[O]ne portion of the parish wanted to discharge their priest, Fr. Nathaniel Sideris, and “hire” another. “We have the right to tell a priest that he is no longer needed and to engage another priest,” one parish leader explained. Other parishioners were appalled at such an approach. “Our complaint,” said the leader of the opposition, “is that the people upstairs are conducting the affairs of a Greek church different from anything to which we have been accustomed, and we do not consider it right. The bishop of the Greek church in Athens alone has the power to assign a priest.”

In the paper, I went on to observe that while one group wanted total independence from the hierarchy and the other recognized the authority of the Church of Greece, neither side said a word about Tikhon, the Russian bishop in America. Of course, that’s because the Lowell Greeks didn’t consider themselves to be under Tikhon — a fact that is perhaps unsurprising today, but which, a couple of years ago, contradicted the commonly held belief that all Orthodox in America recognized Russian authority prior to the Bolshevik Revolution.

April 28, 1901: St. Tikhon, the Russian bishop, celebrated the Divine Liturgy at Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church in Chicago. At least, that’s what some modern sources say; I can’t find any references to the event in the Chicago Tribune, although the newspaper covered a lot of other Orthodox happenings in that era. If anyone has more information, please let me know.

April 27, 1903: St. Alexis Toth, one of the leading priests in the Russian Diocese, was awarded the “Order of St. Vladimir” and received a miter. Toth, of course, had been a Uniate Greek Catholic priest until his conversion to Orthodoxy in 1891. He went on to spearhead the conversion of tens of thousands of former Uniates into the Russian Diocese, until his death in 1909.

April 23, 1917: St. George Syrian Orthodox Church in Worcester, MA became the first official “Antacky” parish, declaring its loyalty to Metropolitan Germanos Shehadi. Informally, the Russy-Antacky schism began immediately after St. Raphael died in 1915, when his priests disagreed on whether to acknowledge the authority of Antioch or Russia. But the Worcester declaration marked the formal beginning of the schism, which divided the Arab Orthodox in America until the mid-1930s.

April 27, 1922: The Holy Synod of Russia named the refugee Metropolitan Platon Rozhdestvensky as the temporary head of the Russian Archdiocese of North America. Soon enough, the Russian Church (under Soviet pressure) changed course and condemned Platon, who led the Russian Archdiocese to declare its independence from Moscow.

April 25, 1926: Archimandrite Mardarije Uskokovic was consecrated in Belgrade to be the first Serbian bishop for America. According to this article, the original plan was for Bishop Nicholai Velimirovich of Ochrid to lead a new Serbian diocese in America, with Archimandrite Mardarije as his administrative assistant. But Bishop Nicholai’s flock in Serbia apparently protested, and Nicholai himself recommended that Mardarije be consecrated in his stead. Thus, in 1923, Mardarije was appointed administrator of the Serbian churches in America, and three years later, he was elevated to the episcopacy.

Bishop Mardarije’s greatest legacy may be his founding of St. Sava Monastery in Libertyville, Illinois. He died in 1935.

April 29, 1933: Archbishop Aftimios Ofiesh, of the fringe “American Orthodox Catholic Church,” married a young girl named Mariam Namey (no relation to me) in a civil ceremony in Niagara Falls, NY. This effectively snuffed out any remaining legitimacy Ofiesh had within Orthodoxy.

April 28, 1952: Romanian Bishop Valerian Trifa was consecrated by the Ukrainian Metropolitan John Theodorovich. The trouble was that Theodorovich was a “self-consecrator,” rendering Trifa’s consecration invalid in the eyes of mainstream Orthodoxy. Later, Bishop Valerian was properly consecrated by bishops of the Russian Metropolia.

April 29, 1956: Archbishop Adam Phillipovsky died. He was a colorful character who was, at various times, on seemingly every side of the unending Russian Church disputes of his day.

April 25, 1959: Reginald Wright Kauffman, a noted writer and journalist, died. Kauffman had converted to Orthodoxy four decades earlier in the short-lived convert parish of the Transfiguration in New York. Unlike nearly all of the Transfiguration converts, Kauffman remained Orthodox for the rest of his life.

This week in American Orthodox history (April 23-29) is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

March 14, 1767: Philip Ludwell III, the first Orthodox convert in American history, died in London. Decades earlier, in 1738, Ludwell had joined the Orthodox Church in London. He was just 22 at the time, and was a rising star in the Virginia aristocracy. Remarkably, the Russian Holy Synod gave him permission to bring a portion of the Eucharist back to Virginia. In 1762, Ludwell brought his three daughters to England to be received into the Church as well. Of course, we would know none of this were it not for the exceptional research and writing done by Nicholas Chapman, whose articles we’re proud to feature here at OrthodoxHistory.org. Click here to read Nicholas’ first article on Ludwell, and here to read about Ludwell’s landmark translation of an Orthodox catechism. And if you find Ludwell as fascinating as I do, I would highly recommend that you invest $4.95 to download Nicholas Chapman’s recent lecture on Ludwell. (And for $9.95, you get a CD of the lecture, a copy of Ludwell’s portrait, and the Ludwell family book plate.) I rarely encourage our readers to buy stuff, but trust me: this is worth it.

St. Alexis Toth

March 14, 1853: Chronologically, after Ludwell, the most important American Orthodox convert has to be St. Alexis Toth, who was born in the Austro-Hungarian Empire 159 years ago this week (most of my sources say March 14, but Wikipedia has his birthday as March 18). Originally a Greek Catholic (“Uniate”) priest, Toth was assigned to serve a Carpatho-Rusyn parish in Minneapolis in 1889. But the local Roman Catholic archbishop didn’t want Toth’s “kind” — that is, Greek Catholics — in his diocese, and the two men clashed immediately. In 1891, Toth and his Minneapolis congregation joined the Russian Orthodox Church. Dozens and dozens of Uniate parishes followed suit over the next two decades, and Toth was one of the chief advocates of Uniate conversion to Orthodoxy. He died in 1909 and was canonized by the OCA in 1994.

March 13, 1868: Fr. Nicholas Kovrigin was sent on a pastoral visit to San Francisco, establishing the first foothold of the Russian Church in the contiguous United States. It all started back in the 1850s, when San Francisco’s growing Orthodox community organized into a mutual aid society. In the early 1860s, Russian ships visited the area, and some local Orthodox children — including the future Fr. Sebastian Dabovich — were baptized by a Russian navy chaplain. But there wasn’t a Russian parish until Kovrigin came along later in the decade. His visit was precipitated by the arrival, late in 1867, of the renegade Ukrainian priest Agapius Honcharenko, who moved to the Bay Area and tried to start some kind of hybrid Protestant/Orthodox parish. The Orthodox people seem to have realized that they needed to get an actual, legitimate Orthodox priest in their city, so they sent a formal request to the bishop in Alaska, who responded by sending Kovrigin for a visit. Initially, it was just that — a visit — but later in 1868, Kovrigin was formally assigned to be the pastor of a new parish in San Francisco. Unfortunately, Kovrigin seems not to have been made of the strongest moral fiber, and he ran into all sorts of trouble, ultimately being suspected of foul play in the death of his superior, cathedral dean Fr. Paul Kedrolivansky. Kovrigin was finally sent away in 1879, by the newly arrived Bishop Nestor Zass. On a more positive note, despite many trials and tribulations (and name changes), the San Francisco parish has survived to this day, and is now Holy Trinity, a cathedral of the OCA.

March 15, 1896: Archimandrite Theoclitos Triantafilides celebrated the first Divine Liturgy in Galveston, Texas. I’ve written about Fr. Theoclitos recently: he was one of only three Greek priests to serve under the Russian Mission. Previously, he had been the tutor to the future king of Greece and the future Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. His Galveston parish was multiethnic, composed of Serbs, Greeks, Syrians, Russians, Copts, and American converts. To this day, his old parish of Saints Constantine and Helen venerates him as a holy man. To learn more about Fr. Theoclitos, read this article by Mimo Milosevich.

March 15, 1898: The future Antiochian Metropolitan Antony Bashir was born in Douma, in what was then the Ottoman Empire and what is now Lebanon. Bashir led the Antiochian Archdiocese of New York from 1936 until his death in 1966. This was the era of the “New York-Toledo” schism, when the Antiochians in America were divided into competing archdioceses (one based in New York and the other in Toledo, Ohio). Bashir was a major proponent of pan-Orthodox cooperation and the proliferation of English in church services.

March 13, 1904: Archimandrite Raphael Hawaweeny was consecrated to the episcopacy by Archbishop Tikhon Bellavin and Bishop Innocent Pustynsky. This was the first episcopal consecration in American Orthodox history. Technically, St. Raphael was a vicar bishop under St. Tikhon, the Russian Archbishop of North America, and St. Raphael’s “diocese” was actually a vicariate for Syro-Arabs. Reality was considerably more complicated, and St. Raphael basically functioned as a mostly independent diocesan bishop with ties to both the Russians and the Patriarchate of Antioch. (As he put it, his diocese was a diocese of Antioch, “notwithstanding its nominal allegiance to the Russian Holy Synod.”) He served as bishop until his death in 1915.

March 12, 1914: Fr. Alexander Hotovitzky, dean of St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Cathedral in New York, returned to Russia after nearly two decades of service in America. He went on to suffer under the Communists, died a martyr’s death, and has since been canonized a saint.

Bishop Nicholai Velimirovich

March 18, 1956: The exiled Serbian bishop Nicholai Velimirovich died at St. Tikhon’s Monastery in South Canaan, Pennsylvania. He had first come to America in the 1910s, as a representative of the Serbian Church. After World War II, Bishop Nicholai returned to the United States as a refugee, and he went on to teach at several Orthodox seminaries in the US. I feel like I should have a lot to say about Bishop Nicholai — who, after all, was canonized in 2003 and is famous for his prolific writings (most notably the Prologue from Ochrid), but to be honest, I don’t really know all that much about the man. There are a couple of informative biographical articles online, but I should note that both are written from a somewhat hagiographic (as opposed to a strictly historical) perspective. Click here for one published in The Orthodox Word, and click here for one from the periodical Orthodox America.

March 16, 1960: The Standing Conference of Canonical Orthodox Bishops in the Americas — better known simply as SCOBA — held its first meeting. SCOBA arose from the ashes of the “Federation,” a 1940s attempt to foster pan-Orthodox cooperation in America. And while many initially thought that SCOBA might lead to the unification of the various jurisdictions, that obviously never happened. In 2010, SCOBA was disbanded and replaced by the Assembly of Bishops. The two organizations are different in many ways, but two are of particular note: (1) SCOBA included on the heads of the jurisdictions, while the Assembly includes every active, canonical bishop in America, and (2) the “Mother Churches” tolerated SCOBA, but the same Mother Churches actually created the Assembly. Along the same lines, SCOBA was a voluntary association, whereas the Assembly is an official ecclesiastical organization with a clear mandate from the Mother Churches. I realize that I didn’t really say much about the first SCOBA meeting, but that’s a story for another day.

March 13, 1965: On the very same day, both Albanian Bishop Theophan Noli and Greek Bishop Germanos Liamadis died. As far as I know, this was the only instance of two American Orthodox bishops dying on the same date.

