The following remarkable story appeared in the New York Times on May 1, 1908. If anyone can provide more information, please email me at mfnamee [at] gmail [dot] com.

BABY LEFT IN CHURCH; SOCIETY TO ADOPT IT

Advent of the Little Stranger Caused Flurry Among Women of the Ladies’ Aid

LEFT IN JANITOR’S BED

The Infant Is Sent Temporarily to Bellevue, but the Women Say They Want to Bring It Up.

The day before yesterday, and theretofore, the basement door of the Greek Orthodox Church, Holy Trinity, at Seventy-second Street and Lexington Avenue, could be opened without the slightest sound. It always stood unlocked.

But yesterday there was a shrill bell attached to the door, which rang sharply whenever the door was opened. Moreover, whenever the door did open or the bell rang there was a quick movement on the part of the janitor and of those members of the Ladies’ Aid Society who happened to be present to see who entered.

For on the previous day some one, taking advantage of the fact that the door latch was always out, had slipped into the janitor’s room in the basement and left in his bed a two weeks’ old boy baby. The janitor and l adies are glad that the baby came to the church, but do not wish, nevertheless, to establish such a precedent. Hence the new bell.

It was quite dark and the Ladies’ Aid Society had finished its meeting in the rear room of the basement when there came a squeak from the janitor’s room. The members of the society acted variously. The unmarried members got on chairs.

“It’s a mouse,” they said.

The married members listened attentively.

“It’s a baby,” they asserted.

Leaving the unmarried members still on their chairs, the married members hurried to the janitor’s room. On the bed was a little white bundle. As they drew near the little squeak was repeated.

One of the women more bold than her sisters went to the bed and threw back a blanket. A baby blinked up at her.

The question arose what was to be done with the infant.

“Notify the police,” said the janitor.

But word went about the room:

“It’s a Greek Church baby, and the Greek Church should take care of its own.”

So the police were not notified. Instead, one of the members of the society took the baby home. Yesterday the society was about to meet to discuss what was to be the ultimate disposition of the baby when a policeman arrived. The janitor, possibly not relishing the idea of a church baby, had telephoned to the East Sixty-seventh Street Station.

The baby was taken to Bellevue.

“But we want it here,” said the members of the Ladies’ Aid Society.

“You can claim it at Bellevue,” the policeman told them.

So the members of the society haven’t given up the idea of adopting the church baby. To-day there will be a special meeting of the society, when steps looking to its adoption will be taken.

If you’re anything like me, you want to know the rest of this story — what happened to the baby? Did one of the Greek women adopt him? How did his life turn out? I haven’t yet found any other articles on this story, but beyond the newspapers, an obvious place to look is in the baptismal records of Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church (now Cathedral). Presumably, if the baby was adopted by one of the parishioners, he would have been baptized sometime between this May 1, 1908 newspaper article and the end of 1908. As I said earlier, if any of our readers can help solve this mystery, email me at mfnamee [at] gmail [dot] com.

Tags: 1908, Greek, newspapers, parishes, primary sources

Fr. Pythagoras Caravellas

Editor’s note: The following article was written by relatives of Fr. Pythagoras Caravellas, and originally appeared in the 60th anniversary commemorative album for Annunciation Greek Orthodox Cathedral in San Francisco, published in 1996. The article has been reprinted at Annunciation Cathedral’s website, and we present it here courtesy of the San Francisco Bay Area Greek Historical Society. The Society has done outstanding work on the history of Greek Orthodoxy in the region, and its chairman, Jim Lucas, is building a virtual photo album which may be found at this link. The website includes special pages for Fr. Pythagoras Caravellas and St. Sophia/Annunciation Cathedral, where he served as a priest.

We originally ran this article here at OrthodoxHistory.org on August 9, 2010. However, today is the 77th anniversary of Fr. Pythagoras’ repose, and I thought it appropriate to reprint his biography.

Pythagoras Caravellas was born in 1890, in Greece, on the small island of Samos, off the coast of Asia Minor. He was the son of a tobacco and cotton merchant and the youngest of four children.

At the age of 16, he completed his pre-university education at the gymnasium in Karlovassi. His schoolmasters, impressed with the young man’s curiousity and studious inclinations, recommended him for further study at one of the Greek teaching monasteries.

The year that young Pythagoras was cloistered in the mountain monastery, he applied himself diligently to the assigned subjects, religion, science, and the humanities. Perhaps it was the humility with which the monks imparted their wisdom to the young scholars that influenced young Pythagoras to cherish learning. This inspiration was to follow him always.

While under the tutelage of the monks, the Metropolitan of Corfu, Alexander, paid a visit to the monastery. The hierarchy of the Greek Orthodox faith had always taken a personal interest in the education and development of their youth. Alexander was not an exception. A man of deep perception, he was to become the first Archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Church. If his visits to the monasteries were anticipated by the students, a few requested were granted private audiences. The topics that generated the most interest were students’ personal aspirations.

During one of his private conversations with the Metropolitan whom he had known since childhood, Pythagoras confessed his secret hope to continue his education in the United States and perhaps establish a permanent home there. Expecting a small admonishment or to be dissuaded from his ambition, Pythagoras was pleased with the unexpected approval his received. The full impact of this meeting was not to emerge for twelve years, but its immediate result was that Pythagoras entered the Seminary in Athens to study for the priesthood. After a year, he was uncertain as to the wisdom of his action and decided to enroll in the University of Athens.

During the next four years he earned his degree and received his teaching credentials. While attending the university, he made occasional visits to his family in Samos. He also found time to tutor students, work for a tobacconist and take additional courses in English.

In 1911, he made his big decision to go to the United States. He went to Middleboro, Massachusetts, where a small colony of Greeks had settled, to live with his two brothers, Nicholas and Theodore, who had immigrated there two years before. Convinced that their brother was not interested in their restaurant business, they encouraged him to enter Harvard University with an offer to help him financially.

Before leaving Greece, Pythagoras had already decided to become a physician. Realizing how many long years of study lay ahead, he preferred not to accept his brothers’ generous offer. He considered ways in which he would attend school, allow time for studies, and still be able to earn an adequate income necessary for his tuition and living expenses. He would rely on his knowledge of small business accounting to earn his living and soon had a number of shopkeepers and restaurants as clients.

After graduation from Harvard with a degree in medicine in June, 1917, he became engaged to Evangeline Constantine. They were married in November, 1917. His work as a hospital intern offered some degree of fulfillment, but he was restless.

Recalling his year at the monastery and his communications with Archbishop Alexander, Pythagoras sent a letter to the Metropolitan asking for his guidance. The sincere simplicity of the Archbishop’s reply and his words of encouragement to enter the church convinced Pythagoras to give up medicine and to complete his studies in the priesthood.

Through further correspondence with the Metropolitan, Pythagoras learned of the need for Greek priests in the western part of the United States. As waves of Greek immigrants moved westward across the United States, they were dependent upon a small group of itinerant Greek priests for infrequent church services and the administration of religious rites. More Greeks lived and worked in the western states than the number of churches would suggest.

In 1921, Father Pythagoras arrived in San Francisco. At this time, his wife and daughter Theofani (Faye) were living in Chicago and it would be months later before he had the money to bring them to San Francisco. Once more the question of earning a livlihood and attending school was of immediate concern. Through letters of introduction and recommendation, Pythagoras became an assistant professor of Greek at the University of California, and attended the Pacific School of Religion. He supplemented his income writing for the Greek newspaper and the Christian Science Monitor. Soon, Pythagoras and Evangeline became an integral part of the young Greek community. Their resourcefulness and command of English, attracted the older families. They were often called upon to act as witnesses or interpreters in matters concerning immigration or in matters of law affecting members of the community. The more affluent Greeks were enthusiastic with the qualifications of the young couple and gave their wholehearted support for the erection of a church which would have Pythagoras as its priest.

After his graduation from the Pacific School of Religion in 1927, Pythagoras was ordained into the priesthood of the Greek Orthodox religion by the Patriarch of Constantinople, Metaxakis, and Archbishop Alexander, both of who were visiting in San Francisco at the time. The colorful ceremony was held in the new, small white church of St. Sophia. The presence of these eminent prelates in San Francisco created much interest and served to establish the young church of St. Sophia as a unified and integrated religious community.

With the advent of the Russian revolution, the organizational work of the Russian Orthodox Church in America came to an abrupt halt. In the meantime, the royalist-liberal controversy in Greece had divided event the Greek immigrants in America. The church could nor or would not steer a neutral course in the civil war raging between the forces of King Constantine and Premier Venizelos. This partnership, which had its beginnings in 1916, was to shake the church communities of Greece and United States to their foundation. The reaction in the United States was violent.

Reorganization required a degree of cooperation difficult to obtain. Nevertheless, Father Pythagoras managed to steer his congregation away from the repercussions of the political battles in Greece and toward the establishment of a Greek-American community whose growth would be a blending of the cultural heritage of Greece and the democratic principles of their adopted country, America.

Since coming to San Francisco, Father Pythagoras’ family increased by two daughters, Helen and Joan. After his ordination, Father Pythagoras budgeted his family severely. Occasionally, his small salary was supplemented by farmers; gifts of produce, fruit, and fowl. His parish was a poor one, and living became more difficult during the depression when members of his congregation dwelt on the edge of poverty. He administered to their needs, with words of encouragement and guidance. He would officiate at services during his frequent visits to farming communities. He taught the children of the community Greek after their regular school hours. He found time to program social activities for the community in observation of national and religious holidays. He made his rounds at the hospitals giving communion to the sick, the injured, and the dying. He conducted services every Sunday, every Holy Day and in the Greek church this alone is a rigorous and demanding schedule.

In 1931, the physical strain had taken its toll. Father Pythagoras was will with tuberculosis. He was a patient for three years at the California Sanitorium in Belmont. During his confinement, he continued to read avidly and began work for his degree as a Doctor of Divinity. He looked forward to returning to his church and his congregation. In late 1934, the doctors told him that he was cured and that he would soon be going home. On December 6, 1934, he suffered a heart attack and died. He was mourned by Greeks throughout the nation and his body lay in state in the church of St. Sophia for 7 days to afford his many friends the sad privilege of a final farewell.

Tags: Greek, parishes, Pythagoras Caravellas, San Francisco

Yesterday, I published a brief article on Fr. Stephen Andreades, the first resident priest of the first Orthodox parish in the contiguous United States — Holy Trinity in New Orleans. The entire early history of that parish is something of a mystery. We know who the early priests were — Andreades, Fr. Gregory Yiayias, Fr. Misael Karydis — but we don’t know much about them, and we don’t have a clear understanding of the early life of that parish. The hints that we do have are tantalizing. For instance, Holy Trinity used an organ decades before any other American Orthodox church is known to have added one. But we don’t know the story behind it.

Anyway, all this got me to thinking about some of the toughest cases to crack in my research into American Orthodox history. I’ll run through some of them today.

The Ludwell-Paradise story

This is really Nicholas Chapman’s turf, and it’s just loaded with great mysteries. Among them:

• How exactly did a young Philip Ludwell III decide to convert to Orthodoxy?
• What was his family’s connection to the Orthodox Church prior to his conversion?
• Were there any other Orthodox converts in colonial Virginia, aside from the Ludwell family?
• How long did Ludwell’s descendants remain Orthodox?
• What — if any — connection existed between the Ludwell-Paradise family, the New Smyrna colony, and the Russian mission to Alaska?
• Etc.

St. Peter the Aleut

Did he exist? If so, was he martyred? If not, how and why did the story of his martyrdom develop? We’re making progress on this front, but the critical questions remain unanswered. The frustrating thing is that I know that the Russian government contacted the Spanish government about this at the time, and the Spanish did an investigation, and there are records of this investigation in Madrid. But I can’t get anyone there to get back to me.

The aborted New York church of 1850

The January 1850 issue of the Home and Foreign Record of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America reported this:

Efforts are now making in New York to form a congregation of Greek Christians. We observe an announcement that a priest of that denomination, with an interpreter, is now in New York, and will doubtless take charge of the movement.

But the first documented Orthodox congregation in New York wasn’t organized until Fr. Nicholas Bjerring arrived in 1870 — 20 years later. So what was going on in 1850? I haven’t found any other traces of this story.

