Greek shipping and island policy minister, Yannis Plakiotakis, on Thursday spoke to the Orthodoxia News Agency via Skype. Among others, the Greek minister referred to measures by the state to shore up the coastal shipping sector amid the ongoing crisis, as well as stepped up patrols in the eastern Aegean by the Hellenic coast guard…

The Archdiocese of Athens has announced that all of its charitable institutions and social structures will continue to cooperate with state and municipal entities in order to maintain the delivery of meals to at risk households and individuals. Other Metropolises under the jurisdiction of the Autocephalous Church of Greece are urged to follow suit. In…

Metropolitan Myron of New Zealand has issued his latest announcement regarding the Sacred Services during the coronavirus (Covid-19) crisis. Read the full text below: ANNOUNCEMENT Wellington 1st of April 2020 To the Clergy, the Monastic Brotherhoods and Sisterhoods and the reverent plentitude of the Holy Metropolis of New Zealand (Fiji, Tonga, Samoa) Beloved siblings and children…

Apart from its usual dedication to the Menaion (the commemoration of the lives of the Saints) and the early custom to celebrate Kontakia (a type of hymn) during the Pannychis (festive night vigil celebrated at the Blachernae chapel), the Akathist had also the function to celebrate military victories or to ask, during wars, for divine…

The Holy Synod of the Autocephalous Orthodox Church of Greece on Wednesday, after a marathon session, announced that services for Holy and Great Easter Week, known as “Passion Week”, and Divine Liturgies will be conducted in closed, to worshipers, cathedrals and chapels around the eastern Mediterranean country, the result of strict precautions to prevent exposure…

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  Greece’s culture ministry this week submitted a case file to UNESCO requesting that the annual religious celebrations on the Aug. 15 Feast of the Dormition of the Theotokos, the Mother of God, in the villages of Vlasti and Syrrako, both in mountainous northwest Greece, be included in the world’s Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

  The Holy Eparchial Synod of the Archdiocese of America convened on Tuesday via teleconference, in order to be briefed and to discuss significant matters that affect the Archdiocese amid the ongoing pandemic. Hierarchs unanimously decided to offer 20 percent of their wages for the next three months towards the financial support of the Holy…

The Metropolitan of Zambia, His Eminence Ioannis, this week called on the faithful to strictly follow public health officials’ guidelines and precautions to limit the spread of the coronavirus. His Eminence also cited a decision by the Pope and Patriarch of Alexandria and All Africa, His Divine Beatitude Theodoros II, to close parishes under the…