It rhymes with news.
Just heard that there is, finally, a viable candidate to succeed my late bishop, +Metropolitan Nicholas of Amissos.
The candidate is from the Metropolis of Atlanta in the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese. He is American-born, well-educated. More importantly, he knows about prayer. He can even talk about the nous -- without any sarcasm, I must say that this fact alone distinguishes his candidacy.
You can imagine, I'm sure, that some cultural and ethnic questions have been asked. Isn't there any candidate from our own ranks, from our own "people"? Isn't there anyone from the old country?
The fact remains -- despite some bloggerisms to the contrary from the usual sources (the sort that read like a monongahela brown-land on a rainy day in grey November) -- that our chancellor, vice-chancellor and consistory priests worked hard in the last 15 months, looking for and praying for a worthy candidate. Some were identified -- and for one reason or another, these "some" did not work out. That kind of process must be allowed for, given the complexity of this world, and the free moral agency of every man.
There has been no contact from the old places in Europe. A few intemperate notions (on blogs and facebook pages and twitterisms -- I can't wait for the inevitable anonymous letters) suggest that there is some geo-political contretemps between the Patriarchate and some Eastern Europeans, and consequently the former quashed any consideration of the latter.
No -- the reason for the absence of an old world candidate is far less interesting (and much more despondent): the old world simply hasn't said a word or made contact or demonstrated one iota of interest, in these last 15 months, in showing up for the continued pastorate of its children in America.
I should note here that one can always expect intemperateness in transitional moments, such as the one we're in. To us who are still afflicted by old family memories of the Habsburgs or the Tsars (or their red successors), any and every regime change brings out predictable anxieties. We whisper. We project. We speculate. We are sure that large forces are at work, working against our interests. We are positive that choices are foisted upon us, and that all we do is to "rubber stamp" decisions that have been already made.
I get that way myself, and my grandparents and great-grandparents did not come from the starij criju. Switzerland, yes, and Aberdeen. Thuringenwald and Brementown, too. But I suggest that these worries are not confined to any single sort of people. When I get that way -- i.e., intemperate and anxious -- I pray, and remember that the Holy Trinity disposes a Good Economy, and that Christ Jesus is our one and only High Priest and Pastor. I also listen to the Sons of the Pioneers on my porch in the evening.
To the "old world" voices who harbor strong notions of ethnic continuity, I would like to remind them, gently, that I have bent over backwards (to use an old cliche) personally defending the ethnicity of this particular Orthodox community. I have suggested, not too gently, to converts that they should quit complaining about the occasional appearance of Church Slavonic in the services, and that the Carpatho-Russian recension of the typicon is just as valid as is the Russian, Greek, Ukrainian or Antiochian recensions. We converts can be a wild-western lot, I know, having been one and, I guess, continuing to be so. I have also helped Vladyka prepare presentations on the Rusyn (see? I can use that spelling, too) heritage, and its continuing value for the Orthodox evangel to America -- and I believed in those presentations. He always laughed about my monoglottism, and my complete inability to translate the simplest phrases into po-nashemu (this means "our language" to us ex-anabaptists). He said, on several occasions (and even as a joke at one of our interminable banquets) that I said Slava Isusu Christu with an Oklahoman accent.
Now (and please excuse this post-modern meta-self-referential idiom), that last paragraph was rhetorically positioned in just the same way as St. Paul's remark in Philippians 3.5: Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee.
You see? Despite my Heinz 57 pedigree, I should get some credit for having tried to be Carpatho-Russian -- or at least, to act in the best Carpatho-Russian interest.
Having lodged this credential, in an admittedly pathetic manner (and you must pardon that rhetorical pun there, because it was so irresistable), I suggest that the pastoral care given us by the Ecumenical Patriarchate since 1938 hasn't been so bad. The Phanar has let us be (and continue to be) who we are. We have made necessary adjustments. We have not been folded, willy-nilly, into another diocese and into another culture -- a sad state of affairs that would be manifestly non-Chalcedonian, and very much at our particular expense. Oddly -- and "oddly" in a tragic sense -- the ethnic voices who might actually work politically for such a "folding" would, if they got their way, produce the very extinction of Carpatho-Russian values that one would expect they'd rather avoid.
I like this Carpatho-Russian culture, this idiom of Orthodoxy in the wild west. Once in a while I understand parts of it.
At this point, I still know little of this new candidate for the episcopacy of our diocese. But I pray fervently for him and this process nonetheless.
