|
|
Regarding Gary Conrad’s “Hellenism”
http://www.ocl.org/hellenism2.htm
Gary Conrad made
an excellent point in decrying the association of
Hellenism, ethnicism, nationalism, or any other
kind of "ism" with our religious faith, but he
went too far and contradicted his own position by
suggesting that if we wait patiently for ten or
twenty years we will prevail and eventually have
ourselves our own "ism." Our Eastern Orthodox
faith doesn't need an ethnic or nationalistic
modifier. Our religion is Eastern Orthodox, and
that nomenclature has been around for almost two
thousand years. It has a nice, stable, and
ancient ring to it. Let's not start changing
things. The Catholics are in the process of
restoring Latin masses after having abandoned them
because they thought they were losing their
youth. Our beautiful, traditional, bilingual
church services can and should continue as they
are, whether they are being held here, or in
Australia, Japan, Hong Kong, or anywhere else.
The cradle of our religion is in the Middle East,
and we should never lose sight of that fact. When
the Ecumenical Patriarch Meletios IV said in
January 1922 that we should be united in one
church organization - an "American Orthodox
Church," as he put it, he was (and they still are)
patronizing the influential benefactors in this
country which is the situs [sic] of the
church's major cash flow. That attitude won't ever
change, and they can only go so far with their
so-called "control" of our parish councils and
laity. We still control the purse strings of our
facilities, personnel, and infrastructure. Our
parish councils can manage our secular affairs
competently so long as they don't let their
egos get in their way. We don't need an American
church, anyways, but we still owe allegiance to
the head of our Faith. Hail to the
Eastern Orthodox
religion throughout the WORLD.
Harry Pappas,
Phoenix, Arizona
|
