THE CHURCH MILITANT
Ephesians 5:11-"And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them". This Christian News Blog maintains a one stop resource of current news and reports of its own related to church, moral, spiritual, and related political issues, plus articles, and postings from other online discernment ministries, and media which share the aims to obey the biblical commands to shed light on and refute error, heresy, apostasy, cults, and spiritual abuse.
Editor’s Note: Police misconduct is real, but the clearest examples are typically not the ones that become mainstream news. Instead, any and all incidents are used to promote the narrative that “white racism” and “white privilege” are the underlying problems. This overlooks the fact that blue privilege, (i.e. police officers not being held accountable for criminal behavior), is often the real culprit.
“It’s been three weeks since the flashbang exploded next to my sleeping baby, and he’s still covered in burns. There’s still a hole in his chest that exposes his ribs. After breaking down the door, throwing my husband to the ground, and screaming at my children, the officers – armed with M16s – filed through the house like they were playing war. They searched for drugs and never found any. I heard my baby wailing and asked one of the officers to let me hold him. He screamed at me to sit down and shut up and blocked my view, so I couldn’t see my son. I could see a singed crib. And I could see a pool of blood. The officers yelled at me to calm down and told me my son was fine, that he’d just lost a tooth. It was only hours later when they finally let us drive to the hospital that we found out Bou Bou was in the intensive burn unit and that he’d been placed into a medically induced coma.”—Alecia Phonesavanh, the mother of Baby Bou Bou
After a year dominated with news of police shootings of unarmed citizens (including children), SWAT team raids gone awry, photo ops of militarized police shouldering assault rifles while perched on top of armored vehicles, and reports on how the police are using asset forfeiture laws to pad their pockets with luxury cars, cash and other expensive toys, I find myself wrestling with the question: how do you prepare a child for life in the American police state, especially when it comes to interactions with police?
Do you parrot the government line, as the schools do, that police officers are community helpers who are to be trusted and obeyed at all times? Do you caution them to steer clear of a police officer, warning them that any interactions could have disastrous consequences? Or is there some happy medium between the two that, while being neither fairy tale nor horror story, can serve as a cautionary tale for young people who will encounter police at virtually every turn?
Children are taught from an early age that there are consequences for their actions. Hurt somebody, lie, steal, cheat, etc., and you will get punished. But how do you explain to a child that a police officer can shoot someone who was doing nothing wrong and get away with it? That a cop can lie, steal, cheat, or kill and still not be punished?
Kids understand accidents: sometimes drinks get spilled, dishes get broken, people slip and fall and hurt themselves, or you bump into someone without meaning to, and they get hurt. As long as it wasn’t intentional and done with malice, you forgive them and you move on. Police shootings of unarmed people—of children and old people and disabled people—can’t just be shrugged off as accidents, however.
Aiyana Jones was no accident. The 7-year-old was killed after a Detroit SWAT team launched a flash-bang grenade into her family’s apartment, broke through the door and opened fire, hitting the little girl who was asleep on the living room couch. The cops weren’t even in the right apartment.
Ironically, on the same day that President Obama refused to stop equipping police with the very same kinds of military weapons and gear used to raid Aiyana’s home, it was reported that the police officer who shot and killed the little girl would not face involuntary manslaughter charges.
Obama insists that $263 million to purchase body cameras for police will prevent any further erosions of trust, but a body camera would not have prevented Aiyana from being shot in the head. Indeed, the entire sorry affair was captured on camera: a TV crew was filming the raid for an episode of The First 48, a true-crime reality show in which homicide detectives have 48 hours to crack a case.
While that $263 million will make Taser International, the manufacturer of the body cameras, a whole lot richer, it’s doubtful it would have prevented a SWAT team from shooting 14-month-old Sincere in the shoulder and hand and killing his mother.
No body camera could have stopped a Georgia SWAT team from launching a flash-bang grenade into the house in which Baby Bou Bou, his three sisters and his parents were staying. The grenade landed in the 2-year-old’s crib, burning a hole in his chest and leaving him with scarring that a lifetime of surgeries will not be able to easily undo.