The phantom Galveston parish of the 1860s

Lots and lots of secondary sources refer to a very early Orthodox parish in Galveston, Texas. This parish was supposedly formed in the 1860s and used the name “Ss. Constantine and Helen.” But the earliest traces I’ve found of organized Orthodoxy in Galveston are from the mid-1890s, when Fr. Theoclitos Triantafilides founded a parish of the same name, which still exists. In fact, according to Triantafilides’ biography by Milivoy Jovan Milosevich, Triantafilides intentionally revived the old parish name. From the bio:

It is known that with the outset of the American Civil War, a group of multi-ethnic Orthodox Christians were having regular prayer meetings in Galveston, as early as 1861, and they called themselves “the Parish of S.S. Constantine and Helen.” [...] [I]t was Arch. Fr. Theoclitos’ decision to use the name S. S. Constantine and Helen Church, because the congregation that started on its own should be remembered.

But was this “congregation” a full-fledged parish, as some have suggested? Was it simply a group of Orthodox laypeople gathering for reader’s services? Was it somehow connected to the New Orleans parish — perhaps the earliest “mission” community (as we now commonly use the term) in the contiguous United States? We just don’t know.

Another tantalizing piece of information: at exactly the time when this congregation was supposedly formed, the descendants of Philip Ludwell III were living in Galveston. Were they still Orthodox? And were they connected to this “parish”?

The mysterious death of Fr. Paul Kedrolivansky

We’ve covered this one before: Kedrolivansky, the dean of the Russian cathedral in San Francisco, died under suspicious circumstances in 1878. I’m pretty sure that Kedrolivansky was murdered, but I don’t know by whom. Was it his rival priest, Fr. Nicholas Kovrigin? Gustave Niebaum and the powerful Alaska Commercial Company? A “nihilist,” as some later speculated? We don’t know, and this is a mystery that will probably never be solved.

The Kodiak Bell

The bell from the first Orthodox church in the New World — Holy Resurrection in Kodiak, AK — currently hangs in a Roman Catholic church in California. And nobody really knows how it got there.

Fr. Raphael Morgan

For a long time, all we knew for sure was that the first black Orthodox priest in America was alive in 1916, and disappeared from the historical record afterwards. Now, we can say with confidence that he was dead by 1924. But 1916-1924 is a pretty big range, and we still don’t know how and where he died, where he’s buried, and whether he remained Orthodox until the end.

This little run-down is just the tip of the iceberg as far as American Orthodox historical mysteries go. If you have any insight into these conundrums, shoot me an email at mfnamee [at] gmail [dot] com.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: Colonial Virginia, Galveston, Greek, John Paradise, Kodiak Bell, New Orleans, New York, parishes, Paul Kedrolivansky, Peter the Aleut, Philip Ludwell III, Raphael Morgan, Russian

In the past (for instance, here), I’ve referred to a Fr. Stephen Andreades, who, in 1867, was the priest of Holy Trinity parish in New Orleans. He was one of the first Orthodox priests in the contiguous United States, but we know virtually nothing about him. In fact, until now, the only source I had for Andreades was the following note in a 1967 St. Vladimir’s Quarterly article by Fr. Alexander Doumouras:

The priest who succeeded Fr. Agapius [Honcharenko] in New Orleans was an archimandrite named Fr. Stephen Andreades. One of his sermons, which was delivered on December 15, 1867, was translated into Russian by Thomas Kraskovsky and printed in the Alaska Herald on March 15, 1868. In this sermon Fr. Andreades stated that he had been “invited from Greece” to come to America and serve the parish in New Orleans. He did not state who invited him and who appointed him.

I’ve never seen the original Alaska Herald source, and while we could state pretty confidently that Andreades was the first Greek Orthodox priest in America — and the first pastor of the New Orleans parish, given that Honcharenko was never actually the resident priest — we didn’t know anything else.

We still don’t know much, but on Google Books, I found this note from Understanding the Greek Orthodox Church by Demetrios J. Constantelos (1982):

In 1867 the congregation moved to its permanent church and appointed its first regular priest, Stephen Andreades, who had been invited from Greece. He had a successful ministry from 1867 to 1875, when the archimandrite Gregory Yiayias arrived to replace him. The New Orleans congregation also acquired its own parish house; a small library, which included books in Greek, Latin…

And of course, this being just the “snippet view” of Google Books, I can’t get any more information.

My own research conflicts somewhat with Constantelos’ information. He has Andreades in New Orleans from 1867-75, followed by Fr. Gregory Yiayias. However, I found a reference to Yiayias in New Orleans in the September 13, 1872 issue of the Petersburg Index, a Virginia newspaper. Also, Henry Rightor’s Standard History of New Orleans, Louisiana (1900) puts Yiayias’ tenure at 1872-74.

So we’ve got two sources — one of them contemporary — which put Yiayias, and not Andreades, in New Orleans in 1872. Which makes me wonder where Constantelos got his dates. Obviously, I need to look at Constantelos’ actual book, rather than a Google snippet view.

The early history of the New Orleans parish remains shrouded in mystery. We know the names of some of the priests — Andreades, Yiayias, and the strange Fr. Misael Karydis — but we don’t know much about them, or their relationship to the church hierarchy. If anyone has more information, please let me know.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: 1867, Greek, Gregory Yiayias, New Orleans, parishes, Stephen Andreades

I’ve got several new articles in the works, but law school has been brutal lately, so I haven’t been able to finish any of them. In the meantime, I thought I’d republish one of my old articles. This one was originally published on June 1, 2010.

Fr. Philip Sredanovich is one of the odder characters in American Orthodox history. Perhaps not as odd as the embellishing Agapius Honcharenko or the wandering Bulgarian Monk, but in all my studies, I’ve run across few parish priests stranger than Sredanovich.

Sredanovich was born in Montenegro in 1881. I read somewhere that he was educated in Russia, although I can’t seem to track down the precise source at the moment. (This is supported by the 1920 US Census, which says that Sredanovich’s wife was born in Russia.) He came to the US just after the turn of the 20th century; by 1906, he was pastor of St. Nicholas Serbian Church in Wilmerding, PA. A couple of years later, while serving in Butler, PA, he made his first newspaper headlines. From the Washington Post (12/11/1908):

The Rev. Philip Sredanovitch, pastor of the Greek Orthodox Church and editor of Justness, today announced a discovery, which, if it works out, will put Newton, Franklin, and Edison in the amateur class. The pastor-editor declares that he has invented a means by which the rotation of the earth on its axis may be taken advantage of in travel, and that by standing still one may go around the world in 24 hours.

He says he has found a way by which men may lift themselves above the earth to a point where they will stand still while the earth, rotating from west to east, will do their traveling for them. The secret is jealously guarded by the pastor and his wife, whom he credits with suggesting the idea. He asks $100,000 for the invention.

Sredanovich says: “We will hoist ourselves above the earth and await the coming of the desired place, then we will lower ourselves where we desire to be. In this way we may go from America to Europe in less than eighteen hours. My secret is how to stand above the earth and not be affected by the earth’s attraction.”

He says his invention makes it possible to get away from gravitation and still not be lose [sic] in space.

He does not say how one may get away from the swirling earth and take his stand in the ethereal world, but any one with $100,000 may find out. So far as is known, the pastor has invented no airships nor announced any scheme for climbing a sunbeam.

This has to be a joke, right? An educated clergyman couldn’t seriously think that you could circle the globe simply by “hoisting” yourself above the earth — could he?

Moving on… Sredanovich bounced around a lot. Here is an incomplete list of the places he served:

• Wilmerding, PA
• Butler, PA
• Kansas City, MO
• South Bend, IN
• Gary, IN
• Kansas City, MO (again)
• Butte, MT
• Milwaukee, WI
• Steelton, PA
• Johnstown, PA
• Butte, MT (again)

Of course, in Sredanovich’s day, it was quite common for priests to spend just a couple of years (or less) at one parish before moving on to the next. But Sredanovich’s travels seem to have been caused as much by his own personality as by the era in which he lived. In November 1920, he was “fired” from his post in Kansas City, responded with four successive lawsuits in the span of three months. In one suit, he asked for $25,000, charging that “church officials were instrumental in causing slanderous remarks to be printed against him” in a Serbian newspaper. A few days later, he filed another lawsuit, this time merely seeking $120 in back pay. (I don’t know the outcomes of these cases; my only source is the Kansas City Times, 1/25/1921.)

After leaving Kansas City, Sredanovich went to Butte, Montana, where he took over Holy Trinity Serbian Church. One day, in November of 1922, he was walking down the street when a group of teenage boys started to bother him. One picked up a rock, at which point Sredanovich took off for his house. He went inside, got his pistol, and returned to the street. The youths continued to taunt Sredanovich, who responded by shooting one of the boys in the foot. The injured 18-year-old was taken to the hospital, and Sredanovich was arrested and charged with second-degree assault. (Idaho Daily Statesman, 11/30/1922)

Sredanovich soon left Butte, but he returned to the parish in 1949, spending the last three years of his life there. He died in 1952, and is buried at St. Sava Serbian Orthodox Monastery in Libertyville, Illinois.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: Kansas City, newspapers, parishes, Philip Sredanovich, primary sources, Serbian

Editor’s note: The following article was written by Christopher Tripoulas of The National Herald, the leading Greek-American newspaper. It was originally published on The National Herald‘s blog on October 27. (Click here to view the original.) Many thanks to Mr. Tripoulas for allowing us to reprint the article.

During an age when the “what have you done for me lately” mentality reigns supreme, the Annunciation Cathedral of New England is undertaking a very auspicious project that pays tribute to one of its greatest ever memorable benefactors and stands as a very positive example within the Greek-American community. The Cathedral’s decision to adopt a proposal by its dean, V. Rev. Cleopas Strongylis, to: a) compile its history during Archbishop Iakovos’ deanship, b) create a digital archive of the Cathedral’s historical files, and c) establish a Research Center in the Cathedral Mansion for the promotion and preservation of the Cathedral’s history, is an initiative that definitely deserves to be commended. Like the old Greek saying goes, if you don’t praise your home, it will fall and crash down upon you… and what better way to praise and celebrate the history of this 100-year-plus-old community than to commemorate its most celebrated period: Iakovos’ tenure – then known by most as Archimandrite James A. Coucouzes – as its dean.

This historical study is particularly poignant today, and not just because it coincides with the 70th anniversary of Iakovos’ appointment to the Cathedral or his centennial of birth, but also because it comes at a time when there is an apparent leadership crisis plaguing society in general. The late archbishop has sometimes been characterized as “larger than life.” His decisions, like those of every great leader, sometimes sparked controversy and remained under the historical microscope for years to come. But whether you agree with of all his decisions or not, there’s no debating Iakovos’ leadership qualities and ability to inspire.

What makes this particular work all the more interesting is that it provides a closer look at one of the most significant ecclesiastical figures of the Twentieth Century, before he put on the Archbishop’s miter. It will provide information that will help to reveal the qualities, passion, and mentality that played a key part in transforming this dynamic Boston area priest, Archimandrite James Coucouzes, into national Church and ethnic leader: Archbishop Iakovos of North and South America.

The early years and priestly ministry of the man who went on to lead the Church in America for four decades naturally never gets as much attention as does his high-profile career as archbishop and particularly his storied trips to the White House. But the humble confines of his office on Parker & Ruggles Streets in Boston have just as much to do with the making of this legendary leader, because it was there that he first laid the foundations for his later work and came of age.

There is a real potential for this study to provide a wonderful inspiration and serve as a great resource for clergymen and laypersons alike, possibly even encouraging them to explore the histories of their own communities or organizations. By researching precisely what it was about Coucouzes’ tenure that helped to lay the groundwork for the Boston Cathedral’s “Golden Era” and its dean’s subsequent astronomic rise in the Church’s ranks, it might be possible to redefine our own expectations for what we envision our future “golden era” to be.

Coucouzes’ deanship simply was prolific. He worked endless hours dedicating his attention to every aspect of the community life – spiritual, educational, and social. In addition, he showed particular interest in Hellenic national issues and care for the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Those are just some of the aspects that the study promises to bring to the forefront, thus better acquainting us with the iconic figure that would go on to leave an indelible mark in the Greek Diaspora.

