Orthodox Christian Laity

OCL Laments “Few tangible results” at Episcopal Assembly

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Source: Orthodox Christian Laity

I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm – neither hot nor cold – I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” Rev. 3:16-17,

The tone of the meeting was polite. The meeting had the feeling of a classroom. The Professor directed the class, and the students sat quietly and listened. The meeting was organized and tightly controlled. Formal addresses were presented by Archbishop Demetrios (GOA), Metropolitan Philip (AOCA) and Archbishop Justinian (MP). To his credit, Archbishop Demetrios suggested that lay involvement in committees is essential and should be increased. The committees need to make use of the talents of the laity. Metropolitan Philip lamented that we are still disunited. Orthodoxy in North America cannot live with this disunity. He lamented the continued loss of youth.

The students/Bishops did not receive written committee reports in advance. Thirteen Committees needed to provide reports. Some of the committee chairpersons had written prepared remarks, but they were not distributed. Some presented oral reports when their turn came. Some provided no reports or partial reports.

The Assembly reviewed the status of the seven Agencies – former SCOBA Agencies. The goal is to incorporate them into the Assembly of Bishops. How will they fit into the work of the Bishops? How will the Bishops provide Episcopal oversight? Will these agencies give up their non-profit status to be incorporated by the Assembly of Bishops? Metropolitan Athenagoras of Mexico wants the Endorsed Organization, “Project Mexico,” to become an Agency of the Assembly of Bishops. Does he also want Episcopal oversight of Project Mexico?

A very brief report was presented by the Planning for the Future Structure of the Church Committee headed by Archbishop Nicolae of the Patriarchate of Romania. His Beatitude Metropolitan Jonah is also on this committee. The committee has hired Alexei D. Krindatch to assist it in gathering data. Mr. Krindatch has just completed The Atlas of American Orthodox Christian Churches published by Holy Cross Press. Those interested in the issues of unity should purchase this volume.

What was accomplished? The Bishops of the United States met. Canadian Bishops did not attend. They want an Assembly of Bishops of Canada. The Serbian Bishops were not present, because they were called to meet with the Synod in Serbia for important business. The Bishops heard committee reports. The meeting was passive. There was no discussion or recognition that the Church in the USA is a local Church and these are local bishops serving a local Church. The Bishops did not indicate that they understand that the churches outside the Roman Empire are not state-sponsored and supported churches. There was no guided discussion and interaction by the Bishops on the crucial question of what should the Church in the USA look like. Becoming a church community is not the same as becoming and autocephalous Church. Does the meeting of the four ancient Patriarchs without the rest of the Old World Patriarchs take us back to the issue of recognizing the autocephaly of Moscow and the other Patriarchs, as the Patriarch of Alexandria long ago stated? Has the fast track to a Council of all Bishops been slowed down, because there is an impasse among the Old World Patriarchs on how to grant autocephaly and an impasse on the Diptychs?

There were few tangible results from this meeting that kept our bishops in a straightjacket. Where is the leadership? Where is the renewal of Orthodoxy in the United States? There is no passion for the Church in this geographical area called America on the part of the servant Bishops. How can this be, in the Season of Pentecost?

George Matsoukas, Editor
877-585-0245

Where Have All the Flowers Gone? Or, Where Lies CEOYLA?

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The CEOYLA struggled for years to please the hierarchs and the clergy, to be understood, to be accepted, to be messengers of a unified Church in North America, but to no avail. They didn’t know what they were doing ‘wrong’ or what was considered ‘acceptable.’ The Church withdrew or let languish its support of the CEOYLA and the young of the various ‘jurisdictions’ stood apart, as though some form of invisible ‘ecclesiastical Berlin Walls’ had been erected between them. (Bp. Nathaniel Popp in Solia – The Herald, April 2000.)

Source: Orthodox Christian Laity (OCL)

By Archbishop Nathaniel (Popp)

As everyone knows, a flower has the potential to become fruit, which, in turn, bears seed that is a source of new life. An old German song entitled “Where have all the flowers gone?” referred to the young men who had been sent off to war. It was a verifiable assumption that many would not return to initiate new life in society. What a dismal future this foretold, youth nipped in the bud!

