Byzantine, Texas

The foundational purpose of the Patriarch Tikhon Russian-American Music Institute is: to promote prayerful and professionally executed Russian Orthodox church singing in North America (in both the English and Church Slavonic); to establish the process and infrastructure for Maestro Vladimir Gorbik and other Orthodox conductors to instruct and influence the dynamic beauty of Eastern Orthodox conducting and singing in America and Canada. Our intent is to positively improve the prayerful sound and quality of Orthodox church singing through: training a new generation of master conductors growing the ranks of professionally trained singers in church choirs significantly increasing the musical collaboration among members of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (ROCOR), the Orthodox Church in America (OCA), and the faculty of the Moscow Representation Church of the Holy Trinity–Saint Sergius Lavra.

( AOB ) - On Tuesday, January 28, the Executive Committee of the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America convened. Along with the members of the Executive Committee, the first hierarchs of all jurisdictions were invited to participate. In a spirit of mutual respect and fraternal love in Christ, the bishops reconfirmed their commitment to the Assembly process. They noted with concern the temporary withdrawal from the Assembly of the hierarchs of the Patriarchate of Antioch, and expressed their brotherly commitment to their full restoration to the Assembly at the earliest possible time. The hierarchs also discussed the Assembly’s fifth annual meeting, which is scheduled for September 16-18, 2014 in Dallas, TX. Assembly V will open with a pan-Orthodox gathering on the evening of September 15 for all clergy and laity in the area.

Frederica: The Life and Work of Frederica Mathewes-Green ( Kickstarter ) - A film about a woman who has encountered the life of the ancient Christian faith amid a culture in conflict. About our Project A self described "women's libber" and "mother-earth hippie" turned pro-life activist and Orthodox Christian, Frederica Mathewes-Green has become an accomplished author, speaker, and commentator on numerous topics from pop-culture to ancient Christian spirituality. With over 700 interviews, 9 books and hundreds of published articles, Frederica has become a nationally recognized voice for the unborn and one of the most widely recognized women in the relatively small community of Eastern Orthodox Christians in the United States. This film will document her life and work as we follow her on speaking engagements throughout the county. Stay tuned here for some exclusive clips from the film.

NEW YORK ( GOARCH ) – Fordham University conferred yesterday, January 28, 2014, an honorary doctorate degree of Humane Letters, the highest honor of the University, to His Beatitude Archbishop Anastasios of Tirana, Durrës and All Albania, in an official ceremony at Fordham’s University Church. Following the conferral, His Beatitude delivered the “Orthodoxy in America Lecture” on the topic Sharing the Good News in a Multi-Religious Country: Theological Reflections on Other Religions . “Your name suggests, speaks and points to the Resurrection as does your ministry,” said Fr. Joseph M. McShane, S.J., the president of Fordham in his welcoming remarks. Fr. McShane welcomed Archbishop Anastasios to the Fordham family saying that the University considers itself blessed to be a home for Orthodoxy and have the only Orthodox Studies program in the United States. His Eminence Archbishop Demetrios of America offered the invocation, preceded by short introductory remarks in which he acknow...

( New Liturgical Movement ) - Is there such a thing as a new traditional image? How can you create something new without stepping outside tradition? Or is this something that we should not even attempt - a contradiction in terms? Those who have ever attended an icon painting class will know that the method of teaching is to copy an existing icon and that deviation from the prototype is usually flatly forbidden. This is an important and useful part of the training - provided that the student is given an understanding of what it is he is copying and why the artist who painted the prototype made the decision regarding style and content that he did. This experience can lead some to conclude erroneously that there is no room for any creativity or originality in icons. In fact while originality from the artist is never sought as an end in itself, sometimes it is necessary - when for example there is no existing image of a particular saint. The icon top left is St Winifred (also spelt...

( Orthodox Nepal ) - Many of you who read this blog may already be aware of this, but if not, let me share the good news about a recent development for Orthodoxy in the Philippines. You may recall that Fr. Deacon Silouan Thompson accompanied me to the Philippines last year for short-term mission work. During that trip, we had the opportunity to talk about his longstanding desire to assist the Orthodox Church in the Philippines. By God’s grace and with the blessing of our Metropolitan Hilarion, Fr. Silouan is being sent as a full time missionary to the Philippines this year. If all goes well, and by your prayers it should (!), Fr. Silouan will be ordained to the Priesthood after Pascha. As soon as he has adequate financial support, he will then be on his way to the Philippines. Please check out his new website: http://philippine-mission.org . I am grateful to God for this opportunity for Fr. Silouan to begin his priestly ministry in a missionary context. He has had a long ...

