Tag Archives: Orthodox Christian Studies

Scholars Not Priests

by George Demacopoulos  |  Ελληνικά  |  Русский  |  српски

In a seminal essay in 1990, the eminent scholar of early Christianity, Elizabeth Clark, demonstrated that Christianity grew rapidly, in large part, because women served as the community’s earliest financial benefactors—they were “Patrons not Priests.”[1] According to Clark, female patronage was not only a matter of Christian piety, it was also a consequence of broader social and cultural changes for women in the Greco-Roman world. At precisely the same time that Roman society was restricting women from serving as patrons for civic events, a small but determined group of female aristocrats turned their patronage toward Christianity. And the rest, so to speak, is history.

I would like to suggest that there is a parallel sociological phenomenon in the Orthodox Church in the United States today. While women are still unable to become priests, they are increasingly becoming scholars of Christianity. And this is having a profound, positive impact on the Church. Continue reading →

Introducing the Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies

by George Demacopoulos and Vera Shevzov

The Orthodox Christian Studies Center of Fordham University is pleased to announce the launch of the Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies, the first double-blind peer-reviewed academic journal covering all aspects of Orthodox Christianity and the Orthodox Christian world. The first issue is now available digitally and in print. Subscription information and more details about the journal are available from Johns Hopkins University Press.

The following introductory note by journal editors George Demacopoulos and Vera Shevzov briefly explains the vision and significance of the journal and of the field of Orthodox Christian studies.

Often associated with the qualifier “Eastern” and perceived as the Christian “other” in the context of contemporary world Christianity, Orthodox Christianity has historically remained largely off the curricular and scholarly radars of American academics. Yet, from late antiquity to modern times, as persecuted minorities, subjects of state-supported imperial regimes, or immigrants to “foreign lands,” Orthodox Christians have made some of the most significant and lasting contributions to the visual arts, literature, music, philosophy and theology, among other fields. Equally significant, yet politically more contentious, is the fact that Orthodoxy, in all its distinctive permutations, has historically offered a host of alternatives to the more familiar Western European narratives of the history of Christianity, as well as histories of traditionally Orthodox countries and cultures.

As a field, Orthodox Christian Studies connects an archipelago of cultural and religious traditions that for centuries were the dominant forms of Christianity throughout Asia Minor, the Balkans, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Russia. And while there is creative scholarly work devoted to the study of Orthodox Christianity in these regions and elsewhere, most of that work is conducted in relative isolation. Continue Reading…