No body camera could have prevented 10-year-old Dakota Corbitt from being shot by a Georgia police officer who tried to shoot an inquisitive dog, missed, and hit the young boy, instead. Alberto Sepulveda, 11, died from one “accidental” shotgun round to the back, after a SWAT team raided his parents’ home.
Cleveland police shot and killed 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who was seen playing on a playground with a toy gun. Surveillance footage shows police shooting the boy after getting out of a moving patrol car. Thirteen-year-old Andy Lopez Cruz was shot 7 times in 10 seconds by a California police officer who mistook the boy’s toy gun for an assault rifle. Christopher Roupe, 17, was shot and killed after opening the door to a police officer. The officer, mistaking the Wii remote control in Roupe’s hand for a gun, shot him in the chest.
These children are more than grim statistics on a police blotter. They are the heartbreaking casualties of the government’s endless, deadly wars on terror, on drugs, and on the American people themselves. Not even the children who survive their encounters with police escape unscathed. Increasingly, their lives are daily lessons in compliance and terror, meted out with every SWAT team raid, roadside strip search, and school drill.
Who is calculating the damage being done to the young people forced to watch as their homes are trashed and their dogs are shot during SWAT team raids? A Minnesota SWAT team actually burst into one family’s house, shot the family’s dog, handcuffed the children and forced them to “sit next to the carcass of their dead and bloody pet for more than an hour.” They later claimed it was the wrong house.
More than 80% of American communities have their own SWAT teams, with more than 80,000 of these paramilitary raids are carried out every year. That translates to more than 200 SWAT team raids every day in which police crash through doors, damage private property, terrorize adults and children alike, kill family pets, assault or shoot anyone that is perceived as threatening—and all in the pursuit of someone merely suspected of a crime, usually some small amount of drugs.
Then there are the hands-on lessons being taught in the schools about the role of police in our lives, ranging from active shooter drills to incidents in which children are suspended, handcuffed, arrested and even tasered for what used to be considered childlike behavior.
Case in point: in Pennsylvania, a ten-year-old boy was suspended for shooting an imaginary “arrow” at a fellow classmate, using nothing more than his hands and his imagination. In Colorado, a six-year-old boy was suspended and accused of sexual harassment for kissing the hand of a girl in his class whom he had a crush on. In Alabama, a diabetic teenager was slammed into a filing cabinet and arrested after falling asleep during an in-school suspension. Seven North Carolina students were arrested for throwing water balloons as part of a school prank.
What is particularly chilling is how effective these lessons in compliance are in indoctrinating young people to accept their role in the police state, either as criminals or prison guards. For example, police officers at a Florida middle school carried out an active shooter drill in an effort to educate students about how to respond in the event of an actual shooting crisis. Two armed officers, guns loaded and drawn, burst into classrooms, terrorizing the students and placing the school into lockdown mode.
If these exercises are intended to instill fear and compliance into young people, they’re working.
Sociologist Alice Goffman understands how far-reaching the impact of such “exercises” can be on young people. For six years, Goffman lived in a low-income urban neighborhood, documenting the impact such an environment—a microcosm of the police state—on its residents. Her account of neighborhood children playing cops and robbers speaks volumes about how constant exposure to pat downs, strip searches, surveillance and arrests can result in a populace that meekly allows itself to be prodded, poked and stripped. As journalist Malcolm Gladwell writing for the New Yorker notes:
Goffman sometimes saw young children playing the age-old game of cops and robbers in the street, only the child acting the part of the robber wouldn’t even bother to run away: I saw children give up running and simply stick their hands behind their back, as if in handcuffs; push their body up against a car without being asked; or lie flat on the ground and put their hands over their head. The children yelled, “I’m going to lock you up! I’m going to lock you up, and you ain’t never coming home!” I once saw a six-year-old pull another child’s pants down to do a “cavity search.”
Clearly, our children are getting the message, but it’s not the message that was intended by those who fomented a revolution and wrote our founding documents. Their philosophy was that the police work for us, and “we the people” are the masters, and they are to be our servants. Now that has been turned on its head. Our so-called “servants” with badges are no longer held accountable to the same laws that we are. In their military gear and assault vehicles, they are allowed to operate above the law. In fact, their word is the law.