Do we have a similar situation in the Church today, not in context of political warfare but in the context of youth losing the warfare for their eternal salvation? No one knows the true number of those who have left or leave the Church in search of spiritual nourishment elsewhere or who abandon faith in the Divine. The attendance of young people at divine services and educational programs brings us to the real assumption that they do not hold Church worship as a priority. We all acknowledge that once they are out of the parish and family situations, they are not as involved with the Church as they ought to be. Does the Church recognize this, and is she also doing something about it?

A glance at the history of the Church in North America shows us that youth has fared poorly at our hands. Because of the unintelligibility of liturgical languages, a tendency to “Americanize” to accept that all beliefs are “the same” which caused a crisis of indifference and confusion in their minds, and because of other reasons, the Church has lost generations of young people.

Where is that tender flower, the “CEOYLA?” The Council of Eastern Orthodox Youth Leaders of America once represented most young Orthodox of various ethnic jurisdictions. The CEOYLA began from a desire of the young people to be together; it was not the creation of an external authority but of a recognition of oneness of faith. The CEOYLA was strong, as strong as the groups of which it was composed, but this fertile ground was neglected. Instead of being filled with guidance, it went unattended by parish clergy and lay leaders, and the hierarchy.

What titanic measures these young leaders had to undertake to receive a modicum of permission (a blessing) to meet together, socialize together, pray together, witness together to their common Orthodox faith! Their good intentions, their innocent programs to know one another, to serve the Church in America, to create a working basis for the future, were overcome by the weeds of leadership-indifference.

The CEOYLA struggled for years to please the hierarchs and the clergy, to be understood, to be accepted, to be messengers of a unified Church in North America but to no avail. They didn’t know what they were doing “wrong” or what was considered “acceptable.” The Church withdrew or let languish its support of the CEOYLA and the young of various “jurisdictions” stood apart, as though some form of invisible “ecclesiastical Berlin Walls” had been erected between them.

Today, the Church in North America is reaping the fruit of the death of the CEOYLA. Much of that “future” left the Church, frustrated, disappointed, angered, “turned-off”, sidelined. Judging from the number of mixed marriages, indifference by local parishes to spouses who had converted to Orthodoxy was a major factor, and many of these good-intentioned neo-converts, and their Orthodox spouses, in frustration, left the Church for a church which embraced them and in which they felt their spiritual needs fulfilled. Instead of being fertilized with love and concern, respect and support, the CEOYLA was judged insignificant, brash, ill-timed, even “disobedient.”

There are some CEOYLA people who reminisce about the programs and dreams they had formulated and who nourish the hope that “something” similar to the CEOYLA can still be created. They did not all leave the Church, although their hearts still ache and bear the scars of the indifference of the Church’s leadership. They consider hierarchal withdrawal of support as the death blow dealt to the CEOYLA.

What concrete actions did the Church take for the youth? Which are examples over the decades of any united effort to guide the youth in its witness to the Lord? In the meanwhile, the new youth watch and wait; wait and are placated; placated and drift; drift and abandon, because the Church does not work together with the youth.
Christ never said that the “ethnic” planting of the Church in America would bear future fruit. He said that the powers of darkness would not prevail over the Church through the eons. A two hundred year old vine does not assure a fruitful plant; the leaders of the Church must tend the young people and cultivate them to produce the fruit of the Church today, let alone tomorrow. Indifference to youth is indifference to Christ.

In recent times, general support has come forth from all jurisdictions for the International Orthodox Christian Charities (IOCC) and the Orthodox Christian Mission Center (OCMC), two activities which sprang up in response to pan-jurisdictional needs. Credit must be given to those who initiated the IOCC, which was then adopted by the Standing Conference of Canonical Orthodox Bishops in the Americas (SCOBA), and to the Greek Archdiocese as the foundation for the OCMC, which was also adopted by the SCOBA.

