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Source: The Cyprus Weekly Saturday’s pilgrimage to the Hala Sultan Mosque in Larnaca by more than 1,000 Turkish Cypriots proves the island’s two communities can co-exist peacefully, Turkish Cypriot religious leader, the Mufti of Cyprus, Talip Atalay has said. Speaking after morning prayers at the mosque, he thanked everybody who helped make the pilgrimage possible, in particular the head of the Greek Orthodox church Archbishop Chrysostomos and the Swedish embassy here. “Today’s pilgrimage proves that people of different faith can coexist and live peacefully in the same area with tolerance,” he said, noting that Islam advocates peace. He also said…

Source: IMEMC News by Saed Bannoura – IMEMC & Agencies Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church in Palestine, Archbishop of Sebastia (Theodosius) Attallah Hanna, called on the world community to fully recognize all legitimate Palestinian rights of liberation and independence. Archbishop Hanna said what is happening in Jerusalem, the deadly escalation in the city, stems from Israel’s ongoing injustice, and violations, against the Palestinian people, their property and their holy site. Talking to the Greek Orthodox Radio in Athens, on Saturday morning, Hanna said the Palestinian people are intellectuals, a civilized nation that wants to live in peace, and to…

Source: The Economist BY B.C. | THESSALONIKI IN THE churches of this country’s second city, some of which date from the Byzantine era, there was a decent turnout of worshippers this morning for one of the most enigmatic and mystical rites of the Greek church calendar: a service commemorating the moment when the Virgin Mary, as a young girl, is said to have gone to live in the Jerusalem Temple and prepared to become a new kind of “temple” herself by carrying a divine child in her womb. The liturgical poetry was reassuringly familiar, but there is nervousness in the…

Source: The Tablet by James Roberts The Prince of Wales this week followed up his impassioned plea for religious freedom at the 4 November launch of an Aid to the Church in the Need report on persecution, with a visit to St Yeghichè’s Armenian church in South Kensington, London. April next year marks the hundredth anniversary of the beginning of the genocide by the Ottoman Government against the Armenian population, in which 1.5 million were killed. Some of those who escaped fled to Syria, and the visit by the Prince of Wales comes as the descendants of those who fled…

Source: Christian Telegraph The Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill led the opening of the International Congress of Orthodox Youth, organized by the Youth Department of Synod on November 18, 2014 in Moscow, reports The Christian Telegraph in reference to “Patriarhiya.ru.” With the support of the Government of Moscow in the framework of the Congress an extensive cultural and educational programs for youth were implemented, themed booths and stands dedicated to different periods of the history of Russia and the Russian Orthodox Church were organized, as well as master classes and a number of other activities. Before the meeting…

Source: The Moscow Times Boldly bridging the gap between faith and science, a Russian Orthodox Church spokesman has voiced backing for the panspermia theory of life origin, which holds that life was transported here from elsewhere in the universe. “God could have created the world through various means,” Moscow Patriarchate representative Vsevolod Chaplin was cited as saying Thursday by the TASS news agency. “This includes the primary material contained in the bowels of a comet,” Vsevolod Chaplin added. He was commenting on the findings of the first comet landing in history, pulled off last week by the European Space Agency (ESA), which landed the Philae spacecraft on the 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko comet. Philae has found organic molecules — the basic building bricks…

Source: Orthodox Christian Network By Seraphim Danckaert in The Sounding Several years ago, Orthodox peoples in America were happy to see coverage of our faith on broadcast television when CBS aired a documentary about life on Mt. Athos. Although such mainstream coverage is rare, it is not entirely without precedent. Decades earlier, Fr. Alexander Schmemann, the long-time dean of St. Vladimir’s Seminary and a major voice in 20th century Orthodox Christianity, used to appear on a CBS program called “For Our Times.” Shortly after Fr. Schmemann’s death, the show aired a documentary about his life and influence, “a recollection of…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru Athens – The editor-in-chief and the publisher of the Greek Akropolis newspaper have been sentenced to several months imprisonment, reports Romfea. The charge of the trial court sounds unambiguous: for repeated defamatory publications against head of the Church of Greece, the Archbishop of Athens, and other hierarchs. After the hours-long hearings the court found the editor-in-chief and the publishing editor guilty of the libelous publications that had allegedly threw light on the relationships inside the Church connected with the hierarchs’ alleged connivance in the moral state of the clergy of the Church of Greece. At the hearings the Church…

Source: The National Herald BY CONSTANTINE S. SIRIGOS NEW YORK – The St. Michael’s home for the elderly, one of the most beloved institutions of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, took a giant step into the future on November 20 when it closed on the property for its new state of the art continuing care facility in Uniondale, NY. Archbishop Demetrios of America was present, along with Bishop Andonios of Phasiane, the Director of St. Michael’s, Haeda Mihaltses and Peter Lambros, president and vice president, respectively, of the Home’s Board and other Board members. Also present were attorneys for…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru [Moscow]  Construction of the Orthodox Church of Sts. Cyril and Methodius in memory of the victims of the 2002 terrorist attack on the musical theater in Dubrovka (Moscow) have been completed, reported the press service of the State Building Control Committee of Moscow toInterfax on Thursday. The construction, initiated in 2011, was carried out exclusively on charitable endowments. This is the first church whose foundations were laid within the framework of the program for the construction of 200 Orthodox churches in Moscow. Its foundation stone was blessed in April 2011 by Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia in…

Source: Pravoslavie.ru Ramallah, November 13, 2014 During excavations near the Palestinian town of Ramallah archaeologists have discovered a greatest Christian relic – the burial place of Holy Archdeacon Stephen, the First Martyr for Christ, reports the Linga news portal. Research in the Kharaba at Taiar village, which lies two kilometers west of Ramallah, carried out by the Palestinian and Israeli researchers have yielded unexpected results. Within the framework of a project by the University of Jerusalem for the discovery and restoration of antiquities, a group of archaeologists led by Dr. Salah al Hudeliyya has discovered ruins of an entire church…

Source: Orthodox Church in America SYOSSET, NY [OCA-CSHA]  As Orthodox Christians, we are called to wisely manage our talents, our treasures, and our time.  And, in these first days of the Nativity Fast, we very well may find that our good intentions for spiritual discipline in this regard may be threatened by expectations of the secular holiday season. To save ourselves from becoming “busy beyond belief,” the Department of Christian Service and Humanitarian Aid [CSHA] of the Orthodox Church in America recommends an article for clergy and laity by Dr. Albert Rossi and Julia Wickes, titled Time Management: an Orthodox…