It’s getting harder by the day to tell young people that we live in a nation that values freedom and which is governed by the rule of law without feeling like a teller of tall tales. Yet as I point out in my book A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, unless something changes and soon for the young people growing up, there will be nothing left of freedom as we have known it but a fairy tale without a happy ending.
Glidden and Sheriff Darren White, working together, forced entry through the closed front door and attacked Jason and Laura, who were still reeling from the previous attack by Glidden. Wrote HSLDA’s Jim Mason:
Together they forced open the door and found Laura and Jason lying on the floor. Glidden sprayed Laura in the face a second time while White sprayed Jason and tried to turn him over onto his stomach.
When the Hagan’s dog started barking, the officers also sprayed it and threatened to shoot it if it didn’t shut up. Having overpowered the Hagans, the officers handcuffed them both, arrested them, charged them with resisting arrest and child endangerment, and booked them into the county jail. The kids were remanded to the tender mercies of social services for the duration. ______________________________________________________________
The Washington, D.C. newspaper The Hill noted that Obama's new local police program would cost taxpayers some $263 million over three years ($75 million of which would purchase the cameras), all spent without so much as a “by your leave” from Congress. Sure, Obama talked about working with Congress in the speech excerpted above. But he also made abundantly clear that the new program would spend the specified money whether Congress sent him more funds or not. Obama essentially announced that he had found $263 million under the seat cushions of the White House couch that he could spend at whim.
THE PARDONING CEREMONY FOR THANKSGIVING SPARES THE LIFE WITH ONE WAVE OF THE LEFT HAND FROM THE BENEVOLENT MONARCH;
OBAMA'S SINGLE WHITE BENEFICIARY OF AN EXECUTIVE ORDER:
VIDEO:
BUT WILL ALL THE OTHER JIVE WHITE TURKEYS
SURVIVE UNSCATHED? NOT IF HE CAN HELP IT!
NOT A SINGLE FINGER RAISED FOR U.S. CITIZENS
AND THEIR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS
FARRAKHAN PROVIDES OBAMA WITH
JUSTIFICATION FOR MARTIAL LAW
Farrakhan Brands Black Leaders as Compromisers; Calls for Retribution to Bring Equanimity With Whites Under a New Race War; Calls For Obama To Confront White Police; Calls For Black Separation:
Published on Nov 24, 2014
Minister Louis Farrakhan commented on the situation in Ferguson, Mo. His comments were part of his keynote address at the Black United Summit International Conf. at Morgan State University, Baltimore, MD., on Nov. 22, 2014 - Full Video @ http://NOI.org/webcast-archive
The government is taking away our constitutional rights at every turn. Will the constitution even be relevant anymore? Will we turn into a dictatorship or Monarchy by the end of this decade.
American Constitutional Crisis:
Published on Jan 10, 2014
Alex continues with Constitutional Law Professor Elizabeth Price Foley on the topic of the rampant abuses of power by the Obama administration and the dangers of the approach of Tyrrany on the horizon.
www.OnlyVoteOnce.com At the Belle hotel in Baton Rouge on Monday, December 1, 2014, the Black Conservatives Fund revealed footage of Democratic Mayor Don Cravins, Sr. encouraging voters to vote twice. He went on to say that if they reelected Earl Taylor as District Attorney he wouldn't prosecute them for voting twice.
Democrat Mayor Encourages Voter Fraud at Landrieu Event
NOTICE: AFTER THIS POST WAS PUBLISHED ON DECEMBER 3, 2014, ALL THE ARTICLES THAT WE LINKED TO WERE STRIPPED FROM FORDHAM'S WEBSITES AND THE INTERNET, INCLUDING ALL THE PICTURES. WE HAVE RE-COPIED THE PICTURES AND ADDED SOME MORE PICTURES FOR THE ENTIRE WORLD'S BENEFIT:
THE BLASPHEMY OF JESUS CHRIST
& THE IDOLATRY OF MAN
2 Timothy 3:5-"having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away!" 2 Peter 2:1-"But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction."
