Release from second meeting of the Episcopal Assembly

(Episcopal Assembly) - From May 25-27, the second annual Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America gathered for its meeting at the Chicago O'Hare Hilton. There was a total of 45 bishops in attendance. In addition, nearly all of the members were present at the Assembly: the Ecumenical Patriarchate, including the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, and the Albanian Orthodox Diocese; the Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese; the Patriarchate of Moscow, including the Russian Orthodox Church in the USA and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia; the Romanian Orthodox Archdiocese of the Americas; the Bulgarian Eastern Orthodox Church; and the Orthodox Church in America. Not represented were the American Carpatho-Russian Diocese, as they currently have no bishop, owing to the recent repose of Metropolitan Nicholas; the Georgian Orthodox Church, whose bishop resides in Georgia; most of the bishops of Canada and Mexico, as the Canadian bishops anticipate their own assembly, as do those of Mexico and Central America who have requested to join the Assembly of South America. The Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church were detained by the business of their Synod in Belgrade, which was in session at the same time, and by delays in travel caused by the volcanic ash over Europe, and so were not able to attend...

Three decisions by the Assembly stand out as particularly important. Firstly, the Assembly expressed its desire to define more carefully its relationship to the agencies and endorsed-organizations which it inherited from SCOBA. It was felt that the bishops should do more to enable the success of these ministries in North America, and they agreed that the guidelines previously used by SCOBA were not adequate for the Assembly. These guidelines will be revised by the Secretariat's Coordinator for Agencies and Endorsed-Organizations, together with the liaison bishops for the various agencies, to allow the Assembly a more active participation in and support of the various ministries under its oversight.

Secondly, the Assembly agreed on the great importance of the role of our military chaplains, who give spiritual support to our dedicated men and women who serve in the armed forces and are subject to the many hardships of deployment and combat. They decided upon the need to develop clear guidelines for Orthodox Christian chaplains, and to create a single, unified endorsing agency for all military chaplains with the Department of Defense. In addition, it is a desired goal of the Assembly to facilitate a gathering of all active Orthodox Christian military chaplains.

And thirdly, the Assembly stressed the great importance of the Church's ministry to the youth, and as a result, has endorsed three projected conferences to bring together Orthodox youth workers from all over North America. It is hoped that this will help to encourage them in their ministry, eliminate redundancy and divided resources among the various churches, and create a common vision for youth ministry in the Church in North America.

The Assembly decided that it was prudent for itself to be incorporated as a legal entity, as this would bring the Assembly a number of benefits and would further its ability to act as a body. It therefore authorized the proper agents to move ahead with the work of incorporation. In addition, the Assembly reaffirmed its petition of last year to the mother churches, for the partition of the Assembly, by establishing Canada as a separate region, and joining Mexico and Central America to the region of South America. This represents also the desire of the Canadian, Mexican and Central American bishops. Lastly, the Assembly drafted and approved an official message to be issued in its name to the all Orthodox Christian faithful living within the region.

All of the proceedings over the course of the two days were characterized by a strong fraternal spirit of charity among the brother bishops. This was reflected nowhere more clearly than in the fact that all decisions of the Assembly were made with complete unanimity.

Complete article here.