Is it not equally important to have all-out “jurisdictional” support for the youth in as “united” an effort as has been given for charity and mission? Admittedly, each “jurisdiction” may be doing its “own thing,” but is this not a terrible judgment on the entire Church? The Church is One Body, and no one can assume the luxury of not being concerned for the entire youth. “We’re doing our thing for our kids,” is not an acceptable, mature and Christian refrain. All kids, all young people, are members of the One Church and not of temporary “jurisdictions.” Does the hierarchy have a national youth organization on its docket?
Most Orthodox peoples around the globe have their own national Orthodox youth organizations. Not so, the Church in North America. We, this great nation, have no Orthodox youth representation neither as a witness here nor a witness abroad (Just as we have no representation in the plans for the “Great Synod” which is yet to come.). After the skeleton CEOYLA was brought down, nothing else was erected in its place. How we laud and praise “Syndesmos,” but create no Orthodox American Youth Organization! Is it not unusual to praise what others have and neglect to do the same for oneself? To admire “Syndesmos” and to not be concerned for our own youth is unacceptable. It is time for the hierarchs to act! It is time for unity of action with all diocesan and parish leaders! There needs to be a National Orthodox Youth Organization.
Where have all the flowers gone? Look around and see. Where have all the flowers gone? Pressed dry between the pages of the empty catalogues of our materialistic, consumer-based society, syncretism of belief, the screen of internet claims to “truth” and our own weak, inexcusable indifference. “Now is the time, says the Lord, I will grant them the safety they sigh for.”

Originally printed in Solia-The Herald, a publication of the Romanian Orthodox Episcopate of America, April 2000.

Orthodox Christian Laity (OCL) honors CEOYLA Members and Movement at Upcoming Annual Meeting

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Source: Orthodox Christian Laity (OCL)

CEOYLA MEMBERS PLEASE HELP!
Mark Your Calendar!
OCL 24th Annual Meeting Pittsburgh, PA
OCTOBER 7 and 8, 2011
Theme: Honoring CEOYLA MEMBERS and Movement
Marriott Courtyard…Call in Reservation 412-683-3113
5308 Liberty Avenue Pittsburgh, PA 15224

Program to take place at Holy Assumption of St Mary Church (South Side), 105 South 19th Street, Pittsburgh, PA – Hieromonk Patrick Carpenter, Pastor

The 24th Orthodox Christian Laity OCL Annual Program Meeting will honor the work and memory of the “greatest generation” of Orthodox Christian lay activists who comprised the Council of Eastern Orthodox Youth Leaders of the Americas movement (CEOYLA). CEOYLA was formally established in 1954, and its first chairperson was Ernie Villas of blessed memory.

But the vision began in the mid 1940’s, when the Orthodox faithful who eventually comprised this movement returned from World War II. The unified activism of returning veterans working together and transcending jurisdictional limitations achieved the recognition of Orthodoxy as a major faith in America. These faithful souls got the Armed Services to include the designation of their Orthodox faith (EO) on the dog tags of generations of soldiers that followed them.

They brought Orthodox Bishops of different jurisdictions together to participate in the first Pan Orthodox Great Vespers ever on American soil, on Saturday August 31, 1963 at the Pittsburgh Civic Arena – now the Mellon Center.

Please – help us locate radio and TV archival recordings and TV tapes which document the events of the period. Here is what the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette wrote, 8/31/1963:

“This speech [homily of Greek Archbishop +Iakovos] and the music of the festival [1,000-voice choir] will be featured tomorrow on the CBS radio program “Church of the Air” and on CBS-TV “Lamp Unto My Feet” on Sept. 8. The Voice of America will pick up and beam a special Festival broadcast to the Iron Curtain countries and to Greece.” [Voice of America recorded and broadcast the event to Europe and “Iron Curtain” countries on August 31, or September 1, 1963].
CBS-TV & Radio recorded this event for national broadcast in a special “Lamp Unto My Feet” program entitled “CEOYLA Eastern Orthodox Religious Cultural Festival.” The 1963 Festival attracted between 12,000-16,000 faithful. This was the high point of the movement.

