This statement appeared on September 1 on the Vatican website.

(L to R) Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, Pope Francis of Rome, Archbishop Justin of Canterbury

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For more than a year, we have all experienced the devastating effects of a global pandemic—all of us, whether poor or wealthy, weak or strong. Some were more protected or vulnerable than others, but the rapidly-spreading infection meant that we have depended on each other in our efforts to stay safe. We realised that, in facing this worldwide calamity, no one is safe until everyone is safe, that our actions really do affect one another, and that what we do today affects what happens tomorrow.

These are not new lessons, but we have had to face them anew. May we not waste this moment. We must decide what kind of world we want to leave to future generations. God mandates: ‘Choose life, so that you and your children might live’ (Dt 30:19). We must choose to live differently; we must choose life. Read More

JUNE, JULY, AUGUST 2021

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Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew to Visit United States this Fall

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Today marks the fourth anniversary of Orthodoxy in Dialogue’s official launch on August 22, 2017, with the publication of our maiden article, The State of Orthodox Theology Today. Written mainly by one of our former editors, it reads in part:

So one must ask, “What is the state of theology today? What is really going on?” Theology is the sound of the breath of the Spirit passing through the lungs of the Church. The Orthodox Church is not an institution, she is not confined to being merely a visible organisation; rather, she is nothing less than the Body of Christ, existing throughout all of time and space, and firmly rooted in the eternity of God. Theology is thus the visible sign of the pneumatic life of the Church.

In the last thirty years there has been an influx of converts to Orthodoxy in North America, many of whom have come to the Orthodox Church seeking a haven for their conservative values and political sentiments, without fully inquiring whether Orthodoxy is really speaking to their provincial values.

We hear enough political and moral sentiments from the ambo already. Where is the genuine theology? Where are the words of life being uttered? What is being said theologically today…and more importantly, what is not being said? Read More

One day at Oxford in 1982, I asked my tutor, Bishop Kallistos Ware, what Orthodox thought of the Catholic liturgy as reformed by Paul VI. Sensing immediately where I was coming from, he replied that Orthodox had mixed feelings: they mostly approved of things like the use of the vernacular and the restoration of the cup to the laity as returns to an older tradition. They were less impressed by innovations like celebration facing the people.

I agreed with him then and now. Almost forty years later, I still think he was right. A little of my personal story will serve to give context to the reflections that follow. As an adolescent, I encountered Latin liturgy (in the new rite) and it drew me, uninspired by the vernacular liturgy which took its place, to considering priesthood. I was just too young to remember the old Latin Mass, but when Archbishop Lefebvre became notorious for rejecting the post-Vatican II reforms, I acquainted myself with the older rites and fell in love with them. Read More