Deprecated: trim(): Passing null to parameter #1 ($string) of type string is deprecated in /home/aoiusa/public_html/wp-content/plugins/sexybookmarks/public.php on line 388
Deprecated: trim(): Passing null to parameter #1 ($string) of type string is deprecated in /home/aoiusa/public_html/wp-content/plugins/sexybookmarks/public.php on line 394
Deprecated: trim(): Passing null to parameter #1 ($string) of type string is deprecated in /home/aoiusa/public_html/wp-content/plugins/sexybookmarks/public.php on line 400
Fr. Michael Oleska, dean of St. Innocent Orthodox Cathedral in Anchorage, Alaska, writes that self-governance of the church also has an important practical dimension: corrupt bishops can be removed through the combined action of priests and laity. Self-governance in other words provides an essential check and balance that is lacking in the monarchical model of the episcopacy that emerged under submission to the Ottomans on the Byzantine side, and under submission and dependency on the state on the Russian side.
The past leadership of the OCA invoked this putative authority to intimidate priests and laity who refused to accept the rampant corruption that afflicted the OCA. In the GOA, the monarchical model has been imposed in greater measure ever since the Bishops were elevated to Metropolitans and the dioceses began to function as fiefdoms of Constantinople. This late development has its committed defenders as well (see: GOA Deacon responds to Dn. Eric Wheeler) although the reasoning never seems to get past the finger-wagging at those who dare challenge the implicit notion that the Metropolitans are infallible.
Fr. Michael Oleska
Our tragic situation in Alaska was resolved when a few clergy on the Kuskokwim River appealed to the Holy Synod of the OCA to alleviate their plight, the unkindness and insensitivity of a ruling bishop who was treating them and their culture with pronounced disrespect, imposing on them, precisely, an alien so-called “Russian” identity and trying to mold and direct them toward becoming replica parishes of his own concept of a “Russian Orthodox” ideal. The Holy Synod hesitated. Then more clergy and eventually hundreds of laity united in “one heart and one mind” emphatically expressed their desire for an appropriate investigation of the situation. There were actually two such visits, two reports, the first prepared and presented by the Chancellor of the Church, which was never received or published as the Primate refused to accept it, and the second prepared by two members of the Holy Synod, which was accepted, resulting in the “retirement” of the Alaskan hierarch.
Continue reading