also be accurate in regard to the English phraseology.
Having become acquainted with the Reverend Henry Ramsden Bramley, a Fellow and formerly Tutor of the College of Saint Mary Magdalen in the University of Oxford, and now Precentor of the magnificent cathedral of Lincoln, I begged him, as being well acquainted with Greek, to revise the translation. He, remembering how the Church of Lincoln had paid great honour to the Archbishop of Syros and Tenos, Alexander Lycurgus, when he visited England, and how he had himself waited upon that ever-memorable Prelate in Oxford, as a friend of orthodoxy gladly accepted and kindly executed the revision: for which I beg to thank him.
In thus endeavouring to satisfy the desire to which I have referred, I think it proper to add here that the Greek text from which this translation was made, and which is published with it, is taken from the authorized edition bearing the patriarchal seal; and that the portrait of the Most Holy Oecumenical Patriarch, Anthimus VII, prefixed to this work, is taken from a photograph sent to me from Constantinople.
EUSTATHIUS METALLINOS,
Archimandrite.
January 4/16, 1896,
MANCHESTER.