A Plea for English in Greek Orthodox Services in 1963

The US Congress imposed immigration quotas in 1924, ending the Ellis Island era of immigration. With no more newcomers, Orthodoxy in America began to assimilate more rapidly into American society, as the children and grandchildren of the original immigrants came to see themselves as Americans, even if they held onto...

The Orthodox Baptism of a Civil War Veteran

Last week, we published the story of William Hoskins, an 89-year-old veteran of the American Civil War who traveled from Los Angeles to San Francisco in December 1900 to be baptized into the Orthodox faith by St Sebastian Dabovich. Shortly after this, Fr Kirill Sokolov, dean of Holy Trinity Cathedral...

US Civil War Veteran Baptized by St Sebastian Dabovich

At the beginning of the twentieth century, the number of Orthodox in America had not reached 50,000, but it already had several distinguished converts to the Orthodox Faith from Protestantism and Roman Catholicism: William Hoskins, an eighty-nine-year-old Civil War veteran who was a Baptist from Los Angeles, who traveled to...

Karloutsos and Biden

This is the fifth article in our series on Fr Alex Karloutsos. Here are the first four: The Father Alex Karloutsos Origin Story Karloutsos and the Rise of Bartholomew Father Alex and the Mother Church Karloutsos and 9/11 “I first met Joe Biden in 1987, when he ran for President...

Karloutsos and 9/11

This article is the fourth in a series on Fr Alex Karloutsos, based on many hours’ worth of interviews I did with him in 2024. Here are the previous three installments: The Father Alex Karloutsos Origin Story Karloutsos and the Rise of Bartholomew Father Alex and the Mother Church By...

An Early English Life of St Herman of Alaska

The article that follows is, as far as I know, the first English-language life of St Herman of Alaska. It originally appeared under the title “Herman — Russian Missionary to America,” in a publication called The Constructive Quarterly 7:1 (March 1919). The author, Vera Johnston, was the Russian-born wife of an Englishman,...

How Many Orthodox Christians Are in America?

A quick bit of self-promotion: In January, I'll be teaching a live, 4-week course on American Orthodox History for the Orthodox Studies Institute at Saint Constantine College. I hope many of you can join me -- you can learn more and register for the course by clicking here.   Lately,...

New Class: American Orthodox History

Hey everyone - I've been writing and talking about American Orthodox history for a long time. We started OrthodoxHistory.org way back in 2009, and earlier this year I published my first book, Lost Histories, on the early years of Orthodoxy in America. Today I'm excited to announce that I'll be teaching...

An 11th Century Challenge to Papal Supremacy

The belief that the Pope of Rome has immediate and universal jurisdiction has been officially part of the Roman Catholic tradition since at least the eleventh century with the proclamations issued in Dictatus Papae. In the the Roman Catholic Church’s current code of law, the 1983 Code of Canon Law...