But the Cathedral’s initiative is also important because in addition to enriching history, it will use this work to enhance and beautify its facilities and services in a rather ingenious way. This project hopefully will speak to the minds and hearts of prospective donors to relive history while renovating the community as well. And in doing so, it will provide readers with a look at how some of the pioneering Greeks and their ever-memorable spiritual leader chased progress, while helping inspire today’s generation of church and lay leaders to recapture some of that all important ingenuity.

This work was made possible thanks to the commendable efforts of Nikie Calles, Director of Archives at the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. Anyone who has ever visited the Archives can plainly see what a superb job Calles has done capturing and organizing the history of not just the Church, but of the entire Greek-American community. In addition, the generous support of noble contributors like Stephen and Catherine Pappas and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation should also be recognized, as their financial assistance was essential in helping Calles to apply her many talents and compile this tremendous didactic and informational resource.

And so, whether based on donations from philanthropists like the Pappases or the Foundation, Calles’ invaluable work, or the “philotimo” shown by the Boston Cathedral, the encouraging sign is that the Greek-American Community still loves its history, and as long as there is genuine love for the past, there is all the reason to hope for a brighter tomorrow. Because in a true community of persons, the dreams of the previous generation are perpetually being realized by its successors.

This article was written by Christopher Tripoulas of The National Herald and has been reprinted with permission from the author. To view the original article, click here.

Tags: Boston, Greek, Iakovos Coucouzis, parishes

If you’ve read the last two issues of our SOCHA newsletter, you know that Holy Protection OCA Cathedral in New York City is in the middle of a fight with the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC). Here’s how I described the situation in the most recent newsletter:

In last month’s newsletter, I mentioned the plight of Holy Protection OCA Cathedral in New York City. The cathedral community is in a fight with the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission, which is trying to have the cathedral declared a historic landmark against the wishes of the cathedral itself and its diocesan bishop. If the Commission is successful, the cathedral will be forced to get government approval for any changes to the church exterior. They may also be forced to make “improvements” deemed appropriate by the city. This is an unacceptable infringement on the religious freedom of the cathedral community in the name of “historic preservation.” As I said last month, I’m (obviously) a huge supporter of preserving history, but we don’t need the government telling us how to do it. Here is an update from Fr. Christopher Calin, dean of the cathedral: “The Community Board #3 voted 32 to 9 to endorse the Landmark District which would include our Cathedral and other houses of worship in the EV [East Village]. We are currently working with a Local Faith Communities group to find alternatives to the forced landmarking of our buildings and have a meeting scheduled for 9/12 with the Commissioner of the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) Tierney. There is support to NOT designate religious institutions as individual landmarks, but the well-funded and staffed preservationists are lobbying the LPC and city council members very hard.” We at SOCHA strongly and officially support the cathedral in its efforts to resist the coerced landmarking. In a future article, we’ll let you know how you can help.

As I indicated, Bishop Michael Dahulich has already voiced his disapproval of the forced designation of his own cathedral. In a letter to the chairman of Community Board 3, Bishop Michael wrote,

We are not against preservation or even an historic district designation for the East Village, but the forced individual landmark status of our cathedral and other houses of worship and will place time-consuming and costly demands on parishes to make application and receive permission from the Landmarks Preservation Commission every time the parishioners need to change a window, put in an air conditioner, paint a gate, install a new sign, or replace doors, roofs or steps.

But  it’s actually even worse than that. The cathedral was originally a Protestant church. Fr. Christopher Calin told me that back when the then-Russian Metropolia acquired the building in the 1940s, it drew up plans for a complete redesign of the exterior. The plan called for a much more traditional Orthodox appearance, with cupolas and so forth. The plans have never been enacted, in part because of funding issues, but there’s still hope that the community will eventually raise the money for it. If the landmark designation is imposed, though, the cathedral would have to get government approval of the design before they could move forward. As I understand the process, that would involve a public hearing at which any citizen could come in and argue against the cathedral’s plans. So you could have the City of New York blocking the addition of Orthodox architectural elements (such as domes and icons) because they would alter the historic (Protestant) exterior of the building. In that case, “preserving history” would amount to preserving Protestant architecture and suppressing the Orthodox owners’ right to freely exercise their religion via Orthodox architectural expression.

In Orthodoxy, and indeed in nearly all religions, religious architecture is a religious matter. Domes, icons, crosses, the shape of the building; it’s impossible to separate these elements from our Orthodox faith itself. When I attended St. George Cathedral in Wichita, they added gorgeous mosaics to the exterior of the building. Had the cathedral been a historic landmark, the church would have needed government approval for those icons — and if the government thought that the icons unacceptably changed the original look of the church, then the church would have been prohibited from adding them. This is a blatant violation of religious freedom.

But it goes beyond the simple fact that church architecture is intrinsically religious. Take, for instance, the addition of an air conditioner. Should the church be prevented from adding the air conditioner of its choice, simply because it happens to be in an old building? Should it be forced to make a case to the government, and undergo a public hearing, simply to replace a broken window? This is what Historic Preservation does: it puts decision-making power over churches into the hands of government bureaucrats.

To those who say that one’s choice of air conditioning unit is not really an ecclesiastical matter, I ask this: who gets to decide whether an issue is ecclesiastical or not? Who is qualified to make that decision? As I’ve argued in the past, the question of whether something is ecclesiastical is, itself, ecclesiastical. And we absolutely, constitutionally, cannot have the civil government making those decisions.

Forced preservation has another problem: it violates the authority of the bishop. Ultimately, the proper authority over Holy Protection Cathedral is the OCA Bishop of New York, Michael Dahulich. Above him is the Holy Synod of the OCA. As long as the church architecture doesn’t present a safety problem, how on earth can the civil government justify usurping the bishop’s authority and dictating to a church what design elements are acceptable and what are not?

We’re not talking about the type of government justifications that most people accept — things like fire code, building code, etc. The government’s interest isn’t safety — it’s the nebulous concept of “history.” Why, exactly, is the City of New York the proper judge of what constitutes proper preservation of Orthodox Church history? As an Orthodox Christian historian, I would argue that the work of church history, including its preservation, is an inherently religious exercise. To compartmentalize it, and to divorce it from the life of the church, is contrary to Orthodoxy. But that is what the historic preservationists of New York are attempting to do: they’re attempting to place the final decision over church architectural design into the hands of the civil government. That, my friends, is both unconstitutional and just plain wrong.

And if you think this is just a minor issue for one community, think again. How old is your church? If it’s more than, say, 50 or 70 years old, it’s at risk of the same problem. We all have an interest in preserving history, but we have a greater interest in preserving religious freedom. We have an interest in preserving our freedom to preserve our religious history as we, as Orthodox, see fit. We do not need the government to tell us how to preserve our history, against our will. That does violence to the First Amendment and, indeed, to the actual preservation of history itself.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: civil authorities, historic preservation, New York, OCA, parishes

Recently, Holy Cross Orthodox Press published the Atlas of American Orthodox Christian Churches, edited by Alexei D. Krindatch. I contributed several pieces to the Atlas, including the article “Ten Interesting Facts About the History of Orthodox Christianity in the USA.” With Alexei’s permission, we’re publishing excerpts of that article here at OrthodoxHistory.org. To purchase your own copy of the Atlas (for $19.95), click here.

4. In 1888, the Orthodox of Chicago tried – but failed – to establish a multiethnic Orthodox parish.

By 1888, there were about a thousand Orthodox in Chicago. Most of them were Greeks and Serbs, and despite the fact that they weren’t Russian, they petitioned the nearest bishop – who was Russian – to send them a priest. In 1888, Bishop Vladimir Sokolovsky responded to their petition by asking them to hold a meeting, to gauge there was enough interest to support a church. The main speakers at the meeting were a Greek, a Montenegrin, and a Serb. George Brown, who emigrated from Greece as a young man, had fought in the American Civil War. He gave a short speech, saying, “Union is the strength… If our language is two, our religion is one… We will surprise the Americans. Let us stick like brothers.”

Everyone at the meeting agreed to start a parish, with services in both Greek and Slavonic. Bishop Vladimir visited later that year, but unfortunately, he soon became embroiled in a series of scandals in San Francisco. One of his strongest opponents was a Montenegrin whose brother was a leader in the Chicago community. Hearing reports of the crisis, the Chicago Orthodox decided they wanted nothing more to do with the bishop, and instead contacted the Churches of Constantinople, Greece, and Serbia.

Eventually, the Church of Greece sent a priest. He established Chicago’s first Orthodox parish in 1892, specifically for Greek people. One month later, a Russian church was founded. For the first time in American Orthodox history, two churches answering to different ecclesiastical authorities coexisted in the same U.S. city. But despite their separation based on language and ethnicity, the two churches still got along well. In 1894, the Greek and Russian priests served together at the Russian church to commemorate the hundredth anniversary of the Russian mission to Alaska. When the Russian Tsar died the following month, both priests held a memorial at the Greek church, which was simultaneously dedicating its new building. When the new Russian bishop, Nicholas Ziorov, visited Chicago, the local Greek priest participated in the hierarchical services. Later on, in 1902, Russian church bell was stolen, and the Greek priest invited his Russian counterpart to come to the Greek church and ask the parishioners for help. The two churches, held a joint meeting in an effort to find the bell. Chicago thus represents both an early manifestation of “jurisdictional pluralism” and a wonderful example of inter-ethnic Orthodox cooperation.

Tags: 1888, Chicago, early unity, George Brown, parishes

This 19th century Alaskan Orthodox peg calendar will be auctioned on June 26.

I’m testing out a possible new feature here at OH.org — links to recent articles that might be of interest to readers of our website. Please let me know what you think of this feature, and if you have any suggestions for links to include in future “Friday Links” posts. You can email me at mfnamee [at] gmail [dot] com. Please include “Friday Links” in the subject line.

• If you haven’t done so already, be sure to peruse the list of short papers for our upcoming (and first-ever) symposium. I have to say, I’m really impressed with the diversity of topics that will be covered. I’ve read the abstracts, and they look excellent. I hope as many readers as possible will be able to attend!
• Tomorrow (June 26), a 19th century Alaskan Orthodox “peg calendar” will be auctioned. We mentioned this story on Tuesday.
• St. Demetrios Greek Orthodox Church of Waterloo, Iowa was honored with a historic preservation award for maintaining its 82-year-old church building. Unfortunately, parish membership has dwindled over the years, dropping from 100+ families to just 35 individual parishioners today.
• St. John the Baptist Orthodox Church (OCA) of Edwardsville, PA celebrated its 100th anniversary, although it appears to be one year late — the Edwardsville Times-Leader article says that the parish was founded in 1910, so this year would be anniversary #101. Bishop Tikhon of Philadelphia and 20+ clergy attended the event.
• The folks behind the Antiochian Archdiocesean website interviewed Chris Holwey, chairman of the Antiochian Department of Sacred Music. As part of the interview, they linked to Michael G. Farrow’s history of sacred music in the Archdiocese. Farrow mentioned that the earliest known Antiochian musical works in America were issued by Bishop Emmanual Abo-Hatab, with a surviving manuscript dating to 1926. Farrow notes that there surely were earlier musical arrangements, but “none are presently known to have survived.” We can add at least one to the list: in 1920, Metropolitan Germanos Shehadi published The Paradise, a collection of liturgical hymns in Western musical notation.
• Alabama’s unique “Malbis Plantation” and its Greek Orthodox church were placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The church isn’t home to a parish of the Greek Archdiocese; it’s a memorial church under the direct oversight of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. It was built to memorialize Jason Malbis, a remarkable Greek immigrant who was raised in a monastery and went on to establish a Greek plantation in Alabama. The whole story is really fascinating and too long to tell in a bullet point, so I’d encourage you to read the article. Also, to see photos of the church and to learn more, click here.
• Earlier this month, Rose Haddad, who was quite possibly the oldest Orthodox Christian in the world, died at the age of 111. She was born in 1900 and immigrated to America with her family as a child. She was a member of St. John of Damascus Antiochian Orthodox Church in Dedham, MA.
• Our own Fr. Andrew Damick authored a piece at “Emmaus Patch,” a newsletter for Emmaus, PA. The article introduces people to Orthodoxy and promotes Fr. Andrew’s new book, Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy.
• Speaking of SOCHA directors, Fr. Oliver Herbel recently discovered that someone has plagiarized his work.
• Last weekend, the famed American historian David McCullough was interviewed in the Wall Street Journal. He said a lot of interesting things, including this interesting idea for teaching history to kids: ”I’d take one of those textbooks. I’d clip off all the numbers on the pages. I’d pull out three pages here, two pages there, five pages here—all the way through. I’d put them aside, mix them all up, and give them to you and three other students and say, ‘Put it back in order and tell me what’s missing.’”