PAMPAKUDA, January 29 ( Oriental Orthodox Church ) - The Eleventh meeting of the International Joint Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Roman Catholic Church and the Oriental Orthodox Churches begins in Pampakuda near Kochi, Kerala, India, on Tuesday January 28. All the Oriental Orthodox Churches, with the exception of the Antiochian Syrian Orthodox Church and the Eritrean Orthodox Church, were represented, namely the Armenian Apostolic Church (Catholicosate of All Armenians), the Armenian Apostolic Church (Holy See of Cilicia), the Coptic Orthodox Church, the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, and the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church. The Roman Catholic Church and the Oriental Orthodox Churches delegations met separately on the morning of Tuesday January 28. The Joint Commission begins its four-day plenary session on Wednesday. The endeavour of this year’s dialogue is to discuss the relevance of the nature and communion of the united and undivided Apostolic Church ...

TAMPA, FL, January 27, 2014 ( LifeSiteNews.com ) – The man who tricked his ex-girlfriend into taking an abortion-inducing drug has been sentenced to nearly 14 years in prison. John Andrew Welden received the full negotiated sentence of 13 years and eight months in a hearing at 1:30 this afternoon. "I don't think Mr. Welden is an evil person, but he committed an evil act and for that he's going to have to pay the consequences," said U.S. District Judge Richard A. Lazzara as he imposed the full sentence. Welden signed a plea bargain in September to avoid life in prison for violating the 2004 Unborn Victims of Violence Act. But Lazzara, a 1997 Clinton appointee, nearly let Welden escape with only 41 months in prison. The 29-year-old, who goes by Andrew, was engaged to Remee Jo Lee, 27. When she became pregnant, he accompanied her to an OB/GYN visit. He then forged the name of his father, Dr. Stephen Welden, on a prescription of Cytotec and had an employee of Su...

( The Grammarphobia ) - How fast is Godspeed? Q: When Phil Everly died the other day, Nancy Sinatra tweeted, “I love you Phillip–Godspeed.” I’ve always assumed “Godspeed” is short for something like “May God speed you on your way.” But why speed? Why the hurry? A: The “speed” in “Godspeed” has nothing to do with quickness. In fact, the word “speed” itself didn’t mean quickness when it first showed up in Anglo-Saxon times almost 1,300 years ago. The noun “speed” (spelled spoed in Old English) originally meant “success, prosperity, good fortune; profit, advancement, furtherance,” according to the Oxford English Dictionary . The OED cites this early example from a glossary, written around the year 725, of Latin and Old English terms: “ Successus , spoed.” Similarly, the verb “speed,” which showed up in the late 900s, meant to succeed or prosper. The dictionary’s earliest citation is from The Battle of Maldon , an Old English poem dating from 993. Here’s the citation in Mo...

As a parent of many children, I've posted about children in church many times (see here , here , here , and here ). Please read the below by James Hargrave. ( OCN ) - “Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.” (Matthew 10:14) Does your parish welcome little children? Of course you love kids. Like mine, yours is a probably a church where adults rejoice to worship with young ones, and where even the grumps- like Sounding blogger Bev Cooke - give thanks for them anyhow. I’ll take for granted that your church likes kids. But that’s not my question. Even though you like having children around, does the physical set-up of your church make it burdensome for little children to participate in the services? As parents of a ten-month-old, my wife Daphne and I have discovered all sorts of new things about our parish. Our son loves coming to services. But sometimes we dread bringing him, because some things about our church...

( GOARCH ) - How can you keep your kids and your family safe in an ever changing digital world? The explosion of social media and mobile technologies has made safety and privacy issues even more complicated. Quite often, parents feel completely overwhelmed. Noted internet and mobile safety expert, Theo Nicolakis, will be with us to help busy parents like you see where technology is taking us, understand the issues and potential dangers kids are facing, and equip you with the tools and knowledge you'll need to help keep your family safe. Originally broadcast on January 21, 2014 and presented by Theo Nicolakis, Chief Information Officer of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, this webinar is the first of a series of online educational programs by the Center for Family Care of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America.

( AOB ) - Archbishop Demetrios of America, Chairman of the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America, has issued the following statement in response to the temporary withdrawal of the Hierarchs of the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America from their participation in the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America. The Synod of the Patriarchate of Antioch, in October 2013, decided to temporarily withdraw from all Assemblies of Canonical Orthodox Bishops around the world because of a jurisdictional issue in the Middle East. The statement of Archbishop Demetrios is as follows: “We are deeply grieved that this temporary withdrawal has occurred, and we pray for a swift resolution. We hope that the Antiochian faithful who are participating in the many good works under the aegis of the Assembly—the philanthropic activities of IOCC, the prison ministries of OCPM, the college work of OCF, the missionary efforts of OCMC ...

