Source: Orthodox Christian Laity
BE INFORMED – Orthodox Christian Unity in the USA
A STUDY GUIDE to HELP YOU UNDERSTAND THE CONTEXT AND WORK OF THE ASSEMBLY OF CANONICAL ORTHODOX BISHOPS IN THE UNITED STATES.
IT IS TIME FOR THE LAITY TO ACT!
The Assembly of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in the USA is a work in progress. The Assembly has concluded its 6th Meeting held on September 15-17, 2015. The bishops could not reach a consensus and move ahead to develop a blueprint for a unified Orthodox Christian Church in the USA. Many see the Church as a colony and not a mission to evangelize the people in their local communities. Their immigrant mentality continues to isolate our Church and makes us strangers in our own land. That is why the Church is in a no-growth situation. Assimilated 5th and 6th generation faithful leave. Many converts come to Orthodoxy for negative reasons; they leave their Churches because of the social and cultural issues of the day.
OCL has assembled a series of articles and essays to give you a context and analysis of the work of the Assembly up to this point. Read what you wish to get and overview. The ball is in the court of the laity to help the hierarchy decide the future of Orthodoxy in America. The challenge is to be informed and to act. Do you want your children and grandchildren to remain in the life of the Church?
A New Ecclesiology for the Orthodox Church? – Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy
Diaspora – OrthodoxWiki
Orthodoxy in America: Diaspora or Church? – Orthodox Church in America
The Orthodox Diaspora: Canonical and Ecclesiological Perspective – The Greek Orthodox Theological Review
Byzantine response to Orthodox Church in America autocephaly – Wikipedia
What Makes the Orthodox Churches Strangers to American Mainstream Christianity? – Hartford Institute for Religion Research
Summary of OCL Open Forum on February 19, 2011 – Orthodox Christian Laity
George Karcazes’s questions for the Assembly of Bishops helps them to stay focused on the task of Canonical Order – Orthodox Christian Laity
Do Old World Patriarchs Really Want Orthodox Unity? – The National Herald
Eastern Orthodox Unity – First Things
Will the Assembly of Bishops Lay a Foundation for Unity? Why is our Geographic Church in America Subject to Patriarchates Abroad Whose Actions Appear to be Obstructing Unity? – Orthodox Christian Laity
An Impatient Patience: Achieving Orthodox Unity and Canonical Normalization in the West: An Interview with Metropolitan Kallistos (Ware) on the Orthodox Assemblies of Bishops – Patristic Nectar Publications
John X’s Vision for the Patriarchate of Antioch – Notes on Arab Orthodoxy
Ecclesiology of Community and the Need for Tangible Unity in North America – Orthodox Christian Laity
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“In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person’s becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American … There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn’t an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag … We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language … and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people.”
Theodore Roosevelt 1907