There are many parallels between recent upheavals in the Orthodox Church in Europe and the ongoing saga of Brexit. Both paths of events raise fundamental questions about our fidelity to truth and the rule of law, and reveal the existential crises that affect the United Kingdom and other nations on the one hand and the Orthodox Church on the other. What sort of a world do we want to live in? What kind of Church does God intend us to be?

In my Culture Wars and the Orthodox Church I draw parallels between the rise in the right wing and nationalist populism that produced Trump and Brexit, as well as a debased form of Orthodoxy that raises national or ethnic identity to an absolute and tolerates the kind of fusion between church and state that has been taking place in Russia. I concluded that the culture wars surrounding Brexit/Trump and those within the Orthodox Church are functionally related, in that not only is Russia the site of this church-state fusion, but it also has in Vladimir Putin a leader who has made no secret of his support for Brexit.   Read More

On July 3, 2019 we published A Special Kind of Orthodox Clergy Directory, and on July 15, an Update. 

To date, our directory includes about a dozen canonical hierarchs and priests ministering on three continents. Our commitment to protect the identities of our participating pastors is so absolute that even they don’t know who else is on the list.

By the grace of God, we have made several successful referrals of LGBTQ Orthodox Christians, catechumens, inquirers, and seekers to the pastors in our directory. One transgender person is soon to be received into the Orthodox Church through Holy Chrismation. 

If you’re a bishop or priest of a canonical Orthodox juridiction anywhere in the world, and you minister—or you feel spiritually and emotionally equipped to begin ministering—to LGBTQ persons and their families, please read the two articles linked above and contact me by email. Read More

Metropolitan Epiphanius of Kyiv and All Ukraine

Some 600 parishes in Ukraine belonging to the Orthodox Church aligned with the Moscow Patriarchate have in one year switched over to the newly formed Orthodox Church of Ukraine, the latter Church’s leader says.

The new Church’s first Primate, Metropolitan Epiphanius, told RFE/RL in an interview over the weekend that he foresaw another “wave” in the future of “such massive transfers.”

However, “we want them to continue to be peaceful, calm, and voluntary…we do not need confrontation,” he said. Read More

Screenshot from comments at When a Bishop Does Right, The American Conservative

With thanks to Twitter user and Orthodoxy in Dialogue follower @RationalSheep for bringing Rod Dreher’s studied assessment of editor @GiacoSanfilippo to our attention.

Addendum 1/10/20: See Editorial: Rod Dreher’s Limited (and Theologically Meaningless) Vocabulary.

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