A reader sent me a response to Monomakhos' article (vide infra) and asked me to post it as he does not have a blog of his own. I agreed to do so and have added some editorial commentary in blue. A recent piece on Monomakhos entitled “ The DC March for Life: Part I–Another Nail in the Coffin? ” proposed that the choice of Bishop Demetrios of Mokissos to give the invocation at the 2014 March for Life in Washington was the playing-out of a larger ecclesiastical battle, and a symptom of a supposed loss of moral authority of the OCA. The author describes it as follows: “As most everybody in the OCA knows, Archbishop (sic) Tikhon Mollard, the primate-apparent of the OCA, was slated to give the opening invocation, as per long-standing tradition. This custom arose because of the good relationship between Fr John Kowalchik (sic), the Chancellor of Philadelphia, and Nellie Gray, the legendary leader that made the national March for Life happen.” This notion that the OCA’s parti...

( mospat.ru ) - On 26 January 2014, His Beatitude Patriarch John X of Great Antioch and All the East and His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia made a joint statement addressed to the participants in the Geneva II International Conference on Syria. Taking part in the Conference are representatives of the opposing parties and the world community. The text of the Statement is given below. We, Primates of fraternal Orthodox Churches, the Church of Antioch and the Russian Church, met in Moscow in order to once again bear witness to love in Christ, the love which our Churches have preserved intact through centuries and which is addressed to all people regardless their nationality, religion or political views. Today our common prayers go to the long-suffering Syrian people undergoing unprecedented ordeals. The land, in which Muslims and Christians have lived together for centuries, has been filled with tears of those who are lamenting the death of their relatives and ...

PARIS ( RNS ) - If all goes as planned, a golden-domed Russian Orthodox Church will flank the Seine River two years from now, a glittering symbol of Moscow’s growing spiritual and political presence abroad. Construction is expected to begin shortly on the complex, which will include a primary school and a cultural center. For the Moscow Patriarchate, it represents the latest in a string of high-profile buildings erected in such places as Spain, Thailand and Dubai that burnish not only the church’s image but that of the Russian government, which picks up the construction costs. “The Russian church culture is the culture of Russia,” said Stephen Headley, an American-born Russian Orthodox priest in France and author of “Christ After Communism,” which examines Orthodoxy in post-Soviet Russia. “The ideology of separation of church and state was never strong.” In France, home to tens of thousands of Russian Orthodox — there are no precise figures — the Moscow Patriarchate has retak...

I've been posting on this church's troubles for quite a while now. It has now devolved into fisticuffs... in church... during the Divine Liturgy. ( Salt Lake Tribune ) - Police were called to a fight Sunday at a service at Prophet Elias Greek Orthodox Church in Holladay. A long-running church dispute led to the fight, said Unified Police Lt. Justin Hoyal. Officers are investigating allegations of assault, Hoyal said. No one has been arrested and no one was injured in the fight. In December, the parish council told Prophet Elias Rev. Michael Kouremetis it had eliminated his position in the budget. Kouremetis refused to leave his post at the church, and a group of members is trying to pay for his salary with donations. That group — known as Protect Our Clergy — sent a letter to all church members Thursday, asserting the fight began near the end of the service, when Kouremetis told parishioners that he would keep his hours at the church every day, despite the parish counc...

( OCA ) - The Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America has received information regarding Archbishop Seraphim (Storheim), who is on suspension from his position as Archbishop of Canada. In court proceedings that took place earlier today—Friday, January 24, 2014—in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Archbishop Seraphim was found guilty of one count of sexual assault. He also was acquitted of one count of sexual assault. Sentencing will take place later this year. He remains free on bail. Separately and apart from the court proceedings, Archbishop Seraphim remains suspended, pending completion of reports from a Synodal Commission that was appointed to review the charges from an internal Church perspective. While this is a sad and stressful matter for all involved, the legal process had to take its course before any administrative action could proceed. While taking an active interest in the criminal proceedings, the OCA is not a party to the criminal action. The Lesser Synod of B...

How much more can the OCA weather? ( CBC News ) - A Winnipeg archbishop accused of sexual assault against two boys has been found guilty in one case but not the other. Seraphim Storheim, 67, will be sentenced later in the year. In the meantime, he will be free on bail. Storeheim had been accused of sexually assaulting two pre-teen brothers in 1985. He was facing two counts — one for each boy. In reading the verdict on Friday, the judge said he was convinced beyond a reasonable doubt about the assault against one boy but the burden of proof was not met for the second. Court of Queen's Bench Justice Christopher Mainella said in his ruling that Storheim was evasive and untrustworthy in his denials on the witness stand. The judge also said one brother was clear in his testimony, while the other had memory and mental illness problems. The brothers, who are now in their 30s, testified they lived with Storheim briefly, on separate occasions, when they worked as altar bo...