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: Alaska, Antiochian, Greek, music, OCA, parishes

Matthew Namee’s somewhat recent post concerning what constitutes a parish caught me by surprise, as I was preparing a very similar article of my own to illustrate a problem I’ve been having in continuing to tell the story of the Armenian Orthodox Church for SOCHA.  When I agreed to assist SOCHA in covering Armenian topics, I envisioned my first posting to be a quick narrative about the Armenian Church (which it was, you can read that here), and my second to follow soon thereafter, containing a listing of the first parish in each of the twenty-four states where the Armenian Church is found.  Matthew Namee, of course, did the same thing for the growth of Eastern Orthodox parishes, and I thought it might be helpful to our readers if I did, too.

I quickly found that writing such an entry was difficult, precisely out of the primary question Matthew posed in his entry:  What truly constitutes a parish?  I was consulting parish and diocesan websites, several books published by the church (dating back as early as the 1940’s), newspapers, and couldn’t find a set standard anywhere.  Some parishes gauged their founding from the building of their first sanctuary.  Others dated it from the first vestiges of a board of trustees, or the first time there was really any appreciable, united Armenian community.  Even more confusing are the so-called “Mission Parishes,” which ordinarily do not have (and probably never have had) either a permanent sanctuary or a priest, often both.  These communities tend to date their founding by the year in which they were formally recognized as a Mission Parish, which doesn’t seem to have been general practice until the 1970’s, even if an Armenian presence and some modicum of organized church life existed long before.

My home parish (when I’m not in Chicago), St. John Armenian Church in Southfield, Michigan, is celebrating its 80^th anniversary this year.  That’s all well and fine, except the first evidence of a parish organization apparently dates to 1909, and first priest assigned to Detroit arrived in 1913.  There was no sanctuary, so the community met in a number of borrowed spaces, especially St. John Episcopal Church in downtown Detroit (which, interestingly, also housed the plenary sessions of the 4^th All-American Sobor in 1924, for those interested in Metropolia/OCA history), until they could afford to purchase land and build a church of their own.  The movement to build the first church began in 1928, and it was ready for consecration in 1931.

So there’s three possible anniversary dates here if we look at when the community came together, when the first priest came, and when the first church was built:  1909, 1913, and 1931.  To give you an idea of what standard the parish ended up using, in 2006, we celebrated our 75^th anniversary, and this year we celebrate the 80^th.

Then there’s the situation of the Armenian community in Chicago, which seems to truly defy explanation, and gets at the root of the incredibly strange arrangements that combined to form the Diocese of the Armenian Church in America in 1898 (which I hope to cover later on).  The previous year, the entire country was separated into four “ecclesiastical districts:” Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Fresno (California), and Chicago, and the scant amount of Armenian clergy distributed amongst them.   This could be considered an odd choice, considering an 1898 list of the seven largest Armenian communities in the United States prepared by Bishop Hovsep Saradjian ranked Chicago dead last, numbering just 400 people.   Yet this was the biggest Armenian community in the Midwest at the time.  Fr. Khat Markarian was assigned to travel to Chicago, but a disagreement over his reassignment from his parish in Boston resulted in Markarian instead going to New York.  No replacement was named, and Chicago languished.

While other communities around the country rapidly grew, taking advantage of massive waves of immigration to build churches and the infrastructures of parish life, Chicago was a comparative non-starter.  Though he visited nearly every corner of the country, Bp. Saradjian never visited the city.  In 1901, he sent Fr. Vahan Messirlian to Chicago to organize a slate of trustees to establish a parish, and while he may have been marginally successful in the short-term, there were no representatives from Chicago at the 1902 Diocesan Assembly.   There were loose associations of parish life over the next decade, but there would not be a permanent priest assigned to Chicago until 1915.  St. Gregory the Illuminator Armenian Church formally dates its establishment to that year, and was the culmination of all that had happened in Chicago since 1898.  Since St. Gregory is the oldest Armenian parish in Illinois, is 1915 really the right year to pick for its establishment?

So, like Matthew, I’m struggling a bit with how one gauges the intricacies of parish formation, especially looking at situations that were anomalous both in geographical dispersal as well as the highly irregular way in which the Armenian Church in America constituted its hierarchical administration in its earliest years.  Long story short, I guess, that list I mentioned at the opening is forthcoming, once I can determine some kind of standard, and wade through the evidence enough to come to a consensus.

Until then, SOCHA readers, are there any particular issues you want me to cover about the Armenian Church?

This article was written by Aram Sarkisian.

Tags: Armenian, Historiography, Oriental Orthodox, parishes

Today I’ll be discussing Aglikin v. Kovacheff, a 1987 Illinois appellate court case involving a dispute over control of St. Sophia Bulgarian Orthodox Church in Chicago. The key question, in this case, concerns the extent of the diocesan bishop’s authority over the local parish. The bishop had dismissed certain members of the parish board of trustees — did he have the authority to do this? The Illinois court (both the majority and the dissent) applied neutral principles analysis to the case. (To read the full opinions, click here.)

St. Sophia was a part of the Bulgarian patriarchal jurisdiction. It was incorporated in 1946, and its articles of incorporation indicate that it is “administratively and canonically” an “inseparable organic part of the Bulgarian Eparchy in America and under its jurisdiction.”

The bylaws of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church grant diocesan control over local parish boards — according to the bylaws, if parish board members fail in their duties, the diocese can dismiss the board and appoint a commission to run the church. These Bulgarian Church bylaws also stipulate that the “organization and administration” of the American diocese will be determined by a special synodical order sanctioned by the Bulgarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs — but, the court says, “[n]o such order appears in the record before us.” The lack of such an order was a major part of the dismissed trustees’ argument against the bishop’s authority.

The Bulgarian diocese in America was founded in 1969, and its bylaws provide for “absolute control” of church property by the local church, administered by the parish board. The diocesan bishop must bless the election of board members, but the bylaws are silent about any diocesan control over the board once it is in office. Unlike in the patriarchal bylaws, there’s no indication in the diocesan bylaws that the bishop can dismiss board members.

The trial court had applied strict deference in this case, and found that since the local parish is subordinate to the diocesan bishop, it is bound by his decisions. On this basis, the trial court granted summary judgment in favor of the diocesan commission. (Summary judgment means that the case didn’t go to trial — the trial judge decided that there was no “genuine issue of material fact,” and that one side was entitled to “judgment as a matter of law.”) The appellate court disagreed, holding that neutral principles, rather than strict deference, should be employed. Why? “Our preference for a neutral principles approach, rather than the strict deference approach, is based on our conclusion that court entanglement in ecclesiastical doctrine is less likely to occur in the application of neutral principles.”

Deference, said the court, presumes that a local church has totally submitted to a hierarchical authority — but it’s not always that simple. In fact, strict deference may discourage local parishes from affiliating with a diocese, since they would be subject to the whims of the diocesan authority. Citing Justice Rehnquist’s dissent in Serbian Diocese v. Milivojevich, the court observed that strict deference also runs the risk of establishing religion.

Neutral principles analysis isn’t always possible. According to the appellate court, it works in disputes over ownership or control. In this case, both sides agreed that the dispute wasn’t about doctrine or polity — it was about control of property.

Applying neutral principles, the appellate court found that there was a genuine issue of material fact in this case: namely, the extent of diocesan authority. St. Sophia’s articles of incorporation place it under the Bulgarian Church, but they don’t specify the extent of that subordination. Nothing in the articles says that the bishop controls parish property or can dismiss a parish board. Likewise, the diocesan bylaws don’t help. The Bulgarian Orthodox Church bylaws do give the bishop that kind of authority… but that brings us back to that special synod order I mentioned above. There was no such order, at least not that anyone could produce, which led the court to question whether the Bulgarian patriarchal bylaws applied to its American diocese.

This isn’t to say that the patriarchal bylaws don’t apply to America, but it’s enough for the court to find a “genuine issue of material fact” sufficient to send the case to trial. Because of this, and because the trial court erroneously (so says the appellate court) employed strict deference rather than neutral principles, the case was sent back to the lower court. The appellate court reasoned,

We note that the trial court impermissibly extended its jurisdiction by declaring that St. Sophia will be “governed by the dictates” of the bishop. While civil courts have subject-matter jurisdiction over church property disputes, they may decide only issues relating to the parties’ civil and property rights. [...] By according the bishop plenary authority over St. Sophia’s affairs, the trial court failed to restrict itself to deciding who controls St. Sophia’s property and assets. Civil courts lack the power to confer ecclesiastical authority.

[Emphasis mine.]

In dissent, Justice Jiganti actually agreed that neutral principles analysis was appropriate in this case, but he reached a very different conclusion. Neutral principles is the right approach, he says, but here there simply is no geninue issue of material fact. “The only issue in this case is whether St. Sophia submitted to the jurisdiction of the regional diocese and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church. Although the majority finds a question of fact with regard to this issue, I believe that it is foreclosed by the statement in St. Sophia’s Articles of Incorporation that St. Sophia was ‘administratively and canonically’ under the jurisdiction of the ‘Bulgarian Eparchy in America.’”

These articles of incorporation, says Justice Jiganti, should be analyzed just like a contract — the plain meaning of the words is paramount. And those words plainly subject the local parish to the jurisdiction of the Bulgarian Church. Yes, the parish has some level of choice in certain respects, but it’s still subordinate to the American diocese and the Church of Bulgaria. The fact that the diocesan bishop can replace the parish board doesn’t take control over church property away from the parish — it just changes the identity of the parish leaders. “St. Sophia will still operate as St. Sophia, but under a new leadership.”

Both sides in this case make some good points, but my initial reaction is that the majority’s decision hinges on a technicality. No, there wasn’t that special synod order, but how important is that? Does the absence of a special order mean that the American diocese isn’t subject to the bylaws of the Mother Church? It would be nice to get some more information about just what the special order is, but we aren’t given any details. We’re just told by the majority that there wasn’t such an order. I didn’t discuss it above, but the majority also found some significance in an affidavit by the former president of the parish board, claiming that St. Sophia retained “administrative independence” when it joined the American diocese. The dissent points out that, since we have reasonably clear official documents like the articles of incorporation, that affidavit doesn’t carry a lot of weight.

In defense of the majority, on the other hand, I would point out that they didn’t say that the former parish board wins the case — they just said that there’s enough of a factual dispute that the case should go to trial. They may be right. At the very least, I would think that a trial would reveal the content and significance of those “special orders.”

The most interesting thing about this case is the fact that justices applying neutral principles can still reach very different outcomes in the same case.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: 1987, Bulgarian, Chicago, civil authorities, parishes

St. Raphael Hawaweeny

Prior to Bishop Raphael Hawaweeny’s death in 1915, pretty much all the Syrian (Antiochian) Orthodox in America recognized his authority. This included St. George Syrian Orthodox Church of Grand Rapids, Michigan, which was incorporated in 1910. The parish was under St. Raphael, and all seemed to be well. But in February 1915, St. Raphael died, and his flock split: some recognized the authority of the Patriarch of Antioch, and others the authority of the Russian Holy Synod and its North American Archbishop. This marks the beginning of the “Russy-Antacky” schism, which divided Antiochian Americans for many years.

This split not only divided St. Raphael’s diocese, but individual parishes as well. At St. George in Grand Rapids, the priest came back from St. Raphael’s funeral and told his congregation to sign a declaration of loyalty to the Russian archbishop. Not everyone complied, and pro-Antioch parishioners insisted that their priest commemorate the Patriarch of Antioch in the Divine Liturgy. Meanwhile, the pro-Russian group tried to amend the parish articles of association to place church property under the control of the Russian Holy Synod. The factions went to court, culminating in Hanna v. Malick, a 1923 Michigan Supreme Court case.