March 18, 1981: OCA Metropolitan Ireney Bekish died. He had been the Metropolia/OCA primate from 1965 until his retirement in 1977 — so, the period when the OCA received its Tomos of Autocephaly and established its current identity — but I’ve never heard anyone talk of him as a major historical figure. Nobody talks about the era of Ireney, because it really was the era of Fr. Alexander Schmemann, who effectively led the OCA during Ireney’s entire episcopate.

March 16, 2008: ROCOR’s First Hierarch, the revered Metropolitan Laurus Skurla, died, shortly after helping to accomplish the reunion of ROCOR with the Moscow Patriarchate. Met Laurus had led ROCOR for seven years, and while he is most remembered for that tenure, the bulk of his hierarchical career was spent as abbot of Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville, New York.

March 13, 2011: Metropolitan Nicholas Smisko of the American Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Diocese (ACROD) died of cancer after more than a quarter-century as primate of ACROD. A year later, his position has yet to be filled. ACROD has established a memorial web page for Met Nicholas; click here to view it.

This week in American Orthodox history (March 12-18) is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

February 20, 1900: At the behest of Bishop Tikhon, the Russian Holy Synod officially changed the name of its North American missionary diocese, from “Diocese of the Aleutians and Alaska” to “Diocese of the Aleutians and North America.”

February 21, 1923: Serbian clergy held a meeting in Gary, Indiana, where they formally declared their independence from the Russian Church and their affiliation with the Serbian Church.

February 23, 1934: The Ukrainian Bishop Joseph Zuk died.

February 23, 1984: Archimandrite Serafim Surrency died in New York, at the age of 58. He was a historian, best known for his important work The Quest for Orthodox Church Unity in America (published in 1973). Until recently, Surrency’s book was the source for information on many American Orthodox historical subjects, including the American Orthodox Catholic Church, the Federation, and the early years of SCOBA. And, despite its limitations, the book remains an essential resource. One mystery which Fr. Oliver and I have been trying to solve for years is what became of Surrency’s personal files — we think they’re full of important material, but we don’t know what happened to them after he died.

February 24, 1904: The newly-consecrated Bishop Innocent Pustynsky arrived in America to take up his post as auxiliary bishop of Alaska. As Scott Kenworthy recounted in an interview with me last year, Bishop Tikhon had been trying for years to get an auxiliary to help govern his immense diocese. Eventually, Tikhon just went to Russia and refused to leave until he had a duly consecrated bishop in hand for his return voyage to America. Very soon after Bishop Innocent’s arrival, he and Tikhon consecrated Fr. Raphael Hawaweeny to the episcopate — the first Orthodox consecration in the New World.

February 24, 1931: The newly-elected Archbishop Athenagoras Spyrou arrived in America to take charge of the Greek Archdiocese.

February 25, 1896: The future hieromartyr Alexander Hotovitzky was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Nicholas Ziorov. Fr. Alexander was assigned as rector of the fledgling St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Church in New York.

February 26, 1895: Fr. Sebastian Dabovich celebrated the first Orthodox services in the newly established multiethnic chapel in Portland, Oregon. (To read more, check out my 2009 article on early Orthodoxy in Portland.)

This week in American Orthodox history (February 20-26) is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Archimandrite Theoclitos Triantafilides

Recently, I’ve been working with a group of researchers to document the life of Fr. Theoclitos Triantafilides, the remarkable priest of Galveston, Texas. Fr. Theoclitos was from Greece — his father had fought in the Greek Revolution — and as a young man, Fr. Theoclitos lived on Mount Athos and later studied in Russia. He tutored the children of King George of Greece, and later the children of Tsar Alexander III (including the future Tsar Nicholas II). He was apparently quite close to Nicholas II, and when, in 1895, the Orthodox of Galveston requested a priest, the Tsar sent to them his former tutor. Fr. Theoclitos was already in his mid-60s — quite old for his era — but he served in America for a full two decades before his death in 1916.

The American ministry of Fr. Theoclitos was utterly unique. He was, as I said, an ethnic Greek, but he served under the auspices of the Russian Mission in America. His parish was composed of Greeks, Serbs, Syrians, and even Copts, and today, that parish is a part of the Serbian Church. Fr. Theoclitos was also one of the first Orthodox priests in America (and perhaps the first) to actively proselytize Americans. His parish was truly pan-Orthodox, and he was uniquely capable of ministering to the needs of such a diverse flock.

Until recently, we knew a fair number of facts about Fr. Theoclitos, but nobody, as far as I know, had found any surviving sermons or writings. Just the other day, though, the lead researcher — Mimo Milosevich, from Galveston — discovered the full text of Fr. Theoclitos’ Christmas sermon, given on January 7, 1914 and published in the next day’s issue of the Galveston Daily News.

It’s a short sermon, but it reveals much about the character and vision of the great archimandrite. According to the newspaper, Fr. Theoclitos began by recounting the story of the star, the wise men, their gifts, and King Herod. Then, said the paper, “Father Theoclitos took off his spectacles and used them to gesticulate with, as he preached a fatherly sermon on charity and its relation to happiness.”

My children: Before Jesus came into our world the earth lacked the attributes of sympathetic understanding, which we find necessary to our happiness in this era. The Lord gave us his son, Jesus, to soften us, to give us understanding of human wants, to give us a sense of forgiveness, to teach us that to forgive is our duty, and to teach us charity.

My children, be charitable, open your hearts, for only in charity is there happiness. Make life brighter for your brother and your sister and the candle you light for them will make your light brighter.

God gave us Jesus, and Jesus gave us his all, even his life. We can do no more than emulate him, and in doing that we do all.

Think today of the poor whom he loved, lighten their burdens, even as he did. Open your hearts, oh, my children, even as did Jesus of Bethlehem.

My children, when he came among us he did not ask, “Of what nationality art thou? What is thy belief?” No! He came down among us and was one of us and he ministered to us. Open thy hearts, likewise, my children, and go among the poor and succor them; all the poor, for they are thy brothers and sisters, my children, and they are his people.

My children, many of you are not native to this land and it is well to treasure memories of thine own country, but think that this is a good land, and its people are good to thy people, and you all are his people. Learn to love, be honest, tolerant, forgiving, and charitable.

I pray you Merry Christmas, my children, and many, many years of happiness.

After the sermon, Fr. Theoclitos passed a plate to collect alms for the poor. “The plate was heaped high with bills and coins,” reported the Daily News, “the merry chink-clink-chink of the contributions accenting like tiny cymbals the smooth melody of a beautiful hymn.”

To learn more about Fr. Theoclitos, visit Mimo Milosevich’s website, and listen to his recent lecture.

Fr. Theoclitos of Galveston on Charity is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

http://sites.google.com/site/theoclitostriantafilides/

Indeed, I consulted Mimo when writing my paper on Greeks serving in the Russian Mission, which I presented at this past year’s SOCHA Symposium.  He was very helpful in pointing me to sources and information.

Mimo has dedicated himself to sharing the story of Archimandrite Theoklitos and it’s easy to see why.  In an age when missionaries for the Russian Mission were brought over for short stints and when missionaries of any Orthodox background typically moved about from parish to parish, Theoklitos is a sturdy rock.  He still went to the “hinterlands,” mostly in Texas, but also in Colorado and spent time in San Francisco reaching out to the Greek community there.  He (and others) were ultimately largely unsuccessful in that venture in San Fran, in that the Greeks formed their own parish eventually, but not entirely and his dedication was clear.  He served God and God’s people through the Russian Mission.  He was able to see his way through the difficult hectic life of a missionary priest at a time when not all could.  Indeed, at a time when many laity could not.  He accepted canonical order and he loved the people under his care.  Barring some unbeknownst event in the Galveston Daily News, he should be included amongst those mentioned as possible Greek saints in America.
All that said, here is a recent talk given by Mimo:

http://www.saintjonah.org/podcasts/stherman2011/galveston_talk.mp3

Please be aware that during the introductory part, before Mimo himself begins speaking, there is a lot of background noise.  If you can forebear, you’ll be glad because that quickly goes away and the talk is very nice.  We at SOCHA are very glad that Mimo and Fr. John Whiteford (the talk was at his parish) were willing to allow us to share this with our readers.

Archimandrite Theoklitos Triantafilides is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

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.

In Search Of… Fr. Philip Sredanovich is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Matthew Namee

Independence Day in Chicago, 1892 is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

In dissent, Justice Rehnquist pointed out the problems with this approach. For instance, what if a group of Holy Assembly members — but not enough to constitute a quorum for an official meeting — got together and voted to depose a bishop? Would the US courts have to defer to this decision, even though according to the Serbian Church’s own rules, the group of bishops wasn’t enough to constitute the Holy Assembly? According to Rehinquist, you can’t just toss out the church rules and “rubber-stamp” decisions simply because they’re on religious letterhead.

After analyzing that case, I learned that Bishop Dionisije had appealed to the Ecumenical Patriarch, who rejected the appeal and supported the decision of the Holy Assembly. But this raised another question — what if the Ecumenical Patriarch had done the opposite? What if he had, instead, reversed the Holy Assembly decision? And if the Holy Assembly rejected the EP’s reversal, leading to two competing groups in America: one pointing to the Holy Assembly decision, the other to the EP?

This is what I’ve taken to calling the Dionisije Conundrum. According to one interpretation, Canon 17 of Chalcedon grants to the Ecumenical Patriarch the right to hear appeals. Others claim that the EP has no such prerogative. In my hypothetical, to use the deference approach, the secular court would first have to decide what Canon 17 means. Think about what that would involve. The court would have to hear testimony from canonists and historians, weigh competing interpretations, and decide which interpretation would be enshrined as law by the court. All of that would deeply involve the court in a religious matter, but that involvement would be a necessary prerequisite for the court to use the deference approach. If you’re going to defer to the highest authority, you first have to figure out who actually is the highest authority.

There is no easy answer to the Dionisije Conundrum. The only alternative, for the court, would be to refuse to hear the case altogether — to tell the two sides that they’ll have to fight it out themselves, without involvement from the civil authorities. In other words, if the court rejects its role as arbiter, it must accept the likelihood that the parties will take matters into their own hands. It should be clear that this isn’t an acceptable approach. We can’t have rival factions of a church physically battling for control of property. That’s the whole point of having a judicial system — to decide between the parties in as unbiased a manner as possible, and for that decision to be final and enforceable.

I keep coming back to the same idea — that civil court involvement in religious matters, at least in Orthodoxy, is inevitable and unavoidable. The judgments of these courts will not always be in the best interests of Orthodoxy, and we certainly don’t want secular judges getting so involved in church affairs that they are effectively overruling legitimate church authorities. But for a secular court to determine whether a church authority acted legitimately — that is something we may need to accept. This determination will involve religious questions. It won’t fully take into account all the nuances of Orthodox ecclesiology. But at this stage, I just don’t see how it can be avoided.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

The Dionisije Conundrum and why deference doesn’t work is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

What none of the justices’ opinions mentioned is the fact that Bishop Dionisije actually did appeal the Holy Assembly decision to another judicial authority — the Patriarch of Constantinople. On June 6, 1964, the Chicago Tribune reported that Patriarch Athenagoras I responded with a letter rejecting the appeal and recognizing Dionisije’s defrocking as valid. The Ecumenical Patriarch also declared Dionisije’s consecration of Bishop Irinej Kovacevich to be “uncanonical and worthless.” (Just before this, SCOBA also rejected Dionisije, announcing that they would not recognize him or his jurisdiction.)