The Second Festival, also with Great Vespers, was held in 1977, again in Pittsburgh.

WE NEED CEOYLA MEMBERS TO COMB THROUGH THEIR FAMILY MEMORABI1LIA AND ARCHIVES TO HELP US FIND THE TV PRESENTATION AND THE AUDIO TAPED BROADCAST OF THESE HISTORIC EVENTS. ALSO SOUGHT IS THE COMMEMORATIVE MEDALLION THAT WAS STRUCK TO HONOR THE 1983 EVENT.

We want to digitize the TV tape and make a CD of the radio tape and show and listen to them on OCTOBER 7. We want you to be present to talk about your memory of this event and CEOYLA. Please contact OCL at 877-585-0245 or via email at ocladmin@ocl.org.

Need for Pan Orthodox Unified Archive: Staff and Funding to Save our History

We have been tracking down these documents and primary sources since December 2010. It seems that the dioceses and archdioceses do not have copies of these tapes. How could they disappear?

Let’s look together and find them and preserve them as part of our journey as Orthodox Christians in America, building an Orthodox Church for America. Putting the pieces together for this project makes it clear that the Orthodox Christians need a single/united archive of the history of our journey in the United States and not archives scattered all over the country under difficult conditions where our primary documents are in storage and their care neglected and understaffed.

Further information on CEOYLA

An excerpt from the history of the movement gives an overview of the achievements of CEYOLA. Without a hint of irony, it states:

“While its efforts and accomplishments among the Eastern Orthodox in the Western Hemisphere have remained somewhat unheralded, the occasion of the first Eastern Orthodox Religious-Cultural Festival in Pittsburgh on Saturday, August 31, 1963, points to a gigantic undertaking which has been five years in the making. First discussed in June, 1958, the Festival necessitated the planning and steering of seven national conventions and/or meetings in Pittsburgh during this time; and the planning and effecting of hundreds of details pertinent to the occasion.”

“Although the Festival represents the culmination of much effort, it is but one of the many projects that C.E.O.Y.L.A has successfully undertaken. It has gathered and distributed seven libraries of Eastern Orthodox Sunday School materials. It has helped organize Eastern Orthodox Fellowships on university and college campuses, and Inter-Orthodox Councils in various metropolitan areas. Following exhaustive research, it has prepared a complete directory of Eastern Orthodox Churches. In the area of “recognition” of Eastern Orthodoxy as the Fourth Major Faith in America, C.E.O.Y.L.A. has been active in the passing of legislation toward this goal by over thirty States. Recognizing this fact, it was also instrumental in having the U.S. Armed Forces direct that “E.O.” be accepted as a designation of the Eastern Orthodox Faith on the identification tags of military personnel.”

“Other projects include contact with commercial calendar companies for the inclusion of the Orthodox date of Easter on commercial calendars, and the urging of orphanages to place orphans baptized in the Orthodox Faith in Orthodox foster homes. While the aforementioned projects are those of a “tangible” nature, the “intangible” values brought about by CEOYLA through regular meetings and exchanges of ideas by Eastern Orthodox Leaders perhaps even exceed the values of its more permanent projects.

The opportunity for young men and women of the Orthodox Faith, leaders in their respective organizations, to meet one another through an expression of their common Faith and by an exchange of their diverse cultural backgrounds, has had a far-reaching effect in more fully expressing the unity of Orthodoxy in the Americas.”

It should be noted that many of the laypersons who were part of CEYOLA were the lay Orthodox Church leaders for a generation after 1963. They served the Church in all jurisdictions on parish levels, as choir members, Sunday school teachers, Parish Council Members and members of diocesan and archdiocesan councils and leaders of National Assemblies. They succeeded their immigrant parents who established and built the church buildings…using the parliamentary, legal and educational skills and opportunities available in the USA to build up the Orthodox Church in America. Now we must work together to build up the Orthodox Church for America. Now we must work together to add our hands and voices to our hierarchs.