The key question in the case is which faction — Russy or Antacky — should have control of the church property. To figure this out, the court had to determine which hierarchy — Russian or Antiochian — was recognized by the parish when it formed in 1910. The Antacky members “claim that they organized under and are subject to the supreme jurisdiction” of Antioch, “whose representative in America was Bishop Raphael of Brooklyn.” The Russy members “claim that this local church was organized under and has always been subject to the supreme jurisdiction” of the Russian Church.

The original parish documents are somewhat ambiguous. Article 2 of the original articles of association describes the purpose of incorporation as follows: “To teach and promulgate the Christian religion in accordance with the tenets and doctrines and creed of the Syrian Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch, Syria, and the Syrian Greek Orthodox Church of America, as expounded by the bishop thereof resident at Brooklyn, New York, U.S.A.”

According to the trial court judge, the articles were prepared by a local Grand Rapids attorney “after he had asked these men under what jurisdiction this contemplated church was claimed by them to be.” Similar language appears in the parish bylaws:

All persons believing in the divinity of Christ, in God the Father and the Holy Ghost, the sacrament of baptism and marriage in accordance with the articles of faith established by the Orthodox Greek Church of Damascus, Syria, shall be entitled to membership. Members are admitted by baptism and by confession of faith under the rules and tenets of the Orthodox Greek Church of Damascus, Syria. They may be suspended or expelled for violation of the teaching and precept of the church as laid down and expounded by the bishop of the Syrian Greek Orthodox Church of America, resident at Brooklyn, New York.

Now, to a casual reader, these documents seem to recognize Antioch. There’s not a word to be found about the Russian Church. But there are references to the Bishop of Brooklyn, and the Russy party used this fact to argue for Russian jurisdiction. According to the Russy group, all the Orthodox in America were under the Russian hierarchy. In fact, they expounded what is, as best I can tell, the earliest coherent example of the “flag-planting theory” for Russian jurisdiction. Here’s how the trial court explained it: “By virtue of having established in the Western Hemisphere a Russian church, and the territory wherein the church was established having been purchased by the United States, the Russian Church now claims the right to rule over and assumes jurisdiction over all Greek Orthodox churches within the United States, regardless of the nationality of the congregation or the membership of the local church.”

But the court wasn’t interested in the jurisdictional claims themselves. It’s not a dispute between Russia and Antioch, but between members of the local parish, for control over a piece of real estate. Because of this, the paramount question is the intention of the original incorporators. “If this were a lawsuit between the Patriarch of Antioch, on the one hand, and the Holy Russian Synod, on the other hand [...] it is possible that a different question might be raised.”

The case, then, boils down to St. Raphael himself. If he was under Antioch, as the Antacky claimed, then their side would win. If he was under Russia, the case for the Russy would be greatly strengthened. So the court looked at St. Raphael’s own writings: what did the man himself say about his jurisdictional position? The following quotations are from St. Raphael’s periodical Al Kalimat, and were translated for the court (brackets in original):

• “That he [Raphael] was consecrated bishop by the order and permission of Melatois, the Patriarch of Antioch.” (vol. 1, page 2)
• “Those who were consecrated bishops through his [Patriarch of Antioch] consent were his grace, Basileus Dibs, the Metropolite of Akkar, Syria, one of the Antiochian dioceses, and the owner of this magazine, the Bishop of Brooklyn, New York, U.S.A.” (vol. 2, page 95)
• “Patriarch Melatois counted the new parish of Brooklyn, New York, as one of the parishes of Antioch.” (vol. 3, pages 95-96)
• “And during his [Melatois'] administration [as patriarch] many unusual things many unusual things took place, such as the demise of several lamented archbishops. For this reason a conclave was had of archbishops, his beatitude presiding, during which conclave there were clected bishops for the seats vacated by such deaths. … Those who received the benediction of ordination into the high priesthood by the sanction of his beatitude are two, to wit, his eminence, Basileus Dibs, archbishop of Akkar, and the editor of this magazine (Bishop Raphael), Bishop of Brooklyn, North America.” (vol. 3, page 95)
• “And the territorial jurisdiction of the See of Antioch became much more extensive during the time of his beatitude, for Syrians who emigrated to many other countries still retained their spiritual relations with and continued to acknowledge and yield allegiance to their mother church, the Holy Church of Antioch, and kept firm in the Orthodox faith. His beatitude manifested the most perfect evidence of his interest in and care for them to the best of his means and ability. In substantiation of this, when the Russian Holy Synod informed him that the lot of presiding in this diocese [the diocese of Brooklyn] had fallen upon our humble self [Raphael], his beatitude hastened to write to the Holy Synod, to His Eminence Tikon, then Archbishop, and to our humble self, sanctioning the choice and declaring that he [his beatitude] had instituted this new diocese as one of the dioceses pertaining to the See of Antioch and thus it is in actuality, notwithstanding its nominal allegiance to the Russian Holy Synod.” (vol. 3, page 95)
• “Whereas, we, the Syrian Orthodox residents of Greater New York and all other parts of North America constituting our new diocese (may God keep it) are considered a vigorous branch of our mother tree, the Church of Antioch; and whereas, this branch has flourished luxuriantly during the days of the administration of our father, may his name be ever blessed, the thrice illustrious Patriarch Melatios; and whereas, his beatitude was the first to sanction and bless the establishment of this new Syrian diocese in this new world.” (vol. 2, page 18)

The trial judge observed that “at first the writings of Bishop Raphael gave to the Patriarch of Antioch jurisdiction over the Syrian branch of the Orthodox Church in the United States, and later gave expression to language indicating that all the branches, including the Syrian branch, of the Greek Orthodox Church in America, were under the jurisdiction of the Holy Synod of Russia.” Without a clear-cut answer from St. Raphael’s own writings, the judge looked at two non-Orthodox sources: Funk & Wagnalls’ Religious Encyclopedia and the Encyclopedia Britannica. The former reported that “the Patriarch of Antioch elevated Raphael to the rank of bishop” (but that Raphael was consecrated by Russian hierarchs), while the latter noted that the Russian archbishop in America “is assisted by two bishops, one for Alaska [...] and one for Orthodox Syrians, residing in Brooklyn.” The secular sources don’t seem to settle things, either.

Texts being insufficient, the judge moved on to consider actions. He observed that “the record shows but one instance where he [Raphael] was directed by any church authority.” That instance was in August 1910, when St. Raphael announced in Al Kalimat an order he had received from the Patriarch of Antioch regarding marriages of Syrian Orthodox in America. In addition, in 1901, St. Raphael wrote that he had received a telegram from the Patriarch informing him of his election as Metropolitan of Salefkias. St. Raphael declined, but the judge saw this as evidence of a relationship between Raphael and Antioch. Furthermore, according to the judge, “It is not shown in this case that during the life of Raphael the authorities of the Russian Church in any manner gave any orders to the Syrian branch of the church, or attempted in any way to direct the actions or utterances of Raphael in his relations with the Syrian Church.”

There are some flaws in this reasoning. Yes, we can establish that there was a close relationship between Raphael and Antioch, but there was also a close relationship between Raphael and the Russian hierarchy in America. It was St. Raphael who, as an archimandrite, welcomed St. Tikhon to America in 1898, and Tikhon and his auxiliary Bishop Innocent were the ones who actually consecrated Raphael in 1904. It was St. Raphael who blessed the land on which St. Tikhon’s Russian Orthodox Monastery was built, and there are countless examples of Raphael working with the Russian Archdiocese in America. The Russians themselves clearly understood Raphael to be one of theirs, and in his 1905 plan for Orthodoxy in America, St. Tikhon includes the Syrian bishop as a crucial part — while at the same time recognizing that Raphael was “almost independent in his own sphere.”

Both parties have a legitimate argument in this case, but as the judge consistently reiterated, this case is ultimately about the intent of the original incorporators of the Grand Rapids church — not about the relative claims of Russia and Antioch in America. Those claims are relevant only insofar as they help us better understand the incorporators’ intent.

In the end, the trial court sides ruled in favor of the Antacky group — that is, as best as the court could determine, the original parish incorporators intended to be under Antiochian jurisdiction. The court based its decision largely on the references to Antioch in the parish documents. Yes, those documents also refer to the bishop of Brooklyn, but the judge saw insufficient evidence to conclude that Raphael was under Russia rather than Antioch. The Michigan Supreme Court upheld the judgment (and, indeed, hardly added a word, mostly quoting directly from the district judge). The Michigan Supreme Court did note that, in light of the chaos that followed the Russian Revolution, “the precautions taken in organizing this Syrian church seem to have justified themselves.”

This is a terribly fascinating case from a historical perspective, and tells us a lot about how the early Antiochians in America thought about themselves. But what are the legal lessons we can learn? The district court judge — affirmed by the state supreme court — could not have employed “deference to higher church authorities” if he had wanted to, since the entire dispute was over which was the correct higher church authority. The judge was forced to employ something along the lines of a neutral principles analysis. Did he get the right answer? Well, it depends on the question. The judge was trying to figure out the intent of the original incorporators, and based on the language of the official documents, it does seem like they intended to be under Antioch. Were they really, in fact, under Antioch? What would the outcome be if the claim was between Antioch and Russia themselves, and actual jurisdiction had to be determined? That is a much, much more complicated question, to which there isn’t a single, clear-cut answer.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: 1923, Antiochian, civil authorities, Hanna v. Malick, parishes, primary sources, Raphael Hawaweeny, Russian, Saints

In March, I gave a lecture at Holy Apostles Greek Orthodox Church in Westchester, Illinois, on the subject of Chicago’s Orthodox history. Since then, I’ve begun to probe deeper into the early history of Orthodoxy in Chicago. Many people have asked about one man in particular — George Brown, an early leader of Chicago’s Orthodox community.

At a landmark meeting of the Chicago Orthodox in 1888, Brown was elected president of the fledgling multiethnic proto-parish. He offered this speech (reported in the Chicago Tribune the following day, 5/14/1888):

Gentlemans, union is the strength. Let everybody make his mind and have no jealousy. I have no jealousy. I am married to a Catholic woman but I hold my own. Let us stick like brothers. If our language is two, our religion is one. The priest he make the performance in both language. We have our flags built. It is the first Greek flags raised in Chicago. We will surprise the Americans. Let us stick like brothers.

The Tribune also reported that Brown was a veteran of the American Civil War. Three years later, the community was still trying to start a full-fledged parish, and Brown was still in a leadership role. From the Chicago Inter Ocean, we learn that “Mr. George M. Braun, a Greek, who is one of the leaders in the movement for a church in this city, says that they have been promised a priest of the orthodox faith as soon as they have erected a church.” Ultimately, no multiethnic parish was founded; instead, separate Greek and Russian churches were established in 1893.

Four years later, Greece was on the brink of war with Turkey, and thousands of Greek Chicagoans prepared to return and fight for their home country. The Tribune (2/15/1897) reported,

George M. Brown, a barber, No. 32 Wells street, and, in spite of his English name, of pure Greek blood, was seen last night at his home in North Market street, between Kinzie and Michigan. He rubbed his hands gleefully when told of the latest cable news.

“I am glad to hear this,” he said. “There are 2,000 of my fellow-countrymen in Chicago who will return to their native land to fight against the hated Turks. I hope it will end in driving the Musselmans [Muslims] out of Europe. We have been holding meetings for some time and almost without exception the Greek residents are anxious to fight. I do not know positively, but understand the resident Consul favors the movement and has promised its support. As soon as war is declared, and I guess the news of today is a practical declaration of war, we shall write to the Consul at New York and offer our services. Many of us can and will willingly pay our way back, but the majority will require assistance, which I have no doubt will be furnished by the proper authorities. The Greek colony numbers 3,000 and there are few women and children. If passage money is assured, it is probable 2,000 would embark for Greece without delay.”

Recently, I searched the US Census records to see if I could find Brown. And I did: the 1880 Census lists George Brown, a 40-year-old barber who was born in Greece and living in Chicago. He is listed along with his 26-year-old wife, Louisa, who was born in Italy (which is consistent with his statement in 1888 that he was “married to a Catholic woman”).