What exactly is the extent of the Ecumenical Patriarch’s right to hear appeals? The key texts are Canons 9 and 17 of Chalcedon. Here is the relevant portion of Canon 9: “And if a bishop or clergyman should have a difference with the metropolitan of the province, let him have recourse to the Exarch of the Diocese, or to the throne of the Imperial City of Constantinople, and there let it be tried.” Similarly, Canon 17 prescribes, “And if any one be wronged by his metropolitan, let the matter be decided by the exarch of the diocese or by the throne of Constantinople, as aforesaid.”

According to Fr. John Erickson in “Chalcedon Canon 28: Its Continuing Significance For Discussion of Primacy in the Church,” these canons provide two paths for a party seeking appeal: he may go to Constantinople, or to his own exarch. This appeal would have applied to the whole Eastern Roman Empire. Early evidence shows appeals to Constantinople from the diocese of the Orient, “whose ‘exarch’ would ultimately bear the title of patriarch of Antioch.” Erickson writes that in Constantinople, “thanks to the continual flow of visiting bishops from all parts of the empire, a convenient court of appeal, in the form of the synodos endemousa, could easily be convoked by the capital’s archbishop.”

Erickson goes on to note that Rome, too, had been given wide-ranging rights of appeal, in its case by the Council of Sardica. He distinguishes these appellate prerogatives from ordination rights, which were much more limited.

If you go to the Orthodox Wiki article on the prerogatives of Constantinople, you’ll see a different view. The authors of that article quote St. Nikodemos of the Holy Mountain (d. 1809), who argued that Constantinople’s right to hear appeals was limited to its own jurisdiction. According to St. Nikodemos, in this regard, the Ecumenical Patriarch was no different than any other exarch. I asked Fr. John Erickson about this, and he replied, “The system of the imperial church in the fifth century was significantly different from that of more recent times – and with ‘more recent times’ I must include St Nikodemos.”

I’m not a canonist, so why am I venturing into these (at times controversial) waters? My interest, here, is in the potential legal implications of a Constantinopolitan right of appeal. It’s possible, of course, that there are no legal implications. But, at this early stage of my research, I’m not sure, and I want to at least explore the possibility.

Let’s assume, for now, that such a right of appeal exists. This means that the decisions of a given Holy Assembly, Holy Synod, or Patriarch are not necessarily final. If the Ecumenical Patriarch could have heard Dionisije’s appeal and ruled in his favor, doesn’t that mean that the Serbian Holy Assembly is not the highest judicial authority in the Serbian Church (at least, from the standpoint of the American legal system)?

This raises another interesting question: if American courts can’t overrule the decisions of the highest judicial authority in a church, can they still overrule the decisions of lower judicial authorities? For instance: Assume that an American Orthodox jurisdiction has a local or eparchial synod, and that this synod has the authority to make certain decisions. Assume further that members of this jurisdiction can appeal the local/eparchial synod’s decisions to the Holy Synod of their Church. What, then, happens if church members appeal one of these local decisions, not to the Holy Synod, but to a secular US court? I think this wouldn’t matter, because a court applying deference to church decisions would probably tell the church members that they must make use of the appellate process in their own church, rather than bypassing that process and running to a secular court. But… well, I don’t know enough to say for sure.

The more pertienent issue, I think, has to do with Justice Rehnquist’s hypothetical scenario of a pseudo-Holy Assembly purporting to defrock a bishop, but not complying with its own quorum rules (and thus, by its own rules, not constituting an actual Holy Assembly). Justice Rehnquist uses this scenario to argue that secular courts must be able to adjudicate the case, but if a right of appeal to Constantinople exists, I it’s possible that this appeal might have to be made before US courts could get involved. Again, you probably can’t just bypass the church-appointed process in favor of civil litigation.

This seems to be consistent with the spirit of Canon 9. I quoted part of Canon 9 earlier, but here is the beginning of the canon: “If any Clergyman have a matter against another clergyman, he shall not forsake his bishop and run to secular courts; but let him first lay open the matter before his own Bishop, or let the matter be submitted to any person whom each of the parties may, with the Bishop’s consent, select. And if any one shall contravene these decrees, let him be subjected to canonical penalties…”

A clergyman can’t first run to the secular courts, but he could make use of those courts if the church courts gave him an unsatisfactory judgment. As a practical matter, according to Erickson, this wouldn’t have been a commonly-used option in the Eastern Roman Empire (unless the clergyman in question was particularly well-connected). In any case, the idea seems to be that we should try to resolve matters internally, but if that fails, we could then go to a secular judge. Of course, these canons were composed in a totally different era in church history, when the Church and the Roman state were becoming increasingly intertwined, and when Constantinople was (to many) the center of the world. Does the right of appeal to the Ecumenical Patriarch really apply today, when Constantinople is no longer a cosmopolitan center for Orthodoxy and the Ecumenical Patriarchate is oppressed by the Turkish government? I don’t know.

But if the right to appeal does exist, what are its implications on American courts? I’d be very interested to hear what the lawyers reading this think.

Anyway, in the case of Bishop Dionisije, he did appeal to Constantinople, and his appeal was denied. The Ecumenical Patriarch in essence affirmed the decision of the Serbian Holy Assembly, and SCOBA followed suit. Bishop Dionisije was thus isolated from much of mainstream Orthodoxy, more than a decade before the Supreme Court heard his case.

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Ecumenical Patriarch denied appeal of Bishop Dionisije is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

First of all, Justice Rehnquist points out that the jurisdiction of the Illinois courts was actually invoked by the Serbian Church representatives themselves, who sought an injunction to establish their control over church property. With its jurisdiction invoked, the Illinois court “was entitled to ask if the real Bishop of the American-Canadian Diocese would please stand up.” The inquiry that followed was, says Justice Rehnquist, no different than the inquiry a court would make to resolve a dispute in any voluntary association — religious or otherwise. The courts were faced with two parties claiming to be the rightful church authority, and both sides had actually asked the courts to decide between them.

What else, says Rehnquist, were the courts supposed to do? If they can’t pick one side over the other, the parties will have to resort to “brute force” to resolve their claims. The majority says that civil courts must accept the decisions of church tribunals — but, as Justice Rehnquist points out, even this rule requires civil courts to determine just what those decisions are. And if there’s conflicting evidence, or conflicting interpretations of church decisions and rules, then the courts are back in the position of choosing one side over the other.

Next, Justice Rehnquist presents a very good (and very realistic) hypothetical scenario. Suppose, for the sake of argument, that the Holy Assembly has 100 members, and that its rules for defrocking a bishop require a majority vote at a Holy Assembly meeting at which a quorum is present. Further, suppose that the Holy Assembly’s rules define a quorum as no fewer than 40 bishops. Now, what happens if 30 bishops of the Holy Assembly meet, and 16 of them vote to defrock a bishop? Is their decision binding on civil courts in the United States? Justice Rehnquist argues, “If the civil courts are to be bound by any sheet of parchment bearing the ecclesiastical seal and purporting to be a decree of a church court, they can easily be converted into handmaidens of arbitrary lawlessness.”

Justice Rehnquist then gets into some of the Court’s prior decisions. He points out that Watson v. Jones (which I discussed in a previous article) doesn’t have anything to do with the First Amendment and freedom of religion. In fact, the Court in that case was merely applying the same rules that would apply to “private intraorganizational disputes” (Rehnquist’s term). The Watson court explicitly equated religious bodies with other private organizations.

In Gonzalez v. Archbishop, Justice Brandeis set forth the “fraud, collusion, or arbitrariness” exception to deference to church decisions. (I discussed this in my article on the Curtis paper on Kedroff.) Here, too, a parallel is made between churches and “clubs and civil associations.” According to Rehnquist, the key factor in Gonzalez is the fact that church members (like club members) freely submitted to church judgments. Once again, the First Amendment is not really crucial — the churches are deferred to not because they are religious, but because they are private associations.

In Justice Rehnquist’s view, Kedroff was the first time the Supreme Court clearly applied the First Amendment in a church property dispute. After Kedroff, the Supreme Court revisted the issue in Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church (1969). In this case, Georgia common law predicated church property rights on an adherence to the church’s original doctrine. The Supreme Court held that the departure-from-doctrine standard was “a creation of state, not church, law” and struck it down.

The next year, in Md. & Va. Church v. Sharpsburg Church, a denomination tried to retain control of the properties of two local parishes that wanted to leave the denomination. The state courts ruled in favor of the local parshes, basing their decision in part on the denomination’s own constitution. The Supreme Court rejected the denomination’s argument that this violated the First Amendment.

From these cases, says Justice Rehnquist, we can derive the following rule: “[T]he government may not displace the free choices of its citizens by placing its weight behind a particular religious belief, tenet, or sect.” This, Rehnquist argues, is what New York tried to do in Kedroff, and it’s why (according to Rehnquist) the Supreme Court made the right decision in that case. But, in the present case, the Illinois Supreme Court never “placed its thumb on the scale” in favor of Bishop Dionisije. In reality, the Illinois court simply applied “neutral principles of law” — a concept which, in a few years, would receive Supreme Court endorsement and is now used by many courts as an alternative to the “deference” approach used by the majority in this case.

Justice Rehnquist argues that “blind deference” is neither logical nor constitutional. “To make available the coercive powers of civil courts to rubber-stamp ecclesiastical decisions” would amount to an Establishment Clause violation. While acknowledging that courts should avoid religious disputes as much as possible, “they obviously cannot avoid all such adjudications.” Courts must always “remain neutral on matters of religious doctrine,” and the Illinois Supreme Court did just that. Thus, in Rehnquist’s view, the Illinois decision was constitutional and should not have been overturned by the US Supreme Court.

Justice Rehnquist makes some compelling arguments. To his hypothetical about a pseudo-Assembly meeting, we could add many others. What if, as has happened in the past, two factions claim to be the legitimate Holy Synod? What if a Holy Synod issues contradictory decisions, or there is a dispute about whether a Holy Synod decision was, in fact, made by the Holy Synod (and not somehow falsified in its transmission)? What if the Holy Synod, writing in a foreign language, uses words which could have multiple interpretations — whose interpretation do we believe? What if the individual members of the Holy Synod themselves disagree about what the decision meant?

And what if a Church grants, not some measure of self-administration, but formal autonomy or autocephaly to its American jurisdiction? What happens if that Mother Church tries, in the future, to rescind its grant of autonomy or autocephaly and re-take control? A civil court would have to determine who the legitimate higher church authority was. Certainly, the court couldn’t just take for granted which group was the rightful authority.

In all these cases, and more, courts cannot simply “rubber-stamp” a purported ecclesiastical decision. As a practical matter, there are times when courts can’t avoid making a determination about who is legitimate and who is not, who has a rightful claim and who does not. And, Rehnquist argues, the best approach for courts in those situations is to apply “neutral principles of law.” About which, more to come…

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Serbian Diocese v. Milivojevich, Part 2: Justice Rehnquist’s Dissenting Opinion is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Justice William Brennan authored the majority opinion in Serbian Diocese v. Milivojevich

We’ve introduced the first major Supreme Court case dealing with Orthodoxy, Kedroff v. St. Nicholas Cathedral (1952). Today, we’ll begin an analysis of the other landmark case, Serbian Eastern Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich (1976). Justice Brennan’s majority opinion includes a lengthy historical background on the case, and I won’t go into all the details here; interested readers can review the full opinion for themselves. (Click here to read the opinion, and click here to listen to the oral arguments.) What follows are the basics.

