THE HOLY ASSEMBLY OF BISHOPS
OF THE SERBIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH

EPISTLE ON THE COVENANT
(1804-2004)
On the Two Hundred Year Anniversary of Serbian Rebirth

Exactly two centuries ago, in Orasac, the hometown of the Uprising, a meeting of Serbian leaders took place on the Feast of the Meeting of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Temple. Exhorted by their forefathers and persuaded by their descendants, they chose among themselves Vozd1 Karageorge as their leader, the first among equals. And he, guided by Divine Providence, addressed his martyred people and his heroic princes then and for all times. Like the Holy Prince Lazarus, he, too, formulated his Word as a Prayer:

"Thus, our brothers, I call on you again to all rise to your feet and raise your weapons against the enemy who attacks, that we may fight him. We will neither attack nor fight first but should anyone attack us – we will defend ourselves. Better to die in our Faith and our Homeland than to trample upon our Faith. Hence the Holy Gospel states: If you are of the true faith, you shall be saved. Therefore, it is better to die in our Faith than to stand before God and the people and be judged. And God Almighty will help us! I am convinced that with your devotion to our Orthodox faith and our Homeland, with your courage, which you have shown so far; you will spare no effort, you will spill your blood, for the love of our Faith, our Homeland and our descendants. And God Almighty is our great Hope."

BROTHERS AND SISTERS, FELLOW CHRISTIANS,
CHRIST-BEARING, GOD-LOVING AND PHILANTHROPIC PEOPLE

Freedom is the greatest divine gift to each person and each people, a priceless gift which, if real, can never be taken away. Since receiving this gift upon its christening, to the present day, the Serbian people have sacrificially struggled for its Freedom – for it was created for Freedom and in Freedom. And not just any kind of freedom but the greatest freedom of all, Christ-like Freedom – including Suffering on the Cross as well as the Triumph of Resurrection. Hence our national struggle is for the Honorable Cross and Golden Freedom.

The ancient Christian Didache (The Teaching of the Apostles, the oldest post-apostolic text) already speaks of two paths for all persons and all peoples: the Path of Life and the Path of Death. By choosing the first, the life-giving Path, one chooses, once and for all time, the ultimate goal of our lives. Since the beginning of its Christian history, the Serbian people have had a long tradition of ascetic laborers of sound choice.

From the Holy Apostles to the holy Teachers of the Serbs and all the Orthodox world, Cyril and Methodius, the Protectors of Europe, we have been guided through history along the narrow and suffering path of Christ, leading by way of the horrible Golgotha to the Kingdom of Heaven. Throughout the centuries and generations, our people have ever anew been granted the possibility of tangibly experiencing the entire fullness of the historical age. Hence, despite our stumbles and falls, we remain a truly Christian people; hence our all-national history has its original internal sense, derived from the fullness of the ages and from the Kingdom of Heaven itself.

Saint Sava, the first Serbian Archbishop and Teacher, whose church dedicated to the Burning of His Relics (1594) we officially open today for Divine Services, bore witness to this wisdom in his deeds his whole life, ever directing all toward heavenly life, casting the anchor of our ship in the Kingdom of Heaven. Hence follows our entire hierarchy of historical and spiritual values. Only the heavenly hierarchy gives true meaning to our earthly existence.

This truly Christian identity of the Serbian people was confirmed in life-giving example by the Holy Great Martyr Prince Lazarus of Kosovo. A prince in history, an Emperor in eternity, the forefather of our Freedom in Christ, Holy Lazarus was forced to use his wisdom to make and his daring to affirm, as his Choice and ours, either this earthly time or heavenly eternity. He did not hesitate for a second – for the Kingdom of Earth is brief, while that of Heaven everlasting and eternal.

Our eternal contemporary and timeless one, the Holy Great Martyr Lazarus, hails us through the centuries that we must never, in any circumstances, betray our faith (not to betray our blessed honor). As it was then, Kosovo remains today the place of showing and proving, the critical place, that is, the place of judgment - kriseos ("Now is the judgment of this world" Jn 12:31), for not only our people, but for all the peoples of the earth. This means: the place of decision, assessment and judgment of human deeds and misdeeds, the place of choice and decision. The confirmation that persons and peoples are still in danger, that "men love darkness rather than light" (Jn 3:19), hatred rather than love, destructive-slavish demonic force rather than constructive Divine justice and truth, granting eternal freedom. Hence, truly: Kosovo is a momentous place of judgment, as foreseen by yet another dweller of Heaven and keeper of the Kosovo covenant, Peter II Petrovic Njegos: I prefer to lose the earthly kingdom rather than to lose the Kingdom of Heaven.