ECUMENICAL "BRIDGE BUILDERS"
STEEPED IN APOSTASY,
FORMING THE ONE WORLD CHURCH; FORDHAM UNIVERSITY THE HOST & VEHICLE
Republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
Archibishop Demetrios, primate of the Greek Orthodox Church in America; Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham; Aristotle Papanikolaou, (behind) senior fellow and co-founder of the Othodox Christian Studies Center; and Archbishop Rowan Williams, 104th Archbishop of Canterbury. Photo by Chris Taggart
In an era where religious experiences often take place at venues and where concerts have replaced ritual, Rowan Williams, the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury, came to Fordham University Church to make an argument for the relevance of the liturgy in today’s world.
Archbishop Williams made his case in a lecture, “Liturgical Humanism: Orthodoxy and the Transformation of Culture,” which he delivered after accepting an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham.
Archbishop Williams, who served as senior bishop of the worldwide Anglican Communion from 2002 to 2012 and is Master of Magdalene College at the University of Cambridge, is a noted scholar of Orthodox Christianity. His particular interest in Russian Orthodoxy focused on Vladimir Lossky, the influential 20th-century theologian. His dissertation on Lossky, done at Oxford, set him on a path to become one of today’s leading experts in contemporary Orthodox Christian thinking.
In introducing Archbishop Williams, Father McShane called him "the greatest theologian in the English speaking world."
“With word and action, you have sought—with telling results—to convince the world that the encounter with God is transforming, life-giving, and exhilarating. As you have done so, you have become Pontifex Anglicanus: the Anglican bridge builder."
In his talk, Archibishop Williams built yet another bridge by focusing on a religious experience shared by Catholics, Anglicans, and Orthodox Christians: the liturgy.
Archbishop Williams delivers the Orthodoxy in America Lecture.
“In every era, the Divine Liturgy is a way for humans to experience [God] in reality, not in theoretical principle,” he said.
The liturgy, he said, maps out an alternative reality and must remain relevant to contemporary culture— lest it become perceived as an “enclosed in a world of ritualized code.” He added that the liturgy should not become an alternative to other kinds of engagement, social or otherwise.
“We need to keep liturgical action at the center of our vision,” he said. “The question isn’t whether it’s instructive or entertaining, but it’s whether it looks as though it’s credibly changing the vision of those participating.”
He said that as a “Christian interruption,” liturgy should also not be expected to offer solutions to complex problems, but rather it should pose questions. As a general heritage, the ritualized activity in the liturgy “specifies and incarnates a culture, a culture that asks serious questions of our own culture.” And sometimes those are the most culturally uncomfortable questions, such as concern for the unborn or “the power of death in the world we occupy—and trying to understand a world [heaven] where that doesn’t exist.”
“Our popular culture refuses or trivializes our location in time,” he said. “It has a very limited understating of past and future.”
Conversely, the liturgical act exists in the past, present, and future, he said. It also explores how the period of time from one world can be connected to that of another world, namely the Kingdom of God.
Today’s trivialization of time has led to all sorts of short-term gain behavior that has affected the planet’s future, he said.
“If we do want to live in the future Kingdom, we must be aware of how short term comforts . . . affect the health of the natural world.”
In addition, Archbishop Williams warned against politics that “fail to protect the vulnerable, add to the degradation of the material world, or shore up inequalities.”
“Any and all of these deserve a critique in the liturgy,” he said.
“The believer is one who takes seriously an openness in art, science, and politics. Approaching this through liturgical practice, he or she physically enacts this in a straightforward act. Here, in this space and time, it is enacted in a charismatic event.”
Founded in 1841, Fordham is the Jesuit University of New York, offering exceptional education distinguished by the Jesuit tradition to more than 15,100 students in its four undergraduate colleges and its six graduate and professional schools. It has residential campuses in the Bronx and Manhattan, a campus in West Harrison, N.Y., the Louis Calder Center Biological Field Station in Armonk, N.Y., and the London Centre in the United Kingdom. 10/14
EXCERPT: "Fordham University has had a long and vibrant relationship with Orthodox Christian communities. The internationally renowned Orthodox theologian and historian, The Very Rev. John Meyendorff, was a Professor of Byzantine History at Fordham from 1967 to 1992, and for generations, Orthodox families have chosen Fordham as the school where students pursue a rigorous education that respects and encourages a deeper understanding of Christianity."