Prior to 1921, the Serbian Orthodox in America were affiliated, to varying degrees, with the Russian Orthodox Church. By the 1910s, the affiliation was pretty weak, and in 1921 a separate Serbian diocese was founded for America, under the jurisdiction of the Serbian Church. In 1927, a national diocesan assembly adopted a constitution, which was modified and then approved by the Serbian Church.

The diocesan constitution makes it clear that the diocese is “ecclesiastically-judicially” an “organic part of the Serbian Patriarchate,” and subject to all the rules and regulations of the Serbian Church. Because of its “geographical location,” the diocese “enjoys full administrative freedom.” The word “autonomous” isn’t used, but the diocese was clearly given a lot of independence. It was the only diocese in the Serbian Church to have its own constitution.

In 1939, the Holy Assembly of the Serbian Church (composed of all the diocesan bishops of the Church) elected Bishop Dionisije to be the new head of the American-Canadian Diocese. Eventually, the diocese grew to the point that it requested elevation to the status of Metropolia, with three auxiliary bishops appointed to operate under Bishop Dionisije. Diocesan representatives made a formal request before the Serbian Holy Synod in 1962, and the Synod responded by appointing a delegation to visit America and study the proposals. The delegation was also tasked with confronting Bishop Dionisije about numerous complaints it had received about him over the years.

After this visit, the Holy Assembly (all the bishops) recommended that the Holy Synod (the executive committee, essentially) institute disciplinary proceedings against Bishop Dionisije. The Holy Synod immediately suspended Dionisije pending the investigation, and appointed Archimandrite (future Bishop) Firmilian as temporary administrator of the diocese.

After this, the Holy Assembly responded to the diocesan request for elevation to Metropolia status with auxiliary bishops. But rather than grant the request, the Holy Assembly instead divided the American-Canadian Diocese into three separate dioceses. Dionisije — who was suspended at the time — was appointed Bishop of the Middle Western Diocese.

Dionisije rejected the Holy Assembly’s reorganization of the diocese, claiming that it violated the diocese’s autonomy guaranteed by its constitution. The bishop also refused to accept his suspension, arguing that it didn’t comply with the constitution and laws of the Serbian Church. Dionisije told the temporary administrator, Fr. Firmilian, that he no longer recognized the decisions of the Holy Assembly and Holy Synod, declaring both bodies to be “communistic.”

Things get kind of complicated from this point. The Holy Synod appointed a commission of bishops to meet with Dionisije, who continued to reject the Holy Assembly’s decisions and demanded that he be given all accusations against him in writing. The commission declined, pointing out that Dionisije’s defiance of the Holy Assembly was wrongful conduct in and of itself. On June 27, 1963, the Holy Assembly voted to remove Dionisije as bishop, based solely on his acts of defiance following his suspension and on his violation of the oath he took upon becoming a bishop. In February 1964, the Synod referred the case to the Holy Assembly, which tried Dionisije and unanimously found him “guilty of all charges and divested him of his episcopal and monastic ranks.”

Even before this defrocking, though, Dionisije had taken his case to the US courts. In July 1963, he sued to prevent the temporary administrators from interfering with diocesan assets. The trial court ruled in favor of Dionisije, but the appellate court reversed the decision and ordered a new trial. After the new trial, the trial court made the following decisions:

1. The defrocking of Bishop Dionisije was legitimate.
2. The diocesan property was held in trust for all members of the diocese.
3. The division of the American-Canadian Diocese into three dioceses was “improper and beyond the power of the Mother Church.”
4. Archimandrite Firmilian was the valid administrator of the whole diocese.

Next, the case went to the Supreme Court of Illinois, which affirmed most of the appellate court’s decisions, but reversed the trial court’s conclusion that Dionisije’s defrocking was legitimate. According to the Illinois Supreme Court, the Serbian Church had not followed its own constitution and penal code when it defrocked Dionisije. One key argument: Dionisije had been properly suspended, but he hadn’t been validly tried within one year of his indictment — a violation of church rules. As Justice Brennan puts it, “Thus, the court purported in effect to reinstate Dionisije as Diocesan Bishop.”

According to Justice Brennan and the majority, this is totally unacceptable — the Illinois Supreme Court can’t substitute its own interpretation of church rules for the judgment of the Holy Assembly. ”For where resolution of the disputes cannot be made without extensive inquiry by civil courts into religious law and polity,” writes Brennan, the civil courts are obliged to accept the decisions of church authorities “as binding on them.”

Basically, the idea is that it is just way too dangerous for civil courts to get in the middle of a religious dispute. They must always defer to the highest ecclesiastical authorities — period. “If the civil courts are to inquire into all these matters, the whole subject of the doctrinal theology, the usages and customs, the written laws, and fundamental organization of every religious denomination may, and must, be examined into with minuteness and care, for they would become, in almost every case, the criteria by which the validity of the ecclesiastical decree would be determined in the civil court.” This logic is particularly convincing in the case of Orthodoxy: rather than a single legal code or constitution, we have diverse canons, local traditions, internal church documents, Patristic counsels, Scriptural interpretations, and any number of other factors to consider — and that’s even before you get to the tricky concept of oikonomia.

In a footnote, Brennan quotes from Watson v. Jones: “It is not to be supposed that the judges of the civil courts can be as competent in the ecclesiastical law and religious faith of all these bodies as the ablest men in each are in reference to their own.” This is a compelling argument, even apart from any religious freedom concerns. Who better can deterimine the right outcome in a religious dispute — a secular court unfamiliar with church rules and traditions, or the church authorities who are well-versed in such matters?

Part of the problem in this case is that the Illinois courts abused the authority they (arguably) may have had. They basically decided the whole case of Dionisije’s defrocking on a technical point — the expiration of a one-year deadline for a church trial. The Illinois courts did this, says Justice Brennan, “under the guise of ‘minimal’ review under the umbrella of ‘arbitrariness’”. Brennan seems to recognize that, just because the absolute letter of church law wasn’t followed, secular courts can’t, on that basis, overturn church decisions. We must allow church authorities more flexibility than we would, say, the federal government.

The majority’s holding is that the US Constitution permits hierarchical churches to establish their own governing rules and to adjudicate their own disputes. When churches do this, their decisions are binding on civil courts.

Justice White concurred in the judgment, pointing out that secular courts can decide (1) whether the Serbian Church is hierarchical, and (2) whether the diocese is part of the Serbian Church. The mere fact that “church authorities may render their opinion” on those questions “does not foreclose the courts from coming to their independent judgment. But once both questions are answered in the affirmative — as they were in this case — Justice White agrees that church decisions are binding on civil courts.

Next, we’ll discuss the dissenting opinion of Justice Rehnquist (future Chief Justice of the Supreme Court).

Oh, one other thing — right this moment, I’m listening to the oral arguments (which you can hear via the link at the top of this article). The attorney arguing against judicial intervention in church decisions said that when the church authority’s act is one of fraud or collusion — if they “don’t actually exercise their judicial function” under church rules — then civil courts can review the church decision. The attorney doesn’t actually think that there is a practical case in which the fraud/collusion exception would apply (frankly, he thinks it’s totally improbable), but… well, he must not be familiar with church history, because I can think of plenty of instances in which church bodies engaged in fraud or collusion. Anyway, more to come…

This article was written by Matthew Namee.

Serbian Diocese v. Milivojevich, Part 1: Justice Brennan’s majority opinion is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

I should note that I don’t know for sure whether someone from Montenegro should be classified as Serbian. Most references I’ve found treat Montenegrins as a subset of Serbs, rather than a distinct group. More importantly, I think (but again, I’m not certain) that in 1875, a priest from Montenegro would have had no quarrel with being called a Serb. The Serbs and Montenegrins in America seem to have totally intermingled. If any of our readers want to correct me on this, please, by all means, do so.

Anyway, the visit of Matanovich is verified by Dabovich himself in his 1897 history of Orthodoxy in California (published in the Vestnik in April 1898):

In 1875 a priest from Montenegro, Father Sabbas Matanovich, arrived in San Francisco. He was received into the Bishop’s house and served two or three Liturgies, but as he was not assigned a position, he went back home after several months. At the present time the honorable Father Matanovich is an archpriest in Cetinje.

I haven’t been able to find any other references to Matanovich’s visit, and I suspect that the 1985 Sacred Places in San Francisco reference used the Dabovich article as its source. It would be interesting to know what other places (if any) Matanovich visited in America. Did he serve liturgies in other cities besides San Francisco? If anyone else turns up anything, please let me know.

This article was written by Matthew Namee. He can be reached at mfnamee [at] gmail [dot] com.

Fr. Sava Matanovich: the first Serbian Orthodox priest in America is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

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.

Photos of the oldest Orthodox church in Texas is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

This photo shows the Holy Trinity bell tower still under construction.

Here, it's obviously winter, and the bell tower is complete. It looks like a young boy is enjoying the snow.

In this interior shot, a priest -- probably St. John Kochurov -- is preaching from the pulpit. A choir is at right.

A man kneels before an icon of St. Nicholas, and a cluster of ladies in black hats look on. Who is the man standing next to the banner? A Russian official of some sort?

Fr. Sebastian Dabovich, head of the newly-created Serbian Mission, stands inside Holy Trinity Cathedral.

– Matthew Namee

1905 photos from Holy Trinity Cathedral in Chicago is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

St. Varnava Nastic

The Northwest Indiana Times recently published an article on St. Varnava Nastic, who was born in Gary, Indiana in 1914. St. Varnava was the first person baptized in St. Sava Orthodox Church, which was originally in Gary and is now located in Merrillville. The Nastic family returned to Yugoslavia when St. Varnava was nine years old. He went on to become a bishop in the Serbian Church, suffered under the communists, and died under suspicious circumstances in 1964. He was glorified in 2005.

Anyway, there’s more information in the article, which you can read by clicking here. Thanks to Bishop Savas of Troas for the link.

An Orthodox saint from Gary, Indiana is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Fr. Sebastian Dabovich

Editor’s note: The following lecture was given by Fr. Sebastian Dabovich on August 15, 1897 to the parish school St. Sergius in San Francisco, in the presence of Bishop Nicholas Ziorov. The occasion was the 100th anniversary of the birth of St. Innocent Veniaminov, the great Alaskan missionary and later Metropolitan of Moscow. The text was originally printed in Dabovich’s 1898 book The Lives of the Saints (1898).

As I stand here in the midst of this gathering, I picture in my mind another company, greater than this, filling the spacious halls of a more magnificent structure in the capital city of the Russian Empire — Matushka Moskva (dear mother Moscow). My imagination reaches still farther out, and I behold another throng of busy citizens, together with young Seminarians and prayerfully inclined Christians, away off in Siberia, in the city of Irkoutsk. Methinks I hear them speak the very name of him whom they have come to honor, Innocentius. My whole being thrills with a veneration at the sound of that name. My heart is filled with gladness when I think of the pure joy and reasonable pride of the country folk in rural Anginskoe of the Province of Irkoutsk — the native home of the Most Reverend Metropolitan Innocent.

