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It was disappointing and dispiriting to see that the American media largely chose to ignore the participation of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew in the Apostolic Pilgrimage of Brothers that took place in the Holy Land in May. The meetings between Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and Pope Francis, during the May 23-27 pilgrimage—marking the fiftieth anniversary of the first meeting between Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras and Pope Paul VI in Jerusalem, the historic audience that...

One thing that you realize fairly quickly on your first day in the Holy Land, especially in the Old City of Jerusalem, is that you are always walking on ground connected in some way to the Holy Scriptures. Moreover, you come to understand that this hallowed ground is revered by a multitude of faith traditions. It is, therefore, almost impossible to find a house of worship that holds significant value to only one religious community. On a daily basis there...

After experiencing the awe of Golgotha and the silence and the glorious light of the Holy Resurrection, the second day of the Apostolic Pilgrimage would lead me to the humility of Bethlehem. His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and other pilgrims from around the world traveled to Bethlehem to venerate the Grotto where our Lord and Savior...

Much has already been said about the impact that the Apostolic Pilgrimage, the meeting between Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew will have on the dialogue between Orthodox and Catholic Churches. Without a doubt, all people of good will are hopeful that this meeting between the Pope of Rome and the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople will enhance the relationship between the two Churches, but more importantly, inspire Catholics and...

In 2010, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) licensed the slogan “If You See Something, Say Something,” as the slogan for a national campaign intended to raise public awareness of signs of terrorism and, especially, to mobilize citizens to report suspicious activity to U.S. law enforcement officials. The DHS meme (a meme is “an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture,” according to Meriam Webster...

The media anticipation surrounding the Vatican Mass that took place on April 27 was almost without precedent, but then again so was the reason for the excitement—namely, two popes presiding over the canonization of two other popes. In the two-hour ceremony, attended by more than 50 heads of state, 1,000 bishops, and witnessed by nearly a million onlookers, Pope Francis, joined by Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI, proclaimed sainthood for two pontifical predecessors, Popes John XXIII and...

With the Ecumenical Patriarch and the Pope meeting in Jerusalem May 23-27, 2014 (for more information go to www.apostolicpilgrimage.org/ and blogs.goarch.org/), the issue of religious difference and dialogue will surely be on the minds of religious educators and youth ministers. How should we deal the many topics that this event raises? For the purposes of discussion, and in the spirit of the meeting in Jerusalem, I’ll use...

A quick glance through the pages of history helps us call to mind individuals that have significantly shaped our perception of the world. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Einstein, and Darwin, to name a few, have given us insight into the mechanics of the cosmos....

One way of thinking about the East-West schism of the past thousand years is that it occurred because each of the sides came to believe it could be the church, wholly the church, without the other. Each began to envision an ecclesial future in which the other had no place. For a variety of reasons, this sense of self-sufficiency was stronger, earlier, in the Latin than in the Greek church. None of the four major Eastern Sees was as prepared as Rome was to detach itself...

In this post, we’ll give a short overview of the history behind the meeting in May between Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew. The history of the Orthodox/Roman Catholic relationship, the early years of Christianity, the Byzantine (Roman) Empire, and the Crusades is rich and complex, so we won’t delve into it here. For...

For almost a year now, since my appointment in September as the Director of the Department of Inter-Orthodox, Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, friends and family members have been asking me about my new diakonia in the Church. Most of the time I find myself giving people simple yet candid answers. “Things are ok,” I say, or, “Each day brings about something new and exciting.” Don’t get me wrong; I try my best to give people an...