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew addresses a standing-room-only audience in the University Church on October 27, after receiving an honorary doctorate of laws from Fordham. During hisaddress, "Discerning God's Presence in the World," he praised the University as a global center for Orthodox-Christian dialogue and the study of Orthodox Christianity. Photo by John Mindala
By Gina VergelDinner gatherings can be dull or memorable, but they don’t often lead to extraordinary events in the history of Christianity and the life of a university. Yet that’s exactly what happened six years ago, when a chance conversation about 1,600-year-old relics prompted two Fordham theology professors to play a key role in helping to heal the centuries-old rift between the Orthodox and Catholic churches. Their efforts positioned Fordham as a global center for Orthodox-Christian dialogue and the study of Orthodox Christianity—and led to a historic visit last fall, when the leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians came to Fordham University Church, where he delivered a moving call for openness and reconciliation.
“The way of the heart stands in opposition to everything that violates peace,” Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew told a standing-room-only audience in the church on October 27, after receiving an honorary doctorate of laws from Fordham. “Unless our actions are founded on love, rather than on fear, they will never overcome fanaticism or fundamentalism.”
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew receives a standing ovation from members of the Catholic and Orthodox clergies, including (from row, l. to r.) Archbishop Timothy Dolan, Joseph M. McShane, S.J., Edward Cardinal Egan and Archbishop Demetrios Trakatellis. Photo by Bruce Gilbert
Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham, praised the patriarch’s “devotion to peace and the cause of environmentalism” and described his address as “a primer for the way people of faith should conduct themselves in the world.”
John Doscas, CBA ’80, was one of the faithful who filled the church for the occasion. He was moved not only by the patriarch’s words, but also by the warm welcome he received from Fordham and the Catholic community.
“It showed real caring and a true spirit behind what they were trying to accomplish. We’re all aware of the schism from 1,000 years ago, and the Catholic Church does not necessarily need to reach out in ways like that,” he said. “It gives Orthodox Christians a feeling of hope.”
The Relics of the SaintsThe seed that led to the patriarch’s historic visit was planted in spring 2004. Fordham had recently launched its Orthodoxy in America Lecture Series with an inaugural address by Archbishop Demetrios Trakatellis, head of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. To celebrate the occasion and discuss how the University might deepen its relations with the Orthodox community, Aristotle Papanikolaou, Ph.D. (FCRH ’88), associate professor of theology at Fordham, organized a small dinner with the Rev. Alexander Karloutsos, a trusted adviser to Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, and several Fordham colleagues, including George Demacopoulos, Ph.D., associate professor of theology.
The hot topic of conversation was a public letter recently issued by the patriarch accepting an apology from Pope John Paul II for “sins of action and omission” by Roman Catholics against Orthodox Christians during the Fourth Crusades—particularly the 1204 invasion of Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul), when crusaders sacked the Orthodox Christian city, widening the 1054 schism between Orthodox Christians and Roman Catholics.
The pope’s gesture and the patriarch’s response were a fine step toward reconciliation, Father Karloutsos said, but wouldn’t it be something if the Catholic Church returned the cherished relics of St. John Chrysostom, patriarch of Constantinople during the late-fourth and early-fifth centuries and one of the most revered figures in Orthodox tradition.
“No kidding,” Demacopoulos agreed. “And how about the return of the relics of Gregory Nazianzen?” he added, referring to the patriarch, also known as St. Gregory the Theologian, who preceded St. John Chrysostom.
That’s when Father Karloutsos said that the patriarch did indeed plan to travel to Rome to ask for the return of the relics. The priest then surprised Demacopoulos and Papanikolaou by asking them if they would help provide the necessary documentation to support the patriarch’s historic request. Where exactly were the relics, and how—and when—did they get there?
