Volume 6 Number 18 - Tuesday, May 4th, 2004

A Publication of the ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN LAITY

 


Home

 

Orthodox News

• Last Week's Edition

• Archives

• Search Engine

 

Submissions

Policy

Send


Email us



Support Us!

Donations

Nonprofit Ministries

The Orthodox Christian Laity

OCN Website

• The Video -  "A New Era Begins"

 

 

The Orthodox Christian News Service

 


Published by Kathimerini.com, April 29, 2004

An unholy row...

By T. Economopoulos

Apart from the nationalist or personality-focused zealotry which unfortunately characterizes much of the Christian population, the overwhelming majority of the populace is unable to comprehend the ever-intensifying conflict between the Ecumenical Patriarchate and the Church of Greece. This reached such a peak a few days ago that some are even making reference to the danger of a schism.

There is no doubt that the tension created in relations between the Patriarchate and the Archbishopric cannot be doing the Orthodox Church any good but is rather trivializing its worth.

But for the normal citizen, the religious faithful or the agnostic who acknowledge the right of others to believe, this entire conflict makes no sense.

References to canons and acts from the previous century which took place within an entirely different set of circumstances — far removed from today’s globalized world — sound like falsehoods, pretexts, and screens concealing special interests that bear no relation whatsoever to what people understand by “Church” and “faith.”

Indeed, how many rational Greek citizens in the year 2004 can grasp the notion that Macedonia, Epirus, Thrace, the Dodecanese, and so on comprise the New Territories which are the “spiritual” property of a senior cleric based outside Greece?
 

 

Home Archives Search Submissions Support Us

 
 



This Online Newsletter is partially funded by a grant from the Virginia H Farah Foundation

Orthodox News, PO BOX 6954
WEST PALM BEACH FL  33405-6954
USA

Phone:  (517) 522-3656
Fax:  (517) 522-5907