The couple also appears in the 1900 Census, along with their children. (The 1890 Census records are unavailable.) Here’s the family:

• George, born in Greece in May 1840, immigrated to America in 1855. He and Louisa had been married for 28 years as of the 1900 Census. This puts their wedding sometime around 1872. George still ran a barbershop in 1900.
• Louisa, born in Italy in June 1855, immigrated to America in 1870. She must have met George not long afterwards, since they were married by 1872 at the latest. The Census reports that Louisa could neither read nor write, although she could speak English.
• Son Leo was born in Illinois in March 1883. His occupation is listed as “Laborer in Grocery.”
• Son Lycurgos (clearly George picked this name) was born in Illinois in June 1884, and in 1900 he worked as an “Errand [boy] in Office.” Incidentally, the early Greek organization in Chicago was known as the “Society of Lycurgos.”
• Daughter Asphasia (or Aspasia) was born in Illinois in May 1890. She’s listed as being “At school.”
• Daughter Consulata was born in Illinois in September 1895.

I can’t find George Brown in the 1910 Census; in fact, I can’t find anyone who even possibly is a match — that is, (1) named George, (2) born in Greece sometime around 1840, and (3) living in Illinois. It’s entirely possible that Brown died between 1900 and 1910. Even in 1900, at age 60, he had surpassed the average lifespan of Americans in his day.

In trying to track down the Brown children, I started with son Lycurgos, for the obvious reason that there can’t be more than one Lycurgos Brown — right? Wrong, actually: In the 1920 Census alone, there were no fewer than six men named Lycurgos (or Lycurgus) Brown. Only one was reasonably close in age to our Lycurgos (who would have been 36 in 1920), but that man, aged 38, was born in Texas, as were his parents. I haven’t been able to find any of the other Brown children in later Censuses, either. However, I found possible matches for daughter Aspasia in the Social Security Death Index. We know that she was born in May 1890, and according to the SSDI, Aspasia Pantek and Aspasia Constantinou were both born in that month. If anyone wants to take the baton and try to track down George Brown’s descendants, go for it — it would be great to see what, if anything, they know about their ancestor.

Finally, further digging turned up the fact that our George Brown’s actual surname was Kotakis. He seems to have dropped it after coming to America. So, here is what we know:

• George Kotakis was born in Greece around 1840.
• He came to America in 1855, took the surname “Brown,” and fought in the Civil War.
• He married an Italian woman named Louisa around 1872.
• He was living in Chicago by at least 1880, and he worked as a barber.
• He was a leader in Chicago’s early Orthodox proto-parish, becoming the community’s president in 1888.
• He had at least four children — two sons and two daughters.
• He may have died between 1900 and 1910.

If anyone out there has any information that can add to our knowledge of George Brown, please email me at mfnamee [at] gmail [dot] com.

[This article was written by Matthew Namee.]

UPDATE: I may have found Lycurgos Brown, George’s second son. On November 16, 1917, a girl named Elizabeth Veronica Brown was born in Cook County, IL (i.e., Chicago). Her birth certificate lists her mother as the former Clara Scanlan, and her father as George Lycurgus Brown, age 33, born in Chicago. Doing the math (1917 minus 33), this man would have been born in 1884 — the same year as our Lycurgos Brown. It’s entirely possible that our Lycurgos actually had the first name of George (after his father), but went by his middle name as a child.

We can verify this hypothesis by revisiting the Census records. In 1910, George L. Brown, a 25-year-old shipping clerk, was living in Chicago with his wife Clara, 3-year-old son George E., and 7-month-old son Daniel P. And according to the Census, George L. Brown’s father was born in Greece, and his mother was from Italy. This is our guy.

I can’t find George Lycurgos Brown in the 1920 Census, but in 1930, he’s still in Chicago. Here is the family:

• George, age 46
• Clara, age 42
• Daniel, age 21
• Gordon, age 17
• Elizabeth, age 12
• Robert, age 5
• Clara G., age 3
• Thomas M., newborn

George Lycurgos Brown’s youngest children would thus be in their eighties today, and it is entirely possible that one or more is still alive. I wonder how much they know about their grandfather, the original George Brown?

UPDATE 2: Sorry for all the updates, but I’ve now traced George Brown’s line down to the present day. Son George Lycurgos Brown’s daughter Elizabeth married a man named Russell Garrett. Elizabeth died in Chicago in 2004, and according to her obituary, her descendants include daughter Elizabeth Balfanz and grandchildren Michael and Rebecca Balfanz.

I’m sure George Brown has dozens of other surviving descendants, through his various other children and grandchildren.

Tags: 1888, 1897, Chicago, early unity, George Brown, Greek, parishes

The following item appeared in the Washington Post (among other papers) on July 6, 1933:

Martins Ferry, Ohio, July 5 (A.P.). – The Rev. Parthenios Colonis, 72, pastor of the Martins Ferry Greek Orthodox Catholic Church, died today from hatchet-inflicted wounds. He was found unconscious in the basement of the church Saturday night, his skull fractured by blows from the blunt and sharp edges of a blood-stained hatchet.

He regained consciousness, but did not indicate who attacked him, although police say they believe he knew his assailants. It was the third time in three years that the priest was mysteriously assaulted in his church.

Archimandrite Parthenios Kolonis (or Colonis) born on the Greek island of Patmos in the early 1860s. He was ordained a priest in 1904 and immediately sailed to America, where he went to Milwaukee and established the Church of the Annunciation (Evangelismos). Kolonis served in Milwaukee until 1913; after that, he briefly stopped in Haverhill, Massachusetts before moving to Wheeling, West Virginia, where the founded the parish of St. John the Divine. In 1921, Kolonis made his final move, to Martins Ferry, Ohio, where he reportedly spent a whopping $7,000 of his own money to build the Church of Zoodochos Peghe (the Life-Giving Spring). Finally, as reported above in the Washington Post, Kolonis was brutally murdered in Martins Ferry in 1933.

Apart from his tragic death, Kolonis’ career (on the surface) seems rather ordinary for a Greek priest in early 20th century America. He founded three parishes and spent most of his career in those communities (Milwaukee, Wheeling, and Martins Ferry). He served in numerous other cities as well, among them Pittsburgh, Jacksonville (FL), Pueblo (CO), and Haverhill (MA). All in all, Kolonis had a pretty typical priestly career for his time. Except that he didn’t, because everywhere he went, Fr. Parthenios Kolonis was accused of being a predatory homosexual.

Margot Canaday tells the story of Kolonis in The Straight State: Sexuality and Citizenship in Twentieth-Century America. According to Canaday, Kolonis left Milwaukee under a cloud of scandal. A parishioner had suggested that Kolonis was gay, and Kolonis himself had purportedly written a letter to a boy in Greece, suggesting that the two had engaged in a sexual relationship. Later, an investigation turned up the accusation that Kolonis had sexually assaulted a steward on the ship that  brought him to the United States. After leaving Milwaukee, Kolonis moved on to Haverhill, Mass., but he was almost immediately run out of town when multiple young men separately accused the him of sexual misconduct. (I am intentionally not providing all the gory details, but Canaday’s book is pretty explicit about the specific allegations in all of these cases.)

In Wheeling, the problem reached a tipping point. Kolonis purportedly made more advances on young men (including paying money for sexual favors), and eventually news of this reached the US Bureau of Immigration. The Bureau opened an investigation, and they found out about the Milwaukee and Haverhill allegations. In February 1916, the Secretary of Labor issued a warrant for the arrest of Kolonis on the grounds that, being a “moral pervert,” he should have been designated a likely public charge (and thus deported) when he immigrated to the United States in 1904. Kolonis’ attorneys made successful legal arguments in their clients’ favor, and the warrant was rescinded.

But the allegations were still out there. Kolonis argued that he was the victim of an “elaborate blackmail scheme” (Canaday’s description). This seems incredibly unlikely. Kolonis was accused of sexual misconduct literally everywhere he went, by numerous individuals. The accusers in one city seem to have been totally unaware of the allegations in the other cities. We can’t prove anything, certainly not a century after the fact, but I just cannot see how Kolonis could be innocent. (Oddly enough, Canaday’s narrative ends here; she appears to be unaware of Kolonis’ final years and violent end.)

Somehow, Kolonis remained in Wheeling for another five years, even after all the allegations were public. And while I don’t know much about his tenure in Martins Ferry, I think it’s safe to assume that Kolonis was accused there as well. That would certainly explain why he was “mysteriously assaulted in his church” three times in his final three years, and why he apparently knew, but would not identify, his murderer(s). In fact, when Kolonis was discovered by the police, he initially claimed that he had slipped on the basement steps and hit his head on the concrete floor. Dr. Bill Samonides did some digging in local newspapers, and offered the following findings:

According to the Steubenville Herald-Star of July 6, 1933, Fr Colonis died at Martins Ferry Hospital at 12:45 PM. He was attacked the previous night. did not die instantly, but lingered for some hours in the hospital after he was discovered. He is said to have been struck from behind by a hatchet. A skull fracture was assigned as the cause of death. He was struck in the basement of the church. He sustained a head injury in the church the previous Saturday night [July 1]. He told police that he had slipped on the basement steps and struck his head on the concrete floor.

Weirton Daily Times of July 7, 1933 reported that the Martins Ferry Coroner had arrested a Nick George of that town in connection with the murder. Witnesses told the coroner that they had seen George dining with Fr Parthenios the evening of the fatal attack. These witnesses also said that George was the last person seen on the church grounds that day. George was later exonerated and released.

Weirton Daily Times of July 8, 1933 reported that Rev Chrysostomos Papalambrou of Weirton was in charge of the funeral. It seems odd that the Wheeling priest was not in charge.

According to Dr. Samonides, that July 8 Weirton Daily Times article also noted that among Kolonis’ possessions was a painting said to have been owned by Tsar Nicholas II, and valued at a whopping $25,000 (over $400,000 today). I’d love to know what happened to that piece of art after Kolonis died.

We’ve reached the end, and it’s not unreasonable to ask the question, “Why bother telling this horrible story?” The unpleasant reality is that Orthodoxy in America has, today, a serious problem with sexual misconduct among the clergy. It’s a problem that crosses jurisdictional lines, and all ranks of clergymen. The Kolonis story demonstrates that this is, unfortunately, not a new problem for American Orthodoxy. There have always been bad priests who prey on vulnerable people and bring shame upon the Church. Kolonis didn’t really have a bishop (or at least, not one more than an ocean away), so it was easy enough for him to just move to a new city when his deeds started to catch up with him. Today, we don’t have that excuse.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: 1933, Greek, parishes, Parthenios Kolonis

In my recent lecture on Orthodoxy in Chicago, given at Holy Apostles Greek Orthodox Church in Westchester, Illinois, I cautiously addressed the still-controversial issue of the 1897 split in Chicago’s Greek Orthodox community. Let me go over the basic details very briefly, before moving onto the broader question of what constitutes a parish.

In 1892, Fr. Panagiotis Phiambolis came to Chicago and founded the city’s first Greek Orthodox church, Annunciation. This community met in a rented space and existed for at least five years. Of that, there is no dispute. In 1897, for various reasons which I won’t get into right now, the parish divided. The Archbishop of Athens had sent Fr. Theodore Papaconstantine to replace Fr. Phiambolis as priest of Annunciation. Fr. Phiambolis refused to step down, and Fr. Papaconstantine led part of the Annunciation community away to start a separate parish, Holy Trinity. Fr. Phiambolis remained in Chicago for a couple of years, until about 1899, after which he moved to Boston.

This is where things get complicated. Some contend that Annunciation closed when Fr. Phiambolis left in 1899 (or even earlier — some date its closure to 1897). These folks say that there was no Annunciation Church in Chicago from then until 1907, when the current parish of Annunciation (now a cathedral) was established. Thus, according to this narrative, there were two Annunciation parishes — we’ll call them Annunciation 1892 and Annunciation 1907.

Others have a different story. They say that while Annunciation did lack a priest from 1899 (or whatever) until 1907, it continued to exist, serviced by visiting priests. At my lecture, a woman in the audience even said that she had a photo from her grandparents’ wedding, taken on the steps of Annunciation’s building in 1902 or thereabouts. A parish can still exist without a resident priest, and the argument here is that the present Annunciation Cathedral is identical to the original Annunciation Church from 1892.

I should also mention a third, related argument, brought up to me by a gentleman after my talk. This man suggested that, actually, Holy Trinity itself, while technically founded in 1897, may reasonably be dated to 1892. After all, the founders of Holy Trinity were all previously members of Annunciation. Holy Trinity could, according to this interpretation, be considered merely a continuation of Annunciation 1892, under a different name.