The co-directors of Fordham's Orthodox Christian Studies program, George Demacopoulos (left) and Aristotle Papanikolaou, flank Archbishop Demetrios Trakatellis, primate of the Greek Orthodox Church of America, and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew. Photo by Jon Roemer
The professors got to work. Demacopoulos, a medievalist who thrived in this area, spent an entire day holed up in Fordham’s William D. Walsh Family Library before finding the perfect source.
“There was a study done by an art historian documenting all the shrines in St. Peter’s Basilica and all of the relics that are in those shrines with references in the footnotes to when everything got placed in those shrines,” he said. “We were able to say precisely where they are and what manuscripts held in the Vatican detailed them being placed there.”
Here’s what they found: The remains of both patriarch saints had rested side by side in Constantinople before being taken to present-day Italy around the time of the Fourth Crusade. Eventually, the ancient bones were enshrined under side altars at St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City. Demacopoulos promptly faxed this information to the patriarch, who presented the letter to Vatican officials with his official request for the return of the relics. Pope JohnPaul II agreed, and the rest is history. On November 27, 2004, the pope presented the relics to the patriarch during a ceremony in St. Peter’s Basilica. Three days later, the relics were transported to Istanbul for a ceremony at the Cathedral of St. George, the seat of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. During the pilgrimage, Demacopoulos delivered a lecture on the lives of the two saints and received the patriarch’s personal thanks for helping to facilitate the return of the relics.
“My role is only a by-product of Fordham’s commitment to the Roman Catholic and Orthodox relationship,” Demacopoulos said at the time. “Fordham has historically been a place of cooperation between the two religions, and this sets up Fordham to be the logical foundation for further improvement.” A Home for Orthodox Study Fordham has had a long and vibrant relationship with the Orthodox Christian community, particularly in the New York metropolitan area. Generations of Orthodox students have chosen Fordham as a place to pursue a rigorous education that not only respects, but also encourages their faith. From 1967 until his death in 1992, the Rev. Dr. John Meyendorff, a renowned Orthodox scholar and educator, taught Byzantine history at the University. And Stella Moundas, longtime secretary to four Fordham presidents, helped the University strengthen its ties to her faith community while serving as a matron to many Orthodox students.
In recent years, Fordham’s relationship with the Orthodox community has grown even stronger. With support from the Office of Campus Ministry, the University established a chapter of the Orthodox Christian Fellowship, a student group, in 2004. Three years later, the Orthodox Christian Studies Program was born. Under the leadership of Papanikolaou and Demacopoulos, the program—the first of its kind at a major university in the United States—hosts the annual Orthodoxy in America lecture and gives students an opportunity to earn an interdisciplinary minor in Orthodox Christian studies. In addition, Papanikolaou and Demacopoulos are co-editors of Fordham University Press’ Orthodox Christianity and Contemporary Thought Series. The publication of the first book in the series—In the World, Yet Not of the World: Social and Global Initiatives of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew—coincided with the partriarch’s visit last fall.
“It’s the century where the Orthodox Church is really trying to rebuild its intellectual tradition, and Fordham is being recognized as becoming a part of that,” Papanikolaou said. “The fact that the patriarch came to Fordham was huge. It is absolutely a validation of what we are doing here.”
The program has also received considerable and growing support from individual members of the Orthodox community. Thanks to a generous gift from Michael and Mary Jaharis, Fordham established an endowed professorship—the Archbishop Demetrios Chair in Orthodox Theology and Culture. The Jaharises also have supported the Orthodoxy in America Lecture Series since its inception, in 2004. That same year, Solon and Marianna Patterson were among those who traveled to Istanbul to witness the return of the relics. It was on that pilgrimage that they met Demacopoulos and learned of Fordham’s role in the historic exchange. They later attended a Fordham conference on “Orthodox Readings of Augustine.” Sensing the potential of such academic gatherings to foster Orthodox-Catholic dialogue and understanding, they made a generous gift—and issued a challenge grant—to help Fordham establish a triennial conference examining Orthodox-Catholic relations.
Demacopoulos and Papanikolaou hope to continue to develop the program’s offerings, eventually establishing a center for Orthodox Christian studies at Fordham that might provide scholarships for students, fellowships for faculty and a study abroad program.