But as an ingrafted convertski Carpatho-Russian priest, I have nothing to fear. For God is sovreign, and we serve a timeless apostolic church. Metropolitan Nicholas is praying for us in Paradise -- of that I am sure.
We should trust God. We should worry less, and stop thinking so politically.
Because historically, politics is manifestly not "our thing."
Ingemar: An odd yardstick to use to be sure. Is the OCA dying because it has had to pull in its last three bishops from outside (2 ACROD, 1 Antiochian) or because Alaska has sat fallow for years?
I hope the new bishop, whoever he may be, makes another go at monastic communities. It's not an add-on to a diocese, but central/necessary to it.
Posted by: Byzantine, TX | June 11, 2012 at 11:07 AM
Father, I think what gets lost in the ramblings of the Canonistas (East or West) is a sense of the general in a search for perfection in the specifics.
Our Lord said the two greatest commandments are "Love the Lord your God with all you heart, mind, soul and strength" and "Love your neighbor as yourself." Does BenXVI cheerleading over his attempts to curb the abuses of Vat2 help us Love God and Neighbor better? Do the never ending arguments over Canon 28 help us Love God and Neighbor better? Do these thoughts even register?
Sometimes I worry that leaving my previous Protestant church for Orthodoxy has made me love God and Neighbor less, but I am only speaking for myself. In that sense, I am beginning to grok the fathers' warning that the demons can help me pray.
Posted by: Ingemar | June 10, 2012 at 02:22 PM
Thank you, Anonymous. I disagree with you respectfully. I would not, myself, characterize a 15 month interval as "rushed." I don't know what you mean by "transparency" or "public record." Do you know of any episcopal candidacy process that is as open as you'd like?
I think the requirement for full communion with Constantinople is self-explanatory, and necessary. As I am handicapped here by not knowing whom I'm addressing, I will assume that you might not know that the Holy Synod in Constantinople is the final decision in the process of succession. As that is the case, then of course communion with "EP" is requisite. I think the reference to pregnancy in this context assumes a simplistic dichotomy that does not obtain here, or in any other episcopal succession.
Posted by: Fr Jonathan | June 09, 2012 at 10:55 AM
Several concerns...The way the nominations are being made allows for no public record of the said nominations. For example, if a candidate's name is submitted in writing the consistory will review it and decide if the candidate is worthy to be voted on. This lacks transparency, and allows for the possibility of all candidates but one being deemed "unworthy." I am not saying that this will happen, but the process allows for it which could be a cause for scandal.
The short time frame being allotted for the nominations of episcopal candidates is not what most would consider normal for the election of a ruling bishop. It would have been more prudent to have called a sobor of priests to make nominations from the floor as in the past, recess, begin vetting candidates, and reconvene for the election of a bishop.
Also, it would make more sense to have the election during the week and not on a Saturday because many priests are faced with the obligation of going to Johnstown to vote and having to close the parish on Sunday, which is not a good situation.
One guideline which was perplexing is that only names may be submitted of candidates who are in full communion with the E.P. This is ambiguous. On the one hand it could mean candidates from the True Orthodox Churches are not allowed, it could mean Greek Catholics are not allowed, and on the other hand it could mean no candidates from the OCA are allowed. I know the OCA sits on the Episcopal Assembly, and I know their clergy and faithful commune with the other jurisdictions in America, so what does this mean? Is there a "half-communion" of the Eucharist? As one priest said concerning this issue: "You are either pregnant or you are not."
To be fair I have heard Fr. Tatsis speak and it was nothing short of marvelous! My only concern is that this whole process is so rushed and hurried, and it lacks the transparency that such a serious matter should have.
Posted by: Anonymous Out of Concern | June 09, 2012 at 08:35 AM
I am surprised at this notion of Serge's.
I'll have to chew on your association of ritual with moral legalism. The latter sort, espoused by the Pharisees, rejected the Spirit of the Law that manifested Christ, and chose instead a superficial performance.
The desire for rules and regulations for ritual is probably more a Sadducee thing, and it goes on in our own community, too, with the belief that slavish devotion to rubrics will evoke certain "satisfactions." Heaven forbid the desire is not for actual "invocation" by the accomplishment of proper ceremony.
A friend of mine said to me just a few days ago: "At Liturgy, we celebrants are only children playing in our Father's house." There's something to be said for that -- in any case, the childlike humor and humility that is conveyed by that remark seems to militate against the exclusive use of a dead, non-evolving language.