St. Innocent as a young bishop

Yet all these multitudes and territorial distance are but a part of the whole, celebrating a great event. Look you, the tribes of Kamchatka with the Yakout race sing of him, while the Aleut and the Alaskan Indians gratefully commemorate their teacher on this day — the one hundredth anniversary of his birth. While the great Orthodox Missionary Society in Russia, which to-day upholds our prosperous Church in Japan and in other parts of the world, is paying honor to the sacred memory of its founder, we too bless this one hundredth birthday of our first Bishop in America — the same Innocentius, Metropolitan of Moscow.

This great Missionary, who passed away from this visible world eighteen years ago, and rests with his remains in the holy Troitse Sergiev Monastery, still dwells in the loving hearts of the different peoples of his spiritual charge. I understand and feel the special privilege which I enjoy to-night, and for which I most heartily thank thee, Gracious Bishop and Most Reverend Father in God. Deeply feeling the love of our Archpastors, I become bold and venture to look into the unseen, where I behold the spiritual eyes of our first hard-working Missionary, with kindly light beaming upon this gathering and approving of the feeble words of your son (to the Bishop), and your brother (to the Clergy), and your pastor (to the Congregation) — one of the first born of the young American Orthodox Church!

John Veniaminov, indeed, was a great man. As one of the first priests in Alaska, he labored for fifteen long years in several parts of that vast region, making his home, principally, first in Ounalashka and then in Sitkha. In those pioneer days of Alaska an Aleutian badairka or small canoe made of the skin of a walrus was the only means he had for his constant locomotion, and not seldom for his voyages of a longer course. It often happened that, in a mean, wet climate, his only comfort for whole months would be found in an earthen dug-out. I will not detain you by repeating; you will soon hear, and also read for yourselves, of his life, and then you will know how in the Providence of God the Reverend Father John became to be known by the name of Innocent, and how he returned to Alaska — as the first bishop there, and likewise our first bishop in America! Brief accounts of his life are now printed in English, as well as in Russian and other languages, and may be had for nothing, comparatively.

There are several people in this city who have personally seen him, and remember well the wholesome instructions of their gentle pastor — Bishop Innocent, later the Metropolitan of Moscow. Besides the elder brethren and the elder sisters among you, some of the people mentioned are also fathers in their community. Our present Bishop and beloved Father in God was at one time under the spiritual rule of the Most Reverend Innocentius, and that was during his student life in the Academy of Moscow, when Innocent was the Bishop of the Church of God in that Province.

I have strong reasons for maintaining my assertion that this Missionary Priest, John Veniaminov, also landed on our shores here, and — how I love to dwell on the thought! — he bestowed God’s blessing upon our beautiful California. It was in the fall of 1838 that this God-fearing worker left Sitkha in a sailing vessel — to voyage down the whole length of the great Pacific, and make his way around Cape Horn to Europe and St. Petersburg. At that time the government of Alaska, following the wise counsel of Baranov (another great man), obtained and held land in California, where it had a flourishing colony in the part now known as Sonoma county. Baranov was well aware of the worth of Alaska, but he needed California as a store- house of grain for the Great North with its many resources and grand coast. The globe-circumnavigating vessels, coming from the north, certainly must have anchored in California waters, in order to take on supplies and make a final preparation before setting sail to round the Cape for Europe. And so it is possible that our dear Missionary may have even offered the Divine Liturgy in the chapel at Fort Ross, and also baptized the Indians in Russian River. I do not attempt to speculate on the idea that our apostle trod the sands where now our splendid city of San Francisco is built. For memory’s sake I simply ask: Is there not a history attached to Russian Hill in San Francisco?

A most remarkable man was this Russian priest from Siberia. He was a mechanic, navigator, school-teacher, administrator, and a preacher of the Gospel. A poor orphaned boy, too young to earn his own bread, must depend upon the charity of poor relatives and even strangers for his very existence. From a little town in the heart of Siberia he finds his way into the city of Irkoutsk, where he becomes a pastor, beloved by his devoted people. Then he goes, as he thought, to give up himself with his entire strength and knowledge to the simple Aleuts, who sat in darkness in the distant islands of the ocean. It was he, as he afterwards sat in the councils of the Most Holy Governing Synod of our Church, who moved the proposition that the Orthodox Bishop in America should transfer his residence from Sitkha to San Francisco.

God selected the priest, John Veniaminov, to bear the light of Orthodox Christianity from the East to the West, from Asia to America! And nobly did the Great Russian Church prove herself worthy of the apostolic power of rightly dividing the Word of Truth by carrying out the work in all its detail. She faithfully keeps the apostles’ will as expressed in these words: Let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially they who labor in the word and teaching; she elevates her Missionary to a high post. In his new office as an archpastor, the M. Rev. Innocent created two more dioceses in Eastern Siberia, besides the church of Alaska. He was ever sailing over the ocean, or driving in reindeer and dog sledges over a country thousands of miles in extent, everywhere baptizing the natives, for whom he has introduced the use of letters, and translated the Gospel into their native tongues.

It has been, and still is, the habit of some who are unfriendly to the Orthodox Church to speak of her as a dead church. Such a daring charge could be uttered for three reasons, and they are these: Such persons are either determined upon a certain course of public policy, with no respect for the truth, or they are not inclined to think well of Eastern Christians, whom it would be inconvenient to recognize as brethren while enjoying personal comfort through social connections; but if it be not that, it is then because of a light head and total ignorance of the facts in universal history. In modern times the Russian Church has proved, in more instances than one, that she is alive with the missionary spirit. May we condemn the Slavonic Orthodox Church in the Balkan States, and in Austria, simply because she is struggling for her existence in spite of the aggressive intrusion on her own ground of the brethren of the Society of Jesus? Nor is the influx of American Sectarian preachers in Arabia and in Palestine, a reason which could justify any one in saying that the Church of Christ in those parts is dead! In these days we know something of what enslavement to the Turk involves. And what, in common justice, to say nothing of Christian charity, have we a right to expect from those groaning under such bondage? Have we the conscience to ask that they should make converts, when now for five hundred years they have been struggling, as in a bloody sweat, to keep Christianity alive under Moslem tyranny? And, in that time, how many martyrs of every age and condition have shed a halo around the Oriental Church? Not less than a hundred martyrs of these later days are commemorated in the services of the Church, and countless are the unnamed ones, who have suffered for the faith, in these five hundred years of slavery. In 1821, Gregory, Patriarch of Constantinople, was hung at the door of his cathedral, on Easter Day. Many other prelates and prominent ecclesiastics were put to death in Adrianople, Cyprus, the Ionian Islands, in Anatolia and Mount Athos. And yet, none apostatized from the faith of Christ. Are not such martyrdoms the best way of making converts? It was thus that, in the first three (and more) centuries of our era, the Church was founded in those lands by the apostles and their immediate successors. How can it be said that, among people who could so die for the faith, there was no real spiritual life ? Has not the Greek Church shown by her deeds the steadfastness of her faith?

But it is not our purpose to lecture on history. Nor is it that out of mere curiosity we are here. Let us now look to the duty we have before us this hour. We are gathered here to show our gratitude to our benefactor, and also in a becoming way to honor the memory of our dear Archpastor, Metropolitan Innocentius. Remembering him who has had the rule over us and our fathers — the Christians of this Diocese; remembering him who had spoken unto us the Word of God, let us now, according to the Divine commandment, consider his end, so that we may be able the better to follow the example of strong faith, which he gave us throughout his whole life. Although he was much weakened in his last days by old age and sickness, yet the venerable prelate retained his mind clear up to the last, and truly his course on earth was appropriately crowned with a bright Christian end. Tell them, he said, as he was about to sleep, that no eulogies be pronounced at my funeral, they only contain praise. Let them rather preach a sermon, it may be instructive; and here is the text for it: The ways of man are ordered by the Lord.

Fr. Sebastian Dabovich on St. Innocent of Alaska is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Fr. Demetrios Petrides of Atlanta was one of the leading Greek priests active in 1916.

Before I get started, I wanted to let you all know that I do plan to finish my series on St. Raphael and the Syrian controversies of 1905. However, I’ve got several other irons in the fire, so I’m going to take a little time off of that project to present some other research. But don’t worry; we’ll get back to it.

Anyway, recently, I took another look at the 1916 Census of Religious Bodies, conducted by the US Census Bureau. The census includes data on numerous aspects of American Orthodox church life in the mid-teens, including clergy salaries. Of the seven Orthodox groups reported in the census, six — all but the Syrians — provided data on clergy pay. Of those six bodies, three — the Albanians, Bulgarians, and Romanians — provided salary information on just two priests apiece:

• Albanian priests averaged $780/year, or $15,187 in 2009 currency.
• Bulgarian priests averaged $850/$16,549.
• Romanian priests averaged $570/$11,098.

Obviously, the sample sizes are small, but it’s clear that none of these priests were making much money. Here is the data for the larger groups:

• 93 Greek priests reported an average of $913/year, or $17,776 in 2009 currency.
• 149 Russian priests reported $762/$14,836.
• 11 Serbian priests reported $1050/$20,443.

The average salary for all American Orthodox priests in 1916 was $828, equivalent to just $16,117 in modern terms. (Inflation data courtesy of www.westegg.com/inflation.) I should emphasize that these numbers are based only on the clergy who reported their salaries to the Census Bureau; other priests did not report, including, as I said, all of the Syrian clergy.

Obviously, the 1916 salaries are startlingly low. Even the Serbs — the highest-paid group — were scraping by by modern standards. However, things were quite a bit different in 1916 than they are today. Many parishes had rectories or parsonages, so a lot of these priests didn’t have to pay for their housing. Some of our biggest expenses — health care, transportation, various forms of insurance — would have been minimal 94 years ago. And while I don’t have any hard data to support this, it’s my impression that a higher proportion of clergy were unmarried in 1916 than in 2010.

In addition to all those facts, there is a high probability that the reported salaries don’t include honoraria for weddings, baptisms, funerals, house blessings, and the like. In other words, simply taking the 1916 base salaries, plugging them into a calculator, and figuring out their modern equivalent, is not really an accurate way to determine how well American Orthodox clergy were actually compensated in 1916.

Beyond the seemingly low numbers overall, I was struck by the fact that the Russian clergy reported significantly lower salaries than their Greek and Serbian counterparts. The Russian Church in America was substantially subsidized by the Russian government in 1916, whereas the Greek and Serbian parishes primarily relied on local funding. Nevertheless, the Russian clergy were among the lowest-paid in America.

[This article was written by Matthew Namee.]

Clergy salaries in 1916 is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Bishop Maxim (Vasiljevic)

Recently a historic event took place in New York: A pan-Orthodox Assembly of the Fullness of God’s Church on the North American continent, represented by the Hierarchs of the local Orthodox dioceses. The most important goal of this body is to witness Orthodox unity in a “new world,” and to secure a more effective organization of mission, witness, and cooperation of the local Orthodox Churches in the diaspora, faithful to the soteriological needs of contemporary man and society.

In accordance with the decision of the Fourth Pre-conciliar pan-Orthodox conference held June 6-12, 2009 in the Orthodox center of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Chambésy, Switzerland, and at the invitation of Archbishop Demetrios of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, the first Assembly of canonical Orthodox Hierarchs of North and Central America was held in New York May 26-28, 2010. Of sixty-six hierarchs of this region, fifty-five were present at this historic gathering.

