Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I

Remarks and Toast of His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew at the Dinner in his Honor Hosted by Vice President Joseph R. Biden at the Residence of the Vice President, Number One Observatory Circle, Direct Archdiocesan District, Washington, November 4, 2009
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Mr. Vice President and Dr. Biden, Your Eminence Archbishop Demetrios and Brother Hierarchs, Honored guests and friends, Beloved spiritual children in the Lord,

We return to the Naval Observatory and to this historic residence after twelve years, to be among friends of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, and yet, more than friends.

Mr. Vice President, you are a person who has sought justice and fought for liberty throughout a lifetime of public service. Through tragedy and triumph, you have persevered with a constant awareness of those most in need, of those who are powerless, and those who live without hope. Your life story is truly an American story, filled with peaks of exemplary achievement, and valleys of loss and despair. But through them all, as you yourself have so movingly written, you have risen to every challenge and every occasion. Continue reading →

At the Joint House and Senate Luncheon in his Honor Hosted by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid

Remarks and Toast of His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew

The Rayburn Room
The Capitol
Direct Archdiocesan District
Washington, DC
November 4, 2009
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Madame Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid, Your Eminence Archbishop Demetrios and brother Hierarchs, Honored guests and friends, beloved spiritual children in the Lord,

Standing again in this Capitol – this people’s house of democracy and freedom – whose dome rises above every other building in this capital city of the American Nation, our mind travels back in time to twelve years ago, when both we and the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople were honored by this august body with the Congressional Gold Medal. At that time, we made a commitment and a pledge to you, the elected representatives of the great American people. We promised you that “in the spirit of freedom, we pledge to redouble our efforts as peacemakers among different peoples and faiths.”

We say to you this day, that in spite of rising tide of intolerance and fanaticism, the Ecumenical Patriarchate continues to fulfill that pledge. Continue reading →

From the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America (Nov. 4, 2009):

President Obama receives Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew in the Oval Office

WASHINGTON – His All Holiness, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew was received today at the White House in the Oval Office by President Barack Obama. This reciprocal visit to the one paid by President Obama earlier this year (April 7, when he made his first overseas visit to a Muslim country, Turkey) followed up on their conversations at that time on the subjects of the recently concluded environmental symposium on the Mississippi River and the re-opening of the Theological School of Halki.

“The President with his kindness and openness received me and my delegation with love and honor,” said His All Holiness to the Press as he was exiting the White House. Continue reading →

Bravo! On Oct. 31, the Patriarch closes his speech at the Order of Saint Andrew the Apostle Annual Banquet at New York’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel with these words:

Our Orthodox Christian faith has lived and thrived in this nation for generations, from the first Greeks who came to New Smyrna in the 18th Century, to the first Orthodox parish in America in New Orleans, which was founded in 1863, and flourishes to this day and which we have just visited for the second time.

America is a land and, indeed, an idea that offers to every soul the freedom to express one’s own religious conviction. and this is surely the most basic of inalienable human rights. We are profoundly grateful for the blessings that have been afforded all Orthodox Christians in this great country. And for this we say, may God bless the Orthodox Christians in this United States and may God bless America.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMvDVIdesXk[/youtube]

Address of His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew

“A Changeless Faith for a Changing World”

Center for American Progress and Georgetown University
Gaston Hall of Georgetown University
Washington, DC
(November 3, 2009)
Remarks as Prepared for Delivery
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Thank you very much, Professor James J. O’Donnell, Provost of Georgetown University, and John Podesta, President of the Center for American Progress. We are also especially grateful for the students who are present with us today, and for their interest.

Progress is often equated with change. So let us acknowledge this: it may appear strange for a progressive think tank to sponsor a lecture by the leader of a faith that takes pride in how little it has changed in 2,000 years. The fact is that our first instinct in Orthodoxy is to conserve the precious faith that has been handed down to us in an unbroken line from Jesus Christ through the Apostles. In the case of our Ecumenical Patriarchate, the First See of the Orthodox World, it has been handed to us through St. Andrew the Apostle, to whose See we are the 270th successor.

But even though our faith may be 2,000 years old, our thinking is not. True progress is a balance between preserving the essence of a certain way of life and changing things that are not essential. Christianity was born a revolutionary faith – and we have preserved that. In other words, paradoxically, we have succeeded in not changing a faith that is itself dedicated to change.

Let us, as the lawyers would say, make a disclaimer: By calling Christianity revolutionary, and saying it is dedicated to change, we are not siding with Progressives – just as, by conserving it, we are not siding with Conservatives. All political factions believe God is on their side – as Abraham Lincoln said of the Union and Confederacy, “Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes His aid against the other.”

The only side we take is that of our faith – which today may seem to land us in one political camp, tomorrow another – but in truth we are always and only in one camp, that of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Continue reading →