On July 3 Orthodoxy in Dialogue published A Special Kind of Clergy Directory, in which we appeal to priests in canonical Orthodox jurisdictions who feel spiritually, pastorally, and emotionally equipped to serve Orthodox Christians, inquirers, and others who identify somewhere along the LGBTQI spectrum. 

By the grace of God, our directory has grown to eight priests in four countries in just under two weeks. Every good structure begins with the first few stones.

We have made three referrals and are in contact with a fourth individual who is discerning whether to be referred.

In a fifth, heartbreaking case, we helped an individual through the discernment process of finding an ecclesial home outside of the Orthodox Church. This person wishes with all his/her heart to remain Orthodox, and is under no illusions that one church is just as good as another—but if one has been chased away, what can one do? One has to eat somewhere. This case is particularly shameful in that the priest accused the person of lying about being in a sexually abstinent relationship and excommunicated him/her.

In yet another shameful case, an OCA bishop continues to ignore our request for a priest to accompany a bisexual married man on the path to repentance from adultery. Read More

This article can be read in conjunction with No Other Foundation but Farley?. 

Archpriest Lawrence Farley

The utter incoherence of Father Lawrence Farley’s rhetoric, driven by a combination of his homosexual fantasies and rabid homophobia, crosses an unconscionable line in his “Two Men in Bed Together”: A Failure of Exegesis of July 12, in which he responds to my From the Fathers: The Kingdom of Heaven Is Like…Two Men in Bed Together? of July 10. In it he draws a connection between same-sex love and child rape—not once, but twice:

I will not deal with Sanfilippo’s first point at length [i.e., my “Despite endless iterations by churchmen who possess no intellectual curiosity—indeed, no sense of pastoral responsibility—to become familiar with scientific advances and the helpful insights of queer theory in our understanding of sexual diversity in human nature…], other than to note that the same dubious argumentation is now being advanced in some places to justify pedophilia (now being sanitized under the term “minor attraction”).

Sanfilippo’s conclusion—which if taken at face value justifies not only homosexuality but also pedophilia (“also each man and boy”)—simply doesn’t follow.

In  case Father Farley tidies up his text after he reads this article (as he did with his response to my Conjugal Friendship of May 2017 after he had called traditional icons of the Mystical Supper disturbing visual trash), I have appended his full article below as copied and pasted around 11:30 p.m. ET on July 13.  Read More

Orthodoxy in Dialogue and RAICES are exploring the possibility of forming a permanent partnership as a mechanism for our readers to become one-time, occasional, or frequent donors. In the meantime, you can take action today by:

1. Checking in with your neighbour, joining community groups, protesting at the local ICE office, calling your elected official, and asking your mayor to demand ICE not enter their city
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See our related On Sodomy. Providing for the needs of the foreigner and the stranger, the widow and the orphan, is not a matter of liberalism or conservatism, but the very heart of the Christian Gospel as preached by all of the Holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church.

ICE has become an American nightmare, nothing less than the main thrust of an attempt to institutionalize racism against a scapegoated minority — undocumented, nonvoting, mostly voiceless brown people.

Darlena Cunha for the New York Times

ICE Raids are set to begin this weekend in Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York and San Francisco.  We have set up a hotline for those in Texas affected by the raids. Read More

In A New Political Theology for 21st-Century Ukrainian Orthodoxy we noted, “What works in the West, with its tiny minority of Orthodox Christians, might not fit unmodified in Ukraine, with its solid majority of Orthodox Christians. Yet we can meet together, learn from each other, borrow from each other, support and encourage each other.” We offer Patriarch Daniel’s remarks, delivered on June 7 of this year to the International Conference on the Relations between the State and Religious Denominations in the European Union, in order to advance the conversation on what an Orthodox political theology might look like in our time and how it might be modified to fit local circumstances.  (Published originally at the news agency of the Romanian Orthodox Church.)

Importance of Church-State cooperation in the European context

Patriarch Daniel of Romania

According to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), as amended by the Treaty of Lisbon of 2007, ‘The Union respects and does not prejudice the status under national law of churches and religious associations or communities in the Member States’ (article 7, paragraph 1 TFEU). Thus, ‘recognising their identity and their specific contribution, the Union shall maintain an open, transparent and regular dialogue with these churches and organisations’ (article 17, paragraph 3 TFEU).

Therefore, in the European Union there is no ‘European model’ for the relationship between religious communities and the political authority, but the legislative systems in force in the EU Member States oscillate from a radical separation to an almost complete identification between a particular religious community and a State. At the same time, the European Union aims to engage in dialogue with religious denominations so that they may express their specific contribution to the European construction.

Today there are four Member States with a majority Orthodox population in the European Union (Greece, Cyprus, Romania, and Bulgaria), where Autocephalous Churches are organized and operate, while in other Member States there are important Orthodox communities organized ethnically as autocephalous (Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia) or autonomous (Finland and Estonia). Also, in some Member States there are consistent Orthodox communities organized ethnically as diaspora (Italy, Spain, France, Germany, Belgium, and Austria). Romania, with a population of 16,307,000 Orthodox believers, is the largest country of the European Union with a majority Orthodox population. Read More