It needs to be said that the entire gathering was held in a spirit and atmosphere of brotherly love, in the joy of the Pentecost Feast Day: Greeks, Serbs, Romanians, Bulgarians, Russians, Syrians, Arabs, Americans, and Latin Americans all together spoke with one mouth and one heart demonstrating that the ontological foundation of the unity of the Church is inconceivable without multiplicity. Discussions about various questions and problems of the “diaspora” went on in a spirit of understanding, while Archbishop Demetrios wisely and capably led the gathering. His Eminence Archbishop Demetrios presided over this Episcopal Assembly, having Metropolitan Philip (Antiochian Orthodox Church) and Russian Archbishop Justinian (Moscow Patriarchate) as co-chairs. Bishop Basil of Wichita (Antiochian self-ruling Archdiocese) was elected secretary. His Eminence Metropolitan Christopher of Libertyville/Chicago and His Grace Bishop Maxim of the Western American diocese represented the Serbian Orthodox Church.

One of the topics that was repeated many times as a refrain during this three-day Assembly was the will and desire of all participants “for the swift healing of all canonical anomalies which resulted from historical circumstances and pastoral necessity.” Above all, soteriology is of primary importance for this Assembly in its reflections on God, man, the Church, and the world today, and our unity must be visible, Eucharistic, and structured in accordance with the one-many life that the Eucharist imparts to the Church from its source in God Himself.

Along with this the participants emphatically called to mind the contributions of the Primates and representatives of the Orthodox autocephalous Churches gathered at the Ecumenical Patriarchate from October 10 to 12, 2008, to confirm their “unswerving position and obligation to safeguard the unity of the Orthodox Church” (Chambésy Rules of Operation, Article 5.1a). A slightly different view was presented by one of the hierarchs, who questioned the necessity of jurisdictional connections with autocephalous Churches which are, as he stated, over seven thousand miles away and do not have any ties with the “new world.” This was somewhat of an isolated opinion. If there was an opinion that it is only necessary to follow the Primates of the autocephalous churches, or so called “Mother Churches,” in spirit rather than in letter, Archbishop Demetrios gave a witty answer: “This would test the distinct American sentiment for independence and democracy.” Through this exchange of opinions the participants came to the conclusion that the relatively “young” American Orthodoxy has a need for guidance and help from the “mother Churches” of the Old World, Middle East, Bosporus, and Balkans. There is the need for both dependence and a certain independence in making decisions.

During this gathering, and in conformity with the rules for regional Episcopal Assemblies established during the Fourth Pan-Orthodox pre-conciliar conference, the following were accomplished: A registry of canonical bishops (Article 6.1); a committee to decide the canonical status of local communities in a region which cannot be connected with (have no reference to) any of the Holy autocephalous Churches (Article 6.2); a registry of canonical clergy (Article 6.3); committees that will take on the work of the Assembly in addressing liturgical, pastoral, financial, educational, ecumenical, and legal questions (Articles 11 and 12); a committee to plan the organization of the Orthodox in this region on a canonical basis (Article 5.1). In addition to the above, it was agreed that the Assembly establish and maintain a directory of all canonical congregations in our region. This is in conformity with the basic Orthodox ecclesiological principle: it is primarily the bishop who presides at the Eucharist in his local church, so the principal manifestation of the Church is the gathering of the whole community around the bishop and his presbyters and deacons for the Liturgy.

A decision was also reached regarding the question of SCOBA. This Episcopal Assembly understands itself as the heir of the Standing Conference of Canonical Orthodox Bishops in the Americas (SCOBA), and it has taken over all SCOBA agencies, dialogues, and other services. Interestingly, the question of the OCA (the Orthodox Church in America, formerly the Russian Metropolia) was not discussed, but it has become clear that its “autocephaly” (given by a unilateral decree of the Moscow Patriarchate in 1970) is understood only as autonomy. Even though the OCA’s autocephaly is not recognized by most Orthodox local Churches (including the Serbian Patriarchate), the fact is that her hierarchs at the Assembly enjoyed the same rights and honor as others. The order of seating at the Assembly followed the Diptychs (the established order of precedence of the ancient and newer Patriarchates and autocephalous Churches), so that the bishops of the OCA came after the Serbian and Romanian delegations (a representative of Georgian church was not present at this gathering).

Upon formal petition of the Hierarchs who have jurisdiction in Canada, the Assembly will send to the Ecumenical Patriarchate, in accordance with the rules of procedure (Article 13), a petition that the current region of North and Central America be divided into two separate regions, of the United States and of Canada. In addition, upon petition of the Hierarchs who have jurisdiction in Mexico and Central America, the Assembly will similarly recommend that Mexico and Central America join the regional Assembly for South America. For example, Serbian Bishop Mitrophan, who has jurisdiction in both those regions, would become a member of both those Episcopal Assemblies. Canadian Bishop Georgije, on the other hand, will be a member of the Canadian Episcopal Assembly, given that he has no jurisdiction outside Canada.

In open discussions about the demands of evangelization and enculturation, one could hear opinions on various questions of importance for Orthodoxy: questions of liturgical practice, pastoral challenges, financial aspects, the future of educational schools and programs, ecumenical dialogues, as well as some other legal issues. In this context, it was also clearly understood that contemporary Orthodoxy must be prepared to open up its theological frontiers to other sciences and cultural concerns and the challenges coming from the non-theological world.

It was clearly established that the Episcopal Assembly does not have jurisdictional power; rather it is of a consultative character, although in some questions it naturally has authority (as in establishing and maintaining the previously mentioned registries of canonical bishops, clergy, and parishes).

His Eminence Iakovos, Greek Metropolitan of Chicago, strongly emphasized that we Orthodox have a gift of dogmatic and liturgical unity that we already share, and that incidental differences (customs, liturgical practices, language, and similar things) need to be secondary. The Eucharist, understood in the light of the Trinitarian mystery, is the criterion for the functioning of the life of the Orthodox Church as a whole and the institutional elements should be nothing but a visible reflection of the reality of the mystery. The fact that this assembly-conference, as every church assembly from apostolic times to this day, can have its own controversial points need not discourage us; on the contrary, it should inspire participation and motivation. The use of the English language in services was also discussed, especially focused on the variations in usage of the personal pronoun when directly referring to God.

The question of the boundaries and limits of participation in theological dialogue with heterodox and non-Christians was raised, and in the discussion which followed the answer was crystallized: the Orthodox Church, not being afraid of dialogue because it has Truth, enters into such discussions with the deepest conviction that faithfulness to her Orthodox Tradition and active ecumenical engagement are not incompatible with each other, but rather one demands the other.

The Serbian Orthodox Church views this regional Episcopal Assembly as something positive, as is reflected in the Communiqué from the regular Holy Assembly of Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church held in Belgrade from April 26 to May 5, 2010:

“The Assembly of Bishops heard and approved the following reports regarding the life of the Church over the past year since last year’s meeting: … on the decisions of the Fourth pan-Orthodox Pre-conciliar conference in Chambésy near Geneva in June 2009 on the theme of a more efficient and organized mission, witness, and cooperation of the local Orthodox Churches in the Diaspora and on the stand of the pan-Orthodox preparatory commission for the Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church, held in December of last year also in Chambésy, on the manner of proclaiming church autocephaly and autonomy. In this context, the Assembly especially analyzed the status and problems of the life of the Serbian Orthodox Church in the Diaspora and made appropriate decisions.”

Moreover, on the eve of the convening of this First Episcopal Conference of Orthodox Churches in North America, in the spirit of Pentecost, His Holiness Serbian Patriarch Irinej sent the Serbian hierarchs in North America his Patriarchal greeting for its successful work and for rich spiritual fruits of the descent of the Holy Spirit the Comforter to come upon all Orthodox in North America, calling them to take a part in this new Pentecostal work of historical significance. This conference is truly an excellent opportunity to clearly define a vision and establish a platform for the future of the Diaspora on a healthy theological and ecclesiastical foundation.

Here it is worthwhile to remember the visionary Saint Nicholai of Zicha and Ochrid, one of the first Serbian Orthodox laborers on the American continent. The most eloquent example of Nicholai’s openness and pan-Orthodoxy is his readiness to view the Serbian Orthodox Church in America in the context of the ancient orthodox canonical tradition and the wider, contemporary Orthodox context, as most eloquently witnessed by his words: “When, by God’s providence, the time comes for the realization of unity, it will be a joy for many. Undoubtedly, the primates and hierarchs of all of our Orthodox Churches, in Europe, Asia, Africa, guided by the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, will show love and understanding, and give their consent and blessing for the establishment of one new sister church in America” (Bishop Nicholai, Collected Works XIII, pages 565-572, Serbian text pages 573-579).

The appearing of Episcopal Assemblies throughout the world (these gatherings have already started work in Europe) should not be understood pretentiously, nor should they be presented one-sidedly, but rather it is necessary to take into consideration the reality and need for ecclesiastical unity on a pan-Orthodox level in its totality. A correct interpretation of this ecclesiologically and theologically important attempt from Chambésy to accomplish a fuller unity, cooperation, and catholicity (sabornost) on the territory of the diaspora only contributes to a stronger position for the particular Orthodox Churches and to the avoidance of their marginalization in their future ecclesiological formation on the American continent. With this, above all, we must be mindful of the pan-Orthodox consensus expressed in Chambésy.

Participation in the Episcopal Assembly is equally faithfulness to the Pneumatological catholic institution of the Holy Spirit who “holds together the whole institution of the Church” (hymn for Vespers on Pentecost). In this way we show faithfulness to the Apostolic Orthodox Faith, which obliges us to contribute “to this common work of addressing the pastoral needs of the Orthodox who live in our region.” By working together through this forum, the Serbian Church also has the opportunity to witness to its specific and particular place in the Orthodox family of America.

This synthetic and unifying work of the Assembly was also evident in the opening speech of Archbishop Demetrios. Regarding the equal dignity and particular gifts which each nation brings the Church, Archbishop wisely said: “In Pentecost, we celebrate the call to unity for all human beings through faith and obedience to the one Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. At the same time, however, in Pentecost, we celebrate the refreshing reality of the diversity, wonderfully manifested in the extraordinary fact of the proclamation of the one Gospel in many languages as a result of the advent of the Holy Spirit.” Alluding to the reality of Orthodoxy in America, he added:

“As we behold the event of Pentecost, we observe that the multiplicity of languages used by the Holy Apostle in proclaiming the single Gospel is not a cause of confusion or conflict, but a reason for thanksgiving and celebration. The one Gospel does not obliterate linguistic, ethnic, or cultural differences and particularities. The Gospel is clearly a call to unity, but as our history of 2000 years demonstrates, it does not cause an eclipse of the diversity within the Church. And this speaks directly to our case today.”

The hierarchs have called the clergy and faithful to join them in these efforts “to safeguard and contribute to the unity of the Orthodox Church in this region and her theological, ecclesiological, canonical, spiritual, philanthropic, educational, and missionary responsibility.”

The Assembly concluded its work by serving the Divine Liturgy on Friday, May 28, 2010 in the Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in New York. During Liturgy, prayers were offered for the eleven reposed victims of the ecological accident in the Gulf of Mexico, for the consolation of their families, and for all those who are afflicted by this catastrophe.

Maxim (Vasiljevic)

Serbian Orthodox Bishop of Western America

Guest article by Bishop Maxim on the Episcopal Assembly is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

Fr. Sebastian Dabovich

Editor’s note: The following interview, with Fr. Sebastian Dabovich, originally appeared in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and was reprinted in the Macon (GA) Telegraph on July 31, 1903. We’re reprinting it here in full.

