Bridging the Ecclesial, the Academic, and the Political
We sign this letter as Orthodox Christians who are witnessing a shocking shift, under the Trump administration, away from democratic norms, international law, human rights, civil rights, and religious liberty. These are not partisan concerns. Rather, they involve actions that appear to violate fundamental and widely recognized norms, values, and standards of human decency. In…
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Ever since emerging from the lockdowns, Orthodox parishes—almost exclusively English-speaking ones—have experienced a historic increase in inquirers and converts. It is probably safe to say that there hasn’t been such an intense and sustained period of growth in the history of Orthodoxy in America. What is remarkable is not only the sheer number of newcomers…
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The Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council would not recognize the Church today because of the absence of women leaders. Seventeen hundred years ago, the bishops who made their way to Nicaea carried with them the memories of the great martyrs like Saint Barbara and Saint Katherine and the 20,000 martyrs of Nicomedia. They would…
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“There have been two major types of ‘corruption.’ First, a great number of cases, primarily political, were removed from the jurisdiction of the courts and submitted to special forms of investigation and trial. Secondly, the independence of the judges was progressively curtailed, and the courts were placed in an ever more dependent position. The government…
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As an Orthodox Christian witnessing the systematic persecution of clergy and faithful in Russia, I find myself compelled to break the deafening indifference within our American Orthodox communities. My heart grows heavier each day as friends—priests I’ve known for decades—suffer for their faithfulness to the Gospel of peace. Here, I must acknowledge that Ukrainians are…
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Orthodox Christianity in the United States is an immigrant church. That is to say, it is a church primarily brought to the United States by 20th- and 21st-century immigrants and still largely populated by them and their descendants. It is a part of our collective identity that would be wise to remember as the country…
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There are many holy ones, examples of the martyric witness of Orthodoxy throughout the history of America’s Transatlantic slave trade, Reconstruction, and Jim Crow semi-slavery and segregation. We can consider these the Holy Ones of American Slavery. It is their martyric witness of the faith that bridges the Black American experience of suffering to the Pontic…
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One morning not long ago I sat down at a table in a Midwestern university’s special collections library, eager to spend several days working through a cart packed with anniversary books and commemorative pamphlets published by Orthodox parishes and dioceses across North America. These kinds of booklets are invaluable in my work as a historian,…
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Alongside fellow citizens, an Orthodox perspective on rights needs to be heard. But are Orthodox themselves interested enough to discover their Tradition’s grappling with such questions?
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On Bright Thursday 2023, the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of the United States issued a statement about an Orthodox cleric without a canonical home. During the bright joy of Paschaltide, the bishops decided to tackle an issue plaguing Orthodoxy in the United States for the past several years: namely, how to publicly denounce a…
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American society is polarized to an extent that one can hardly recall. It is as if we have entered a cold civil war. There is another name for this war: culture war, which is a literal translation of the German Kulturkampf. Culture wars are not proper wars, and they are not about culture. They…
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It is encouraging to see young scholars and emerging Greek Orthodox leaders entering the conversation about anti-racism. In a posting in this forum, Nikolaos Piperis and Stavros Piperis, scholars at the Creighton University School of Law and Youth Directors at St. John the Baptist Greek Orthodox Church in Omaha, Nebraska, contribute to the discussion from…
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Some of the readers of Public Orthodoxy may have read my book Turning to Tradition: Converts and the Making of an American Orthodox Church. Those who have will have heard of Fr. Raphael Morgan. Others might not have read the book, but may be aware of him, perhaps due to his Orthodoxwiki entry or an…
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Democracy and the separation of church and state are relatively new for the Orthodox Church. From both derive the many challenges the Church in America encounters as it stands unfettered in the political arena. Paraphrasing the British historian and theologian G.L. Prestige, the concept, let alone the reality, of a political atheist was unknown until…
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It has always been the case that forces beyond the control of the Church have prompted changes in the practice of theological education. For example, Ottoman repression led many Greek Christians to seek education abroad. Tsar Peter I imposed Western-styled seminaries upon the Russian Church. And the Bolshevik Revolution crippled religious education throughout Russia and…
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Who gets to decide what it means to be Orthodox in America? Greeks? Russians? Converts? Foreign bishops? How do “cradle” and convert identities come together – or not? How do “diaspora” narratives that tie Orthodoxy to nationalism translate in an American context? What does Orthodoxy mean in the American religious marketplace of ideas? Is it…
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Thirty years ago this month, Metropolitan Philip of the Antiochian Archdiocese began the process of bringing into the Orthodox Church seventeen “Evangelical Orthodox” communities from across America. At that time, he declared Orthodoxy to be “America’s best kept secret,” and he urged us as new converts to do something about this. “Take Orthodoxy to America,” he…
Continue readingThis essay was originally delivered as a public talk at the June 2015 Fordham/OTSA conference on the upcoming Great and Holy Council of the Orthodox Church. It was part of a panel on Autocephaly and Diaspora. I would like to begin with three questions, for which I would ask for a show of hands: How…
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