Source: Orthodox Church in America DEREYAMANLI, CAPPADOCIA, TURKEY [OCA] Orthodox Christian faithful who trace their roots to Cappadocia filled the Church of the Mother of God here on the Sunday of All Saints—June 23, 2019—as His All-Holiness, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople and His Beatitude, Metropolitan Tikhon concelebrated the Divine Liturgy. Metropolitan Tikhon and a delegation representing the Orthodox Church in America that included Archpriest Alexander Rentel, Chancellor, and Archdeacon Joseph Matusiak had been invited by His All-Holiness to participate in the annual pilgrimage to Cappadocia in conjunction with a three-day pilgrimage to the Ecumenical Patriarchate. His Eminence, Metropolitan Paisius…
Browsing: Patriarch Bartholomew
Source: Orthodox Christianity Istanbul, June 10, 2019 — The primate of the schismatic-nationalist Ukrainian church created by the Patriarchate of Constantinople in December, “Metropolitan” Epiphany Dumenko, traveled to Istanbul today to congratulate Patriarch Bartholomew on his name’s day, which will be celebrated tomorrow, reports the press service of the “Orthodox Church of Ukraine.” Vespers for the new calendar feast of the apostle St. Bartholomew was served at the Monastery of the Lifegiving Spring, during which Pat. Bartholomew and “Met.” Epiphany prayed, along with His Beatitude Archbishop Ieronymos of Athens and All Greece, who also arrived to celebrate the Patriarch’s name’s day.…
Source: Orthodox Christianity Istanbul, May 31, 2019 – The Patriarchate of Constantinople restored canonicity to the entire Ukrainian nation, although the “presence of the Moscow Patriarchate” threatens the unity of the Ukrainian nation, Patriarch Bartholomew boldly declared in a recent interview with the Bulgarian outlet BGNES, even as the so-called “Orthodox Church of Ukraine” (OCU), created by him along with President Poroshenko, battles to maintain unity simply within itself. Pat. Bartholomew’s brother primates, the Holy Synods of the Local Churches, and a number of hierarchs from throughout the Orthodox world have repeatedly called on him to convene a pan-Orthodox council to…
Source: Orthodox Christianity Patriarch Bartholomew is Isolated: The Danger of Ethnophyletism Fr. Theodore Zisis For the first time, the Constantinople Church has found itself isolated from the other autocephalous Churches, due to its anti-canonical and anti-conciliar actions in granting autocephaly to the Ukrainian schismatics. Thus, it itself has placed under doubt its accepted coordinating role as a unifying factor and driven its hitherto proven and effective ecclesiastical politics into complete failure. It all began with the incomplete, truncated representation of the Body of Christ at the pseudo-council in Kolymvari, Crete. In our previous articles we noted the unavoidable danger arising…
by Nick Stamatakis A chaos much bigger than the one created by the Patriarch’s decisions on Ukraine is bound to be created by the so-called “election” of Elpidoforos of Bursa at the helm of our Greek Orthodox Church in America. Elpidoforos definitely deserves the title of “Cardinal”. First, he recently authored a diatribe titled “Primus Sine Paribus” (“First Without Equals”), submitted to the University of Thessaloniki, in which he throws out more than 17 centuries of democratic/synodical Orthodox traditions and explains why the Patriarch cannot be “equal” to the other church leaders; he also spent at least the last 10 years…
Source: The Pappas Post written by Gregory Pappas Like many in our community, I have been following the demise of the institution of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America with great pain, not to mention the dismal state of affairs with St. Nicholas National Shrine at Ground Zero and the decaying condition of the Seminary in Brookline. These logistic and administrative failures clearly are the fault of Archbishop Demetrios. In Greek we say that “the fish smells from the head” and if the types of things that happened in our Church had happened in corporate America, Demetrios would have been fired…
Source: The National Herald By Antonis H. Diamataris From one end of America to the other, our community follows, with justifiable anxiety, the issue of the successor of the resigned Archbishop Demetrios. The community has lived the decline in which the successors of Archbishop Iakovos have led to our Church and endured the consequences with remarkable patience. But it has reached its limits. That’s why it wants to prevent another mistaken choice. So, the Greek-American community is turning to the voice that it trusts, to The National Herald. People are telling us: “Do something.” But what can a newspaper do,…
Source: Orthodox Christian Laity The Synaxis of Patriarchs in 2008 decided that the Orthodox Church in the USA is uncanonical. How many more years can this situation fester? The Synaxis developed an Assembly of Bishops of all the canonical bishops in the USA to address the issue. They have been meeting for ten years and have reached an impasse. It is now up to the Patriarchs to act either in a synodical conciliar meeting with the 14 Self Ruling Patriarchs/Hierarchs, or if that cannot happen, the Ecumenical Patriarch needs to act as he did in Ukraine. On his visit to…
Source: Orthodox Synaxis The recent letter of Patriarch Bartholomew to Archbishop Anastasios of Albania is a remarkably revealing document, not only for its candid expression of the Patriarchate of Constantinople’s ecclesiology, but also for the insight it gives into the patriarchate’s internal discourse and the historical touchstones of its self-understanding. It is striking that most of the examples and quotations that the letter cites to illustrate the “Throne of Constantine[‘s …] universally recognized hallowed and dread responsibilities that transcend borders” date from the Ottoman period, to a degree that one might be tempted to suggest that the “Throne of Mehmet” might be…
Source: Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate Thank you for your time and your noble intention to give readers of “Politika” answers to very sensitive issues that characterize the positions of Orthodoxy in the modern world, namely – as you feel and know well – answers to very interesting questions about the Church of Ukraine. We admit that among the Serbian public, your explanation for this situation and your arguments have not been presented to a satisfactory degree. In contrast to this, the view and attitude of the Russian Church is constantly repeated in the Serbian media, and readers are fully…
Source: Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate In a January 14, 2019 letter to His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, Archbishop Anastasios of Tirana and all Albania called for a pan-Orthodox Council to resolve the crisis in Ukraine. His All-Holiness’ response, detailing the duties, responsibilities and rights of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, follows below. Protocol Number 104 Your Beatitude Archbishop Anastasios of Tirana and all Albania, most beloved and precious brother, concelebrant in Christ our God of our Modesty: We address Your venerable Beatitude with exceeding delight, even as we greet you with a fraternal embrace. We received and thoroughly examined your fraternal…
Source: Union of Orthodox Journalists by Konstantin Shemliuk What is behind the concern of US officials about the rights of the Orthodox? At the Athens conference on disinformation and news manipulation held on March 5, the ex-US Ambassador to Ukraine and now the Ambassador to Greece Jeffrey Payette made a strong statement about Russia’s efforts to undermine the authority of Patriarch Bartholomew: ”We’ve seen evidence of this kind of manipulation of information in Greece. We’ve seen Russian efforts in the Church, the efforts to undermine the role of the Ecumenical Patriarch.” He particularly stressed that “the purpose of this event tonight is to…