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region ( AINA ) - "It is one of the greatest moments of my life," said the Iraqi Minister of Environment Sargon Slewa about the plan of the Iraqi Council of Ministers to establish a province in the Nineveh Plain. Assyrian politicians in and out of Iraq have lobbied for years to give Christians autonomy there. Slewa, who is a member of the Iraqi Parliament and the Assyrian Democratic Organization that represents Christians in Iraq, requested the establishment of the province. It is one of the three possible provinces the Iraqi cabinet decided to prepare a study on, besides Fallujah and Tuz Khurmatu. The Nineveh Plain has the largest population of Christians in Iraq. They make up around 40 percent of the population of the planned new province. They now live in a so-called disputed area: Iraqi territory that Kurdistan claims for its autonomous region. The approval of a study is a first step for the Iraqi Christian dream of governing themselves to come tru...

From the blog Typikon Days, a post entitled " Ask your liturgical questions here! " For those interested, please take a look. I’m working on a new post about forefeasts and afterfeasts, and some interesting details about the current afterfeast of Theophany. There’s a lot of interesting information about this in general, and since we’re currently in the middle of an afterfeast, I thought it would be a good topic to write about. While I’m working on it, I’d love to hear what people want to know. Do you have something you always wondered about? Want to know how a particular service “works”? Let me know (either specifics or in general) what you’d like to read, and I’ll either answer questions now, or try to write posts about topics of interest.

( Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy ) - Editorial Note: O&H doesn’t usually post about ecclesiastical politics per se, but in this case there were some interesting ecclesiological doctrinal issues touched upon, which is what this post is about. As with all posts on O&H, the views expressed here represent the poster and not necessarily the editors or any other writers for the site. The only comments that will be published are those which deal with the substance of this post, i.e., with the ecclesiological/canonical questions. This isn’t a place to hash out church politics in general. —The Editors On January 15, 2014, the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia ( ROCOR ) clarified its vision for the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America . This came in the form of an epistle from Archbishop Kyrill of San Francisco, acting as the Secretary of the Synod of Bishops of the ROCOR to Archbishop Demetrios, chairman of the Assembly of Bishops. This letter was subseq...

PARMA, Ohio ( cleveland.com ) - It started as a tradition hundreds of years ago in the Ukraine. To honor the Epiphany or the Baptism of Jesus on Jan. 19, men from a parish church would go to a nearby lake and cut blocks of ice and bring them to the front of the church. They would then cut them to form a cross. For the past 30 years, the parishioners at State Road's St. Vladimir’s Ukrainian Orthodox Cathedral have built an ice cross like their ancestors in the Ukraine. Fr. John Nakonachny, pastor of St. Vladimir’s, said St. Vladimir’s is the only church in the area that keeps up this tradition. On Jan. 17, eight men from the parish cut blocks of ice into a triple bar cross, which is the cross used by the Ukrainians and some other Eastern Orthodox churches. With temperatures plummeting this week, the members of the parish will certainly have their ice cross at least through next week. Fr. Nakonachy said there was only a couple of years when the temperatures climbed over fre...

Moscow, January 23 ( Interfax ) - The first Russian school in Bethlehem is due to open on September 1, 2014. The issue was discussed at a meeting between Palestinian National Administration leader Mahmoud Abbas and the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society Chairman Sergey Stepashin at the Society's office building in central Moscow on Thursday. "Mahmoud Abbas has asked for more schools," Stepashin told reporters after the meeting. Before 1917 there were around 100 Russian schools in Bethlehem, he recalled. Russian schools could also open in Ramallah and Gaza Strip in the future, Stepashin said. "A miser pays twice. We must not lose the Middle East," he said. Also, in one year's time Bethlehem will see the launch of a multi-functional Russian center, one of the biggest in the Middle East, the Society chairman said. In 2013, some 450,000 Russian pilgrims visited Palestine, he recalled. Before the revolution the region was visited annually by around...

Drove in for the March for Life today along with seminarians from St. Tikhon's, St. Vlad's, and Christ the Saviour Seminary along with clergy, laity, and hundreds of thousands of other marchers.

