Source: Orthodox Church in America March 18, 2021 marks the 40th anniversary of the repose in 1981 of His Beatitude Metropolitan Ireney (Bekish), the first Primate of the Autocephalous Orthodox Church in America (OCA).  When Metropolitan Ireney signed the agreement with the Church of Russia on autocephaly for the Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church of America (popularly known as the Metropolia) and the Tomos of Autocephaly was granted by the Patriarch of Moscow in the spring of 1970, he had already served as Primate of the Metropolia for nearly five years.  He would continue his Primatial service within the Autocephalous Orthodox…