All of this caused me to take a step back and ask, “What is a parish?” We can say what is definitely a parish — a cohesive community of Orthodox Christians with a permanent place of worship, a resident priest, and regular church services. But beyond that, there’s a huge gray area. I’ve come up with several factors and sub-factors to help define a parish. The list isn’t exhaustive, and you could have a parish with only a couple of these elements.

An Orthodox community. This is the most essential element. On the OCA website, many former Greek Catholic parishes which converted to Orthodoxy date their foundings to the year they were established as Greek Catholic communities. I don’t do that; I would date their foundings as Orthodox parishes to the year when they converted to Orthodoxy. Before that, they may have been parishes, but they weren’t Orthodox.

A cohesive community. In other words, the Orthodox people must think of themselves as being part of a community. You could have 100 Orthodox in a city, and a priest could occasionally visit them, but if they don’t think of themselves as being a community, it’s hard to argue that a parish is present.

A priest. Most normatively, an Orthodox parish has a resident Orthodox priest. However, this element can be satisfied with something less than that. Many missions are serviced by priests who care for multiple churches, or by priests assigned to other parishes. Throughout history, some communities have relied, at times, on the services of itinerant clergy.

Worship space. Again, the norm here would be a permanent Orthodox temple, owned by the parish. Alternatively, a parish might rent its building. This could be broken down further — the parish could rent the building every day of the week, or only on certain days (e.g. Sundays).

Regular church services. The basic standard is a Sunday liturgy each week, but of course many parishes do a lot more than that. However, you could have a parish that meets less often (only once or twice per month). And while priest-led services are the norm, in theory, regular meetings of the laity for prayers might suffice.

Incorporation. Most parishes are incorporated as legal entities with the state. However, it’s also true that parishes usually predate their incorporation. After all, until you have at least some of the basic elements of a parish, how could you take the steps to incorporate? Incorporation helps us identify a parish, but lack of incorporation doesn’t mean there isn’t a parish.

A parish council or board of trustees. This isn’t absolutely essential, but it’s the norm for Orthodox parishes in America.

Hierarchical oversight. Today, to be an Orthodox parish in America, you pretty much have to be under a bishop. That wasn’t always necessarily the case. I mean, I guess you could argue that some of the early American Orthodox parishes weren’t really Orthodox, because they were established in an ecclesiologically irregular manner, but I don’t take that approach myself. At the very least, there usually was some minimal tie to a bishop or “mother church.”

A common name: Having a common name doesn’t mean a community is a parish, but you’d be hard-pressed to find a parish that didn’t have a name along the lines of “Annunciation,” “Holy Trinity,” or “St. Nicholas.” I’ve heard of fledgling missions called, “Orthodox Mission of [City],” but they usually get a name pretty soon after their establishment.

Self-identity as a parish. This is actually kind of a big one. In Chicago, prior to the 1892 founding of Greek and Russian parishes, the city had a cohesive community of Orthodox Christians. These people had organized themselves into a “society” for the purpose of starting a parish. They elected officers. They seem to have had a name (St. Nicholas), may have rented worship space, and may have had something resembling regular services. Yet, they clearly didn’t consider themselves a parish. In 1888, they met to decide whether to start a parish, and as late as 1892, there was still talk of starting a multiethnic parish. They obviously didn’t consider themselves to be a parish, even though they had a lot of the fundamental elements. In some cases, we might look back with hindsight and say, “That was a parish,” even if the community didn’t say so at the time. But the burden of proof is higher, I think.

In sum, then, we can say for certain that an Orthodox parish exists if there is a cohesive Orthodox community with a common name, self-identifying as a parish, under the jurisdiction of a bishop, incorporated with the state, with a board of trustees, and holding regular church services with a resident priest in a permanent worship space. But lots and lots of parishes don’t have one or more of those elements, and they’re still indisputably parishes.

I think the mimimum to call something a parish has to be a cohesive Orthodox community, but even that may not be enough. Consider: I was once a part of a cohesive Orthodox community which held regular services in a permanent worship space, led by a resident and full-time Orthodox priest. We had a name, a patron saint. We didn’t self-identify as a parish, and while our priest was under an Orthodox bishop, our community was technically an OCF (Orthodox Christian Fellowship, a campus ministry) not under any one hierarch. We didn’t self-identify as a parish; we called ourselves an OCF, even though we had many regular worshippers who weren’t actually OCF members. Later, our priest left his jurisdiction for another, and our community was converted into a mission parish under a specific bishop. At that point, we incorporated ourselves and elected a parish council. Were we a parish at the beginning, when we self-identified as merely an OCF? I don’t think we were, but looking back, it wouldn’t be unreasonable for someone to say, “Hey, that’s a parish, whether you say it is or not.”

Another interesting question, this one from history, concerns the original Orthodox community in Portland, Oregon. In the 1890s, an Orthodox chapel called Holy Trinity was established in Portland, under the oversight of the Russian Diocese. The community had a permanent building and was served by priests who visited from the larger Orthodox parish in Seattle. The Russian Diocese, and perhaps the local community, referred to it as a “chapel.” Was this a “parish,” or was it something else — to steal a term from others, a “proto-parish”? Later, the Greeks formed their own parish, which was also called “Holy Trinity” and, at the outset, rented the original Holy Trinity chapel building. This raises another question: was Holy Trinity Greek parish a continuation of Holy Trinity Russian chapel? After all, at least some (and perhaps most) of the Holy Trinity Greek founders had previously attended Holy Trinity Russian chapel. It’s a gray area.

Returning to the original issue: did Annunciation parish of Chicago persist during the early 1900s, or did it close? Put another way, was the present Annunciation founded in 1892, or 1907? There is, I’m afraid, no single answer. Let’s do the analysis:

• An Orthodox community: The key question here is whether there were Greek Orthodox people in Chicago who weren’t members of Holy Trinity. I think the answer is yes.
• A cohesive community: Again, I think the non-Holy Trinity Greeks continued to exist as a cohesive community, as evidenced by the existence (or founding) of Annunciation in 1907.
• A priest: No, there was not a resident Greek priest in Chicago apart from Holy Trinity in the gap period.
• Worship space: I think the original Annunciation worship space continued to be maintained. I haven’t verified this, but if true, it is a key argument in favor of Annunciation’s claim.
• Regular church services: I don’t think there were regular services. I’ve heard that visiting priests occasionally held services for the Annunciation survivors.
• Incorporation: I’m not sure, but I don’t think the community was incorporated prior to 1907. I hope readers will correct me if I’m wrong.
• Board of trustees: I don’t know about this. I strongly suspect that there continued to be officers, but I don’t know for sure. This would be another good argument that there was a parish.
• Hierarchical oversight: Bishops had little practical oversight of Greek parishes in America at the turn of the last century, and without a resident priest, I can’t imagine the Annunciation survivors had much contact with a hierarch.
• A common name: The argument here depends a lot on this element. The claim is that Annunciation’s survivors continued to refer to themselves as “Annunciation” during the gap period.
• Self-identity as a parish: This is another critical element, and Annunciation partisans would certainly argue that this self-identity existed.

This leaves us with some basic questions, and perhaps someone in Chicago could look into them:

1. Did Annunciation’s building continue to be maintained and used by a Greek Orthodox community?
2. Were the members of that community not members of another Orthodox parish (i.e. Holy Trinity)?
3. Did that community have a board of trustees?
4. How often did the community meet for services? How often did a priest visit them? (One place to start looking would be state marriage records.)
5. Did the parishioners in 1907 understand themselves to be (re-)founding the parish, or did they think that the parish had continued to exist during the gap?

We’ll continue to explore the issues of parish identity in the future, but the whole Chicago debate reminds me that we must always ensure that we define our terms. We can’t take for granted that we all know what a “parish” is, because, as I think I’ve demonstrated, there’s a lot more gray area than we might initially assume.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: 1897, America, Chicago, Historiography, parishes, Portland

An Armenian Apostolic church in Worcester, Massachusetts

Recently, there has been interest from SOCHA to explore the history of the so-called “Oriental Orthodox” family of churches.  As a longtime reader of this blog and a member of the Armenian Church, I volunteered to write an article or two. 

First, a bit of a personal introduction.  My name is Aram Sarkisian, and I’m currently a graduate student at the University of Chicago.  I’m both Russian and Armenian by ancestry.  I was raised in the Armenian Church, and am an ordained subdeacon in the Eastern Diocese of the Armenian Church of America, which is under the administration of the Holy See of Etchmiadzin. 

That is not to say that I am unfamiliar with Eastern Orthodoxy.  My primary research interest as a scholar is in the history of Russian Orthodoxy in early twentieth century America.  Additionally, my maternal grandfather was a priest in Canadian and Midwest Dioceses of the Orthodox Church in America, so I have also spent a great deal of time in a variety of Orthodox parishes as well. 

It’s been my experience that many in the Eastern Orthodox family have only a passing knowledge about the Armenian Church, so I thought it might be helpful to give a short history of who we are and how we fit into the general scene of Christianity in America before getting into more particular historical posts.

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The Armenian Church claims its roots from the Apostles Thaddeus and Bartholomew, who tradition tells us preached the Gospel in the lands of historic Armenia soon after the time of Christ.  Though various Christian communities did exist thereafter, the Armenian kingdoms remained officially pagan until the dawn of the fourth century, when St. Gregory the Illuminator, a Parthian by birth, converted the Armenian King Drtad to Christianity in 301 AD (the date traditionally held, but it may have been several years later).  Because of the conversion of his kingdom, Armenia is generally regarded as being the first nation to adopt Christianity as its state religion.

In the following centuries, Armenians cultivated a unique cultural and liturgical identity tempered by encounters with foreign invaders and other Christian groups.  The Armenian Church rejected the Council of Chalcedon in 451 not only for specific theological issues, but also due to the fact that the Armenian delegation could not physically attend the Council, as Armenians were fighting off the advances of Persian invaders as the Council convened.  Thus, the Armenian Church has remained in canonical isolation from the Eastern Orthodox family of Churches for over fifteen centuries.  Instead, we are a so-called Non-Chalcedonian, or Oriental Orthodox Church, in communion with the Coptic, Ethiopian, Eritrean, Syriac, and Indian Churches.

The Non-Chalcedonian Churches are all rather different, each having unique rites and languages.  For Eastern Orthodox Christians, one could feel relatively at home and find much familiar in the services and ambience of a parish in Russia as they could in a parish in America, Syria, Greece, or Japan.  Concelebration is common.  For Oriental Orthodox Christians, an Armenian would find few commonalities in an Ethiopian parish, and an Indian would probably be lost in a Coptic liturgy.  While we are theologically united, there does not seem to be a great deal of communication, concelebration, or understanding within our family of Churches, especially on the local, parish level. 

So what does that mean in America?  How did Armenians get here, where and how do we worship?  Armenian immigration to the United States didn’t really exist on a widespread basis until the end of the 19^th century, with most of the early Armenian immigrants coming from the Ottoman Empire and the Middle East for educational reasons.  The earliest Armenian communities to coalesce in America were in New England and, later, California.  These early communities largely worshipped in local Protestant parishes in lieu of churches of their own.  They formed cultural and fraternal organizations, library societies, and political groups, and out of these institutions came the embryonic forms of Armenian parishes.

The first parish community emerged in Worcester, Massachusetts in 1889, which itself is a topic for another entry.  In 1897, the Armenian community in America was separated into four “Ecclesiastical Districts:” Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Chicago, and Fresno, California, each under the administration of a single priest.  The smaller communities of New York City, Troy, New York, and Philadelphia were also given spiritual oversight on a less formal basis.  In 1898, Catholicos Mgrdich I, through an encyclical issued from the Holy See of Etchmiadzin, established the Diocese of the Armenian Church of America.

In the 113 years since, the Armenian Church in America has grown exponentially from coast to coast, though unfortunately through several waves of immigration coming out of moments of tragedy for the Armenian people.   Of course, the first of these was a result of the Armenian Genocide, a series of systematic exterminations of the Armenian populations of Eastern Anatolia at the hands of the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1923.  To a lesser extent, there would also be waves of immigration from Soviet Armenia in the decades to come, as well as the Middle East in the 1960’s and 1970’s.  After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, which coincided with the beginning of a brutal conflict with Azerbaijan, another wave of Armenian immigration from post-Soviet states began, which continues to this day.