Abbot Sebastian Dabovich, a priest high in the circles of the orthodox Russian church, passed through Seattle yesterday on his way to inspect the mission of that church in Alaska. The abbot is an authority on the Russian church in Alaska, and spoke very interestingly of the work there in an interview. He said:

Next to the Roman Catholics the Russian [Church] has the greatest number of communicants of any church in the civilized world. On the coast the two great strongholds of the Russian church are in Alaska and a section of California. Last year I made a trip of 6,000 miles in and along the Alaskan coast, inspecting our mission stations.

On this trip I go to consecrate a new church in Douglas Island, opposite Juneau, the communicants of which are mostly miners of the Slavonic race. From there I go to Sitka to look after the work. On the whole, the trip will be largely in the nature of a rest for me.

The work of our missions in Alaska is a continually growing one, and owing to the great floating population of that country, a work that is continually changing to meet the new demands.

The majority of native Alaskans are Christianized. Our own church has been organized in Alaska for nearly 110 years. Since the country has been occupied by the United States the Roman Catholics, Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, and several other missionaries have come to spread Christianity.

The Russians of Alaska in early days had some land grants in California, and they occupied the whole of what is now known as Sonoma county. From here they shipped wheat and fruit to Alaska. The quality of fruit, which took a prize in the World’s Fair at Chicago in 1893, came from Sonoma, and it was planted by the Russians, the seeds having been brought across Siberia from the Caucasian country and elsewhere.

Long before any one dreamed of a city of San Francisco there in San Francisco bay, in the little town of Sausalito flourished an iron foundry and machine shops. There in Sausalito the Russians built the first steamer that ever steamed to the north on the Pacific ocean. The engineer that brought the first steamer to Alaska is still living, now an old cripple of more than ninety years. He is an old Alaskan Creole, and lives with a son in Sedovia, Alaska.

On entering the old Russian capital of Sitka, the first building which attracts attention is the cathedral of St. Michael’s. The clock in the tower of this old church was made and put in its present position by Innocentius, the first bishop of Alaska.

Source of the week: an interview with Fr. Sebastian Dabovich is a post from OrthodoxHistory.org. All rights reserved. Your use of this article is subject to our Terms of Use.

I’ve been asked to speak about Orthodoxy in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Of course, this was the Ellis Island era, the time when hundreds of thousands of people flocked to the United States from Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean. It’s when many of your ancestors came here; it’s also when my own ancestors came here, from what was then the Ottoman Empire and what is today Lebanon. Of course, besides the Greeks and the Syrians and Lebanese, there were also lots of Serbs, Romanians, Carpatho-Rusyns, and Bulgarians. These were largely Orthodox people, coming to the United States from all over the Orthodox world, and bringing with them their ancestral faith. And while these people spoke different languages and had different local traditions, they all shared that Orthodox faith. Because they came here and preserved their faith – because of that, we have Orthodoxy in America today. My goal here today is to give you a sense of what it was like back then – what it was like to be an Orthodox Christian in late 19th/early 20th century America.

In 1890, only two Orthodox parishes existed in the entire United States of America: a Russian cathedral in San Francisco and a semi-independent Greek church in New Orleans. Of course, there was a significant Russian Orthodox presence in Alaska, but at that time Alaska was just a territory, not a state, and it was both geographically and culturally disconnected from the US mainland.

Holy Trinity Orthodox Church in New Orleans, early 20th century

The church in New Orleans was founded in 1865 by a group of Orthodox people led by a Greek cotton merchant named Nicolas Benachi. This was a multi-ethnic parish, and besides Greeks, it included Antiochians and Slavs among its members. The U.S. Census of 1890 describes it as a part of the Church of Greece, “in connection with the consulate of Greece in New Orleans.” The first priest to visit New Orleans – he wasn’t the parish priest, but he visited and served the first liturgy there – he was a strange character named Fr. Agapius Honcharenko. This man was an itinerant Ukrainian of questionable credentials who was visiting New York in 1865 when he was contacted by the New Orleans parish. He certainly was not connected to the Russian Church; he actually claimed that the Tsarist government had put a price on his head for his involvement in revolutionary activities. Honcharenko had some sort of connection with the Church of Greece, but not long after his visit to New Orleans, he left Orthodoxy altogether and tried to start his own Protestant sect in California.

The New Orleans parish itself was a really interesting community. Before they had actually organized themselves as a parish, they raised their own Orthodox militia regiment to fight on the Confederate side of the Civil War. Later on, from 1881 to 1901, the community had a priest from Bulgaria. Until 1906, most of the church records were kept in English. It was only later that Greek became the dominant language.

After I finished preparing this talk, I learned of some very exciting developments happening with the New Orleans parish. After Hurricane Katrina, the parishioners were cleaning out the church, and someone stumbled onto bunch of old documents, tucked away in some long-forgotten cupboard or closet. As it turns out, these were the sacramental records kept by the parish priests in New Orleans, dating back to the earliest years of the parish. The papers were soaking wet, and right now, the parish is having them restored. They show that the parish had members of all different ethnic groups, and in particular, a lot of Antiochians. And these people weren’t just concentrated in the city of New Orleans – they were in small towns all over Louisiana, and probably beyond. We’re just now beginning to get a glimpse of what life was like in the first Orthodox parish in the contiguous United States. There are plans to digitize the documents, and there’s even talk of building an Orthodox museum in New Orleans, to house the hundreds of documents and artifacts the community has accumulated over the past century and a half. Anyone interested in Orthodox history or Greek history will want to keep an eye on what’s going on in New Orleans.

The Russian cathedral in San Francisco, after renovations following an 1889 fire.

The other really old parish, the San Francisco cathedral, was founded in 1868 under Russian authority. Just like New Orleans, San Francisco had a multi-ethnic Orthodox community. That community largely consisted of Greeks and Serbs, and in 1867, they formally requested that the Russian bishop in Alaska send them a priest. Soon after this, the Russian bishop moved his own residence down to San Francisco.

The San Francisco parish seemed almost cursed with turmoil. In 1879, the dean of the cathedral was apparently murdered, and one of the prime suspects was his assistant priest. A few years later, the Russian bishop drowned at sea; this appears to have been a suicide brought on by a physical ailment. In the late 1880s and early 1890s, the cathedral community was rocked by scandal. The new bishop, Vladimir, was accused of all kinds of horrific crimes. The cathedral itself burned to the ground, and many people suspected arson. Eventually, Bishop Vladimir was recalled to Russia, and by the end of the decade – by the end of the 1890s – the bishop in San Francisco was an outstanding man, Tikhon Bellavin, who was respected by all the different ethnic groups in the community. Bishop Tikhon went on to become Patriarch of Moscow. He suffered under the Communists, and in 1988, he was canonized a saint.

Now, as I mentioned, the New Orleans and San Francisco parishes were the only churches in the United States in 1890. They were outposts, really; there wasn’t much in the way of established Orthodoxy in America, outside of the Russians and Orthodox natives in Alaska. But after 1890, things began to change really rapidly. On the one hand, as I said before, thousands of Orthodox immigrants were arriving in the United States. And at the same time, entire parishes of Eastern Rite Catholics were converting, en masse, to Orthodoxy.

St. Alexis Toth

These Eastern Catholics were from the Austro-Hungarian Empires, and their ancestors had been Orthodox, but in the preceding centuries, they had left the Orthodox Church and joined the Roman Catholics. When they came to the United States, they were not very well-received by the Roman Catholic hierarchy in America. The big moment came in 1889. An Eastern Catholic priest named Alexis Toth had just arrived in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to take over pastoral care of the Eastern Catholics in the area. And as was the standard procedure, when he got to Minneapolis, he presented himself to the local Roman Catholic archbishop, a man named John Ireland.

Archbishop Ireland was absolutely livid that Toth had come to Minneapolis. Ireland shouted at Toth, “I have already written to Rome protesting against this kind of priest being sent to me.” Toth said, “What kind of priest do you mean?” And Ireland said, “Your kind.” And then he continued, “I do not consider either you or this bishop of yours Catholic. […] I shall grant you no permission to work there.” Later on, Toth said, “The Archbishop lost his temper, I lost mine just as much.”

Unwelcomed by the Roman Catholics, Toth began to look into other options. At this point – and here, we’re talking right around 1890 – there wasn’t much in the way of Orthodoxy in America, as we’ve seen. Toth eventually contacted the Russian bishop in San Francisco, and his entire Eastern Catholic parish in Minneapolis converted to Orthodoxy. Toth himself became a leading proponent of Eastern Catholic conversions to Orthodoxy. Tens of thousands of Eastern Catholics joined the Russian Orthodox Church in America over the next several decades. The core of the growing Russian Archdiocese – and the core of what we know today as the OCA – consisted of these former Eastern Catholic parishes. The significance of the Eastern Catholic conversions cannot be overstated – this was a major, major development.

Of course, at the same time that this was happening – literally, at exactly the same time – thousands of people who were already Orthodox were coming to the United States from Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean. And these people were also starting their own Orthodox churches.

One of the most interesting of these early communities was in Chicago. In the 1880s – so, even before the big immigration started – Chicago had a growing Orthodox population. By 1888, there were about a thousand Orthodox in the city. 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, the Russian bishop responded to their petition by asking them to hold a meeting, to figure out if there was enough interest to support a church. The main speakers at the meeting were a Greek, a Montenegrin, and a Serb. The Greek man was George Brown, who had come to America as a young man, and had fought in the American Civil War. George Brown gave a short speech, and it’s short enough that I’ll read most of it to you now, exactly as the Chicago Tribune reported it the next day:

“Gentlemans,” he said, “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.”

Bishop Vladimir Sokolovsky was the Russian bishop in America from 1888 to 1891.

The meeting ended with everybody wanting to start an Orthodox church, and they agreed that the services could be done in both Greek and Slavonic. The Russian Bishop Vladimir traveled east from San Francisco for a visit later that year, but unfortunately, this was the same Bishop Vladimir who became embroiled in a series of horrible scandals. One of Vladimir’s strongest opponents in San Francisco was a Montenegrin who happened to be the brother of one of the leaders of the Chicago community. So the Chicago Orthodox were hearing all these horrible things about Bishop Vladimir, and they decided they wanted nothing more to do with the man. They put out feelers to numerous other Orthodox churches – the Serbian Church, the Ecumenical Patriarchate, and the Church of Greece.

Eventually, the Church of Greece sent a priest named Fr. Panagiotis Phiambolis, and in 1892 Phiambolis established the first Orthodox parish of any kind in Chicago. But this was not a multi-ethnic parish, like San Francisco and New Orleans. This parish was specifically for Greek people. The Chicago Tribune reported that the new Greek church “wants no one but those of Hellenic blood among its members” Almost exactly one month after the Greek church began in Chicago, the Russians established their own church. By now, I should note, Bishop Vladimir had been recalled to Russia, and was replaced by Bishop Nicholas.

