An interview about the historically continuous Hellenic Ethnic Religion

Hercules Invictus Interviews
Vlassis Rassias
Founder of the
Supreme Council of Ethnikoi Hellenes: YSEE

Mount Olympus Presents:

Hercules: Geetings Vlassis! I am greatly honored to be interviewing you. Your dedication to the aboriginal spirituality of our ancestors is sincere, long-standing and praiseworthy.

Vlassis: Greetings Hercules. Thank you for your good words.

Hercules: What first drew you to Olympian spirituality?

Vlassis: Long ago, in 1976, at the age of 17, I read in the newspapers that a Christian Orthodox monk from Mt Athos drove all the way to Athens and attacked with a sledgehammer the replica of a naked statue of God Zeus that was standing right after the entrance of the Ministry of Education. I still remember his full name! (* See Note Below) This horrible incident made me henceforth see with a completely different angle the mutilated statues in our museums. I now knew that the sledgehammers of similar ancient fanatics and not "earthquakes" were the main reason for all that mutilation of beauty in the sacred art of my ancestors.

Hercules: What other Paths did you explore before finding and committing to your deepest resonance?

Vlassis: For almost a decade, I also explored the spirituality of the native people of the Americas, the "First Nations" as they define themselves. And in the mid-eighties I received from a Mohawk old man that brilliant response to my question raised on how I could become perfect partaker of the native wisdom: "In the language that you are dreaming in, there you'll definitely find the truth that you seek". Since then, I focused mainly in the Hellenic spiritual path.

Hercules: How and when did your personal mission become clear?

Vlassis: Well, I do not believe in "personal" missions other than only being an honest part of a link in the long historical chain that brings Hellenism from the farthest past to the present, and from the present to the future. This notion became quite clear to me in the first years of the nineties, when I met some people that informed me about the unbroken historical continuity of our Tradition and Religion from the times of the persecution by the Christians up to our present times. I recently made known this unknown continuity via my latest bookYour Glory and your Despair, a historical narrative. The title comes from a Friedrich Hoelderlin's quote.

Hercules: What were some of your initial steps? Was the YSEE your first organizational vehicle?

Vlassis: I started alone, in the late eighties, expecting no more than to speak the truth of my ancestors via editorials in various magazines. I admit that what I expected then, was only to to speak the truth of my ancestors, having against ten millions incensed Christian Orthodox Greeks. Quite soon, to my pleasant surprise, I found out that I was not alone on this path. By 1991 I had already gathered around me a number of like-minded people and we proceeded with the publication of Diipetes, the first ever Greek journal that openly preached the restoration of the Hellenic Ethnic Religion. It soon reached a circulation of 2.000 and after some years, in June of 1997, we founded YSEE, the Supreme Council of Hellenes (Ypato Symboulio Ellinon Ethnikon).

Hercules: Can you provide us with an overview of the YSEE, along with its Mission and goals?

Vlassis: YSEE aims for the moral and physical protection and restoration of the Polytheistic, Ethnic Hellenic Religion, Tradition and way of life in (modern) Greek society where it is still being oppressed due to its institutionalized intolerance and theocracy. After 20 years of activity in the (modern) Greek reality with more than 330 interventions (letters and press releases) and many protests for the protection of the Hellenic tradition, for the human rights and for the religious tolerance, more than 800 seminars, tactical celebrations of the ancient festivals, public rituals and educational events, YSEE is the front line of the movement for the protection of the Ancient Hellenic Heritage and the return to the ancient ways.

Hercules: What differentiates the YSEE from other Olympian spiritual expressions?

Vlassis: Considering ourselves the contemporary phase of the historically continuous Hellenic Ethnic Religion, we are broad and catholic. We embrace all forms of spiritual expression compatible with the verified forms of the past, including the forms of the Middle-ages or the Renaissance, e.g. the Plethonists, the followers of Georgios Gemistos - Plethon. In the same way, we embrace all the philosophical Schools from the Ionians to the last days of the Academia of Athens. We only reject neopagan inventions, travesties of our rituals, magic, UFO theories and other by-products of the monotheist world.