“We also want to provide a model that could be replicated at other institutions,” Demacopoulos said. “It can be done, if it’s done right.”
Indeed, the patriarch praised Fordham’s Orthodox Christian Studies Program during his address in the University Church last October.
“This program,” he said, “demonstrates a practical synergistic spirit, modeling for Orthodox and Roman Catholics everywhere a shared common purpose based in truth and love.”
Referring to both the nonviolent principles of Mahatma Gandhi and the civil rights activism of Martin Luther King Jr., the patriarch went on to say that the most “provocative message is loving our enemy and doing good to those who hate us.”
Moving words when one considers the unsteady state of religious freedom in Turkey, where successive governments have closed the Ecumenical Patriarchate’s schools and seized almost all of its property. Yet he continues to work to advance reconciliation and understanding among Muslim, Jewish and Christian communities.
“The patriarch is convinced that dialogue is a divine mandate, the only way forward in a world of division,” said the Rev. Dr. John Chryssavgis, theological adviser to the patriarch on environmental matters and editor of In the World, Yet Not of the World. “No tension or crisis seems to overwhelm or crush him. Every hurdle or barrier is an invitation to encounter and dialogue.”
The patriarch’s commitment to promoting dialogue and action on environmental issues is just as vigorous as his commitment to advancing religious tolerance. Each year, the “Green Patriarch,” as he has come to be known, leads a symposium on Religion, Science and the Environment. Just days prior to his Fordham visit, he was in New Orleans, where he led a large and diverse group of theologians, scientists, policymakers, environmentalists and journalists in a five-day symposium titled “Restoring Balance: The Great Mississippi River.”
In his Fordham speech, he described the international, interdisciplinary conferences as “an effort to raise awareness on regional ecological issues that have a global impact on our world.”
“After all,” he said, “we are convinced that recalling our minuteness in God’s wide and wonderful creation only underlines our central role in God’s plan for the salvation of the whole world.” The Ecumenical Spirit
The patriarch receives the Bartholomew Rose from Anne Neuendorf, president of the Orthodox Christian Fellowship at Fordham.Photo by Jon Roemer
It’s a message that resonated powerfully with Fordham students. Shortly after the patriarch arrived at Fordham on October 27, he held a private reception in Walsh Library for Greek Orthodox students, who presented him with gifts, including a Fordham sweatshirt, a Fordham baseball cap and a rose developed in his honor.
Fordham College at Rose Hill sophomore Anne Neuendorf, president of the Orthodox Christian Student Fellowship at Fordham, had the honor of presenting the patriarch with the Bartholomew Rose. Created to commemorate the patriarch’s visit to Fordham and to honor his commitment to environmental protection, the flower is designed to thrive in many harsh climates without the use of chemical pesticides.
“The fact that he took the time to single us out really meant a lot,” Neuendorf said. “Sometimes it can feel a bit isolating being an Orthodox Christian—especially when you grew up in the Midwest like I did. Meeting the head of the church made me feel connected.”
Evangelos Tsevdos, a sophomore in Fordham’s College of Business Administration, said meeting the patriarch was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
“Just his presence here was unbelievable,” Tsevdos said. “I liked his sense of humor—putting on the Fordham baseball cap that we gave him, for instance. It’s not something you’d expect to see from someone in such an esteemed position. It was amazing.”
The patriarch’s visit also struck a powerful chord with longtime members of the Fordham community, including Constantine Katsoris, GSB ’53, LAW ’57, the Wilkinson Professor of Law at Fordham.
“That entire night, I got the feeling that there was one God and one church,” Katsoris said. “That’s how ecumenism should be.”
—Gina Vergel is a staff writer for Inside Fordham.
Rowan Williams, the former archbishop of Canterbury, discussed Orthodoxy and the role humanity and divinity play.(Maria Ancona/The Ram)
By Eddie Mikus
_____________________________________________
The Orthodox Christian Studies Center held its 10th “Orthodoxy in America” lecture on Sept. 30, featuring Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury from 2002 until 2012 and the current master of Magdalene College at the University of Cambridge.