"Nerds in canon wars." Heh.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 09, 2012 at 05:58 AM
Ingemar, I am surprised that Serge made such a faux pas. Why should the presence of episcopal candidates demonstrate the viability of a diocese? But I think I said something about that hundreds of years ago, at the top of this comments column.
Anyways, I will chew on the relationship between birettas and incense and Pharisaism. I've usually associated Pharisaism with the fundamentalist penchant for superficial morality, as opposed to the crucial concern for deification.
The damning Pharisaism you so rightly excoriate is the degeneracy of Orthodox theosis into Church Lady fastidiousness.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 08, 2012 at 08:00 PM
So ACROD is not dying? This fellow seems to think so: http://sergesblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/church-orthodoxy-carpatho-russian.html
Of course, for some (like the aformentioned) religion is all about birettas and incense and Latin. For others, it's about a desire for rules and regs. When those nerds get in their Canon wars, I remember the Joker's line to Batman in the Dark Knight: "You have all these rules, you think they're gonna save you."
I lament that Jesus saved us from our sins only to damn ourselves to Pharisaism once agin.
Posted by: Ingemar | June 08, 2012 at 05:26 PM
Chris, my apologies for using the word "basis" when I should have used "context" and "language." I used "basis" in the sense of "substrate" -- I certainly did not use it in the sense of "substance."
For many reasons, the Church in post-Constantinian times behaved not altogether unseemly. There were Providential reasons why the Church accepted a role in society that she no longer has. One such reason was the miraculous development of Divine Liturgy and the services of the Apostolic Church. Another reason was the articulation of apostolic doctrine in the Seven Ecumenical Councils.
You may disagree, but those two reasons are very much the most important "evangelizing" the Christian Church has accomplished.
The Orthodox Church is always ready and willing -- even in its most ethnic moments -- to evangelize. Of course, the better word for that is the offering of the gift of deification.
Anyone who wants to become partakers of the divine nature is welcome. But if they want this, then they must accept the disciplines of Liturgy and Doctrine, two things which are hard for many to swallow. I have found a good criterion to judge the quality of a culture is to ask whether that culture helps its people to accept Orthodox Liturgy and Doctrine. If it doesn't, then it is a poor, ragged culture indeed.
The Church has journeyed into and through many cultures throughout the ages. Every single one of these cultures has taken itself too seriously. However, the Church took seriously the language and memories of each one -- mainly for instrumental reasons (i.e., to speak the language, in order to proclaim the Gospel). There are other reasons to cherish ethnicity: every single one, and every single culture, has something to articulate about human nature -- and that is a subject which has helped us preach the Gospel, in and out of season, that has had, as you point out, "everything to offer."
We have already offered America the Gospel. We will keep offering it, even though America, by and large, is growing less inclined to accept it.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 08, 2012 at 05:18 PM
Culture...church..ethnic...culture...church...pre-Constantine...post-Constantine...
We live where and when we live, the Church as we receive Her has a life which precedes our own and surely will outlast us...However, the Church exists not as a static piece of 'art' in a museum deigned to reflect the glory, vanity or pain of what was, but it exists with us in the now. This talk of somehow separating the Church from the culture held by the faithful strikes me as an intellectually false construct. Surely culture itself is NOT the Church, i.e. Hellenism as urged by some or the romanticized view of 19th century peasant Russia held by others - but it is inextricably linked with the Church.
As to the argument as to what IS American culture - I will leave that to others - but the various ethnic sub-groups contained within America's geopolitical boundaries are surely part of that 'culture.' If not, the other alternative is shaped solely by Madison Avenue, and surely there is no place for Orthodoxy in that world-view.
Posted by: dmd53 | June 08, 2012 at 02:50 PM
"American culture, as it is, cannot be the basis for an American Orthodox Church."
I don't disagree with this, as written, but I strongly disagree with its implicit premise that a culture -- ANY culture -- can be "the basis" for a local Church. The basis for the Church is the Gospel and the Apostolic Tradition, NOT any human culture, be it Greek, Russian, Carpatho-Russian, whatever. A particular culture is the *context*, not the *basis*, for the Church.
"It is certainly more akin to the pre-constantinian church than has ever been present since."
Absolutely. A fact of the utmost importance.
