Greek lobby

Hellenes Abroad News, one of the primary voices of the Greek lobby, reports that Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew will meet with SCOBA during his visit to the United States, which kicked off yesterday. The article makes a startling assertion:

Under the leadership of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the worldwide Orthodox Church has moved significantly in the past year toward a canonical normalization of the Churches that exist in the so-called “Diaspora.” This opportunity for the Members of SCOBA to meet with the Ecumenical Patriarch comes at a fortuitous time in the process.

Considering that the newly constituted U.S. episcopal assembly is not scheduled to gather for its first meeting until May 2010, this is what we “barbarians” in America’s so-called “diaspora” refer to as jumping the gun.

Recall, to cite just one example, Antiochian Metropolitan Philip’s critique of Constantinople’s interpretation of Canon 28.

Met. Philip argues that Constantinople’s interpretation of the canon is historically untenable, interferes with good order, hobbles efforts at jurisdictional unity and, most important, retards Orthodox missionary work in the United States.

Ever notice how the communication organs of the Greek lobby seem to have been modeled on the techniques of Newspeak that were used so effectively at the Ministry of Truth?

Bishop Savas, head of the Greek Orthodox Office of Society and Culture, is starting a new blog called Living in the LOGOSphere (no posts yet). He told Greek News that the new blog “will have a different, less personal, less whimsical character” than the travel diary blog he authored last year. Readers of the AOI Observer will recall that his blog greeting to the new president after last year’s election included this exclamation: This is the Day that the Lord has made!

The editorial focus on the new blog will range from “the political to the environmental, from bioethical issues to trends in popular culture,” the bishop says. A number of writers will be involved.

This is a positive development and welcomed here. Too much of what passes for “social witness” in the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese in recent years has been focused on the very mixed bag of “national issues” of the Greek state and constant collaboration with various and sundry Greek pols and bureaucrats. Defense of the Ecumenical Patriarchate against Turkish repression, certainly. Lobbying in Congress on the Macedonian “name issue,” ridiculous.

We hope that by citing “bioethical issues” the bishop intends for his new blog to offer a strong defense of the sanctity of life. But we know that might get him in “Church and State” problems with Greek Orthodox politicians who would rather defend a party platform than defend the unborn. We shall see.

Excerpt from Bishop Savas’ interview with Greek News:

Greek News: Please tell us something about your new office.

Bishop Savas: The Office of Church, Society and Culture is actually the revival and adaptation of the Department of Church and Society, which was an important part of the Archdiocese from the ‘60s through the 80’s. Archbishop Demetrios felt strongly about resurrecting that department to explore means of reaching out to the great numbers of Orthodox Christians who stand on the borders, as it were, of a full-blooded commitment to the Church.

You may recall that the theme of last year’s Clergy-Laity Congress in Washington, DC, was “Gather My People to My Home”. His Eminence and the Holy Eparchial Synod firmly believe that God has charged us to bring the world into the Church. To that end, my new directive is to promote a creative Orthodox Christian engagement with contemporary social and cultural realities. My office is charged with the task of developing and implementing programs and ministries that will assist those persons, and particularly young adults, who look to the Church for guidance in meeting the challenge of living lives that are both fully and authentically Greek Orthodox Christian and fully and authentically 21st-century American. Continue reading →

The anarchists that sank Greece into a near state of chaos late last year are now taking aim at the Church:

Greece is seeing an unprecedented spate of terrorist attacks against churches. Among the churches that were hit, in one case during religious service, were the Athens Metropolitan Church, the Piraeus Metropolitan Church, and the Church of St. Demetrios in Thessaloniki. Greek media have described these attacks, the likes of which Greece has not seen even when the country was under occupation, as a “declaration of war against the Church of Greece.”

All of the bombs were defused in time and only one, at Agia Triada in Pireaus, caused minor damage. The organization “Conspiracy of the Nuclei of Fire – Commandos” along with “The Nihilist Faction” assumed responsibility for the attack and in a manifesto claimed “Religion is a mechanism of power that plays a particularly devious role in subjugating people.” Authorities in Greece are taking the attacks very seriously, especially in view of the Easter period during which thousands of the faithful will congregate at the country’s churches.

Something very dark is going on here. The Orthodox Church, which has served as the ark of nationalist — indeed racial — Hellenism since liberation from the Ottomans in the 19th century, is now under attack in Greece. This violent turn, which authorities are rightly taking “very seriously,” comes at a time when the Church, embroiled in one scandal after another in recent years, is fast losing the respect and trust of Greeks.

An opinion poll conducted in December for the newspaper Kathimerini asked people to rank their most trusted institutions. The Orthodox Church ranked only 22nd, dropping from 15th place in the previous poll. The pollsters surmised that the scandals involving shady land deals linked to the Vatopedi Monastery was a contributing factor. Apparently, not all Athonite monks spend their days toiling in the fields. (To see a depressing catalog of corruption by Greek hierarchs, skip to the bottom of this post.)

Let’s raise a question concerning matters closer to home: If Hellenism is falling out of favor in Greece, where does that leave the “Hellenism and Orthodoxy” project that is being promoted by the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America? The GOA has raised $28 million so far to see this program through. No doubt many good things — scholarships, computer labs, Oratorical Festival awards — are funded with these dollars. But none of these projects have anything to do with Hellenism, if by that term we are referring to its theological expression, the marriage of Greek philosophy and Christian theology. Continue reading →

The Greek newspaper Kathimerini is reporting that President Obama will meet Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew when he is in Istanbul on April 7 during a visit to Turkey. “However,” the paper said, “the US president is also due to hold a one-on-one meeting with the patriarch in the White House on November 3.”

The plans were firmed up when Archbishop Demetrios met with the president on March 25 during a White House reception in honor of Greek Independence Day, Kathimerini said.

During the public ceremony, the archbishop compared the president to Alexander the Great. While in Washington, he also attended a reception hosted by the Ambassador of Greece to the United States Alexandros Mallias at the Greek Embassy. Minister of Justice Nikolaos Dendias represented the Greek Government at the Independence Day events.

Meanwhile, the tug-of-war between, on one side, the Turkish government and, on the other, the U.S. Greek lobby and the Greek government, continues over a proposed meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat.