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Source: Orthodox Reality A new report, A Unified American Orthodox Church: Do Parish Priests Want It?, is now available. Do parish clergy support the creation of a fully independent autocephalous American Orthodox Church? Do they prefer a self-ruling Church under the Ecumenical Patriarchate? Or, would they rather keep things as they are, with separate jurisdictions? If the latter, why? Based on a national survey of 390 U.S. Orthodox parish clergy, the answers to these questions can be found here: https://orthodoxreality.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/OrthodoxClergyOnUnity2023Protected.pdf Four major issues are discussed: How parish priests of various jurisdictions envision the future of the Orthodox Church in the USA…

Originally posted on December 31, 2021 The process for gathering input from the clergy and laity outlined by the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America (GOA), was to ask the 80 or so members of the Charter Committee to submit questions to be collected, organized, and incorporated into a questionnaire to be submitted back to the committee. The committee’s responses to the questionnaire would then be “summarized” by the Archdiocese to guide the members of the “drafting committee” appointed by the Archbishop. Those appointees will presumably meet with the 5 or so members of the drafting committee appointed by the Patriarch.…

Source: International Orthodox Theological Association (IOTA) The video recordings of select conference presentations are being edited and uploaded to the IOTA YouTube Channel. Approximately 1-2 new videos will be published each week. Currently available videos include the Keynote Address and Florovsky Lecture by Metropolitan Ambrosios of Korea, and the Presidential Address by Dr. Paul Gavrilyuk. Excerpt from Metropolitan Ambrosios’s Keynote Address, January 11, 2023: “[O]n February 24, 2022, the abominable war in Ukraine escalated on a massive scale. I immediately knew that I had to change the subject and nature of my speech, because I believe it is unacceptable for a…

Source:  OINOS Educational Consulting by Frank Marangos, D.Min., Ed.D., FCEP Disturb us, Lord, when We are too pleased with ourselves, When our dreams have come true Because we dreamed too little, When we arrived safely Because we sailed too close to the shore.Disturb us, Lord, when with the abundance of things we possess We have lost our thirst For the waters of life; Having fallen in love with life, We have ceased to dream of eternity And in our efforts to build a new earth, We have allowed our vision Of the new Heaven to dim. Disturb us, Lord, to dare…

I am a third-generation member of the Orthodox Christian Church in the United States, dating back to 1906, when my paternal grandparents settled in Springfield, MA, and then Poughkeepsie, NY (1908), when my maternal grandfather settled in Pittsburgh, PA. At 28 years old, my grandmother died of the Swine Flu in that city in 1918, leaving a 3-month newborn and a 4-year-old child.   Eventually, this branch of the family settled in Garden City, L.I., N.Y. I grew up with my parents in Jersey City in 1942. My views on this Greek Orthodox Archdiocese Charter development process relate to this impressionistic…

View the Declaration’s inaugural publication in the July 5, 2022 editions of The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times Over 380 Signatures to Date – Be One of Them! Check below for the live count. Click here to read comments received from signers. Orthodox Christian Laity board members authored this declaration in June 2022. Click Here to read the LETTER SENT TO PATRIARCHS Original English text and Translations of “A Declaration for Orthodox Christian Unity in America” (PDF) Albanian Arabic Bulgarian English French Georgian Greek Romanian Russian Serbian Spanish Ukrainian CLICK HERE to view all signatures to date…

Source: Public Orthodoxy ελληνικά | Русский Your Eminences! My letter is addressed to the Orthodox bishops in Russia. I have intentionally not collected signatures or involved any Church structures or public organizations, because I am addressing not the episcopal body, not the leaders of the Moscow Patriarchy, but each of you personally. My letter’s addressee is an Orthodox Christian who took holy baptismal and monastic vows, was elevated to the dignity of bishop, and who in his heart recognizes that it is impossible to govern the Church without striving to love Christ, seeking His truth, and serving Him and not Caesar. Under the circumstances,…

Source: Orthodox Christian Laity During OCL’s Orthodoxy in Action Call on January 29, 2023, George Matsoukas (OCL Executive Director Emeritus & Board Member) relates his experience during the International Orthodox Theological Association (IOTA) Mega Conference held in Volos, Greece from January 12-14, 2023. Dr Teva Regule and George Nassos, who also participated in the Conference, offered their perspectives also. NOTES FROM GEORGE MATSOUKAS Basic Overview IOTA International Orthodox Theological Association Conference January 11-15, 2023 Volos, Greece Major Supporters and Co-Laborers sponsored the conference. The mission of IOTA is a community of scholars and professionals dedicated to the worldwide exchange of…

Source: The National Herald By Christopher Tripoulas It’s a new year, but the Archbishop’s recent meeting at the Phanar regarding amendments to the Archdiocese of America’s Charter is more like a blast from the past. This on-again, off-again process, which began in the fall of 2019 with the sudden suspension of the Charter by the Ecumenical Patriarchate, was thought to have ended last June when the Patriarchate restored the Charter at the “request” [sic] of the Archdiocese. However, no sooner did this thoroughly botched matter seem to have been resolved, when it was awkwardly revisited, following a cryptic announcement by…

Source: The National Herald By Theodore Kalmoukos BOSTON – Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew has appointed Metropolitan Evangelos of Sardis as a member of the Holy Synod of the Phanar for a one-year tenure starting March 1, 2023. Archbishop Elpidophoros is also a member of the Synod during the current Synodic period. Metropolitan Evangelos served as the duly and canonically elected Metropolitan of the Metropolis of New Jersey for seventeen years, from his election and enthronement on May 11, 2003, until October 8, 2020. Under his leadership the Metropolis of New Jersey, for the first time, acquired its Metropolis Center in the…

Source: The Moscow Times By Ksenia Luchenko The celebration of Orthodox Christmas in both Russia and Ukraine on Jan. 7 provided ample evidence of what the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War has called Russia’s weaponization of religion in its propaganda war against Ukraine. Just as Ukraine’s 2013 Maidan Uprising was seen by Vladimir Putin as a personal affront, the 2018 creation of an independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church to replace the Moscow-aligned Ukrainian Orthodox Church Moscow Patriarchate, has not been forgiven by the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, who was left fearing a domino effect should other regional churches seek to break…

Source: Religion News Service Contentious issues of church polity have been exposed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February. By Meagan Saliashvili (RNS) — Nearly 400 Orthodox Christian theologians from 44 countries convened in the largest international conference of its kind in Greece on Thursday (Jan. 12) to discuss “Nicaea-sized” questions facing the Eastern Orthodox Church amid war and bitter division. Some of the most contentious issues at the Mega-Conference of the International Orthodox Theological Association, meeting in Volos, have been exposed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, which exacerbated a split between a newly independent Orthodox Church of Ukraine…

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