The next step on THE WAY is to bring to realization our joining all sister local churches, thinking and acting as one – as The American Orthodox Church.

The OCL effort to remember and honor the persons and achievements of the different youth groups that comprised CEOYLA began in December 2010 when members of the Orthodox Brotherhood (Romanian Episcopate OCA) began looking for documentation of the past. Many of the members of CEOYLA were World War II veterans, and they are in the twilight of their years or departed. Some of the names associated with CEOYLA in this era include: Ernest Villas of blessed memory; his wife Vicky is helping to locate the primary sources; Anastasia Tsoutsoura, the wife of the late Soterie, a former President of OCL; Alice Kopan, wife of the late Andrew Kopan, educator and a founding member of OCL; Bishop Basil Essey, Secretary of the Assembly of Bishops, Wichita, KS; Jim Demetrion, OCL Board Member; Chris Xeros, OCL Board Member; Ronald Muresan, Vice President of the Orthodox Brotherhood and informal historian of this era and seeker of the primary sources who helped compile the information for this article; Preoteasa Silvia Yova; Fr. John Badeen; Father Leonte Copacia; Fr. Vladimir Berzonsky; Ambassador Michael Sotirhos; and Katherine Stamatelos to name a few. Help us add your name to this list!

Letter from William Souvall, OCL President, to the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Christian Bishops

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A letter from Orthodox Christian Laity president William Souvall. Highlights:

…The need for thorough committee work is understood, but it should not delay palpable unity-related activities which can be undertaken immediately: such as increased and highly visible Pan-Orthodox worship services throughout America.

With few exceptions, the Orthodox presently worship together only on the Sunday of Orthodoxy when attendance is often disappointingly low. In some regions, even this minimal activity has either been neglected or discouraged. Is it not fair to ask why Pan-Orthodox activities and initiatives at almost every level rank so low in priority? This example is cited to demonstrate that such activities need not wait for the formal committee work which the Assembly is laboring to commence.

[…]

…Unless the Church’s leadership vocally, visibly, and urgently insists that unity matters, this present woeful situation will persist. We suggest that the Assembly address this matter by creating a permanent office and staff, not only to coordinate the committee work but also to energize and sensitize diocesan and local communities to undertake unity-related activities. The more we live unity, the sooner it will be realized.

Source: Orthodox Christian Laity | HT: Byzantine, TX

April 25, 2011
Bright Week
Feast day Great Martyr George

His Grace Rt. Rev. Bishop Basil
Bishop of the Diocese of Wichita and Mid-America
Secretary of the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Christian Bishops

Christ Is Risen!

The officers and members of Orthodox Christian Laity hope this letter finds you, your family and the faithful of your Diocese in good stead and spirit. We also pray that the Holy Spirit inspires you and your brother Bishops with wisdom and courage as you prepare for the next meeting of the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops. It is because of your direct responsibility in coordinating the Assembly’s activities that we are writing to you at this time.

We write, not as critics or monitors of your work and the work of the Assembly, but rather as supporters and advocates, for nearly twenty-five years, of Orthodox Unity in America. In this vein, OCL has sponsored many public meetings and forums attended by thousands throughout our country. OCL has also developed and distributed books and other written materials devoted to the cause of unity. It has collaborated with hierarchs, clergy and the laity from every Orthodox jurisdiction who have expressed a commitment to a truly united church. In this effort OCL has been in both spirit and action unequivocally inclusive and Pan-Orthodox.

We are encouraged that under your leadership, the Assembly has established its own website and committees with Episcopal chairs and members. We applaud these tangible actions which give form to the Assembly. Unfortunately, these steps are not yet fully reflected throughout our churches, neither at the highest ecclesiastical levels nor at the parish level. It is good to establish websites and committees, but unless their reality is projected by hierarchs and by clergy from the pulpit, ignorance of, and indifference to the unity effort will prevail. This lack of a growing unity consciousness is disappointing. It is a responsibility which rests not just with the hierarchy but with all of us, clergy and laity alike.

