Tag: Russian

St. Tikhon’s Vision, 1905

In 1905, the Holy Synod of Russia was preparing for an All-Russian Council. In advance of this, the Synod asked all the diocesan hierarchs of the Russian Church to send in their opinions on various church reform issues. St. Tikhon was among the respondents, and a portion of his reply...

A Russian Church in New York, 1895

Since the closing of Fr. Nicholas Bjerring's chapel in 1883, New York City had been without a Russian Orthodox place of worship. Greek churches were founded in the city in 1892 and '94, and by 1895, there were Russian parishes in Minnesota, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut. Finally, in April of...

Abp Panteleimon & the Jerusalem Patriarchate in America

When most people think of the Jerusalem Patriarchate in America, they think of the controversial jursidiction that spung up in the past decade or so, which included ethnic Palestinians and some former clergy of Ss. Peter and Paul (Antiochian) in Ben Lomond, California. This jurisdiction received a bishop in 2002,...

Fr. Ambrose Vretta: pioneering priest in Chicago & Seattle

In the past, I've mentioned the Russian Mission's practice of employing "client clergy" -- non-Russian priests with ties to Russia, who served multiethnic or non-Russian parishes in America. St. Raphael and Fr. Sebastian Dabovich are perhaps the most famous examples, but there were many more. One of the earliest of these...

The Russian Diocese in 1905

In 1905, the Roman Catholic religious writer Andrew Shipman wrote an article on the Russian Church in America. It's an enlightening piece, a snapshot of the Russian Mission taken by an intelligent outsider. Given that the Russian Mission is the subject of my latest podcast on Ancient Faith Radio, I...

Podcast series on past attempts at unity

I thought I'd let all the readers of this website know that I've launched a bit of a miniseries on my Ancient Faith Radio podcast. For the next five or six episodes, I'll be interviewing experts (and SOCHA members) Fr. John Erickson, Fr. Andrew Damick, and Fr. Oliver Herbel. In...

Isabel Hapgood on St. John of Kronstadt

A couple of weeks ago, we reprinted St. Alexander Hotovitzky's 1904 account of his meeting with St. John of Kronstadt. Nearly a decade earlier, the famous translator Isabel Hapgood wrote her own profile of St. John -- then known as Fr. John Sergieff, pastor of St. Andrew's Church in Kronstadt. The...

One city, two churches: New York, 1894

The first Greek Orthodox church in New York City -- named for the Holy Trinity -- was formed in January of 1892. It was organized by a group called the Society of Athena, which, as the name suggests, was composed mainly of Greek immigrants from Athens. The community's first priest, Fr. Paisios...

More on Fr. Vladimir Alexandrov

A few days ago, we discussed the tragic story of Fr. Vladimir Alexandrov, the early 20th century Russian priest whose life reads like (as Fr. Andrew Damick has suggested) a Russian novel. Very briefly: Alexandrov accidentally killed his son; his wife had an affair with his assistant priest (and took...

St. Alexander Hotovitzky on St. John of Kronstadt

  St. Alexander Hotovitzky was the rector of St. Nicholas Church (and then Cathedral) in New York City from his ordination in 1896 until his return to Russia in 1914. For almost all of that time, he was the highest-ranking priest in the Russian Mission. Of course, he was dean...