Sochi, January 21 ( Interfax ) - Over 100 priests of the five world religions will work in the Mountain and Coastal Clusters of the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games in Sochi. "Over 100 priests will be on duty and provide spiritual and psychological help to participants, guests and spectators of the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games in Sochi," press service of the Sochi administration told Interfax on Tuesday. Three interreligious centers will function in the Olympic Park in the Coastal Cluster of the Adler District in Sochi, and there will be prayer rooms in the Mountain Cluster in Krasnaya Polyana. "There won't be regular services," the interviewee of the agency said. The 21st Olympic Games in Sochi will be held from February 7 to February 23, and the 11th Paralympic Games will take place from March 7 to March 16.

( First Things ) - I’m reading through Augustine’s City of God with a fantastic group on Facebook. Augustine wrote the book about 1,600 years ago, but I’m continually struck by how applicable his insights can be. One of my new favorite bits might be this passage from the beginning of book two: And yet, will we ever come to an end of discussion and talk if we think we must always reply to replies? For replies come from those who either cannot understand what is said to them, or are so stubborn and contentious that they refuse to give in even if they do understand. I immediately thought of the comment sections on various sites and the trolls who dwell there. (Naturally, I did not think of the First Things blogs, where all of our commenters are polite and insightful.) Augustine shows us that even though technology changes, human nature remains the same. There have always been trolls among us, and there always will be.

This is the only source I have on this so far. I know that the current Antioch-Jerusalem tension sparked a break from Assembly business by the Antiochian Church until their canonical complaint against the Jerusalem Patriarchate could be resolved, but I have yet to see anything of the nature of a permanent resignation. If this is true, this leaves only the Greek Archdiocese, the OCA, and the Serbian jurisdictions at the table - an untenable configuration. ( Monomakhos ) - Sources in the Antiochian jurisdiction have confirmed to Monomakhos that Metropolitan Philip Saliba has instructed all of the Antiochian bishops in North America to resign from the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops forthwith. When we receive the actual letter we will publish it. As for myself, I didn’t think it would happen this fast. Maybe the “break in the dam” I was talking about last week was ROCOR deciding that the EA was nothing but a sham. Whether ROCOR emboldened Philip to take the final step or not I ...

I've receive a lot of emails on what all the recent news stories about the Assembly of Bishops means . Here's a quick break-down. Your thoughts are appreciated. Antiochian Archdiocese: The Patriarchate of Jerusalem is trying to move into Qatar. The Patriarchate of Antioch has demanded they cease this activity. As a result, before Antioch cuts off communion with them they have "... decided to suspend the Church of Antioch’s participation in all the Assemblies of Canonical Orthodox Bishops abroad (in the Diaspora) until the removal of the violation of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem. (see here )" What does that mean in reality? From the representatives I have spoken to this means that all Assembly of Bishops activities have been removed from their schedules. Bulgarian Diocese: Bishop Daniil provided the first sign that the way forward might not be a direct one when he delivered a lengthy "No." to the Assembly during their last meeting. Greek Archdiocese:...

( OCA ) - His Grace, Bishop Mark of Baltimore, was nominated to fill the vacant Episcopal See of the Diocese of Philadelphia and Eastern Pennsylvania at a special Diocesan Assembly at Saint Nicholas Church here on Friday evening, January 17, 2014. Bishop Mark has served as the Diocese’s Administrator since 2012. His name will be forwarded to the Holy Synod of Bishops for canonical election. His Grace, Bishop Melchisedek, Bishop of Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania and Locum Tenens of the Diocese, called the Assembly to order, after which Archpriest John Jillions, Chancellor of the Orthodox Church in America, read greetings from His Beatitude, Metropolitan Tikhon, offered thanks to the Diocesan Search Committee for its dedicated work, and explained the nomination process. Bishop Melchisedek stated that two candidates had been vetted by the Holy Synod of Bishops, adding that while one candidate accepted, the other declined. Archpriest John Kowalczyk, Diocesan Chancellor, repor...

This is big news, people. If we had the idea that the Chambésy process of normalizing the "diaspora" into one-city-one-bishop canonical Orthodoxy was on the horizon, read the below... ( Pravmir ) - From the Editors: On Tuesday, December 9, 2013, the Synod of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, during a regular meeting, deliberated on the results of the previous September’s Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America. During the discussion regarding the proposal to reorganize the Orthodox dioceses in North and Central America, the President of the Synod of Bishops stressed that the Russian Church Abroad is under the canonical authority of its dear and great Mother, the Russian Orthodox Church, and is obligated to minister to its multitude of devoted flock finding itself abroad and wishing to remain in her bosom. The members of the Synod of Bishops, agreeing with the opinion of their President, noted that Orthodoxy in America is...