Thus, the Armenian community in America is really quite diverse within itself, reflecting immigrants that came not only from Armenia and Turkey, but also many other places as well.  Linguistically, due to both this diversity and Americanization of 3^rd and 4^th-generation Americans, there are a lot of bases to cover.  The Armenian Church worships in Classical Armenian, though in some parishes a limited amount of English, Russian, or even Turkish is often used in lections or sermons.  Outside of worship, you’re likely to hear a number of languages spoken in the average Coffee Hour, from Eastern or Western Armenian to English, Russian to Arabic, Turkish to French.  English is most common, and probably could be considered the vernacular, but many of our parishes are still Armenian speaking at a significant level.

There is also a jurisdictional divide in the United States and Canada, which came purely out of a political disagreement and the fallout of the 1933 assassination of Archbishop Levon Tourian (again, a story best told in another entry).  Local divisions emerged, parallel parishes were established, and the administrative division became official in 1957 when a group of parishes entered under the jurisdiction of the Catholicosate of Cilicia, with the remaining parishes staying under the authority of the Catholicosate of Etchmiadzin.  Thus, there are Eastern and Western Dioceses (Etchmiadzin), and Eastern and Western Prelacies (Cilicia).  The schism is not a break in Eucharistic communion, but it is, in many places, an acrimonious split that translates to limited relations between the two parties. 

This is, of course, a rather short and barebones introduction to who we are as a Church, but I hope, in the future, to fill in the blanks with some interesting material about the Armenian Church, and how it is has interacted with the Eastern Orthodox Church on the North American Continent.  There are many commonalities in our witness in America, and much we all can learn from each other.  I thank SOCHA for being so accommodating and willing to entertain an Armenian voice, and I am glad to lend a hand to broaden their exploration of the rich tapestry of ancient Christianity on the North American continent.

This article was written by Aram Sarkisian.

Tags: America, Armenian, parishes

Way back in the summer of 2009, we went down to Houston to visit family, and while there, we made a special trip to the nearby city of Galveston. Really, my family was indulging me — I wanted to visit Saints Constantine and Helen Serbian Orthodox Church, the first Orthodox parish in Texas and one of the oldest Orthodox church buildings still in use in America. I took a bunch of photos, and I’ve been meaning to publish them here, but just haven’t gotten around to it. Until now:

Exterior photo of Ss. Constantine & Helen Church in Galveston

Ss. Constantine & Helen was founded in 1895 as a multiethnic parish of the Russian Diocese of the Aleutians.

To this day, parishioners preserve the memory of their venerable first pastor, the remarkable Greek Archimandrite Theoclitos Triantafilides. He is buried in the altar, and this gravestone can be seen on the rear exterior of the church.

These Western-looking icons of Christ and the Theotokos were donated by Tsar Nicholas II.

Tsar Nicholas II also donated this Gospel book to the Galveston parish. I was told that, during a flood, it was miraculously preserved and was found resting, unharmed, atop a nearby tombstone.

I took a lot more photos, and I may post more in the future. To learn more about the fascinating history of Ss. Constantine and Helen parish, and their legendary priest Fr. Theoclitos Triantafilides, check out this article, posted on OH.org last January.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Tags: Galveston, Greek, parishes, Russian, Serbian, Theoclitos Triantafilides, Tsar Nicholas II

Editor’s note: Today we are very pleased to introduce a new author here at OrthodoxHistory.org. Dr. William Samonides of Canton, Ohio, is one of the foremost historians of Greek Orthodoxy in America. With his wife Regine, he coauthored the book  Greeks of Stark County (Arcadia Publishing, 2009). I feel pretty confident in saying that Dr. Samonides knows more than anyone about early Greek parish clergy in America.

Father Demetrios Mittacos and Father Gregorios Pantazonis, circa 1936. This is a rare photograph in which the priests of the two rival Greek Orthodox parishes in Canton posed together. The occasion is not known. Father Mittacos served at Holy Trinity in 1936-1937. Father Pantazonis was one of only three priests who served both Canton parishes. He served at Holy Trinity from 1928 to 1931 and at Saint Haralambos from 1931 to 1938.

Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church was established in the city of Canton, Ohio, in the early 20th-century boom years of the American steel industry. Orthodox Christians, who flocked to Canton, had already formed three other Orthodox parishes: Romanian, Syrian, and Greek.

Chartered in 1917, Holy Trinity was founded five years before the establishment of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America. It was created as the direct result of a political split in the Canton Greek community. Saint Haralambos, which had been established in 1913, became the parish for supporters of the Greek King Constantine, while backers of Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos worshipped at Holy Trinity. This Royalist-Republican split was not unusual; most large Greek communities around the world experienced similar divisions. It is, however, noteworthy that Holy Trinity has maintained its independence long after most of the other parishes that were formed for political reasons have disappeared.

The history of Holy Trinity is quite useful for the study of early Orthodoxy in North America. Stark County was and is home to a concentration of Orthodox Christians from the Pontos region along the Black Sea in the northeastern part of modern Turkey. Holy Trinity is one of few parishes in North America founded primarily by immigrants from Asia Minor. At 10^th Street NE, the original site, the first Greek Orthodox church in the region was constructed. In 1927, a Greek community center and hall – also the first in the region – were added.

In recent years Holy Trinity has been at the forefront of Greek Orthodox parishes in the exploration and exhibition of its history. In spring 2004, the parish was the focus in a major exhibition at the Wm. McKinley Presidential Library and Museum in Canton. In 2009, the history of Holy Trinity and two other Greek Orthodox parishes was featured in Greeks of Stark County, a book issued by Arcadia Publishing in the Images of America series. Several months ago, a History Room was created to display changing exhibits exploring different aspects of parish history.

The first History Room exhibit, which is in the process of being mounted, examines the history of the parish through its spiritual leaders. The exhibit focuses on the priests and their accomplishments at Holy Trinity, also discussing their careers before and after serving in Canton. The exhibit also surveys the sacraments – the baptisms, marriages, and funerals – that the priests performed for parish families.

For reconstructing the biographies and understanding the careers of early Orthodox priests in America, parish histories are essential. Unfortunately, all too often the priests who served a parish are reduced to a list of names. Usually the focus is only on the priests’ experiences at the parish. The work of John S. Moraites at Holy Trinity-Saint Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church in Cincinnati, Ohio is a notable exception.

Parish histories can also shed light on larger issues that affected the church and the clergy. One issue that emerges from the study of Holy Trinity history is how much special attention the parish received from the early hierarchs of the Archdiocese. Judging from the visits they made to the parish, it was an important “battleground” in the early years of the Archdiocese. Over 150 parishes were founded before the establishment of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese in 1922. The first two Archbishops of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America visited Holy Trinity early in their tenure. Archbishop Alexander consecrated Holy Trinity on May 28, 1922, less than three weeks after his appointment as the first Archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America. This visit to Canton was probably his first extended road trip from New York after becoming Archbishop on May 11.

His successor, Archbishop Athenagoras, made visiting Holy Trinity a priority. In May 1931, he celebrated his first Pentecost as Archbishop at Holy Trinity; this was quite an honor for the parish considering the number of parishes in North America named Holy Trinity.

Photograph of Archbishop Athenagoras and area priests during a visit to Canton in the mid-1930s. Archbishop Athenagoras was a frequent visitor to Stark County during his 18 years as Archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America.

Archbishop Athenagoras would make many more visits to the area as he worked to reunite the Canton Greek community [see photo]. His efforts were not, however, successful, and the two Canton parishes remained separate. This was not the only area in which Holy Trinity rebuffed the Archbishop. The Holy Trinity Koraes Ladies Society, founded in 1927, resisted joining the Greek Orthodox Ladies Philoptochos Society. Philoptochos, the official philanthropic organization of the Greek Orthodox Church in America, was established by Archibishop Athenagoras in November 1931 and now has more than 475 Philoptochos chapters in the United States. At Holy Trinity, however, the Koraes Ladies Society continues its independence to this day.

Another issue that emerges from the study of early Holy Trinity history is the large number of priests who served the parish before 1940. During the first 22 years, there were 14 priests. This is in contrast to a parish established at about the same time just 20 miles to the north in Akron, Ohio; the Akron parish has been served by only three priests since 1926. Of course, parishes – like priests – all have different “personalities.” The high turnover in priests at Holy Trinity is not a source of pride, but it provides useful information in studying the early priests of the Greek Orthodox Church in North America.

In some respects, Holy Trinity should have been a preferred parish for early Greek Orthodox priests. At the time, most parishes initially rented spaces or purchased buildings from other denominations before raising enough money to construct their own church to Orthodox specifications. Holy Trinity was different. Immediately after receiving its charter, it began to build, and the church was completed before the first priest arrived in October 1917.

Money does not seem to have been an issue. Considering that the parish was mid- sized and most of the parishioners earned low wages in the nearby steel mills, the church was on remarkably firm financial footing. The mortgage was burned less than three years after the state charter was issued. However, none of the parishioners was wealthy, and the parish in later years never paid priests top dollar. During the early 20^th century, prior to the establishment of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese, there were no guidelines for salaries and benefits, and the shortage of priests created a sellers’ market.

Unlike Greek Orthodox parishes, like the Annunciation Cathedral in Atlanta, which has preserved all the minutes from parish council meetings, Holy Trinity has very few early records. Built in a flood plain, the parish was plagued by damaging floods for most of its history, and many of its early records were destroyed. Most of the information on the early history of the parish and priests has been painstakingly compiled from numerous external sources, including local newspaper accounts. This makes it difficult to state with certainty what accounts for the high rate of turnover of priests. Local newspaper reports, however, suggest that the relationship between parish and priests was at times contentious. In January 1921, members of the board of trustees accosted one priest and his wife after Divine Liturgy and were sued for assault. Two years later, another priest sued a parishioner for $10,000, alleging libel. Yet another early priest had a brief stay, because he molested an adolescent girl and was run out of town by her enraged father.

The parish was served by a corps of extremely mobile clergy. They were a well-traveled lot, some serving as far west as Idaho and Utah or as far south as North Carolina and Texas. Most, however, served primarily in the northeastern U.S. Only two are among the “pioneer” priests who founded parishes across North America, and these two served at Holy Trinity toward the end of their careers. All but four of the early priests were ordained before their arrival. Many had been in the U.S. for some time – some more than 30 years – before coming to Canton. Those who did not come to North America as priests had worked in a variety of professions: from sponge diver to confectioner to assembler of automobile parts. Most of the early priests were middle-aged or older; only two of the first priests were under forty. Very few would be buried in the U.S.; even those who had family in America or had become naturalized U.S. citizens chose to retire to Greece.

All but one of the early priests were originally under the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarch or the Church of Greece. The one exception later became an Archbishop in the Patriarchate of Jerusalem. Little is known of these priests before their arrival in America. Holy Trinity, unlike many other Greek Orthodox parishes established before the Archdiocese, did not summon priests directly from overseas, but hired priests who were available in America. Although most of the parishioners were from Asia Minor, no priest from Asia Minor ever served the parish. Instead, the island of Samos provided more priests for the parish than any other area. There seems to have been an unofficial network of priests from Samos operating in America, which may have been the reason for the high number of Samioti priests at Holy Trinity.

The inaugural exhibit at the Holy Trinity History Room examines these and other issues based on information and photographs collected over the last six years by Holy Trinity Historian, Dr. William H. Samonides. A number of photographs and stories about the early priests of this area can also be found in Greeks of Stark County (Arcadia Publishing, 2009), which he co-authored with his wife Regine.

[This article was written by Dr. William Samonides.]

Tags: Greek, parishes

Yesterday, we published a series of photos of Holy Trinity Russian Orthodox Cathedral in Chicago. These images, taken in 1905, are part of the Library of Congress’ online collection of photos from the Chicago Daily News. Over on our Facebook page, a reader named Katja Yurschak posted a link to a wonderful old postcard, featuring the cathedral in its original colors. The postmark appears to be from 1906. Here’s the image:

Postcard of Holy Trinity Russian Orthodox Cathedral in Chicago (click to enlarge)

Tags: 1906, Chicago, parishes, primary sources, Russian