“The lecture is about 10 years old and it is the only lecture of its kind in the United States in terms of size and scope,” said Dr. George Demacopoulos, the director of the Orthodox Christian Studies Center. “It is the largest annual public lecture of its kind in a university. Some of the past speakers included Archbishop Dimitrios, who is the head of the Greek Orthodox Church in the United States. We’ve also [hosted] Patriarch Bartholomew, the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople, which is the worldwide leader of the Orthodox Communion.”
The Orthodox Christian Studies Center’s mission is to “foster intellectual inquiry by supporting scholarship and teaching that is critical to the ecclesial community, public discourse and the promotion of Christian unity.”
Lectures like the “Orthodoxy in America” provide a forum for discussion of Christian unity. Williams focused on ways to apply Orthodox teachings to a larger Christian context.
Despite his Anglican background, Williams is also an Orthodoxy scholar. Demacopoulos explained that, despite William’s Anglican background, he was an ideal lecturer for the event. “He is one of the most visible and important theologians in the world today,” Demacopoulos said. “He’s retired now, but he is the former Archbishop of Canterbury, which is the head of the Anglican Communion…[He has] continued to write about and reflect about and be inspired by Orthodox Christianity.”
Rev. Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of the university, gave the ceremony’s introductory remarks.
“You have truly become Pontifex Anglicanus, the Anglican bridge builder,” McShane said. “You have built bridges of understanding and love between and among peoples and between and among faiths.”
“What Christians claim is that human existence is addressed by an act that is completely beyond the categories of nature, of repeatable process,” Williams said. “So our humanity is eternal, taken beyond repeatable processes and capable of responsibility, in the strictest sense of the word,” said Williams. He described how this eternal humanity leads to a Christian hunger for the Eucharist that would exhibit this humanity.
He explained how the human and divine worlds are linked to each other through the liturgy and the Eucharist.
Williams also discussed the importance of the liturgy in Christian celebrations as a way to bridge the gap between the living and dead.
“Liturgy is the period of time in which the transition from one world to another can be traced and mapped,” he said.
He continued, “The celebration of the liturgy is the primary way in which we are constituted guardians and guarantors of the faith of others.”
According to Williams, Orthodox theology differs from Western theologies like Catholicism in that it is more accepting of humanist traditions than Western theologies.
“It is a theology that expects to find an anthropology of visually healing, in way which Western theologies have not often sought to do,” Williams said of the Orthodox tradition.
Michael Palamara, GSB ’15, and president of the Orthodox Christian Fellowship, said that he hoped the lecture would help lead to unity among Orthodox Christians within the United States.
“It’s the state of Orthodoxy in America, because originally it was made up of the immigrants and the diaspora. So, they separated based on their race and they separated based on their cultural identity. And, the divisions arose from that,” Palamara said of the current divisions in the Orthodox church in America.
He explained that Americans often view the Orthodox church based on ethnic lines, even though all of the Patriarchs are part of one unified church. But, he saw events like the one at Fordham as helping to bridge the divide.
“There’s such a dialogue now of the Orthodoxy in America that it is forming one Church… [It’s] grassroots movements like these, bring together people of all jurisdictions, and where we have an understanding that we’re all Orthodox and we’re all American,” said Palamara.
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Eddie Mikus is a Staff Writer for The Fordham Ram.
Fordham University conferred its highest honor, the Honorary Doctorate of Laws, to His All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew for his remarkable service to the world community and for the principles that he continues to uphold.
NEW YORK – Fordham University conferred yesterday, January 28, 2014, an honorary doctorate degree of Humane Letters, the highest honor of the University, to His Beatitude Archbishop Anastasios of Tirana, Durrës and All Albania, in an official ceremony at Fordham’s University Church. Following the conferral, His Beatitude delivered the “Orthodoxy in America Lecture” on the topic Sharing the Good News in a Multi-Religious Country: Theological Reflections on Other Religions.
“Your name suggests, speaks and points to the Resurrection as does your ministry,” said Fr. Joseph M. McShane, S.J., the president of Fordham in his welcoming remarks. Fr. McShane welcomed Archbishop Anastasios to the Fordham family saying that the University considers itself blessed to be a home for Orthodoxy and have the only Orthodox Studies program in the United States.