The Orthodox Church of pre-Constantinian times had no qualms about evangelizing the disparate cultures in which she found herself. The fact that there was "no central mass" culturally did not make the Church stop evangelizing, nor did it make the Church stick to the cultural context that she already knew (i.e. Jewish). In fact the Gospel itself was the catalyst that made it possible for a "central mass" to develop. The Orthodox Church of today, if she is, as she claims, concretely the same Church as that of pre-Constantinian times, should be behaving the same way that the Church of that times did.
The "various ethnic memories" of the Orthodox Church have *nothing* to offer contemporary culture. The Gospel has *everything* to offer. Which do you want to give us?
Posted by: Chris Jones | June 08, 2012 at 01:49 PM
I'm in no ethnic cocoon. The 3rd generation Eastern European blue collar parish in which I work is pretty good at welcoming all races, ethnicities, income classes and familial configurations. We have pretty put-together people and some who are not together at all.
They all come together, yes, on an occasional ethnic exercise, such as a Carpatho-Russian hymn once in a while, and most of us like our pirohi, kolbassi and halushki.
That "borrowed ethnicity" does not detract from the more important Christian business of following the Church year, celebrating the Divine Liturgy and receiving the Eucharist, and understanding Scripture in a rigorous Christological light.
And I guess there is where we part company with contemporary American culture, that would put a premium on a market-oriented program and needs-based evangelism.
I'm quite glad we are what we are. I have no reason to replace Carpatho-Russianism with Americanism, because there is no stable Americanism really to take its place.
We all speak American anyways. We like the Fourth of July. There's a flag in our front corner, and we take all comers. But the comers-in, more likely than not, are just as much refugees from contemporary culture as from anything else.
So I would suggest that a cocoon is really not the problem at all. What is far, far worse is the desert from which the Orthodox Church -- with all its various ethnic memories intact -- is an oasis.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 08, 2012 at 01:31 PM
I guess where one puts the full stop determines the meaning of the sentence.
That there is an American culture I would not only not deny, but fully and enthusiastically endorse. Of course: "where two or three are gathered, there is culture in their midst," to rephrase a well known line. And that is simply because human nature, in a group, becomes culture.
In fact, I've kind of prided myself in advertising American culture in these very pages.
But my proposition said something different. You will probably disagree, but I meant to say that American culture, as it is, cannot be the basis for an American Orthodox Church.
The crucial phrase in my re-statement is "as it is." Your examples -- most of which I savor and value (I'll give items no. 1, 3, 7, and 11 a pass) -- are mostly drawn from the past. Aside from the crassness of most contemporary American culture, there is another factor that makes it utterly deficient for an American Orthodox Church -- indeed, so deficient that it makes a single American Orthodox Church unlikely at all.
That factor is simply the fact that American culture, today, has no central mass. Culture is a network of lived out history and myth, nourished by a robust metaphysic. Much as you might insist that culture must exist where there are Americans, I would insist with equal poignancy that where there is no generally common myth or metaphysic, where there is no robust common inheritance of civic knowledge, there can be no culture that is sufficient as an ethnicity that can replace Greekness, or Romanness, or Russianness.
Perhaps this is a good thing. It is certainly more akin to the pre-constantinian church than has ever been present since.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 08, 2012 at 01:08 PM
"There is no American culture that can predicate a thing called an American Orthodox Church."
This can't be right. And if it's not right then the conclusions you draw from it can't be right either.
This can either mean "There is no American culture" (full stop), and there can be no American Orthodox Church because there is no culture there to evangelize; or it can mean there is an American culture, but the nature of that culture is such that it is completely incompatible with Orthodox Christianity and with having an Orthodox Church as part of it.
If what you mean is the first ("There is no American culture, period") then I say that that is ridiculous. Human beings cannot exist other than as part of a culture. It is a part of human nature. American culture may be ugly, it may be commodified and commercialized, it may be artificial and sanitized, but it is a culture. McDonalds, Willa Cather, American Idol, the NFL, Stephen Foster, the Modern Jazz Quartet, Madonna, the suburbs, the Boy Scouts, George Washington chopping down the cherry tree, Reality TV, and fireworks on the Fourth of July are all artifacts of American culture. It may not be a culture you like, and it may not be a culture that is congenial to your religion, but it is a real culture, and one that is waiting to be converted and transformed by the Gospel.
If what you are saying is the second (American culture is incompatible with Orthodox Christianity) then what you are saying is that ours is the one nation that is irredeemable, that our culture can't be converted and therefore if one is to be a Christian one must adopt someone else's culture. I cannot find words adequate to express my revulsion at such a notion. The Saviour commanded his followers to go to all nations, and He made no exclusion for America.