The freedom and responsibility to decide on our fate in eternity – that is our fundamental right, the right of all persons, neither received nor given. This right to Freedom through Responsibility is never solely personal or collective; it is, at the same time, an individual and a national right to be defended, together, in assembly – with all of our forefathers, contemporaries and descendants: With all our Saints; with St. Sava whom we celebrate today, and with the immortal Karageorge. By modeling ourselves on them, our faith becomes our armor, the Cross becomes our weapon, love becomes our defense, and our sword is the Word of God (as our Archbishop Sava described us in his time in his Service to St. Simeon).

In this uninterrupted historical sequence, Vozd Karageorge, the supreme commander and leader of the Serbian people, also a true keeper of the Kosovo covenant, still fights together with us. Therefore, it is no surprise that many Serbian regions claim to be the place of Karageorge's birth and origin – for the entire Serbian people is the cradle of his birth. Because of this covenantal bond all the Serbs responded to his call in number and without exception: from freedom-loving Sumadija, heroic Montenegro and robust Herzegovina, from proud Bosnia and our lands north of the Sava and the Danube. And only because of this – the Kosovo Covenant made for all eternity – that Karageorge could be and had to be what he was: So strict and yet beloved; So powerful and yet justice-loving; A hero on the battleground and the founder of a state. Despite all his enemies, Vozd Karadjordje found the strength to rise above the earth and all that is earthly, above circumstance and above himself. Transcending historical appearances, he, together with his heroes, touched the very Heavens and from there, up above, still leads his entire people.

Thus, it was not only the military force of the uprising that gained strength with Vozd Karageorge but the spiritual and state-founding consciousness of the entire people: The awareness that freedom distinguishes us from beasts; The awareness that freedom is dependent upon law and that the law is the same for everyone.

These (free and God-seeking) Serbs became both model and inspiration for other enslaved Balkan peoples at the beginning of the twentieth century – as well as for us, here and now. This national striving toward freedom, which echoed through Europe, resulted in the reemergence on the horizon of not only our own history but also the history of the world of the resurrected sense of justice, love of truth, and loyalty to moral principles, the only healthy foundation of European civilization and civilization as a whole. Hence, we are ever confronted by the same question: does anyone - especially we ourselves - dare to forget or condemn to scorn and to silence the sacrifices this people made at that time, during the First and Second World Wars, and during its new and most recent sufferings and expulsions, sacrifices made for the principles of freedom and the free world?

Reminding ourselves of these historical events and sacrifices does not mean regressing and slowing down progress. History and its remembrance show everyone, including ourselves, not only the past but also the present, as well as serving to warn us perpetually and incorruptibly of the future. A knowledge of history successfully cures the alienation and the errors of the modern world, the loneliness, selfishness and confusion of the people, especially when a people, as in our case, finds itself in the maelstrom of the many contradictions and selfish interests that flourish in today's world, chaotic in many respects. The unending crises of the modern, the violence of the powerful who exhaust and confound, can only be transcended by stopping the gap between spiritual and material values, by establishing a balance between Earth and Heaven, the reality of this world and the world beyond, by a Divine-Human union of earthly life and heavenly choice.

In order to be able to achieve this, we must rise above all temptations and heal ourselves of confusion and spiritual weakness through justice, unity and freedom. The same problem that shackled the Vozd with worries will frame, in threatening form, all of our joint endeavors from now to eternity.

Yet another of our distant contemporaries, St. Peter of Cetinje, addressed the most enlightened Lord Georgije Petrovic, by the grace of God the leader of the Slavic Serbs, thus: The people cannot be happy if they do not have within them firm unity and perfect obedience.

