The following excerpts are taken from Patricia Miller’s “The Story Behind the Catholic Church’s Stunning Contraception Reversal,” published the day before yesterday on Religion Dispatches. The link for the full article is given below.

The relevance of this article for our readers lies in the appearance of a rigidly Pauline (i.e., reflective of Pope Paul VI) approach to marital intimacy in certain lay circles of the Orthodox Church in the 21st century.

At 63 I have been “informally Orthodox” since birth, and formally Orthodox for 42 years, my entire adult life. By “informally Orthodox” I mean that my mother’s family was Orthodox; in fact, my grandfather was an Orthodox priest. At age 12 I began to associate with their Orthodox friends in the parish that Grandfather attended in his retirement. I have a theological education from St. Vladimir’s Seminary. I was ordained to the priesthood as a married man and father of three when I was almost 33. My former wife and I went on to have two more children, five in total over a span of thirteen years.  

I mention these autobiographical details to underscore my astonishment when I “learned” from a convert only a year ago—for the first time in my entire life—that “the Orthodox Church condemns and forbids contraception.” I am fairly certain that my priest-grandfather and presbytera-grandmother (born in 1887 and 1912, respectively) would have been no less surprised by this “revelation” than I was.

Since this seems to have become an “issue” for us Orthodox, we publish the following article to facilitate a conversation in the Orthodox Church. Some of the author’s statements raise the question of how a ban on contraception might relate to attempts to control women and their lives. Read More

Mark Arey, writer for Orthodoxy in Dialogue and Executive Director at The Hellenic Initiative, posted the following on his Facebook timeline. We publish it, together with associated links where you can donate, in collaboration with him. Check your preferred news source for media coverage on the disaster.

May our gracious Lord and Saviour have mercy on the survivors and grant eternal rest in the kingdom of heaven to those who have perished.

The fires in Greece have been truly devastating and the loss of life is unbearable. The organization I am privileged to serve, The Hellenic Initiative, is on the ground as I write meeting with those whose lives have been so terribly affected. If you wish, you may donate at one of the links below and I promise you that we will get the aid to those who need it most, and report back on how all emergency funding was used. Tomorrow morning in Greece, our team will meet with the Mayor of Rafina and other parties to strategize our best response. If you can, please help and share this with others. Thanks…. Read More

On July 20 the website and Facebook page of the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of the United States of America showed their first sign of life in six months. Six months! The new post consists of nothing more than a new directory of clergy brotherhoods and lay organizations.

Prior to four days ago, the Assembly had posted nothing on either platform since January 30: not a Lenten greeting, not a Paschal greeting, and most certainly not a response to our White Supremacy in the American Orthodox Church: An Open Letter to the Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of the United States of America of January 22. Its most recent “Pan-Orthodox News” is over a year old.

(By contrast, the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is a beehive of daily activity. The social consciousness of the USCCB boggles the mind.)

The Assembly’s January 30 post contained the sobering news that almost half of our bishops in the United States reject the goal of a united Orthodox Church organized in accordance with the canons along strictly territorial lines. The percentage of dissenting bishops skyrockets to 72%—nearly three-quarters—in the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese. We reported on this here: please take the time to read it.

Why does this matter? From the About page on the Assembly’s website: Read More

The two incidents related below took place thirty years apart, the first in 1986 and the second in 2016. Both involved highly respected senior priests, one in the Orthodox Church in America and the other in the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. 

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I completed the course requirements for the MDiv at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary between 1986 and 1989.

In class during my first year, one of the seminary’s most esteemed professors recalled an incident that took place during a previous parish assignment. A young male couple came to his church office seeking counseling for their troubled relationship. “Get out!” he shouted at them.

He laughed heartily as he recounted the story. Most of the class laughed with him. I didn’t.

At the time, I was married with three kids. I did not believe that there was a place in the Church for same-sex couples. Yet I was appalled by the priest’s callous disregard for the humanity of a young gay couple, the reality of their love for each other, their sincere appeal for help from a man of God.

More than 30 years later I am still haunted by the emotional and spiritual trauma that this trusting young couple must have suffered at the hands of this priest. Read More