If Orthodox Christianity is the true faith, then American culture, for all its faults, is supposed to be grist for your mill. Get out of your ethnic cocoon and get to it.
Posted by: Chris Jones | June 08, 2012 at 12:49 PM
The petition "for the union of them all" has nothing to do with a single administrative complex (with brass and glass and secretaries).
It has only to do with a sobernost predicated upon kenotic love and apostolic vision.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 08, 2012 at 12:33 PM
I agree with Father on the administrative issue. I suspect that the Heavenly powers that be would far rather see a robust and lively series of Churches rather than an administratively bloated one attempting to curry political favors like in some large eastern Eurasian lands....I don't lose any sleep about five Bishops in Pittsburgh or anywhere else, frankly only on the internets and with people thinking 'deep thoughts' do such things get in the way of real life. Frankly, the ONLY Patristic era example of a multi-ethnic geo-poltical entity akin at all to the USA was the western Roman Empire in its various incarnations. The model that usurped Church administration there has vexed the Church ever since and is hardly a model to emulate.
Posted by: dmd53 | June 08, 2012 at 12:30 PM
I see that, and I'll raise you ... use a truly American argot:
More than "I just wish we'd do it together," I would say "We had better do it together." For ethnic exclusion and/or superiority is a sinful thing.
There is no American culture that can predicate a thing called an "American Orthodox Church." One of the many reasons why we "convertski" were drawn to Orthodoxy was the very appealing reality that Orthodoxy sustained robust ethnic cultures. Admittedly, this is a minor reason (the apostolic tradition, the Christological reading of Scripture and the New Testament and the Eucharist comprising the crucial reason) for joining up -- but contemporary neo-fascist commercialism sucks culture dry. We converts all remember the riveting, and deeply psychic, transition of traversing the threshold from plastic Twinky culture to the quiet dark hush of candleflame, incense and icons.
Well, having said that, I'm all for American Orthodoxy remaining an administrative mess, if only to forestall the inevitable doctrinal degeneracy that occurs with every centralization that's occurred in American religious history; and to obstruct, if possible, the continued cancerous decay brought about by radical commodification and bozartism.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 08, 2012 at 11:25 AM
I'm all for retaining "the particular concreteness of various ethnic courtesies and customs", I just wish we'd do it together rather than apart. Sure, things would change, but they'd change in the same way immigrant cultures from a specific place changed when they came here. That is, Greek culture in a GOA church is not the same as in a Greek church in Greece - because they are no longer "simply" Greek. Similarly, our churches would begin to reflect the reality of being Orthodox in America - we are small, we aer diverse, we are from here and there with generational histories that are wildly different, and yet we all face the same altar and commune of the one cup. There's no need to attempt to create an American Orthodox culture, and there's no need to dedicate churches to one ethnic particularity over another. We have the opportunity to be "The Orthodox Church, here comes everybody" - and yet we prefer being "The Orthodox Church, here comes my countrymen".
Posted by: a so-called barbarian | June 08, 2012 at 10:49 AM
Barb's comment also was found over on byzcath where I felt it necessary to post a comment outlining our process. It really elicited positive responses. Funny how we all are so prone to 'assume' the worst when it comes to politics and religion. We're all guilty on that count for sure though!
Posted by: dmd53 | June 08, 2012 at 09:38 AM
David, the laughter of your dad and Vladyka are dulcet sounds to my memory. I remember fondly, them laughing, speaking in tongues (ponashemu) with Fr Dolhy, at my dining room table in Scranton over little amber glasses of Grand Marnier. I had no idea what they were saying. And I didn't even care if I were the butt of the joke, so much did I love them, the convivial old men of our sacred clan.
Barb, I honor your anti-apartheid trend, and I agree with your advertisement of fearlessness in the face of xenos flitting from one ethnos to the other. But I hope we can retain the particular concreteness of various ethnic courtesies and customs. What a shabby church we'd have if we were uniform and indistinct, non-personal even. Christ is glory of a coat of many colors indeed. The usual eschatology pays no attention to concrete stuff like this. But I'd rather err on the side of simple detail than play it safe on the side of exhausting academia.
I am all for the accession of Archimandrite Grigorios. If he is willing to stay with us, this very textured and God-beloved band of knockabout brothers, then God bless him first of all, and he's got my vote for hope and courage. Plus he's almost exactly my age, too, so he's very young.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 08, 2012 at 12:18 AM
I think part of the confusion over Greek involvement was due to non-ACROD Orthodox being unaware of the process by which a candidate was selected. I, for instance, only learned about it via an announcement by Abp Demetrios. That is, from an announcement from above by the exarch, not as being the result of a search conducted by ACROD with the blessing of Abp Demetrios.