So now in 1892, there were two Orthodox parishes in the city of Chicago – one Greek, one Russian. This was the first time in our history that two Orthodox churches, answering to different ecclesiastical authorities, coexisted in the same US city. But there’s a flip side to all of this. Despite the fact that they had separated based on language and ethnicity, they still got along with each other. In 1894, the Chicago Greek and Russian priests concelebrated the Divine Liturgy at the Russian church to commemorate the one hundredth anniversary of the Russian mission to Alaska. When the Russian Tsar Alexander III died the following month, a memorial was served by both the Greek and Russian priests at the Greek church, which was simultaneously dedicating its new building. When the new Russian bishop, Nicholas, visited Chicago in later that year, the local Greek priest, Phiambolis, participated in the hierarchical Liturgy at the Russian church. Later on, in 1902, the church bell was stolen from the Russian parish, and the Greek priest invited his Russian counterpart to come to the Greek church and ask the Greek parishioners for help. The two churches, Greek and Russian, then held a joint meeting of both parishes, to organize an effort to find the bell.

On the Pacific Coast, Orthodox communities began to organize themselves in places like Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington. In both Portland and Seattle, there was a lot of diversity among the Orthodox, with Greeks, Serbs, Antiochians, and Russians all in the same community. And in both Portland and Seattle, these diverse Orthodox populations affiliated themselves with the Russian Church. Seattle is a really interesting story, because, while it was under the Russian Church, the parish itself was named after St. Spyridon, who of course is a Greek saint. How did that happen? Well, the land for the church was donated by a Greek family, and because of that, they got to choose the name. Church services were in Greek, Slavonic, and English, and one of the prerequisites for being the pastor in Seattle was an ability to work in multiple languages.

Seattle’s multi-ethnic community didn’t last forever. By 1917, there were over two thousand Greeks in Seattle, and they decided they needed their own Greek church. But there weren’t any hard feelings. People said that they were just happy that there were enough Orthodox in Seattle for two churches.

Fr. Michael Andreades

Fr. Michael Andreades was of the early priests of that original multi-ethnic Seattle parish. Andreades was Greek, but he had been educated in Russia, and he was under the Russian bishop in San Francisco. He was one of several ethnic Greek priests who served under the Russian diocese. This was certainly not the norm for Greek clergy in America, but it definitely was not unheard of.

Another of these Greek priests was Fr. Theoclitos Triantafilides. His father was an Athenian who fought in the Greek War for Independence, and then afterwards moved to the Peloponnese. That’s where Triantafilides himself was born. As a young man, Triantafilides went to Mount Athos and was tonsured a monk. He became affiliated with the Russian monastery of St. Panteleimon, on Mount Athos, and from there, he went to Russia itself, where he studied at the Moscow Theological Academy. This is where things get really interesting. Triantafilides was asked by King George I of Greece to come to Greece and tutor the king’s young son, Prince George. Then the Russian Tsar, Alexander III, asked Triantafilides to return to Russia and tutor his children, including the future Tsar Nicholas II. Triantafilides was actually one of the priests who served at the wedding of Nicholas II and his wife Alexandra.

So how did Triantafilides go from the royal courts of Greece and Russia to the United States? Well, in Galveston, Texas – which was a major seaport in the 19^th century – there was another one of those multi-ethnic Orthodox communities. The Greeks and Serbs of Galveston got together and petitioned the Russian Church to send them a priest. Tsar Nicholas II himself answered their petition by sending them his old tutor, Triantafilides, who by this time was in his early sixties.

Archimandrite Theoclitos Triantafilides

Triantafilides was the priest in Galveston for over 20 years, until his death in 1916. But he didn’t just take care of the Galveston parish. He took responsibility for the Orthodox people living throughout the Gulf Coast, traveling thousands of miles by horse and by train. His parish, which was named Ss. Constantine and Helen, eventually came to be predominantly Serbian, and many years after his death, the church switched from the Russian to the Serbian jurisdiction. But to this day, they continue to venerate their original Greek priest, sent by the Russian Tsar.

But Fr. Theoclitos Triantafilides was not the first prominent Greek priest in America. That title belongs to Fr. Kallinikos Kanellas, who arrived in San Francisco in the early 1890s. Kanellas came to the US from India, where he had been the priest of the Greek Orthodox church in Calcutta. He initially came to America just for a visit, but he was a sickly man, and he became ill, which forced him to stay for awhile. He became affiliated with the multiethnic Russian cathedral in San Francisco. Of course, with so many Greeks there, having a Greek priest would have been particularly helpful. Like so many of his fellow priests, Kanellas traveled all over the country. He actually seems to have been the first Orthodox priest to visit this state – Georgia – when he baptized a Greek child in Savannah in 1891.

In 1892, a new Russian bishop took over in San Francisco, and he released Kanellas, who then traveled to the eastern part of the United States. Around 1902 or 1903, Kanellas was asked to become the priest of the Greek church in Birmingham, Alabama, which was under the Church of Greece. He spent the next eight years there. The Greek-American Guide described him as “a very sympathetic and reverend old man.” He was one of the only Orthodox priests in the entire American South, so like Triantafilides, he traveled quite a bit. One of the places he visited was Atlanta. Kanellas eventually became the first priest of the Greek church in Little Rock, Arkansas, and he remained there until his death in 1921.

Priests like Andreades, Triantafilides, and Kanellas were not Russian, but they all spent time serving in the Russian diocese. The reverse didn’t happen – Russian priests didn’t serve under the Church of Greece. But there is a fascinating story that I must tell you – because not all of the Greek priests were, in fact, Greek.

Fr. Raphael Morgan

Just after the turn of the twentieth century, a man named Robert Morgan began to attend the Greek church in Philadelphia. The curious thing about Robert Morgan is that he was a black Episcopalian deacon from Jamaica. In 1907, he traveled to Constantinople, and was ordained an Orthodox priest. He was sent back to Philadelphia, and I’ll quote directly here, “to carry the light of the Orthodox faith among his racial brothers.” Morgan took the name “Fr. Raphael,” but unfortunately, he wasn’t very successful in his missionary work. Aside from his own family, there’s no clear evidence that he converted anyone else to Orthodoxy. But the startling fact remains that at the beginning of the twentieth century, the Ecumenical Patriarchate initiated a mission to convert black Americans to Orthodoxy.

Now, as I said, Fr. Raphael Morgan was attached to the Greek church in Philadelphia. When he went to the Ecumenical Patriarchate to be ordained, he had two letters in his possession. One was from the Greek community of Philadelphia, which supported Morgan’s ordination, and said that if he failed to establish a black Orthodox church, he was welcome to be the assistant priest at their parish. The other letter was from the parish priest in Philadelphia, a remarkable man named Fr. Demetrios Petrides.

Fr. Demetrios Petrides

Petrides was born on Samos in the mid-1860s. He was a married priest, with children, but his wife died before he came to America. Back in Greece, Petrides’ daughter fell in love with a young man, John Janoulis, and they wanted to get married. Petrides approved, but the Janoulis’ father wanted his son to get an education, rather than get married. So Janoulis was disowned by his father, and Petrides took the couple under his wing. The young Janoulis left for America to earn money, which of course was common practice at the time, and then Fr. Demetrios was asked by the Church of Greece to become the new priest in Philadelphia. He arrived in 1907, and brought along his daughter, reuniting her with her husband. Just a couple of months after he arrived in America, Petrides wrote his letter, recommending that Robert Morgan be ordained a priest. For a while, Morgan actually lived in the Petrides family home.

Like so many of his fellow priests, Petrides traveled throughout his region of the country, ministering to the Orthodox people he found who didn’t have a priest. One time, he went to Ithaca, New York, to do a baptism. After the service, unbeknownst to Petrides, a 16-year-old Greek girl had advertised that she would go into a “spirit trance.” Greeks had traveled from all over to witness the spectacle. Petrides caught wind of what was going on, and he burst into the room, stopped the girl’s trance, and told the people that spiritualism is against the teachings of the Orthodox Church. This was the sort of man he was – completely unafraid to stand up for what was right, no matter what.

It was this gumption that got Petrides run out of Philadelphia. The Philadelphia church was dominated by a rich layman, Constantine Stephano, who was a millionaire cigarette manufacturer. Stephano and Petrides did not get along. Things came to a head in 1912, when Stephano sent the following message to Petrides – this is almost unbelievable. It said,

“Constantine Stephano commands you to appear at his office every evening at sunset and salaam low upon entering his presence. Then you are to stand erect, with folded arms, with your eyes cast downward, awaiting a word from Stephano before sitting down or otherwise changing your position. If you are not asked to be seated you are to remain in this position until Stephano leaves his office, and when he passes through the door you are to salaam low again and depart with bowed head.”

Stephano was obviously trying to humiliate Petrides, and Petrides would have none of it. He responded, “I will not thus humiliate myself before this maker of cigarettes.” Now, in the early twentieth century, Greek parishes in America had only a loose connection to the church authorities in Athens or Constantinople. As a practical matter, the parishes were run by lay boards of trustees, which would hire and fire priests at will. Constantine Stephano arranged for Petrides to be ousted from the Philadelphia church, by the slim margin of seven votes.

But, characteristically, Petrides left with his head held high. In September of 1912, newspapers in Georgia began reporting that a daring Greek priest was coming to Atlanta. One newspaper called Petrides “the stormy petrel of the cloth.” Another paper said that he was famous for his “lambasting of the rich Greeks who loved money for the sake of power.” He was warmly welcomed by the Greeks in Atlanta, who seemed to have a good idea of the sort of priest they were getting.

But Petrides was not simply focused on his fellow Greeks. At the turn of the twentieth century, there was a very active dialogue taking place between the Orthodox and the Episcopalians. This led to the creation of a group called the “Anglican and Eastern Orthodox Churches Union.” The Orthodox members of the group included clergy from various ethnic backgrounds, including Antiochians, Russians, and Greeks. For several years in the teens, Fr. Demetrios Petrides was the organization’s Greek representative. He thus was engaged in this national inter-Christian dialogue, and he was also cooperating with his fellow Orthodox of different ethnicities.

As the teens wore on, Petrides developed diabetes, and in the days before insulin, that was a death sentence. He died in September of 1917. Annunciation Cathedral here in Atlanta should be very proud to claim Fr. Demetrios Petrides as one of its first priests. He was a significant historical figure, and an outstanding pastor.

We’re nearly at the end of this talk, and I’ve basically just told you a series of stories. So what’s the point – are there any common threads, or lessons to be learned, from this admittedly limited look at early Greek Orthodox history in America? I think there are, and I’ll just touch on them very briefly here at the end.

First and foremost, it should be clear that Greek Orthodoxy in America did not develop in a vacuum, somehow separated from the rest of Orthodoxy in America. Most of the earliest communities of Orthodox Christians here were multi-ethnic. This was largely a matter of practicality: there simply weren’t enough people in each individual group to start forming separate ethnic parishes. In many places – San Francisco, New Orleans, Chicago, Seattle, Galveston – there was a clear sense that, for Orthodox Christians to survive in America, they needed each other. They needed – we still need – to work together to build up Orthodoxy in our local communities. No matter what we’d like to think, we’re simply too small, too weak, to thrive on our own, without each other. And just as in those early parishes, cooperation and a unified effort does not imply the abolishment of our individual identities. I will always be Lebanese, just as so many of you will always be Greek. Working together, on a practical level, does not have to mean a compromise of our heritage. It didn’t a hundred years ago, and it does not now.

I’d like to close with the words of that Greek veteran of the Civil War, George Brown, the early leader of Chicago’s Orthodox community: “Union is the strength. Let everybody make his mind and have no jealousy. Our religion is one. We will surprise the Americans. Let us stick like brothers.” Thank you.

[This article was written by Matthew Namee.]

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