Hercules: Can you please share some of the highlights of the YSEE's history?

Vlassis: Well, they are many. Indicatively I'll mention the organization in Athens of the 7th World Congress of Ethnic Religions in 2004, its Memorandum, dated May the 7th, 2006, to the President of the Hellenic Democracy, the President of the Hellenic Parliament, the Prime Minister of the Hellenic Republic, and three relative Ministers, on the necessity for the the protection of the Hellenic Ethnic Religion as living part of the National Heritage of Greece and, of course, the recognition of our Religion as such, by the official authorities of the Greek Ministry of Education and Religious Matters a few months ago. To their credit, they gave us official permission for a place of worship in Athens, thus promoting the Hellenic Ethnic Religion to the status of a “known religion” in Greece, according to article 13 of the Constitution. The Hellenic Ethnic Religion is now under the protection of the law, to the same degree as the other 5 – 6 non-Christian religions that are already classified as “known religions” in our country, and we can henceforth register our children at the Registry Office as belonging to the Hellenic Ethnic Religion, and also perform Hellenic wedding rituals with full legal value.

Hercules: Congratulations! The recognition of Olympianism as a valid religion in modern Greece is truly historic. Where is the YSEE now in terms of its evolution?

Vlassis: In the last few years, YSEE has been trying to obtain recognition as a statutory corporation of religious character according to recent Law 4301/2014. So far its appeal signed by hundreds of Ethnikoi Hellenes has been rejected by both the Court of First Instance and the Court of Appeal and now the case is taken to the Supreme Court. The “justification” given for the rejections directly insults the intelligence and knowledge of history of the average educated person. The purely cultural and religious terms “Ethnic Religion” and “Ethnikoi Hellenes” "create “confusion"” (so they claim) "in the minds of the public" !

Hercules: What challenges remain?

Vlassis: To win the case of recognition as a statutory corporation of religious character either at the Supreme Court, or at the European Court of Human Rights if needed, and, of course, in a near or far future, to have the Hellenic Ethnic Religion recognized by the Greek Parliament as aliving part of the National Heritage of Greece. We recently supported the similar appeal of Romuva, the legal body of the Ancient Baltic Religion for state recognition by the Seimas (Parliament) of the Lithuanian Republic, as part of the Lithuanian historical, spiritual and social heritage.

Hercules: What is your vision for the YSEE's growth and development?

Vlassis: So far, we have chapters and nuclei in many areas of Greece, and most importantly in the United States (Astoria, New York) and Cyprus. We'll continue spreading in new geographical areas and growing both in numbers and in quality of membership. For us, the later is the most important. The quality of our members. If we content ourselves with the numerical growth, and not persist in the spiritual growth, especially via Arete (virtue), sooner or later we'll face all the pathology of the monotheistic world inside YSEE. In the past, but thank the Gods on a small scale, we have seen this happening, so now we are more rigorous in our wider targeting.

Hercules: What role do you see the YSEE playing in the overall history of Olympianism?

Vlassis: YSEE is the body that opened the gates for the re-emergence of the Hellenic Ethnic Religion to the contemporary world. Re-emergence not as a product of romantic reverie, but as a historically continuous Religion that returned back after centuries of persecutions and an obscurity due to necessity, to stay, thrive and prosper at the lands that it thrived and prospered in the good old times when Hellenism was unimpeded, offering its spiritual light to all civilized people.

Hercules: Do you welcome interaction or form relationships with other groups?

Vlassis: Yes, we do welcome any kind of co-operation with other groups from all around the world, even with groups of other Ethnic Traditions. The only prerequisite for a co-operation is the other side to recognize the Hellenic Ethnic Religion as a historically continuous and inherited Religion that has full knowledge of its past and that it rightfully demands a future of dignity and self-determination.