In fact, should Fr. Grigorios be consecrated Met. of ACROD, it would be a wonderful opportunity to prove the possibility that ethnicity and the typikon of one's home parish need not be feared by other ethnicities and those of other typikons. That is, it may be possible for a Greek to lead an Rusyn jurisdiction, and perhaps Russians, Americans, Romanians, etc., even converts, to rule in other jurisdictions. (Even in the GOA...?)
Posted by: a so-called barbarian | June 07, 2012 at 04:05 PM
My dear Father and dear friend - I split my side in laughter at much of your post - as I am certain the Metropolitan and my father would have done were they to have read it.
But I agree with pretty much all you have observed. I will just add that I have known the priests on the consistory for all of my life, either as friends who became priests or as priests I knew from childhood who were the pupils and friends of my late father.
Anyone who believes that those men would have stood for a 'Greek coup' are fools and do not know these priests.
One of the drawbacks of having a married clergy in a country without a large monastic presence - or one that is at least of a practical mind and humane, pastoral mind-set - is that all of our Orthodox jurisdictions are faced with a lack of viable candidates. In the absence of having say a young priest who is a widower and whose children have fled the nest it becomes problematic. I should note for those not aware that both Bbs. Michael and Mathias were in fact widowers at a young and tragic age in their respective lives.
Don't read the tea leaves, just enjoy the tea. Pray and put your faith in the Holy Spirit and in the power of the protection of the Theotokas who has protected our people and our diocese since its inception.
Posted by: dmd53 | June 07, 2012 at 03:56 PM
I should mention, too, that the "viability" of a diocese is not diminished by the absence of episcopal candidates from its own clergy. Any such absence is not an unprecedented historical particularity, but rather indicates the non-viability of candidates, not the diocese.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 07, 2012 at 11:36 AM
I cannot comment about Bps Michael and Matthias.
I will say, confidently, that the Archdiocese (and further up) has been most laissez-faire with our Diocese in the matter of looking for candidates. So I do not think that the issue of "Greek to Greek worthiness" is germane at all to our situation.
Thank you, barb, it's always nice to talk civil.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 07, 2012 at 10:10 AM
I thought two things when I heard the announcement, only one of which was really fair.
Should there be some questioning regarding the viability of a jurisdiction if cannot produce its own bishops? especially if that jurisdiction is not comprised of new or quite backwards converts?
That's a serious question, and it applies to mini-autocephalous churches, too.
I'm also wondering what it says about the bishops that have come out of ACROD, recently, e.g., Bps Michael and Matthias in the OCA. Are they unworthy? If not, were they the only worthy ones? If so, why were they let go? And that gets to the age old issue with the Greeks when it comes to 'jurisdiction'. The worthy ones only ever seem to be Greek, to Greeks - which is not to say there are not worthy Greek candidates such as Fr. Grigorios (I assume).
On the upside, while it's inauspicious to place a Greek at the head of a non-Greek jurisdiction ("separate but equal") this is a wonderful opportunity for the EP to act as 'ecumenically' with other Orthodox as it does with other Christians. While the apartheid structure of the EP (and the OCA, mind you, incarnating the 'vision of St. Tikhon') is unappealing to me, it's a great opportunity for them to show that some animals are not in fact more equal than others. We'll see.
Posted by: a so-called barbarian | June 07, 2012 at 10:03 AM
I'll mention your suggestion to the author of that certain blog. Ha! or "hahaha" (to use the facebook argot).
So sorry you can't come up. I was hoping to see you Father/Counselor.
Posted by: Fr. Jonathan | June 07, 2012 at 09:23 AM
Thank you, Father. I think we all have a tendency to want to micromanage all of our affairs, and why should selecting a bishop be any different? I am by far the worst offender in that regard, but in doing so I/we forget the big picture, which is the providence and care of God, who has never failed us and shows no sign of doing so now.
I'm very excited by Fr. Grigorios. Like you, anyone who can use the word "nous" with a straight face already has my attention. Sadly, I will not be able to be at Camp Nazareth or in Taylor to meet Father face to face. Maybe a certain blog can carry a report for the benefit of us toiling far, far away from Pennsylvania home land?
Posted by: Fr. James | June 07, 2012 at 09:14 AM