“All who enter the church, and listen to the Holy Scriptures, but, due to some deviation from the order, do not participate in the common prayer with the people, or turn away from receiving the Holy Eucharist, let them be excluded from the Church until they confess, showing the fruits of repentance, and ask for forgiveness, and thus be able to receive it. Let it not be allowed to have communion with those excluded from communion, or to gather in houses and communicate with those who are outside church communion; those who avoid assemblies in one church, do not accept in another church. If it turns out that any of the bishops, or presbyters, or deacons, or generally anyone from the clergy, communicates with those excluded from communion, let him also be out of church communion, as one who causes confusion in the church rank (2nd Rule of the Antiochian Local Council; emphasized by me – V.A.).
“…in previous times our fathers determined: if someone a layman, being in the city, in three Sunday days, during three weeks, does not come to the assembly (to the Eucharist, to the communion of the Holy Gifts – V.A.), let him be deprived of church communion” (11th Rule of the Sardican Local Council).
No one can be excluded from the Church (and no one can be forcibly or against their will added to the Church. To Freedom (the Church) they join or fall away from it only freely)!!! From the Church one can only fall away! “Who shall separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus?!” – exclaims a Christian, who has known (experienced, been to the “third heaven”) the mystery of love in the freedom of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, all anathemas, exclusions, proclaimed by the Church (and not by mad bishops, or satanic councils of bishops, such as the actions of the hierarchy of the ROC regarding His Holiness Patriarch Filaret, or the trial (and anathemas) over St. John Chrysostom, St. Athanasius the Great, or regarding whole churches – in the history of the Church such madness and satanism – even the Dnieper would overflow), – are a statement of the fact of falling away from the Church (Theanthropic existence in love and unity by the Unity of the Holy Trinity). From the Body of the Church are cut off only dead members (if in “this world” (in phase II) a person is no longer treated, no longer fought for her life only in case of death, and while there are signs of life – they fight, then all the more in the Church, Which loves with Divine Love). Therefore, falling away from the Eucharist (spiritual death) occurs not after an anathema (because some madmen decided so, seeking the realization of their own selfish interests), but before it, which (in the mouth of the Church) is only a statement of what has happened! For a better understanding, let’s give an example (an unlikened likeness; one should always approach all examples apophatically, that is, not giving the mind the opportunity to objectify reality, to understand it “to the end” without hypostatic knowledge, to reduce it (reality) to a thing, which one can possess, use for oneself – then, according to Orthodox knowledge – all existing is a call to the knowledge of another person in hypostatic communication and relations, in the community of life-existence – V.A.): if someone does not breathe for twenty minutes – let him be excluded from the community of the living (let there be anathema)! Who does not breathe for twenty minutes (even in less than twenty minutes irreversible processes of dying occur, and we took with a reserve for vividness of the example) – he dies, therefore he, as a corpse, needs to be buried, so that the stench (stench) does not spread and is not a source of infections… (A person is buried (“anathematized”, excluded from the living), not because someone decided so, but because it is a necessary action, because the person is already dead.    Therefore,    the    living    confirm    death,    then “anathematize”, that is, perform the act of burial- exclusion). Another unlikened likeness (example): a leg (or another organ), to which no blood has come for a whole day, needs to be amputated, as dead, although physically, formally (with muscles, veins, bones) it is connected with a living body… Similarly, one who does not commune (without significant reasons – due to the impossibility of having communication with the members of the parish), although he walks (about those who do not go to church – here everything is clear), as an individual, to the temple and is present (and not a participant) at the liturgy – is dead! Visibly he seems to be in the church community, but in reality is dead, that is, outside the Body of the Church, and to bring such a person to his senses – it is necessary to anathematize him (for his own good), that is, to exclude from the Eucharist, which is tantamount – to the Church (as a dead leg, which needs to be amputated, so that there is no intoxication and, as a result, death of the whole body. Compare Mt. 5, 29-30; the context seems a bit different, but, if we consider marital relations of Christ and the Church (Eph. 5, 31-32), that is, consider it in the eucharistic context (which is actually the case), then the given “analogy” (example) becomes “reality” – through one member-organ the whole Body may perish).