1) How is the Metropolitan of the AOCNA elected or chosen?

2) Given the status of the constitution as described by the Metropolitan do the deliberations of the Church in America have any real meaning? Are any actions of the Archdiocesan Conventions valid? Is the Archdiocesan Convention, Board of Trustees etc just decorative bodies with no real authority?

3)How can you really have self rule without the structures in place for self governance? Its almost Orwellian to call the AOCNA self ruled today. Its like a country proclaiming itself democratic but only one person can run for president and there are no choices.

4)Who is the bishop of all of these dioceses? Has each diocese of the AOCNA now been vacated and dissolved?

5)Its sad to read the Metropolitan’s reflection on Canons and Constantinople given these current events. Has the vision of unity now changed?

6)The Comments about the governance of other jurisdictions not working deserves more clarification. What is not working? and is the solution to a crisis in Orthodox Governance the dissolution of the structures of self rule and the consolidation of power at the executive level. Its like the Founding Fathers of America giving up and crawling back to King George in England. Self rule is not nor should it ever be easy.

7)Most Importantly! The question needs to be answered quite simply what is more important The Unity of Orthodox Christians in North America of the unity of the AOCNA?

I do not think there were really be any answers to these questions but I do think they are worth asking and seeking serious answers.

They have spooked both the Patriarchate of Antioch and their own Self-Ruling Metropolitan. The hierarchs saw all of the former-Protestants in the ranks of their clergy and feared their nascent Protestantism that ironically is a result of the the very Eastern Rite protestant ethos that they themselves help to perpetuate in North America!