Hercules: How can folks learn more about the YSEE?

Vlassis: The ones that know Greek may visit our webpage www.ysee.gr. Unfortunately, for the time being, its English section does not contain many texts. However, we plan to publish the English translation of our informative book Theology and Praxis in the near future.

Hercules: How can those who find resonance with the YSEE get involved?

Vlassis: They can become members, or just friends of our organization and spread the word to more people. What we actually all try to do is to bring back a healthy form of humanity that once existed, but for centuries now was purposely construed as a remote heathen past or as only an archaeological exhibit.

Hercules: Thank you Vlassis! As a human being, as a Lemnian and as an Ellinas I am proud of your accomplishment and am greatly honored that you granted this interview. I wish you great success in all of your endeavors and may Olympus continue to bestow many Blessings on you and the YSEE!

Vlassis: You are welcome. May the Gods always shine on you.

Papa-Kleomenis vandalises sculpture

"The so-called "priest kleomenis" attacks with a hammer the sculpture Crisis of the Greek sculptor Tasos Nyfadopoulos. Tasos Nyfadopoulos speaks about the action of "priest kleomenis" in this video. Crisis sculpture is the first sculpture in public space addressing socioeconomic crisis worldwide. Sculptor Tasos Nyfadopoulos unveiled the artwork back in April 2015."

YSEE: Twenty Years of Struggle

Don't let good deeds be localised

This is a Norwegian woman, who visited Crete and likes taking walks in nature. So one day she saw the road she was walking on full of rubbish, so she decided to collect them as she thought it is a pity to let such a beautiful sight wasted. A local man saw her doing it, helped her to bring the rubbish to the nearest bin and asked why she was doing this. He then made it viral in the Internet.

A similar thing happened with an american singer Willow Smith daughter of an actor Will Smith. She went with a yacht to Antipaxos. Antipaxos is the smaller of the Paxoi islands part of the Ionian Islands in Western Greece, between the bigger islands of Corfu and Lefkada.

 

The singer said she saw dead seagulls and plastic litter on the three beaches she sailed to. Not only seagulls, but other wild animals too eat plastic and die painfully as they cannot digest it. So as she posted in the Instagram she wanted to do her small deed as a human being, as humans are responsible for all the plastic, to protect wildlife from such a fate.

The place in Crete wasn't know, so nobody was bothered, the island however was named, so consequently one knew the responsible mayor.
The mayor of Paxoi phoned in a show and said that there are more 100 beaches in both islands and she chose to go to the most inaccessable at the north west of Antipaxos. Well, plastic was there, seagulls were dying, wildlife is dying, he has to forgive these species for going to remote places, they don't deserve to die painfully. However he chose to present it as if it was a conspiracy against him. The Adriatic Sea, he said, has many floating rubish islands and so the beaches of these islands, which are on the Ionian island, can be full of rubbish any moment. One the map one can see that the Ionian Sea is not part of the Adriatic. He said that this happens to the beaches facing the Adriatic. These litter-islands do have weird habits and preferences.

Then he said that it is impossible that the rubbish from three beaches could fill 22 bags. He says that every second or third day he circumnavigates the island personally and has never gathered more than 6 or 7 bags litter from all of them. Well maybe he had bad luck and a big litter-island just arrived from the Adriatic Sea.  In the photo below one can estimate the number of bags. If one is willing to believe that they are full with litter collected from the beaches and not the boats litter.

After saying that the girl sailed to the remotest beaches at the northwest of Antipaxos, he then said that he couldn't recognise the beaches, although he has lived all his life in Paxos. He didn't say, he couldn't recognise the beaches, althought he circumnavigates both islands more than twice a week. So what does that mean, the beaches are not at Paxoi at all? 

Who could be after the mayor of Paxoi and why? Are the worlds secret societies after the area's unknown riches? Is the mayor the last obstacle to their plans?

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