The Patriarch of Serbia, His Holiness Irinej, later this month will visit the Eparchy, or diocese, of Buda, which retains ecclesiastical jurisdiction for the Serbian Orthodox Church in neighboring Hungary. The visit is part of the Serbian Patriarch’s tour of expatriate Orthodox parishes and jurisdictions. While in Budapest, His Holiness will inaugurate a new diocese…

In southeast Asia, the Russian Orthodox Church continues to make inroads for Orthodoxy, even in the face of persecution of Christians in some parts of the region. During Holy Easter Week, the Exarch of the Russian Church for SE Asia, His Eminence, Metropolitan Sergiy, presided in Divine Liturgies at the church of the Dormition in…

Iran’s minister of intelligence, the hard-line cleric Mahmud Alavi, this week raised eyebrows around the world by expressing his concern, over “… the spreading of Christianity” in the Islamic republic. Even more shockingly, the conservative minister said Iranian authorities were in the process of questioning people who have converted to Christianity in the predominately Shiite…

Sessions of the Ecumenical Patriarchate’s Holy Synod continued for a second day on Friday, having already settled one of two major issues affecting the two most populous Greek Orthodox Archdioceses overseas, in America and Australia. On Thursday, members of the Holy Synod unanimously elected the Bishop of Christoupoleos, His Grace Makarios, as the new Archbishop…

The body of reposed in Christ Elder, Emilianos Simono-petritis lay in state at the Holy Convent of the Annunciation in Ormylia, located in the northern Greece prefecture of Halkidiki. The Elder Emilianos (born Alexandros Vafiadis) was the Abbot Archimandrite of the Holy Monastery of Simono-petras, and the spiritual father of the Holy Convent of the…

A number of first-time launches and a range of shows will celebrate International Museum Day and annual Night at the Museum date this month at Vardzia, an iconic medieval cave city monument in Georgia’s south. The site of the 12th century monastery complex, under preparations to be nominated for the UNESCO World Heritage list, will…

On Wednesday May 8, 2019, the Georgian parliament approved the changes proposed to be made into Labor Code of Georgia. May 12, which was previously declared as Saint Andrew the First-Called Day, was also announced to be Day of Georgia’s Allotted to Virgin Mary. The Government’s Parliamentary Secretary Natia Mikeladze presented the proposed changes to…

Iconographers from the St. Andrei Rublev workshop at Holy Trinity Church in Kursk transferred a newly-painted copy of a 13th-century Syrian icon of the holy Martyrs Sergius and Bacchus to representatives of Rossotrudnichestvo (The Federal Agency for the Commonwealth of Independent States, Compatriots Living Abroad and International Humanitarian Cooperation) on Monday. From there, the icon…

His Beatitude Onufry performed a memorial service for those who fell during the Great Patriotic War at the Monument of Eternal Glory in the city of Kiev. On May 9, 2019, on the Victory Day over the Nazi invaders, at the stele on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in the territory of the Park…