The United States’ Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback has expressed Washington’s support for the reopening of the Halki Theological School, the Athens-Macedonian News Agency said on Friday. Responding to a question from the ANA-MPA, Brownback reportedly said that the US has “always supported” the shcool’s reopening and while he cannot say…

On 7 February 2019, His Beatitude Hieronymos II, Archbishop of Athens and All Greece celebrates 11 Years since his election as head of the Greek Orthodox Church. His Beatitude Hieronymos II born Ioannis Liapis in Oinofyta, Boeotia, in 1938, is a graduate of the Faculty of Philosophy and of the Faculty of Theology of the…

A Bible thought to be 1,200 years old was found in a police operation in southeastern Turkey, the governor’s office said on Tuesday. An anti-smuggling team on Monday seized the Bible, said to be only 34 pages long, with gold lettering on leather, in the city of Kayapinar, said the southeastern Diyarbakir governorship in a…

Representative of the Ukrainian president in the Verkhovna Rada Iryna Lutsenko says over 200 parishes of the former Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP) have become part of the newly created Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) since the unification council and the creation of the local OCU independent of Russia’s influence. “As of…

Ecumenical Patriarch Vartholomaios on Wednesday hailed a “highly symbolic” visit by Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras to the Halki Orthodox Seminary on an island off the Istanbul coast. Vartholomaios expressed the hope that the school, which was shut down by Turkish authorities in 1971, will reopen soon. In his comments, Tsipras said a decision to…

Alexis Tsipras on Wednesday visited an Istanbul seminary shut down in 1971, becoming the first serving Greek prime minister to do so. He was greeted upon his arrival by Metropolitan Elpidoforos of Bursa (Proussa in Greek). The Greek premier was accompanied by Education Minister Costas Gavroglou, Alternate Foreign Minister Giorgos Katrougalos, Deputy Foreign Minister Markos…

On February 2nd, 2019, His Beatitude Theodoros II, Pope and Patriarch of Alexandria and All Africa officiated during Orthros and the Divine Liturgy at the Holy Patriarchal Monastery of St Savvas in Alexandria, for the Feast of the Meeting of the Lord. Before the dismissal of the Divine Eucharist, the Alexandrian Primate performed the consecration…

(Source: theologicalschoolhalki.com)

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras on Wednesday visited the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. Ibrahim Kalin, a spokesman of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, accompanied Tsipras on his tour. The Greek premier was also accompanied by Education Minister Costas Gavroglou, Alternate Foreign Minister Giorgos Katrougalos, Deputy Foreign Minister Markos Bolaris, as well as his wife Betty…