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Source: Orthodox Christian Laity At its recently adjourned board meeting in Akron, Ohio (May 30, 2014), four OCL members were elected to the Board of Directors.  Each member is passionately committed to Orthodox Christian Unity.  The variety of ages and interests of the new members will strengthen the vision and mission of OCL.   The new board members are:  Ellen Pantazis, Ocala, FL (GOA);  Michael Pacurar, Long Beach CA and Akron, OH (OCA); John Regule, The Villages, FL (OCA); and Roy Snyder, St Louis,  MO (Antiochian Archdiocese). Ellen Pantazis has had professional experiences as an educator and technology coordinator.  She also…

Source: Orthodox Church in America SYOSSET, NY [OCA] Intensified prayers for Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, the 27-year-old mother who had received a death sentence from a Sudanese court in mid-May 2014, and her family are being requested in light of a BBC report issued Saturday afternoon, May 31, indicating that a government official had announced her impending release from prison. [See related stories here and here .] Meriam, who gave birth to her second child in prison on Tuesday, May 27, also had been sentenced to 100 lashes on the grounds that she had married a Christian. When pressured to renounce her faith—Meriam is an Ethiopian…

Source: Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America On Thursday, May 22nd, Metropolitan Silouan led the delegation of the Hierarchs of the Archdiocese to the meeting with His Beatitude Patriarch John X of Antioch at his patriarchal residence in Balamand (Lebanon). The delegation was formed of the following hierarchs: Archbishop Joseph, Bishop Basil, Bishop Thomas, Bishop Alexander, Bishop John, Bishop Anthony and Bishop Nicholas. After the meetings that lasted for almost two and a half hours, the delegation visited new installations at the residence, mainly the new conference room where the Synod will be hosted from now on, and the…

Akron, Ohio Meeting Hilton Hotel May 29 to May 31, 2014  Thursday, May 29  Board members arrive and check in at Hilton Hotel, 3180 West Market Street, Akron, OH 44333   Telephone:  (330) 867-5000 6:30pm.   Dinner at BRAVO Restaurant (Italian cuisine) followed by informal Executive meeting.  The restaurant is walking distance from the hotel, directly across the street in the shopping center.  Don’t worry if you are arriving late.  Just straggle over after you check in.  We will be there in a private room for quite a while. Friday, May 30  8:30am.  Continental Breakfast in Hilton meeting room, lower level. 9:00am. …

Source: The National Herald BY CONSTANTINE S. SIRIGOS NEW YORK – Although the blessing of the site at Ground Zero has been postponed until the Fall and the start of construction has been pushed back to September after earlier hopes for a July or August beginning, the new Church of St. Nicholas may still be completed in time for Pascha 2016. His Grace Bishop Andonios of Phasiane, Chancellor of the Archdiocese, informed The National Herald that due diligence and the desire to “negotiate the best price for materials to keep the cost down,” has delayed the finalization of some agreements.…

Source: CNN By Salma Abdelaziz, Catherine E. Shoichet, Daniel Burke and Ed Payne, CNN (CNN) — Hours after a Sudanese court sentenced his pregnant wife to death when she refused to recant her Christian faith, her husband told CNN he feels helpless. “I’m so frustrated. I don’t know what to do,” Daniel Wani told CNN on Thursday. “I’m just praying.” This week a Khartoum court convicted his wife, Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, 27, of apostasy, or the renunciation of faith. Ibrahim is Christian, her husband said. But the court considers her to be Muslim. The court also convicted her of adultery and sentenced her to 100…

Source: Orthodox Church in America SOUTH CANAAN, PA [STOTS] Saint Tikhon’s Seminary here will host its annual Continuing Clergy Education Symposium June 17-19, 2014.  This is the second year that the school will provide this symposium to enable OCA priests and deacons to fulfill their annual 20 hours of continuing education studies mandated by the Holy Synod of Bishops. The list of speakers and topics to be included in this year’s symposium includes the following. “Spiritual Life in Saint Silouan the Athonite” by Christopher Veniamin, D. Phil. (Oxon.), Professor of Patristics at Saint Tikhon’s Seminary – Tuesday, June 17, at 1:00…

Source: The Wall Street Journal Concerts to celebrate the most-performed classical-music composer alive By STUART ISACOFF You may not know the name, but you’ve heard his music. Estonian composer Arvo Pärt’s alluring, hypnotic “tintinnabuli” (“bell-like”) style has resonated with listeners world-wide—the database Bachtrack reports that Mr. Pärt is now the most performed living classical composer. The haunting music in the trailer for the film “Gravity”—a perfect complement to the image of astronauts adrift, its piano pattern suggesting a cosmic clock as floating violin tones and spacious pauses convey a sense of human frailty—is his 1978 work, “Spiegel Im Spiegel” (Mirror…

Source: The Times of Israel Church representatives say Father Gabriel Naddaf has been dismissed from his Nazareth post The Greek Orthodox church in the Holy Land has dismissed an Israeli Arab priest who publicly supported Israeli army service for Christian Arabs, a church spokesman said Thursday. Spokesman Essa Musleh told AFP that ecclesiastical authorities decided Tuesday to fire Father Gabriel Naddaf from his post in Jesus’s traditional childhood town of Nazareth, but were only now making their decision public. “We warned him before to keep to his priestly duties and not to interfere in matters of the army,” Musleh said.…

Source: American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association WASHINGTON, DC –  Anthony Kouzounis, supreme president of the American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association (AHEPA), the largest and oldest membership-based association for the nation’s millions of American citizens of Greek heritage and Philhellenes, issued the following statement on the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom’s release of its 2014 Annual Report on April 30: “The return of Turkey’s designation to ‘Tier Two’ country status rectifies to some extent the Commission’s egregious and disappointing designation last year that significantly upgraded Turkey to a country that simply needed to be ‘monitored.’ “The Commission’s 2014 report properly documents many…

Source: BSANNA News Bucharest, May 7. /AGERPRES/. Fifteen years ago, Pope John Paul II conducted, between May 7-9, for the first time, a visit to Romania, a country predominantly Christian Orthodox in faith. It was the first visit of a Pope in Romania. ‘It is for the first time that Divine Providence offered me the possibility to make an apostolic journey to a country predominantly orthodox’, said Pope John Paul II, thanking Patriarch Teoctist of the Romanian Orthodox Church, as the latter greeted him on the airport. During his pontificate, Pope John Paul II conducted a great number of trips…

Source: Greek Reporter by Theodora Matsaidoni Elder Paisios the Athonite (1924-1994), one of the greatest and most revered Elders of the Orthodox Church of our time, is well-known for his spiritual teachings. His Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew announced that the Holy Mountain Elder will be formally canonized as a saint. Elder Amphilochios (Makris) of Patmos, Elder Sophrony (Sakharov) of Essex, Elder Ephraim of Katounakia and Elder Iakovos Tsalikis are anticipated to follow as well. “The Orthodox Church serves a higher Truth, which has nothing to do with myths and speculations,” said His All Holiness, Bartholomew I, Archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome, and Ecumenical Patriarch, denying all…