It remains for us to hope in the internal strength and wisdom of the people; that through repentance we may be cleansed and freed of discord, enmity toward our brethren and division; that, like Karageorge, we may despise all evil and condemn every crime, especially that which is committed in the name of this people, even if its perpetrator is our own brother; that we may hope for a new readiness for great historical deeds in the spirit of the self-sacrificial achievement of the Feast of the Meeting of Our Lord,; that we may once again see the one and only Path of Life before us. Toward this goal, let us pray before the holy and exalted images of our forefathers, in Vozd's immortal words:

O God, God Almighty, turn Your merciful eyes toward the faithful and Your Church. Amen.
O God Almighty, extinguish not your faithful. Amen.
O God, have mercy and lend strength to the Serbian people and the hearts of the sons of Serbia. Amen.
Our Lord God, have mercy on us. Amen.

With this prayer we also consecrate today our capital City, this Holy Shrine in the center of this City, and this divinely convened Assembly before which the Table of Light and Love has been appointed and to which all are invited.

And hence, through our prayers at this brotherly and all-Christian gathering, we consecrate also our present and our future. In addition to the official liturgical opening of St. Sava Cathedral itself, today we also place the cornerstone of the new building of the Patriarchate, the religious home of our people and our local Church founded by St. Sava, which is open to all persons of good will, the home in which we bear conciliar witness to Our Resurrected Lord Jesus Christ and the freedom whereby He has set us free.

With us is the first Hierarch of the Holy Orthodox Church, His All Holiness the Archbishop of Constantinople and New Rome, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I. With us are the first hierarchs and envoys of all the local Orthodox Churches and numerous of God's faithful, as well as representatives of other Christian Churches and communities. Let us walk all together in the festal procession toward the Cathedral. As we enter the church together, we receive within the Peace of God and as we part from it we announce to the whole world the Glad Tidings of Christ's Triumph on the Cross and His Resurrection, of the Kingdom of God that comes and already exists.

May the blessing and love of the Triune God respond to our words of prayer and may the steps of our festal procession show the inevitability of this Path that leads to life. Amen, God grant that it be so!

Given at the Serbian Patriarchate in Belgrade, on the Feast of the Burning of the Holy Relics of St. Sava, 2004.

Your intercessors before the Crucified and Risen Lord, before His Holy Servant St. Sava and all the saints:

Archbishop of Pec, Metropolitan of Belgrade-Karlovci and Serbian Patriarch PAVLE
Metropolitan of Zagreb and Ljubljana JOVAN
Metropolitan of Montenegro and the Littoral AMFILOHIJE
Metropolitan of Midwestern America HRISTOFOR
Metropolitan of Dabro-Bosnia NIKOLAJ
Bishop of Sabac and Valjevo LAVRENTIJE
Bishop of Nis IRINEJ
Bishop of Zvornik and Tuzla VASILIJE
Bishop of Srem VASILIJE
Bishop of Banja Luka JEFREM
Bishop of Budim LUKIJAN
Bishop of Canada GEORGIJE
Bishop of Banat NIKANOR
Bishop of America and Canada (New Gracanica Metropolitanate) LONGIN
Bishop of Eastern America MITROPHAN
Bishop of Zica CHRYSOSTOM
Bishop of Backa IRINEJ
Bishop of Britain and Scandinavia DOSITEJ
Bishop of Raska and Prizren ARTEMIJE
Bishop of Bihac and Petrovac CHRYSOSTOM
Bishop of Osijek and Baranja LUKIJAN
Bishop of Central Europe CONSTANTINE
Bishop of Western Europe LUKA
Bishop of Timok JUSTIN
Bishop of Vranje PAHOMIJE
Bishop of Sumadija JOVAN
Bishop of Slavonia SAVA
Bishop of Branicevo IGNJATIJE
Bishop of Milesevo FILARET
Bishop of Dalmatia FOTIJE
Bishop of Zahumlje and Herzegovina GRIGORIJE
Bishop of Budimlje and Niksic JOANIKIJE
Bishop of Australia and New Zealand (New Gracanica Metropolitanate) MILUTIN
Retired Bishop of Zahumlje and Herzegovina ATANASIJE
Vicar Bishop of Hvostno ATANASIJE
Vicar Bishop of Jegar PORFIRIJE

The Orthodox Archdiocese of Ochrid
Metropolitan of Veles and Povardarje JOVAN, Patriarchal Exarch of the Autonomous Archdiocese of Ochrid
Vicar Bishop of Velic and locum tenens (administrator) of the Diocese of Polos and Kumanovo JOAKIM
Vicar Bishop of Dremvic and locum tenens of the Diocese of Bitolj MARKO

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1 Vozd – leader in old Serbian language