We are told that the unity effort is in its early stages and that the Assembly must proceed carefully in an organized manner to deal with a variety of complex ecclesiastical issues. The need for thorough committee work is understood, but it should not delay palpable unity-related activities which can be undertaken immediately: such as increased and highly visible Pan-Orthodox worship services throughout America.

With few exceptions, the Orthodox presently worship together only on the Sunday of Orthodoxy when attendance is often disappointingly low. In some regions, even this minimal activity has either been neglected or discouraged. Is it not fair to ask why Pan-Orthodox activities and initiatives at almost every level rank so low in priority? This example is cited to demonstrate that such activities need not wait for the formal committee work which the Assembly is laboring to commence.

In this respect, we offer an observation and suggestion. We know that pastoral and administrative duties of the hierarchy, their staffs and parish clergy are more pressing on their time and resources. Unless the Church’s leadership vocally, visibly, and urgently insists that unity matters, this present woeful situation will persist. We suggest that the Assembly address this matter by creating a permanent office and staff, not only to coordinate the committee work but also to energize and sensitize diocesan and local communities to undertake unity-related activities. The more we live unity, the sooner it will be realized.

If the Assembly seeks substantive and substantial participation of the laity in its committees and other work, it will be all the more likely that its mission will be achieved, particularly in light of the possibility that a Great and Holy Council could convene as early as 2013. With only fifty eight bishops and an estimated 1,000 priests in the various jurisdictions and active faithful of perhaps 1,000,000, it is clear that substantial involvement of the laity must be enlisted. We have every confidence that hundreds of devout men and women of diverse talents—many in retirement—would respond positively to calls for participation in the mission of Orthodox unity.

We also appreciate your efforts and that of others to discuss the Assembly’s work and more broadly the question of unity. Interviews on OCN’s Come Receive the Light and Ancient Faith Radio have been most helpful, but these efforts must again be reflected at the parish level. It is essential that unity initiatives and discussions at regional, metropolitan and local areas be sanctioned and promoted by the Assembly. We believe one way to encourage such activity is for the various jurisdictions to designate unity liaisons of both clergy and laity at diocesan and local levels.

We urge the Assembly to widely disseminate information about developments here and abroad that might affect the pace and nature of Church unity in America. Frequent updates on the deliberations of the Assembly or the Chambesy meetings, even if contentious, will help the faithful understand the complexity of the issues and how much time it may take to for them to be resolved.

Your Grace, OCL’s commitment to a united and canonical Orthodox Church in America is based on our Lord’s command that we “be one”. We take that to mean in spirit, body and worship. Following the historic and inspiring decisions taken concerning unity by the Synaxis at the Ecumenical Patriarchate in 2008, OCL promptly endorsed and engaged in activities supporting the actions taken by the leaders of World Orthodoxy. When OCL learned that an Assembly of Bishops was to be formed and convened, our members, on short notice, happily expressed their support in tangible ways, including significant financial assistance. OCL genuinely anticipated that a path toward Orthodox unity in America had finally arrived. OCL seeks no special status, but only to energize and expand the involvement of the People of God in the work of the Assembly.

We realize, Your Grace, that you and your fellow bishops carry a great and historic responsibility for ending the division of our Church in America. It is for this reason that we hope our observations and suggestions may prove helpful to the Assembly as it moves forward. In the end, the divine mandate for one united Church is a command to all the faithful. It is in response to this imperative that Orthodox Christian Laity has and will continue to pursue the unity of our faithful in America in all appropriate ways. We look forward to your response.

We pray that our Risen Lord may guide you and your brother bishops wisely and prudently in this most holy task.

Most Respectfully,

William Souvall, President
Orthodox Christian Laity

cc:

His Eminence Most Rev. Archbishop Demetrios of America, Chairman
His Eminence Most Rev. Archbishop Antony Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA, Treasurer
His Grace Rt. Rev. Bishop Maxim, Coordinator for Committees
His Grace Rt. Rev. Bishop Andonios, Coordinator for Agencies and Endorsed Organizations

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