Thus, there is no blasphemy in calling a priest "father" and "father". Man must understand that the only source of his life is in God. Here, as in relation to the icon: only the One God can be worshiped and served. But it is possible and necessary to honor that through which and through whom we learn about God and receive the gift of life. "Worship God alone," but "honor your father and mother," and, of course, do not forget about your spiritual kinship.

But what do Christ's words "call no one your father" mean for Orthodoxy? Christ does not speak about the external, but about the internal. He condemns not the conversion itself, but the inner state of the soul that can be reflected in such conversion. And it is not the one who says "father" who is condemned, but the one who demands such an address to himself. There is the lust of vanity, there is a lustful craving for presiding over meetings and for signs of reverence—and this is what Christ condemns. Let us recall the context: "On the seat of Moses sat the scribes and Pharisees <... > nevertheless do their deeds so that people < see them... > also love to preside at banquets, and to preside in synagogues, and to greet them in public assemblies, and that people should call them, "Teacher, teacher!" But do not be called teachers, for you have one Teacher, Christ, and you are all brethren; and call no one on earth your father, for you have one Father, who is in heaven; and do not be called teachers, for you have one Teacher, Christ. Let the greatest of you be your servant: for he who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted" (Matt. 23:2:5-12). It is not that in any society there really are teachers and there are disciples, not that in any assembly there really is and should be a senior and those who have yielded to him the primacy, but that vain and proud craving that seeks in everyone he meets, first of all, an obsequious respect for himself as a "mentor", "teacher", "elder", "father". The desire of a person to become a "teacher", "mentor", "greater", the desire to elevate himself is condemned. This is not just the sin of the clergy, it is a much more common sin. A parishioner grandmother, who authoritatively explains to a girl how to light a candle and how not to light it, often radiates proud phariseeism, although she does not call herself either a "priest" or a "teacher." And in the hearts of young Protestants, did not something similar stir in the face of a neophyte: "Look, I have been in our wonderful community for a year and a half, I already know everything, I even participated in a week-long theological seminar, and you still do not know how many books are included in the Holy Scriptures. Well, it's okay, come, I'll teach you!"

… And in the final analysis, this text really denounces us. We really do not live by these words. We are all Christians, not only Orthodox. Where is the confession in which all the ministers fulfill this Christ's commandment, not for show, but sincerely and unceasingly: "Let the greatest of you be your servant: for whoever exalts himself will be humbled, but whoever humbles himself will be exalted" (Matt. 23:11-12)? There are words in the Gospel that are a thorn in the soul of Christians. They do not allow reading the Gospel with a sense of superiority and self-admiration: "Behold, they say, we are not like the Pharisees and the Jewish scribes; we have come to know Christ, we have believed in Him, we have accepted His teaching, and we fulfill it in all things." Yes, yes, this denunciation of the Pharisees applies to us Orthodox Christians as well. But it burns our conscience not because we have the title "father", but because it is something much more comprehensive, deep, important... In the seminary, a passage from the Gospel was read at every morning prayer. And I remember what an unusual silence hung in the hall when one day the priest read this very passage: "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees..." (Matt. 23:14). The Gospel is not only a comforting book, not only touching, not only affectionate. Its scourges and thorns are for everyone, not just for the ancient inhabitants of Palestine.

But in the words of Christ against the Pharisees there is no condemnation of those who, out of humility, consider their neighbor superior to himself, and consider him to be the elder. And if Protestants wish to combat the internal, spiritual disease of Phariseeism through external language reform, if they hope to remove the spiritual temptation of vanity and pride by removing one or two words from the lexicon, then let them be consistent and abolish professorial titles in their seminaries. A "professor" is nothing more than a "teacher."

No one can be forced to address this or that person with the word "father". In Orthodoxy, addressing a priest as "father" is not a requirement of church discipline or doctrine. This is an extra-statutory, non-canonical, but precisely family, intimate treatment. There are words, there are addresses that are used only between close relatives. And if a stranger, who accidentally overheard them, begins to demand from his acquaintances that they call each other not by their home names, but exclusively by their first names and patronymics, then he will put himself in a not very favorable light. It is impossible to forbid the manifestations of love. It is impossible to forbid a brother to be called a brother and a spiritual father – a priest[186].

It also follows that a priest should not call himself a father. Only the decline of class ethics can explain why today some priests present themselves not as "Priest Alexander" but as "Father Alexander." Once I bore the obedience of the secretary of the Rector of the Moscow Theological Academy. A student who had been ordained a priest a few days ago came into the reception room, introduced himself ("I am Father John Ivanov from the 4th grade") and said that he would like to meet with Vladyka Rector. Entering the Rector's office, I conveyed this request: "Father Ioann Ivanov has come from the 4th grade, he asks to meet with you." Vladyka's reaction was unexpected: he asked me if Ivanov had introduced himself in this way, or if I called him that. I replied that I had conveyed exactly what and how I had been told in the reception room. And then Vladyka said something that became a lesson for me for the rest of my life: "Go and tell him that he will be a 'father' in his parish for his spiritual children, and I myself ordained him only three days ago – and he is already climbing into my father?! Let him learn to introduce himself properly, and then he comes!"

So the address "father" is the result of a kind of "recognition". Is it possible to address a clergyman in a different way? There are official addresses: "Your Reverence" (to a deacon, priest, hieromonk), "Your Reverence" (to the abbot, archpriest, archimandrite). In principle, you can also address them secularly - by their first name and patronymic. But, I must warn you, such an appeal can leave an abrasion in the priest's soul. Why this abrasion arises can be seen from an incident related in the memoirs of B. N. Lossky, the son of a famous Russian philosopher. For N. O. Lossky, as for many other St. Petersburg intellectuals, "addressing priests by their first names and patronymics was a habit. He himself abandoned this custom and began to condemn it after he called his pre-revolutionary colleague and ideological comrade-in-arms, Father Sergius Bulgakov, who had arrived in Prague in the clerical rank in 1924, and heard from him that he accepted such a designation as one of the manifestations of God's punishment for his late conversion to the faith.

In addition, for the clergy who have experience of life and service under Soviet rule, addressing by name and patronymic is a reminder of that time of summons and interrogations. With this appeal, the Chekists and other Soviet officials emphasized that all kinds of church conversions and monastic names did not exist for them. And therefore, with an accentuated accentuation, the clergy (including the Patriarchs) were called only by secular names (which was still a step forward in comparison with the pre-war years, when the authorities' address to the clergy varied in the range from "citizen" to "prisoner"). Therefore, addressing a priest in a secular way is an emphatic distancing and a clearly expressed reluctance to see in one's interlocutor what he himself considers the most important in his life and in his ministry.

This also explains Metropolitan Pitirim's defiantly witty response to the note "How should I address you?" which Vladyka received in 1988 at one of the first meetings of the Soviet intelligentsia with representatives of the Church (as far as I remember, it was in the Central House of Writers). After reading this note, Vladyka smiled and answered: "Call me simply: Your Eminence!"

So, if a person does not have special reasons to emphasize his non-churchliness, then it is better not to use such appeals, which for a clergyman still have a worldly, and, therefore, profane, understating connotation. When people ask me how to address me, I answer: "Usually I am addressed by Father Andrei, more officially by Father Deacon. My patronymic name is Andrey Vyacheslavovich. Patriarch Alexei addresses me in personal communication as "Father Andrei"... However, recently he has also begun to address "father professors" (with a smile, however)." You can address as it is more convenient for you... I add this last sentence to relieve some of the embarrassment of people who are much older than me. After all, here the question is not so much about respect for the individual, for the person, it is a question of attitude to the rank, to the service to which the person has devoted himself.

In general, this is a matter of etiquette, not dogma. To put it forward as a pretext for separation from the brethren and the Church means to keep only in one's mind, and not in one's heart, that strange text of the Apostle Paul, where he says something about the mutual relations between the fasting and the non-fasting[188]...

In addition, from a purely linguistic point of view, it is necessary to distinguish between naming and addressing; These are different classes of words. In the Gospel we are asked not to call anyone on earth a father (and it is obvious that this does not apply to a real father), that is, not to recognize anyone's paternal rights, and these rights in the East at that time were very extensive. Addressing with the use of so-called "kinship names" is a common thing in all languages: we simply determine both the age relationship with the interlocutor and, almost imperceptibly, our attitude towards him. In fact, which address is more polite – father or uncle? Mother or aunt? Isn't it better to live in a society where boys are called son, and not boy? The normal use of a normal linguistic means can in no way be blamed on the Orthodox. And the fact that we respect our priests and therefore address them accordingly is our right. The Gospel did not take it away from us.

In what way is Orthodoxy worse than Protestantism?

The paradox is that practically all the accusations that Protestants make against Orthodoxy are applicable to themselves.